Private Unfinished Business

[Ishani Dinn]

"That wouldn't work. Never came back isn't the same as definitely dead, she'll never stop hoping."

"Unless they've already claimed my body," Ishani pointed out. But Kyra was right, it was better not to leave it so open-ended. "All right, scrap Tython entirely. Maybe I met you while traveling to, uh..." If she said Zeltros, her mother would have a heart attack. "Coruscant, and asked you to find my mother and tell her to make sure my kids were okay if you ever heard I'd died. That way you wouldn't even have to be sure I was dead, you'd just be doing as you were told."

Ishani watched the cat move around, belatedly realizing she must be in Kyra's apartment now. As a ghost she lacked a certain awareness of the world around her. After all, she wasn't truly in this world anymore. That wasn't all bad - in life she'd had a fear of cats, ever since a neighbor's pet had suddenly gone from purring in contentment at her petting it to biting her hand and hissing. They were moody, mercurial animals, and she tended to avoid them. Being immaterial now, she knew this one couldn't hurt her, so she was able to ignore its presence entirely.

Kyra asked whether her mother knew about Ishani's Force sensitivity. "Yeah, she knows," Ishani replied. "She didn't talk about it that much, but I'm sure she disapproved of my not cutting myself off from the Force. They were both pretty pissed when they found out I ran away from home to attend a... an academy for Force Users." It wasn't a good idea to outright admit she'd gone to a Sith academy, so she left that part ambiguous. "At least she's not a dick about it like my dad was. He stopped speaking to me after he found out." Funny, her ghost trying to communicate with him now would be virtually the same sort of interaction she'd have had when she was alive. She'd been more or less dead to him for a long time.

"It won't matter. Neither of them can tell you're Force sensitive either, as long as you don't go using it around them."

Kyra Perl​

 

[Kyra Perl]

Well that wasn't any better. Kyra was beginning to think she'd just have to wing it, she couldn't have the Mom left on a needle point just cause they didn't want to admit they used the force. Like it or not, Kyra's empathy was already creeping in. It was like blinders over a horses eyes, tunneling her focus into one thing:

The mother's closure.

Kyra would be the one that had feel her grief when she gave the news, and there was nothing quite as uncomfortable as a mother's aguish.

She blinked, a set of words rounding back to her.

"You have children?"

 

[Ishani Dinn]

Ishani paused, momentarily thrown off by the question. "I... Yeah. The twins. Arcturus is their father. As far as I know, he's with them in the Outer Rim."

She thought that information could be easily inferred from her words, but apparently she was wrong. Well, this was awkward.

"My mom used to take care of them whenever I couldn't. She helped a lot. I hate to have to rely on her, but she's the only person in the galaxy I'd entrust them to besides Arc."

Kyra Perl​

 

[Kyra Perl]

Well, as long as they weren't on Typhon. Her arm hairs raised at the very thought.

The spirit said names like they were obvious but Kyra bore no connection to them. Whoever The Twins were, she was just grateful they were clear and out of the way.

She closed up the cabinets and picked the head-butting cat up. He purred and relaxed into a puddle in her arms, large paws kneading the air they dangled into.

"Ok, I'll be sure to mention them to her. Sounds like she'd go to them anyway." She shrugged, that part of the task growing easier.

 

[Ishani Dinn]

It appeared there was some confusion, and it was Ishani's fault for not being clear enough. She figured she could withhold certain embarrassing details and just rely on Kyra to deliver the message as asked. But clearly she'd have to elaborate, if only so that Kyra would understand the imperative nature of it all.

"Okay," Ishani began, with the spiritual equivalent of a sigh. "My mother needs to know Arc's ship codes in order to find him. She's never met him before and doesn't know which ship is his, so she can't just go to him on her own."

Dysfunctional families were nothing new. The fact that her parents didn't approve of her boyfriend was probably a minor infraction compared to other people's problems. But something in Ishani had never quite gotten over it.

She gave Kyra a chance to grab something to write with, then listed off the codes for Arc's ship, the Leviathan. With those numbers, she could track down his vessel anywhere it had to be registered, such as a starport or fueling station.

"That's it, I think." She shrugged. "Are we good to go?"

Kyra Perl​

 

[Kyra Perl]

Kyra full out stopped and raised a brow.

"Were just never gonna tell me that or..." Kyra shook her head, frustrated by the pushy tempo of the whole affair. "Mesa think you're a sith," she grumbled under her breath, ripping off the paper from the pad and shoving it it into her pockets.

 

[Ishani Dinn]

"Were you just never gonna tell me that or..."

"I told you now, didn't I?"

She'd left out the part about Arcturus potentially vanishing at random due to a curse that caused him to be sucked into the Netherworld at odd times. Mostly because it would make her look like a shitty parent for leaving the kids in his care in the first place. But it was never supposed to be for longer than a day at the most.

Obviously she hadn't planned on dying.

Kyra muttered something under her breath about thinking she was a Sith. It may have been meant as a joke, but it pushed Ishani's buttons.

"At this rate, probably," Ishani snapped. Her anger was directed less at Kyra and more at the universe in general. "I used to be. I was trained as one. The Dark Side is the only thing keeping me from disappearing into the ether at this point, and it'll be the only thing that lets me come back."

If she could even manage to cheat death, that is.

"Look, just... write her a note and leave it in her mailbox, even." Ishani began to deflate, overwhelmed by the series of mistakes she had made. Catastrophic errors with compounding consequences. "I don't know how much longer I'm going to be here. Judge me all you want to, call me an idiot who doesn't think things through, but this is what I've got. It's all that I have. All that I—"

And just like that, the ghost was gone. Pulled somewhere else.

Kyra Perl​

 

[Kyra Perl]

Kyra raised her hands passively. "Whoa, whoa-"

And then spirit was gone before she could say a word more. She was left standing there, the taste of metal fouling her tongue.

"What the hell," she protested to the silence. Popsicles hissed.