Private Dibnitz

[Arabella Darkhold]

Arabella was very quiet staring out the view of the ship. Somewhere inside the children were busy with tasks assigned to them by their father. He was giving her the space she needed as she thought about the future whatever it was. Silenty she spoke with Maudie so that the children wouldn't hear.

I am uncertain of the future Maudie. I'm not at home on Alderaan, and though I grew up on Atrisia without my father and brother there the great house feels like some sad memorial to their name. We need out own space our own...this is ours place.

She missed her father and brother and while yes she had a sister in Faith and a brother in Theo it wasn't the same none of it was the same. She felt separate from them and just knew inside she needed her own identifty.

Yes she was Maudie's riduur, and mother to their children. A sith or was she a witch now...or was she a dark jedi...feth if she knew anymore. That too was part of the problem maybe she was really a kashi at heart.

Maudie, what do you advise?

Muad Dib

 

[Muad Dib]

He knew she needed space. She needed time. She needed a little peace.

It wasn't like life was easy for them. He was just supposed to be the reckless little sithling that would be an amusement until he met his end at a Jedi's blade, or a Sith's annoyance, or perhaps he would manage to destroy himself. Then again Arabella was often looked at as the spoiled, protected princess of Master Darkhold. They were both destined for short life spans of no importance.

They had proven just how wrong it was to count against them.

Sith, Witch, Sorcerer of Tund, Rhandites, Shadows, Dark Jedi …. What were they? Who were they?

He watched his riduur staring through the viewport lost in thoughts and contemplation. His eyes flashed blue while he let her know with a little wave that he was behind her. Her words washed over him reminding him of a time he had lost his own way. His identity. It had taken him awhile to find his way. A pain filled path filled with destruction and death.

And then he found out who he was. What he was.

He was Muad Dib. He needed no grandmaster to guide him, no Dark Lord to rule him. He didn't need a nightmother to lead him or sith'ari to mold him. He didn't need a Mand'alor to command him or a Vicelord to point him.

He was sha'buir Muad fething Dib.

He rode incandescent flying magikal dragons named Puff, he commanded Charlie the Unicorn class warships at the head of a flotilla, he ran a company from Candy Mountain, he was Alor of Clan Farr, he was the head of House Dib, he fought Sith Masters in the throats of the Sarlac, he laughed as he blew Sith master Assassins' spaceport built in a moon to Chaos and back, and he had surfed a burning tibanna gas tanker through the atmosphere of Nal Hutta. He had stood against Jedi Masters, Sith Lords, Shamans, Sorcerers, Witches, Mand'alors, and even his own blood and still lived.

Every path, every choice, every decision had left it's mark and scar upon him as he made his own way through life against all who said he could not. And here he stood.

He slipped behind Bella and wrapped his arms around her, pulling her gently into his embrace. His chin nestled onto her shoulder as he gazed at their reflection. The Mad Man and the Princess in Pink. His lips quirked in a soft smile.

"Burn it all."

He winked at her reflection as he nodded into the flashing stars out the viewport.

"Seriously. Burn it all. Burn everything anyone ever expected of you. Cast away any and all predictions spoken over you. It's your life my love. Live it. You have obligations, I know. I'm not saying turn your back on Atrisia or Alderaan. I'm saying find your place. Find who you are because you want to, not because it's expected of you. Out here, somewhere, is a place that's ours. We just have to find it. Whatever you decide, you know you have me. You always have, from the first moment I saw you in that temple. My puppet ventriloquist skills were quite good, I might add."

He grinned remembering the beginning. He loved her then and he still did. The galaxy may have changed, the nations at war wore new names, but she was still his Belly, and he her blue eyed madman.

Arabella Darkhold

 

[Arabella Darkhold]

Bella rested against her madman as they stared out the view at the darkness. The darkness that which had drawn them in together, and bound them tighter than any emotional attachment.

She listened as he spoke his words soft and alluring as they always were. His blue eyes for a moment reflected in the plexiglass and then softened.

"Burn it..let it all go" She whispered in return "I want to walk away from it all. My heart is always yours...my home is where you are, where all our kinder are. I need to time to just be me...be your wife...to forget the pain." The pain the separation from her father, the death of her brother these things lingered on her more than anything else. All that she had known was gone except of the Great House on Atrisia. She left it in good hands.

The Emperor could call upon her but she doubted her would. She would be greatful that he didn't.

Then she laughed turning her head slightly, "I remember those puppet skills...such a bony puppet." She leaned and softly kissed his cheek, "yes you were very good that day. You made me laugh. I think I liked the fun house though, do you remember that?"

That festival...what a time they had. She had never been so free as then.

Muad Dib

 

[Muad Dib]

"Hmm, we should definitely find another festival."

His lips met hers and the heat of the moment flashed through him. Grinning he broke the kiss and retreated to a seat and tossed his boots to the desk, leaning back and balancing on the rear legs of the chair. Sneaking a death stick from an unseen pocket he inhaled as the tip flared to life as a bright ember. He held the smoke in his lungs for several moments before exhaling a plume of blue. A wry grin stretched his face as he slipped down into the chair lazily.

"Sometimes I remember the beginning. The freedom, the ability to do what we wanted without any care for consequences. The innocence of youth perhaps. For two who didn't have a childhood. And now the weight of life and responsibility weigh upon our shoulders. I begin to understand that look Master Darkhold held in his eyes. When he wasn't wearing his buy'ce and he thought he wasn't being watched."

After all this time, everything he had experienced, Muad still honored the Old Man by calling him Master. The only one he ever truly had. Beside the gluttonous appetite of Chaos that is. He sighed as he took another drag. They both felt the responsibility and anchors that life attempted to constrain them with. Oddly the chains that bound them were forged by their own decisions. Every link that restrained the madman was a choice he had made. A decision. A consequence of his life. But would he truly trade it all?

"Sometimes I just want to get away from it all. To start over. To be something new. And then I remember them. Family ties. Friends made. Brothers and sisters forged in the heat of conflict. And all those that have grown to look upon me as one who has the answers. Hahahaha! The truth is I don't know what the hell I'm doing half the time. And the other half? I'm reacting on instinct. And sometime between being that puppeteer to now, my instincts have changed. Not what is the best thing for me, but what is the best for those that are mine."

He looked at the glowing cherry at the end of the death stick and screwed up one side of his face.

"We need that place where we can be ourselves. But something tells me we will never be free of this fate that surrounds us. Maybe that's okay too."

Arabella Darkhold

 

[Arabella Darkhold]

God he was the devil the kiss lit fires within her that drove her to the edge of deep dark sin. She smiled as he pulled away that's him light the fire and dance away. She'd have to catch her breath some.

It was something that fate had played for them that he had been trained by her father. She wondered if he knew what the future had been even then for them. He wasn't here to ask, and the last time she saw him he told her something that made her almost fall over. Originally her father had been a woman but having transferred bodies so often well he had children, or she had them.

She smiled at Muad thinking I don't think I've told him that. Wouldn't he be surprised!

She walked over and set into a nearby seat looking over at him. That ability he had for relaxation under any subject, add in the attraction that she felt to him always. It was a surprise they didn't have a brood but the ones they had she wouldn't change.

"Our lives have grown and perhaps it is what it was meant to be. A life of responsibility that awful twist the fate does to those who don't want it. It makes them excel at it. You excel at it my madman, our children are everything we would expect of our children. And yes I agree we need a place where we are ourselves. Where we have forged it and we aren't falling back on the accomplishments of family and friends. I need that Muadie, and I suspect you do to"

She didn't use the death sticks it interfered with her abilitities where it seemed to enhance his. Opposites and the same. She winked at him just because she could.

"Can we find that place?" How hard can it be?

Muad Dib

 

[Muad Dib]

"Never bet against a Corellian, or a Dib. And you are most assuredly a Dib, love. Can we find that place? I'd wager on it. And aye, I believe we both need that place that is home, ours, something we forged by the sweat of our brow, the tilt of our blade, the riposte of our word, the blood in our veins. Though I fear that sanctuary we do find will not long remain solely ours. Times of turmoil are upon us. And only those who have danced with Chaos will find as harbor. For themselves and their aliit."

He offered a half smile as he watched her pulse beat in her neck, a knowing grin lighting upon his face. He glanced away, out the viewport, as ruminations infected his mind. The darkness was coming. Most thought it would surely be the end, they always did. But in truth there was always another salvation for a time before unrest that lead to darkness reclaiming leadership. It was a pattern played out upon a pendulum. The never ending sway as forces battle one another for supremacy while neither acknowledged a simple truth. They only existed because of their counterpart.

He sighed as he glanced back at Bella, devilish thoughts crowding his mind as he rose once more to claim his riduur. Yet even as his arms encircled her waist a feeling in the Force echoed through him and their bond. An expectation of arrival. A state of being that resonated deeply that felt familiar. He looked into Arabella's eyes as he grinned, hungrily kissing her backwards into his arms. Wolfishly he broke the kiss once more, his own chest rising rapidly, as he motioned toward the cockpit.

"I think perhaps we have arrived somewhere of import."

A final wink and he moved to the cockpit, hopping into the pilot's seat and hands drifted over the controls while he eyed their location. Reaching out he pulled the lever that brought them out of hyperspace and into view of a planet that hung suspended before them.

Arabella Darkhold

 

[Arabella Darkhold]

There it was again a familiar banter which made her smile. The quiet in their storms, then there again the chaos rose up, "I had found that we can do anything we put our minds to Muadie." She smiled as she caressed his mind with warm thoughts.

She knew his thoughts, his dreams, and usually his intentions. Right now he was working on building them to a moment where they burned everything around them down. A kiss that lingered communicating want and need quickly broken when the sensation of something else trickled through their bond.

"Importance...." She caught her breath once more She thought to have a little fun as well as she pushed an image into his mind of a time on Tatooine, spent laid out and still longing for a touch. She smiled as she looked out.

"A planet?" Bella brought up navigation, "it has a designation but not a name. How odd" Bella sat down, "no much information on it either. Breathable air but not much on terrain. Though from the looks of it from here I'd say green areas, and dry....maybe deserts...oasis...I'm not sure. Can we go look?" She grinned she loved something new, "could be I'm totally wrong...puppet master."

Muad Dib

 

[Muad Dib]

Mmhmm, Tatooine. Yes, he remembered. The heat of the … suns. The curves of the … dunes. The insatiable appetite of … krayt dragons. A bemused smile filtered upon his face as eyes lost their focus whilst lost in memory of a time carefree. When nothing mattered but one another. When the only responsibility they followed was the beat of their hearts. Where two lost and lonely souls became one.

An alarm beeped warning of their imminent approach into the upper stratosphere. Sheepishly he glanced over to Belly with a shrug of innocence. She knew where his mind had drifted for it was her own memories that pulled him along with her mind thanks to their bond. So many things united them one to another, and the Force bond was the least of them. He toggled a few switches, activating the shields and long range scanners as he slowly began to take the shuttle in for a gradual descent.

"Puppeteer? I believe I'm the marionette and you are the one pulling my strings. Always pulling my strings ner riduur."

He grinned without taking his eyes from the clouds the ship pierced. Below stretched out in either directions were mountains that seemed to raise up in points as though fingers piercing the mist below. Hundreds of digits emerged from the mist like fingers reaching up for mercy. The fog or mist was impenetrable. Even the radar and sensors were baffled. Heading for one of the massive plateaus jutting from the fog, he activated the landing gear to set the ship down with only a soft rock to indicate his success.

"Thank you for flying Air Dib. Please remember your carry on luggage, and please, tip the captain."

His fingers brushed the button activating the ramp before standing and leaning into Arabella. He was a mad man. Crazy, reckless, and full of energy, Muad Dib was synonymous with chaos. But with his riduur he could be the calm visage and quiet demeanor. A healing sort of peace. His head lowered against hers and he sighed. He was tired. Tired of fighting all the time. Tired of being the man to call upon when all hope seemed lost, when people needed a sword, when a battle required warriors. He just wanted this. This moment. Just the two of them, on an unnamed planet, together without purpose other than their own.

The brief moment of respite, less than a minute, seemed to rekindle the fire in the madman. Reaching down he raised Bella in his arms and walked swiftly through the ship and down the ramp to slowly spin them in a circle. He chuckled as the suns, binary stars, filtered their light through the scattered cloud cover.

"Welcome to Genesis. The beginning. Sounds apt, doesn't it? Or maybe just call it fire!"

Arabella Darkhold

 

[Arabella Darkhold]

She laughed, "I know which strings to pull for maximum effectiveness my dear" She stared out at the world around them.

"I have a tip for the Captain" She looked around, "don't drop me" She was in awe of it all really it seemed almost perfect. A world that appeared untouched no satellites, no large cities that she could see, it was waiting for them.

"Fire..." The half grin she was wearing stayed put as her cobalt blue eyes looked to the horizon, "I bet there's a great word that means fire we could use." How do you file a name change with the galaxy, from a designation to whatever this world would hold for them.

Was it possible that this was their new beginning. No one named Darkhold or Organa anywhere near by. No mention of royal this or that, or of obligations and responsibilities. No this was just...them.

Bella closed her eyes for now she heard nothing, "It's quiet Muadie, listen." She couldn't help but reach over to touch his cheek soft as a feather to caress the cheek covered in stubble. How had she gotten so lucky? She wouldn't question it now there were other things to consider.

"Let's check it out, see what we can..." was this really to be their home?

Muad Dib