House on Fire

[Keira Priest]

Ashrah​

Hodasal System​

​

Almost.

She'd almost killed him.

Almost.

Her finger had been seconds away from tensing on the trigger.

Almost.

But she'd hesitated. Why had she hesitated?

Nothing hurt like the almost.

Keira had spoken to nothing and no one about what had happened, not during the fighting, and certainly not after. It was something she was still wrestling with, from what had transpired to what she should have done and finally, ultimately to what had happened: nothing. For all of her pent-up emotion, the sadness, anger, frustration, the hatred - that was all different face-to-face. It was easy to wish death on someone from afar, especially a lover that had vexed you, but seeing them again with a gun in their hand? That crossed all the lines she hadn't realized were drawn in the sand, until she wasn't sure whether or not she could trust her instinct in that moment.

Thankfully, he had fumbled as well, even going so far as to endear her with a pet name that would have at one time made her melt, but in the present only infuriated her. After what he'd done, how he'd broken her, he still had the gettse to use the same sweet syllables that had once enticed her so easily. Despite herself he incorrectly-accented Mando'a had brought a smile to her face, before she remembered all that had happened and where she stood. Even still, hesitation overtook her. She needed to kill him, had wanted to since the divorce, but how could she do that when looking him in the eyes still hurt like a dagger being twisted between her ribs?

Around and around it went, but she only sat there silently, clenched fists and taut jaw beneath her helmet the only signs of distress. A jolt as the ship broke atmosphere caused her to start, and her hand was halfway to the dagger on her belt before she was drawn back to the present all at once. Blinking once, she shook her head in an attempt to dislodge all thoughts of him, something that was doomed to fail from the start. Reluctantly she leaned back, attempting some semblance of relaxation but failing, the stiffness of her posture immediately telling. There would be no rest, and likely no sound sleep for the next few nights at the very least. She'd been getting better, and she'd known full well that she'd see him again on that battlefield.

But she'd still gone.

She'd always been self-damning.

When the vessel finally settled on solid ground she was the first on her feet and down the ramp, gaze fixed straight ahead and paying little attention to her surroundings while being hyperaware all at once, rigidly tense yet lost in her own thoughts. So much so that she didn't notice the figure standing near the entrance to the homestead, instead breezing right past without a second thought, her only concern stripping off her armor and doing anything to forget what had happened. There was no doubt she would seek out her same poison. Ideally, the alcohol would make her forget.

Or at least, it wouldn't hurt.

[member="Marvik Dathu"]

 

[Darth Vulcanus]

Dathu was not known for its hospitality towards other clans. In fact, it wasn't known for much else than hating the other clans - that's why the whole clan laughed their Alor off Eres III when he told them he was going to invite a Verd to the homestead. The ones that weren't laughing were glaring. He couldn't blame them either. There were very few reasons to invite anyone to Eres III and doing so was a sensitive matter and it only made matters more delicate that he was inviting her to Tuur'haat - The Day of Truth.

Flipping through holonet tabs, Marvik looked up as soon as he heard her boots crunching through the leaves. He wished he could say he knew it was her by the way her feet landed on the ground. In truth, it just wasn't hard to guess clan members when the whole aliit was a whole five people. He smiled at her, stashing the datapad in his leather jacket and stepping forward.

"Hey there, Verd, got a surprise for you."

He waited for the inevitable string of party-playful insults with his usual slyness. But she didn't say anything. She didn't take her helmet off. She may have not even looked at him. His mouth dropped alongside his heart when she stormed past him, "hey, did you hear me?"

Again no answers. Heat rose to his face, turning white to red and curling his fingers into tight coils. Without a second thought, he stormed forward, "Verd! Keira! What the kark! What are you on about, huh?"

What, was she too good for him now? Dathu below her just like they were falling all the other clans? Not on his watch.

 

[Keira Priest]

Keira registered she was being spoken to but failed to process the words, his urgency entirely lost on her. Her walk through the halls was nearly robotic in its cadence, each turn ingrained in her memory already, little thought put toward her destination. There were a million other things on her mind that comprised themselves as the same few thoughts rearranged and spun throughout her headspace on a near-constant loop. She was responsive only in the most physically automatic ways, each movement not consciously registered but performed all the same, instinct taking over in full.

Upon entering her quarters she pulled off her helmet, running a hand over her head and staring into her own T-visor for a long moment, thumb tracing one of the jaig eyes painted on the forehead. It was her mask, the one thing that allowed her to remain faceless, an anonymity that lent her a feeling of safety in being of the unknown. Removing it did away with that protective shell, leaving her vulnerable in a way she found difficult to process during a time like this, when she wasn't even wholly aware of all that she was feeling. And feeling of any kind was dangerous for her, because she'd never learned how to regulate and process her own emotion in any way that didn't somehow involve alcohol.

With a heavy sigh she set the helmet aside, beginning the process of stripping the remainder of the armor plating from the bodyglove, starting when she spotted a figure in the corner of her eye. Turning to face them fully, it took a few moments for recognition to flash in the back of her mind, and she blinked once. "Marvik?" Dazed confusion was evident both in her voice and on her face, her brow crinkling. "What are you doing here?" Glancing about the room, she motioned for him to step inside. "I'm sorry, I..." She cut herself off, averting her gaze.

"You can sit down. How long were you out there?" As if still oblivious in some way to his presence she continued the process she'd already started, unzipping her bodyglove and stepping out of it, changing into a pair of sweatpants and an old t-shirt. Stepping over to her bed, she sat down and crossed her legs, looking down at her hands for a long moment, lost in thought. There was nothing and everything to say all at once, so she said nothing. Instead, she leaned back and reached into her nightstand, pulling out a half-empty bottle of liquor and unscrewing the cap, tipping the bottle back for a frighteningly long period of time, grimacing when she was finished.

Holding the bottle in her lap, she finally looked up at him, awaiting a response.

[member="Marvik Dathu"]

 

[Darth Vulcanus]

The frustration plastered on his face was only the shock setting in as he watched the woman stripping from her body glove. His pupil's played ping-pong in his head, eyes scanning her entire body as if trying to photocopy the sight directly into his head. Unfortunately, she didn't stay in the world of the nude long and quickly found herself slipped into all-too-baggy sweats and a loose t-shirt.

His spirits rose for a second when she pulled the whiskey out and tossed the cap - but when she threw back a quarter of the bottle without so much as a breath, his soul shriveled back to where it belonged. When the bottle finally came back down, she looked at him with lazy eyes and a blank expression. He'd seen that same look many times before, but never in a mirror as clear as this one.

His chest throbbed, a needle slipping between his ribs and prodding his heart. This was a reflection he couldn't stand to look at anymore.

He plucked the bottle from her hands, using a free hand to bat away any attempts at taking it back - then he did the only thing he thought to do. He chugged the last few shots worth in the bottle, lowering himself into a seat as he did so. When he was finished, he casually threw the bottle onto the bed beside Keira, burped and let the headrush of the sudden buzz overtake him.

"Long enough to need that..." he trailed off, collecting his words, "long enough to not like being snubbed at the door. The hell got into you anyhow? You don't seem...yourself."

Did he even really know what 'herself' was? He had only met her a few times really, but still...this didn't seem like her.

 

[Keira Priest]

Music
A shrug, and Keira considered the empty bottle for a moment. "It's nothing." Hoping that would suffice for an explanation while knowing he wouldn't let her leave it at that, she retrieved a second bottle from beneath the bed, this one full and unopened. For the moment it stayed that way, but she kept a close hold on this one, unwilling to part with it as easily as she had the last. Silence filled the air between them as she toyed with the bottle, looking anywhere but directly at him. The fact that he'd made himself comfortable meant he wasn't going to be leaving her alone anytime soon, something she at once loathed and was thankful for.

She looked down at her hands, flexing her fingers, entranced in that one simple movement. "Just got off the battlefield. Still coming down from the adrenaline. You know how it goes." Her voice was distant, as if she were there and not there, and in a way that was true. While part of her sat in her bedroom on Ashrah, another existed on a different plane in a faraway place, one her mind halfway inhabited.

The proposal had tumbled out of him all at once as he held her in his arms in the twilight of the morning, the sun slowly crawling its way up the horizon. Just as fervently she'd recited the words, and with that their souls were bound together for eternity in vows sacred to her culture in a way most wouldn't understand. It was a simple pledge to carry out the rest of their lives together as two halves of the same whole, but it hadn't been as enduring as he promised. It took nothing more than a return to her people to sever it, a coldly worded letter and the return of his wedding ring signaling an end to what had only just begun. As if he'd never meant any of it. As if he'd faked every smile, every 'I love you,' all of that turned to ash.

But in seeing her again, he'd still called her cyar'ika. Her jaw clenched, and she swallowed hard, blinking in an effort to banish the stinging tears before they spilled over.

The crack of the bottle's seal broke the silence, and she took another pull, the burn that washed across her throat wrenching her forcibly back into her body. "I, uh..." She shook her head, reaching up to rub her eyes. "Osik, sorry. What'd you need, anyway?" She feigned normalcy as best she could, not realizing for herself how weak of a facade it really was. Anyone with half a brain could see through it, and he already had. That didn't cause her to drop the attempt, nor would she open up any easier for it. Right now she just wanted to be alone, convinced that was the best thing for her. A night spent with the bottle would remedy things as it always did, and she would be back on her feet the next day as if nothing had happened. And so the cycle continued.

[member="Marvik Dathu"]

 

[Darth Vulcanus]

[member="Keira Verd"]

"Oh you know, I just really enjoy babysitting other drunks" he bit out, sardonically - his eyes clinging to the bottle in her hands. If he couldn't smash the mirror, he'd at least drink until it was too blurry to see a reflection. Leaning forward, Marvik yanked at the new bottle with an irritated vigor,

"And you are sharing," He told more than asked, taking the bottle and sipping it once before setting it on the floor between them, "and we can get to me later, because it's kind of hard for me talk about it when you keep running your mouth like a backed up toilet. I don't take you as one to get hammered for no reason."

Leaning back in his chair, he eyed the woman. He didn't know her, yet knew everything about her all at once. It was an odd feeling, almost instinctual - he wondered if this was how most people felt about themselves. "I know who I am, but I guess I was wrong about you."

The voice of his brother reached through time and chocked his words. He croaked out a sigh, fighting back the memory. He stifled it. Strangled it. Left it to rot somewhere deep in his gut and returned his attention to Keira, "So. Spit it out, I don't like having to beat information out of gorgeous women."

 

[Keira Priest]

Despite it all she let out a snort of brief, almost bitter laughter, shaking her head. "You barely know me. I'm not that easy." But she wanted to talk, because as much as she despised opening up, it helped. It was a matter of trust with a depth that very few had achieved, and one Keira wasn't willing to hand out so freely anymore to just anyone. It had been used against her too many times, often enough that she knew better than to be honest, and didn't trust people that were without question. People weren't to be trusted except under very rare circumstances, and he most certainly wasn't one of those. He was, in his own words, another drunk, but unlike her brother not one she was particularly close to.

Fixing him with a glare born not out of malice towards him but at the circumstances and maybe herself, she brought the bottle to her lips and drank. And kept drinking. And then finally pulled away to breathe, forcing down the last mouthful and flinching at the burn, dropping the bottle in his lap. There was still silence for a moment, but it was more contemplative than the one before, somehow more and less tense. "I didn't kill someone I should have. I'm pissed at him, at me, I know I should have put one in his head, but--" She cut herself off, swallowing hard and releasing an unsteady breath, fingers tangled in the bedsheets.

"It should've been easy, it was easy, but then he looked me in the eyes and said that damn word and I couldn't-- I wanted to--" Again an abrupt stop, and she held her head in her hands, breathing shaky and shallow, whether from rage or grief it was hard to tell. More like than not it was some unholy combination of both, because in her lifetime one had never existed without the other, she was angry because she was full of grief, filled to the brim with it, and so instead of being vulnerable she turned sharp, bared her teeth and made others too scared to get close. Because that was easier than admitting to the pain, but even someone like her could only keep up that act for so long, and the alcohol wasn't helping to bolster her defenses.

"I don't know who I hate more. I don't know if I even can hate him. I want to, and right now I think I do, but then I saw him again and it wasn't easy. I don't know what I'm supposed to do." She let herself fall back onto the bed, the heels of her palms pressing into her eyes. "I don't know."

[member="Marvik Dathu"]

 

[Darth Vulcanus]

The tensing of his heart squeezed Marvik's chest, traveled down his arm and turned his fingers to vices on the armrest. He struggled for the right words, then for any words at all. Looking your own soul reflected in another had a way of stealing the breath from your lungs and the thoughts from your head. The world became fuzzy. Thoughts became hallow. He fought to focus.

He focused on her.

Then he forced himself to rise from the chair - stumbling into a fall that left him plopping onto the mattress beside Keira. From a seated position, he could look down at her and all that she was. Broken.

And not just from whatever hell had befallen her tonight. Now, more than ever, he could see the jagged edges and broken glass that shackled together whatever was left of the woman he'd come to care about so quickly. So very quickly.

Broken pieces had a way of fitting together.

"Killing..." his gaze softened, eyes vacant and focus lost to the memories seared into his head, "...we've both killed for a long time. I don't know about you, but...killing is easy for me. It has to be for us, being who we are. But we forget what it really is like after killing for so long...

The crack of swords echoed in his mind, his chest squeezed tighter. "Sometimes we are reminded what its like to actually take a life...there isn't shame in that. I've killed people since I was fifteen - for a lot of reasons."

Looking at Keira, he held back the tears welling in his eyes, "Don't make the same mistake I did. Not every wrong is made right by killing."

 

[Keira Priest]

"No, you're right." Her hands fell from her eyes as she felt the mattress shift where he sat, and Keira turned her head to look at him. "You can't fix everything by killing it. There are more than a few trigger pulls I regret." Memories rose unbidden, and she pushed them down just as she had countless times before, locking them away in even deeper recesses of her mind where they couldn't be found. "But I wouldn't regret this one." There was a moment she took to consider that, doing her best to will away the tears that again stung her eyes as she imagined herself taking the one life she’d never imagined would become necessary. “I know I wouldn’t.”

With a sigh she pushed herself up to rest on her elbows, considering him for a moment. “You didn’t come here to listen to my problems anyway.” Again with the minimizing and brushing aside, something that was just as much a coping skill as the alcohol. Another push, and she sat on the edge of the bed, pausing for a moment as the world spun in those first seconds. What she’d downed of the bottle was definitely starting to kick in now, but she reminded herself that she’d still had less than him, somehow.

“You’re drunk.” She let that statement hang in the air, contemplating just what to do about it. As much as she wanted nothing more than to be left alone with her own thoughts and the bottle, she couldn’t in good conscience allow him to leave in his current state. For all the personal disregard of her own safety, she still managed to care about other people with an urgency she never managed to muster for herself.

Glancing about the room, she considered the options. “You can stay here for the night, at least. There’s an extra room down the hall that I can set up for you.” Nodding to herself, she stood, again having to take a moment to readjust as her center of gravity shifted.

“I can get you extra blankets and a pillow. It’s not a problem.” Her siblings wouldn’t let her hear the end of it later, but that was an issue for just that: later. Right now his sleeping arrangements were the primary concern, and once she set her mind to something it was nearly impossible to get her to change it - especially now.

[member="Marvik Dathu"]