Private Blossoms on the Wind

[Reina Daival]

Tag: Ayame Tsukihana
Location: Atrisia

Atrisia. Reina's nose wrinkled to herself as she wandered the planet, aimlessly. Well, it wasn't entirely aimlessly. She had to get used to this. Walking normally. It was hard to think about as she stared down at her leg. It shouldn't be there. The flesh. The blood. It should have been replaced with cold hard metal. She had just gotten used to the prosthesis and it had been ripped away from her like all things were. A lot had been ripped away from her and replaced with something else that wasn't her. It was someone else. Reina didn't feel like herself anymore. Who was she meant to be? It was a question that had been on her mind since she was rescued. She couldn't dare look herself in the mirror anymore...or to contact her old friends. The three who had saved her was an exception. Colette. Everest. Valery. She couldn't hide from them. Everest had been doing her best to try and help, whilst Colette had been doing the best to guide Reina from now on...but there were others Reina wouldn't communicate with. Couldn't. Klar. Reina hoped that the Codru-Ji was safe...Azurine. Aadhir. Neither of them were people Reina could communicate with.

It didn't help that Reina couldn't talk. Or well, wouldn't talk. The voice that came out from her lips wasn't hers. Not anymore. The same way as the face she had wasn't her. The skin. It had all changed. None of her scars...her injuries. None of that remained. Though...on the upside, she wasn't letting that stop her from trying to communicate. She had been working on learning once more. Not in the ways of the Jedi, no. Reina didn't feel like one of those anymore. Instead...she was just learning life skills. Whilst she had been working on Galactic Sign Language and Outer Rim Sign Language, it was still a struggle for her. She wasn't a good student. So of course, she had some kind of backup plan. A simple datapad that she could write down on...Sure, the fact she struggled with spelling was an issue as well but it was an issue she'd need to confront.

For now however, Reina was wandering to deal with her thoughts. She had done her best to assure that Colette that she didn't have to worry about Reina taking a simple walk like this. Atrisia was...far safer of a planet in Reina's opinion than Tatooine had been. The planet could help the healing that Reina needed as well. It wasn't the physical she needed. It was the spiritual. The emotional. And this brings us to where Reina stopped at this precise moment. Standing on the edge of a clear pond, with various small fish swimming back and forth. Reina brushed herself down for a moment before she knelt by the water, staring at the fish. Staring at her own reflection. The face that should feel so familiar just seeming to be a stranger's.

"...I have more in common with you than I used to now."

A simple sentence that sounded so wrong to Reina's ears. It wasn't that it sounded wrong. Her voice wasn't hoarse, nor was it like nails on a chalkboard. No. Her voice was sweet. It had almost a natural song-like element to her words. Reina was no stranger to singing. She had used to recall dozens of sea shanties...but now it felt like that was her constant way of speaking. There had to be a way for her to control it. To talk at least somewhat normally, so that it didn't feel like every word was part of a song...but in this moment? She would stick to her alternative methods of speaking.

Her hand gently swayed through the water before Reina lifted it, using the Force to gently bring a small trail of water snaking its way up her arm, twisting and turning. The irony hadn't been lost on her from the transformation. She had always felt so much more at home in water. In the ocean. Dry land had always felt like a cage for her...and now? She would always be at her best in the water. It would always feel like home for her. And for once in her life? Reina hated the idea of the sea being her home.​

 

[Ayame Tsukihana]

Tag: Reina Daival


Ayame Tsukihana had slipped away again.

It was never out of rebellion. Just a quiet defiance wrapped in folded sleeves and soft steps. Her handmaidens thought her in study with the scrollmaster this morning. In truth, she had excused herself after tea and walked a path she hadn't taken in weeks.

Lately, her days had grown more formal, more confined. Her father had spoken of engagements — of names and dates and appearances to be kept. Her presence, he said, mattered. She was a Tsukihana, after all.

But presence was not the same as freedom.

She clutched her small woven book bag to her chest, feeling the spine of a half-read romance tucked between layers of silk. The story had paused mid-duel — a swashbuckling rogue deflecting blaster bolts with a vibroblade while the heroine dangled from a transport cable above a canyon. Ayame had imagined herself there, as she often did. Wind in her hair. Courage in her bones.

But she wasn't dangling over a canyon. She was walking through the upper gardens of one of the many beautiful parks of Atrisia's capital.

The path wound gently along the edge of a pond, where willow branches touched the water like brushstrokes. Koi flicked their tails beneath the surface. Petals floated lazily, spiraling in the current like thoughts she hadn't caught in time.

Ayame paused. The stone path widened here, bordered by moss and low wooden benches. The air smelled faintly of rain, though it had not fallen. For a moment, she stood completely still — and then, as she often did when her heart felt too full, she murmured aloud to herself.

"The pond forgets me
but the blossoms do not stop
drifting where I go..."

The Atrisian-styled poem escaped like a sigh. A way to turn feeling into form.

She exhaled.

And then she noticed the figure at the water's edge.

A woman — no, a girl close to her own age — kneeling at the pond, her posture still but heavy, as though time sat upon her shoulders. There was something unfamiliar about her. Her features were beautiful in a way Ayame couldn't quite place.

Their eyes met.

Ayame's heart skipped.

She startled, just slightly, and took a half-step back, hand instinctively rising to adjust her glasses even though they were perfectly in place. Her face flushed with warmth, and the silence that followed was somehow louder than her poem had been.

"I—" she stammered gently, bowing her head. "I didn't see you there. Forgive me. I didn't mean to disturb..."

Her voice was soft. The wind carried it like silk. And yet it was clear she had meant every word — not just the apology, but the feeling behind it.

She lingered there, caught between embarrassment and curiosity.

Beneath it all, a thread tugged at her, a quiet sense that she had just stumbled into a moment meant to change something. Even if she didn't yet know what.

 

[Reina Daival]

Tag: Ayame Tsukihana
Location: Atrisia

Her hand continued to drift lazily through the water, her eyes never leaving the reflection staring back at her. She was oblivious to the fact she had an audience right now. Far too busy being contained in her own mind at her first as her fingers brushed against various petals laying in the water. Leaves from the trees, falling so slow. She sighed to herself at that thought. Reina had heard stories about how blossoms were meant to be healing in some way. Their beauty was meant to uplift the heart but when Reina looked at them, all she saw was...leaves. They weren't anything special. Either way, her attention finally lifted from the water to spot someone looking at her. Someone who appeared similar to her own age...but when you think about all of the alien species in the Galaxy, it's possible they could be one of those long lived species.

All the same, Reina gave an awkward smile, holding both of her hands up into the air. A universal signal of "My Bad" at the end of the day as Reina pushed herself up to her feet, brushing the dirt and dust off her knees carefully. Strangers weren't exactly something that Reina dealt well with. Even before she had been changed, Reina was never the most talkative or good with strangers. At the very least, she wasn't being as ignorant as she normally would be, by shrugging off the woman's presence. Instead Reina just stood there awkwardly, trying to decide if she wanted to just leave without saying anything...but there was just something about the stranger that insisted Reina stayed here. Just for a few more moments.

"...You don't need to be sorry. It's not...your fault. You weren't disturbing me. I promise."

Reina internally cringed as she spoke. She had to try and avoid from speaking in a way that would influence someone. But it was the truth in her eyes, the stranger hadn't been bothering her. They had no reason to be sorry about any of this. She just took in a short breath and made her way over towards the stranger, holding her hand out carefully.

"I'm Reina." ​