Private Without Reason

[Loske Treicolt]

BASTION // REVELIN // CARNIFEX FORTRESS
​

It was working. It was draining, taking a toll on everything that kept her animated, but it was working. Waylon’s suicide wouldn’t be for naught, and for everything that meant, she kept focused. She pushed harder. Any sense of self was diluted by the intense concentration required to snuff out the Gen’dai’s natural regenerative processes. The sacrificial inferno blazed around her, burning at the layer of her suit and deprecating its defenses. In the distance, she could hear the warning klaxon of her HUD. The heat was too much to sustain and was obliterating its cooling system. Her eyes grew heavy, oxygen being forced into her lungs through the suit’s life support but it was unnatural and smokey; the filtration system damaged from the Gen’dai’s attack.

As the body of Darth Assimilus the Hateful slipped away into nothingness, eternally trapping the Gen’dai in a state of torment, Loske lost her waning grip on consciousness. Woozily, her body swayed and staggered. On her knees, she felt her hand touch the ground as a final attempt to keep herself erect before she collapsed in the cloud of smoke and fire. The suit’s filtration and life support systems working overtime to keep her lungs smoke-free and flesh unburnt.

A sharp shake to her shoulder coerced her back to the land of the living.

<...lright?>

The silhouette of black against a colourless sky reminded her of the faceless movements she’d seen projected an immeasurable stretch of time ago. A fearful gasp hop-skipped from her sternum through her throat, filling her cheeks and nose. The soldier’s hand caught her reflexive lash out and held her wrist long enough for her HUD reading and assessing the silhouette as Nomad-3, Bleys Tanau. He’d tried to object to the Major General’s commands, but because of him, he’d survived. He didn’t say anything further to the Jedi, who seemed to realize what was happening.

She propped herself up to her elbows, coughing. The helmet rescinded from her face just in time to let the air out. Where there’d been fire, instead there were thick, lingering layers of smoke in the air. Ash shifted down, coating everything with a few millimeters of grey. Everything stank of it and she coughed again before letting the Imperial officer help her to her feet.

Reeling from the echo in The Force she had yet to understand, Loske staggered woozily. It took her a few meters to reduce dependency on the rubble for stability. By the time she was back in the space with Ryv, Kir, and Maynard she was upright. A temporary success before she dropped to her knees alongside Maynard once again, not saying anything but clutching him tightly. His wound had enclosed, and some of the colour had returned to his cheeks but it was a state of desperation she never wanted to see. She was partly blinded by conversations from the past, and her hate for this moment. Hating the way he appeared now.

“ I'd follow you into anything, anywhere.

But when it gets too much, if I ever see that...you like that again, I’m going to tell you I want out. And I'll beg for it. I don't care. I want to walk away. With you, toward something better and worth focusing on. Together.”

“But- yeah, I don't know if I can keep going if I see you like you were at Muunilinst again...or the same with me.

I love you- more than anything. Whatever it takes...I'll do it for you and...as much as I'd just like to slip away, alone, just us. We can't leave behind everyone else who'd been at our side the whole way. We gotta finish this fight."

“I don’t want to be here anymore.” She sniveled, virtually a mumble with the words all stuck together. It could have simply remained a thought, but she needed to hear it herself. A reminder that there was a choice to be made.

​

SCIPIO // NIO SPACE // ALLIES SAFEHOUSE //
Sometime AFTER THE BATTLE OF BASTION
Maynard Treicolt
MIRACLE​

Were they finally finished?

Had Bastion marked the dawn of the New Imperial Order’s era?

Irveric Tavlar, Sovereign Imperator of the New Order, had denounced all affiliation with The Sith. That part put her mind at ease. She’d been uncomfortable since JanFathal about the tightknit association with darkness. But genocide..hadn’t been the answer. It couldn’t be. It had left a gap in The Force that day like an agonized echo chamber none of them could escape.

And how perceptive of a man was Irveric Tavlar to the nuances of The Force? The Sith were a faction of it, using a mutilated rendition of the empyrean but..she was not flawless. Maynard was not flawless. What did Irveric define as a Sith? Was it any trace of darkness? Was Kyber Dark the first of many instructions to eradicate Force users from the galaxy?

Is that what she’d seen from the Sith Apprentice? Is that what she’d been shown? The future? All the Jedi lined up to be buried after an edict was passed down to destroy them?

The battlefield would fade away, playing out like a montage that Loske would find herself unable to control. Images of explosions, cries of death and destruction, and a wooden box, covered with a leather jacket and the Galactic Alliance Saber Squadron's insignia. The shuttle would touch down on Coruscant, and the scene would slowly fade as others from their squadron, faceless, would carry the box away.

The hanger would glow slightly from Coruscant's sun, several wooden boxes would line the emptied out hanger. Upon each wooden casket, a name, a picture, and an Alliance flag folded in the ceremonial funeral fashion. Loske would find herself glancing, seeing the nameplates of those that died on Bastion. Ryv Karis, Kir Dantos, Allyson Locke, and finally Maynard Treicolt. People walked the hanger, touching each box, and crying at the loss of their loved ones. People would pass Loske and whisper, knowing her ties with the man laid in the casket, who gave the ultimate sacrifice for the peace they fought for. A hand would wander to her shoulder and give it a soft squeeze, an offer of comfort.

Dwelling on the mental treachery was probably giving it too much credence, so she’d been trying to distract herself.

Every fibre of her wanted to protect her Mandalorian counterpart and the idea that had been percolating since Bastion made her scared. It had unsettled Ryv too, and that in itself was worth being weary over. Maynard was in and out of consciousness, and when he was awake she tried to keep his focus on things that would aid the recovery process. She didn’t even know if he’d been conscious for Kyber Dark’s order.

She couldn’t pull away now, they were in too deep. Too close to his home. The Alliance was a wonderful dream, spreading warmth through the galaxy but the battle-ax that was the Imperial Order was the most likely to get Maynard back on Concord Dawn’s soil. Waylon believed that to be the truth, so much so that he’d return to the soil as dust.

That was probably the only reason she wasn’t turning away from everything now, that, and the power she’d felt in victory was a bolstering reminder that she could do this. She was one of the few that could. So she would.

Before Bastion, she’d thought little of titles or hierarchies. The blade that Ryv had hovered above her shoulders left a weight there she had to burden now. Leaving and slipping into the night wasn’t as close to plausible as it had been before. The balance between the horizon getting further, and closer away, changed with every moment. Like the ebb and flow of a tide trying to get caught on the sand.

The fire’s crackle snapped her attention and drew her wandering mind back to the present. Rubbing her eyes, she tried to sort through the news she was going to have to deliver. And how.

“So what happened anyway? When I got to you, it’s like there was..another presence or something within you.”

 

[Maynard Treicolt]

T R E I C O L T
WAYWARD SON
Loske Treicolt
A N V I L

The remainder of the initial assault on Ravelin was a blur. It was consciousness fading, the last he saw in the cold and ugly vision of reality was the infernal gaze of Vesta Zambrano before it faded into nothingness, a cold vantablack envelopment of his senses. The frigid embrace of death grazing him before he was ushered from the brink by the fading spirit of Vyrin Karis. Ever greatful, but some void of presence compelled his body to continue its blissful shut down from being enveloped in the hellish blaze of the war. It might've been something ethereal, something in the Force which kept him from retaining his full consciousness in that moment.

As if something within or without him knew he'd do no one any good, certainly not himself if he was there to bare witness to the execution of an act he so gravely dreaded the possibility of. The death of his last tether to home, his last tether to him. With the death of Waylon, he was alone in his name once more. The ever wayward soul isolated again.

He awoke fully for the first time since on Scipio. It was the only world left untouched by the retreating onslaught of the Sith when they'd first lost Mygeeto, Muunilinst, Entralla and this very world to the first wave of the New Imperial offensive. In spite of an abrasive climate, it served well enough as the deployment staging ground for the Galactic Alliance as the New Imperial Order occupied a great deal of the orbital capacity of Echoy'la and Dubrillion just ahead of them along the Braxant run, with all the worlds in between with the exception of the industrial heart of Entralla too strained from their reconstruction to host the expeditionary force.

It could've been anywhere in the end, he was just glad his eyes opened and he was intact. The presence around him was warm, comforting. As if there was some form of intangible...peace, acceptance with him. He knew deep down he knew well what had happened. All the same, he still wanted to drop a line of communication to his old friend again. Complain about the shared nuances of life at war, he would tell him how happy he was with Loske, how much he looked forward to a life with her and then Waylon would respond in kind with a shared happiness between them as the justified end came closer in sight.

It was just closer for Waylon than either of them ever thought.

He'd been standing with his gaze looking out over the argent valley with arms crossed over his chest as he existed in a state of negligent dishevel.

“So what happened anyway? When I got to you, it’s like there was..another presence or something within you.”

"There was, Vyrin. He was with me at the end...I remember it. I- I think he...gave a part of himself...to save me. And- I don't know if there's anything left of him." Maynard admitted in solemn.

"I just feel...I feel somehow...empty, like something's been ripped from me...but I'm also...I'm also at peace." It was an enigmatic feeling and after he'd said that, his gaze shifted from the calm and slow snowfall to look to her, hoping she'd have some sort of answer.

 

[Loske Treicolt]

BE STILL ​

"There was, Vyrin. He was with me at the end...I remember it. I- I think he...gave a part of himself...to save me. And- I don't know if there's anything left of him."

Vyrin.

Vyrin Karis. Loske only knew the name and she made a face that looked dubious. If they were anything other than mystical wielders of an intangible Force, the idea that a long-dead father figure restoring Maynard back to himself would have been ludicrous.

And to give himself up for the benefit of Maynard was as sweet and meaningful as it was sad. They were all losing so much to, and for one another. The three of them. Sacrifice after sacrifice.

Popping and snapping, the fireplace maintained most of her focus now, as if she’d manage to see an elder manifestation of Ryv himself in the dance of orange and yellow. She hmmm’d with the insight. Did Ryv know? Was he hurting now too?

“I hope there’s enough of him left to feel my gratitude.” She offered cordially, looking away from the ornate hearth and taking an involuntary step backward. She hadn’t even noticed how uncomfortable it was making her until the back of her leg met the edge of the equally decorative gate-leg table.

As much as the prickle of the cold near the window offended her internal temperature, it was significantly more sobering and polar to the explosion that had engulfed her and Waylon.

The steady pulse and warmth of the fire were too reminiscent. Too familiar from Waylon’s last moment and she couldn’t deliver an answer for him about it so close to the heat. Burns on her fingertips flared, a reminder of the Gen'dai's undoing and that wretched volcanic outburst of shrapnel, fuel and...family.

"I just feel...I feel somehow...empty, like something's been ripped from me...but I'm also...I'm also at peace."

The weight of reality was heavy, and she’d tried to keep the load to herself for the collection of hours, days, whatever measure of time Maynard had been in and out of awareness. She didn’t want to unburden it to him, but it wasn’t her information to keep. Nervously, she chewed her knuckle.

Ripped away. It wasn’t the first time he’d found those words to describe his family and their relationships.

"Anyone who's ever given a damn about me has been ripped away...and violently."

The knot that had been tied in her stomach tightened.

He didn't know. Of course he didn't know.

"You..have to know. They gave me something for you." The statement was delicate, the words treated as precious and she placed them before him as an irrefutable invitation.

What came next was equally cautious. She didn’t want to announce the truth out loud, not associate her voice with news so devastating. Grimness took over her countenance, and she reached into her pocket to produce a slim, silver disc. She held it out for him to take, her palm a silver platter. The device was fairly smooth, the only ridges found carved on it matched the divots and outlines of the New Imperial gear motif. When Maynard touched his thumb to the centre, the official statement would project. Script that matched the sentiment of several notifications he’d had to pen. Except he was now on the receiving end. He was the next to kin.

"Not ever that I can see. Most of the time when their belongings, their flag and all that is delivered in person...which isn't ever something I'm there for, I get some insight on what their thoughts on it second hand. I can't say I can blame them...not sure how I'd ever reply to a message like that, if I'm honest. I've been there myself for enough moments like that to never warrant one...to know I wasn't there, that I was helpless losing someone I cared about...I- yeah, gotta be tough."

Respecting his privacy, she found interest in the space between his feet. Loske looked there while he interacted with the communications chip. The personal belongings, medals, Imperial Flag, would all be dispatched accordingly once they’d taken a full inventory of Bastion’s losses. The Imperials were an organized sort, and even the little disc was stylish. She’d only appreciated it’s external presentation, the contents inside were not for her and she respected that boundary. Even now as it scrawled, she didn’t look at it –– only through it to the face behind.

The dichotomy between sympathy and empathy was a peculiar thing, and the would-be Kiffar found herself at a strange juncture between the two. She hadn’t lost anyone. Inarguably she’d felt the pain like she was going to lose someone: Maynard, Ryv, Allyson –– they’d all been seconds from death throughout this campaign, but they never died. They were never on the wrong side of mortality. Waylon was probably one of the closest she’d felt, but it was selfish to ruminate on her own experiences when the contrast to her partner was so brazen. Maynard had lost so many. His entire family At least the family he’d ever spoken of. If he had a cousin, there were probably uncles or aunts somewhere, but who knew their survival rate? If they were true to the Treicolt name, they’d probably been cursed by death. Waylon and Maynard, as far as Loske knew, were the last surviving members of the Concord Dawn locales.

And now it was down to the one.

Waylon had been nothing but a source of joy and comfort for Maynard, ever since their reunion on JanFathal. He’d been stoic, stalwart, and worthy of admiration. He’d even made Loske feel welcome and relevant, without any hesitation after the initial introduction. Committed to the same root cause as his cousin: Home soil. Reclamation and vindication.

Loske spoke, keeping her voice small and slow. Mostly so he could interrupt and stop her from talking any time without having to do it more than once.

Every time someone in his family perished, he’d been alone. Had to sort through the facts by his lonesome and in solitude face the grim reality of loss. She moved to put a hand over his, gentle and soft. Her apology was wordless, evidenced by the pull of her jaw and mouselike movements.

“I don’t know if everything’s captured in there. And I..” She left her part of the story out. How she would have died at the hands of Quinn and Kezeroth if he hadn’t lured the evildoers away and pounded salvo after salvo into the fray to dissuade the Sith attackers. How she’d been in the middle of an attack, had to recover, and then ended what Waylon had initiated. She couldn’t have succeeded without him and would have passed out before the task was complete. The Gen’dai would have regenerated, and wreaked havoc. That success was wholly credited to the Major General’s quick-thinking sacrifice. One that she didn’t have to try very hard to feel guilty for.

“He drew attention away from us..” Another reason to scorn Kyber Dark. If that call hadn’t gone out, that Sith would have stayed allied with Kir. Allied with the Imperials. He wouldn’t have attacked the tank. “His men said the override to the tank was broken, and his decision to manually set it and cause the explosion saved his crew, me, and probably several others. You included and..probably Ryv too. This Sith was..big. And outraged at the Kyber Dark betrayal. They all allied and..” She was projecting now, and only caught herself at the end of it, clicking her teeth shut to prevent further suggestion from slipping through. “They'd had the advantage. We wouldn’t have survived without him.”

She moved that resting hand to wrap around him, pull him into an embrace that reminded him he wasn’t alone. The impact of the knowledge he now had wasn’t mitigated, but it was shared. She’d help him sort through it in whatever capacity he needed her to. “I’m so sorry, May.”

 

[Maynard Treicolt]

He nodded once to Loske's sentiment, he could only hope for the same from the Jedi Master...even in the end he knew it might not matter all too much at all. Maynard was alive and it was Vyrin's intent to make it so, he could just only hope to do good by him from then on. To make that last breath, that sacrifice worth it all in the end.

"You..have to know. They gave me something for you."

And soon as she produced the object, Maynard knew immediately. His hand was trembling faintly as he took it from her grasp. Pressing his thumb unto the middle of the projection, the message wasn't displayed over text but instead, the image of a figure projected out about two feet tall. The figure was of course, the Sovereign Imperator of the New Imperial Order, Irveric Tavlar.

Standing brazenly in the dress uniform fit of a man of his station, of the Imperial identity, he spoke up with an eye looking into Maynard's even if they were a mere re-creation of the Imperator's gaze, it was one immistakable as his, even if Maynard had never shared the field of battle, only having seen him in passing on Coruscant he could tell immediately this was a message of a personal nature from the Imperial warlord.

It was a gesture that he should've anticipated, but didn't. Waylon spoke highly of Irveric, regarding him as one of the better leaders of men he'd ever come across and Maynard believed him or else he wouldn't have died fighting for him. Through a visage of blaster burns and faded scars, the message Irveric recorded for the Jedi personally began.

"To my understanding...the very last connection the Major General Waylon Treicolt had to his blood family, is to you, General Treicolt. I had hoped...against all hope that I'd never once have to record this message. He was one of the best I'd ever served alongside. He was with me from the start, conscripted as I was. We'd served at Kintan...Mandalore...Muunilinst, Borosk, Dubrillion...all of it, together."

"There was no more tenacious will, no more wise a guiding hand of a leader than there was Waylon. He was invaluable...to me...to the New Imperial Order, to the war against the Darkness. And it showed in his sacrifice, his sacrifice to his brothers-in-arms. In that he is undeniably a hero, to the Order, to the Alliance...to the Galaxy. We will not ever forget him. I will not ever forget him and I will see to it...in all my power, in all the will of the New Order, that he is returned home. As his final wish before his death was to buried beneath the sunset of Concord Dawn. I will make good on that, you have my word. "

"Until then, I hope only the best for you, Maynard. Do not hesitate...should you need the help of the New Imperial Order...we will do good by the kin of those who have given their lives for our people. Thank you...for your service and keeping his legacy alive."

The Sovereign Imperator spoke before his hand rose in a salute. And then the message ended.

He'd all but dropped the device unto a nearby table. He couldn't stand to hold it any more as his gaze froze over. He nodded once, as if the physical gesture of his acceptance. The acceptance of one of his closest friend, the last of his kin...gone. Forever.

The message on the Sovereign Imperator's part seemed all but genuinely good natured, at least to the Jedi. Even still, the voice was nauseating toward its conclusion as he could hear the Imperial making peace with his own loss in the same form and it drove a dagger into his stomach and twisted it all the same.

When she'd gone through explaining his death. He nodded, once, twice. He got it. He could piece the image well enough in his mind to acknowledge it as a fact. And all in all, he wasn't sure Waylon would've had it any other way. He'd lived and breathed to do good by the men and women he commanded, it only made sense to him that if giving his life to save even just two of them he did it without hesistation.

Knowing that his beating heart was a collateral result of that sacrifice made it ease down gently even if packed with guilt in its wake, as if he could've changed it all. But even then he'd known that in that dilemma, between Maynard or himself, Waylon would give his younger cousin the chance to fight another day every single time.

“I’m so sorry, May.”

"It's alright..." He muttered, curling his lips in between his teeth before baring them down unto the flesh as if to subside the feeling of tears welling up in his eyes, nodding once more only to let them plummet down his cheeks. An image not too dissimilar to the form Vyrin saw of him in his manufactured vision, of the boy on Concord Dawn who'd lost everything.

Luckily, with her...that boy was still long dead. But he could still confide in her that vulnerability and he strode forward to close the gap between them before his arms wrapped around her in a close embrace, tightly clutching her to the point of it still keeping comfort between them though in truth he wanted to hold her as if she was the only thing left for him to hold at all and that was true. The numbers were slowly dwindling around him but in her, he could still imagine that picturesque future.

Eventually, the embrace eased and his hazel eyes locked with her calm blues. There was something he'd wanted to say to her, if they'd both survived Bastion. And with himself being the last stand of his legacy, it might be the only thing that could subside the sorrow he'd felt, knowing he was still progressing down that path they'd set down for themselves to walk. To the future they deserved. He wanted to say now but he couldn't will himself in that moment and that realization drove another tear fall down his cheeks again.

"I just...there was something I wanted to ask you, if that's alright." Maynard suggested.

Loske Treicolt

 

[Loske Treicolt]

Even delivering an apology, being somewhat emotional, the Imperial leader’s voice was orotund and purposeful. If the sound of his voice didn’t initiate a crawling sensation along her skin she might have been more immersed in the marvellousness of the gesture. Knowledge and beats were hit that were deemed important, honouring the legacy lost. The lists of locations, everything they’d seen and been through had been together. The horrors, the losses, the victories.

As much as she might have found disfavour with the Imperator’s decision-making as of late, he wasn’t someone who could have his conviction questioned. That same level of absolution resounded in his promise, his word to uphold on behalf of his brother-in-arms, to see him home.

How frequent was it that he created something so personal for the families of his soldiers? Each of those locations plundered and established under the silver and black flag, how many of those soldiers were known by him? It could be likened to Chancellor Emmen Tagge, perhaps, recording a visual and sending it to Alliance defence force families. Did the Chancellor do that? Did he even know who they were? Could he make such a promise to General Treicolt boldly wearing the Starbird? As sterile as an Imperium could be, the relationship between leader and predominant supports was tighter –– those sort of relationships were diluted and delegated in The Alliance. Deployment after deployment happened, and their figurehead(s) were thousands of feet above, receiving high level debriefs of outcomes only. Their soldiers were statistics. Maynard, Loske, Ryv, Bernard, Auteme, Kir, Olen, they were all statistics. Numbers lumped into an aggregate. She knew this, but the personal touch of this message was a cruel reminder.

Loske thought she understood the gravity of the news. Maynard’s interpretation of it was tight and controlled.

Growth was something people praised and encouraged. Seeing people change and evolve was a coveted metamorphosis, initiated from childhood and awarded with nods and handshakes or compliments to continue cultivating self-awareness. Sometimes though, watching it happen in real-time was painful. As private as this moment should have been, Loske was an involuntary voyeur and couldn’t help but observe and judge the response from her lover to the message.

His processing barely showed on his face. His expression only seemed to harden, giving little autonomy to his emotions. Her eyes traced over his features as they contorted to physically constrain any outbreak and her frown deepened on his behalf. His heart was likely being torn asunder, but he wasn’t letting it show to the magnitude he might have at the start of this war. She hoped death hadn't become so desensitized to him, just a categorization of tenses: Waylon being relegated from an is to a was.

Even when she divulged further detail, praising Waylon, he was silent.

"It's alright..."

It wasn’t alright! Darkness had ripped more away from him, more people had died and it was just part of the wheel’s cycle. It made her angry, and it vexed her further to see the human reaction snuffed out in favour of normalcy. At least there was some level of agitation in his micro-movements, and there was some sort of vindication in that, that all humanity and grief hadn’t been entirely lost. Just a different level of control. Who was she to prescribe the accuracy or inaccuracy of a reaction?

In hindsight, that shouldn’t have been too much of a surprise. Traumatic moments needed processing time. He’d voiced as much after Harnaidan.

"Yeah...its alright."
"Some times...that's just- just how it is."

"Not sure I really wanna talk about it."

Whenever the fallout happened, if it happened, however it happened, she’d be there.

When he held her, she could barely feel him shake. As if the information was packed away and compressed so tightly it made his muscles into stone. The harsh reality added another thick layer to don beneath coats of armour. Silently, she gave him a single squeeze of reassurance, pressing her face in that space between his chest and neck. He shifted, and she angled to reciprocate the movement. The horrifying haze of his eyes had dissipated, and though there was a cloud of weariness and emotion layering his look, those autumnal hues were more focused again. Full of some level of awareness.

Polite as ever, he asked permission to ask something again. He did it once in a while when it was traipsing into an evocative territory.

"Need you to help...if that's alright."

But it was never anything she could deny him. It would be out of character to ask a favour so large she couldn’t handle. Unless he'd come up with something so beyond their scope of morality, and even then she'd consider it. So long as they were in it together. Maybe that was the explanation for the root of anticipation that reverberated between their ethereal tether. That bond was a leading viewport to the base of his emotions, and with everything he’d just evidenced, she wouldn’t deny him any sort of need from her. How could she be so callous?

Quizzically, Loske's dark brows furrowed to evidence her opinion on the silliness of his caution and her mouth became something small and frustrated. Her hand lifted, the skin of her thumb drawing along his jawline to wipe away the tears that had fallen amidst the stubble. His tentativeness made her nervous, and there was a tautness between them. She called him out on it: “Don’t be so polite, I think we’ve been through enough to just...say what you need to say. Or ask what you need to ask.”

 

[Maynard Treicolt]

C R Y S T A L I S E D

She would've been right to think that he was a contained fury for now, in this moment. There was a tempest that waited to be awakened, as if something rearing in the back of his subconsciousness urged him, not here, not now. With that, he'd put all those thoughts away. They were no good to him now and in his heart of hearts, he knew Waylon would never want his death to force his younger kin through so much pain and distraught, painfully aware or at the very least desperately hoping he'd make peace with his own finality long before Maynard ever had to.

Maynard found solace in that Waylon made that painfully obvious to him as well.

"I- I didn't know what happened to you, when the Sith took home and we split on off. Seeing you as you are now? That tells me all I needed to know. That you got that spirit, that intangible. You put your mind to it, you can conquer it. I just know it. I love you, Maynard. And...and you're most of what I got left. This is gonna be tough but I'll be damned if I don't get you back to her. Because you deserve her and she damn well deserves you. That's a promise."

The fact that he went out so that Maynard could carry on living again...while it wrought him a searing pain, it gave Waylon all the peace in his demise to know for a certainty that the Jedi would live to fight another day. Live to see the golden fields and clear skies of home again and make something better of himself than Waylon ever had. That thought compounded with Loske's teasing of him brought a smile to his face and a faint laugh, acknowledging out of the context to soon abrupt from his rather uncharacteristically meek request how off it might've seen to her but her answer only reassured him of the prior certainty he felt in what he wanted to ask her to begin with.

It wasn't anything resembling an ideal time for this, not with the weight of the news officially delivered to him only fading in his mind but...if he waited any longer, every second he didn't make that flowery plea might compound into a wayward pain.

“Don’t be so polite, I think we’ve been through enough to just...say what you need to say. Or ask what you need to ask.”

His eyes looked to hers in a lost longing for those deep blue eyes. There wasn't a flaw that could be discerned out of any of her. Whatever mark war or toil left was a negligible hinder in his perception of her radiance. Those eyes so loving, forgiving and caring enveloped by those perfect bright locks as everything else was shaped to perfection. Surreal as it ever was he managed to let off another soft chuckle of his breath between them to choke down the nervousness he'd felt.

He never really knew what exactly he was supposed to say here, where and when it should be or any of the ritualistic arbitrary requirements to make this moment 'perfect'. A hand moved up to course through those golden locks as his weary gaze fixed to hers again, welcoming an instant of silent serenity between the two.

And then he finally spoke up.

"I just...I just wanted to ask you...if you would marry me, Loske Matson." He was able to say, unable impede the grin that he forced through a face all but sunken with loss not moments before. If there was any suitable distraction to set him from looking from the past to the path ahead of them, it would be her answer in this moment.

Loske Treicolt

 

[Loske Treicolt]

All the things you are, are mine​

Suspended in waiting while he rolled through the motions of realization, she paid heed dutifully. The inflection of his expression gave her some level of relief before he broke the silence with the question that blossomed a burst of exhilaration through her chest. If he could be angry later, she could be angry later. In all the furious uncertainty that rolled around in her mind, he was always a stark parallel of certainty to her.

"I just...I just wanted to ask you...if you would marry me, Loske Matson."

Shock turned into delight, her expression quickly transitioning between the two. Two shuddery, long breaths of disbelief and appreciation rolled through her chest and she could feel them all the way to her toes. Loske bit her lip, as if to slow the beaming smile that quickly broke through her teeth’s restraint and stretched from ear to ear.

It could have been an inopportune time, but in a world of no guarantees and facing the reality of a pitting loss, it was as good a time as ever. Location and set up meant little compared to sentiment.

Comprehending the emotional pivot was laughable, but not completely out of character. The last time Maynard had taken a risk with his emotions had been after splaying out in the lowest of lows and then joining her in a remarkable high. She supposed it made sense, as sensible as anything in this world could be. He trusted her so completely to pull him from the mire of his own distress and he wanted her to know that.

They were forced to be opportunists in this life of theirs. By now, the two lovers were professional time thieves, continuously executing the greatest heist from Kronos’ vault to steal precious moment after precious moment. Minutes, hours, days, and months were treasures to lust over and protect, and they’d been growing wealthy in smiles of pearls and touches of gold that prolonged their luxury.

Wrapping her arms around his neck, she tugged him into herself, bending his body forward by the demand of her forearm and kissed him, hard and insistent. Her brain was on fire, the warmth spreading through her entire body and melting away anything in their surroundings that wasn’t him. The rolling, snow-capped cliffs, swirling ice, crackling fire, ornate décor, it all disappeared. In a moment that was meant to pave the way for the future, her mind was locked in the present.

Eventually, Loske drew back and forced a breath through her nose, and it caught a hitch of humour and she chuckled. She hadn’t actually given him the answer yet. Verily, there was only one to give. “Yes.” The affirmation was firm and smooth, shades above a gleeful, somewhat shrill whisper. It felt like honey on her tongue, and she kept her nose touching his so he might feel the stretch of her smile like a trace against his mouth. “I would.”

She knew he’d be with her forever that moment he held her in silence. He’d been there, offered himself up to just be there. She could talk to him or not talk to him, but he was there. He was always there. He promised to persist past her greatest fear of loneliness, and conquer it by being unapologetically him.

It was like a daze. Suddenly everything their shared dreams took one step closer to reality, and Loske hadn’t realized how much she needed some level of calcification to make that horizon seem more tangible. There’d never been any doubt in their relationship and the everlastingness of it once officially initiated, but something like marriage was deeply rooted in the concept of growing old together. She did it all the time, loving him as they grew older. Which just happened, and happened again, and happened several days ago, continuously, and a year or so before that, and would continue to happen with every tick of the chrono, and every swipe of a holo calendar that marked the passage of time. It was inexorable and it was fierce.

The idea of being in such elysian after such devastation was incredibly difficult to grasp, and she abandoned any hope to try and make sense of it and gave in to the moment only, honouring his virtuous bravery. To drive the point home, partly to abolish the sheepish realization that she’d taken a few seconds to give him that original affirmation, she flipped his words back to him: “Yes, I really, really would marry you, Maynard Treicolt.”

After a pause, she looked up at him, eventually letting her hands settle on his shoulders. “And I’m really glad you didn’t kneel.” Of course she could imagine pitching herself at him with that same level of excitement that still burgeoned within her, but the holofilms had made that gesture such a contrived display. And they did it when they were Knighted, and that was honestly enough. He didn’t need to physically drop to give her the awareness of how much sway she had over him. The pureness in the moment far outweighed anything predictable. Hopefully they didn’t need anymore tragedy in their lives to spur whatever came next in this relationship’s road.

 

[Maynard Treicolt]

It was all but impossible to justify asking that question if he wasn't all but certain of her answer. And he was almost immediately vindicated if only after a moment of shared bliss as they indulged in eachother's lips hungrily for a faint moment, an exchange of grazing smiles making way for her answer.

“Yes.”

“I would.”

He couldn't help what came next in the form of another draw of his breath before his lips were against hers, his silent gratitude as he ran a hand up and through her blonde locks, lacing his fingers through her hair in a faint grasp as he drank in that sweet taste of her. Unlike anything else, not even Meranzane Gold could make it any better. Not that he minded if he had a bottle of it between them now, but he certainly didn't need it to feel the nigh paralyzing bliss and elysian of this moment together, alone.

Just like every moment he'd seemed to enjoy in this past stretch otherwise marred by visions of death, destruction, strife, toil...all the worst of what he could continue to endure. He had the respite in knowing when the tempest calmed, she'd be there to welcome him into a place of peace and comfort in one another. No blaze was bright enough not to endure so long as he still had that awaiting him. That warm embrace isolated from the frigid graze offered by all else.

“Yes, I really, really would marry you, Maynard Treicolt.”

“And I’m really glad you didn’t kneel.”

"Didn't think that was our style..." He said, forming the well needed smile in triumph of the faded tears that once streaked his face. Even as he sought to strive past those previous moments of guilt, anger, mourn and advance into a more accepting stage where he could only piece together that, it was this moment and any other like it why Waylon decided to do what he did. To give his life in the interests of his kin living on a life of happiness, peace, love, comfort...all of it was worth. Realizing that moment the best way to do right by that legacy was to be with her, as selfish as it might've seemed otherwise.

"Though I'm not sure 'Loske Matson' fits our style much anymore does it now, Loske Treicolt?" Maynard suggested, all but sealing that bond between them as he uttered the name now mirrored between them.

"I just wanted to get...to get here. Through all of the other shit. This is really where it can start, for us." The Concordian suggested, a hand rising to pinch her chin between his thumb and forefinger. Another stolen kiss marked the finality to that shared lapse of silence before he broke the kiss only to set his hands on her hips, to turn her in the direction of the open view port taking in the view of The Renegade sat on its solitare atop the landing pad enveloped with the sight of the windswept frigid valley below. In spite of the open view, there was all the blissful solitude for them as the purple and orange swirl of intoxicating coloration began to draw up the sky at the coming of dusk.

Wrapping his arms around her so they could take in the view together, he spoke once more.

"To think all it took was some bumbling farm boy making explosion noises to sweep a beauty like you off her feet." Maynard said through a grin before he leaned his head over her shoulder, pressing another longing kiss along her neck as he pulled her closer still.

Loske Treicolt

 

[Loske Treicolt]

IN AND OUT OF LOVE​

The shadow of Waylon’s death hadn’t completely been outshone by this moment, and part of her wondered how much of his timing was influenced by the recent open space on the family tree. It didn’t matter, she didn’t care. She’d never regret saying yes to forever with him, and she sincerely doubted he’d regret asking. Further rumination down that avenue ended abruptly.

"Didn't think that was our style..."

Not their style. They’d proven to be a scrappy pair, managing whatever they could and turning it into something worthwhile. Constantly balancing between duty to others, and to one another. They were as efficient as they were vulnerable. Wholesome, genuine and easy. It was just...so easy to love him and be loved by him. He left no room for wanting and embracing the chaos had been one of their finest choices.

"Though I'm not sure 'Loske Matson' fits our style much anymore does it now, Loske Treicolt?"

It would be a bald-faced lie for her to say she didn’t roll the name Loske Treicolt around in her mind now and then. Sometimes she’d murmur it in faux conversations in the shower, as practice or something in solitude for future introductory scenarios that could or could not happen. Especially since they’d latched onto the affectionate moniker of Triocolt after Muunilinst.

As if that girlish secret had been exposed, she looked down sheepishly and nodded. A permanent smile stretched across her mouth, and it only grew when she heard him say it with that drawling accent. It was his name, after all, he knew how to say it better.

This sort of commitment was the ultimate defiance of her conception. Her name was nothing more than a collection of letters, borrowed from other names, and smushed together to brand her. That’s all she was, a collection of parts until Maynard fought so fervently to reinforce her worth and make her so much more whole. He had the audacity to want to humanize her and spend time cultivating that humanity. Before they’d embarked on anything officially together, she’d been all about the mission first - even going so far as to chastise him for wanting a moment's reprieve. Now, all she craved were those moments.

Those moments made her feel safe, for all the fear that spread through the galaxy. For everything she was afraid of right now, with him on her side, they’d prevail. She’d planned on admitting all of her apprehensions to him, scorning Kyber Dark but this...this was much better. The anxieties of tomorrow could wait –– they weren’t going anywhere.

"I just wanted to get...to get here. Through all of the other shit. This is really where it can start, for us."

His warm, green and amber gaze held all sincerity and she nodded against the fingers touching her chin. He captured her mid-nod in a kiss, soft and enticing.

"Me too." Getting here was a big deal. Bastion had felt like an apex of sorts, certainly for the New Imperial Order, and...she feared for what they would turn into now that the dust was settling. She’d bring that up later, though. It’s not like those fears were going to disappear entirely, but she could prolong the sanctity of this moment as long as possible. They deserved it. Getting here had been..an uphill battle.

They’d helped unite two governments to one, formed a starfighter squadron, become vanguards of a New Jedi Order, visited countless planets in the name of expanding The Alliance’s territory, tussled with horrible Draelvesir monsters, negotiated with morality, and brought a bioweapon to a fight, boarded a Vong ship, rejected an astounding bribe, been affected by an ancient Sith artifact, and dueled swathes of Sith several times over now. They’d even had to attend a funeral, reassured their brother through all his losses, and waded through the confusion of the spy world that made no sense. He’d grown from Padawan, to Knight, to having a learner of his own. Captain, Commander, and General. It was a lot, and their bond couldn’t have been stronger through it all. For all his titles earned, he was about to stack on another one: Husband.

Gratefully, she’d earned her big title under her name, Knighted as Matson. Not that the name meant anything, but it was hers and she’d put in the work to get there –– and there was a certain glee that came with hearing someone, preferably a stranger through introduction, say ‘Knight Matson’. The first and last. He’d patiently respected that.

Daylight’s waning moments bathed the cliff sides in a warm afterglow, the snow reflecting it back upward. Through the glass, Maynard’s most prominent features were painted with brushstrokes of marigold and violet, prompting satisfaction to run its course through her.

In his arms, she could feel how she affected him. The same sort of pleasant happiness she felt reverberating through that ethereal tether. She loved him, adored him, found his brain endlessly fascinating, the stories in his scars gripping, and his body enticing. She wanted him as much as he wanted her, with a gnawing need that felt like it'd spread to her bones, to the very fabric of who she was.

"To think all it took was some bumbling farm boy making explosion noises to sweep a beauty like you off her feet."

That made her laugh.

“Yeah, that was...definitely the moment I knew you were the one.” Loske chuckled at the memory aboard Peace. It was a day that she could reflect on with gratitude, because if she’d never sent that message, and he’d never shown up, and they’d never...if she’d never seen his face, would she still be waiting for him? There were too many what if’s that weren’t worth spending time over. In the end, it didn’t matter. They were here now, together. “It was the accuracy of pitches I think and the final boosh. Just an..” she emphasized a swooning sigh, “Irresistible mating call.” Since that day, they’d been nigh inseparable. Even now they fit together like puzzle pieces. A trill of anticipation pricked her skin where he kissed and coursed through her body. She slipped her hands over his in a staying response, as if her caress could keep the tides at bay. His nudge felt treasuring and appreciating, the foundation of close companionship.

“But also, kind of.” Loske murmured in reflection, sinking into his hold. “I guess you could reason that was just a preview to the passion you take to everything, without losing your roots and who you are. So that’s.. not entirely untrue.” It had just taken her a regretful handful of time to enact and realize it.

Because as important as it was, Maynard Treicolt’s focused, battle-hardened mind wasn’t the most alluring thing about him. It wasn’t even his restless determination and tenacity, nor his protectiveness. It wasn't his eyes or his smile or his broad shoulders or muscles sculpted from natural effort, though she appreciated all of that like the work of art he was. No, the alluring thing about Maynard Treicolt was that he listened to her needs and desires with the same foundation of conviction he took everywhere else. He found purpose in honesty, did not judge, and offered his own in return. It was a pure foundation that had initiated their friendship and strengthened when they wanted it to be more.

Another wave of excitement rolled through her and she closed her eyes, tightening her grip on his wrists and she sighed contentedly before spewing an admittance: “I want to tell everyone and no-one at the same time. Keep it for ourselves.” She turned on him, pressing her hips against his and looping arms around his neck once more, her voice picking up speed with her excitement. “We could leave tonight. Between everything. Get out of Imperial space.” She made a face, an indistinguishable twist between humour and actuality. The actual side of it was they had no family they had to worry about inviting or notifying, but they did have friends who deserved some happiness in their life too. But was that selfish? She eased the consideration out into the open: “But then you might miss out on Ryv throwing you one of those bachelor parties or something.

Either way, Farmer boy,” She shared a conspiratorial wink “Your future {riduur}..” the word wife felt almost taboo between them, and like it wasn't real enough yet, or it felt too cheesy to say –– so she opted to show off her attempt to try and adopt his culture. The inclusion of her poorly pronounced mando'a hopefully display enough at her dedication to that Concordian renewal dream. Something electric in her stomach tightened, and her sheepish grin grew coyer “er..wife..could do with being swept off her feet again right about now.”

 

[Maynard Treicolt]

The fact she was able to twist and distort the good nature'd self maligning comment of long past antics as a newly resurgent Jedi fresh from his existence as a solitary spacer drew that irrevocable smile even wider. A sign of where they started and how far they’d come. The Maynard only a few years prior would’ve laughed into another sip of liquor at the prospect of him being a Jedi Knight General of a newly resurgent Galactic Alliance with a lover and now wife beyond his imaginable limits of mortal beauty.

He always feared the moment it might ever be swept from under him and he’d coalesce at the bottom and rot away like he’d always been expected to. But she always made that wither into nothingness. There was boundless opportunity in those eyes, a future of hearth and home. Something which would so brightly contrast their youth of danger and peril, but it was a toll to be paid out in spades later at the dawning of the 'triocolt' and the settling of the storm. Even if this sealing of fates brought a sense of permanence to that reality...itself felt longingly distant from him. The Third Imperial Civil War and the liberation of Concord Dawn would certainly not be the only things between them and that long justified end.

After she regaled him him of one reason after another that she'd cherished him so, she offered a peculiar proposition.

“I want to tell everyone and no-one at the same time. Keep it for ourselves.”

“We could leave tonight. Between everything. Get out of Imperial space.”

“But then you might miss out on Ryv throwing you one of those bachelor parties or something.

"For all I care you could just take the name now and we just keep going like nothing ever happened at all. It's for us, not for anyone else." Maynard suggested. Ever in favor of a policy keeping what belonged to them, ultimately, to themselves. Knighted at the very nexus point of the formation of the Galactic Alliance or in some corner of Tython, it didn't matter to him. He just wanted to cherish the moments of triumph with those he cared about in the end. Though their station, certainly as a propaganda figures in the Galactic Alliance 'two lovers, man and wife fighting side by side against the Sith, they're doing their part why aren't y- blah blah.' , earned them all the grandness and revelry that could be reasonably desired in an occasion celebrating their union.

But they wanted none of that, 'wasn't their style'.

"We could leave, yeah...but you know the second we get back into 'blue' space we'll be handed some other assignment or mission. Probably to go out and kill some terrorists, whatever it'll be. Imperial space or not...its just us, this sunset, probably a bottle of something with some bite hidden around here...wouldn't quite mind just keeping this moment for 'us' at all, blue." Maynard suggests to her. Then following up that comment with a question all his own.

"But if you'd wanna jump ship and go anywhere...where would that be? Call it a honeymoon, if you want." The Concordian says before the comment of a 'bachelor party' enters the fray. With a faint laugh, he speaks to deflect the prospect almost immediately.

"Ryv might just have to figure that one out himself. I think the night before...the night of and just about any time afterwards...I'd just wanna be with you." He admitted truthfully, a grasp of his hands easing her body closer to his until his forehead pressed against hers in the embrace of forms, a single hand remaining on her hip as another coursed more behind.

"Either way, Farmer boy,”

“Your future {riduur}..”

“er..wife..could do with being swept off her feet again right about now.”

He couldn't help but offer a laugh that snapped at some of the compounded tension between them as she tried to speak in his homeworld's accustomed tongue, a language he could only passably carry full conversations with.

"Oh really? Something gave me that impression...just so happens..." He says, drawing a breath before he seems to offer her a look over before his eyes lock with hers once more, immediately trapped in her gaze.

"You have a riduur yourself...who wouldn't mind indulging." Maynard offers before his lips press to hers, daring to bare his teeth unto her bottom lip with a playful tug as he hungrily indulges for a moment before breaking the contact once more.

"A bottle of 'gold...somewhere warm...just the two of us doesn't sound too bad right now." He says before all but contradicting his offer to 'leave' this spot at all as he eased her back against the very transparent wall they'd admired the sunset through not moments prior, letting those purple and orange hues paint over his face as he looked over her with a smile and gaze of sultry admiration.

Loske Treicolt

 

[Loske Treicolt]

C O N T R O L ​

“Just take it?” She parted her mouth to speak an objection, but swallowed it for now. “Consider what’s yours, mine then.” That’s how it had gone for the most part so far, his ship, his home dream, his name. Their ship. Their home dream. Their name. Loske was more than happy to adopt and nurture for all of everything he gave her, when she had little to give. All she had was the dream of the future and the ability to keep him out of the dark realms of his mind.

Getting into the details of official and legal things she actually didn’t know about wasn’t worth it, and so, like her apprehension about the outcomes of Kyber Dark, she relegated the topic to the back of her mind and focused on the present. The moment just for the two of them. She hummed her agreement and rolled her wrists so her fingers could run through the ends of his hair while he continued to offer his counter opinion, finding and twisting the ends of a strand.

"We could leave, yeah...but you know the second we get back into 'blue' space we'll be handed some other assignment or mission. Probably to go out and kill some terrorists, whatever it'll be. Imperial space or not...its just us, this sunset, probably a bottle of something with some bite hidden around here...wouldn't quite mind just keeping this moment for 'us' at all, blue."

"But if you'd wanna jump ship and go anywhere...where would that be? Call it a honeymoon, if you want."

He was right. Imperial space or not, these luxe quarters were just for them. Just like that, he reminded her how safe she was now. When was the last time they could appreciate a Sunset for more than a few minutes? Alderaan? Maybe while walking through Coruscant, but, the city sky hardly counted. Through his rationalizing, she realized none of her fears would manifest tonight, not so soon in the wake of Bastion. Traipsing back into Alliance territory, at least Coruscant, would trigger several outreach messages. Safe to bet none of them congratulatory. She exhaled her defeat through her mouth, murmuring a sentiment of agreement to his clairvoyant observation. “You’re probably right. We can..steal a few more days for a honeymoon after tonight. I don’t know where. Somewhere with a shoreline.” The meadows of Alderaan had been sweet, but they had the benefit of seeking new experiences. What a luxury they were blessed with — the ability to hop from planet to planet. Some people would never leave Scipio.

"Ryv might just have to figure that one out himself. I think the night before...the night of and just about any time afterwards...I'd just wanna be with you."

She smirked at the denial of a celebration, and his preference to continue protecting what was theirs. She might have expected that. She should have, anyway. “Fine. But! I’m referring to you as my groom tonight then. I expect to be called bride at least once.”

Drawn so close together they were practically braiding their breath, her remaining awareness suggested she couldn’t prolong her needs much longer with flirtatious commentary. After seeing him on death’s doorstep again, feeling his waning light and low breaths in her arms, his blood on her hands, she’d been so afraid that would be the final way she saw him. Now, betrothed, she ached for that level of intimacy only he could deliver, one she couldn’t help but long for. On the topic of selfishness, she couldn’t maintain her poise much longer. She needed his hold, and for all the emotions that had just been shared between them, some sort of release.

The laugh he offered was the premiere foray to shared ecstasy, and she pursed her lips in brief acknowledgement to the emphasis of the u in the foreign word. She knew she was off by a bit, but his repetition showed where and by how much.

His grip flared sparks, and his mouth tasted like fire. Lips that knew hers, that knew when to pull her in, and back away, and then in again with pressure that was torch-like. Like an ocean tide or the ebbing pangs of an addiction. Her fingers spread against the back of his head in response, threading in his hair and grasping tightly to keep herself as close to him as physically able while standing. An involuntary shudder elapsed when he pulled away, finalizing the plans for the rest of the evening and she exhaled through her teeth. The glass did a good job keeping the external temperatures out, but it was chilled against her shoulders and she involuntarily arched in vague protest to the sensation but she still grinned: Bright, white and happy.

“I think we can warm up anywhere.” Loske suggested coyly, but gave an indicative point with her chin in the direction of the hearth snapping and popping a distance away. His eyes were leading, the way he looked at her was enough to win any sort of location debate. That hazel hold made her all too aware of a rolling, deep flutter below her navel, just beneath the skin at the center of her hips. She met his look with her own, flaring with unmistakable heat like someone trying to boil the ocean in her eyes. It was a practiced, wordless exchange.

It was settled then. No departures into this night. Maynard hadn’t explored much of this apartment anyway, given he’d been forced to focus on mending and waking up intact. Her hand slipped up to the knot keeping the wrapped fatigues draped around her body, and gave it a few seconds of finagling before a decisive tug undid the tie and the garment fell to an open invitation. Only a few seconds for appraisal were offered before she pulled her toward him to action her smoldering yearning. //

The sun had long since set, the violet and orange hues replaced only with the glimmering golden highlight over their silhouettes from the fireplace. Time had been lost to rhythm, and she wasn’t sure how much closer they were to dawn, but the warm blues that threatened to creep up from the canyons and take over the starlight suggested they weren’t far from morning.

“Not bad for a dead man walking.” Loske complimented, making a flicking gesture with her forefinger and thumb to use an invisible hand to dislodge the cap from the tall tube of pretty liquor. It settled easily, and she stretched to pour two glasses. Keeping one for herself, she passed the other to her lover, tinking the rims briefly in cheers. This wasn’t the first dip into the bottle, but she was certainly a slow drinker. Each sip pulled her cheeks and bit her tongue, but the symbolism of the drink made it worth it. And it’s powers of extensibility to her happy buzz. Turned out Maynard didn’t have to initiate The Renegade’s lightspeed to make her see stars. There was a little galaxy unleashed within, and she was still humming from the kaleidoscopic sensation.

She tucked her legs up on the couch’s cushions, nestling against him and drawing a finger over his fresh scar, unable to conceal her frown. Pressing her palm to it, she tried to imagine his torso without it. It was so new, but so...permanent. And deep. “Can you still feel him?” She asked, tilting her head up to look at his stubble-lined jawline. “Vyrin, I mean. I can’t imagine what that would have felt like amidst everything else that happened on that battlefield.” At that she scooched up a bit, resting an arm on the back of the sofa and propping her head up to look at him more eye level. "What else did you feel on that battlefield, anyway? Anything?"

 

[Maynard Treicolt]

W I T H O U T _ Y O U

“Fine. But! I’m referring to you as my groom tonight then. I expect to be called bride at least once.”

"If that's what you want, my bride." He manages to tease with a grin before delving into another kiss.

It was a swift and elysian spiraling descent from a conversation of bated breaths so poignant and sentiment of their future before a shared want and hunger between them . All those worries and buried contemplation melted away between them as he fixated solely on her body. The more she gave to him, the more he took. Each perfect curve and imperfect blemish all but an intoxicating treasure which he obsessively domineered over with each grasp and squeeze of want.

He needed it. That moment to forget about everything else. To forget about the war, the death, the struggle all to be welcomed in her warmth. A reprieve in blissful isolation from the universe to feel so alive after feeling so close to death. After managing to crest and begin the climb down from that serene high he took the glass of liquor offer to him, returning that faint ‘clank’ of the vessel in return as he ease himself back into the sofa.

He couldn’t retrace those steps of how they got here, having been so solely fixated on her but he was thankful enough to be situated somewhere warm, comfortable. That hand over the vicious wound over his chest. It'd healed but it was jagged, brutal sight having been the laceration inflicted by a Sith sword and not the smooth cauterization of a lightsaber. But it'd heal over, the mark would be there still not that it was anything all too foreign to Maynard's form, nor hers. He remembered the first sight of angered disbelief at the sight of her healing wounds after Muunilinst. The way the searing cuts marred her skin...it was a nauseating vision but one he was able to grow comfortable with as it grew to associate with her greater beauty and not the pain of that moment.

“Can you still feel him?”

“Vyrin, I mean. I can’t imagine what that would have felt like amidst everything else that happened on that battlefield.”

"What else did you feel on that battlefield, anyway? Anything?"

It wasn't anything short of one of the more unusual follow up questions she could've ever asked him. But he understood the curiosity over the matter, it certainly wasn't any sight or reality either had adjusted to.

"Not...really, but no one ever really leaves you. What with the Force and all. So yes...and no." A complex answer to a complex question as he drank down a long draw of the liquor as he leaned himself back in his seat with narrowed eyes fixated on a point of nothingness as their means of physical contact were bridged only her intriguing brushing of fingers over his wounds and an errant hand of his on her thigh. It was a horrid thing to contemplate over, his will to live snuffing out a wisened, beneveolent spirit who'd only ever meant good by him and everyone else.

"I felt...when it happened...the order. When the Imperials flipped it on the Sith. I could tell immediately that death, hatred, betrayal. But that's war... And that's what we're fighting...the Sith. Maybe wasn't...the right way but you remember how you felt near them? On JanFathal? Just- imagine that all the time for all them...like what Waylon felt or what the Imperator felt. All the way back to the Sith Empire...I'd probably do the same if I felt that way all the time." Maynard admits in a morbid truth.

"Wish I could've been around to save him...and put a few in the ground myself. Me and Ryv told eachother, right before we jumped...we were there to kill Sith...I just didn't make good on it." Treicolt admits, searing off any nuance of what the command could imply in favor of a brazen dislike outright.

Loske Treicolt

 

[Loske Treicolt]

"Not...really, but no one ever really leaves you. What with the Force and all. So yes...and no."

She supposed that was as good as it was going to get. That was one of the parts about The Force that always made her uneasy. It used to breed malcontent, but now she was just placidly accustomed to it. The inconclusiveness of self, and the acceptance of the indescribable. The Force often created more questions than it gave answers and it was their duty to peer into the ether to look at nothing and everything all at the same time. At least Vyrin wasn’t lingering around in a disruptive or..creepy way. Loske hummed in acknowledgment, slowly drawing her touch away from the freshly risen skin.

Why did she have to tug that thread? Why couldn’t she be content murmuring sweet nothings into his ear all night long? She’d been concerned for him, surely that was the sole purpose for her prompt. She bit her lip to keep from interrupting or speaking too swiftly on her own apprehensions on everything. He seemed to reason relatively swiftly that it might not have been the best way to go about the act, despite its effectiveness. That shouldn’t have been deeply surprising, Maynard was ultimately about outcomes before method.

"I felt...when it happened...the order. When the Imperials flipped it on the Sith. I could tell immediately that death, hatred, betrayal.

But that's war... And that's what we're fighting...the Sith. Maybe wasn't...the right way but you remember how you felt near them? On JanFathal? Just- imagine that all the time for all them...like what Waylon felt or what the Imperator felt. All the way back to the Sith Empire..

“Yeah, I..” Loske shifted, dropping her eyes to her knees. That level of rationality made the strike make all the more sense, but her initial reaction was still fearful. Maynard’s rationale didn’t make the Imperator faultless. “I remember. That’s probably..fair.”

She immediately regretted opening this door. At least earlier in the evening, she’d done a better job at focusing on the new, fresh, boundless opportunity ahead of them, not so..typical and keeping the banter light and on themselves, until she couldn’t talk anymore and initiated the whole process again that got them to the pillow talking phase to begin with. And here they were again, descending from the high. She released a shuddery breath, before sucking down another gulp of the stinging liquor that turned smooth only after it passed over her tongue. The Merenzane slipped easily through her system, and she felt it warming in a pool in her stomach.

...I'd probably do the same if I felt that way all the time."

Her stomach tightened all the way up to her chest when he said he might make a similar order. In protest, she shook her head and stretched to put her glass back down on the table, sliding both free hands over his roaming one. It was hard to project how someone would respond in that situation, the scary part was, Maynard was now in a position to make those sorts of calls.

“Maybe.” She started slowly, “Maybe you would. But..you know The Force. You know the difference between a Sith, a Jedi, or even someone who’s got some dark tendencies. I..” she ran her fingers through her hair pulling the ends over her shoulders in fret before letting them drop and seeking to put her hands back near his, to stop herself from further anxious gestures.

“I’m scared that someone is making the call who doesn’t know the difference. The two different sides of the same coin. Not in a purposefully ignorant way, but in a way that they might harbour the same kind of resentment against The Sith against any Force User. Like a schism of power and the threat..we..uh..we could pose to their hold.

Those Sith, yeah, they were..they’ve been uncomfortable to be around, I don’t think either of us has agreed with it, but they made sacrifices the same as others to be discarded and turned on. And that’s..fine I guess but..it’s also not? I don’t know.

If one man has the power to say someone’s too dangerous to be kept alive, and then kill them, then what does that make him?” She stopped trying to look elsewhere at that point, meeting his gaze with hers. For all the mirth that had been there earlier, that trepidation she’d suffocated up to now was starting to cloud up in her eyes. The fallout had scared her. It was more than war, and Maynard had touched on the personal aspect of it.

"Wish I could've been around to save him...and put a few in the ground myself. Me and Ryv told eachother, right before we jumped...we were there to kill Sith...I just didn't make good on it."

Loske wasn’t sure if this was one of those times where he was on the cusp of slipping into self doubt, or just ruminating on a lost opportunity he’d been looking forward to making good on.

That was..the first thing he’d said alluding to Waylon other than ‘It’s alright’. Her light eyes traced over him for a second before she gave a response and leaned forward to place a gentle kiss at the crow’s stretch of his eye.

“I know. As much as I hate to say it, there’s going to be a next time. Kyber Dark didn’t get every rotten thing.

And..I know we keep saying we’ll do it together, but I..I left on Bastion.” She’d accomplished the mission, but she didn’t feel guiltless about it. In her mind’s eye, Maynard’s suffering had been a sacrifice to that. He’d just been trying to uphold his end of the bargain to Kir. “I’m trying not to get overwhelmed with the what ifs and if only I’d just...kept my promise to you and not put that responsibility in Ryv’s hands, but I..I really, truly mean now we have..” She swiftly righted herself. “I have to treat that with more honour. Especially now, in the wake of that fallout and what it could turn into.”

 

[Maynard Treicolt]

They were all nuances beyond his understanding. Much easier to register than whatever whirlwind was wrought by the defection of Allyson Locke, but even then it was barely a reprieve. He was never asked to debate the inner machinations of Imperial warlords or stratocratic dogma. The New Imperial Order, even if it once played host to his kin and would hopefully soon enough be the very government which rips his homeland back from the Sith Empire, they weren't his people. He yearned for that freedom, those open skies, that final stone to end the path they walked in triumphant elysium.

These New Imperials seemed to get their job done, but they wouldn't instill that happiness, that rightful dream for them. Though all the same, he couldn't play to the whims of the Alliance in the hopes they'd offer the same. It was up to the two of them and no one else to make good on their promises.

“Maybe.”

“Maybe you would. But..you know The Force. You know the difference between a Sith, a Jedi, or even someone who’s got some dark tendencies. I..”

“I’m scared that someone is making the call who doesn’t know the difference. The two different sides of the same coin. Not in a purposefully ignorant way, but in a way that they might harbour the same kind of resentment against The Sith against any Force User. Like a schism of power and the threat..we..uh..we could pose to their hold.

Those Sith, yeah, they were..they’ve been uncomfortable to be around, I don’t think either of us has agreed with it, but they made sacrifices the same as others to be discarded and turned on. And that’s..fine I guess but..it’s also not? I don’t know.

If one man has the power to say someone’s too dangerous to be kept alive, and then kill them, then what does that make him?”

"It all makes him a dictator. Not sure why the fuck you'd be surprised by any of it really. But all that shit is politics. The lesser of two evils. Its either you get the Sith...the Sith indoctrinate all their people into a cult in worship of a Dark Lord who is too much of a limp dick fuck to show his face in battle. The same people who defended Mandalore from 'terrorists' and then wiped the planet clean to infest it with 'Graug' the second they had the chance. Put Concord Dawn to the torch. Kor Vexen, he was there. Hammerfall, Kintan. He can rot six feet deep all I give a damn. Kezeroth? Fuck him. The whole reason the Core has Blackwing at all. Avernus? Same old shit, intolerable prancing fuck head...they can all have that same fate for all I care." Maynard says before he drowns his lips in the last of the liquor from his glass, leaning forward to refill it once more. It felt good to decompress this way, at least to him it did. Reminded him that he was alive after being so close to death.

"The Imperials aren't great either...I mean they all had the Sith help them and they put blasters to the back of their head. I can't imagine their people are all too fucking happy under their rule but when the Sith leave a twenty k rad gift for the worlds they leave behind just about anything is better than that." Maynard remarks. It was the fate of Muunilinst and Mygeeto at the very least, the planets wiped clean and glassed in the wake of the New Imperial Order overtaking the Sith defenses. His second bout of bitter sentiment is followed with another long draw of the merenzane.

“I know. As much as I hate to say it, there’s going to be a next time. Kyber Dark didn’t get every rotten thing.

And..I know we keep saying we’ll do it together, but I..I left on Bastion.”

“I’m trying not to get overwhelmed with the what ifs and if only I’d just...kept my promise to you and not put that responsibility in Ryv’s hands, but I..I really, truly mean now we have..”

“I have to treat that with more honour. Especially now, in the wake of that fallout and what it could turn into.”

"I keep telling you that. I don't know how many times now...that we're better together." Maynard iterates for the umpteenth over. It really was becoming a perpetual sentiment for him. Not that it was a difficult one to hold being as he only ever just wanted to be...with her. And on the field of battle, it gave him that feeling of control of their own fates with one another instead of leaving it to the whims of the chaos in war. It would be far easier to accept whatever happens then, even if he himself would be the vessel of infliction to his own fury if she was hurt at all. In the hands of someone else? They might not live moments after revealing the damages done to her.

He leans forward once more, setting the almost emptied cup of liquor on the table infront of him as he rests his elbows on his knees, his palms pressing against his forehead in addled contemplation.

Maynard manages to draw a deep breath before he leans back, looking back to her again. In that moment, whatever agitated bout he was soon to unfurl withered to nothingness when he looked into her eyes. That intoxicating azure gaze captured him for a moment or two, finding peace and comfort in just...the sight of her. The sight of her well, alive, alone with him. That alone was enough to settle him at ease.

"I just want to do good by my bride. Whatever it is..." He offers.

Loske Treicolt

 

[Loske Treicolt]

Loske was mostly silent during Maynard’s response. Mesmerized in the way his face moved, or looked like it was moving, with the constantly animated shadows from the leaping flames in the hearthstone behind her. The orange and golden glow cast and stretched over his cheeks, nose, eyes and mouth. The way the flickering embers made the small, lingering beads of perspiration seem as though they were dancing along his brow, somehow made the fervency of his outburst all the more intense. Her grip on the glass tightened.

"It all makes him a dictator. Not sure why the fuck you'd be surprised by any of it really. But all that shit is politics. The lesser of two evils.

The recount of Sith after Sith, and the outcomes of what would happen if.. Kyber Dark didn’t, was one of his more passionate topics. Usually she loved this side of him, the confidence in purpose that dipped in uncouth humour. It’s the side he used to rally his team, bolster attitudes, focus on the objective. Even picking them apart, he touched on the pieces that were important to him, highlighting their faults as almost personal wrongs; making it something to get impassioned over.

“I guess it’s not surprising. Or, you’re right, it shouldn’t be. Maybe I just hoped that the people that are getting it done aren’t..all bad.” Loske slouched into her seat, under the weight of her own naivety.

His feeling toward The Sith, all Sith, was unchanged. He had cause to hate them. They’d ripped everything from him and destroyed his life. But it seemed to blind him from the core of what she’d meant to say, but that might have been her fault. Had she meant to conceal her fear behind the distraction of something so hateful?

“That part makes sense, something about it feels...I still don’t know. But there’s a nuance to it that scares me.” She paused, this was the part she was intimidated by. “I’m scared Tavlar has or will have, the power to make that same extermination call on any Force user. On us, Jedi, once he proves how effective it was against The Sith.

I don’t know when, and I don’t know how, but he seems like a strong-willed man. And he’s not immortal, he’s going to want to do it before he dies so..” Time wasn’t an infinite luxury. Her free hand ran through her hair again, shifting the part to the side and running her fingers along her chin in thought before all her fingertips met wrapped around her glass, just warming the liquid inside now. “I don’t know. I just know I’m afraid, and maybe I’m getting worked up for nothing." She clicked the rim against her teeth, forcing herself to take a sip and pause in her sentence, looking past him at the soft snowfall outside while the bitter amber stung her tongue. Instead of hiding her words, they were amplified by the shape of the glass "I probably am, honestly.”

Not knowing was the worst part, perhaps. Not knowing why she’d seen all those names of the people she loved. Not knowing ahead of time that Kyber Dark was a plan going to happen.

She tried to tell herself she was overreacting, that the focus was on the Sith and solely The Sith. It would end there. That was the whole campaign and purpose of the Imperial Order — take those who had been scorned by the Empire and give them the opportunity to keep living in a regime, but with a twist. And, bonus, they’d get revenge time and time again. She tried telling herself that, but she was getting less and less persuasive.

“Maybe we can depend on The Alliance not to do that to us, and not be swayed by a dictator outside their borders. An Imperial, no less. But if we keep allying ourselves so closely, I’m just.. worried I guess that we’ll be the ones with blasters to the back of our heads eventually. Or maybe I’m letting a dark vision get to me — on Bastion, someone got into my mind and, I don’t know if there’s a shelf in my head neatly labeled” she spread her hands to gesture, the liquid in the glass jostling in protest in its container “Loske’s Greatest Fears, but it was everyone’s names all written out on tombs. Bernard, Kir, Leon, Ryv, Auteme, Allyson, Zaavik, And you were..” she covered her mouth, trapping the end of the sentence behind her palm. It hadn’t been true, and she didn’t want to say it out loud. In case it made it so. He could put the pieces together, nothing moved her to such trepidation than watching him in a state of total vulnerability.

She watched him carefully like there was a rolling tide that thrashed and burgeoned within him. On the other end of that ethereal link, she felt it shroud, tighten, and fold in and out. Whatever negotiation that was going on in his mind, it diffused and cooled.

"I keep telling you that. I don't know how many times now...that we're better together."

Loske was probably undeserving of his persistent patience. He’d always been both of those things, right up to the moment where she might have broken his heart by walking away the first time, unable to sort through her emotions. She was..better at doing that now, but she still pinched the area between her eyes to avoid looking too shameful. “I know, I’m sorry.”

Allyson had strung her along on a confusing game of cat and mouse that had taken up too much of her mind space. With her arrested, she was out of Loske’s hair and her sense of duty was complete. Maybe it was a weakness baked into her DNA. It wasn’t beyond reason. Kiskla and Carnifex had the same sort of mutated fascination in the One Sith wars. It ended with his death and the destruction of Panatha’s reach.

If it weren’t for Maynard’s near fatality and Waylon’s actual fatality, Bastion would have been a pretty good experience for Loske. She’d been Knighted, arrested Allyson, and killed a Gen’dai responsible for Blackwing with her bare hands. It was the first time in the war where she’d hit her stride on the ground. Not been too slow, too distracted…. except for when it came to May and his family.

"I just want to do good by my bride. Whatever it is..."

She sniffed and gave a small smile at his dedication, tracing the rim of her glass with her fingertip before setting it down, unfinished.

“Helps that my groom trusts my asks to be reasonable.” This wasn’t the first time he’d proclaimed she had complete sway over his direction. He’d do whatever she asked. Whatever she needed, as long as she was happy.

Except to walk away from this war.

“You are, I mean you do. I mean..I love you so much and..”

She rubbed her eyes, looking backward at the fire for a distant moment. As if it had the answers somewhere in its flames, the ones they couldn’t reach tonight. The ones just out of their grasp.

Turning back to him, she didn’t say anything further for a few long seconds, letting the silence stretch between them. That time allowed for a level of self-awareness –– she was a bit of a chaotic mess. What was that word Cedric had used once when training her? A tempest. She’d been waiting with bated breath for May’s eyes to open again, pitched into having to explain to him Waylon was dead, proposed to, physically enraptured, and all throughout that nursing some distant fear she hadn’t talked through yet. The merenzane probably didn’t help but she'd said her piece. Aired her apprehensions out to dry, be weighed and judged but at least they were out of their cage. She needed it to keep talking about what was to come next.

“Hold me,” she murmured, crawling from her spot to his to force the action more than anything. His touch was far from unfamiliar, but with the creeping conversation they’d delved into, it had resurrected her nervous dread and it prickled along her skin. And she needed something constant so she didn’t spiral into her own head.

“You’re a General now. You have more influence than ever before and a say in how we –– the Alliance, the Jedi ––move forward.

What do you think is going to happen next? How do you want to see us involved in everything? With how you said it, it really starting for us. All the other shit aside.”

It was such a thin sliver of hope, but she felt herself jumping at it all the same. The equation was no longer about odds anymore, it was about stakes.

 

[Maynard Treicolt]

He nodded once into the concerned sentiment in Loske's tone. Bad men, getting things done. Why does it always seem to be that line that culminates in reality. It wasn't well in truly until the formation of the Galactic Alliance that Maynard ever recalled good men and women getting the job done. Putting aside the differences of the old Corellian Confederation and Grayson Imperium to consolidate into a more powerful, more prosperous government and nation designed to pave the way for a better Galaxy.

They'd consolidated the Core, they'd gotten that done. But at the end of the day, it was the terrorists in the Agents of Chaos putting the Sith-led CIS to the torch. ten out of every eleven soldiers on the rebel bloc to die on the Braxant Run were New Imperial in some capacity. The Galactic Alliance had a presence and it made it known, but overall it was a war on their part designed if anything to gather experience and kill Sith.

Bad men would always see their aim through to the end. Carnifex at Mandalore, Tavlar at Bastion. Always.

While the jury was still out on the New Imperial Order, they at least if nothing else, were stone cold. In a way the Alliance just wasn't. It wasn't how they faced inward that set them apart. The message from the Imperator gave every impression that he cared. That he cared about all those who'd hoisted the banner over Fortress Carnifex, now deemed Fortress Imperator and every last soul that willed it there. It was how they viewed the rest of the Galaxy. Republics, Democracies were naturally more optimistic, more faithful of the people to do right by justice and liberty. The Imperial was a different breed. Peace at the end of a sword, the rule of the mighty, the security of the people above all else.

The New Imperial Order might've had a real, human face, but it was still the rule of the few, the coveting of order and security above all else.

“I guess it’s not surprising. Or, you’re right, it shouldn’t be. Maybe I just hoped that the people that are getting it done aren’t..all bad.”

“That part makes sense, something about it feels...I still don’t know. But there’s a nuance to it that scares me.”

“I’m scared Tavlar has or will have, the power to make that same extermination call on any Force user. On us, Jedi, once he proves how effective it was against The Sith.

I don’t know when, and I don’t know how, but he seems like a strong-willed man. And he’s not immortal, he’s going to want to do it before he dies so.."

“I don’t know. I just know I’m afraid, and maybe I’m getting worked up for nothing."

"I probably am, honestly.”

"Depends on how the Alliance wants to play it. We put the Sith on the run, us and the Imps...but he's gotta be worried...gotta be scared about what we might we wanna do. No doubt this war is taking a toll on em right? If the Alliance, now with the Core with us was really determined to...we could move in and try our hand at putting an end to both of those Empires while they fight themselves. While they've ripped each other apart, the Alliance is doing just fine. No doubt he might be afraid of that. Us turning on them." Maynard remarks. Living in the grungy underbelly of the Galaxy exposed him to similar lines of thought, it was all a similar line of thinking. Gangsters from the top to the bottom. Even in the porcelain halls of the Imperial Palace of the uniform podiums of the Galactic Senate. So very few were as honest to anyone else as they were to themselves.

Tavlar was one of the more dangerous sorts of them. He very clearly was determined and very clearly wasn't afraid to get his hands dirty. But his ambitions were more shrouded than anyone outside of his inner circle had ever believed at the dawning of Kyber Dark. The waters ahead would be difficult to traverse, for the Alliance, Maynard and Loske, the Galaxy as a whole.

"For better or worse, its not up to us. However the Imps and the Alliance get along. I fought with them on Harnaidan, Borosk and you and me both on Dubrillion. They're not all too much different from us at the end of it. They all have those loved ones back home, those lost homes they're chasing, delusions of glory and grandeur, all of it. The difference only ever becomes noticeable at the top. Put me and say...I don't know, any of those Stormtroopers together, we probably get along just fine. You put Tavlar and Tagge in the same room, they might- well I'd say they'd gouge each other's eyes out but no offense to the ol' man Chancellor, I'll take Tavlar in that scrap every time." One was a desk politician and aristocrat and the other active military in all fairness. With Tagge being last seen before the Senate and Tavlar last seen stabbing a former Dark Councilor Sith Lord to death on the steps leading to the Imperial palace.

“Maybe we can depend on The Alliance not to do that to us, and not be swayed by a dictator outside their borders. An Imperial, no less. But if we keep allying ourselves so closely, I’m just.. worried I guess that we’ll be the ones with blasters to the back of our heads eventually. Or maybe I’m letting a dark vision get to me — on Bastion, someone got into my mind and, I don’t know if there’s a shelf in my head neatly labeled”

"Loske’s Greatest Fears, but it was everyone’s names all written out on tombs. Bernard, Kir, Leon, Ryv, Auteme, Allyson, Zaavik, And you were..”

"I'd hope I was on there." He said, letting off a faint, morbid laugh at the comment.

"Those kind of visions are only so true as you ever care to believe them...Ryv told me about similar before. I've seen the same...that kind of profound darkness that only exists in the back of your subconscious. But there isn't where you have the power. Its the here and now." Maynard states candidly, not that he was any profound expert on the matter and he'd certainly be the first to admit that.

“Helps that my groom trusts my asks to be reasonable.”

“You are, I mean you do. I mean..I love you so much and..”

“Hold me,”

“You’re a General now. You have more influence than ever before and a say in how we –– the Alliance, the Jedi ––move forward.

What do you think is going to happen next? How do you want to see us involved in everything? With how you said it, it really starting for us. All the other shit aside.”

He obliged by that plead. A simple one and perhaps the one he was most eager to answer for her and he did, abandoning another, now empty, glass to the table before he took her into his arms before letting her straddle his lap, his hands smoothing along her back to bring her against him in a warm, flush embrace of the two, planting a kiss against her collar bone as he runs his fingers through her blonde locks again, fielding her concerns all the same as he yearns for that closeness. That lover's embrace.

"I think we need to let the Galaxy know we're here and that we're here to protect our way of life. To protect our dreams, make good on them. We're surrounded by people evil or dumb enough to be a threat to us. We need to let them know they aren't. That we can protect our interests, preserve what we've built." Maynard says in a full breath of confidence before continuing.

"Or there will be more worlds like Concord Dawn, Mandalore, Ryloth. Worlds put to the torch because people were too afraid of the darkness. Too afraid to stand for themselves." He remarks.

Loske Treicolt

 

[Loske Treicolt]

"Depends on how the Alliance wants to play it. We put the Sith on the run, us and the Imps...but he's gotta be worried...gotta be scared about what we might we wanna do. No doubt this war is taking a toll on em right? If the Alliance, now with the Core with us was really determined to...we could move in and try our hand at putting an end to both of those Empires while they fight themselves. While they've ripped each other apart, the Alliance is doing just fine. No doubt he might be afraid of that. Us turning on them."

Getting her cogitations out in the open, and inviting that feedback loop to manifest felt good. It brought a warmth, a looseness, to the knot that had tightened in her stomach and chest and gnawed at her ribcage this whole time. The conviction and assurance that bled through each sentiment he delivered was the comfort she sought. She’d been sitting in her own head since Kyber Dark, distracted only with updates on Maynard’s well-being or updates from the front-lines as information was processed and the declaration of official victory got nearer and nearer. Having only her own voice on the matter eliminated the other angles, and made her vision narrow. Maybe she should have meditated.

Emptying her concerns out opened up more space for other feelings –– mostly, appreciation and deep respect. And the ability to listen.

“I hadn’t thought of that.” She admitted, validating his stream-of-thought and giving a small nod as if she were taking the idea and filing it away for later. There was a human there, at the head of the Imperium. And Maynard reminded her that helplessness wasn’t their only option. The two governments that had once only been one were busy with one another, and much like when Sith took the rebellion on Kuat as an opportunity, The Alliance could do that as well.

It was about recognizing the typhoon was approaching and battening down the hatches for it. Preventing the elements was beyond their scope.

"For better or worse, its not up to us. However the Imps and the Alliance get along. I fought with them on Harnaidan, Borosk and you and me both on Dubrillion. They're not all too much different from us at the end of it. They all have those loved ones back home, those lost homes they're chasing, delusions of glory and grandeur, all of it. The difference only ever becomes noticeable at the top. Put me and say...I don't know, any of those Stormtroopers together, we probably get along just fine. You put Tavlar and Tagge in the same room, they might- well I'd say they'd gouge each other's eyes out but no offense to the ol' man Chancellor, I'll take Tavlar in that scrap every time."

There was something painful about being told that things weren’t up to them. She’d known, and been frustrated for a long time. They were cogs in the machine. The only thing that was up to them is if they kept churning or not, or if they broke down and had to be replaced. They didn’t stop the machine, just had the power to inconvenience it.

It had a space in her mind, that awareness, and it would continue to reside in her peripheral. She didn’t need to be paralyzed with fear, but make decisions that acknowledged it for the reality it was and steer herself around it like an obstacle.

Despite the overarching sentiment of the delivery, she smirked at the mental picture of the poised Emmen Tagge and the rugged Irveric Tavlar. “Even if Tavlar has 50% more work to do?” She gestured between both her eyes, and held up her middle and pointer finger for the universal sign of ‘two’ to indicate Emmen only had to gauge one remaining Imperator eye to be victorious.

"I'd hope I was on there."

The humour didn’t stop there and she used the back of her hand to thwack against his chest, and shook her head. Losing him was her greatest fear, a wretched reality and a poor thing to laugh at. Her lips twisted, unable to completely conceal her amusement. “You have your own room, nevermind shelf.”

"Those kind of visions are only so true as you ever care to believe them...Ryv told me about similar before. I've seen the same...that kind of profound darkness that only exists in the back of your subconscious. But there isn't where you have the power. Its the here and now."

His comment to visions and fears and the sway they had over her was a sobering reality, and she’d come to a similar conclusion. To leave it to atrophy. She nodded slowly in agreement, considering the ramifications of fear. She’d been scared a lot lately, between Allyson’s defection and Kyber Dark all that confidence she’d manifested earlier was a struggle to cultivate. It felt wrong and she knew it, like she was out of sorts.

"I think we need to let the Galaxy know we're here and that we're here to protect our way of life. To protect our dreams, make good on them. We're surrounded by people evil or dumb enough to be a threat to us. We need to let them know they aren't. That we can protect our interests, preserve what we've built."

"Or there will be more worlds like Concord Dawn, Mandalore, Ryloth. Worlds put to the torch because people were too afraid of the darkness. Too afraid to stand for themselves."

“You sound like a general.” Loske said softly and proudly, noting the confidence behind the delivery. The words he blanketed her in were reassuring, but his arms were better. Almost like a sedative. Or sunlight cracking through her tempestuous clouds. Either way, it was another reminder that she needed him and they’d managed to strike an unequivocal balance of dependence and reliability over the course of their time together. More to keep falling in love with. She tightened against him.

“Thank you.” She whispered against his hair, pulling back a bit to let their eyes meet. The oranges from the fire lit one half of his face, and the creeping indigo from the piquing morning sky lit the other. For as tired as she should have been, the fatigue hadn’t set in yet –– though she could see it leering behind the mountaintops, hopping from snowflake to snowflake.

A soft ding from the other side of the room pulled her attention. It was amplified enough to recognize it was a widely distributed message between both their comms. The source of the sound from the only way to manage communication with the outside world. It was easy enough to feel it out as an inanimate gap in the Force, and draw the datapad to her palm.

It was a broadcast, a proclamation of success. She was angled against him so the information could be digested and shared. Her and Waylon’s names were on there. Few others she recognized, save for Lyra’s and the Imperator’s himself. Several Sith that had been within the New Imperial Order’s ranks had been listed. Seemed the tally was complete, all inventory of sides had been done. The Imperials were certainly efficient in their reclamation of the ground they’d defected from. There’d probably be funerals for the fallen Imperials in the coming days or some sort of celebration dancing on the dirt of the city that had been under the Sith’s boot for too long. Unlikely the Dark Emperor would be around to participate.

The hunt was on.

“While we’re here..” Loske murmured, swiping the scrawl away and instead illuminating a stretch of stars between them. Any colour that had been highlighting their features was replaced with the projection’s cerulean glow. “Ord Cantrell is much closer than Alderaan or Chandrila for scenery. And it’s not in anyone’s controlled space –– we could actually steal some covert time for a honeymoon. Away from the snow and a giant finance fortress.”

She ran her fingers through his hair, a creeping, roguish grin spreading “Think 'ol Renegade can manage the trip?” It’d been a while since either of them had the spare time to dedicate to any maintenance of the freighter. Not that it truly needed it.