Private Creep

[Aeris Lashiec]

Metal surface against skin that seemed to burn like an infection that didn’t take to its cure, hesitation bundled up into a fiery ball whose sharp corners bloodied jagged lines on its way down her throat. Every word, every interpreted meaning that she had pulled from between the lines screamed at the back of her mind even as she convinced herself that she was seeing things where nothing was to be seen. This announcement, this glorification of what to her was the opposite of being a Jedi felt like just another straw in an increasingly larger haypile of mixed emotion.

She had no time for idealism. She held a casual disregard of the worthwhile endeavour to reach unification. Aeris had always known that being a ‘Shadow’ really just meant being an Alliance Agent and it was entirely correct that a couple of Jedi, quite literally so, held rank in the very same Alliance that the Shadows operated under.

These were all beliefs that Aeris held, except the opposite. Consular Galliard’s piece had been the only one that truly reached her, and that fact alone was something that caused her to realize that the burning sensation in her chest, the tickling droplets of crimson beneath her skin, was not Aeris trying to swallow a blatant disagreement, but a disagreement that had already swallowed her.

In the moment she knew that the Order was not the issue, she was. She was the faulty piece, the red piece in a blue puzzle. Aeris put the pad on the table before her in the hopes that it would help her settle down, but the burning just didn’t stop. The feeling of unease refused to settle even as the door behind her opened with a hiss. Dagon’s presence did little to make it stop. The thoughts had to go away, she needed to resurface, to let herself breathe again.

“Hey,” She said and turned around to face her friend. “Thanks for coming by.”

Her arm shook as she motioned around the room. “Have a seat, if you can find one.”

The bookcases, a small stool, the armchair she stood in front of, and the bed. The choices were about as endless as a shot glass.

What the hell am I doing here?
I don't belong here.

Dagon Kaze​

 

[Dagon Kaze]

It had been a few days since his return from Chaldea. A few days in which he had to think and adjust over the events that had transpired there. The tribulations over it were left behind the door to Aeris' office in the Library. Dagon stepped in, two carton cups of caf in hand and his signature, lopsided smirk on his face. Always happy to see his close friend.

One look at her contorted face and his smirk began to thin out.

"Hey," the padawan handed her one of the cups and sat down on the edge of the bed. Last time he sat on the stool it broke. He wasn't testing it again. "What's up? Why the long face?"

Lately, Dagon had been on a streak of bad days.

Seemed like today wouldn't be any different. Despite the artificial birds chirping, despite the sun piercing through Coruscant's haze.

Aeris Lashiec

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

Dagon Kaze

“I’ve been… Thinking.” Aeris let out a weak exhale and smiled as she sat down in her armchair again. “About the Order, again.”

Eyes closed to block out the lights from outside as her fingers brushed against the top of the pad to push it over in Dagon’s direction. The recruitment pamphlet was still there. Still a piece she didn’t know what to make of.

“Am I in the right place, Dagon?”

“... Do I fit in here?”

“Should I just leave?”

 

[Dagon Kaze]

Dagon frowned, slightly confused, then picked the pad to see what this is all about.

"Oh it's the--" he began but his words were drowned out as Aeris threw questions that made him blink for a few long moments before he could respond.

"Whoa, what do you mean? What are you talking about-- this?" Dagon gestured at the pad as he set it back on her desk. He shook his head trying to understand what the hell was going on. He'd read the pamphlet already earlier. Nothing seemed controversial about it?

Aeris Lashiec

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

Dagon Kaze

“Yes, this thing.” She said and shook her head. Eyes opened to take in Dagon’s reaction. “We sell ourselves off with an image of being warriors, of being so focused on extermination. That our goals are with the Alliance, and that the Alliance is with us.”


“I have seen it before, and I’d rather cut my losses before it is too late.” Her eyes closed again. “I am not here to serve the Alliance, I care about the Jedi Order. I believe in its core beliefs and tents. I care about the people that live under the Alliance, but I don’t care about the Alliance in the slightest.”

“... This thing just makes it seem like we are one and the same. We are the Alliance, and the Alliance are us.” She shook her head yet again trying to swallow that idea, bury it at the back of her mind where it belonged. “I have seen this pattern before, and I have lost everything I had as a result of it. Every. Single. Time.”

“Tell me I am being dramatic.”

 

[Dagon Kaze]

She was more than just perturbed, which wasn't really rare considering her low tolerance on a lot of things. No, this was worse. This was anxiety and Dagon could count the times she was anxious on on the fingers of one hand.

The confusion was partially cleared but Dagon's reaction was still the same - surprise, perplexity.

"Wow, uh, I-- look," he shook his head clearing the fog in his mind, "we work with the Alliance extensively, that's true. We need their resources and they need ours, it's a, uh, symbiotic relationship. To an extent, our ideals are reflected in theirs - it's the only state in the galaxy nearest to our ideals."

"It's not our job to run governments, nations and people. That's the Alliance's responsibility. Ours is to stand, fight and protect these ideals."

He sighed inaudibly, "Someone has to."

Aeris Lashiec

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

Dagon Kaze

“It’s just…” She exhaled yet another anxious breath. “I saw this in the old Alliance, I saw it in the Republic. This mindset that we must stand with them because they are big and we are not. It’s how I lost my old friends, how I lost touch with the mentors of my past.”

“The second those governments crumbled was the moment we had to move on, that we lost everything. Suddenly we weren’t so important anymore, we were tossed aside.”

“I see the lines that will take us there take shape. I see Ripley, Loske, and Maynard, our brothers and sisters become such a prevalent piece of their puzzles. Dying, bleeding, sacrificing pieces of themselves for a cause that is not necessarily theirs. I want to think it isn’t all under the assumption that because of our aligning goals we can somehow assume that their cause is just, it’s not. And then, thinking that…”


“Where do I fit into that?” She asked, again. “Dagon, I am not a fighter. I refuse to fight, I refuse to use my saber unless I have no other choice. And yet, there is this pressure to conform to the ideal that says using it is what is expected of me.”

“I have long felt like maybe I can fix this, point us towards a more peaceful path. But I am not sure that’s what people around here want for us. I am not sure I fit into their ways anymore.”

“... That maybe…”

“... Maybe I should leave.”

 

[Dagon Kaze]

Dagon squinted in pain at the mention of Loske and Maynard; their fate was still unknown. He had helped the latter find further knowledge on Dorin about reverting...the Sith curse that had befallen Loske. It had been the last time he had seen Maynard and the last time he had heard of both of them. Ripley reminded him of Zaavik who also had disappeared and that triggered a chain reaction of memories to flood his mind. Djon, Ryv, Aelys, Rhis, Bernard, Takui...himself, even Auteme and Aaran - the lost generation, he'd heard someone call them that.

He slowly set his caf on the desk, stood up on his feet, and stepped closer to her. There was a calmness in his presence until she uttered her final words. His eyes widened and his chest convulsed. The fear resurfaced. That same fear when Kal died and Djon left shattering their promising team of three, that same fear when Kaska's trust was destroyed, that same fear when they followed Ryv to save the galaxy and in turn the galaxy ostracized them.

"No..." it was so quiet, he barely heard it himself, "No. No. That's-- no. Aeris, it's-- look where the galaxy, what the galaxy had become when good men-- Jedi did nothing. It's not about using or not using your saber, it's about doing what's right. And sometimes...sometimes using the blade is the only way, choice. We all want that same thing, Aeris - peace but...but this powers that we have, this gift of the Force, we've sworn to use it to protect those who can't protect themselves from the malevolent, the vile, those who use the Force to do harm." Dagon continued, then a flame of zeal flickered in his eyes, "And when that is done, when we pushed back the darkness - the galaxy needs us to bear the torches, to light the way forward to a safer place, a better place."

"We cannot do it alone. Yes, there'll always be sacrifices. Loss. We've witnessed them, experienced them but divided we will fall. Hunted down one by one by the Sith... and we're back to where we were not far long ago."

Back to a galaxy enveloped in pitch-black.

Aeris Lashiec

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

“Sacrifices, and losses, experiences…”

“We’re a snake eating its own tail!” Aeris burst as the cool was completely lost, her usually calm demeanor gone in a single moment of weakness and doubt. “For every torch we light, there will be a shadow. There is no dawn without the night, no night without the day. We can’t push the darkness back because the darkness is, inherently, part of us.”

If there had been any clear signs that the girl was scared, this was it. Her hands dragged through her blonde hair, her green stare wide eyed at the macabre blue mirror that held the calm she desperately needed.

“If every corner of the galaxy was lit up with light there would still exist a shadow within the torch itself.” She shut her eyes with a rapid headshake, brows furrowed in growing frustration as the dams cracked. “Everyone that I have once known has been lost to this war because they thought that their sacrifice would be the one to finally balance out the force, to finally bring some sort of closure to this forsaken crusade we swear to uphold.”

Maybe, this wasn’t about the pamphlets at all. Or the struggle, or the crusade. Maybe this was something else. Aeris refused to admit it, but perhaps there was something else beneath that facade of hers. A tiny little voice that she never really knew that she had hid away.

“For as long as we exist, they will. And for as long as they do, we will.” Aeris whimpered under her breath. “But we will still throw so many lives at this war just to tell ourselves that we are killing ourselves for a just cause.”

“I am tired of it.”

 

[Dagon Kaze]

Was that how she felt when Alex had fallen? Did she, too, hide the pain and fear inside; unlike him, who used his extroverted nature to push it all down, she masked it under her natural stoicism.

He had never seen her like that. Emotional. Lost in a spiral of trepidation. The similarity between the two friends was clear, clearer than he had ever imagined. Yet, where Aeris began to doubt it all, Dagon's zeal was further stoked. Even when some of her words hit hard at the strings within his mind, Dagon's resolve remained unwavering.

There could be no doubt in service of the Light.

"The darkness needs to be curbed, Aeris, even when its costly. It is our service. Our oath to the people." he began with conviction, "I know what it's like to bear the burdens of loss, to see your friends die or change forever, but it is part of who we are. Of what it means to be a Jedi. We must stand against evil ready to give our lives to protect the galaxy. If we don't, then all is lost. All the sacrifices of our friends - our brothers and sisters - would be in vain, otherwise."

Aeris Lashiec

​

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

"But would it?" She glanced over at him, eyes glossed over with a burn she tried to mask. "Even in the face of painful sacrifices, the memory of our friends, is it not better to set a broken bone right than accept that it will always be broken?"

"I--" She exhaled. "I tried with Alex, I tried to make them see."

"I didn't want to kill them. I know there were other ways to handle the situation, I know that I could have... Saved them, or talked them out of it. I could have played along, pandered to the connection we shared, but instead--"

"... Instead I took their life for something that had been forced into them."

"We shouldn't kill them, we shouldn't have to fight them. We just need them to see. We need to make them understand what their actions cause in others without resorting to violence. We need to treat them like the people they are, not hold some sort of grudge over who is right and who is wrong."

 

[Dagon Kaze]

"Some...are too lost." Dagon's voice suddenly grew cold, a glimpse of his brother in his head, ".. too corrupted, too far from our reach. And they need to be stopped, even if it means killing them."

His jaw tightened, frustration rising, "No more innocent lives should be lost to the Jedi doing nothing, Aeris."

"The galaxy shouldn't be paying the cost for our...meekness." he spat the last word.

Aeris Lashiec

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

"Is that what I am?" A pointed finger poked against Dagon's chest. "Meek? Timid? Too weak because I refuse to fight?"

"If murder is the only viable solution for you, then how are you any different from the people that you claim superiority over?"

 

[Dagon Kaze]

Dagon froze, staring at where she had poked her finger. And so did the subconscious fear of abandonment and desertion seeping into his words.

He looked back up at her, locked gazes in the silence but no words escaped his mouth for a long moment. That same fear began dialing up again, along with it the subtle presence of his father.

"Sometimes it's the only choice." he said coarsely, breaking the deadly stillness and deliberately ignoring her first question, "I'd rather have their blood on my hands than an innocent's."

Aeris Lashiec

​

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

"It's not!" Aeris exclaimed, her hands thrown in the air. She took a few steps back, dragged one of her hands through her hair again before she turned back to face Dagon. "You know better than that, Dagon. You know that there is always a choice."

Another exhale, another burn against her throat as the metaphorical ridges that had carved into her insides began to feel less like a drop of blood and more like a torrential thunderstorm. She needed to calm down, she needed to find that center she always had. The peace, the calm and quiet that others had come to associate her with.

Why was she scared?

"I am scared for you, okay?!" She burst with a surprised blink to her face. Where did that come from? "I..."

"I am afraid that the day will come where I have to kill you too."

 

[Dagon Kaze]

She stepped back but he didn't follow, instead remaining planted in one place, only following her with sight.

Torn, conflicted--

"I am scared for you, okay?!" I..."

"I am afraid that the day will come where I have to kill you too."

Dagon blinked in surprise, but the shock abated a second later replaced by dogmatic acceptance.

"Good."

"If I fall beyond saving - don't let m-- others suffer the consequences of my fate." he almost did not sound like himself.

Aeris Lashiec

​

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

"Are you insane?" Aeris swept right back up to Dagon to shove him. "Were you born an idiot or did you just take too many blows to your goddamned head?"

"You know what? Maybe I was right." She said finally and backed off, that anger evident in her eyes but most of all disappointment. "If you want me to willingly lay down my better judgment and pick up a sword to execute the only friend I have, then I don't want to be part of this Order anymore. If you fell, Dagon. If for some reason you started to become someone-- something that you are not, then I would rather die than give up on you."

"I'd rather die than give up on the hope that people are beyond saving. That is not what I was raised to believe and I refuse to stop believing it even now."

"I don't know why I called you."

"... Maybe I should have just packed my bags instead."

 

[Dagon Kaze]

He staggered a few feet as she shoved him back, almost tripping on the bed. Dagon knew well what he had told her, what it meant to her as it did to him but he was resolved. She was an idealist and once upon a time he was too, or rather - he still was, only in a different way. He too believed in redemption, just not for everyone. Some truly fell out of the Light's grasp and any concessions made would result in more unnecessary pain and deaths. The war had changed him, its reality had struck him hard and molded him to see what the walls of the temple concealed.

The padawan couldn't help but feel angry, too. Angry that she - his closest friend - would abandon him, the Order and everything they stood for.

Just like the rest.

"And go where?!" Dagon suddenly snapped, his arms wide open, "Huh?! Do what exactly?? Run?? For how long?? For how long before it catches up to you, hm??"

Aeris Lashiec

​

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

For the first time since the argument had started, a silence fell upon the room as Aeris found herself dumbstruck. Not by what he had said but because she had no response. Without the Order, what would she do and where would she go? Her finger rose in defiance of his outburst, her jaw fell limp before she bit her lips to buy for time. And yet, she couldn't say anything at all. Anywhere was nowhere, the Silvers weren't particularly better off. There were 'rogue' Orders a bit all over the place, but even then Aeris doubted that she could live with knowing she ran away even from those that technically needed her the most.

But pride had become far too entrenched in all of this, the desire to be right overburdening her senses as she weighed her options. Lashing out was not part of this, but her nerves still wanted her to do something. She could have attacked him and proven his point, or she could simply do what she opted to do instead.

The door opened and Aeris threw her arms in the air to step outside. She needed air, this room was not the place for this. Eyes lingered on her as she calmly left for the roof. There was more than ample amounts of air to be had there. Even if the freshness of it was debatable at best.

Dagon Kaze

 

[Dagon Kaze]

She left him standing there, fuming over the altercation until he realized he had been holding his breath in anger painfully long. A lengthy, frustrated exhale preceded him slumping down on her bed with his hand rubbing his face nervously. Dagon's inner-self beckoned him to follow after her but stubbornness and pride prevailed.

It was much later - when the flames turned to cinder and the cool breeze of clarity washed over him - that Dagon followed her. He knew exactly where Aeris would go. The roof - the view and the 'fresh' air were only second to the Library on her favorite spots.

He slowly opened the door to the roof and halted for a moment before crossing the threshold. She stood watching the nightscape sprawling all across the horizon, while her blonde locks of hair brushed against the faint wind that had picked up in tonight. The Library was far from any skylane but noise was always ceaseless on Coruscant, even if it was just in the background. He finally stepped towards her and without a word stopped next to her, his eyes narrowed and focused ahead but his attention undivided from her.

"Don't leave, Aeris." he said, his voice just slightly louder than a whisper, "I can't take you leaving, too."

Aeris Lashiec