Private Creep

[Aeris Lashiec]

As the dusk crept towards the night she found the answer she needed, but it wasn't the one she necessarily wanted. There was no place she could go and no place that she could stay at without resenting the being her fear would have turned her into. To give up on this Order now was just as bad as giving up on the people that she claimed she didn't want to give up on and really begged the question why she had been to blindly, unknowinglygive up on friends over strangers.

The steam from the tea in her hand blew in the wind with raspberry scents, her strawberry blonde locks slapping against her cheeks as she settled into the calm she had needed an hour ago. Dagon would find her here, he always did. No matter how much he pretended to be a cold and hardened crusader there was still a greater part of him that didn't buy into it. They both wore their masks, and perhaps that was the bigger issue at stake here.

By the sound of the door opening, Aeris figured she was right. From the sound of his voice behind her back there was no doubt about it.

"Where would I go?" Aeris asked, just to mirror his words back at him. "All roads have led me here."

She let in a deep breath, took a sip from her mug before she exhaled again.

"And for what it's worth, I'm sorry for what I said." her voice fell weak under the shame. "I should have known better than to lash out like that."

 

[Dagon Kaze]

"Me too." he replied softly. "I could've--" Dagon couldn't lie to her - his convictions weren't very different from what he had said to her. But the way he had delivered them, the way he approached her in her time of distress and need - that's not what friends do. Guided by fear, he had snapped at her and driven her way.

Dagon lifted his arm and weaved it around her shoulders in a one-armed hug, nestling her closer. "We'll get through all of this together, alright? Meet on the other side alive and well."

...

"I promise."

Aeris Lashiec

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

"Yeah," Aeris smiled at her friend and hugged him back with her arm around his shoulder. "One to be the idealist the other refuses to be, the other to be the realist that the first one can't be, right?"

Her arm slipped off his shoulder and onto the railing before her with another sip of her tea.

"I just haven't thought about Alex in a long time. Didn't know the weight it still carried." Aeris felt her lips twitch with a smile and a frown, her nerves not really quite sure what to make of it. "They have always been my biggest failure. Not because they fell but because I couldn't help them no matter how much I wanted to."

"And now," Aeris glanced over at Dagon. "Now I have you."

Her teeth were bared with a smirk as she pushed Dagon and his crap-eating grin away with a gentle poke.

"Not like that, you idiot." She shook her head and took another sip of her tea. "It's been a long while since I felt I could trust someone like this."

 

[Dagon Kaze]

There was, indeed, some symbiosis between their outlooks on things. Dagon wondered how much these views had diverged from before the war, or even way back when they were both just padawans. She had ascended to Knighthood much earlier before him and understandably so. What was it again? Older, smarter, prettier?

He leaned on the railing with his hands clasped as she reminisced about Alex - a critical event in her life that he had only learned about recently during their confession spar. The crap-eating grin shifted into a soft smile, it was good, refreshing even, to hear their trust had not been eroded after this. He hoped that would remain so; another Kaska-like situation would've been...catastrophic. Ever since the war had begun, the list of shattered bonds of trust had grown exponentially.

"Likewise." he replied, "With all that's happened, been happening - i'm just grateful for having you by my side." the smiled turned back to that stupid grin again, "even if it's not like that" a snort, then his eyes slightly narrowed looking deeper into the cityscape ahead, a foreboding feeling in the night's air "the days ahead are going to get worse before they get better and we're going to need to be more united than ever."

Aeris Lashiec

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

Dagon Kaze

“Grateful?” Aeris raised a brow and took another sip of her now lukewarm tea. “I would have thought people were more likely to use the words helpful or convenient given the reputation I hold as the cold princess of the damn library.”

Not even a lie. The reputation was there, but it wasn’t exactly as if Aeris didn’t play into it either.

“I think when it all comes down to it we’re more unified than either of us give the others credit for. Just too stubborn to admit when either of us are at fault.”

“... A bit like what happened in my office.”

 

[Dagon Kaze]

He chuckled inaudibly at how she described herself. She did play into that a lot, but he knew how far off that mark Aeris was.

"It's easier to find the differences than similarities, Aeris. But then sometimes these differences can be too stark to find a common ground like--" Dagon said, addressing more the broader issue among Jedi rather than their...altercation "-- I don't think I will ever find it in me to accept Heavenshield siding with the Dark Lord." recalling the New Jedi's meeting with the Silvers at their Assembly and the answers then given over their actions on Dantooine narrowed his eyes. "Some things are just..."

"...unforgivable."

Aeris Lashiec

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

"Master Heavenshield's mistake was..." Aeris frowned at that, took another sip to hide her uneasy grimace. "It's not going to be one of the cleanest pages of our history books."

"I don't agree that there is such a thing as being unforgivable, but he has some ways to go to make up for it and show what he has learned from it."

"Withdrawing in the aftermath is a good first step, but I doubt there is much that can be done in this very moment to ease the minds of people like..."

"Well, you."

 

[Dagon Kaze]

"No, there isn't." he replied, a faint frigidness in his tone suggestive of shifting the conversation at a different direction.

Aeris Lashiec

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

There was a long sip of tea meant to get the last of the contents of her mug before she discarded it on a table next to her.

"Suppose there is wisdom in that as well." She sighed. "Fool me once, and all that."

"But hey, we already had something a bit like that discussion an hour ago. Don't need to get up in arms about it again."

Aeris glanced out at the cityscape before her.

"You know, in some ways it feels wrong that we have this spire." She raised her brow at Dagon and looked down at the people below. "We belong down there with the rest of them, don't you think?"

Dagon Kaze

 

[Dagon Kaze]

She was right, no need for verbal war again. Always right.

"Talk about yourself, princess." Dagon scoffed lightheartedly, "You're the one sitting all day here, I've been gone for weeks now from the temple."

He was.

Investigations took a long time, fighting crime took a lot of nights and he always had to be ready on call duty, so most often than not he ended up sleeping at one of the few safehouses in the under levels of Coruscant. If he could sleep at all.

All of those indicated were the formal reason and while they were true there was another reason behind it, a selfish one - escapism.

Aeris Lashiec

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

"I get out!" Aeris exhaled with an indignant laughter. "I just don't stay out. I have very important things to do in the library, I am a very respected part of the book club there."

Book club being, well, the rest of the librarians.

"Still, suppose you're not wrong. But we could always be doing more to be more accessible to the people down there."

Dagon Kaze

 

[Dagon Kaze]

"Maybe do an open day at the library, oh wait-- that means more people at the library, I'm sure you're gonna love that." he laughed then turned to go back inside, "C'mon, princess, you've had your 'being outside quota' filled for today. Back to the castle."

Even if Dagon joked about it, he believed the same - they needed to build a stronger connection with the people here at the heart of the galaxy. Hope should never be out of reach.

Aeris Lashiec