Private The Restless Pull, A Welcomed Push

[Ahani Najwa-Zambrano]

"You profess your love for her but shrink away? You will watch as your wife demands, or your love is cheap. Put on your bravery and see the situations you hate for how complex they are, not how simple you view them." It might seem harsh to overwhelm the girl, but I see the hate within her as a roiling physical thing. It will either eat her alive, or worse, the family. There can be no trust in this slip of a woman if she forces herself to view the galaxy in so mired a lens. I squeeze Stardust Solus Skirae hand, this moment will burn not through its' pain, but its' stilted joy. "The ones we choose to hate hold the most power over us of all. Is He the one you want to control you so utterly?"

Before the dawn around Panatha assuages us, first comes the comforting wind.

The warm tropical air off the ocean fluttered at Yasha's raven curls. She pulled on a loose robe of silk so soft her fingers fumbled. Night clung in its last seconds before dawn, the haze of the sun enough for Yasha to know her light-blind eyes would prevent her from truly seeing the city of Her People. Yasha leaned on the marble railing of the monumental palace's terrace, her first view not bathed in Ssi'rruk blood. Nobody down below was visible in armour, a dignified perseverance held the Panathan people as they cleaned up their city and went about early business. Deacons and mages lifted rubble with telekinesis, how strange! Such open use of the cantankerous Force! Yasha saw House Fitz-Kierke was part of the diligent nobility tending to the whole below. Eyes so often severe or hidden in her armour widened in an innocent wonder. "What's it like? To see Panatha with the sunlight in your own eyes?"

"It is beautiful," answered Koe, looking up to Yasha as the first rays of the morning sun streaked across the skin and silhouetted her in a brilliant sparkling halo. "The most beautiful thing in the universe."

"Our people, Koe. They fought more bravely than…" She tried to picture it, no zoom in her HUD, or informational upload. Neither were there targets, or a single worry on this paradisiacal world now the battles concluded. Weathered with a collective warrior-pride. Yasha turned to see Koe's perilous body covered in fine linens on the borrowed royal bed.

"My love, such good eyesight to see the city from beyond my ample frame." She stretched and winced at a pain in her shoulder and thigh from the battles the previous day. As the sun peeked beyond the horizon, the sea sparkled with a searing pink and orange light.

"Let's play a game." Yasha recoiled, padded barefoot to ease onto the bed. Kaine opened the blankets to swathe her, his hand stroked along her side and she welcomed it.

"Today, we are not Mand'alor the Infernal and the Emperor, but Ghada and Koemi. Two proper Panathan Nobles, back home. We will visit the street gardens, walk the artist's district without seventy kilos of armour, arm in arm no reason to hide. I'll pretend I was born here, raised visiting the Temple with my mother and grandfathers, a childhood spent hunting in the jungles or dancing on stage. Think of all the botanicals I could create with enough space in my day to experiment, or the planets I could terraform! What prevents us?" A wild hope sprouted in open amber eyes, face flushed with a rare and honest smile.

"Maybe in this beautiful game my family will see my smile, Noa'ik and Ale'ika will recognize… They'll see you almost as I do. Gigi and Maggi will every day know the disciplined affections of their beloved parents. In this… beautiful fiction… I can raise my babies, stop working to death. I won't feel guilt and shame for carrying my children, because it will be a celebration and not something to hide behind beskar plate. An inconvenience unbefitting a Mand'alor." Yasha slid her hand to her flat stomach, amber eyes found a wide electricity in the dim shadow of the suite, lip between her teeth as she watched the impenetrable stone-like face in the bed. Kaine's muscles softened, lips twitched up in a smile as he guided her to his chest to keep her warm. A hand settled on her flat stomach, hemmed her in with its' diligence. Black hair slid along hers, as Kaine leaned down to kiss her forehead. She wrapped her arm around his shoulder, sighed and shut her eyes in the birdsong quiet of the morning.

"I love Mandalore. I will serve my adopted people with the duty they demand, until they release my soul… but today? For this game, we are allowed to celebrate our baby without concern or plot, I can plan the birth as any Panathan woman. Speak to the Temple of Nussyn and imagine I could be there when the time comes, you by my side. Not hidden away in a sea of mumbles and weapon's fire. We can walk the beach and challenge the ocean's waves to dislodge us, hunt a beast the size of a building and no harm or hardship can reach us, because for this beautiful game, we are invincible.

I can pretend I was dedicated to Nussyn at the Temple, educated in botany from the earliest possible age. My family and siblings would be here, where so little could touch us. In my fiction our lives are uncomplicated, dedicated to our peoples, as my Panathan family wanted. You and I would battle side by side and I would terraform broken worlds into gorgeous jewels. Fill my mind with every possible fiction, my love; for a day it can be true. Ghada and Koemi, each with spouses of their own and with each other. We could get married, at the Temple my family helped save. Your sister is here, she could marry us. We could… I could… "

My heart crushes in the spatial remains of my chest, as I watch the cheerful hope of impending motherhood fade. Yasha's fiction crumbles. A tilt of the cosmic cloud, and Cynthia Solus has no escape from the sight, nowhere else to look but the way Kaine cups her cheek and brushes a kiss on her lips, his voice husky with rare but full emotion. "I will have illusions constructed, we may walk as others do and shall have our day… Yasha… it is not my intention you hide what gives you joy, my beloved."

"It's not frivolous to have one day? To live in this beautiful fiction? It would be a perfect life…"

The rumble of his basso voice washed over us, his grip on her chin firm but tender. He turned her back to his chest, both arms gravitated to stroke along her stomach draped in thin silk. Nose nuzzled by her ear, he shut his eyes and breathed with her as they gently rocked together, the warmth of the morning brushing olive skin. How she clung to him, a monstrous salvage. "But first, you should eat. I commanded the creation of meals to keep you and our baby strong."

"So you did make demands while I slept. Of course you did. My Koe, taking care of me, the others of your household will get jealous..." The images fade to the vast incalculable bank of stars and I let the silhouette linger: two monsters in comfort.

"She married him that day, they feasted at the Fitz-Kierke Villa and later back to the Palace to rest. By the next morning, he helped her into her armour and I thought he would break her helm, his muscles were so tense to see her and little Viggo go. Return to Mandalore she did, stolen moments a day here, week there were all they got. Months passed before Yasha laid down her Mantle and moved to Alderaan to be with Noah and Alexandra. The Mandalorians no longer held her… he thought she'd stay away from the battles, then. No longer willing to hold back the onslaught the Sith craved to enact upon those, who massacred Dromund Kaas. Sith never forget a slight, and Mandalorian antagonizers were too virile to ignore upon their Southern border. When she died, her soul was in tatters. Damaged by the priests. There wasn't enough of her left, Cynthia, but the core of her desires. He created her beautiful fiction to fill in her soul's confusions, and gave her the chance to have the life she longed for since she was a child killing to survive."

The universe breathes around us, scale upon scale until the Galaxy is the size of my palm. Thousands of galaxies spin, their dance a prismatic lull to the cosmic chorus filled with our voices. Some recede as others grow, more collide into each other. "Kaine Zambrano is a destroyer. That is his function."

"Without destroyers, there can be no cycle of life and as unfortunate as it is for those caught in his path." The universe spins, nothing but growth until the inevitable stagnation clatters and breaks the beautiful dance to a cold, terrifying death. "When one sees the flow of the Universe, the way Galaxies are made and die and remade, I can see his value for what it is. In its' horrific necessity."

Once more, I flick my wrist and the universe breaks its stillness by an echo of darkness, which purges the stuck-rot and releases the galaxy to another swirling dance. "But think of how the man would change, if he lost her now? If he lost the only entity in the entire Galaxy who shocked us all by bringing love into the Dark Lord's soul? I would rather live in the Galaxy with a fraction of him softening, than in one where he's lost what he's found."

 

[Cynthia Solus]

Farewell - Akmigone

"Please no more." She whispered ever so softly even after her wife denied her that wish. Star said Cynthia would not be alone in witnessing these moments, but in this ethereal space void of touch, void of comfort the woman did feel alone. This place denied her of the tears, the want to collapse and curl up into a ball. This place was a cruelty beyond comprehension of imagination and its fancy magics, all it was offering was pain.

Where one saw joy and love she felt pain and sadness. The side of her sister that she had never been privy to. How the two thought Cynthia would see this and be fine with it, was insanity. They simply expected too much all at once, even if it was an attempt to help heal wounds.

Venomous words like the bite of a crynoid echoed once more, provoking and prodding spreading its poison. Cynthia wanted to spit her own words back as they danced at the tip of her tongue, they were there but held back knowing the witch would distort and bend them back. The woman even went as far to say that Carnifex controlled her because of hate, but Her feelings were far past that of hate, Cynthia despised him and abhorred him.

Cynthia felt powerless in knowing she could not stop any of this as once more they got whisked away to a new place.

The surroundings changed once more to pleasant sights and a morning glow casting up into the sky creeping higher. For a time, the woman of ethereal pink mist tried her best to not watch knowing the pain it would cause, but she could not hold herself back from the quick glance at the sight and her sister stood leant against marble. It was still strange to see her without armor, though welcoming at the same time too. This was a place she had never visited either. Only heard of Panatha in mention.

Cynthia did not turn to look at the origins of the deep voice, It still did not stop her listening however, there was no way to hide away from sound. Wasn't hard to know his words were not entirely in reference to the world beyond but of her sister. Least the monster was not wrong there. Her sister was beautiful, and it was rare to see her face in the past. The statue that stood proud in the halls of alor's had to be constructed from stills to get an accurate depiction. Her gaze almost followed Yasha back to the bed, stopping shy of allowing Carnifex into the corner of her eyes.

Oh how her sister went on to talk about a dream, how much it made her heart ache. Had only she confided in her family, to talk about it. Not everyone judged like harsh critiques, some loved unconditionally, Cynthia loved unconditionally. "I'd have built you a castle with gardens reaching far as the eye could see had you asked." Cynthia muttered softly in a hushed whisper. One quick glance to see that smile, her eyes shut tight, brow furrowed, jaw clenched shut. "Just once I'd love to have seen you smile like that. Not the one you forced that could break so easily."

"And sorry sister but I can never see him in the unworthy light you place him." Cynthia spoke in her head that time as to nor be scrutinised by the witch. "You should never have felt shame for the life you brought into this world, no matter who's the other half was in the mix. Your kids were my family too, never should you have felt like you had to hide. I was there for you, my shoulder was always there for you to lean on so many of us were willing to let you rest. Never once, not one single time was you an inconvenience to us. The fact you felt that way, that you could never be honest makes me feel like I failed you."

All the while the words she spoke within, she thought how she never dreamt like that, a vision for what she would like, dreams filled her with anguish that woke Cynthia in the night. There was little time to ever think of anything more than the pressure to live up to expectations set by herself. Cynthia has a wife, a home. She wanted her family, her sister and even maybe kids of her own but perhaps that was selfish thinking. Every moment in the last few year till now hope was left for everyone else.

Was it so wrong to want this one thing that she would be willing to fight for?

Yasha continued to speak of her ideal life, her fantasy. the more that was said chipped away at Cynthia. Though in the next part she was forced to watch the soft kiss and delicate touch, she reminded herself of the spear in Yasha's back. It was agony to hear the words flow out those lips, now knowing those illusions were the instruments to remove the woman she was.

Surroundings she used to focus on for those last moments turned to stars and dark space, still the corner of her eyes she could still see her sister and the monster for a few moments more. Ahani spoke so many words directed to someone who had been simply broken by all of this. "Maybe in his selfishness he did something that all of you see is right. Then why is it so wrong! To just want her back to have my family back whole? Tell me why a man that only takes and consumes gets to have everything while we suffer someone lost to us? Explain to me how... that... is... right? Because ALL of this is not. It's..."

Cynthia took in a shaky deep breath as she turned her head away from the two, her arm crossing over her chest wishing to feel the grip of her fingers claw. "It's not right, it's not fair... I feel all I have left of her is how I saw her, I pushed myself to her standards hoping to hide the pain, an...and I know the truth, all I am is prolonging it, but I can't cope to let go. T...the mo...moment I let go of the yasha that belongs in my heart, will feel like I've lost her for good. I cannot let that happen. Even if it hurts... so much."

Her jaw trembled and she blinked slowly with each stuttering breath. Cynthia wanted to turn into her wife's arms, but didn't scared her cries for comfort would be turned away once more. Each exhale, a push to compose her words without stuttering. There was a sliver of relief in the scaled down of the galaxy at least, no more images that felt like torture.

"You speak about him in such a way that he is the only thing that destroys?"

"Feth... witch, whatever your karking called, nether I don't care. When was the last time you left your comfy life in your humble abode. The galaxy destroys itself already, there is no certainty that you will wake up in the morning alive. We are in a galaxy that is constantly at war with itself so what makes carnifex so damn special? Because he isn't, just another psychopath pumped up on power."

"My love for her is deep, yet you called it cheap, well now I call you out on your values, there nothing more than a lump of coal failing at its purpose and destroying itself in crackling embers." Her voice trembled as she looked down at the universe that spun around in this cruel illusion. They had broken the woman letting way for other things to fill the cracks and holes.


"Manda forbids the man loses anything, a man who gets everything he wants and if told no he takes it anyway. Well this time I will take something from him." Cynthia turned to look at Ahani as she finally spat her own venom back with a saddened expression, leaving her sentence vague on what it was she wanted. No doubt the two could think of many things it could be, one of them is bound to be correct, not that she will confirm nor deny it.



Stardust Solus Skirae
Aditya Fitz Kierke