Private Reincarnation

[Hasuras Na-Gerra]

The door to the room hissed open and a great figure stepped within. Gerra, hair unbound and the folds of a robe hanging loosely, draping across his shoulders but not bound across his bare torso, did not look her way at first.

He held a small mechanism of gold in his hands which looked akin to the gears of a clock and his eyes were fixed upon them alone, his brow furrowed in concentration.

At last he stepped to a table cluttered with other such objects and set the gear work aside. Only then did his gaze pass to the bed.

“Ah,” his brows rose, “you wake.”

He walked over to the bed, pausing at the edge of it just before her. She wore his shirt, far too large. And yet.

“Somehow that suits you,” he nodded, grinning.

Ansisa

 

[Ansisa]

Ansisa's gaze tracked him as soon as he stepped in the room, trailing over the sculpted muscle of his exposed torso before coming to settle on his face, the brow furrowed in focus on the device in his hand that she paid no mind to. Only once he had set it down did he notice her, his simple greeting curving one corner of her mouth into a smirk as he moved to stand in front of her.

She rose to her feet on the bed, the added height allowing her to rise face to face with him, arms sliding beneath the fabric of his open shirt as she buried her face in his neck, seeking the scent of him lips brushing his collarbone. "Hm, don't get used to it. I've yet to muster the will power to find my way back to my quarters to shower and find my own clothes." she said softly, drawing back and moving to seat herself back onto the bed her gaze drifting back to the tapestries.

"I assume most of these you have taken as you pillaged your way across the galaxy?"

Hasuras Na-Gerra

 

[Hasuras Na-Gerra]

The heat of her arms, slender yet well muscled against his bare skin, and the smell of her hair as she nuzzled her face into his shoulder sent tongues of pleasant fire licking through him. He wrapped one arm around her in turn, then she sat herself back upon the bed.

“Many. Many which caught my eye,” he admitted, golden gaze following her own to dwell upon the trophies and plunder of his adventures. “Though none to rival you.”

His gaze flicked to her, intensity unwavering. He continued.

“Others I merely made.”

Gerra gestured at an array of weapons on the far wall, Sith swords and a lanvarok in the old fashion. Among the first he forged, though not the best.

“The beasts I slew,” he nodded at the skulls and animal heads mounted on the walls, including a Terentatek, “Or else my hounds brought them down. Tuk’ata. I keep a kennel of them, should you share such interests.”

Ansisa

 

[Ansisa]

Ansisa let the insinuation that she was little more than a trophy sit, trying to decide if it bothered her or not. She mulled it over for a little more than a moment before concluding that he was simply a distraction, a very attractive highly addictive distraction that she could see herself enjoying repeatedly. So what right did she have to feel irked at being objectified in that way?

She let it slide as her gazd moved to the weapons, her interest peaking. Was it just weapons he crafted, or was there more? She slid from the bed, moving to the weapons to inspect them, all far too big for her to weild but she could appreciate the craftsmanship. Fingers ran lightly along the blades and hilts. As the suggestion of a hunt pulled another smile to her face.

"I am an assassin, Gerra, I love the hunt, but I relish more in the kill." She moved away from the blades eyes roaming over the heads of beasts, a shudder running through her spine at the terentatek, her hand moving subconsciously to a trio of old scars at her side. "I've never hunted beasts, though. I'd be interested to try. Just," she pointed at the terentatek "not one of those."

Hasuras Na-Gerra

 

[Hasuras Na-Gerra]

He glanced up at the enormous horned skull and grunted.

"A hard kill."

So. An assassin. Intriguing. In truth, Gerra knew but passing little of Ansisa's history. Only the snippets she chose to tell him. He'd only arrived on the planet as a favor to Revna Marr. And it was by chance that he came upon her body in the hallway. Or fate. Or, perhaps, the Force. His people put much stock in seers and prophecy. But Gerra knew of the future's malleability. He prefered to forge his own destiny.

"I have yet to hunt the jungles of Felucia. Perhaps we shall divert, it is not far off our current course."

Gerra's eyes returned to the assassin whose red eyes and steel-blue features so allured him.

"The hunt and the kill are among life's greatest offerings." He wondered at the dichotomy of her and of how fierce a protector she must be for her children, now in the Empress' care, "What else interests one such as you?"

Ansisa

 

[Ansisa]

Ansisa cocked her head at the idea of hunting on Felucia. It promised an opportunity, not only to further test her limbs, but also to learn a little more about her host. Her gaze moved over him again before shifting back to the beast's heads.

"Sounds like a worthwhile venture." She agreed, before turning fully to face him again as his next question struck. For a moment, she said nothing, seemingly lost in her own thoughts.

"You know, I'm not entirely sure I know the answer to that anymore." She looked down, a humourless chuckle escaping her. Malum had been her interest, her hobby. He had consumed all of her. She tried to find somewhere in her memories that he didn't exist, to remember who she was before. She had been hungry for power and knowledge, that much she knew. She took a breath, shunting the melancholy that settled in her chest aside and looking back up at Gerra.

"I'm sure it will come back to me in time. For now, I am interested in this life you lead. Taking and doing whatever tickles your fancy."

Hasuras Na-Gerra

 

[Hasuras Na-Gerra]

"Mm," he grunted, "Like fire. It is the way of the Vahla."

Millennia ago his people lost their homeworld. Ever since then they spread across the galaxy in roving fleets. They turned to piracy and raiding to sustain themselves. To be Vahla was to be free. Free as untamed fire. But always searching for home.

"We rove the stars and call nothing sacred but that which is our own."

The tenets of this galaxy, its civilizations, meant nothing to Gerra or his people.

"Most Sith claim to break their chains, but lose themselves in empire building."

A cloud drew over his features and he recalled the Conclave, when he stood with Empyrean and the others until Solipsis and his outcasts arrived and the tumult broke loose. At last his gaze passed back to her. She had suffered much.

"A new beginning for you. Like a firebird."

Ansisa

 

[Ansisa]

Ansisa drew closer as he spoke, wondering what thoughts passed his mind that drew such darkness over his features. A hand trailed over the muscles of his exposed chest as she pressed close, a smile turning the corners of her lips as he likened her to a firebird.

She let out hum of contentment, her forehead coming to rest against his chest as she let out a sigh, letting the heat of him chase away the thoughts that plagued her.

"Firebird..." she said after a beat lifting her head to gaze back up at him, her neck craned with the height difference. "A good name for a ship, don't you think?"

Hasuras Na-Gerra

 

[Hasuras Na-Gerra]

“Just so,” he grunted, his voice a low bass which thrummed with approval at her words as much as at the press of her body against him.

His chin tilted low and his golden eyes shimmering as with living flame met the glowing ruby stare of the assassin without wavering or breaking.

Gerra’s gaze grew hard and the fires in his eyes kindled with an unbridled intensity.

“Careful, assassin. You stoke a fire in my soul. But fire is wild.”

Little did he need to tell her this, whom he’d found half charred. One would not have known, beholding her and her beauty as he did now.

“Not to be played with.”

Danger flickered in his eyes, but so too did deep mirth.

Ansisa

 

[Ansisa]

Ansisa tilted her head, lips curving into a smirk at the rumbled warning, each word reverberating throughthe fingers trailing the hard muscles of his chest.

"I like the way your fire burns." She replied softly, her smile widening. She placed a kiss on his sternum before moving passed him, hand trailing along his abdomen before she moved for the door.

"I'm going to shower and get dressed. If you want to take me hunting, I can hardly do so in your shirt."

Hasuras Na-Gerra

 

[Hasuras Na-Gerra]

“No that would not do,” he agreed. A dark hunger had crept into his words. Ravenous as the flames of which he spoke. They licked greedily through his body, veins igniting beneath her touch.

The huge warlord did not bide his time. Fire burns even as it waits. Though he made no move to block her exit. She was free to do as she pleased.

“Your things can be brought to you. There is an operable shower here,” he gestured vaguely at the other side of the room.

“Why leave… and deny me the view?”

 

[Ansisa]

Ansisa paused, his hungry look igniting a fire in her. The smart thing would be to put space between them, to take a moment to breathe and recollect, but the longer the fire burned, the more she wanted it.

She took a breath, heat filling her chest glsncing back to where he had gestured. Well, it would be rude to deny him, especially when he'd taken so much care to rebuild her.

Ansisa moved passed him on his otherside padding barefoot across the room towards the shower, glancing over her shoulder she graced him with a smirk, lifting the shirt over her head and disappearing from view.

Hasuras Na-Gerra

 

[Hasuras Na-Gerra]

His shadow trailed her bare footsteps, carpet giving way to cold decking in the bathroom, then once more a fur rug garbed the interior floor. Some arctic beast Gerra slew long ago. Fur white and soft beneath the feet. The interior of the bathroom was decorated in the same haphazard, stolen luxury as the outer chamber.

The warlord prowled behind Ansisa, coming to a stop within the chamber and simply leaning against the wall, observing every movement of her steel-blue form with an intense fascination.

“What would you hunt with?” He asked, over the sudden sound of hissing steam. “Bow? Rifle? Your bare hands?”

Idle talk, mayhap. But it amused him. As did her taunting smirk.

Ansisa

 

[Ansisa]

There was something chaotic about Gerra's taste in decor, a need perhaps, to display every trophy he'd claimed with no true theme other than the unmistakable feeling that everything was his. The soft rug gave way to cool ceramics as she stepped into the shower, water flowing withing moments and filling the room rapidly with steam. She disappeared beneath the flow of it, the steady drum of hot water finding and easing knots in her muscles. Slender fingers lifted working the tangle from her raven hair as Gerra spoke.

"I've never been a fan of guns, not to say that I can't shoot one, just that I prefer the edge of a blade. I like the control of pressure, the precision of a cut. It can mean the difference between a fast and a slow death." She pondered the question. "The greatest test would be for me to use my hands and a knife."

Hasuras Na-Gerra

 

[Hasuras Na-Gerra]

Taking down an Acklay with naught but brawn and dagger in hand would be a feat indeed. And Gerra’s brows rose at the image of it conjured in his head. Her steel-blue form bestride the slaughtered many limbed creature, caked in its ichor. Triumphant. He grunted with approval.

“A fight I’d wish to see.”

His gaze took her in now, admiring as he might the product of a master sculptor working with the finest materials. And then of course he realized that part of it had been his own handiwork. Not given to such introspection, Gerra brushed those thoughts aside.

“And who have you fought? Names I would know? Surely now you have a list of those still living who you would cross off one by one.”

Gerra would enjoy aiding such a task.

It seemed worthy.

Ansisa

 

[Ansisa]

Who had she fought? The question drew a shrug from her as she disappeared beneath the water again, washing the suds from her hair. "I was tasked with elimination, not battle." The only names of note were those that had left her for dead in the ruins of Alvaria's palace. And she had no interest in revisiting that fight.

She stepped free of the water, her gaze moving to him as she turned it off. "Vengeance is for people who have nothing to lose or everything to gain. I have neither. Not now at least. Perhaps, when my children are older, when the ground beneath their feet is what they make it, then I might consider it. Yet there are few who are able to stand against the might of Lord Carnifex and Lord Prazutis."

It had been folly to stand against, she had known it, yet she had made the choice anyway.

She took a breath and stepped from the shower. "Every choice I make has to be in the interest of my children and nothing less."

Hasuras Na-Gerra

 

[Hasuras Na-Gerra]

Those golden eyes of his, simmering with heat, trailed down her frame from head to toe as she stood there, water beading from her body.

"Indeed," he replied.

Every choice.

Casually, the hulking Vahlan tugged a clean towel from the wall and handed it to the Chiss. They two were alike and yet unalike in many ways. She took the clean, quiet kill while he reveled in the glory and the spectacle. Gerra could not imagine working in complete silence or anonymity. It was anathema to his nature, which - like fire - craved more. Always more.

Ansisa protected a different sort of legacy. Her children.

Honorable, Gerra mused.

"Noble."

The Vahlan warlord's brows drew together for a moment, almost for a moment the brush of thoughts about his own family intruded on his mind - that chaotic mess of the Hasuras line. Yet he pushed it aside.

"There are no lengths I would not go to for my own brothers and sisters."

Ansisa

 

[Ansisa]

As far as Ansisa was concerned, nobleness had nothing to do with it. She was a mother and that was all there was to it. Her children were her everything and even when they could build their own foundations she would be there in a heartbeat should they need her. She accepted towel from Gerra, wrapping it neatly around herself.

"I never had siblings, so I cannot compare...what I can tell you is that a mother's love is all consuming..." she smiled her gaze elsewhere a softness crossing her face at the thought of her children before it vanished when she remembered all that had happened, coming back to her like a nightmare. "I want them back, but not before I can protect them."

Her crimson eyes lifted back to his face. "Take me hunting."

Hasuras Na-Gerra

 

[Hasuras Na-Gerra]

Several days later, they stood on the ramp of a shuttle in the jungles of Felucia. The air was humid and cloying. As if it were trying to drown Gerra. He wore no armor, just a simple tunic and pants. Instead of his usual sword, Gerra carried an antique Sith lanvarok, a large polearm that could shoot razor discs coated with venom. Once an ancient Massassi hunting weapon. Now, his personal favorite for these hunts.

The huge Vahlan sniffed the air. It reeked of wet earth and rotted wood and fungus and decay. The smell of the jungle.

"The scouts spotted the Acklay within that copse of mushroom bells," he pointed with his lanvarok toward the towering, colorful cluster of mushrooms not that far distant. "It will likely try to ambush us once we get beneath the canopy."

He nodded to himself, thinking.

"And you should know, this is one the scouts think was specially bred. Left behind by the One Sith. Force sensitive."

Certain breeds of Acklay could be bred to be Force sensitive, nearly Sithspawn. They shot lightning from their maws. Highly dangerous.

An excellent quarry.

"Are you ready?"

Ansisa

 

[Ansisa]

The heat of the jungle called for light clothes, a loose fitted top that left her arms bear and shorts. she wore nothing on her feet, her hair tied in a braid that hung over one shoulder. A pair of khukuri's rested in hilts in the small of her back. Her crimson gaze swept the jungle before them, thick with the noise of birds and critters alike.

Anticipation hummed beneath her skin, eager for the kill, to feel her control fully return. Gerra had been more than accommodating in providing ample challenge for her on the sparring mat and beyond, but he was not tyring to kill her. The acklay would.

A smile curved her lips as he explained the nature of the beast. He had picked a worthy challenge for her.

"Are you?" she replied with a smirk, stepping towards the mushroom trees he had indicated as the force rippled around her and she vanished from sight.

Hasuras Na-Gerra