Private No arms to hold you.

[Syd Celsius]

Wearing: Tank top and jeans

Hooded Cloak

Wind and Fire Wheels


Currently on: Denon (Hidden Safehouse)


He'd had to figure where to put her at some point.

He'd paid off a Rogue Nightsister to hide a place with enchantments, and the presence of whoever was inside them. The safe house had been purchased after his Company, Bacta-Works, had set up shop here quietly.

It wasn't anything impressive. A shoebox of a place. She didn't have much.

She kept the lights off most of the time. She'd gotten rid of the mirrors. Her showers were never warm. She couldn't have enjoyed it even if they were so she didn't bother.

Her nightmares, even her daytime thoughts, were a jumbled haze of mixed images and sounds and voices and thoughts, partly her own, mostly something else, something that had become just as traumatized merging with her, and it had already been pretty traumatized before that itself.

But it's emotions felt almost completely Alien in other aspects. How it processed things. How it perceived others. It was a remnant of a monster. The one part of it that hadn't wanted to be.

She was only able to think properly because it had merged with her, essentially to save what little could be saved after a disaster of a fight against The Battalion.

She ate little. Not because she needed it. But because she wanted to feel mortal. Feel Human.

She had yet to succeed.

Syd had the windows shut, most lights off as usual. Sitting at a second hand used table of oak that creaked and wobbled, one of its legs being a quarter centimeter shorter than the others. There were no photos. No decorations. Nothing that could reflect her face. There were no holoprojectors, no holonet access. She didn't care about the news.

She sat eating a breakfast that couldn't sate her, trying not to think thoughts that would do nothing but wound her. The faint memory of a lover's touch on her shoulders like the sting of a scorpion. The memories of past kisses the bite of a spider.

Laertia's laughter mixed with Maple Harte's innocent stare and sounds of Starlin's harmonica and Syd cupped her ears at the table, trying to will the images and noises in her head to stop. Anything for it to stop.

Her arm jerked unexpectedly at memories of deflecting a Lightsaber blade from Laertia at Kerest. The arm swiped her breakfast off the table. One of those Soldier Biots came by now and then to leave supplies but this time it was different. She felt him.

It was Nathan Bloodscrawl . But she only knew him as Nathan.

The name meant nothing to her. Only that his eye twitched violently whenever he was forced to speak to her. She could tell he was barely restraining himself from killing her. She was too frightened to ask what she had done to warrant his anger.

When he entered the room, Syd, who didn't want the stress of having to watch his twitching eye, floated up to the ceiling, cupped her face, and huddled in an upper corner, facing it, whimpering.

Nathan saw this, but his expression didn't change save for his eye twitching as he stared at her pathetic huddled form on the ceiling. It was completely impossible for him to empathize with her.

"I have re-acquired your Ship." he told her, leaving the hangar access card on her table. "It should have the rest of your Equipment aboard. Private Hangar in the industrial district. Hangar Seven."

"Thank you." she said in a small voice.

"I wouldn't." Nathan replied coldly, turning to leave.

"How did you know I was at Korriban?" she asked suddenly in a whisper, still hiding her face.

He stopped.

"It has no relevance to your current situation."

"But it does matter. Because there is no way you could have known."

Nathan resumed walking out.

"You want to kill me, don't you?" she hissed fearfully.

Nathan said nothing as he left.

Syd huddled on the ceiling for an hour before getting on some boots and a hooded cloak, heading out of her safehouse into the streets of the brain and neon drenched, tech ridden city planet of Denon, pass in hand. Her Lightsaber was with her, but she wasn't much good with it at the moment...

As she walked, she felt a thousand different evils all around her. But it was one that caught her eye, the screams of a child in an alley, that made her hooded figure turn to the source and began slowly approaching, spotting two thugs trying to slap a slave collar around a young Twi'lek girl with yellow skin.

Syd dashed forward, the cry of an innocent momentarily making her forget her lack of said innocence...


Caedyn Arenais

 

[Caedyn Arenais]

The Jedi Knight had been roaming the city streets of Denon with complete freedom of care in which direction he was headed, simply walking for the sake of experiencing the many sounds and sights of the living city, people in abundance going about their day-to-day activities, naive to the weight of responsibilities that the Jedi carried in his every move from world to world, patiently observing those around him and keeping an open eye out for possible wrongdoing.

Caedyn Arenais wasn't a law enforcement officer, and he didn't carry himself like one. He walked with apparel akin to that of a monk and was commonly known to be associated with Force-Sensitives. He did not carry his lightsaber as often as he used to, instead walking in the presence of his Staff which he carried in his left hand and made him look less intimidating to those who passed him. Despite being a skilled combatant, Caedyn avoided participating in assignments of a violent nature where he could manage, and if forced to do so, instead always resorting to making an arrest or incapacitation rather than risking the chance of being forced to take someone's life.

It seemed today would be no different. A couple of screams could be heard coming from a nearby alley, the opposite end of which Syd Celsius had entered, and so Caedyn quickly took off after the commotion, a sudden elegance and declaration of speed in his pace as he had gone from looking his age to suddenly flying into a sprint akin to that of an athlete.

What he found when nearing the source of the disruption was indeed as bad as it had sounded, a young Twi'lek having been forced to wear a slave collar by two fully grown idiots. Further beyond them, Caedyn could see another hooded figure approaching the scene, something altogether different about the presence he sensed in them, but needed first to secure the youngling's freedom and safety.

"You will release her at once" Caedyn demanded with a firm voice of authority to the thugs, facing them with his staff's pommel meeting the ground floor beside him, held in one hand and at the ready to use it if provoked.

 

[Syd Celsius]

"Release her." Syd growled sharply at the slavers, not at all in the mood to deal with their nonsense. Not with the screaming, jumbled up nonsense her own mind was.

Another figure in the ally seemed to have been drawn to the altercation. Syd didn't recognize him, much like she hardly recognized anyone else here. All she knew was he wasn't a threat.

The thugs didn't take the hint. Both drew blasters and opened fire, and the hooded Sorceress stretched out her hand, absorbing the shots, redirecting one at the shoulder of the one firing on her. He crumpled, screaming in pain. But the other thug was still focused on attacking Caedyn Arenais while the little girl ran.

Syd seized her by the shoulder, but not roughly.

"Wait, little one. Wait." Syd pleaded, but just then an unwanted flashback of her murderous duel against Laertia in the snows of Kerest hit her and she stumbled against the wall, clutching her head as it mingled with memories of training Laertia from the thing she had absorbed...

 

[Caedyn Arenais]

One of the assailants turned and fired at Caedyn while the other seemed to be focused on another who had come at the sound of the dispute. While the Jedi Knight carried his staff, he did not use it but instead reached out with his left hand as the Blaster fired the shot. The Jedi's left hand closed into a fist, and before the blaster bolt had left the barrel, the end of the blaster pistol seemed to crumple in on itself, the discharge of plasma causing the firearm to explode in the criminal's hand, causing severe burns and the man to shout in fright.

"That was unwise," Caedyn remarked as he continued to walk calmly towards the pair, yet the second man was downed in a similar fashion, that of which Caedyn felt very clearly the application of the Force, declaring the woman on the opposite side of them to be a capable Force User. The Jedi Knight suddenly felt less of a need to stop the thugs compared to wishing to ascertain who this other Force User was, as well as ensure the child's safety.

The panicked thug who had pointed the blaster at him however had other plans and instead moved to draw a vibro-knife on the Jedi. The Force would speak to Caedyn initiating his precognition, seeing the attack before it would arrive. In one swift yet strong motion, Caedyn's right hand brought the back end of the staff spinning out, smacking the wrist of the armed thug with such an impact that it forced the man sideways before rotating the blunt force weapon into a full spin with both hands and bringing it jutting against the back of the thugs head sending him to the ground hard. He did not get up, and for all appearances looked to be unconscious.

"And that was unfortunate" Caedyn concluded, soon to move towards the two females. The girl appeared frightened and uncertain of who to trust while the older woman seemed to be in a state of shock, distant for several moments before coming to, in time for Caedyn to have arrived by their side. "Are you two alright?" He asked calmly, uncertain of both of their well-being.

Syd Celsius

 

[Syd Celsius]

Syd writhed on the ground, the confusing memories mixing together.

This was the real hell Nathan had condemned her to.

Sparring against a teenage Laertia on the plains of Dantooine, the monster hiding behind the eyes of her master critiqued her every movement, every strategy. She had developed a taste for Form 1, the most basic of Lightsaber Combat. This intrigued the monster but knew it couldn't allow her to become too reliant--

Laertia Io smiled as she wrapped her arms around Syd. They had been lazing around in a meadow on Kashyyyk and Syd had been content to just sit on a large enough rock with the Jedi Shadow, watching the flowers sway in the wind--

Syd was jolted by the sudden arrival of Caedyn Arenais and she suddenly remembered where she was and felt very sick from the overload of two different sets of memories.

She noticed that the girl, though scared, hadn't left. Syd's face was still concealed by the hood she wore, and she hesitantly struggled to her feet.

"I'm...I'll recover..." Syd answered, feeling the Force in Arenais.

"What about the girl?"

 

[Caedyn Arenais]

Caedyn Arenais offered a nod in response to Syd Celsius stating that she was or would be alright, the Jedi Knight soon turning to look to the child who remained in shock and fearful of all that had happened so quickly and violently. "Don't worry, we'll look after you until we can find your parents" Caedyn assured the younglings with a gentle hand on the child's shoulder.

The girl looked younger than Jaitre Lanabre-Arenais, a Zeltron boy whom Caedyn had recently finalized the adoption of; It was easy to sympathize for the young one, so vulnerable and concerningly out in the streets at night without any adult supervision. There were questions that would need to be asked, but that would be a job for the local authorities.

"We should take the child to the local security agency here" Caedyn suggested to Syd Celsius, unable to recall the appropriate acronym for the law enforcement organization present on Denon. The Jedi Knight would approach closer to the woman where he would offer her his hand in assistance getting back to her feet. She was a Force Sensitive just as he was, though the Jedi would not mention this unless she chose to raise the matter first. It wasn't his place to go prying into the private lives of others without invitation or dire incentive.

 

[Syd Celsius]

Syd took a moment to catch her breath.

"Yes, I agree." The Witch spoke, taking his hand and helping herself up, making sure he couldn't see her face, as she pulled her hood down further, though crimson curls of hair would poke out of the hood regardless.

The trek to the local precinct was quiet. Syd said nothing, wincing and dizzy somewhat as the competing memories bubbled to the surface. Maple/Uri laughing at a joke she couldn't remember telling, Blades clashing. Sounds and noise and screaming...

She shook her head, barely having a handle on herself. The young girl instinctively stuck closer to Caedyn Arenais , sensing something amiss. Syd made no attempt at conversing with her.

Finally, they reached the entrance of one of the operating bases the local constables used. She stopped at the steps.

"You...you take her in..." Syd said to Caedyn, battling nausea as a fragmented memory of training Starlin jolted her. "I...I'm not up to giving a statement..."

Syd then sat and huddled at the steps, making sure the wind didn't blow her hood down.

 

[Caedyn Arenais]

To say that there hadn't been signs of suspicion in the other woman would have been ignoring every instinct within Caedyn's Jedi Training. There was no imminent threat coming from Syd Celsius , yet there was certainly a feeling that she wished to keep herself isolated or that she was hiding from the Jedi Knight. She had not yet given him any permacrete reason to doubt her, yet he couldn't shake the feeling that he was needed in some form, with regard to her circumstances. For now, however, Caedyn was obliged to take the young girl into the authoritarian agency, leaving Syd out on the front steps.

The local law enforcement was receptive to the news, Caedyn introduced himself as a Jedi Knight of the New Jedi Order, using his status to ensure that the girl was well looked after. A couple of officers on station at the front desk came out from behind it, one greeting the girl sympathetically while the other shook Caedyn's hand and thanked him for his service. They informed him that the Girl would be cared for until they could locate her parents, for the time being providing her with food and shelter, as well as assistance in dealing with the traumatic experience. Feeling satisfied with their promises to care for the youngling, Caedyn Arenais would return outside to where Syd Celsius had been waiting.

"The law here will care for the Girl until her parents can be found" Caedyn informed her, soon moving to take a seat on the cold steps beside the woman as he looked out across the street in thought. It was always interesting where the Force led people in life, and in the quiet of this moment, Caedyn took some time to appreciate the shared moment alongside a stranger who he would never have expected to meet by his own design.

"My name's Caedyn Arenais, by the way," He would glance at Syd, offering her a nod of greeting and respect, "Jedi Knight" he added. Perhaps if the woman needed help, she might reach out upon the knowledge that he was a Jedi; Or perhaps she was like so many others and feared what the Jedi were capable of, their many failures and contributions to war throughout the Galaxy.