Private On the Cold Edge

[Tilon Quill]

"That," Tilon said slowly, once he'd finished translating, "I think, is what I couldn't quite put into words earlier, about the way the Force connects everyone and different connections swell and link up based on proximity, on grouping, like magnets or neurons or distributed computing or a Sith Lord's life-draining at scale or..." He laughed under his breath. "...rhizomes. Of course now all the parallels are coming to mind.

"We're talking about finding a way to empower some or most of the adults, right? Making everyone...fifteen percent of what Majjas is so they can all carry their weight? And finding some solution to their issue with the anti-rejection meds so they can get that capacity distributed across species?"

Auteme

 

[Auteme]

She laughed. "See, I looked at the Agarians again and it connected for me- but fungi aren't even rhizomatic."

A nod to Tilon's summary. "It's not about being equals, or being the same, but contributing -- if Majjas still has strength to give, she can bear part of the load. But everyone's in it together. That distribution -- rather than more information, more stress on the network with each individual added, it's better distribution. Every part strengthens the whole."

Majjas herself considered this. "Our technology... does not function in this way. But we have heard of a system from far away -- this, Holonet, of yours. A vast interconnected system, though limited."

"Hm- yeah, that's right... I don't know if the functionality is the same, though, whether we could figure something out like that for you... but it could be possible."

"It seems worth looking into. This... rhizome, as you call it. It does not present itself to me as it does to you. But I can feel the way you feel about it. The Connection speaks."

A smile. "Well, there it is. I can feel your worry, your exhaustion. But we'll support each other on the way through, I think."

The exhaustion remained, but the worry receded. "So we will," she said. "I will speak to our more technical elders on the subject, and bring them here if necessary. Thank you."

Majjas pulled herself back, gliding across the room deeper into the cavern. Auteme found herself tired, too, and went to a small sitting area half-protruding from one of the alcoves in the ice. It was strangely warm here, but the ice made no effort to retreat.

"So you get to do this every day?" A grin to Tilon. "Not every day, obviously. But, you know. No one else's experienced this."

Tilon Quill ​

 

[Tilon Quill]

It took Tilon a minute to answer. He was getting as comfortable as the combination of coat, vac suit, and ice alcove permitted, and after all that translation, self-directed words came together slowly.

"All new for sure. Couldn't get this on Tython."

Which turned his thoughts, of course, to all three of the Jedi Orders (including the New one, which was the older one, and the new one, which was not named so) and all the things they were that he never wanted to be — cops and soldiers and lords — and how he'd cobbled together a community of practice through drop-ins and random encounters but was, fundamentally, alone. And on top of that was the growing conviction that ethically, he'd need to be the test subject.

None of that found words.

"When this is over," he said slowly, "when we write it up, I think I'd do it as a Force tradition. As if we were visiting a Voss or Fallanassi elder somewhere. Majjas deserves the... dignity of that."

 

[Auteme]

Auteme nodded. She followed his gaze, tracing an invisible line from Tilon to where Majjas had gone.

"Must be hard, doing all this on her own," she said. "But at the same time, she isn't, is she? What she talks about -- the Connection," she used the little Iskalloni she'd picked up by listening, "Seems the most obvious way to talk about the Force. Ties that bind. You find it everywhere, feel it everywhere. Everyone you meet is a bond. The thing about rhizomes -- they retain their ability to grow in any direction, to connect to any other point. One day, you look around-"

She pointed to the ceiling, the cables of Majjas' harness, connecting everywhere. But so too did she trace back, bringing Majjas to everyone, and everyone to her. "You can see it -- how she feels she needs to bear a certain weight. But it's everyone's to bear with her, even us."

A knowing smile, perhaps a reflection of the elder Quill.

Tilon Quill ​

 

[Tilon Quill]

"Occurs to me," said Tilon slowly, working it through, "what you're talking about isn't too far from some of the mistakes you can make as a ship captain. Keep command burdens to yourself, be the choke point, and you can spare your crew some of the weight for a while, but they'll miss out the chance to get strong enough to do the full job. I've known a couple of well-meaning captains to wind up sinking their whole bridge crew that way, people they liked and wanted to succeed. Just maybe didn't trust the crew as much as the captains felt like they did."

He talked more quietly there so as not to be overheard.

Auteme

 

[Auteme]

She let the thought linger a little while, but in time added an observation of her own.

"Mm. And involve the Force, and it gets more complicated. I recall reading- well, a memoir of Gilad Pellaeon's, strangely enough, from the days of the Galactic Empire- and how the Battle of Endor played out. It's never been confirmed, I don't think, but it seems like Emperor Palpatine was using a form of battle meditation to push his fleet forward. When he died, so did the fleet's resolve, and they crumbled in the face of the otherwise inferior Alliance forces." Auteme matched his volume, less because she was worried about being overheard, but because she knew he was. Hiding their thoughts was, perhaps, exactly what had doomed Tilon's prior captains -- but they'd speak more on that soon.

"It's... something I remember about many Jedi. Even my closest friends. A need to protect, be the center, a solid foundation to build off of. But remove it, when they're gone -- it feels like standing on sand." Her mind wandered, briefly, sadly, and then she laughed to herself. "Mm. And how's your father doing? Have you spoken lately?"

Tilon Quill ​

 

[Tilon Quill]

"Hm? Oh, Dad's fine. Closed up the archive for the summer and headed off to see some Elom matriarchs about petroglyphs. I don't know if you've had the same impression, but the last few years I've felt like he's really turned a corner. He was always so...disappointed when I first came to live with him.

"Not disappointed in me, I mean," Tilon added hastily. "In other people and himself and institutions and the galaxy in general. But these days I feel like he has the life he actually wants, even if it's a life not many other people would want.

"A taste for that — figuring out the life I want, going for it regardless of expectations or lost opportunities or really anything — is probably the best thing I got from him. That and refusing to ever be The Guy, the headliner of the project, the one who makes everything crumble when they leave."

Auteme

 

[Auteme]

"Absolutely," she nodded. She scratched her chin a little, half wondering- "Was I 'The Guy' for the Alliance? I was trying to be, at least a little, and now they're having problems- nope, know what, I don't care. I'm taking that same corner.

"But yes. A good thing to learn -- that's the kind of rhizome I'd want, I think. Your father isn't someone I'm forced to lean on, but he's given me strength more times than I can count, and I hope- no, I have, done the same. We're connected, and making other connections."

She looked around the room, half-realizing the next step.

"Hey, how about- we go talk to some of the folks here. Be less headliners."

Tilon Quill ​

 

[Tilon Quill]

The collaborative work of the next few days involved refining their shared understanding of the problem, exploring the limits of Iskalloni tech and pharmacology, and developing solutions that were social as much as technical. While Tilon had no strength in healing, he'd spent his early knighthood supporting the treatment of alchemically altered people, and some of that experience carried over well. Being a healthy and resilient test subject, he was also able to take on an Iskalloni implant himself — a metal oblong tucked under his hair, sometimes hooked to wires — to help figure out different kinds of connections.

Once solutions were stabilized across a dozen or so core members of various species, the experience, part spiritual and part cybernetic, was unique. He still felt like himself, with mental privacy, but he also felt in communion in a way the Jedi path had rarely offered him.

There was no question of him staying in connection with the link — everyone understood he wasn't going to remain in this sector with this growing community — but it had its appeal.

Auteme

 

[Auteme]

Auteme wasn't as brave as Tilon -- or rather, had more reservations about cybernetics. Thankfully, the choice was not offered to her, as Tilon volunteered to help troubleshoot the technical side. She quickly learned that being a doctor, while at times useful, had significant gaps compared to an expert in cybernetics. From time to time she'd serve as a nurse, easing pain, calming patients, and keeping the operating room in tip-top shape.

Her primary role ended up being teaching: spending her days preparing the community's understanding of the Force. She and Majjas had several long discussions on how they viewed the Force; they talked rings around each other, and though they seemingly could never come to an exact agreement on the terms and truths, they knew they were talking about the same thing.

There was a supposed Sith power, a ritual used at one time by Emperor Palpatine, and perhaps replicated at various other points, that had the effect of enhancing another's Force sensitivity. Auteme had never researched it in much detail, but if there were a Jedi equivalent, she suspected this would be close. Her talk of rhizomes was an extension of her mist-weaving, the literal connections she could see and forge -- by the end of the week, looking at the now-connected cyborgs, she could see the threads forming between them. More importantly, it seemed like they could feel them, too. A multicolour tapestry, built on a collective foundation, but with a distinct personality at each and every junction. A quilt, perhaps.

"We're part of it, too," she murmured to Tilon one night, from the bunk she'd been allocated. "No matter where we are. A part of us will be here. A part of them, there." It felt obvious, saying it aloud, but she said it anyways, as though to make it more real.

And so it was -- their work finished in six days, and on the seventh they held a celebration meager in materials but massive in spirit. She learned an array of Iskalloni space shanties, tasted the best comet-water in the galaxy, and discovered what passed for mild stimulants among Agarians were enough to send her into a brief trance, before she remembered how to purge it from her body.

"Do you think we'll ever come back?" she asked Tilon, as they waved goodbye. The Iskalloni merchant ship had picked up a couple new members, but had built enough rapport with the Narrow Pocket that they said it would be a regular place of visit, should either of them be in this part of the galaxy again.

Tilon Quill ​

 

[Tilon Quill]

"I've heard the Trade Federation's selling modular agricultural platforms these days at a good price," he said, non sequitur but by way of answer, watching the Iskalloni ship ease away into the endless comet storm upstream. "I'm thinking about what it'd take to get one, haul it out here. Could mean a lot. They'd have come to solutions without us, but all of this could've gone so much easier for them and Vesskyzi with more stable food."

Most days, the North Ridge packed a lot of consumables. Those stocks were now very low, and everything edible by any species represented was effectively gone from his garden. He'd need to replenish it with some real biodiversity, find some special plants on a world like, oh, Varunda Nine or Yavin Four. He liked to pick up plants at worlds he visited. There weren't many known humanoid-habitable systems anywhere around here, but he ought to be able to find something on his way back in.

He wobbled a little bit on the ice. The last dregs of those Agarian stimulants were resisting his detoxification skills pretty well. He thought, for the first time actually, of how all this could have gone for everyone concerned if Auteme wasn't the Jedi who replied to his call, and that got a shiver as if his space suit's insulation had finally yielded to the climate.

"I'm glad you were the one who showed up."