Since the universe begat itself in a roaring scream of self-design, the one constant was breath. Aditya used to bundle up her little demon-daughter in their one cloak, snuggled up tight. The ripple of desert air refracting off the punishing sand on the other side of the Oasis shimmered in whatever dim or bright light they had.
“See, Yash? The ripples, desert’s breathing. Just like you and me. Even the Netherworld breathes. And see that sky? See the flickers? Breathing. If the sand can breathe, and the sky can breathe, so can we. We’re gonna make it, Yash. Just like Zambrano… he made it, you saw him, course you don’t remember being a baby and all, but he breathed and kept breathing and he got out… he got out… We can… we’re gonna get out…” Yasha remembered salt water on her hair, drip-drops as a young mother clung to her child. Her little spark of hope that if she focused on Yasha, if she focused on keeping her little life alive, just like the God-King of her Panathan homeland, Aditya could defeat the Nether. "Keep breathing, sweet pea. He got out... we're gonna get out. God please, let us out."
But Aditya never defeated the Netherworld. What courage she kept was transferred via osmosis from tears to her daughter’s brow. Yasha, small as she was, defeated the Nether. Pulled her mother out on their only blanket - a cape of Mandalorian design, for the Field Marshall’s wife. The lost Panathan. When Aditya was dead and the Civil War was over, the thirteen year old Yasha looked up from her shining new beskar’gam to see the God-King Aditya put faith in, when all other lights went out.
Yasha remembered the texture of the recycled atmosphere on the ship the Sith and Mandalorian Empires used that day, to settle negotiations on an Alliance. Ra’s alliance. She remembered speaking to him in their Mother tongue, and his hand on her shoulder. Dathomir smelled of smoke and plant rot and Aedan’s flask as Yasha breathed. Amber eyes locked on the face of her once-twice redeemer.
Those black and red eyes. Her mother’s eyes, through genetic anomaly, the same.
The Mand’alor’s face turned to a mask of facial muscles attempting to still the minute quiver between her eyebrows only Darth Carnifex had the angle to see. The crinkle of Cassiopeia’s beskar’gam… she was always unfamiliar with the armour… The tension in Cynthia’s shoulders… Aedan’s gulp, his lips around a flask of unknown containment… Taeli’s predatory smile, asking for another pound of flesh when the Sith took so many.
The sound of a young woman’s lungs, as they in and exhaled, while she sat on the edge of a table and looked eye to eye with a divine monstrosity, who smiled.
It was then Yasha realized she’d completely missed what Taeli had to say. In the distance, the Warlock Gate hummed and sang to the Infernal. It whispered in the air, using the breath of the planet to infill Yasha’s mind with the song of despair of her mother, locked away in the Field of Blades.
‘Yasha! YASHAA!! Yasha come to Mama! This galaxy is too big for you! You’re gonna get more people killed, sweetie pie! Come to Mama! Come home, Yasha! Yasha!! Yasha. Run.’ Her mother’s voice, as constant as the breeze. It chased Yasha wherever she went on the Gods-forsaken planet of Dathomir, as it always did. ‘Run, Yasha. Run now, sweetie. Run.’
A light glinted off a refreshment jug into her eyes, and she cast them to the Dark Lord, whose shadow overwhelmed it. “Hav kek I mad qmav... i'ay bozi pi izili'duemb I izil vomdik…" A whisper delivered into the breaths between them. Dark Lord and Mand’alor.
‘Yasha please! Sweetie, run. Go on, Yasha, run on. Yasha! Don’t you give him a single second, you run girl! Nussyn’s merkin this danged Gate’s pissin’ me off!’
“I uodi duer nsomid. Moqi dui ymvaldui' ynam ed ryhhil.” Another deep breath. “An alliance should be a courtship, not an imposition. Our garrison at the TMDK Tower, as supplied by my Warmaster Aedan Miles will be unco-opted by the Sith. You are welcome to study the Gate, but a word of caution to any troops or scientists you place there… each person has… a half-life in the Gate’s presence. A certain amount of time, before the Gate’s call is too great and the penitent walk, arms akimbo to touch it and end their existence in Sinner’s Rue. It calls to all in time. The guilty first, those who’s hands are covered in the most blood, or have the most regret will inevitably walk directly into death’s maw. A rotation is best. The Rue only allows the valiant out of its’ grip, as I know you are aware, Kaine. The strong survive it, the weak suffer what they must before the Netherworld destroys them utter and complete.
As for deeper cooperation?” Yasha looked again directly into the eyes few viewed for fear’s sake. “There is much we both have to account for, your Empire and mine. Many conversations unspoken. This defence pact is an opening of relations, and the desire for mutual aide… it will be a hard sell on the majority of my People, so it would do us all well to be cautious and kind. To spread forth the positives quickly, and hold back the ire. To allow what misgivings may take place and answer them honourably. Only then can we make success, where before there was the ache of separation and failure.
I accept all terms but this: the Mandalorian presence on Dathomir in our one Tower is respected and not a joint effort, for now… and if a single Sith or Witch dare use my people as experimental fodder again, they be dealt with in a manner less kind than what you do to Jetiise, who displease you.” Yasha set her thumb upon a datapad, and it whirred to colour. She held it out to the Emperor of the Sith, and spoke in a husked tone.
“May our children grow ever stronger with this alliance. May we stand upon the Galaxy and defeat our enemies, until their skulls are ash beneath our feet.”
[member="Skorvek"] [member="Aedan Miles"] [member="Cassiopeia Australis"] [member="Cynthia Solus"] [member="Taeli Raaf"] [member="Darth Prazutis"] [member="Darth Carnifex"] [member="Kahlil Zambrano"]
