Choosing My Confessions

[Kuzo]

[media]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvlH7OouP-0[/media]​

​

​Blackwater Reach​

Dosuun​

Continued from But Not To Help​

​

​"Rest. Tomorrow.... tomorrow we'll talk."

Curt. Ominous. Had [member="Samka Derith"] ever looked less a child than she did in that moment? She still didn't know what if anything the girl knew about what had transpired, what she had told [member="Elliot Locke"], what [member="Jorg"] had promised to use to destroy her if she didn't do as they wanted. Did she know? It repeated itself over and over in the back of her mind, an anxious mantra. But Irajah was too exhausted to ask, to argue. Too exhausted to do anything but nod and sit, shoulders slumped in the large wing backed chair in her study. She had offered a small, tired smile and a nod to [member="Ghorua the Shark"]- not unlike how they had left each other on Coruscant.

The assumption, of course once again, that they would see each other again. Whatever breach that either had imagined had come between them on Bespin had dissolved entirely, and when [member="Samson"] showed them both out, Irajah thought to herself that at least one good thing had come from the whirling events of the last week and a half. Just as before, she'd managed to take something back from tragedy. His friendship, at least, she knew she could count on- and she only hoped that one day she'd be able to make it up to him. Repay him, for what he had done here for her.

Closing her eyes, she leaned back. She knew she should sleep, but the idea of the passage up to her rooms was simply too much in that moment.

It could have been minutes or hours, but a soft sound brought those distant hazel eyes open again.

She hadn't seen Terin, not truly, since the night the Ren had taken her. Ten days ago. A lifetime. But he stood in front of her now, slight of frame and usually impeccably dressed and mannered. Her Seneschal, the head of her household. He was the central cog that kept Blackwater running- and Irajah didn't know what she would have done without him. She had never seen anything beyond polite interest or, dare she say, a certain fondness on his sharp features.

So the broken, raw and stricken lines of his face were entirely alien to her. He opened his mouth to speak, then stopped, the words again ending in that soft, strangled sound she hadn't been able to place a moment ago.

"Terin," she said softly, reaching out her hand to take his. "Terin it's alright. I'm back. I'm sorry that you were both afraid," she murmured, referring to Samson. Neither had known where she was, or what had happened to her.

Or so she assumed. Until the older man closed his eyes. Both of his hands gripped hers and painfully slowly he sank to his knees in front of her.

His forehead on the back of her hand, it took her a moment to realize that he was crying.

"You have nothing to apologize to me for, my lady," he whispered, his voice tight and shaking. "And I..... I have everything to apologize to you for."

*****​

One more betrayal. One more person.

He had known, all along. About the Ren. About their interest in her. He had been placed here by them, with the expressed purpose of gaining her trust and reporting back to them. And, when the time came, to let them into the manor, no questions asked.

Irajah had never before had anyone beg for her forgiveness. To sob as she withdrew her hand, to swear his loyalty moving forward if only he could prove to her that he understood the depths of his mistake, that he was her man now, if she'd have him. How his doubts had grown, as he'd seen who and what she was, and that he never should have done it-

She stood up so fast the room spun, knocking over the chair with a crash.

"Get out."

She didn't look at him. Couldn't look at him. Her voice was low, flat, and deadly.

"Please, if-"

"If you feel the way you claim, then follow my instruction now, Terin. Get. Out."

Samson appeared, just as Terin vanished into the depths of the house. Quiet, loyal, dog like in his devotion. Irajah wavered, weak and dizzy, and he was there at her side. She didn't need to ask him for help to her room. She leaned on him, without a word.

Tomorrow.

Tomorrow she would start to set her life to rights again.

*****​

She was waiting in the Solarium when Samka arrived the following morning. If not well rested, Irajah Ven looked at the very least slightly refreshed. Clean hair, clean clothes. She had eaten sparingly, the pain and fire in her core from Gideon preventing anything more. Tea, instead of caf, to help settle her stomach.

The Doctor sat at the piano bench, not playing really, just idly letting her fingers call out chords as she sipped from the delicate white tea cup. The morning had dawned clear, bright, the sky a brilliant blue as if finally promising something more.

Maybe something better.

But first, there were things she must say. There were answers to give, confessions to choose.

And a 'no' to offer, gently but firmly.

Irajah Ven would not be joining the Knights of Ren. And Samka Derith deserved to hear it from her directly.

 

[Samka Derith]

Avalonia, Dosuun​

One Month Ago​

​

Work was finished for the day and Cassidy was exhausted. She had spent hours on her feet scurrying around the clinic. The medical profession was more tiring than she'd expected. Cassidy had never thought it would be easy, no, but the picture in her head was less physically draining. Asides from a 20 minute coffee break (the bitter taste of which she was still struggling to get used to), the student hadn't sat down at all. By the end of her 9 hour shift, Cassidy wanted little more than to curl up in bed and sleep for the rest of the week. This was when she was supposed to only be a student understudy, the workload on the others must be unthinkable.

There was still one thing to look forward to, however.

Cassidy had grown to be fast friends with the woman she was shadowing, [member="Irajah Ven"]. Irajah had promised to show the younger woman one of her favourite little cafes near the clinic. There they'd chatted and laughed together over cakes and hot drinks. Cassidy even had a giggling fit which turned the eyes of several patrons as Irajah recounted the story of stuffing her face with cakes similar to this one in front of the Grand Moff herself, an action unthinkable for the nervous teenager Irajah had first met. The conversation had then moved to the benefits of Irajah's baroness status, Blackwater Reach. A gorgeous manor house, the pictures Cassidy was shown were striking in their beauty. The younger woman had been thrilled at the sights. They'd soon began to enthuse plans to meet at Blackwater and share chocolate cake.

But Cassidy would never see Blackwater.

Because Cassidy didn't exist.

Blackwater Reach, Dosuun​

Present Day​

​

Samka marched up the hill towards Irajah's manor house. This time she was here on her own and in person. Black boots trudged through the mud, it had obviously rained recently but the skies were clear for now. The mud flickering onto her freshly polished boots irritated Samka, a woman who took pride in a pristine appearance. Barring the hair, still not yet dyed back to her chosen shade of blue since the break out from the SIS compound, she was dressed in her typical attire, a dark cloak trailing behind a form fitting black uniform while leather gloves covered delicate fingers, holding a black bag beneath her arm. The choice was deliberate. It may have seemed an odd choice of clothing for a meeting where Samka was hoping to continue to rebuild trust, to look the part of a shadowy enforcer, but it was a statement of more truth as to who she was than any more casual clothing would. On some level, Samka believed Irajah would appreciate dealing with 'Decitus Ren' more than anything which reminded her too much of 'Cassidy Jynth' even if the eventual goal was to convince the Doctor that they were one and the same at heart.

"Irajah?" Samka called out once she reached the doorway. The woman had told Sam in advance to let herself in but the Ren announced her arrival regardless as she wiped the mud off the souls of her boots. She wasn't here to surprise the Doctor, to sneak up and whisk her away again. They were here to talk.

Sam followed the sound of Irajah's voice and the gentle sound of piano notes through to the Solarium. She smiled as warmly as she could upon catching sight of the woman's small frame at the piano. "Good morning, Irajah. I hope you're well," the Ren offered a curt bow of her head, one of respect but never deference. "Even when you're not truly playing, you play better than my Mother did," a small call back to Sam's Bespin apartment, framed casually as a small joke but also a reminder to the woman about how frank, friendly and open the young Ren had been. "I adore your place, it's very impressive. You must allow me access to your library some day, I've already seen some titles which interest me just walking through and here," Sam patted the bag beneath her arm, "I've brought you something. May I?" She asked gesturing to a nearby table.

 

[Kuzo]

The faint call of the girl's voice brought only a single pause in the casual strolling of hands across the keys. Irajah had called out over her shoulder, but stayed where she was, concentrating deliberately on the piano. She felt the arrival of the Ren- so different from the feeling of Cassidy, Samka could not be mistaken for anything as mundane as a medical student. How Irajah had ever mistaken her for anything else-

The dark haired woman smiled, ever so slightly, wistfully, at the compliments. They were genuine, she knew. But then, everything that Samka had ever done as Cassidy had been so damnably genuine.

Irajah wanted to believe her.

But keeping up with the series of stories told by the younger woman. She didn't think she could do it.

Even if everything she had said since revealing herself was true, there was no possibility of rebuilding trust and friendship in the span of a week and a half.

"You are too kind," Irajah responded finally, stopping playing and turning on the bench to look up at Samka.

She didn't want to do this. And a gift? That wouldn't make this any easier.

"Perhaps we should talk first, Samka...."

She could not accept a gift from her. Not here and now. Not with what she had to say.

"No. Please. I insist."

With an internal sigh, Irajah nodded, with only a trace of the reluctance she actually felt.

[member="Samka Derith"]

 

[Samka Derith]

Samka flashed her most charming smile at the Doctor as she relented. "This may not be exactly how we envisioned it," the Ren said as she fumbled with a plastic container from the bag. The lid popped off to reveal a chocolate cake, "but we did promise to do something like this one day." Samka stood to one side and presented the cake to Irajah, trying to read the woman's reaction as she did. "I can cut the first slice?" Sam asked and began twirling the cake knife in her fingers.

Now she was up close, Sam could see just how terribly ill the woman looked. She was better than she had looked at the prison but there it was to be expected. A night's rest and a shower wouldn't completely remove the ills of being kept in a SIS black site but this was something Sam had noticed gradually happening since they'd met. She'd become painfully thin, thinner than Samka, the bruising she tried to hide no longer could be kept from view and her eyes drooped with something beyond any ordinary exhaustion or stress. [member="Irajah Ven"] was a fighter, something Sam admired hugely about the woman, and she'd fight this illness until the very end but it was beginning to look like a fight the Doctor couldn't win.

Reading the atmosphere of the room, Sam relented with a sigh, dropping the cake knife onto the plate, and walked right up to Irajah. She didn't want to play friendly, there was clearly too much dwelling on the older woman's mind. "Did they hurt you? Those Alliance brutes?" She asked quietly, reaching a tentative thumb out to examine the marks on Irajah's face. "If you desire revenge, we can burn them to cinders together. I'll do it for you. I won't just protect you, I'll teach you to protect yourself," her voice was little more than a whisper now, "Irajah, let me help you."

 

[Kuzo]

Not like they had talked about.

Irajah's throat hurt just thinking about it.

This wasn't even who she had talked about it with. She and Cassidy- they had been up so late in the lab that night. Both a little punch drunk, high on exhaustion, and giggling as soon as she had noticed that their patient's name translated to a certain anatomy in Bith. Irajah had promised to make it up to Cassidy, the ridiculously late night in the lab while they ran tests that simply couldn't wait. The biggest chocolate cake she could find, just for the two of them, no one else could have any.

The young woman she looked at now?

She was a stranger.

And what came next only drove that fact home even harder.

"What? No." She had to force herself to not physically recoil from the words, the tone, the touch- but the tensing in her body wouldn't be missed. "Not really, no. Just on Bespin and that.... well. We both knew the risks going into that. No. They did not hurt me."

Not physically anyway.

Although, it was becoming more and more clear to Irajah that, whatever [member="Jorg"] had promised to tell the Order, either he hadn't done it yet.... or else [member="Samka Derith"] hadn't heard it. There was a third option of course, and that was that she simply didn't care. Which seemed unlikely. It gave her a small measure of hope. Hope that she could salvage this situation. Keep it civil, keep it.....

What? She didn't know.

"Look. Please. Don't take this the wrong way, but no. I don't want revenge. I just.... Samka, I'm tired. Of all of this. Of being pushed and pulled in a dozen different directions. Of never knowing who is going to see me as..... as an opportunity.... next. I....."

She took in a deep breath.

"I'm going to leave Dosuun. I need to get away. To not be here."

 

[Samka Derith]

Samka's thumb froze an inch from Irajah's face. Her attempt to invoke the Doctor's inner anger and focus it on their mutual foe had failed. She sensed no burning hatred for her SIS captors there but there was clearly confusion, even fear, over her words. The Ren's hand lingered for a moment before snapping back to her side. A dawning realisation that she may have made a mistake and broken the facade with those last words washed over Sam. [member="Irajah Ven"] must have known that she was prepared to be ruthless but never had she displayed that side before the Doctor until now. The side which clashed so horribly with the shy and sweet student Irajah had bonded with. Sam hadn't even thought twice about it, hoping to capitalise on anger which didn't seem to exist.

She frowned at Irajah's next words, "You're not an opportunity to me, Irajah. I'm here because I think we can help each other, not to use you and leave you disregarded in the muck once it's all over. I want to help build you into something stronger." Sam firmly placed both her hands on each of Irajah's shoulders, the contact wasn't rough but it was tight, possessive. Sam weaved her face directly into the older woman's vision, a young sympathetic face with pleading eyes, eyes which were nonetheless tinted an eerie crimson by the Dark Side. "This is exhaustion talking, not logic," she said gently and kindly, "the realisation of the Ren, the Battle of Bespin, the SIS, it all happened so fast and with your illness..." Sam's gaze flickered to the dark lines beneath Irajah's eyes, "It would take a toll on anyone. Dosuun is your home, this is where you belong. You belong with us, with me, so I can shape you into the person I know you can be, a person who can never be pushed around again."

She paused to let her words sink in, not relenting her grip on the Doctor.

"What are you so afraid of?"

 

[Kuzo]

This was already spiraling into places she did not want it to be. If her hands hadn't been set so firmly, her shoulders would have been up around her ears. She leaned her head back slightly, needing at least a few more centimeters of space than Samka was currently giving her, but planted firmly on the piano bench.

The younger woman had hoped for anger before. Oddly, only now, did she achieve that.

"Do- do you even hear yourself?"

Irajah looked back and forth between the crimson flecked eyes, disbelief and yes, anger, on her own face.

"Everyone Samka, everyone, has wanted to change me into something else. Something that I am not. And not a single one of those people ever asked if that was something I actually wanted. Not one of them saw me and thought to themselves 'well, she's pretty much perfect just the way she is.'"

Well. One person.

"I'm not afraid. I'm tired. Even this," she glanced around at the opulence around her, "is an attempt to make me into something I am not."

The last words were bitten out, bitter and hard. But the tone dropped a moment later. Into that tired, done with this, voice.

"I came to Dosuun to find a better life.... all I've found here is heart ache. Yes. It is exhaustion talking. But I'm also making a choice here. And I am saying no. No to your offer- thank you, for what you think you are trying to do- but it's not what I want, so, no."

[member="Samka Derith"]

 

[Samka Derith]

There was much Samka wanted to say. To say that of course Irajah wasn't perfect, otherwise none of the mistakes that had happened over her recent life would have occurred, but she could be perfect if only she seized this chance. To say that Blackwater was something she had earned in her service to the nation, it wasn't something that had to define her. To ask that if Dosuun had been nothing but heart ache, did the good times they'd shared as teacher and student mean nothing now? Was everything tainted?

But the final sentence from Irajah's mouth put a halt to any of that.

She couldn't bring herself to kindly reassure and sooth the Doctor's concerns. "After everything I did for you," Sam muttered, her voice slow and shaky with anger welling up within, threatening to bubble to the surface. "The standard procedure... but I... all for you." half sentences which made no sense alone, the nature of which she couldn't finish just in case this was all a mistake, that any moment [member="Irajah Ven"] could turn around and say that actually, she just needed more time to clear her head. But in Sam's mind, the gaps were filled. Ordinarily, these sorts of cases would bring the unwitting recruits into the hands of masked strangers who'd break down their minds and reeducate them into absolute loyalty and servitude to the Supreme Leader but no, for whatever reason, Samka had decided the Doctor deserved better than that. That she'd guide Irajah Ven into their number with the gentle touch of one she could consider a friend. It was an affair entirely below one of her stature in the Ren yet she'd chosen to remain involved past her initial intelligence gathering role and what had it led to? A tired, sick, selfish woman refusing the gifts offered before her.

The atmosphere of the room darkened, Samka's aura blackened with it. Before she was a neutral entity but now something dark and cold seemed to emit from within her. The Ren grasped her hands together and began to pace in a circle around the Doctor. "Did you think I wanted this at first?" Her composer regained but tone now ominous. "At first I was so lost, confused, afraid. But you saw what I was back on Bespin and now you see what I've become, I am so much stronger than the timid little girl I was. In time, you'll understand just as I do now. I'm sorry, Irajah," empathy returning to her voice with the final sentence, "I'm sorry I let you believe there was a choice here. You can't leave, not knowing what you know now."

 

[Kuzo]

The incredulity on her face, in her voice, was staggering.

"After everything you did for- You lied to me. You manipulated me. You don't get to play the injured party here Samka," she said, voice thick with disgust.

"I'm not a solider. I am not one of your Ren, and I never will be. You do not get to dictate to me what I will and will not do. You do not have the right to give me orders and then be angry that I have not fallen in line. People aren't puppets. I am not a puppet."

The litany of betrayals worked so deeply against [member="Samka Derith"] that there was no climbing out of the pit she had dug as far as Irajah Ven was concerned. If she had been the first, perhaps. Perhaps there would have been away to reach across the divide and offer the younger woman a hand up and out.

But the scars on her trust, on her body, were too great to ignore. All of the anger, the loathing she felt for the Zambranos, the more recent cuts to her trust by Elliot, and as always the foundation of the lies uncovered about her own past, the lies her parents had told. All of that piled on all of the small moments in between coalesced and she had not a single drop of forgiveness available to her. The room darkened, but not from merely one direction. Irajah was not blind to the danger here, to the threat implicit in her final words, but she was done being bullied into what others desired.

Do this or we will hurt you.

No.

Do this and we will hurt you.

"I am sorry. Sorry that you think you didn't have a choice," she said, her tone carefully controlled and words clipped. Looking up balefully, her eyes flashed with anger.

She stood up very slowly, keeping her breathing even. Though they were of a height with each other, the stalking, circling of the other woman kept her knees backed up against the piano bench.

"But we always have a choice, Samka. ALWAYS."

She couldn't pretend she had the strength fight her, physically. Irajah was a fighter, but in spirit- her body was even more rapidly failing her than ever before. That still didn't stop her.

"My decision- my choice- is no, and there is nothing- NOTHING you can do to change that." Her voice lashed out, that steel and fire underlying every word. "Your choice is to accept that and we part as something..... maybe not friends. You threw that away. But at least not as enemies. Or- to try to make me do what you want. And I will fight you. Every. Step. Of the way. And you will not only still not get what you want, but you will also have gained an enemy. That's not the way I want that to go down. But it will. We all have choices. Here's yours."

 

[Samka Derith]

Six years ago​

Academy for young Ren - Skye​

​

A girl aged just thirteen stumbled in the darkness deep below the academy's halls. She shivered from the cold, her body had now adapted to the warm climate of Skye and to be stripped so far from the sunlight bothered her. The labyrinth was completely deprived of a light source leaving the teenager essentially blind. It did seem to enhance her other senses, fingertips brushing along cool, dusty stone, feeling every groove and dent in them, touch guiding her path. The footsteps from her boots echoed down the narrow walkways, setting a steady pace one after the other. Danger lurked down here, so her instructors had warned, but one in tune with the Force had nothing to fear, all she had to do was go where the Force called for her and she would be safe. Thus far, she had been. What dangers there were remained a mystery, her imagination fuelled with terrible beasts or devious traps, making every step one of caution. This was the test, to see if her abilities were powerful enough to guide her to the central chamber. The moment she'd entered, the girl had picked up distorted whispers in her head, directing her way. She couldn't tell if the voice belonged to humans, if it was male or female or even what language it was speaking but somehow she knew which paths to take, which corners to turn.

Time was an abstract concept within the labyrinth but it felt like hours before success. The girl arrived, unharmed, to an altar lit by flame torches on each side, the one bit of light she'd seen down here so her eyes struggled to adjust. A spherical ruby coloured object rested atop the altar, it seemed to ripple with clouds passing inside of it. Now she was here, the power which felt so distant before was great and terrible. The girl's legs weakened and she found herself compelled to lower to her knees. She knelt, mouth agape, eyes glued, utterly entranced as the whispering in her head turned into something overwhelming. A deep man's voice she did not recognise echoed within her mind, explaining all she had been training for.

The Ren existed for the sole reason that the common folk were weak and stupid. People were foolish creatures who could never be trusted. These... democracies, what did they give people? The chance to elect the incompetent, to support motions they knew nothing about and devastate their nations. People turn to crime, piracy, murder, chaos. They exploit one another, emotionally and economically. They can't be trusted with their own freedoms, they do nothing but abuse it. But did that mean they were without hope? That they didn't deserve saving? No. It is for this that the First Order exists and the Knights of Ren with them, to protect the people from themselves. The masses will try and take charge of their own destiny and it will be to their own misfortune. Only the benevolent leadership provided by the Supreme Leader and those immediately under him can save the galaxy from itself and give the people true freedom. Freedom from the evils of others. Her role was to be an unquestioning tool to protect the system they had built until such a day where she may be considered part of that leadership herself.

She couldn't resist it. The strength of will from the voice, the power radiating from it, this wasn't something the young teenager could fight against. She could only submit and accept the truth, accept what she was to be. The bright wide brown eyes regarding the artefact with awe began to tint with a sulphur yellow

A part of the lonely, well meaning child she was died that day. A mark was left beyond the understanding of those who dealt not with the Dark Side of the Force. Samka Derith would never stray from the path again. She hadn't the ability to if she tried.

Present Day​

​

Her head hurt. Something about what [member="Irajah Ven"] was saying ran so contrary to what she believed in that it physically hurt to hear such words from an apparent hero of the First Order. It brought back memories of the labyrinth years ago. The Doctor was requesting something which made no sense. Decorated as she may be, Irajah was still little people and little people were stupid.

"I can't let you walk away," the Ren repeated flatly, starring eye to eye with the other woman, her posture uptight.

"The only one making an enemy here is you," Samka's head cocked to the side. "I've come here as an ally, if that alliance does not take shape, the responsibility is yours and no one else's."

A 'friend' was the term term Irajah had used, the thing she claimed Samka had destroyed any chance of. Yet was she not the one who had rejected everything? To Sam it was quite clear, she'd done everything for Irajah, revealed the truth gently, somewhat tried to get things back to how they were, even rescued the woman from the clutches of the SIS at great personal risk and it was thrown back so cruelly as though she was the one at fault.

It was a disappointment but no great problem for the young Ren, she'd not had friends her entire adult life so what did this matter? That's what she told herself but it didn't stop something in her gut hurting.

There was a simple solution here, the only one reached with cold, ruthless logic.

"You expect me to allow an unregistered Force User with top secret knowledge to simply walk off, to abandon my mission, my duty to my Order, and in return I leave here with you, a powerless sick little doctor, as 'not an enemy'." Samka's brow rose sceptically, "I never took you as stupid, Irajah, you must understand the weakness of your argument and I grow weary of hearing it."

In the blink of an eye, Sam's palm rose out to freeze the Doctor in place, near total bodily paralysis of the type passed down from Kylo Ren's knowledge centuries before. There may still be twitching, eye movements, grunts but beyond that, the victim was utterly powerless.

"Talk is one thing, but let's see how cooperative you really are," Samka placed her gloved palm directly on Irajah's forehead, all the better to tear through the mind. "You brought this on yourself," the Ren hissed, "in time, you'll appreciate how kind I tried to be, how I tried to spare you from all this..."

An assault on the older woman's mind would begin with a wrecking ball to her mental defences, shattering their way through in a most painful manor. This would not be pleasant.

 

[Kuzo]

Different desires. Different loyalties. Different base values and view points. They spoke past each other, again and again, their words not falling on deaf ears so much as never reaching beyond the outter rim of a highly reflective service. Both looking for themselves in the other woman and seeing it and still not understanding that they were looking at the reflection in the window and not the face on the other side.

Somewhere between words and promises, trapped between cold glass panes, this interaction had become a zero sum game.

"If I am merely a 'powerless sick little doctor,'" Irajah smiled unpleasantly through gritted teeth, her eyes flashing, "Then why do you care so much? Your actions betray just how empty those words are. If you are trying to hurt me, you'll have to do better-"

Irajah never finished that sentence.

She couldn't move. Couldn't struggle. She didn't know what [member="Samka Derith"] had done, how she'd done it besides the blanket of 'the Force'. Every joint was locked, weighted and measured, not hers. This was not desired, not looked for, not given permission. Panic flickered in those hazel eyes as they darted around, looking for something, anything- someone-

Samson

She never should have met Samka alone.

It was clear as day, not merely a mistake but something far worse as the girl circled around in front of her, laying a palm on her forehead.

Irajah couldn't have jerked away if she had tried.

Physically, Irajah was spent. Starting with being taken from her home by the Ren, terrified and angry, to this moment had happened in too short a span of time. That she had then been taken again on Bespin, the turmoil and once more fury that had gone with it. That she had been, even briefly, cut off from the Force in between, allowing Gideon to run rampant, filling her body with fire. It was all too much. She knew that her body was failing her rapidly. [member="Cerbera"] was coming, and she would be leaving this husk behind, because there was no more time left for it. It's usefulness could be measured in days, rather than years. She had no strength to fight back with her fists, her muscles, to tear with teeth or claw.

But mentally, the fire of never burned like an internal sun.

She had been trained in the realm of the mind by the best. By [member="Carach"] . By [member="Matsu Xiangu"] . By [member="Ashin"] . She could not hold a candle to any of them, but here, as Samka brought her hammer back to shatter the mind of the 'powerless sick doctor' what she found, instead of a fragile glass confection, a peak of unyielding black stone.

As the cracking weight of the girl's attack struck, Irajah pushed back. Stone could not strike without hairline cracks, the tectonics of moving mountains offering the barest glimpses beyond that black rock, but the alternative simply. didn't. suit. Despite the weakness of the flesh, Irajah was not a passive vessel, waiting for those around her to find something to fill it with, something useful, desirable to them. The stone, the steel striking back against Samka now was what was left after the sea had taken its due.

Her mental defenses did not break under the assault. And if she had been content to merely weather it, Samka could have battered against it for an era, until exhaustion took Irajah's body yes, and left what lay within open like an over ripe fruit.

But Irajah was angry. And the choice to strike back left cracks- not enough for the other woman to slip into without a fight.

But enough to let the light shine out.

To cast shadows on imaginary walls. The shadows of the things that had filled her mind with fear oh so recently. Of the fear of retribution. Of the understanding that the First Order would not forgive. That, although Panatha was her enemy, it was not that of the government under which she lived. A shadow, a projection, if only for a heartbeat, of her calmly pushing a sketch of the Reach across the table as she spoke of its weaknesses. And of the satisfaction in her eyes when she had.

 

[Samka Derith]

"Let's see what you're hiding," Samka said in a hushed tone. She flicked through to access the doctor's memories, a smug satisfied grin on the young girl's face at having shut the blasted woman up at last. She stared eye to eye at the frozen figure of [member="Irajah Ven"] and opened her mouth ready to tell all. A standard interrogation technique, whisper a few harmless memories and secrets one plucks from the target's mind to let them know you're in. Their first pet, the name of a teacher, that time they pinned misbehaviour on a friend or sibling, that sort of thing.

But her voice faltered. That smug smile slowly fading with the dawning realisation that somehow this woman, who until recently had shown no public sign of Force Sensitivity, was fighting back. There was brief confusion on her face which morphed into anger. She pushed harder, refocusing from the physical world into the realm of mentalism yet she still couldn't reach the decisive break she needed. She frowned, grip tightening around Irajah's mind with no obvious progress to be made.

The sheer indignity of it all.

Had she not gained mastery of the Dark Side? Some civilian doctor was resisting her?

Yet again the Ren pushed inwards, fuelled by the anger of indignity, tendrils of cold fear attempted to pry their way through yet for the most part without success. Samka's face twitched as a multitude of emotions coursed through her. She had to find something, to give up now would be admitting weakness to herself and that was something that couldn't happen.

She caught it. Little more than an echo of a whisper through a crack but she caught it. A memory laced with Irajah's fear. Sam seized on it, it was all she had, and unravelled it through to her own mind.

At first it was distant and unclear. Nothing but a blurry sketch on a table but the Ren pushed further. The scene morphed into somewhere else, it took Sam a moment to place it but she'd been here before. The unique architecture screamed that this was somewhere in the Panatha System, the dreary 'charm' of the First Order's Vassal state was hard to forget. Then there was a figure she recognised, that of her ally, [member="Darth Carnifex"], followed by pain and the scene was gone as quickly as it appeared. She was back to the sketch. This time it wasn't so blurred. Now she could see the sketch was of Panatha. Panatha's strengths and weaknesses, it's defences, access points, notable personal. The vision zoomed out from the sketch to two men asking for more detail. The walls behind them betrayed the location. It was a cell. This was the SIS black site Samka had liberated Irajah from just days before.

Samka returned her mindset to the physical world, making sense of what she'd seen. Irajah Ven had passed information directly to the enemy. Despite local Government differences, Panatha was an integral part of their Empire, a core part of regional wealth and defence in the sector. If the Alliance were to successfully strike, it would be a blow to their war effort. They would be deprived of powerful allies, vast resources and leave the entire sector vulnerable. Yet the worst thing was that this act could be forgiven under different circumstances. But Irajah hadn't been under duress nor had she shown the slightest ounce of regret, quite the opposite, Sam had felt just how much she relished the idea of the Alliance striking Panatha. Her own petty struggle with the Zambranos had been placed before the war, before duty and before the Empire. How many First Order lives could be lost defending Panatha now? How many could die for a woman with no regret?

She continued staring at the frozen figure for a moment, trembling with anger. "I respected you," she told Irajah, her voice thick with disgust. The frozen spell was broken but there was no time for the older woman to speak, immediately Samka followed through with a violent Force Choke, suspending the doctor in the air by her neck. The Ren wished to see her flail off the ground, gasping for air. Finally she snapped. "Traitor!" Sam yelled and threw the woman into the piano.

The Dark Side crawled inside her head. A more rational part asked to hear an explanation from Irajah first, it asked in that respectful nervous tone she had used for her 'Cassidy' persona but 'Cassidy' was drowned out by blind rage. The Dark Side called for blood.

 

[Kuzo]

Everything was seen in a fraction of an instant. Time always seemed strange, when locked in cognitive pathways. One could spend a century wandering another's mental landscape only to draw out of it and realize barely a breath had passed and the other was still working on a sentence whose beginning had already been lost to the bearer.

It took only a hint to bring it all down around them both, the wave of [member="Samka Derith"]'s anger dropping all of its weight on the crystalline edge of that stolen confession.

In the instant she could move again, Irajah found herself lofted into the air. Her throat closed against itself, and she knew all too well that feeling. The flash of golden eyes, of the man she had been not simply willing, but gleefully happy to betray to the alliance filled her vision as black stars exploded at the edges as she struggled for a breath. Battered, here, in the physical realm, the dark haired woman had nothing to offer to response. Body already pressed to the very edges of its capacity and limitations failed her and she was flung with bone breaking force into the piano.

The jarring dissonance of dozens of keys struck in turn, the harmony of a cry as she crumbled against the smooth black wood and fell to the floor.

She struggled to her hands and knees, spitting blood onto the floor.

In a perverse judgement of the events within, the sun shined brightly through the glass of the solarium. Warm, cheerful, spotlighting the violence below.

"Yes," Irajah hissed, a certain wheeze as she inhaled betraying something had been broken within.

"And I would give up Panatha and the monsters that rule there again. And again. I will give them to every enemy that will take them," she snarled, only just managing to pull herself up against the piano bench.

There her knees failed her, refusing to rise the rest of the way.

"For what they did to me. Traitor? I swore no oath to protect those butchers. I am many things, but I broke no vow. And I would do it again."

She knew it was coming. A flash, a shatter, the breaking lines of a dozen moments stretched out in all directions but sharing the same space and time. There was no future, clarified in a moment of Shatterpoint, that did not offer it.

 

[Samka Derith]

The Ren marched two steps forward, slowly closing the gap between the women, each footstep echoed across the solarium as though there was an immense weight behind them that the petite girl didn't look capable of. Her gaze remained locked with Irajah's as she drew closer, even now looking for a sliver of regret but there was none to be found.

Instead the Doctor steadied herself against the piano stool and continued her inane rants. For all the wheezing, the blood spat onto the floor, the bruises and scars which covered her body, Irajah's eyes burned with passion and spirit. A pity. Were she a Sith, the sight would have been euphoric. The anger, the latent abilities with the Force already powerful with so little training, [member="Irajah Ven"] had so much potential to become a great and terrible user of the Dark Side and yet with each passing moment, each bitter word from the woman's mouth, Sam became more convinced that the Doctor was no ally, she was a threat. Already she had the strength to resist Samka's mind probe and a will to harm the First Order's interests. What more could develop if this was left unchecked?

"Those butchers help keep our nation safe," Sam said slowly as though she was explaining something to a child, "You can't be so foolish as to think that the Jedi will kill them. Whatever happens, the Zambranos will escape alive as they always do and the only bodies shall be the Stormtroopers defending our space and the civilians caught in the crossfire."

The Doctor had treated enough people in the war, surely if anyone understood the toll it took on the average person it would be her. Which made the fact that she'd tried to prolong this war even more unforgivable. She knew the costs involved for thousands of people and she didn't care. The thought was enough to bring out another burst of anger from the Ren, yanking the piano seat away from underneath Irajah with a kinetic pull so the woman would fall back to the floor.

"One last chance," Sam breathed heavily, doing her best to put aside the fury and speak with rationality, as she stood over the Doctor. "You can still fix this if you work with me, Irajah." Because you must know how this ends if you don't, the last sentence unspoken in her head.

It was almost a plea. Samka was struggling to connect the well-meaning, smiley, caffeine addicted Doctor she'd grown fond of to this wretched, traitorous little creature at her feet. Feeling the growing hatred coming from the older woman, Sam began to wonder if the entire time they'd worked alongside each other at the clinic, she wasn't the only one wearing a mask.

 

[Kuzo]

"Aren't you so. Very. Lucky that Panatha falls within the First Order's space then," she said with a bitter laugh.

"There will come a time, when your Order is no longer of use to the Zambranos," Irajah looked up at Samka, there there was almost pity in her eyes. "Or when too much is asked of them and it is no longer convenient."

She had learned that the hard way. Struggling to stand again, she finally managed, but the swaying stance betrayed just how much effort it had taken her.

"There is no innocence in those who willingly and knowingly shelter murders," she said quietly.

There was a single path out of this. Where she bowed her head, begged forgiveness..... and submitted. She would walk away if she could pretend. Fake it, even if just long enough to find another way out. Those who knew her, who loved her, would understand why she had done it. Some might even council it. Bide your time, she could almost hear [member="Carach"] 's voice in her mind. Lie, and we will come for you. And they would.

And people would die.

Irajah's views on life, who deserved it and who forfeit that gift had changed dramatically in the last year. But one thing she did not abide by was a loss of life because of mistakes. If someone needed to die? She had no pity left in her. But because a situation got messy? It seemed like a waste.

In truth, Irajah was a poor liar, and she knew it. She could try of course, but ultimately, it could crumble.

However, it seemed hardly worth the consideration, how long she could maintain a lie like that.

Irajah had no intention of lying.

"I would rather die than serve a government that gives haven to the Zambranos."

Her tone was even, hard. Unwavering.

She made her choice.

[member="Samka Derith"]

 

[Samka Derith]

"Than you'll die." A blade sliced through Irajah's throat.

Samka didn't bring her Lightsaber with her, there hadn't been any need to. She'd foreseen no danger. This was a short visit to check up on Irajah's well being after a dramatic fortnight. It was, for all intents and purposes, a social call. Sam had hoped it could be something pleasant, something to help create a spark between Irajah and Samka the way there had been between Irajah and Cassidy. It had never been intended to end up anything like this.

It was the knife she'd brought with her that did it. As [member="Irajah Ven"] had railed more against the Zambranos, Samka's crimson gaze had flickered around the room for something suitable. She'd have replied if the Ren thought it would do any good. She'd have said that the Doctor was speaking the obvious, something already considered long ago. That should the need arise, the First Order would crush the Sith, burn the entire Panatha system to the ground if they had to but it was pointless to debate further with someone so stubborn.

Her vision fell on the untouched cake on the table side, a knife resting atop the plate with it. There were other ways to do the deed with the Force but even a choke left signs for the initiated and this had to look like an accident.

With the Force as her tool, the blade had spun through the air at incredible speed, it's handle seized in a gloved hand. Next the Ren had slashed at Irajah with a single precise strike exposing a gash in the side of her neck.

Blood burst outwards, most of it splattering to the ground, some of it falling on both women.

Reaching outwards, Sam caught the back of Irajah's head with her free palm, unwilling to let the Doctor collapse once more. It was done and with it came a sense of clarity, the anger subsided having shed the blood it cried out for, so the killer lowered her spluttering victim down in a bizarrely tender hold. One hand was a cradle, the other brought the knife back to Irajah's throat.

The job was only half finished, the tool she'd used was made to slice food not kill a human being. She was still alive, deeply pained but alive. Cold steel laced with warm blood returned to the older woman's neck to cause deeper wounds but firstly, as she looked upon the struggling figure beneath her, the Ren realised that now she could say anything and everything to the woman and, in just a few moments, nobody alive would know.

"All my life," she forced her face into the centre of the other woman's vision. Her expression a mixture of exhilaration, traces of anger and even sorrow. Even now, Samka looked child-like in so many ways, a picture of innocence tainted not only by the corruption of the Dark Side but by a speckle of the Doctor's blood resting on her cheek. "I've been so... disconnected from reality. I was twelve when the Ren chose me! Raised in secrecy, trained in the Dark Side, seeing things that most people thought were legends and more that-that most people can't even begin to contemplate!"

She spoke quickly, tripping over her own words in a way the elegant speaker normally did not. She was desperate to finish before the light of consciousness left Irajah's eyes.

"You don't know how they treat me! I'm a freak, I'm a lunatic, I'm a servant, a prodigy, a master, I'm never, ever to anyone just... a person. Not... not until you. I don't go out to restaurants and have coffee. I don't go to clubs or bars or anything ordinary, I spend my time training, fighting, killing. It's what I live for." She shook the Doctor, ensuring she stayed awake that little while longer. "You showed me all of that. Now I know more about the little people I fight to protect and I have to thank you for it." Time was moving so fast and yet so slow, her mind cast back over the morning's events, only now at the end could she express herself. "I never wanted to twist what you are for myself but to make you better, for your own sake. I can see how you get victimised, it used to be the same for me! People kicked me into the dirt! So I extended a rare gift to you but all you did was spit in my face."

Irajah, on some level," now she plunged the knife in further, another spray of blood as the blade tore through flesh muscle and cartilage, her hands now stained red as she said in little more than a whisper,

"I think I grew to love you."

 

[Kuzo]

Gasping. Choking. There was no air, no possibility of breath drawn when she was drowning in her own blood. She stared up at the girl, no where else to look. She couldn't have looked away if she tried. There was just enough left there to make a guttural sound somewhere in the back of her throat, something between a grunt and a whimper.

Oddly, beyond the pressure in her chest, in her head- black wings, eating at the edges of her vision, buffeting her with sharp feathers and sharper claws- there was very little pain.

Somehow, she had expected it to hurt more.

She closed her eyes, but opened them again when [member="Samka Derith"] shook her. Her hands came up, and she wondered distantly whose blood that was on them as she reached up and grasped the girl's wrists.

In contrast to the dark wings eating at her consciousness, her words poured out white and clear and soft, the flutterings of a dying bird, looking for something, anything to offer warmth and shelter from the monster that had spilled it from her lips. For a moment, looking up, Irajah saw Cassidy again, for a span of eternity between heartbeats that fought so hard for purchase beneath her breast. She opened her mouth to say something, anything, but words failed her as her vision did.

The grip on her wrists faded, hands falling slack to her sides as the last words flowed over her.

Her chosen confessions.

Blood pulsed, crimson on pale skin. Chest heaved, once, twice, and stilled. Hazel eyes stared.

Black wings consumed.

[media]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KWooB4tpQ9I[/media]​

 

[Jacob Crawford]

Maena​

Jacob was currently in the depths of an undisclosed location, in a place that only himself, Matsu and handful others knew. The latter being the staff he had hired recently. In general, it was still early days, but it was all very real now. He had cemented his place on Maena, within Matsu’s domain. It was a sign of trust from the master, and a declaration of dedication from the apprentice.

There was still a key component to his experiments missing, in the form of his Chief Scientist. He had a list of candidates in mind, dossiers laid out in his office waiting to be looked over for the hundredth time. But for now, he was satisfied with simply sating his curiosity and his newly acquired indulgences.

So there he stood in one of the testing rooms, mirroring the same state-of-the-art look that was shared across the other facilities on Maena. Sitting in the middle of it was an examination table, a nondescript man laid upon it bound by several restraints. He was a nobody, simply someone plucked from the streets of the Slums. It was a pitiful example of what Jacob intended for the future, but suitable enough for his current needs.

For the past hour or so, he had been worming his way through the man’s mind. Breaking down the mental barriers and toying with the emotions that laid within. Fear was his primary target, digging into memories and tearing out physical screams from the subject. Testing to see which buttons did what, how he reacted to them. The man thrashed against his binds, screams retching from his mouth and inane babble falling from his tongue.

That was when it hit. Jacob stood there looming over the table with his left hand clasped over the man’s temple, and his right cybernetic simply resting at his side. At first it was like a clock, ticking away at a steady rhythm, Then is struck from out of left field; a blindsided attack that shook his control. Jacob had assumed the swirling emotions had been from the subject laid out before him. But upon taking a step back mentally speaking and stretching out his senses, he realized it didn’t even originate on Maena.

At first it infuriated Jacob, anger rose to the surface as he tried to figure out what infernal connection was causing the emotional turmoil. And yet as he reached across the tether, feeling for where it originated, he froze.

“No.”

He could feel [member="Irajah Ven"] dying.

Dying. Gasp. Dying. Gasp. Dying...

Dead. Crunch.

Jacob felt something warm and wet suddenly splatter across his face. The surprise of it brought him back to reality, and his head recoiled back.

Jacob looked down at his subject, his cybernetic hand wrapped firmly around the man’s neck. At each beat, each time he could feel Irajah slipping, he had squeezed. The man gasped for breath, but Jacob persisted until the connection went numb and cold. His eyes remained on the now broken body, blood having sputtered from his mouth and was now running down his chin. Swiftly, Jacob removed his hand from the man’s throat; stained with blood already. As well as removing himself from the man’s mind before the very last vestige of life left him. Some part of him was disappointed that he had allowed himself to snap like that, but right now that mattered little to him, there was one thing on his mind..

Jacob remained in that silence for several moments, nothing but his breathing could be heard. He instinctively raised his normal hand up, running a few fingers across his face to confirm what had hit it moments before. Everything around him seemed to darken, his mood turning to anger and fury. And the very walls that surrounded Jacob seemed to whine in response. Nothing came of it however, and he simply turned around storming out of the room.

 

[Jairus Starvald]

Darkness had consumed his form.

Only a single speck of light cradled by his hands, flickering, like a dying ember fighting against the shadows creeping up to it. The corridors were made of dust, bones, blood and dreams, but Carach moved through them with practiced ease. It was the step of a dreaming man. Yet, dreams could influence everything around it, as long as the dreamer was large enough in the Force.

His head tilted.

Almost as if the Sith Lord was listening to something being whispered, to a cry in the night, to that dying ember flicking out of existence without further ado. A frown marred his expression now.

This was not according to the plans set out.

"Dang it, Raj, you had one job." The mumble escaped him, before his eyes closed again and his focus intensified. They would have to speed up their schedule... they would need to do something audacious, if they wanted to salvage this situation. Part of him wondered if they should. It wasn't the crime of denying death its due that worried Carach.

It was the establishment of precedence.

When was it time to let go? Time to let them learn their lessons? Not today. His mind rebuffed him and Carach grunted. Already the Sith had a beat on the dying essence spreading out and being pulled into the Nether.

This would be such a hassle.

 

[Reverance]

So I will say goodbye to this body and let it be consumed. It will not be my end. Because I am not done here yet.

Heavy footsteps moved him through the dimly lit streets of New City. Tasting the ash in the air, the threat of eruption forever lingered in the background. Night time brought about its own delights in this once prosperous volcanic world. Sulphur erupted from the ground, like the steam from sewer systems of Coruscant, with yellow plumes wafting endlessly towards the sky. He stopped to gather at the sight, the way it lingered injected an abrupt and peaceful sense. The sort that seemed insulting.

As he looked through the dark space that separated the two adjacent buildings, he felt a duo scrape the earth before him. Dragging their feet, clinging to one another drunkenly, they stopped in front of him. But he seemed distracted, crimson eyes looking up towards the narrow opening of the sky.

“What’s...what’s wrong with him?”
“I dunno, maybe he’s wrong...ya know…” She looked over and giggled. “Like brain damaged?!?”
“You think, like he’s slow?!?” The male laughed and walked forward, full of macho as was his obvious tendency.

Reverance let out a long sigh as his view turned crestfallen, narrowing at the couple with a less than appealing expression. Quicker than what they could perceive, his hand leaped out and grabbed the man’s throat. He could feel the pulse beneath his palm. “Tell me…” His gaze swept from man to woman. “Do you dance?”

The woman was cowering in her drunken stupor but was brave enough to answer. Enthusiastic head shook and rattled her jewelry, confirming that she did partake. Reverance let out a breath of air with a nod. “She did too. She probably still does.”

He released his grip but not before shoving the man, sending him toppling over into a pile of trash. Blackened hand sent over his mouth and chin, he shook his head with a laugh. Images filled his mind, of blood spreading outward in pools around pale skin and locks of raven hair. But it was blurry, distant, and poor in connection. It was simply enough to serve as reminder, warning, or indication of event.

​

None of it's mine.
“It seems...this time...it is.”

He watched as the couple ran off into the night, the clatter clack of their steps filling his ears. He gave an expression like a disappointed customer, just off the communicator with his favorite dealer who had quit the business. Tucking his hands in his pocket, he continued to trudge through the dark alleyway towards an unknown destination.