Private Promises

[Darth Daiara]

Aradia's head snapped down, a fluttered look leveled at their hands. It was silly to be startled over a silly hand hold after last night, but she glanced at him between her curls... her lips catching in a partial grin.

Her fingers tightened around his. She fought to jump thought her brain back to spoken words.

"I- um. No, actually. But we'll find one." A hopeful note as she led him forward, her words the only bright spot on this magma infested world. Livable area was more than halved on this planet due to the active volcanoes that dotted its surface. The city lacked coherency, the lack of government clear by the state of the crumbling infrastructure.

She walked without a care, more effort put into learning how to match his pace than look for one of the countless food fronts. They stumbled across one without trying, the open face at least mildy well maintained. They were still in the money district, it seemed.

She led him in, the table cool against her forarms as she sat down. "I'm could eat a bantha," she told him. It was easy to see why. The bones of her shoulders stuck out, leading into the exasperated hollow of her collar bone.

She hadn't been eating.

She felt oddly hungry now.

"Um, one of everything," she ordered, barely looking at the menu. There was no such thing as food waste. She bet his fridge was empty.

 

[Zaavik Perl]

"I could eat a bantha."

"That haunt not feeding you? Got you on some kind of esoteric fasting ritual?" Half jesting, half prodding. She could take it as a rhetorical, but it would be her opportunity to say something. They had to be far from any betraying ears now. Hopefully.

"Um, one of everything,"

Zaavik did a doubletake between the Aradia and the menu screen, and then another. "You weren't kidding," he remarked with a furtively astonished tone. If the credstick couldn't afford it, they were in for a dine and dash. "Uh- We'll share," he declared, signaling the service droid that he wouldn't be getting anything. One of everything already, and there wasn't any way she could actually consume one of everything.

Unless she was secretly something like Half-Firrerreo and never mentioned it.

"So," he began, letting the vowel draw out and trail. The pause that came over was prolonged. Nerves made him bounce his knee under the table. "Is it too early to revisit our conversation?" He wanted to put it off, but it only made it harder to ignore.

"Or should we wait until after?"

 

[Darth Daiara]

Oh Vesta was feeding her alright. She grimaced, not taking the bite as she allowed the droid walk away.

Who said anything about sharing?? She accepted the middle ground, also wondering if they were in for a run after this meal was done. She half liked the sound of it, but that musing was killed by his next question.

Her expression caught... then crumbled into a stiff, unreadable mask.

"Might as well get it out of the way. Like ripping off a bandaid." Her voice quaked, betraying her nerves as she clamped down on the table. Her nails dug into the laminate as they waged a silent war on who would go first.

"I think you're being a hypocrite," she exploded, losing said war. "You know that both of our orders are fucked up. But you stayed, you got what you needed from them, and now you're here. I need that. I need that chance. You're holding me back."

 

[Zaavik Perl]

Zaavik bit his tongue. The words stewed in his brain for a moment before he'd give them life with articulation. "Listen, I'm not trying t-" Two people walked by. He stopped, fell silent, turned his face away until they'd passed. "I'm not trying to hold you back," he reiterated fully, this time lowering his voice.

"I'm just worried about this going too far. You've told me before how concerned you are with control. Do you think she shares that concern?" Silence befell them again as the service droid returned, placing vessels of water in front of either of them. Zaavik's eyes didn't break dire contact as he waited for the droid to leave. It felt like the damn clanker was taking forever.

 

[Darth Daiara]

No, Vesta did not. She was clawing to break it, and Aradia was beginning to see why.

Control was chains that kept you from true power. Always fearing what you do not know and never reaching for it because of the fear.

The fear Kaalia had put in her. Fear to hold her back?

More chains, everything was chains. She did not know where the shadows ended and the real threats started, but she did understand one thing. Zaavik would never let her be lost. And so she lied. A little white lie. A little white lie that would help situate her closer to the person that would give her what she sought ... and the other one. The security blanket. The fall back plan she could trust beyond all else.

"I won't let this go too far. And neither would you. You knew when to draw the line with your jedi. When they started taking more than they could give. They have used you until you were dust. Stop pretending like this is shit. It's reality. It's life. Admit it, it's me you don't trust. You don't think I can do it.":

 

[Zaavik Perl]

"I ain't got nothing to admit, I trust you." The biggest downside of being a consummate liar was that it was hard to emphasize the truth. His eyes fled, staring at his untouched glass of water. "You're the only person in the Galaxy I trust anymore," he confessed.

"But you aren't infallible, and neither am I." Suddenly came one of everything. It took two droids and one organic to bring it. The conversation held as one plate after another was delivered, silent thanks and nods awkwardly obliged the servers before they left. Everything was still aside from the steam that billowed off the fresh, hot meals.

"Look, if you wanna learn from that thing in the big house-" He gulped. "Fine. But, I dunno- Just- We can train together, too. I'll show you what I've figured out." A brief memory of his former padawan flashed in the back of his mind. He'd never mentioned her before, had he? It almost made him want to revoke his proposal, remembering what a poor job he'd done.

"Just something to keep you grounded, you know? Something to fall back on when- if things go sour."

 

[Darth Daiara]

The was so intoxicating, it was nearly enough to distract her off the topic. Nearly, but not enough. Her mouth watered as she stared him down, the seriousness of the conversation battling against an appetite that had awoke in force.

And then he made his offer. Suddenly it was a lot easier to think. Her thoughts raced, the reality of his words slowly clicking into place.

"And you'll stay?" She countered, a hint of skeptically residing in her tone. She did not allow herself the joy, her expression frozen as she tried to contain her emotions. She knew better than to get her hopes up.

The image of his back at her window still lingered in her mind.

 

[Zaavik Perl]

"And you'll stay?"

"Of course I will," he replied as if it was a total no-brainer despite his nearly absconding the night before. An actual night's sleep had wiped the exhausted, agitated haze from his perception. The idea of living under the same roof as that thing still wasn't something that set well with him. Yet his longing to stay with her massively outweighed his grievances. He was willing to compromise for once. For her.

"No more splitting up, remember?" he teased.

A piece of meat rolled around beneath the prongs of a fork he grasped clumsily in his right hand. The flavor almost made him wish he'd kept prodding it rather than eating it. His expression twisted into one contemplative as the food slid down his gullet. "Is that a yes?" He bit the inside of his cheek, looking around for a moment to stall. "Or are you just making sure before you tell me to feth off?"

 

[Darth Daiara]

Cracks formed along her icy composure, fissures and ticks that allowed... a smile to slowly shine through. "No splitting up," she echoed. "I mean yes-- yes. The more I can learn, the better."

She wouldn't in a million years admit that she was frightened. Both him and her new master held a future for her that she couldn't see. She felt like she was standing on a preface. At any moment, this could all come crumbling down. The pain, she reasoned, would be worth it. Nothing could be as bad as living with his death.

She picked up her fork and dug in with eager bites. The city around them began to awake, the streets filling up with soot covered bodies going about their mornings.

"You'll have to tell me, what's happen to you the last weeks. When i was recovered, I couldn't sense. And I've always been able to sense you, have you noticed that?"

 

[Zaavik Perl]

"You'll have to tell me, what happened to you the last weeks? When I was recovered, I couldn't sense. And I've always been able to sense you, have you noticed that?"

Could've seen that one coming. Of course she'd want to know where he'd been, what'd happened to him. He had the gaps filled in on her timeline, mostly, and now she wanted the same. Damn. A grimace started to manifest on his face. So much to explain, so many details that made him fearful of her reaction. Damn, damn.

"Yeah, I might have noticed." Some semblance of that connection must have survived whatever happened. Though he'd used every skill he possessed to find her, there was some kind of intangible intuition guiding him there. It could have been one-sided, or perhaps he was connecting things that weren't there.

"I ran into someone trying to collect SIA's hit when we split up. After I took care of that, well, you'd already been carried off, I guess." A few bites punctuated the first bit of his explanation. "I uh- I looked for you a while. You can guess how that went initially." Water bought more time, washed down the sub-par flavors. "Ran into some trouble on Kraysiss trying to get past some obelisk. I made it out, my hand didn't."

Paraphrasing the recount in his head, he left out the more incriminating details.

"Not much else to say. I found you mostly the same way I'd find anyone else back when I was still SIA."

 

[Darth Daiara]

He didn't want to talk about it. She could see it. She would have accepted it then and there, but something tugged at the edge of her thoughts.

"There's no shame. In surviving. If there was another way to have done it, you woulda," she said simply, not understanding the depths of his experience. It was one thing not to let choices made in a battle weigh you down. Jedi or Sith, it's kill or be killed. But he had been forced to cut his way past a family member.

It was that, or loss Aradia. But emotions had a way of twisting things in a way that not even she could empathize with. She had never been forced to act against someone she cared for. Up until lately, she had cared for no one.

She gave him a tight smile, wondering if she needed to address the darkness that stirred in him. It was starting to become a familiar force. Even now, she could feel the faint echo of his new signature sitting across from her.

"...Do you want some lessons from me? On control-- understanding it. Its a bit... hard, on your own. "

 

[Zaavik Perl]

"Do you want some lessons from me? On control-- understanding it. Its a bit hard, on your own. "

Zaavik's eyes began to glaze over slightly. Echoes resonated off the inside walls of his skull.

"See what you made me do!?"

“The hell is wrong with you?”

Was he in control? It certainly felt like he was. Even if he was in denial about certain regrets, hiding them in the back of his mind under the guise of misattributed fault. He flinched, becoming visibly more present with eggs on a fork halfway between his mouth and the plate.

"So we teach eachother?" If his previous proposal still stood, that was. "Yeah, okay," he agreed.

"It is hard," he confessed. "It's all just been... I dunno- Angry intuition."

 

[Darth Daiara]

"Cause you're fighting it," she identified, as if that was not a very recent lesson she was struggling with on her own.

She ate easily, shoving in bite after bite. Occasionally she resorted to fingers. Aradia was a messy eater. No one ever bothered to teach slaves manners. "Kaalia says you need to use it with your head, not your heart. The more you feel, the bigger the risk. This stuff is stronger, yeah. But I think it just... requires more skill.

It takes a brave person to control their fear, their emotions and use them."

She balanced a fork on the tip of her fingers. "Too little, and you'll never reach your potential, but too much," she tipped her finger, nearly causing the silverware to upend and fall over.

"You get those monsters." She caught the fork as it clattered down, twirling it once before stabbing at her food again.

"But. If you can get past the fear and the ignorance--" She informed him, rather lively with him in that moment. It wasn't often she had something to tell him about, but it felt good to be able to explain something to him for once. Like she was capable.

"Well, that's what I've been working on, anyway. I dunno." And just like that, the confidence crashed. She shrugged and dished more food into her mouth, sauce falling on her chin.

 

[Zaavik Perl]

"Cause you're fighting it,"

"I'm not fighting it."

Of course he was. Over a decade of Jedi-isms just to forsake them all, how could he not fight it? None of this had really been a fair choice. Whenever the decision of Fight or Flight came up, Zaavik could only ever pick fight. That's simply how he's wired. If fight meant welcoming the less savory in the antithesis of everything he'd been taught for years, it wasn't like he'd lie down and die instead.

"I just don't fully understand it yet, that's all."

He was only proving her point by trying to argue to the contrary.

"It takes a brave person to control their fear, their emotions and use them."

Zaavik the coward, then? He sneered.

Suddenly not interested in his food, he chose a downward direction to stare while continued to listen. He practically didn't notice how she was eating. Not that it would have bothered him much at all, but other people certainly noticed. A couple just out of Aradia's peripheral shot looks of disgust her way. Zaavik gave them the fish eye, his gaze like magmatic daggers, sending them back to minding their own business.

"Well, that's what I've been working on, anyway. I dunno."

"Well, if it's working for you, I guess it can't hurt." As long as Aradia was the mentor and not that Shade in the halls.

"You're gonna choke yourself if you don't relax," he observed. Her voracity appeared twice her size.

 

[Darth Daiara]

Aradia slowed, an abashed look leveled at her hands.

"...Sorry." She wiped at her face, that bit of life and color growing stronger by the moment. Last night she looked positively haunted. Now she smiled, albiet a bit shyly. "...I'm really glad you're here, you know," she confessed after a moment.

"We've got all the time in the world again. We could do anything-- learn anything." She felt so light, with a future like that. "You found a ship?" She prompted, the loss of hers feeling less significant now. The line of her and his and long since blurred, their definitely of teamwork extending past the battlefield.

"Will it be good enough? For staying under the radar."

 

[Zaavik Perl]

"I'm really glad you're here, you know," she confessed after a moment.

"Yeah, me too."

All the time in the world, she said. That was certainly thinking in advance, given how long they might stick around. Farther into the future than Zaavik had ever bothered to plan for himself. It emboldened a hope that she wouldn't be around the finger of her new mentor forever. A lot of pain would be spared on both sides if she kept such an outlook. As it stood, forceful termination still wasn't out of the question.

Did he have what it took to snuff out a Lord? Time might very well tell.

"You found a ship? Will it be good enough? For staying under the radar."

Zaavik winced. "Uh, probably not. It's a real clunker. A YU-410, old as chit, and only the bare minimum systems for operation are still functional. It flies, but that's about it." Every time he turned it on, he still managed to be surprised that it ran at all. "I never really had the time to fix anything wrong with it," he confessed. It was never a problem of if he could, just that he never did.

"The cabin smells horrible, like Giggledust," he added with clear contempt. "Comfy bed, though."

 

[Darth Daiara]

Aradia grimaced.

"And you just wanted to take back off." Too pointed? Not for Aradia. She started on her third plate, her stomach starting to buldge under the table. And it felt wonderful.

"Well now you can fix it. In between things, I'll help you. We can get it ready, and we're gonna need to be ready when we leave here again. " Another grimace, though she didn't care to indulge too far into that thought.

It was then her heating finally seemed to slow. She wiped her greasy fingers off on the napkin and sat back, a happy groan befalling her. "I might ordered too much," she confessed shamlessly.

And of course, who wouldn't have seen that coming.

 

[Zaavik Perl]

She really liked to remind him, didn't she?

"Even if I- We fix it... Best-case scenario? It'll be just good enough. But I doubt it. Even if it was running perfectly, the YU-Series are slow and hard to maneuver. We'd be better off finding a new one, really. Everything about it is super dated, it almost looks like it should be in an aerospace museum."

Beggars can't be choosers. Not to mention that it might be tagged as stolen if the man he took it from was actually the legitimate owner. He'd just assumed he was stealing a stolen ship, based on the inferences he'd made leading up to the act. Still, the possibility remained that the craft still had heat.

"I might have ordered too much." she confessed shamlessly.

Tell that to his credstick. "Did you really think you could eat one of everything?"

 

[Darth Daiara]

Aradia grimaced again.

"We'll bag it and give it to the kids on the street-- easy." Yes, easy. Random alturism from the mouth of a budding sith. And why couldn't the two coexist? She wanted to smite the imperials not starve children. How could it be anymore black and white than that.

She gestured for the server driod to come over.

"Are you done, you've barely eaten anything. We can go somewhere else... or another nap... I think I might need another nap."

 

[Zaavik Perl]

"We'll bag it and give it to the kids on the street-- easy."

A thin smile feigned across Zaavik's lips. Memories from his childhood began to resurface. Strangers had given him their leftovers, feeling good about themselves for the little kindness. Yet, that one meal lasted only a few minutes while sleeping on the concrete lasted hours. Ironically, the gesture only made him resent them more. Better food than he could have acquired himself back then, but living off someone else's scraps just made it all the more demeaning.

"As long as we don't make a big deal about it." He made the condition with a begrudging acceptance toward her attempts at altruism. His tone betrayed his attempts to hide something that bugged him about the suggestion. Regardless, she meant well, he knew it, and couldn't let his past discontentment get in the way. It was gonna be hard to look a kid in the eyes and pretend he didn't know how the gesture really felt in the dark of their heart. Assuming that his furtive grievances had been a normal thing for someone in that situation, that was.

"Are you done, you've barely eaten anything. We can go somewhere else... I think I might need another nap."

He looked down at the hardly dented one-of-everything, then nodded. A certain recollection had strangled his already frail appetite. The credstick was handed over as two additional droids appeared to bag up the feast they'd hardly touched. To his surprise, there were not issues with payment. He subjected the credstick to a narrow-eyed scrutiny. Just how much money was on this thing?

"You're already tired?" he asked after a drawn-out moment of silence. Come to think of it, he was as well. At this point, he'd just grown used to it as his normal state of being. It simply slipped his notice now. "Well, I can't say I had anything in the city I particularly wanted to see anyway. Could always just go back, in that case."