Private Of bastards and broken things

[Ordo]

A lone ship entered orbit of the world of Zanbar and sat in orbit. It was an ancient YT-2000. The same one that sat in the mud outside of a spaceport on Mandalore while a drunk man sat in a lawn chair beneath it ages ago. Lights silently blinked in the void as a hatch opened on the top. A figure slowly rose from the top on a lift. Nothing more than a silhouette framed in the light of an occasional star. A ghost lingering in the depths, and then, it was gone.

He felt it, a resonance, something from before, something that made him feel...something again.

He was gone. And then he stood in fog. Always a fog. CM- fragstorm in hand. The fog and he moved across a clearing toward a hut, and ship, and the pull of deep things long forgotten.
Mia Monroe

 

[Mia Monroe]

She'd been seeking solitude more and more since she'd crossed blades with Kaine, lost in a world of thoughts delving deep into memories she'd not used looking for the answers to combat his blade. It was like trudging through thick mud to recall alchemy techniques.

Mia was going to need Ijaat's help, but she had to have a plan ready, to blend alchemy and mandalorian runes her idea had to be solid, well thought out. That and she'd have to provide reason for delving so deep into the darkside. Hopefully the still healing wound in her stomach would be enough.

Her mind had been quiet since Malum left. Although she could feel the presence of her brother looming over her, he had been quiet. A blessing in some regards, but in others it simply meant that he was biding his time, waiting for the moment thay his words would cut her most. Mia looked up from the fire pit as something in the air shifted beyond the reaches of the hut.

Her bolter slid from its holster as she rose, slipping outside the door into fog. Fog that had rolled in too thick and to fast to be natural. She levelled the bolter at the figure at its core.

"Tion'cuy?"

Ordo

 

[Ordo]

He watched her through the hut walls. Or perhaps felt her was more accurate. Slowly the resonance of her began to move..things in his mind. Clear things as surge after surge or memory began to play in his mind like a reel of images on a screen. Images of laughter and joy. Images of pain, shared and inflicted. He was Ordo, or had been once. But not the whole. A part of the greater person that still gathered and cultivated souls in the blood waste of the netherworld. More a being now than anything reassembling a person. He was the other side of the farmer, the cultivator, the builder. He was the destroyer, the reaper, the despoiler. But the two sides were one and yet not. It wasn't the season for cultivating, not yet.

He looked at her as she came out. Her senses right to be concerned. He was not a safe creature to leave lurking. He wasn't sure what it was that drew him here. Not before he saw her, felt her move the air as she came out holding her bolter. It was like the rippers he had once made in a basement of mandaltech...somewhere in the past. He lifted his fragstorm a millimeter and hesitated. She was supposed to be with him in the fields. She was supposed to be watching the fences while he grew the crops. She didn't belong here any more than he did. But he could feel that they couldn't go back.

As his memories came so too did the fog begin to lighten. Then the force came, flooding toward him, ready to push and pull and control him. Seeking to balance the universe. He raised a hand palm out and the force...stopped. The air didn't move. The world held its breath. He couldn't be bothered with the force and its whining right now. His sister. His ad'ika. His vod, needed to clear her head and do what needed to be done. And he was the avatar of what had to be done. He was war.

"Jatnese be te jatnese, Ner vod." he said, his voice resonating with a will of it's own before he schooled himself to speak more in line with what this galaxy could contain. "But you knew I'd come. I promised, didn't I? Where you go, I follow. We're inevitable."

Mia Monroe

 

[Mia Monroe]

Forty years, she had walked the blood wastes. Forty years she had watched his fences. No peace, no mercy. She fought so he could have peace, so he could rest as he deserved because it was her war that had gotten him killed. She wanted to plam him off as the ghost that lured in her mind but the pressure that that ghost rested against her had gone. Evaporated.

Along with her connection to the force.

"No." She shook her head the bolter lowering her voice barely above a whisper, yet so very loud in the silence that pressed around them. "You are supposed to be resting. You are supposed to be at peace. You cannot be here, ori'vod." Emotion cracked her voice. The bolter dropped to her side as she drew in a breath. "Go back, Jasper, I do not want this for you."

Ordo

 

[Ordo]

"Calm down, ner vod." He said as the fog cleared and the still force in the air parted around him as if unsure if it could get close. He brother, the part she loved wasn't here. The part that grew and planted the future of their people was busy at his work. He was something else, something...different.

"Jasper, is where he should be. But he's something more now. Time doesn't move there like it does here." He paused his explanation, "You need to let go of us and focus on what you need to do. So, here I am. I'm here because a promise made is a promise kept. In this world or the next."

The fog blew away and cleared as his mind did. His heart took it's first beat since he had arrived and his beskar bones made him leave heavy deep foot prints in the soil.

He lowered his fragstorm and hung it from his shoulder by the sling. He knew she was in pain he could smell it. The force practically screamed it at him. He ignored that.

"Now. Ask. And let it rest." He said his voice briefly filled with intent and an iron will that even creation would be hard pressed to ignore, "There's work to do."

Mia Monroe

 

[Mia Monroe]

The burning pain was returning, devaronian blood poison, coursing unchecked through her. Without the force, she could not quiet it. It was making it hard to think. His words made no sense. She closed her eyes swaying slightly, unspilled tears making her eyelashes damp.

Ask.

She opened her eyes "We died, fighting for a lie. Ra Vizsla was more than a pretender, he was a puppet. You died...we died because of Carnifex's manipulation, and paved the way for a desolation on our homeworkd like we've never seen and for our children..." she swallowed hard against the lump.innher throat. "For our children to be hunted and butchered. I cannot ask. I cannot ask for forgiveness for that."

She took an unsteady step forward, fire screaming in her muscles as she did, but what was pain in this moment? "I do not forgive me, so how can I ask it of you?"

Ordo

 

[Ordo]

He listened. He heard her and knew she couldn't understand. She had always been more in tune with the past. She wouldn't forgive herself. She never had. Not unless it was necessary. He lifted his hand again. The smell of the poison was strong now that she wasn't holding it back with her force powers.

"You won't like this." He looked at the poison flowing in her blood..."Out." He said and pulled. Her blood stopped as the toxin was pulled from her bones, through her muscles and skin and was held in the air.

He let it drop to the dirt.

"Sorry, but what needs to be done will hurt."

 

[Mia Monroe]

The pain blinded her, ripping forth a scream from her lips. She felt the earth press against her, unsure whether she'd fallen or been pulled with the toxin as he ripped it unceremoniously from her.

She lay still, breathing heavy the ache deep in her bones, unable to move. "Shabuir." She whispered as her vision slowly returned. "You could have warned me..."

Nausea lingered in the wake of the pain, and she trembled, trying to push herself to her knees. "Why are you here, ori'vod?" She whispered.

Ordo

 

[Ordo]

Mia Monroe

He blinked behind his visor. Shaibuir. Despite her obvious pain even her curse held affection. He walked close the force parting around him.

"You don't listen to warnings, shab'la dikut." He said as he bent down and scooped her up like old chaff.

He tossed her unceremoniously over his other shoulder as he walked them to the hut. Her form tense over his shoulder as she tried to brace herself. It didn't matter. She didn't need to think about why and how and what. It was clear the cultivator didn't need her to know. He was her support in the way he was accomplished. He was war. She needed war and he could give her that.

He gently pushed her hut door open and then closed it before he found her cot and deposited her on it. He took a pouch from his gauntlet and began brewing an old tea.

"I don't need you to forgive and I offer none. Cin Vhettin. Everytime. For someone so dense you should know that by now."

He slowly took off his buy'ce and his gauntlets. The scars looked heavy and pink like they were fresh as he began to focus on the brewing and let the force touch the hut again.

 

[Mia Monroe]

Mia let out a grunt as he deposited onto the cot. He was the only one that had even been allowed to handle her so. the only one who didn't have to wrestle with her. When Ordo told her to sit still, she sat still and she didn't argue...well, mostly. It wasn't out of fear and it wasn't for lack of respect that Ijaat had had to pin her to a wall to get her to let him help, it was simply that Ordo was the on person in the galaxy that had her complete and utter trust.

She lay still and let out a snort at his comment. "I'm not dense, I'm stubborn, there's a difference." When the nausea in her stomach settled she pushed herself up to seating on the cot, feet on the floor, elbows on her knees she looked at him for the first time. "Cin vhettin has its limits Jasper. You haven't seen how bad it is..." she cocked her head "unless you have?"

Ordo

 

[Ordo]

"Hmph." He replied as she began immediately arguing. And that was ok. That's who she was it always had been. She had to put forward resistance in even the small things. She was a hard woman. They were a hard people. That was what he loved about her and their people.

Cin vhettin has its limits Jasper.

"Not for us, ad'ika." He replied as he pulled the water from the cooker and poured two cups of tea. He turned and looked down at her and pushed a cup into her hands. "It doesn't matter how bad it is. Fix it."

He was a simple man at his core. They had a problem and in his mind the solution came down to whether they could fix it or not. If they could, that's what they would do. If they couldn't, they should wait and grow stronger until they could. But the past only held stagnation. The past didn't move anymore.

"But first, drink the fething tea." He said as he sat down beside her on the cot before the groaning frame made him move to a camp chair. "Then tell me solutions. Not problems."

Mia Monroe

 

[Mia Monroe]

Mia rolled her eyes at him. Fix it. Like it was that damn easy. She sat up as he pressed the tea into her hand, an eyebrow raising as he tried to join her on the cot before realising his error and moving to the chair. Had the topic at hand not been so heavy she might have laughed at him. She shook her head, closing both hands around the metal cup and frowned, staring into it.

"I'm already trying to fix it, well. We are. Ijaat has claimed to title, with some nudging." He might catch the affection in her voice, but she wasn't aout to elaborate on those details. "His focus is inwards, on brokering deals to get resources we need to restore and rebuild, but its a mammoth task. Most of vode these days weren't born on Manda'yaim, they were born on Kestri. We're spread thin and uniting is...complicated. The Enclave won't rally under Ijaat, they haven't seen a mandalore in a couple of decades. So we don't force it, we just keep it open. That one will take time and patience, they're pressed between the Galactic Alliance and the Sith Order and have made enemies of both."

She took a sip from the cup, a small smile tugging at her lips. She had to make a point of introducing him to Elise Ahana-Gwyneira , she would talk his ear off, but it would bring something out of him that was gone. Same as Elise and Malum had brough it out of her. She took deep breath before continuing. "Carnifex has to die." that was the other solution, her focus. "He will keep pursuing mando'ade until we're extinct, or he's dead."

Ordo

 

[Ordo]

Carnifex has to die.

The words lingered in the air and the threads that connected his sister to the other world lit up for a moment in his perception. She didn't understand. Her connection to things outside of the force was weakened. This may have been better for her in the long run. Coming back would protect her from becoming one of the angry mindless things from beyond the veil. Here she could still be herself. But Carnifex, was an issue that she wasn't ready to understand. Or it wasn't something him explaining would help her come to terms with.

"Leave Kaine to me for now." He said calmly, Carnifex was similar to himself in ways she couldn't accept yet. Not completely. "As for fixing things it sounds like you're trying to do what we've always done expecting things to not go the way they always have. That's the definition of insanity, Mia." His soft words resonated through the hut with her name. The force and ground shaking slightly.

"Sorry, I'm still getting a hold on myself. You understand that much I'm sure."

Mia Monroe

 

[Mia Monroe]

Mia didn't flinch, instead she lifted her eyes from the tea cup in her hand and settled the on her brother with a cold steady gaze. He might have been her ori'vod and he might have been powerful, but so was she.

"You are too late to come in now and request I leave Kaine to you. Our feud has already begun and the challenge laid out. I'm not stepping down, so either help by sharing what it is you know, or stay out of the way."

She ignored the slight against her sanity. He didn't know all, he hadn't seen all and they were definitely not doing everything the same as they had. When Ijaat had ripped her from the blood wastes she'd thrown him across the room. She suspected Jasper was wrestling with the incoming flux of memories, trying recall who he was.

It pained her, thay they were so intwined, she had never wanted this for him.

Ordo

 

[Ordo]

"I said leave him for now. Not forever, Mia." He said as he let the steam of the tea waft over his face. The scars were like new, like his body only recently healed. It was an odd thing that the scars were such a part of him that his soul remembered them even without the body. It was telling.

"But that doesn't mean I won't tell you everything I can." He continued, "Kaine doesn't want to eradicate us. He needs conflict too much. He's as much a tool as any base thing in this galaxy is. He won't die anymore than you or I will, but he can be stopped, weakend. Removed from the equation for a time."

He groaned to himself and rubbed his face before he met her eyes for the first time.

"I trust you, Mia." He paused to let the statement sink in, "I will not stop you or get in the way, but I am only a part of what I was. A part of me is still on that bench I carved so I could wait for the rest of the vode to find their way home. I'm sorry. Things are still settling."

He sipped the tea and let the force move around them again. He wanted to see where it pulled.

"Where do you need me." He said finally, "And no fething kark all about how much I shouldn't this or that. I made my choice and you can accept it or not, but it won't change."

Mia Monroe

 

[Mia Monroe]

Mia blew a sigh out of her nose. They were both too stubborn for their own good, no matter the disagreement, one of them had to step down for them to move forward. "Fine." she conceded on the topic of him being there. A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. As much as she hated how their entwined souls meant neither of them could rest without the other, that every time she was yanked back he was forced to follow, she was grateful he was here.

"I need you where I always need you, ori'vod."

She took a sip of the tea, lost in her own thoughts for a moment.

"Do you think I'm crazy? For believing in a sith?"

Ordo

 

[Ordo]

"Do you think I'm crazy? For believing in a sith?"

He grunted in acknowledgment of the question. His large gray eyes looked off into the distance. Acrossed the stars and into familiar fields before he pulled himself back together and refocused on the now.

"There's been only three or four people I've ever believed in, Mi'ika." He began as their faces smiling or crying passed across his vision. "But you can trust a dar'jetii to be selfish. They're all emtional kids in eyeliner and the newest shade of black. Slaves to their feelings. If they think a thing pleases them in the moment they'll keep their word until their desire passes. That's their roll and they can't leave it anymore than the jettiise can. Can you trust the boy? For now, while he wants, yes."

He sipped his tea. That was more talking than he'd done in decades.

Mia Monroe

 

[Mia Monroe]

His words did nothing to comfort her. If anything they made her feel worse. She felt a burning desire to defend Malum, to defend whatever bond had built between them, strange and strained as it was. But there was nothing she could say, no reason she had to defend him other then a feeling deep in her gut that she was making the right call.

"I guess time will tell."

They slipped into a comfortable silence, each in their own thoughts drinking the tea he'd made. After a while Mia spoke again, setting her empty cup aside.

"We should go to Ijaat." she said softly, the tenderness in the way she said his name betraying her feelings for him. "He'll be pleased to see you back."

Ordo

 

[Ordo]

"We should go to Ijaat." she said softly, the tenderness in the way she said his name betraying her feelings for him. "He'll be pleased to see you back."

"Alright, Mi'ika." He said his mind streching out across the area and as he stretched out his presence could be felt. His presence that stretched deep into the nether and he communicated with his other half.

Then all at once he withdrew and stood with an exaggerated groan. He placed his now empty cup on the counter and put his gauntlets back on the new pi k scarred hands then picked up his buy'ce.

He paused a moment as he stared into the T-shaped visor before he turned it in his hands and placed it back on his head.

"Let's go, it's all borrowed time now."

 

[Mia Monroe]

There had been something missing in her, something not quite in place. and it wasn't until Mia doused the fire before and collected her own helmet, that she realised what it was. He blue eyes settled upon her brother and she took a breath deep breath. He had been what was missing. Her counterpart, her ori'vod. They were bound, in this life and the next.

She gave him a sad smile, before donning her own helmet. "Let's go home."

---

The two ships descended through the atmosphere towards the Keldabe. while still nothing close to what it had been in its hay day, it was less rubble and more of an ever changing building site. Beyond it, to the north, the endless stretch of wasteland that Kaine had created strip mining the planet. They would never truly fix the wastes, that would take hundreds of years but it was a least heart-warming to see Keldabe was beginnig to bustle.

Adjusting her trajectory for the landing bays indicated by Keldabe Port Security she led them in to a bay large enough to accommodate both ships. She'd sent word ahead that she was on her way home to Ijaat Mereel but not that she was bringing company.

Ordo