Private Here Comes the Rain Again

[Katarine Ryiah]

"Like lovers do."
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A Few Hours Latter

She hadn't slept, not truly. The Jedi Master had spent the night in meditation instead, letting the Force sharpen her senses into something keen and restless. Now, as they moved through enemy territory toward his ship, she felt every shift in the air, every pair of eyes lingering a second too long.

Security had eased since the incident, but she still spotted clusters of law enforcement wandering the district. None of them seemed to know exactly who they were hunting. The fire had seen to that, she realized with a quiet pang of guilt.

If the authorities started tracking down the club's regulars, they might eventually piece together descriptions. But Katarine had spent a month among those women, earning their trust one drink and one conversation at a time, and by now most of them were likely too strung out, or too terrified, to say anything coherent.

Her eyes slide sideways to her companion. She had half wondered if he was going to leave her here in his mess, but her life had never been something he wanted. He had half carried her off a battlefield before, though that incident had at least not been his fault. She wondered why he cared, or why he had gone out of his way at all. Most Sith she knew would have stabbed her in the back by now.

She wanted to thank him but her voice caught in her throat. He would probably think it was weird, considering he was just cleaning up his own mess.

Mikhail Shorn

 

[Mikhail Shorn]

“Good, they’re so busy locking down the scene the idiots didn’t even bother with the spaceport,” Mikhail shook his head as they walked through the spaceport toward the bay he’d parked his freighter in. “Who runs this place now anyway, clowns?”

The door to his bay hissed open and they walked through. Mikhail had the box holding the Soulsaber tucked under one arm. He almost dropped it when he saw his freighter.

In front of the spaceship stood three beings in black, insidious robes. None of them looked the slightest bit like Coruscanti security.

“Sith,” Mikhail hissed, eyes narrowing.

The leader, a heavily tattooed Umbaran cocked his head at Mikhail.

“Astute. What gave us away?”

Shorn rolled his eyes, then looked pointedly at the lightsaber hilt hanging from the speaker’s hip.

Their presences flared up in the Dark Side. Powerful. Each a full knight or stronger.

One and even two Mikhail could handle alone. But three?

“Katarine, get inside the ship.”

The box clattered to the ground, discarded. Mikhail held up the Soulsaber.

“I’ll handle them.”

The black flecked purple blade sprang to life with a snap-hiss.

Katarine Ryiah

 

[Katarine Ryiah]

"Walk with me"​

"The Sith Covenant," she said, smirking, "though clowns does have a nice ring to it."

She grinned at him as they kept moving, then stopped cold.

Three figures blocked the corridor ahead, lightsabers clipped to their belts, the dark side rolling off them in suffocating waves. Yesterday, her biggest concern had been which tank top would impress Zane the most. Now she was staring down Sith in the middle of occupied Coruscant.

"Katarine," Mikhail said sharply, "get inside the ship."

Absolutely not.

She had only just gotten him back, and the thought of losing him again hit her with sudden, brutal clarity. If nothing else, she could buy him time or create enough chaos for him to escape the planet alive.

"And let you have all the fun?" she shot back.

She slid her lightsaber from the pocket of her jacket but kept the blade unlit.

This was not a fight she could win. Katarine knew that.

The cravings still clawed at the edges of her mind, leaving her unfocused and raw, and now fear for Mikhail twisted through her chest hard enough to hurt.

Attachments. Cravings. Excellent work staying out of trouble, Katarine.

Mikhail ignited his saber with a snap-hiss, purple black light washing across the corridor as the dark side surged violently around him. The pressure of it made her sway for half a second before adrenaline forced her forward, and that adrenaline was the only advantage she had left at keeping her head clear enough to do this.

Katarine thrust both hands outward. The Force exploded from her in a violent wave, slamming into two of the Sith and hurling them backward across the durasteel floor.

Before they could recover, she blurred forward in a burst of Force speed, appearing behind them an instant later.

The Sith reacted fast. Red blades ignited with savage snarls of light. She caught one with her own white blade, and pushed him backward while the other aimed a punch at her face.

She was too fast. She danced out of the way with a smirk. “Let’s keep our hands to ourselves gentlemen.”



Mikhail Shorn

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