Private Children of Shiraya: Ruins of Ardor

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

He kicked a stone. It went further than he expected. The piece of broken statue made it to the edge of the staircase and just barely had the momentum to fall over the edge. And then the next. And the next. Brandyn listened as the echo of the stone bounced about the ruins of his old home.

It had been a while since Naboo had been sacked. Since the day he had been pulled out of 'circulation' by the Jedi Order and put into the undercover team investigating The New Way. His family had since been reunited on their new homeworld of Hapes, but it had not felt like home until he saw what had become of his childhood abode. The once gloriously restored estate was now nothing more than rubble, with the occasional hint as to its former opulence. It was now more a demolition site, as it prepared to become a construction site, than it was a home.

He walked sullenly down the stairs, eyes locked on the broken piece of statue now at the floor. The curving stairs were amazingly still mostly intact, but seemed odd standing in what was now the open air, and not the grand entrance of the estate's mansion. He sat down, about halfway down the stairs. His hands running across the charred wood. No sign of the wear and tear of usage could be seen. Now it was just blackened from the fires that had raged. He looked up towards the door, remembering the years he had spent playing in this very room with Briana, Blaire and eventually little Breha. A lump caught in his throat.

The lump was more of guilt than sadness, though he imagined that sadness was playing its part. Guilt wracked his mind. He had left his mother and Briana to pick up the pieces while he explored and had adventures. They had thought him dead! At the time, in his hubris, he had thought that it was a wise thing to do, but then learning of his father's abduction at the same time? That had pulled him back to reality, and to his family very quickly.

The skittering sound of one of the many ant-like construction droids on the estate grounds interrupted his gilt trip. He glanced through the balustrade, and down slightly to the droid, which stopped acknowledged his presence with a glance, and then became still. A blue light shimmered into existence above its thorax. It was RQ-47, the protocol droid assigned as caretaker and project manager for the estate's rebuild.

"Master Jedi...you asked I contact you when your fellow Jedi arrived. They are here now. They insisted on not waiting for you at the transport and are on their way to greet you at the house."

"Thanks Que-four," Brandyn said, smiling slightly at the event that was probably not as dramatic as the droid was making it out to be, "and I am not a Master...merely a Padawan learner."

He stood, and dusted himself off.

"Apologies, Master Padawan Learner," the droid replied before the hologram flickered and disappeared.

Shaking his head, Brandyn mustered a slightly more daring smile as he walked down the rest of the stairs.

This trip wasn't really about visiting his old home. It was about something that had been uncovered as Naboo was being rebuilt. By the sounds of it, his father's old home - one that Brandyn had never even seen before - had shown up some interesting possible connections to The New Way. It seemed whoever had occupied the site after his father had had some secrets that were uncovered when the building was damaged, and then subsequently inspected for safety. It was beginning to feel as though The New Way followed his family around like a curse.

There was so much about this trip that brought back bad and good memories, but mostly feelings of matters left unresolved. It had been only just shy of 4 years since he had run away from his home, his family and run to the Jedi Order, but this was the first time he had returned. There had just been so much...life...happening.

Straightening his dark grey clothes, Brandyn adjusted his shoulder and awaited the Jedi to crest the stairs towards the entrance in the ruins of his old home. It was funny. He felt just a little like the Lord of the manor awaiting a noble guest. Despite his surroundings, his chest puffed just a little. He reached out with the Force to see if he knew the Jedi that was coming up the stairs.

And then. His face paled. His chest deflated. His knees grew weak.

This. No, this was not something he was ready for.

| Cybelle Elyance |​

 

[Cybelle Elyance]

N A B O O
Tag: Brandyn Sal-Soren
Age: 20
Location: Spritegate Shore to Ee'everwest Estate (Four Years Later)
_________________________________________________________​

"I should not take this mission, Master."

"Take it—You must, dear girl. The past is the past. You will shine as you always have."

Chocolate eyes flashed toward her flame-haired mentor in automatic defiance despite the rather reverent state the seated woman had taken. Her legs were crossed and her hands rest in an upward position. As if she were about to pray. Meditate, as it were. Unlike the majority of Naboo, it seemed like the Shore had been spared the devastation. Cybelle…Cybelle couldn't remember anything from that night other than a deep, devouring dark.

The ceiling fell. Stones and roof tiles crashed around her and several initiates who had been having a snack before turning in. She could scarcely recall tucking the youngest one in when everything went silent and dim before bursting into the brightest golden light she had ever seen. It had touched every end of Sprite Gate Shore. Protected them. Filled them with hope, and fortitude, to make it until morning.

Gianna Aegis had lived up to her namesake and shielded them all. As many as she could. Even now—the freckle-faced woman seemed to be protecting her. "You have nothing to fear."

"I am not afraid. I'm not afraid to fail—"

"I know."

Cybelle stared at her Master for a long moment and crossed her arms. Did she really understand? Did she know why it was that she was not the Knight to visit this particular wreckage? Her lips parted to ask but she shook her head, sending long, silken locks of hair tumbling around her face in a mahogany waterfall. Gianna couldn't know. She had been in shambles when her Master had returned to the Shore one particular evening. When she was barely old enough to cast a vote toward the electoral of the Queen. Barely old enough to be called a Lady versus a girl.

Gianna had held her while she cried.

She had never asked, not ever, why it was that Cybelle was flooding the rice patties with rain from the sky.

"—I know. Just as I know that you must be the one to see this through. You may not be my Padawan any longer but you are still my student. Stop being so willful—", Gianna spoke kindly, though, the corner of her mouth quirked when she sensed rebellion rising in the accomplished young woman before her. There was a reason she always came back to the Shore whenever she had duties that brought her back to Naboo. "—And do what you're called to do."

Those were the parting words that her Master left her with before sending her on her way with a handkerchief full of lemon bars and a few bottles of spring water. Master Aegis always worried that she didn't eat enough, even though, she had long since blossomed from a gangly waif with noodle thin arms and a cylindrical shape. Training had hardened her, sharpened her curves, and made the scope of her all the more apparent despite the plain green Jedi robes she wore. They were the same as what Master Aegis wore, though, the sensible woman had patterned the threads differently. There were barely visible little golden lotus flowers etched into the cuffs. The outer-robe itself was a deeper green that let her blend in with her surroundings. The only thing that signaled that it might not have been made of poor linen was the superb stitching. The perfect hem and waistline that seemed tailor-made for her form, with exceptions, for movement. She wore gloves up to her elbows and kept her hood raised.

The Jedi had not quite been forgiven on Naboo, yet. Not by everyone.

It took several hours for her to get to the ruined old Ee'everwest Estate by speeder and her pack lay in the empty seat to her right. She carried it everywhere. Cybelle never knew when her duties would pull her to some far-flung reach. Supplies could be scarce. It was expected that she would meet some far-flung family member to explain exactly what it was that had been found. To walk them through it safely, to catalog, and quarantine any items that could be dangerous.

The closer she got to the once glorious home, the more she knew, that she wasn't meeting some random individual. Cybelle hadn't wanted to come to the estate. It reminded her too much of things that were better left forgotten. She hadn't expected to feel the object of her hesitance nearby. The olive-skinned beauty moved as if on auto-pilot. She had walked hundreds of people through their homes to recover what they could. This would be no different.

She exited her speeder with her saber secured at her hip, though, her pack remained where it was. She passed through what was once a stately courtyard and felt her heart beat a little too quickly. It no longer reminded her of a gilded palace. Now, it seemed quiet. Empty as a grave.

Cybelle entered the dwelling carefully. It was in no state to be traversed without care and was clearly still a hazard. Her footfalls were sure and poised despite the fact that she no longer knew this path. These stairs—Nor the face of the young man that watched her as if he had seen a ghost. It held elements of the boy she knew. The girl she was, reached for him. Tugged at her heart so hard that it felt like it might leap from her chest. "B—"

The Jedi Knight breathed. Centered.

She was no longer that girl. His Father had seen to that while he shot, killed, and buried such a lonely, loving heart with little more than implication and words.

"Jedi Sal-Soren…", she spoke, boldly, and her voice carried as if it had wings. "I am to be your companion throughout this investigation. Are you up to date as we currently stand or would you prefer that I do a walk-through with you?"

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

...

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

​

Wearing: Jedi Robes
Equipment: Standard Lightsaber
Location: Ee'Everwest Estate, Naboo
Tag: Cybelle Elyance


For just a moment, Brandyn was a teenager again, smitten and overwhelmed. Within that moment he recounted the events that had transpired a few years earlier. He could feel it coming, the anger he had felt. Just for a quarter of a breath his anger spiked with the unresolved parental issues that surrounded the memories end.

"Cybelle," he said, deferring to terms of familiarity.

I am to be your companion...

"You honour me with you assistance," he said in acknowledgement, attempting formality.

She was straight to business. No familiarities. Brandyn felt a coldness that was probably not intended, but he probably deserved. They had played as children, then played Master and Student as youths but now the game seemed to be cold professionalism. It stung. Should he apologize? For his father or for himself?

"I was briefed, but I am sure you know the situation in more detail than what I was given," he said with a gesture of his hand to walk with him.

Was he asking for the briefing just to get her to speak with him longer? Even Brandyn wasn't sure right now.

His path took him into what would have once been the waiting lounge. It would have once held several centuries old lounge chairs, wooden shelves and various vases and other such ornaments from across the families history. Now it was just a room without walls, and a damaged tiled floor. He had memories of Cybelle here. When she was but a child, feet dangling from one of the overstuffed sofas while she begged a young Brandyn to stop fighting with his sister. Brandyn smirked thinking how it was likely that Briana had started the squabble, but it was Brandyn to whom Cybelle had appealed.

"From what I understand my father's old residence has come under scrutiny?" He said matter-of-factly, "Do we know who it was that owned the facility after my father?"

​

 

[Cybelle Elyance]

N A B O O
Tag: Brandyn Sal-Soren
Age: 20
Location: Spritegate Shore to Ee'everwest Estate (Four Years Later)
_________________________________________________________​

She hadn't expected to feel anything at all when he spoke her name. Foolishly, she thought herself to be past that particular weakness. The auburn-haired Knight had heard it time and time again from countless people. Civilians, friends, fellow Jedi—And it never moved her. It never mattered. It was just a word. Just a name, like any other. It weighed less than sunlight, and yet, she could feel it in her bones. Perhaps her mind had built up her affections more than they had ever been. Was it only in her imagination that he seemed just as moved?

As if her voice had struck him, physically, versus being ephemeral.

"It is—", Cybelle breathed, noting, that he seemed to fall into polite courtesy. It was either his natural state from noble blood or a defense mechanism. Perhaps both. She could not afford to feel his pain or his joy as she once had when they were young. It would be her undoing. "—Duty."

She nodded her head when he requested that she walk him through the property. It was charred and mishappen with bits of glass glimmering from where it had melted and melded with precious Nabooian hardwood. "I know enough."

"Let me go first and watch your step. The structure is weakened from both time and the attack. The floor may not bear your weight. If it cannot hold me, it will not hold you."

It was true that it could give out beneath her. But—she was the Knight. He the Padawan. It was her burden to absorb danger, when possible, in this scenario. She was a little surprised that he would have been permitted by his Master to visit the site alone. Or at all. It belonged to his family, which, was a tie that moist Jedi severed. There must have been something else beneath the ash and rot that called to him. "Many structures were torn asunder during the cataclysm. Flame that burned slowly, for days, Filled the forests and ruined the food supply. The ichor the beast left behind is a metallic amethyst. Some pockets still exist—You must not touch it with bare skin."

Cybelle stepped ahead of him when they entered the lounge area and cut him off. Instead, she directed him in a roundabout way that she felt to be safer. She could see the weakness beneath them. Feel the cracks in the way the Force flowed and ran through them as if there were some kind of cosmic drain beneath it. Pulling it all down. "Your father—"

The way she spoke the words were far harsher than the Knight intended. Her eyes closed, briefly, and her tone softened back to neutrality when she continued. "Your father had a caretaker for quite some time. When that service ended the property was transferred into the care of the Bank of Theed."

"It was then temporarily owned by a merchant who seems to have zero knowledge of what lay beneath."

There was a broken area of the estate that seemed to have been recently fortified. She let Brandyn through a scorched portal before turning down, down, a spiral staircase. It seemed to lead into nothing but an abyss for eternity and progressively got darker with every turn. Cybelle raised her hand and a soft light rose from it. A small, diminutive sun, in the palm of her hand.

It wouldn't blind them—But it would loyally light their way.

"Tell me…How well do you know Baros Sal-Soren?"

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

​

Wearing: Jedi Robes
Equipment: Standard Lightsaber
Location: Ee'Everwest Estate to former residence of Baros Sal-Soren
Tag: Cybelle Elyance


Duty.

That stung. If that is the way she wanted it to be though, that was her right and probably understandable. Once Brandyn's own wound healed over he would have time to think on it.

"You don't need to protect me, Cybelle," he said, with a hint of wounded pride, "I await my call to promotion any day. My mother has trained me, Master Noble has trained me...you...trained me well." It was true, but more it was he wished to take on the role of protector himself. He lied to himself that it was somehow about equality.

Brandyn remembered the day of the attack. The news of it braking on the holos. Cybelle's description of what the attack had left behind made him shudder. He could now feel the looming sense of inhospitality that was left behind. "I should have been here."

Walking along behind Cybelle, he could not help but observe...her. She had grown, not much in height, but her beauty had matured into a refined adulthood. The same grace with which she had effortlessly glided about the Shore had morphed into feminine steel, grace and strength intertwined. For a moment he thought of apologizing. But she had made it clear. Duty.

"Well the man is surely lying," Brandyn said with a dismissive wave as Cybelle explained about the transition of ownership and the discovery of the items in question, "or someone from the bank before them. I have never really trusted high finance."

Brandyn followed her down the looping staircase. The air grew colder, the walls more jagged and unfinished. This was not a stairwell that had been a part of the Estate originally. It seemed to have a more industrial finish. At the bottom of the stair case, Brandyn was presented with a tunnel, leading out into the inky blackness of somewhere.

"Tell me…How well do you know Baros Sal-Soren?"

While understanding why she spoke the name the way she did, Brandyn nevertheless found himself displeased with how his father's name rolled from her mouth. He shot her a glance. He had not been his father's favourite. This was well established. But he still had found a way to move past the hurts of the past, to love and forgive his father. His mother had been the pattern for him to follow.

"I know him as well as any son can know their father," he said, stepping into the speeder pod that pointed towards the tunnel. Brandyn offered his hand to Cybelle. With them both inside, the pod activated and sped off to its destination.

The came to stop in a large industrial atrium, multiple tiers of catwalks above them. The lights flicked on, and Brandyn felt a chill run down his spine. He clambered out. It was too much to take in. A veritable museum of the Force, both dark and light. Art work. Displayed weapons. Artifacts. At the centre of the room and incased in glass on a small podium was a holocron that glowed with a eerie red glow.

"I think we need to talk to that merchant again."

​

 

[Cybelle Elyance]

N A B O O
Tag: Brandyn Sal-Soren
Age: 20
Location: Spritegate Shore to Ee'everwest Estate (Four Years Later)
_________________________________________________________​

It shouldn't have stung.

Duty was the only way to move forward. To breathe without feeling like she had a hummingbird trapped in her ribcage trying desperately to break free. The ruins of the Ee'everwest Estate were unsafe in every sense of the word. Not just from the obvious disrepair and damages that had befallen such storied halls—But from what lay in the dark below. Cybelle had descended the spiral staircase with her colleagues for what felt like a hundred times—It had never felt like this.

Brandyn spoke her name again.

She hid a flinch.

He had been content to carry on with his adventures. Cybelle, had let him do so. She had been the one warned away from him. To be likened to a gutter rat, unworthy, of even being his friend. It pained her now to realize that between the two of them only one had prayed for the other. Only one had waited and lingered at the Shore. Wondering, when the might of Baros Sal-Soren might fail.

Chocolate eyes hovered on the form of the Padawan before her and the young woman shook her head slowly. Her gaze would have been unreadable, though, she could immediately note that some things about her old friend had not changed. Not in the slightest. "You may not need my protection—But you have it nonetheless. Whether Knight or initiate…I know what it means to walk broken homes. I know what it is to survive the aftermath of the cataclysm. Had you been present in this estate when the sky fell…You would be dead."

"Be grateful, that you are not. Many did not share your fortune."

The darkness snared her vision into something that left her almost blind as they moved. The light source that she had created helped, but he would always see better in the dark than she did. Cybelle relied almost strictly on the Force to carry her while deliberately keeping behind her. His words had entered one ear and out the other. She would safe keep the padawan that had finally, returned home. Because it was her duty, a privilege, and her prerogative to do so.

She raised a brow that he would not see when he claimed that the merchant was lying. He jumped to conclusions as the son of the man in question—Not the Jedi he claimed to be. Assuming that someone had a mouth full of snakes was just about as folly as jumping off a cliff. So very, very dismissive. "Perhaps.", she breathed, softly, as if a loud voice might wake something in the glom. "Perhaps not."

Cybelle had been present for the interviews and had become very adept at reading body language. The Hapan woman made zero apologies for how she regarded his father, nor, did she seek to explain. He was a loving son, with a loving family, who would never understand the perspective of an outsider until he had no choice. As much as she'd thought their worlds weren't so far apart once upon a time—She couldn't have been more incorrect.

At his brusque explanation of how well he knew the elder Sal-Soren her tongue clicked behind pearly white teeth. A half-arsed answer about such a serious question deserved a sharp response. "So, not at all, then."

She accepted Brandyn's hand when offered. Grudgingly. Cybelle couldn't see well enough to decline—Even with her light. When they moved away from charred romantic woodwork and toward the trove she relaxed only slightly when the automated lights flooded the area. Brown eyes adjusted immediately and her focus was immediately drawn to the ominous holocron. Not, for the first time.

"Don't touch anything."

It was not a request.

His want to talk to the merchant again caused a sigh to pull from the depths of her soul. Brandyn…Would always be Brandyn. "If you wish to waste our time—So be it.", Cybelle responded, though, the Knight would not deny him. The man in question had been entirely bewildered. Confused by the treasures that lay beneath a failed business venture that cost him millions of credits. If he had known...He would have never given the property up so easily. Only part of the area had been properly cataloged. There were many more things out of sight that whispered, nasty things, that threatened with the ebb and flow of the Dark Side. The quiet woman let her aura press outward to stem the tide. Light to banish the Dark.

To keep their wits, among other things.

"Do you recognize anything?"

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

​

Wearing: Standard Jedi Robes
Equipment: Standard lightsaber
Location: Sal-Soren Compound
Tag: Cybelle Elyance


Cybelle's insistence that he not touch anything initially felt annoyingly unnecessary, but then he noticed a slight tug on his inclinations. There was a pull there. Not to the holocron though. Something else. Something...illusive.

"If you wish to waste our time—So be it."

"It's not that I doubt your work, Cy," he said, hands offered up in apology, "it's just...it's my dad we are talking about here. You of all..."

He paused, eyes looking wounded because of the words that were about to come out of his mouth. A reminder of the day a few years ago when his young heart was broken. Who knows how Cybelle had felt about it? She was probably embarrassed to think that his father had assumed some sort of young love. It had clearly only ever been one way, Brandyn towards her.

Brandyn felt Cybelle's aura wash over the location. It was soothing, and the tug at his mind all but abated. He allowed a slight smile of recognition towards her for the effort.

"None of it looks familiar. Though...there is a lot more to see on the floors above, I am guessing," he said, looking up into the open aired atrium and it's multiple floors of museum-like displays, "guess I had better start looking for something that can tie this to...a culprit."

Pushing past the holocron, and offering it only a cursory glance, Brandyn moved to the back of the room. On the wall hung a tapestry of fine artistry, it depicted in some form of pixelated artform, a battle between Sith and Jedi forces. "My father has always disliked. Some would say...hated...the things of the Force," he said, "and yet he married a Jedi. I have never questioned his love for her. He is a devoted husband." He looked back at Cybelle and offered a confused shrug.

The tapestry seemed to tell a tale of a cycle. Jedi taking on a Padawan. The Padawan growing in the Force. The Padawan falling to the darkside, killing their master. Without even realizing it, Brandyn had stretched forth his hand and he was tracing the story across the tapestry. He mouthed his thoughts. "Fallen Jedi leads an army to war against the galaxy. They die at the hand of a young Jedi Knight. That Jedi takes a Padawan...who grows in the Force." It was only then that he realized he was touching the tapestry and he pulled his hand away, hoping Cybelle had been distracted. "If you are suggesting that my father is...secretly...Sith? I'm afraid I just don't see it."

​

 

[Cybelle Elyance]

N A B O O
Tag: Brandyn Sal-Soren
Age: 20
Location: Spritegate Shore to Ee'everwest Estate (Four Years Later)
_________________________________________________________​

"Yes. It is your father we speak of."

Cybelle agreed, almost amicably, but there were few things that could place a storm cloud in her eyes. There were few things that could shake her at her core. Degrade the foundation of hope, of faith, and goodness that her Master had tried so hard to instill. Baros Sal-Soren was one of them. "You know the authoritative, however, loving father. I know only a cruel and mysterious entity that took—"

You away.​

She forcibly breathed to settle her heart again while they walked through the stacks. Cybelle never struggled in this way. Never. She had learned at the tender age of sixteen to place a cage around her heart and make the Force her armor. It protected her against all things. Cared for her, guided her, and even kept her company when all things seemed determined to leave her to rot. Even, Brandyn. It protected her from losing her way then, on the Shore, and it would protect her now.

"I will accept fact. Not opinion."

The truth of the matter revolved around the fact that he was questioning her work without saying so. Just because the merchant was a dead end did not mean that Baros Sal-Soren was solely responsible for the contents of this trove. It simply meant that the merchant was a dead end. Cybelle didn't feel the need to walk down a path toward which no new information would be revealed. So—That left them with the primary evidentiary option to review.

The auburn-haired woman could feel, somehow, that something was in this atrium. The answers were here. They just needed the strength, the fortitude, to find them. "It's not just the items themselves that deserve speculation. It's everything…From one piece of floor tile to the next."

Her eyes followed Brandyn out of an inherent respect for his impulsivity. Cybelle had already checked the tapestry that had caught his attention. It had seemed harmless—But he was so very drawn to it while explaining the elder Sal-Soren. The Jedi Knight pressed her aura further and it blossomed like one of the bright yellow flowers that could be found on the Shore. It was protective in nature and the warmth she exuded would grow tenfold while something began to pry at her mental shielding.

"Many of the objects here are powerful. It is strange that a trained Jedi would not have felt them. It must have been warded somehow…I can feel something from above. It might have been broken in the cataclysm.", she mused, completely skipping over the love his anti-Force Father held for his Jedi mother. What an absolute hypocrite. What right had he then, to shun her, to treat Brandyn so poorly when HE was perpetrating the very thing he claimed to be against? It made her think even less of the man. Even though he hoped she hadn't seen his wandering hands, that, was a fool's hope.

It was the notion of Baros Sal-Soren being a Sith that drew a light laugh from her lips. A Sith would have no use for Jedi artifacts. Oft—They simply destroyed them. "I suggest nothing other than the path the presence of a hidden underground bunker beneath your family home suggests. It was clearly created by someone with means and intellect."

"Not to mention that the collection of such things doesn't denote any great love for them. This is…", she trailed off while she moved deeper into the stacks, watching warily, while things glimmered in a way they had no right to. Calling. A necklace begged for her to pick it up—Promising power. An end to her lonely travels and dependency on the Shore. She didn't need a home, a Master, or even Brandyn. It would provide all she needed and more. Everything, everything she had ever wanted…

All she had to do was pick it up. Put it on.

Cybelle breathed in sharply and took a step back. Reinforcing, mental fortitude. The Force was with her. The Force was with her. The Force…Was always with her. "This is a collection. An expensive, collection. It could be used for knowledge and a good Jedi also knows that knowledge is power. In the wrong hands…With the wrong intention…"

It could be very dangerous indeed. Some of these objects were well and truly cursed.

The green-clad woman glanced back at Brandyn and looked him over from head to toe. He was so cavalier. Charming…But thoughtlessly brave. "I will not tell you again. Touch nothing until I have looked it over. You don't understand—"

One of the investigators had picked up what appeared to be a harmless timepiece and had nearly been driven mad the moment his fingers touched the metal. From hallucinations to delusions the only thing that had helped was to place him in a medically induced coma and purge his body of the contaminants.

"—This place is full of dangerous objects. I can't keep you safe, from yourself."

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

​

Wearing: Standard Jedi Robes
Equipment: Standard lightsaber
Location: Sal-Soren Compound
Tag: Cybelle Elyance


Cruel and mysterious entity.

The words stuck in Brandyn's mind as his hand rested again on the tapestry before him. <She speaks of your father in such terms. Her words are her death sentence.> He shook his head, the voice dissipating as if steam in a the wind. He looked up into the open air above, and sought the location of the voice.

He removed his hand from the tapestry. He stepped away from the art, breathing deepening, focusing the Force and allowing the light to wash over him. There were shadows falling across his spirit from all angles, but one in particular now worried him. Where was Cybelle?

Her words, words that cut and angered, had trailed off. Brandyn fought the darkening shadow of anger against Cybelle's accusations, with concern and care for her wellbeing fighting for possession of his focus. Something. Someone? Was affecting him. He could feel a looming presence, an 'other' in the mix of emotions and words.

"Cybelle."

No response.

"Cybelle."

Concern for her won over, but he could feel the anger strangling out the concern.

"This is a collection. An expensive, collection. It could be used for knowledge and a good Jedi also knows that knowledge is power. In the wrong hands…With the wrong intention. I will not tell you again. Touch nothing until I have looked it over. You don't understand—This place is full of dangerous objects. I can't keep you safe, from yourself."

"You feel it too. Don't you," he intoned, an odd amount of passion in his words. Brandyn shook his head, and looked up again.

"I don't wish to investigate my father, Cy," he said in barely a whisper, "what is found...cannot be unknown." His voice strained against the bitterness of soul that seemed to now mingle the unnatural anger simmering beneath.

He walked to the back of the room, an open air elevator with only a handrail for safety, sat awaiting his gentle journey upward. He didn't wait to see if Cybelle followed, something pulling him, directing his steps. "How could a Force-sensitive person be here, and not...be...corrupted," he said, "so much...noise...stirring in the Force." It echoed from above.

Dark shadows, and ominous lighting highlighted the various artifacts on each floor. Floor one consisted of stone tablets and ancient papyrus behind glass encasements. Floor two was home to a display of ancient bladed weapons, each perched on their own stands. Floor three was home to more artwork, they seemed more to lean into the realm of expressionism - dark and light Force motivated scrawlings that came from the soul. Finally, the elevator nestled into a hole in what seemed before to have been the roof of he atrium. Instead, above what seemed to be the roof was instead a large, darkened open space the size of the first floor. The lights came on in the centre of the room. Two objects were illuminated by the dim spotlights.

A sarcophagus stood, tilted upwards slightly, in the midst of the room. Beside it, a black hilted cross guard lightsaber rested on an open perch. Brandyn did not even remember walking towards it but he was already in front of it.

<She hates your father. Hate is not the Jedi way. Her hate will destroy all you hold dear. Strike her down. Save your family.>

<No,> Brandyn whispered to the voice, <I have loved her. I can't...>

<You coward. You will doom your mother. Your sisters dead at your feet just as you foresaw. She is the key.>

The saber was in his shaking hand already. Everything else faded away, but the saber and the voice.

<Kill. Her.>

"The darkness always lies."

The voice screamed vile insult in wrath as the saber dropped from Brandyn's hand and clattered onto the ground. Before the saber hit the ground, he had already recoiled, crawling backwards across the ground away from the sarcophagus.

​

 

[Cybelle Elyance]

N A B O O
Tag: Brandyn Sal-Soren
Age: 20
Location: Spritegate Shore to Ee'everwest Estate (Four Years Later)
_________________________________________________________​

Her perspective of Baros Sal-Soren was tainted by his callous behavior toward a youngling that was barely reaching womanhood, but, that did not mean it was incorrect. There was nothing she had read that suggested he was anything more than that. A loving and dutiful father when it served his purposes. Had he sought to spare Brandyn by locking him away? Forbidding their friendship in a distant world that seemed to understand neither child?

No. His tongue was akin to the searing lash of a whip.

Cybelle had thought herself to be beyond this pain. The difficulties she had faced in becoming a Knight had seemed to encompass everything she was. The trials blurred out emotional trauma and forced it to a distant memory where it could no longer touch her. No longer harm her. And yet—when trapped beneath the weighty gaze of the elder Sal-Soren from a mere portrait she was brought back to the Shore. Back to the rain, where she was no longer a Knight, nor anyone of note.

Just as a sad, lonely child, whose only source of solace had been stripped away.

Perhaps it was this place.

The auburn-haired Jedi Knight drew in several steadying breaths while she let the Force move through in a comforting wave. It was a steady ebb and flow akin to the rise and fall of the tide. It was calming. Constant—And peaceful. That was what her soul needed, here. Not the trinkets in boxes that sang of forbidden wants and dark wishes. Just peace. "…I'm here Bran…"

She spoke his childhood nickname softly, without thinking, and without looking at him. The objects here were warring with one another. Trying to separate them. Pull them apart—So that they might slip in their duties and choose one. It would be all too easy. His question caused her to turn slowly toward him and her footfalls mirrored his. She felt as if she were in a daze. Wading through air that was thick as water. "…I feel it. Don't go off alone."

Alone.

That weakness, that entry point, would only make it worse. Jedi were always strongest together. Cybelle felt a surge of pity that muted some of the madness that beckoned from the atrium. Her ability to care for others, to empathize with them, caused her to understand his reticence. He reacted like a son. Someone loved—Who knew love, had been loved, and was loved still. The green-clad woman was wary while he followed the stirrings in the Force like a man possessed.

"Jedi Sal-Soren—"

She nearly choked on his name. The darkness was that thick, now, and it held his focus without thought or care. "Brandyn!", Cybelle called for him, louder, and with more insistence. His fingers wrapped around the cursed saber before she could stop him. He held it. For a moment—A split second in which she felt her stomach turn end over end with the thought of him losing all sense. This was what she had been worried about from the moment she'd accepted the mission. That Brandyn Sal-Soren would do what he always did. That she, regardless time, was too pathetic to stop him.

Too drawn toward him. Too much in lo—

Cybelle watched him drop the saber and scuttle back from it without a word. Rather than scold him anew she knelt down behind him so that he might hit her body as a wall, warm, and real. Her arms wrapped around his torso without thought and she held him close. It was clear that he had refused whatever it was that the artifact wanted, but, it had still touched him in ways that would feel ten kinds of wrong. That left a mark. "Close your mind to the whispers. Close your heart to the dark…", she murmured into his ear, softly, while keeping him firmly in her grasp.

"Find a memory where you feel safe. Think of the sounds, remember the smell, or the feeling of something that is the complete opposite of this place. Hold onto it."

The Knight closed her eyes and focused on the flowing well of energy that they had devoted their lives toward understanding. "Don't trust your eyes, nor, your ears. Everything in this place is designed to lead others down a path of darkness. To be their worst selves. Trust in the Force."

She urged him to quiet his mind without words and once again felt her connection to the Force redouble and strengthen. Cybelle wouldn't count herself, particularly as religious, but, a rejection of self in favor of faith in a higher power was about as spiritual as it got. The information they gathered from their own sight and interpretations could cause them to make miscalculations. Errors. It was better to hold conviction in the Force where all things would become clear. The word "trust" was used implicitly. "Do not trust your logical faculties. Let the feelings afforded to you by your connection with the Force drive you…And if you cannot find your way—Follow me."

A light in the dark.

All it took was one small ember to grow and turn into a flame when the right accelerant was applied. While she had casually tried to keep the darkness from swallowing them before—She dug deeper within herself and something about her would seem brighter than a falling star. The aura that pressed from her core was similar to the effect of the Force Nexus on the Shore. It was warm, welcoming, and all-encompassing. It would beat back the whispers like a mighty shield of light. "Stay with me."

Her hand rose from around him and she gestured toward the saber that called to him so forcefully and it floated back toward its resting place. It shook and cursed, seemingly, infuriated by the presence of her being but there was nothing it could do. Cybelle was in control, here.

Not some relic.

"Just breathe…In through your nose. Hold it—And exhale. Breathe and stay with me."

Her arms fell back around him again in a protective circle. She could feel the whispers, the anger, battering at her mental shields with a vengeance—But it didn't matter. She knew that holding her childhood friend so close was like slow dancing on a landmine, but it was also a form of strength. Cybelle directly countered evil with the one resource that no being ever had to make more of. The one thing she never questioned, nor, ever forgot about. Love. Compassion. A want, a need, to protect.

The cursed items in this black hole could never understand that.

It couldn't fight what it had never known.

"Just breathe for me…"

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

​

Wearing: Standard Jedi Robes
Equipment: Standard lightsaber
Location: Sal-Soren Compound
Tag: Cybelle Elyance


Find a memory. He did.

That memory was now. In her arms. Comforted even as the darkness made an assault on his mind again. There was a weakness there. A crack in his over-confident spirit that had now been exposed for a second time.

<You are weak. You are offered power. Power to save those closest to you. And you reject it. Young fool.>

"The darkness always lies," he muttered, mostly to himself.

His mental resilience was already returning. The reality was that it was only seconds of connection with the dark entity attached to the sarcophagus, despite it feeling much longer. The voice was already growing more distant. As if scared of the light emanating from the embracing Jedi.

The shroud of darkness within the whole facility slowly retreated as Cybelle guided Brandyn through a lesson in repelling dark with light. But there was more. An inner strength he gained not just from her presence, but from her full acceptance of him, weakness and all. She did not mock. She did not wag a finger in shame. She embraced him. It was enough for him to believe his weakness could be overcome.

If you cannot find you way, follow me.

Eyes closed, breathing as instructed, Brandyn again saw the misty visage of his nightmare while under Darth Wallgof 's manipulation. Cybelle offering an alternate path into the future. One of light, hope, serenity and love.

Adventure. Excitement. The cravings of a child.

Stay with me.

How he longed to do so. Would that that life would be enough. She was. For now though, leaning into her chest, he held the moment.

Just breathe for me.

Brandyn opened his eyes. The feeling of darkness now a distant clawless echo. His hand moved to caress her face. This was the moment where he knew he should kiss her. This was the moment. All his favourite holofilms shared this moment. However, the thought of the vision still filled his mind. Only two paths, one staying with her at the Shore, and the second of him taking the traditional Jedi path through the temple on Coruscant. The darkness always lies. There was more than those options alone.

"Come with me to Coruscant," he said.

​

 

[Cybelle Elyance]

N A B O O
Tag: Brandyn Sal-Soren
Age: 20
Location: Spritegate Shore to Ee'everwest Estate (Four Years Later)
_________________________________________________________​

Chocolate orbs slid closed for a long moment while a barely visible radiance emanated from her center. She could tell that he was arguing with it. Steeling his mind as she had requested. It was the common phrase that he uttered that drew a stroke of recognition. The darkness did lie. Sweetly, at that. Was it something he had gleaned from their lessons so long ago? Or was it something that his Master had imparted in the present? Thin arms remained as they were, twined about him, but without the sensation of being caged. He was held.

As if he were something precious.

She could feel it when Brandyn began to return to himself. It was as if his soul had nigh jumped out of his skin. The light and warmth she exuded would silently beckon him to resist the dark, to return, to come home. The shield she had produced would solidify when he found his footing and add to it so that the effects of the artifacts in the atrium felt like a distant dream. The allure they held would fade. The chill that followed would lessen—Until the room was just a room. The sarcophagus was just a burial chamber. The saber?

A piece of history. Nothing more, nothing less.

The effect they carried when focused, was simple. She strengthened him. He strengthened her. It became a cyclical joint effort that made it feel almost like second nature to uphold. When Cybelle could feel his convictions bubbling up beneath her own, she felt buoyant, and maintaining the shield became as simple as breathing.

Dark eyes snapped open at the delicate caress to her heart-shaped face, though, she couldn't find the will to breathe a word of acknowledgment. Every protest died in her throat and the studious thought that physical contact helped him combat the disturbance provided an easy excuse. She didn't lean into it any further, nor, did she turn away. Cybelle merely tucked her chin against his shoulder and waited for his vitals to return to something close to normal. To feel him breathe, within range, and to note that his pulse wasn't soaring through the roof. "It's all right…", she soothed, gently, though meaning every word of it. Although the malevolent shadows had faded to white noise the Jedi Knight hadn't expected the question he did ask.

"…To Coruscant?"

The question was touched with a bit of confusion, though, she didn't immediately disagree. The case was here—Was it not? Cybelle slowly began to withdraw from him. Carefully. As if doing so might cause some sort of harm or pain…But it had to be done. They couldn't stay like this forever, regardless, of the unspoken nature of how it truly felt. "Why?"

Emerald fabric shifted while she turned her body so she could sit next to him. Facing, him. Her hand reached out to tilt his chin so that she might see his eyes. Searching. Chasing the darkness that had called him up the elevator in the first place. She wanted to be sure that it was gone.

Slowly, she let go.

Her tender expression carefully schooled itself into something unreadable. If he watched closely, he would be able to see the way it stitched distance and professionalism into every aspect. The gentle creature that had murmured so softly moments before raised invisible walls in a protective fashion. Any moment. Any moment, now, she waited for telltale magnetism to seep through her every cell. Pulling her back into his world. Holding on to him was…Dangerous. Like guarding a grenade.

So difficult—And likely to blow up in her face.

"I've only been to Coruscant a few times. Is there something you've noticed or remembered that might help with the mission?"

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

​

Wearing: Standard Jedi Robes
Equipment: Standard lightsaber
Location: Sal-Soren Compound
Tag: Cybelle Elyance


And just like that. The moment was gone. The moment had been more than just the dissolving darkness, the fading of the sinister into a distant echo. No, the moment had been a rekindling. The stoking of a fire that needed precious attention lest it go out. The flame had emerged, granting hope for the briefest of seconds that it might become the inferno it wished to be. But then it was gone. A gust of wind, words carried upon them, had blown the flame out.

Come with me to Coruscant. You...idiot.

The distance between them now was more vast than the mere inches she had moved physically. Brandyn now supported himself, and decided he would just stand up. He offered a hand to Cybelle, to help her up. It was the polite thing to do.

This might have been the time for vulnerability on his behalf. Truthfulness regarding his own errors. The truth about the visions he had seen. How she was so much apart of his thoughts that even his subconscious could spoke with her voice. But the walls she had put up scared him. Like there was something she wasn't telling him. Something, maybe someone, that prevented her from opening up to him?

For some reason, Brandyn dusted himself off. His clothes weren't dirty. It just seemed he needed something to do with his hands.

"Well. For one thing. Coruscant is not here," he said with a shrug, trying to dismiss the offer, just like that.

He walked, initially with a momentary shuffle of his feet, towards the elevator that could take them down to the first floor again.

"Let's get out of this place," he said, fighting the urge to slump his shoulders.

He felt sick. His stomach was churning, and a glance back towards Cybelle only provided more impetuous to the churn. She had gone back to who she was before. Just like when she first met him today, she was distant, controlled...cold. He felt the cold more now for having experienced the warmth.

Why are you like this?

As the elevator went downwards, he wasn't sure if Cybelle was speaking. He was lost in his thoughts. A swirling mass of emotion that lent credence to the Old Jedi Order's insistence on non-attachment. He would likely rue a missed opportunity to bring Cybelle into his life more regularly, but in the midst of the internal storm he could not see a path ahead. Something would have been better than nothing. But when he had offered, she offered nothing in return. Perhaps her warm embrace had been misinterpreted. Perhaps that closeness was just...duty.

"I will return first to Hapes. I have obligations to the Queen there, but it will also give me a chance to investigate...my father's involvement. And then on to Coruscant to finalize my training," he said, finding it difficult to strangle out the admission of suspicion. It seemed that he was not as adept at the cold veneer of professionalism.

He had to face his challenges, so he steeled himself, his jaw clenching into stone like resolve.

"Whatever my father said to you that day, Cybelle," he said, finally addressing the elephant in the room. He took a moment to compose himself, jaw clenching once more. "They were his words. Not my own."

He looked about the atrium. The art around the room represented someone that clearly had a hunger for knowledge about the Sith and the Jedi. It represented a mind fixated on solving a problem. It was then that some oft repeated words from his father came to mind. They seemed pertinent to discussion he had dared approach.

"If we aren't careful, we can punish the wrong person. Don't you agree?"

​

 

[Cybelle Elyance]

N A B O O
Tag: Brandyn Sal-Soren
Age: 20
Location: Spritegate Shore to Ee'everwest Estate (Four Years Later)

Spoiler

_________________________________________________________​

What ended so abruptly for Brandyn Sal-Soren did not end so easily her.

The distance that settled between them in a mild silence was born of that which lay unspoken. Cybelle couldn't have understood the truth about his query about Coruscant; Just like he wouldn't understand why her hand was unsteady when she accepted help from the floor. For two people that had felt so close as younglings, upon their first chance, they barely spoke—Save for the mission.

Cybelle was at fault for that, perhaps, but their duties were a constant.

The mission would never leave.

"We can come back another day if needed. I've cataloged most of the objects in detail.", she murmured while they made their way back to the elevator. His silence left her heart heavy. Everything, left her heart heavy. This was the exact reason why she'd told Master Aegis that she was not suited for this task. She was a Knight—A proven Knight—And yet this man could unravel her like nothing else. With the barest glance, without thought, and without any effort at all.

Years had passed them by.

Years.

But she still knew him now as easily as she had known him then. She could tell when he was retreating. When something bothered him. The elevator moved both too quickly and too slowly. Between small storm brewing within the Jedi beside her and the sheer force of the artifacts bearing down she was beginning to feel as if she were being suffocated, slowly. As if something were sitting on her chest so that it might permanently press the air from her lungs.

Brandyn spoke of his plans going forward and dark eyes swept the floor while she swallowed what felt like a rock. Cybelle knew what he was saying, enough, that she didn't seek any further detail. It could be heartbreaking to suspect something damning of a parent. Hero or otherwise. It opened the psyche to a whole host of questions that could easily spiral. It would no longer be Father and Son. But a Jedi—Seeking a potential threat. "You don't need to be the one to do this."

But—He wasn't quite done.

Whatever insight Cybelle might have been capable of providing was lost at the mention of their shared history. Her footsteps failed as the lighting in the atrium began to shut down automatically when automated systems no longer placed organic beings nearby. Her nigh-perfect mask of professionalism cracked beneath the weight of memory. Of spending every waking hour wishing that she wasn't who she was—So that she might, in some way, measure up to the impossible standard Baros Sal-Soren had set. Cybelle had done her best. She'd studied harder than anyone, and fought, to remember every lesson and every word from her Master. Just so that…

One day, he might. See, her. Again.

That day never arrived until his family estate was left in shambles. Brandyn had not come for her.

He had come for this.

"You never came back."

The words were…Strained. Pressed tightly thin by a throat that was slowly constricting while her stomach bottomed out. It lacked every trace of the soft melodic kindness that the people of Naboo knew so well. Along with other members of the Order she had brought them through the darkest time in their recent history. She held their hands. Dressed their wounds—Buried their dead. Cybelle handled that scenario with grace. This? This was not the same.

"Do you think I'm punishing you, Brandyn? Or your father?"

Her tone remained even, but there was obviously something wrong. Cybelle had tried. She was still trying. But he seemed determined to get to the root of the problem. She couldn't fault him that—But she doubted he would at all enjoy the truth. "In regards to the case; I followed the evidence to the letter. I believe what I can see. Fact, not fiction. I don't want your father to be involved no matter what he said to me at the Shore that day. He taught a little, nothing child, about how uncaring the world can actually be."

"He told me about who he really is. A man that will protect his family at all costs. A man that knows…Exactly what to say. The best way to lift someone up, perhaps, but also the best way to break them down with little more than a smile."

Perhaps that was the gift of all nobility, but Baros Sal-Soren seemed exceedingly adept. There was an exercise about good parenting in there, somewhere, but it was lost in the minutia of superiority and unkindness. "With all that in mind…That isn't why he should be investigated. It provides insight to the subject—But it is the evidence, the data, that leaves a paper trail must be followed to the letter."

"Even if it turns out to be nothing but a misunderstanding. That is our duty."

Cybelle seemed to have steadied herself, slightly, but she didn't expect it to last. She could talk about the case with cool impartiality because it was her duty to do so. The rest…The rest she didn't quite know how to cope with despite having thought she was past it all. She remained silent for quite some time. Her thoughts flying faster than her mouth could keep up with. She was still preoccupied with keeping the shielding in place, but that wasn't the problem.

It was the sound of her heart thudding so loudly in her chest that she feared he would hear it.

"I'm not punishing you."

Whispered. The auburn-haired woman hadn't taken a single step further toward the exit. Perhaps, if she kept to the shadows Brandyn might not see her reaction. Wouldn't notice a watery sheen to her eyes no matter how valiantly she tried to blink it back. "I'm protecting me."

"You have your own life. A Queen, of all things, to get back to. What I feel—", she paused, jaw tightening, while she forced her voice to some level of calm, "Never mattered. It can't. But, that doesn't mean that I don't—"

Her voice cracked.

She couldn't. Cybelle, just couldn't. She'd been solidly rejected by his Father and subsequently by his long, long absence. For how tall he'd gotten she suspected that he was still the boy she had once known. Would he even know what to do with the truth? She could feel him. Heart and mind—It was dizzying. That was the reason she had to stop talking. She'd already said too much.

The young woman tucked her chin down and tried to get back on track. She was the Knight. It was her job. It didn't matter that being close to him felt like he'd never been gone at all. It didn't matter that she could still feel him against her even while he was standing three feet away. It didn't matter that she would have loved to see him pass his trials and become everything he'd always wanted to be. None of it mattered.

"…Let's get you…h-home."

Such fragile little words.

This time, it was different. This time…She knew why her heart was breaking.

She would never see him again. She would never hold him—Never see his dreams. It was the duty of the Jedi to put all things before themselves. Cybelle had managed. She put everything and everyone before her own wants and needs. It was simply the way it was supposed to be.

Taking a step toward him, toward the exit, was the hardest thing she had ever done.

Would ever do.

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

​

Wearing: Standard Jedi Robes
Equipment: Standard lightsaber
Location: Sal-Soren Compound
Tag: Cybelle Elyance


He hated this. He hated them. Like this. All over something his father had said. Perhaps it was Brandyn's long history of being told things he didn't want to hear from his father, and his rebellion against those things that had left him incapable of seeing how deeply Cybelle had incorporated Baros Sal-Soren's opinion of her into her own being.

"Never came back? I couldn't come back until now."

Coming back from the temple would have been admitting defeat, like he needed the comfort of his family and his old home. That he could not make it. That he was wrong to leave. And then since just before the attack on Naboo, he had been deep undercover. How was she to know all of this without him saying as much. But time did not allow for explanation, as she continued.

Without thought, Brandyn found his hands running through his hair in frustration. His hands covered his face and dragged downwards, stretching his grimace into an exaggerated sad-face, which was oddly appropriate for the moment.

"Do you hear yourself, Cy?" He said, voice raised and pitched higher in frustration, "you sound like you believed what he said. What? Did he say that you weren't good enough? That you weren't good enough for me?"

He ignored the discussion of the case that needed investigating. It's importance was not to be denied. But even as she spoke of it, the issue of his father's treatment of her still wove it's way throughout everything that she said.

"From my earliest memory," Brandyn said, determinedly pointing towards the ground with each word, "my father said I would not be allowed to become a Jedi. And from the earliest moment I also knew I wanted nothing else than to be a Jedi Knight. When I found something I wanted more than my greatest dream, my father took you from me. I decided he would never. Never again, tell me what I cannot or cannot be. I decided. To stop believing him."

Spinning about on his heels, he paced away, towards the exit. Only to spin back around, emotionally drained and mentally seeking the comfort of the Force.

"You are not protecting yourself by believing him. You are destroying yourself," he said, through hands as he rubbed his face again. He realized in that moment, that the most loving thing he could do for Cybelle right now was to free her of this noose that she had allowed his father to put around her mind.

"The truth is. You never had anything. Anything. To prove to him, or to me. You have always mattered. What you felt. Always...mattered," he almost said 'to me' but that wasn't the point. In his life, or out of his life, Cybelle needed to be freed from the bondage of uncalled for expectations. Whatever social, or romantic hole she could fill for him, was of lesser significance than her own wellbeing.

Loving Cybelle, right now, meant not pursuing her.

His arms swung upwards from his sides, in a show of resignation. "I don't want to investigate my father alone. It is going to be hard. I will not be able to be completely impartial. I need someone I can trust. Someone from outside the normal system I work in. So I ask again, as your friend and colleague, would you come to Coruscant with me?"

​

 

[Cybelle Elyance]

N A B O O
Tag: Brandyn Sal-Soren
Age: 20
Location: Spritegate Shore to Ee'everwest Estate (Four Years Later)

Spoiler

_________________________________________________________​

Whether he couldn't or wouldn't return to Naboo was neither here nor there. It didn't change what his absence felt like. It didn't change the fact that it fulfilled the prophecy that his father had issued on a sweet summer day. He would forget about her—And seemingly, he had. At the rather harsh response to what equated to her breaking down, Cybelle had to hide a flinch. It was a callous thing to ask, to say, when the truth was a mystery.

"…I did believe it…"

It was a complicated time. The majority of the galaxy seemed to have a bone to pick with the Jedi Order and her own circumstances were less than desirable for the son of a noble house. Even without her decision to press forward and follow the Force she would have been considered beneath him in so many ways that it made her ache. It would never matter how smart she was, how much she had learned, or achieved—She just didn't have the right connections. "Did you ever wonder why your family let us play together as children? Why it was never an issue until I lost my guardian?"

"I have royal blood, for all the good its done, and when my new caretaker had no designs to push me through the political minefield of the Hapani Court—I became a pariah for all of the nobility of Naboo that had been so friendly before."

"Master Aegis gave me a home. She cared for me without ever asking for anything in return and when I decided I wanted to continue on the path of a Jedi it gave me purpose. It meant that I was more than what Baros Sal-Soren thought. More than what any of them, thought.", she intoned, softly, but still seemingly rooted to the spot. She'd taken a few steps forward but every time she got closer—Bran moved away. Frustrated. He was frustrated—And drained. So was she. Her head tilted and dark hair fell over her shoulder while he spoke and for a long moment, she just listened. Was that it?

That he couldn't understand because he hadn't heard the words? Hadn't felt it—Hadn't wept in the rain until the closest thing she had to a mother swept in and protected her from it all. She'd hidden in the Master Jedi's robes like a baby chick for so long. She didn't even remember moving, leaving, or getting up out of the training circle. "You're misunderstanding me."

His offer was there. Again. To leave with him. To go to Coruscant—With him. Was it a cruel joke?

Cybelle moved forward slowly. Time stretched and the sound of her low-heeled boots clicked on the expensive flooring. She didn't know how to make him understand. Brandyn was resigned to some strange thought process that she couldn't follow. What did he think she'd stopped herself from saying? Why did he think that she was closed off, forlorn, and hell-bent on being proficient above all else? The look on his face, as frustrated as she was, truly, made her want to take it all away.

"…I would have gone anywhere you asked of me, Brandyn Sal-Soren."

She stopped moving, standing, just a little too close. Cybelle reached toward him and eventually let her hand rest against his cheek. It was the same way he had touched her, though, there was something more to it. "That's the truth. Then—And now.", the green-clad woman murmured, carefully, reaching with her other hand to let it curl in the front of his robes. It was more willingness to be near than she had expressed the entire time, save, when the darkness called. When the Force moved in her he would feel it. That same wave of light, rolling and warm, while it provided safe haven. He would feel the soft edge of sadness. The resolute need to be strong, no matter, the circumstances. He would feel the quietly aching tenderness in which she regarded his every breath.

Eventually, Brandyn would recognize a soft knock against his psyche.

It would feel strange. Metaphysical, ephemeral, but more than anything—Polite. There were some that might have used the previous event to barge into his mindscape, but that wasn't her way. Rather than invade him potentially against his will she merely drew nearer in the only way she knew how. Cybelle didn't seek entry to his mind, but instead, invited him into her own. "You've been gone for so long…"

A pause. Heartrendingly soft.

"...I've missed you. I'm not destroying myself for him. I'm not punishing you, for him."

She waited. Waited…To see if he would accept her. Brandyn claimed that she had always mattered. This was his chance to prove it. To experience the things, she couldn't say. To know the truth of her in a way that no one else did. It would expose each time she'd hidden from him since seeing his face. Every time he'd lingered on her mind, her heart, and every time she'd wished her life had been different.

"I let go of you because if I stand this close…If you look at me like that…", Cybelle intoned gently while leaning up to see his eyes better in the dimming light. Should he allow it she would bring that day from the Shore back to the forefront of her mind. It would be a memory that he could view from her perspective—Almost like a holo-vid. He would feel the training mat beneath his knees, grinding into skin, as if it had happened to him. He would feel what she felt. The cold, desolate rain. Rejection. Pain. Loss and confusion.

Love.

"I'm afraid I'll forget who I am."

She'd loved him, then.

"I'm afraid you won't like what you see. We've changed…But some things haven't."

Unequivocally.

"Some things never will."

She loved him now.

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

​

Wearing: Standard Jedi Robes
Equipment: Standard lightsaber
Location: Sal-Soren Compound
Tag: Cybelle Elyance


Whiplash.

From the moment he sensed her presence walking up the stairs of the devastated mansion it had been a series of whiplash inducing moments. She was distant. She was close. She was closed off and retreating. She was open and forthright. In the moment Brandyn admired her openness. He saw the young woman he had been so attracted to for years. Then she closed off again. He thought he understood why. He thought he understood the path to take, and then she opened up again.

"If that is true, then come with me," he said, words choking out of a muddled mind, "I...can't stay here."

The softness of her approach, the lightness of her mental and physical touch, it all combined to calm the tempest, even if the indecision remained.

His mind linked with hers, he granted permission for the tour of hurt, loss and rejection. Laced throughout all the dark memories she carried, there was a seam of affection. He saw it creep up in times of her past four years, only to be suppressed by thoughts of duty and responsibility. Her memory showed few times she allowed her thoughts to dwell on affection, but they became fewer and further between.

Her words were like an echo narrating the emotional images of her memory. He wasn't sure if he could ever truly appreciate the sorrow she carried with her, but he had allowed it to wash over him to the point that he got the point - he thought.

Her hand on his cheek, sparked an instinctual chill down his spine. Synapses collided with each other as he sought for the decisiveness of just a few moments earlier. He had determined to let her go until she be ready but now he wanted to to sweep her into his arms and head off into their future.

Whiplash.

With their minds touching, Brandyn opened his memories to her. The feeling of horror as his father approached them both on that sunny day on the Shore. The instantaneous feeling of loss and grief as he knew that his father's intention would be their never seeing one another again. He even let her see the anger. The moment he lashed out with the Force in his father's study, items from his father's Corellian art collection flying off the walls. He let her see the cold, determined resolve, that was so very un-Jedi, that had saw him plot his departure over the next few months. He allowed her to see the anger, the coldness begin to fade under the tutelage of his Master. He allowed her to see his strained relationship with the Twi'lek Padawan Ralia as the grew to respect each other, and the moment of her death. But most of all, he allowed her to see the motivation for all he had done, for what had driven him to the point he was now in the Order. Her.

Deep down. He had always been running on the fumes of her light that had brightened his path. Cybelle's example and her warm glow had been his core. And now that he understood that this light came from a place that had reasonable excuse for darkness invading. He loved it. He loved her. Even more.

Eyes opened, the warm pooling of tears betraying his heart.

His hand reached for her chin, tilting her face towards his. Such subtle, radiant beauty.

"All I see is you."

And then he kissed her.

​

 

[Cybelle Elyance]

N A B O O
Tag: Brandyn Sal-Soren
Age: 20
Location: Spritegate Shore to Ee'everwest Estate (Four Years Later)

Spoiler

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Cybelle didn't answer.

There was too much running rampant between the bi-directional pathway that was slowly finding purchase. Solidifying in such a way that when she peered at his face it almost felt as if she were looking in a mirror. The evil of the atrium became buried beneath the weight of something far more powerful. Truth drowned out the cloying whispers. Mutual understanding, and affection, ushered out uncertainties that bred weakness with the same fervor to be had when chasing down cobwebs. She breathed and it hitched in her chest. Not out of sadness—Simply out of being inadvertently overwhelmed.

She had been willing, for his sake, to share her secrets.

The auburn-haired Hapani hadn't expected him to do the same in return.

Cybelle hadn't expected to find that all of his achievements, endeavors, and adventures had some common thread that led back to her. He would know, now, that she had truly believed the words of Baros Sal-Soren. He would feel her surprise. The way her heart felt so incredibly full that it might tip over and spill all over the floor. Brandyn hadn't forgotten her at all.

Not for a moment.

She made a small sound that was neither a word nor a sigh while dark eyes flickered back and forth from behind lavender lids. Following his memories. Seeing nothing of the present world; But everything, everything that really, truly mattered all at the same time. She clung to every frame. Every triumph and heartache that she had missed. The hand that rested so softly against his cheek fell into a careful, loving touch. Blind. Unthinking. It was all she could do.

Her own mental pathways were jumbled, out of order, because she wasn't skilled enough to organize what he saw—Brandyn knew her. He would be able to put the puzzle pieces together. To take in the phantom scent of fresh lemons, sand, and sea so that he might liken it back to their stolen moments. The fragile things that she drew strength from when the sky fell on Naboo during the cataclysm. He would feel her through those long evenings. Often, in the silence, being both gladdened and miserable that he wasn't there.

Brandyn would know how much she had been forced to grow up, too quickly, and accept the role of a Knight potentially before her time. He would feel her well-hidden fear that she would never measure up to the soft grandeur of her pacifistic Master. He would see her lessons. Her awe while small flowers grew in the wake of the flame-haired woman restoring the Nabooian countryside. The young wanted to be that. A force of nature that not even a cosmic event could break down. The last four years had been fraught with death and restoration—But Cybelle always kept a small kindling of hope.

Some forbidden dream that she might see him again.

That he might look at her as he once had.

They were selfish thoughts that she buried with the understanding of the expectations of the Living Force. The way she'd been left broken-hearted made her believe the caution that other Jedi observed when it came to attachments. She loved him from a shadow, from a dream, but that was the place where it had always remained. It was important to let that love rest in a perfect state where it might grow evergreen in memory. But, only that. Cybelle had truly thought it could only ever be that for the both of them. Just a memory. It was easy to keep to that virtue, that concept, when they were systems apart. It was easy to hide it when she wasn't even sure if Brandyn knew if she was alive or dead.

It wasn't so easy when her heart's desire stood before her, flesh and blood, with seemingly paralleled affections. Cybelle breathed deeply when the visions began to lift and her chin tilted toward him without a thought in the direction he guided. Her face was a flower, upturning beautifully, wanting, and waiting toward his sun. "Bran…", Cybelle whispered, unsure, if the quiet caress of his name would even be heard over everything else.

She wanted to warn him.

That she was more than what she had been, that shades of grey existed, where once there had only been light. But, he knew that. Brandyn had seen her at her worst, at her best, and everything else in-between through the memory walk. He knew everything.

When he kissed her—She hesitated. Not out of protest, but, because it was new.

A first.

Her svelte form seemed to sigh in relief while she slowly melted against him, delicate, and leaning up on her tiptoes. Unlike before, she didn't pull away. If he saw her? Truly, she wanted to be that. The woman she saw reflected in his eyes was larger than life. Important. Not in the way of nobility or prestige. That woman was significant simply for being herself—For being precious, irreplaceable, in his eyes. Careful fingers threaded their way into his hair and the hand that had curled in his robes moved up to lay warmly against the back of his neck.

She didn't notice that the shadows had all but lifted without her intervention.

Perhaps they were far enough from the heart atrium that it was inevitable. Perhaps, it was something else. Regardless, when she slowly settled back on her feet and the tender kiss broke, she would seem entirely dazed. Her gaze traced the handsome lines of his face unashamed, taking everything, both happy and sad, whilst committing it to memory. Her hand moved from his hair so that she could brush at the edges of his eyes. Chasing visible or invisible tears away. When Cybelle realized she was staring she blinked and her chin tucked down while her cheeks began to burn in earnest.

"I…", she murmured, "We—", she tried to speak, but, found that she kept tripping over her words. It would have been hilarious to anyone that knew her. Cybelle was a bastion of strength. Confidence. Everything she did was with tenable precision that was only matched by careful wisdom. It was an odd virtue to be praised for; But it was true. In the few moments where she could still breathe his air and feel the delicate pressure of his lips against her own… She was just a girl.

Just a girl, with a boy, and no more secrets.

While her eyes swept the front of his robes and dark-eyelashes dusted against pink cheeks she tried to find a way to convey what she was feeling. To find out way out of a daydream without losing it entirely. The world was out there. They couldn't stay here. But, if she could only be in his arms, here?

"…Can I…", she breathed, and her cheeks burned ever-brighter while she bit down on her lower lip. Trying to decide if she ought to press forward. More than anything, this moment, felt like it was tilting this way and that over the edge of a sugar-laced knife. "…Ask for something?"

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

​

Wearing: Standard Jedi Robes
Equipment: Standard lightsaber
Location: Sal-Soren Compound
Tag: Cybelle Elyance


It was an everlasting moment that was gone in the blink of a eye. Even as they broke away from one another, Brandyn could still feel the warmth of her lips against his. As if a dream made real, his mind spun. Thoughts tried and failed to make purchase on something even remotely similar to reality. Perhaps it was the emotion of the moment, the heightened senses due to the room in which they stood. Or perhaps it was the very real temptation of the Dark Side that he had just endured that made ever breath seem meaningfully exaggerated.

She struggled to speak. He understood the feeling. But there was one thing for certain that he wanted to say, even as her trembling lips failed to make a sentence.

I love you, Cybelle.

He was going to say them. Any moment he would regain his faculties, his reason and be able to say them with more than just delirious fog for thoughts.

The innocence of her face, the openness, it was everything he wished for. She looked at him now like he had looked at her then.

Then came a question. It took Brandyn a moment to realize that she was expecting an answer.

A frown. It was a frown that developed on his forehead. She looked worried or perhaps uncertain, and Brandyn adopted it tenfold. He wanted to quip in order that the moment be lightened, but he found nothing to say.

"If it is in my power to give it, then of course, yes" he said finally in reply after searching her eyes for probably just a little too long. His stomach knotted in anticipation.

​