Private Based on what?

[Lothaire]

The corners of his vision darkened further as the stims began to wear away. He caught a vague glittering of purple as Miri's dress reflected the dim light and momentary streaks of laser fire crossing along the room. More boots stomped in the halls beyond; either reinforcements or curious onlookers. Lothaire couldn't do much about them either way.

Strangers approached. The whirring of servos followed with them. Lothaire was slipping in and out of consciousness by the time 'Leia' had left the room, a medical droid hurriedly attempting to stabilize him. Several organic paramedics were dragging the dead and dying away, even as the new group of guards opened up one anyone carrying something that vaguely looked like a weapon.

He slipped in, then out, then in again.

When he awoke again with some sense in his limbs, he was staring up at the red photoreceptors of the medical droid. "W-w-" he sat up, and quickly fell onto his hands, expelling the contents of his stomach onto the kitchen floor. The droid looked on at him apathetically.

"Where's the girl?" He demanded as he wiped his mouth with one of the unconscious Nikto's sleeves.

"That is woefully unspecific." The droid chimed.

Lothaire grabbed the thing by both its arms, eyes wide like a rabid hound. "Girl who was with me. Purple dress, dark hair. Had a gold case."

The droid tilted its head back, watching as one of the guards disemboweled a spice fiend with his vibroblade. "I passed a woman fitting such a description on my way in."

"Thanks," Lothaire grunted as he stumbled up to his feet, his legs feeling like jelly beneath him. He braced himself against the wall, making himself as small as possible as he made his way out of the auction hall. The droid attempted to follow, but Lothaire just waved it off.

"Schutta shot me," he mumbled to himself, one hand on the wall, the other scrambling or his stim-pack. The familiar cylindrical shape was comforting in his hand - soon his agony would be an afterthought.

With little regard for what effects, it might have on his health, Lothaire popped the top of the stim, undid the clasp on his breastplate, and slammed the needle into the receiver port above his heart.

The rush was instantaneous, though far messier this time. Colors faded in and trailed as he walked past them, the solidity of his reality warping as objects in his peripheral vision seemed to move of their own accord. As planned, the damage to his body became something of a non-issue. His muscles tensed for action; the aching left behind by his seizures more of an annoyance now as he pieced together a plan.

"She's gonna leave the station," he muttered to himself as he elbowed his way past panicking buyers. "Gotta catch her. Cut her off at the hangers." He keyed in the station diagnostic on his datapad. She'd beat him there, but with a bit of technical magic he might buy himself some time. The bastard-stumbled on toward the hangers as quickly as he could manage, fingers dancing over his datapad as he prepared his solution.

Miri Nimdok

 

[Miri Nimdok]

Maneuvering with the heavy gold chest through the fleeing guests was rather tricky. Add to that the station being put on high alert in the wake of the disaster, and it should’ve been nigh insurmountable to make her escape. But Miri managed it with some telepathic trickery, a kind word and a gun.

Her freighter, the Conestoga, was waiting for her. She dragged the chest up the loading ramp, then rushed to the cockpit. Sitting down in the pilot’s chair, she prepped for launch… only to hear the distinct sound of the engines failing. She slapped the console out of frustration, then hurried back out.

A few minutes later, she returned to the hangar with a stranglehold on a maintenance droid. “Get the engines working!” she ordered, tossing the machine up the ramp. The droid whirred away, getting to work running diagnostics, while Miri anxiously stood guard.

Lothaire​

 

[Lothaire]

Wasn't much means to track her.

He'd not found the opportunity to link in to her datapad during their brief attempt at stealth. Couldn't trace her that way, didn't know what ship she was flying or what hanger bay she'd parked it in either. Only thing he did know was that she was running, and probably about to get herself off the station. Case would be gone then, and with no means of knowing what ship it was on, possibly forever.

Total loss then. Couple cracked ribs and some internal bleeding for nothing. Lothaire grimaced at the thought, the finality of his failure falling over him like a wet blanket, smothering his fire and weighing him down where he stood.

"Can't go back like this," he growled, globs of blood dripping from his nose and spattering on the silver floor. He wiped the blood from his face as best he could, stood a little straighter, and pulled back from the wall he'd been bracing on.

The sound of laser fire pulled him from his stupor. Two bolts slammed into the wall on either side of him, a third flying high and into the ceiling. The prince blinked, his body reacting before his mind did, dropping into a roll behind an adjacent wall at an intersection of four halls. He peaked around the corner, caught sight of red armor and blasters.

Seemed security was getting a handle on things. The droid had probably marked him out as a thief, likely Leia too. Well aware that he'd lose out against a squad of armored soldiers, Lothaire jabbed his datapad interface module into the doorjack. Two seconds passed, the footfalls drawing nearer, before the datapad dinged and the doors to the hall hissed closed.

"Should hold you for a few," he muttered.

He was still uncertain where to go. Best path was to head back to his own ship now and make his escape before more security showed up. That meant leaving without the case though.

As he ruminated, something twinged at his consciousness. It was a light feeling, like a feather brushing past one's bare shoulder. Just enough to draw his addled attention. He was facing one of the halls that led to the hanger bays, the subtle sensation twisting into a certainty that began to fill in his gut. He could find her. Didn't know how. Didn't know why. Knew that he could though.

The run was short. Three separate doors awaited at the termination of the hall. Lothaire knew instantly which to follow. The middle door hissed open, revealing a motley hanger bay strewn with a handful of ships. He glanced between each of them and found himself drawn toward one vessel in particular. The sound of its engines firing, and then suddenly whirring out into failure echoed across the chamber.

That'd be it then.

He could chase, but then those engines might actually start working. Needed something else.

Wasting little time, Lothaire chipped in to the doorjack of the hanger, sealed the door behind him, and made his way toward the room's APC. Datapad into jack, simple translation of the code, then the commands.

The upload bar filled near instantly, and the blast doors of the hanger began to crunch and whir as they grumbled into place, interlocking just beyond the ray shield and sealing them both inside.

A temporary solution. Sounds of yelling on the other side of the door made its fleeting nature all the more apparent. Lothaire withdrew his datapad, though he left behind a ping shard. Simple command and the blast doors should open again.

Lothaire slammed another stim into his heart, cracking a determined grin as it burned away his pain and exhaustion. His vision was a dance of colors and vibrations now, but he could live with such complications.

Haggard and covered in blood both his own and otherwise, Lothaire approached the Conestoga, holdout blaster in hand. "Think we need to have a talk Leia, or whatever the fuck your name is."

Miri Nimdok

 

[Miri Nimdok]

The ray shield abruptly sealed shut, preventing the ship from leaving. Miri turned toward the doors, ready to face whatever adversary arrived, and beheld a bloodied and haggard Lothaire.

"Think we need to have a talk Leia, or whatever the fuck your name is."

She stiffened. “There’s no need to be rude. In a situation like this, you could at least maintain some sense of decorum.”

The gun felt cool in her bare hands. Part of her wanted to just shoot him. That was the temptation she lived with—the urge to casually end lives for the sake of avoiding a headache later on. Her father had a habit of being merciful to his enemies, yet most of them took that mercy and got up and came after him again. She had hated seeing it, hated experiencing it, yet couldn’t bring herself to hate Dad for trying. And she wound up emulating his mercy anyway, because she knew it was the right thing to do.

Still, the impulse remained. Kill this one now, so he can’t come back to haunt you later. It would make things so much easier…

“That said, at this point I'm afraid you and I wouldn't get much out of talking. Now that the charade is over, there's little left to say.” She touched her finger to her wrist, causing the faint shimmer of a personal energy shield to manifest like an aura around her body. “Don’t come any closer.”

Lothaire​

 

[Lothaire]

The laughter that tore from Lothaire's throat was bleeding bitterness. He couldn't help but cackle at the absurdity of the situation, how deep he'd dug himself, how matter-of-factly she dismissed him. His face split with a wicked grin as he composed himself, the slush of stims tapering off the pain. The gun in her hands replacing agony with anticipation.

"You shot me!" He threw his arms out wide and giggled again. "Took the case too after I had to go through those guys. Coughing up blood, think I'm dyin'." Something of an exaggeration, though not wholly untrue. He was completely out of touch with his body now, his mind teetering on the edge of lucidity, dangling atop the tip of a knife, held in place only by his outrage, adrenaline, and the stims.

He steadied himself, stood a little straighter as he stared 'Leia' dead in the eyes. "Doors are shut. Got the signal to open them right here," he tapped the data pad at his belt. "We're leaving on my terms."

The sound of yelling could be heard from behind the door leading to the halls. Seemed they'd made it through the first set of doors. Lothaire's grin slackened somewhat, indecision muddying his thoughts.

She'd shoot to kill this time. Did he have that in him? The will to kill someone for an object? To prevent possible mass murder in the future? It was for a good cause after all. What greater emotion could one experience than righteous indignation, and then expressing it on the object of their suffering?

He caught the flicker of an energy shield. Girl meant business then. Lacking any such niceties, Lothaire reached for the last of his stims, drawing back a sleeve and holding the point of the needle just over his exposed vein. His eyes never left hers.

"That chest you got there, stuff inside could kill hundreds. Can you live with that on your conscience?" He asked, even as the edges of her body began to shift and vibrate slightly. So too did the hard edges around her - a side affect of his brain's overstimulation from the stims. "Gonna shoot me again?" A brow was lifted, suicidal determination rumbling from Lothaire's chest as the sound of plasma cutters buzzed from the hallway door.

Miri Nimdok

 

[Miri Nimdok]

Gaze flicking toward his datapad, then briefly to the rattling door behind him, Miri pressed her lips together.

“You don’t know where I’m taking it, or why,” she answered. “But if there’s any hands it ought to never fall into, besides the Sith, it’s the Ashlan Crusade.”

Was she going to shoot him again? Get this whole thing over with?

There’s always another option, a familiar voice reminded her.

“Not if I can help it,” she replied. “But you are not going to stop me from leaving.”

With the Force, she reached for his datapad, snatching it from his belt with telekinesis. The device would quite literally fly into her hand—unless he did something to stop it.

Lothaire​

 

[Lothaire]

"Yeah, not like half our M-O is the decommission of Sith WMDs." Lothaire growled. Didn't get the girl's reasoning, but then he didn't get her at all either. Probably some sort of merc looking for some coin; the way she spoke implied other things, however. Her intent was something beyond money perhaps... or more likely, another trick to buy herself some time.

His lips parted to speak further, but the sound of a click at his belt stole his attentions. He glanced down, obviously confused, as the datapad was ripped from its place and sailed through the air toward the girl's outstretched hand. Mouth fell open, eyes narrowed with further outrage. He reached to snatch it out of the air mid-arc and failed miserably.

The sound of metal slamming against metal echoed from behind them. Lothaire whirled, a number of armored guards bursting through the gap in the hallway where the door had been blown off its hinges.

"Fuck," the youth muttered as alarm claxons began to blare over the station intercomm, red emergency flood lights illuminating the chamber in muddied crimson.

Didn't matter if he caught the case now. He was stuck between two rocks now, nowhere to go, nowhere to run. The soldiers caught sight of them from their position on the opposite side of the hanger and quickly began closing the distance.

The bastard grit his teeth.

"Just go," he sighed, the blaring of the alarms ringing in his ears. "Can't stop a Jedi," Lothaire sighed, "No point in trying." His hazy vision turned toward the guards - two squads of four each. They took up cover on the opposite end of the hanger, weapons arrayed toward the youth.

"Hands up before I put a hole in ya!" One of the men snarled.

Lothaire huffed a quiet laugh and accepted his fate with grim determination. "My arms are broke, hold on," he turned his back to Miri Nimdok , injecting the last of his stims directly into his veins as he stared at the soldiers.

 

[Miri Nimdok]

As the station security broke through the door and Lothaire uttered another curse, Miri made a decision that was perfectly in character for her, if perhaps a little naïve and foolish.

She seized the stimmed-up Essonian by his arm, dragged him aboard her ship, and raised the ramp amid a hail of blaster fire from the guards. Several of their shots were absorbed by her shield, while the rest hit the hull or ground around her. (Or possibly Lothaire, though she tried to shield him from the fire.)

Once sealed within the vessel, she tossed Lothaire into a gunner seat. “Shoot at them. The targeting system’s not calibrated, but it should be enough to scare them off!”

She disappeared into the cockpit. This time, the engines worked.

Using the datapad as a key, the ray shield doors slid open soon afterwards. The ancient freighter set sail, jumping into hyperspace in the nick of time. When it was all over, Miri sank back in her seat, releasing a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding.

She was alive, and she had the chest. As for her new guest, it remained to be seen how much of a problem he would prove to be.

Lothaire​

 

[Lothaire]

His perception was teetering on the edge of the world. Colors and shapes were beginning to blur into singular objects, their definition lost as they seemed to warp in and out his eyesight. The soldiers too swirled about in the muck of color, spots of life within the din of swirling crimson and neon. His fingers wrapped tight about the shock-baton that hung from his belt, lips pulled back in a savage snarl. A roar of defiance tore from his throat as he began to move - just as an unfamiliar hand locked onto his arm.

Brief confusion allowed Miri to direct Lothaire deftly into the ship, the soldiers barking orders and firing freely at the duo. Several shots sputtered out violently against the girl's shield, but she managed to keep any of the shots from hitting Lothaire. It was only when she'd dragged him inside and shoved him into the gunner's chair.

The controls glowed up at him menacingly, some of the numbers on the action dial seemingly jumping up from the console to float freely in the air above. Operating on dazed instinct, Lothaire quickly drew power to the radial guns. He sighted in on the closest of the guards, grimacing as a bolt exploded against the glass of his turret. The Essonian bit back a curse as he hesitated.

Then, as another bolt hit the windowpane, he pressed his thumbs onto the firing triggers on either side of the joystick and watched as two streams of crimson plasma spattered randomly about the hanger. Several of the guards dropped for cover, a handful continued to return fire.

He whirred the turret toward a man setting up an E-Web turret atop a pile of crates. Lothaire fired randomly in hopes of simply discouraging the man. To his dismay, one of the bolts crashed into the turret. The weapon's power cell ignited instantly, showering two of the guards in plasma fire.

Disgust and bile coiled at the back of Lothaire's throat as he let up on the guns. Some of the nearby guards attempted to help their flaming comrades, but the efforts seemed rather futile. The youth took aim to offer a mercy killing at least, but then he probably wasn't going to hit anything other than the other men. They seemed content to hide in cover now that they were being shot back at anyway.

Lothaire simply stared as the ship slipped out into the void. He watched the glow of the flames flicker in the distance as sublight engines put distance between them and the station. His gaze did not leave the orange speck until the Conestoga began to rumble and lurch in its transition to hyperspace.

He was left only with the quiet sounds of life from the ship. The stims still burned like fire through his veins, but with nothing to channel his energies toward, Lothaire was left to stew in his own thoughts, and moreover in the reality of what had just occurred.

"That was crazy," he muttered as he stared down at his hands still locked on the turret controls. He'd almost died there, and he'd been wholly prepared to do so. Why? Something stupid like pride, maybe. Maybe it'd just been an excuse - and then those guardsmen. He'd not meant to kill anyone, but those two were probably on their way there. If not that, maimed at the least. More than he'd ever done to someone before.

The youth swallowed hard, chewing down on his lower lip as he tried to find his words amidst the morass of his thoughts. "Why'd you grab me?" He asked loudly and numbly.

Miri Nimdok

 

[Miri Nimdok]

She would drop him off at the nearest station, she decided. If he tried to take the loot, she could always knock him out. Say he’d had a little too much to drink…

It was only a matter of time before she heard his voice calling out to her, asking a question. She turned her chair around. Though he sounded like he was still in the gunner seat, she was unwilling to risk getting attacked from behind.

“Why did I save you from almost certain death at the hands of a bunch of incompetent thugs, you mean?” she retorted. “Because that would be a pointless waste of life. By the way, a ‘thank you’ would be nice.”

Lothaire​

 

[Lothaire]

Seemed a fair enough question to Lothaire.

He would have been staring daggers at her had he the sobriety of body and the coherence of thought for such concentration. As things were, he gazed at her through hazy eyes, lips pressed into a thin line. She was melding into the furniture as far as his perceptions were concerned; a thinly blob of alabaster and purple and those dark eyes that had urged him to act stupidly. Dangerous things those.

"Pointless waste of life," Lothaire snickered, a bit of blood dribbling from the corner of his mouth. Whether that was from a busted lip, broken teeth, or something more serious was anyone's guess. Just felt like stims to him. "You were pretty keen to leave me in the brawl after you screwed me over." He countered, arms folding about his chest defensively. "Think I'm some stupid muscle? Little pawn in your game?" The youth's nose scrunched up with displeasure.

"I could've gotten out of that fine. Not the first time I've blasted my way out of a shit show." Total lie there. He'd never injected that many stims before, and certainly not taken on a squad of thugs virtually unarmed by his lonesome. He'd been quite certain he was about to die in fact, though that too he would never admit.

"You see the way that cannon exploded? Drenched those guys in plasma," Lothaire's gaze tore itself away from hers, peering instead out into the flash of hyperspace as if he might find some solace in the color. All he found was a rumbling in his stomach as the flashing lights began to make him feel sick. "Probably dead."

Probably bad people too. Probably.

"I'll thank you if you tell me your name." With hesitation, he looked back to her, eyes narrowing as he stared her down uncertainly, as if the very act of being looked at by another person at that moment was an intensely unbearable affair for the bastard-prince.

Miri Nimdok

 

[Miri Nimdok]

Miri raised an eyebrow. “Did you not receive the medical attention I requested for you before I left the auction hall, or did you just refuse it?”

"Think I'm some stupid muscle? Little pawn in your game?"

“You tell me. All I had to do was bat my lashes, and you assumed I was on your side.”

For all his spitfire, Lothaire looked a mess. He’d likely need further medical attention soon, judging by the blood trickling from the corner of his mouth.

“They were attacking us, you defended yourself,” she replied. “You would’ve had to deal with them even if you had taken the artifact.”

But she wasn’t without sympathy. Maybe Lothaire was younger and less experienced than his blustering would suggest.

“My name is Miri,” she said, standing up. “And I suggest you go to the medbay. You look awful.”

Lothaire​

 

[Lothaire]

"I see the best in people," Lothaire gave an exaggerated shrug. Wasn't the case, not wholly. It was one thing to know that you'd faltered in your duties for personal desire. It was another thing to have that failure given the life in the words of another. He felt a distinct sting in his chest that pushed through the malaise of the stim-tsunami in his system. It rose up to his face, coloring his cheeks as the embarrassment set in properly.

"Hadn't seen a girl like you before either," he added, his intense annoyance with himself making him scrunch up his face like a kath-hound pup. "Something about your eyes. Could've gotten me to jump into a trash compactor if you wanted to." That much he understood to be true and was particularly why he was refusing to make eye contact with her now.

"They were attacking us, you defended yourself," she replied. "You would've had to deal with them even if you had taken the artifact."

Didn't seem that cut and dry to him. She seemed experienced with this sort of thing, perhaps hardened to the violence. Lothaire had no such resilience toward death, let alone that caused at his hands. Had he ever killed a man before this? He'd blasted a few supply depots via drones, ordered attacks, but by his own hands? Not once. Not till now.

Rather than ruminating on that fact, he opted to dig in his belt for another stim, hoping to ride along the edge of his perceptions until he passed out from exhaustion. Better than reveling in his foolishness and moral quandaries.

Unfortunately for the bastard-prince, he'd used the last of them in their spat with the guards. The youth muttered a curse, then looked to Miri Nimdok as she gave her name and stood up.

"I'm still Lothaire," he grunted, bracing his arms on either side of the chair as he hauled himself up to his feet. "I was just going to sleep it off," he added as he dramatically wiped a bit of blood from his low lip to punctuate his words. "You gonna carry me?"

 

[Miri Nimdok]

Well, that was a new one. People had told her she had her father’s eyes, if they remarked upon them at all. Miri was unaware, but Errik Nimdok had indeed been described as having an almost hypnotic gaze. Mostly by women who had found him, ahem, charming.

“Well, I can’t say the same about your eyes,” she said dryly. “Or maybe it’s your lack of hair that makes me not want to do what you ask. By the way, I was wondering—are you quite bald, or do you just shave your head?”

"You gonna carry me?"

“I think you are too heavy for me to carry,” she replied. “But if you have trouble walking, I do have a repulsor chair on hand.”

She led the way to the medbay, keeping a close eye on Lothaire. If he so much as attempted any funny business, she would notice. Hopefully.

For a vessel of its size, the Conestoga’s medical facilities were quite impressive. Mobile bacta tanks, a fully automated surgery pod, and well-stocked supplies of a wide range of medicines filled the sterile space. Miri turned on a medical scanner to diagnose Lothaire’s maladies.

Lothaire​

 

[Lothaire]

"Really? You don't feel that spark of charisma when you look at me?" Lothaire asked, his sarcasm dipped in the slightest of venom. He followed after her if only because there was nowhere else to go; that and the fact that the stims were beginning to slowly ebb from his system. With their fading came the reintroduction of pain, and quite a lot of it at that. Seemed he was more injured than he'd noticed. "Keep my head shaved," he grunted, gaze drifting hazily about the hall. "Have my mother's hair. Don't want to wear it." His tone implied no further desire for explanation.

"Not that fat, I can manage," he huffed, bracing himself against the wall as they entered the medbay. Lothaire took no time in plopping down on the nearest operating table, breathing a quiet sigh of relief as he took the weight off his feet.

"Nice ship," He mumbled as the scanner did its work. The results were somewhat grim. His heart was thundering away at an artificial pace, and he was at risk of a heart attack at any moment. Furthermore, three ribs were cracked, and blood loss was rather severe. That wasn't to include the various less serious flesh wounds dotting his skin. Lothaire didn't notice any of these things - while he thought the stims were wearing off, he'd dosed himself up enough for several hours. The minor pain he was experiencing was the tip of a veritable iceberg of agony just poking through the surface of a sea of stims.

"Who are you with, really?" He asked, utterly unconcerned about his injuries.

Miri Nimdok

 

[Miri Nimdok]

She did at least humor him with a lingering glance. “... No.” In fact, he reminded her of an angry infant.

“Your mother has bad hair, then?” she asked. At this point, however, she was less concerned with verbal sparring. He was in even worse shape than she’d thought. “You’ve been using too many stims.”

Automated systems went into effect, administering drugs to counteract the effects of the stims before a heart attack could occur. Once stabilized, Lothaire would indeed be in a world of hurt—just before he’d find himself unceremoniously unclothed, masked, and dunked in a bacta tank by Miri herself, working in a brisk and no-nonsense fashion. Painkillers would kick in eventually, and Lothaire would be able to get some sleep… Though he’d likely wake up to find himself left aboard a hospital ship or in the medic services of the nearest space station, provided nothing stopped Miri from doing so.

Lothaire​

 

[Lothaire]

For a moment, Lothaire ignored the severity of his situation. She offered him a glance, and he let himself forget that she'd stolen his quarry and doomed him to the ire of the Judges. He leaned back against the medical table and flashed her an intoxicated grin.

"... No."

His eyes narrowed with momentary annoyance, the grin fading, frustration returning. The youth sat up a little straighter and met her gaze. "She has a bad soul. Everyone else in my father's family has black hair. Have to look the part." He explained tiredly. For better or worse, Lothaire generally operated as an open book. Lying was too exhausting to keep up with.

"I might've gone a little overboard this time. Did the job though." He wasn't dead, and that was enough. Injuries could be healed with the blessings of the Ashla, and in lieu of that, reliable steel. What mattered was success, and he found himself pausing to consider that much as the automated system engaged injected counteractants to his stims.

What are the judges going to do when I come back empty handed? They'll never trust me again. She could've left me there to die. Another important bridge burned.

The bastard-prince's eyes sprung open wide as he shifted about, and the sedation of the stims became evident. Pain, sharp and burning, shook his body with each breath: so too did it prickle across his skin through many bruises and cuts. His heart felt feeble and strong at the same time, fluctuating between each extreme with each passing second.

He couldn't bring himself to speak, his jaw set with pain as Miri stripped him down and unceremoniously dumped him in the bacta tank. Masked and trapped in his cocoon of pain, he floated there helplessly, worries of his failure growing more and more difficult to ignore as the reality of his situation began to set in. What little physical resistance he could offer quickly faded as the painkillers overtook his perceptions, making his limbs fall limp into the bacta. His consciousness lingered on the edge of lucidity, struggling to retain proper thoughts as the painkillers slowed his mental processes.

As his mind retreated from his body, Lothaire clung to that feeling of revulsion that rose within him when he began to imagine the reaction of the Judges when he returned home with empty hands. The shame was like a tidal wave suspended just over him, ready to fall at any moment and drown him in its depths. His father's damnations confirmed.

When Miri went to move Lothaire, he would be very much awake.

Miri Nimdok

 

[Miri Nimdok]

A bad soul?

No time to wonder what that meant. Miri left the medbay, letting the bacta do its work.

She returned an undisclosed amount of time later, having changed out of the dress and into a more practical outfit. Approaching the tank, she paused before the glass, checking for physical signs of Lothaire being awake—but she could not sense with the Force whether or not he was truly asleep.

Lothaire​

 

[Lothaire]

His perception was an unpleasant one.

Any feeling from his limbs was numbed by the combination of bacta and painkillers. Being suspended in a tube of liquid helped cement that disorientation. The entire time, oblivion had been beckoning him, urging a simple relenting and then the relief of sleep as reward. For better or worse he resisted its call, clinging to his intense fear of failing in the task that he'd begged for. It was all he could manage to keep his attention on when every fiber of his being was telling him to relent and welcome slumber. Fuel for the fire.

If he noticed Miri Nimdok entering the room, he made no motion of it. His presence in the Force was a sedentary coiled thing. A reading of the mind would be like reading the perceptions of an animal: higher thought silenced, intentions focused on a single primal goal.

He remained hanging loosely in the bacta, eyes shut, external signs of awareness nil.

 

[Miri Nimdok]

He seemed to be asleep. Miri checked the time. Yes, the drugs should still have been in effect. It was safe to move him.

She drained the tank and opened the hatch, reaching in to haul the Essonian out.

Lothaire