Private Something So Gleaming

[Ishida Ashina]

NOTHING GLOWS BRIGHTER
DENON | RESIDENTIAL DISTRICT | TOO SMALL A HALLWAY
NOTHING GLOWS BRIGHTER
THEN THE HEART AWAKENED
TO THE UNSEEN LIGHT OF LOVE
THAT LIVES WITHIN IT

STILL
​

For some reason, she’d expected it to be raining. Instead, the sky was dry and as pink as the neon sign that flashed Ronto Wraps for only five credits.

As similar as Denon was to Coruscant, it felt less refined. More creative, somehow. Sleepless and daring. Like the technicoloured advertisements and pink, blue, green, and yellow neon signs were waiting to shatter and spill their brilliance into the streets.

The structures that constituted the residential sections were glistening glass steel, shining brightly in the afternoon sun and reflecting the greens of the major park in the centre of it all. The grass was well-kept, with strange statues and installations randomly plotted throughout the gardens. They were less traditional than typical oblong, abstract shapes, and Ishida could only rationalize the uniqueness of the art was because there were few corporations that had sway on Denon. The artists could truly express themselves here, without risking the offence of shareholders.

She took a few seconds to stand and appreciate the primary attraction. A huge loop edged with blue and green lights, wide enough for seven people to walk shoulder-to-shoulder on, and long enough to qualify as a swoop race track. It was, apparently, purposed to emphasize connection through a combination of sculpture, architecture and park space. For Ishida, it felt like a sculpture was a carnate of time, where it was curving back so much that the opposing ends almost touched. Those opposing ends never did of course, not with the natural flows of time. That’s why she was here today. Because she simply couldn’t wait any longer and relying on time was a fool’s game.

Someone in the traffic stream overhead honked angrily and drew Ishida’s gaze upward and away from the park’s beauty. The search for the agitated driver was brief amidst the block of apartments ringed by bright-edged towers and spires and buildings. This district was mostly recreational, which is probably why the structures were less uniform than when she’d first stepped off the train.

Bernard had spoken fleetingly of this area, mostly in reference to his affinity for time with the Marshals, their standards, how much there was to learn, versus keeping overnight company amidst Jedi.

And as Ishida scrolled through the listings in the apartment directory, she realized this was another section of Bernard’s life she knew little about. And her just showing up was bordering on invasive, let alone inappropriate. The very fact that she wasn’t even sure if he was home, or if he even still called this place home, or if he even — it all made her heart stop for half a beat.

Her brain stopped for even longer. Long enough that the lift gave a soft ding, and the doors opened to a mirror image staring back at herself. She stepped forward, towards it, and smoothed down the side of her bangs, her thoughts again overtaken by the naggings of hesitations.

Was now the right time?

Hesitation is defeat.

It had to be. There could be no further hesitations, no more half-written messages, no more sleepless nights. There could be no more almosts.

It had been a year, at least, since the traumatic revelations of Korriban and the fulfilment of Yavin.

"But know that I intend to keep my promise regardless of which path you choose to follow in the end,"

Had that path become clearer? Was she changed?

it seems like an eon since I last saw you; you have changed.~

Yes. She was changed.

Regardless of her intentions, the time spent apart had taken its toll. The adjustments were deeper than the physical; it wasn’t just the way she cut her hair, nor the way she dressed that had transformed.

Whether Ishida liked it or not, time had been slowly undoing everything she’d grounded herself in. All those perceptions and pedagogies had been exposed, killed, betrayed or grown otherwise muddy. And seeking Bernard out was partly out of need. She’d grown enough that she could admit that now; even if it was just the need to know that any change that happened between them wouldn’t be hurtful. She wasn’t sure if she could take that pain.

At the end of the hall, in front of those three digits that matched the directory and foggy memories, she heard herself make a sound to be let in. A knock, a ring, she wasn’t sure. Even though she’d accounted for all the exits, the hallway suddenly felt narrower and closed in.

The anticipation was a tightness in her throat and in her hands and a thumping in her brain. She’d planned this the entire travel over in that stupid X-Wing that she loved, whether or not she just let herself in, wait for arrival, smile and grin, launch forward with no words, maybe wait for him to set the tone, it was all coalescing in her mindscape and composure was fast becoming something tenuously held.

She drew in a sharp breath and steeled herself regardless, squaring up with expectation and equipping herself with the Ashina tenants: One must be direct, deliberate, and decisive in all things. Death is destiny. Live in the present lest you squander the temporary

 

[Bernard]

It broke down to a problem of linguistics. The New Jedi Order faced problems the Jedi had known for dozens of millennia. A fractured and fragmented body of Knights, Masters, and Padawan, relentlessly pressured by a pan-galactic threat that sought to consume the Core and tyrannize its citizens, then move on to do the same to every other free world in the galaxy. Mistrust sown from within, by that very threat, and the still lingering influence of one of the most catastrophic events that had ever befallen the Galactic Alliance. The threat of rising extremism in one of the Alliance's, and Jedi's, former allies against the Darkness that portended coming betrayal and greater bloodshed on a front long thought stable and secure. An ally to the south who was consumed by the strife of internal flux. And on top of all the crises in the galaxy, it had been almost a year since he'd let go of the one thing that had...

Bernard inhaled deeply and closed his fingers around the ring hanging over the fabric of his tunic. It felt impossibly cold, but the sensation grounded him. The frustrated tension slowly faded from his muscles, and he started feeling a little lighter. He ran his thumb over the engraving on the signet, feeling the smooth grooves that shaped wings. Those memories are not an anchor. He turned back to the wide scattering of papers and holopads cluttering his desk.

The time of peace promised after the end of the Sith War had never come. The galaxy had kept spinning in its state of perpetual crisis, with hundreds of fires igniting across its systems, and all of it broke down to a problem of linguistics. Bernard nudged one book to the side to read a hastily scribbled note. Krhetar, a third declension noun of the fifth greater spiritual sphere of the Koa, roughly translated to 'spirit' and often found use in secular contexts. Which didn't seem to bear any relation to the wider context of ethics and moral guidance the text had suggested so far.

The one sitting before him currently didn't only defy any conventional translation holoware Bernard knew, it also proved to be as dense as beskar and just as difficult to crack. But it possibly offered insights into some of the difficulties plaguing the galaxy now, so the notes at Prosperity's library promised. At least in theory they'd said. However theory alone, and the promise of much needed wisdom, remained enough to keep Bernard translating the texts for a week and a half. That he'd chosen to do so after a catastrophic assembly with the other Jedi of the Order had no relation other than pure coincidence. He sighed, beginning to scribble a partially formed translation of the sentence he'd become stuck on when the door chimed to alert him to a visitor.

He stopped writing. Hadn't he turned that off to better focus on his studies? No one he knew had contacted him about coming to visit, and barely anyone knew he even lived here. After he'd departed from the Marshals this place on Denon had turned into a secret refuge sequestered from the business of Jedi life. A private haven for him to retreat to in case he became overwhelmed and needed to work through difficult problems. Nobody on the council knew about it, and he hadn't told any of the other Jedi either. The Marshalls he'd worked with knew he'd transferred to Denon for a while before he'd resigned, but none had followed up on exactly where he'd settled down here. That left mostly the local Marshals, criminals, and anyone who wanted to track him down. Bounty postings rarely disappeared in the underworld, and Hunters could get crafty.

He slid quietly from the chair, pulling a glove over his sabre-hand, and moved towards the door. His lightsabre rested safely within reach of the door, in a Zeffo reliquary atop a small shelf. Being a Jedi had a few perks, that way. He reached out through the Force for further clues, but it didn't offer any signs of coming danger. All he felt was a single being, waiting, suspiciously a little anxious, on the other side of the metal door.

His mind lingered on the lightsabre as he tapped the panel unlocking the door, uncertain whether he'd invited in some undercity crime boss' goon or—

The being opposite him was human. Short, white hair, Atrisian features, fine clothes, gray eyes. Her posture betrayed a readiness for combat, the same way a Jedi's might, but the stance came from a different tradition. He exhaled slowly. His mind absently continued to take note of other details, potential weapons, her intent, who she might be associated with, but all of that became white noise to fill the gap left by the sheer depth of surprise short-circuiting any rational decision-making processes.

He became aware of his heart beating in his chest, the steady warmth spreading suddenly and relentlessly through him. Disorienting emotions that made a jumble of his mind, and reduced the carefully laid plan, and his previous composure with it, to irrelevancy. He was forced suddenly from the future, a place he felt confident about, to one that was wholly unpredictable, unknown, and uncertain. Where his mind fumbled in vain for a new plan of action, thought after thought offering dozens of possible solutions, each finding dismissal in the second he lingered at the door.

Instead of waiting, however, despite the uncertainty, he made a decision, stepping forward to wrap his arms around his visitor, and pulled her into an embrace.

Ishida Ashina

 

[Ishida Ashina]

LEARN TO OUTGROW THE THORNS​

Bernard looked at Ishida, and Ishida looked right back at Bernard.

He remained expressionless for a few beats as if she were standing in a thick fog and the sharpness of her image was slowly, slowly refining. Watching her closely, but unable to really realize or understand anything about her standing there in front of him. Not yet, anyway. In those precious, foggy moments, she could imagine him trying to fit her into a logical framework of how this day was supposed to go. Maybe she should have called first. Maybe she should have caved to one of those almosts earlier. But she’d trusted him to be ready for her when she needed him, and he had to trust her that she’d find him again. When she was ready. He’d made so many promises, assurances, and during their goodbye she promised that day wouldn’t be their last. Recycling the sentiment from Nar Kreeta.

Her breath jumped in her throat.

She wanted to help him understand, to speak or move into him. But her reaction was distant, and her vocal cords only buzzed soundlessly with that shared, unprepared shock that tried to at least smile. No matter how many times she imagined this scenario, she couldn’t conceive the next appropriate step.

Ishida didn’t move. Couldn’t move. As if those bright, cloud-coloured eyes had reduced her to paralysis. He was looking at her, and something happened inside. A shift or a swell, or a rolling indiscernible motion that felt like herself after a year of wandering, wondering and fighting.

She wanted to take more of him in, appreciate details beyond the incomprehension or the way he was looking at her, but something must have happened for him too because his arms were around her.

With closed eyes, she pressed herself to him in relief and felt the tension from her slide away, melted by the warmth of his embrace. His heartbeat was loud against her ear — loud enough to drown out the steady thunder of her own. Thud-a-thump-thud-a-thump-thud-a-thump was all she could hear. All she wanted to hear.

It was a close replica to those peaceful nights a year ago, but it was a fragile imitation. Protected by a shell of uncertainty that sought answers beyond this moment. They’d fought hard to get to where they’d left off, and getting back there would be ––

"Hi." She tried at first, the word soundless, nothing more than a hoarse scrape through her throat. It was thick with emotion, but she swallowed past it and exhaled a staggered breath in preparation to speak. Her hands clutched tighter to his upper back, keeping the firmness of this moment alive and real. This was happening. He was here with her. Not a voice across a commlink, or a holo projection on the other side of the galaxy, or just a smile in her memory.

“I couldn’t bear to miss you any longer,” Ishida admitted into his tunic, her voice unsurprisingly quiet. “I thought I might find you here.

After Tython.”

 

[Bernard]

"Tython had its time," he whispered. "Right now I want you alone to be all I know of the galaxy."

He pressed his head against hers, running a hand through her hair while the other caressed her back.

"The days my thoughts didn't linger with you were few. I..." he paused. The corners of his eyes tightened, his brows creased with thought. Behind his eyes he seemed to weigh two conflicting points.

He spoke again after a few heartbeats, more subdued with his voice, as though what he was saying should have remained a secret, "I often feared I might never see you again."

He frowned, relieved that Ishida couldn't see his expression as the fears resurfaced. Extrapolations of possible futures, possible paths Ishida might have taken, laden with uncertainty and doubt that had continually gnawed at his resolve. They had stayed with him as a quiet whisper at the back of his mind that never ceased to prophesize a fate where they'd never find each other again. Even the memento he kept had only succeeded in quieting the whispers, rather than silencing them altogether.

He drew her closer, selfishly drawing comfort from the physical sensation of holding her in his arms after all this time. The fabric of her clothes against his glove and the soft hair coiling around his fingers seemed both real and dreamlike at the same time. He wanted to ground that sensation firmly in the real.

"But now you're here."

He pulled back in their embrace, just far enough to run his hand out of her hair, along her jaw, and to her cheek so he could tilt her head up to meet her eyes. The tranquil stormclouds he remembered from Yavin met his gaze, and drew a smile. He leaned down to remember her kiss, and to speak the silent words of devotion that could only spoken in the sanctuary between their lips.

Ishida Ashina

 

[Ishida Ashina]

"Tython had its time,"

And she wanted to hear of it. How he felt, not just with the convocation itself but the world he’d stepped into now. How was he handling it? Was this what he wanted, where he wanted to be? Being a councillor in the wake of galactic tumult was an incredible burden, and she’d only caught a glimpse of it — was he facing it alone?

Like her, he’d been a Padawan when they’d parted, and now his path seemed so sure.

That had been part of the motivation that moved her to now, and not delay any further. Beyond all the reasons of self, all the ground that shifted beneath her and made her feel unsteady, there was an equal desire to be there for him. She hadn’t been after Coruscant, and that part still nagged at her.

"Right now I want you alone to be all I know of the galaxy."

She smiled. Swooning at his whispers couldn’t be helped, and Ishida was ever-grateful their grip on one another was so firm with the way his sound ran through her. The chasm of worlds, scars, loss, closed in their embrace.

"The days my thoughts didn't linger with you were few. I..."
"I often feared I might never see you again."

His words were sharp and painful, and she felt her breath leave the moment he spoke the idea of never.

Breathless, she squeezed her eyes shut tighter. There might have only been centimetres between them, then turned to millimetres, but it was more than that. Measures more. There was a whole year that existed between them, their bodies, their minds, all they’d gone through separately.

Never would have been the worst of outcomes, and a gamble they’d made when they parted. She’d spent time thinking about that potential reality too, what her actions meant, and how they could lead to alternatives that would keep them apart. Darkness or death were the ultimatums that would have created that endless chasm. Early on she could bear neither if it meant no way back to him. It was an anti-guide.

"But now you're here."

Swift bursts of electricity ran along her jaw and up her spine with his touch. As if his hands were the source of all the galaxy’s heat, warming her— the heat seemed to bleed to her chest and spread like a wildfire. If she turned to ash in the next hour, burned by his hands, it would have been timeline apart that had been worthwhile.

Anticipation trilled through her arms, shoulders, and travelled up her neck to heat her cheeks. Did a kiss still carry the meaning it had a year ago? Could it, with nothing but history for them to base it on?

For him to so readily accept her, to move into her like this, was proof such intrusive thoughts had no place here. They were the foundations of hesitation when he was assured, decisively reinforcing the desire for their union. He forced those lingering notions out with the wordless promise that pressed between their mouths, and Ishida felt the dreamlike state of their reunion become reality. Bewilderment’s mental fog replaced with a different kind of haze — the kind that had been imprinted so firmly in her memory.

The weight of a kiss didn’t have to mean the same thing, she realized in the half-seconds it took for them to collide. It was a language that could evolve and strengthen.

If, later, they decided the change was too much or too little, that devotion was undeserving, that would be a bridge to cross. For now, the devotion they’d kept true to that led them to this moment found itself greatly deserving.

Joy lit her from inside like a fire.

Her fingers curled against his back, tightening their twist in the fabric of his shirt as she gave in to ravenous longing. Her whole soul fell into it, heaving and holy. A year’s worth of yearning poured into their kiss, deep, firm and urgent. Love intensified by absence.

Eventually, they parted. Heavy breaths slipped in and out between her contended smile.

“I’m here.” Ishida confirmed, her eyes still closed and lips tracing against his. Her hands moved from gripping his back to eclipse the back of his hand against her chin, fitting her fingers in the spaces between his while the other fell to his chest, letting it rest over the thrum of his heartbeat.

Did he taste it? The graveyard between her mind and her mouth of all the words unsaid? Where thousands of thoughts of finding him sooner had gone to die?

“I should have been with you sooner,” Ishida admitted quietly, the conviction of her desire stronger than the delivery. Her voice fluctuated and pulsed through the threatening gush of emotion, and she was careful about it. As if the words were made from glass and they could cut her if she spoke them too hard.

“I needed you so early on—” she searched his expression, pushing through her shameful self-pity with the distraction of trying to ascertain the changes months had made to him.

"Between everything going on with The Jedi, my br-" the word died in her mouth "-family. It felt wrong. Too soon, too incomplete and too much to mix you up with it all and it would have —" Her eyes closed for a moment. "—been wrong. I couldn't find you just to leave you again."

Things weren’t necessarily better now but she’d at least weathered the brunt of the storm solo. Proven that she could and hadn’t been so dependent on him, or anyone else, that she lost resilience.

 

[Bernard]

She moved into the kiss and it sent his heart racing. It dislodged a great weight from his soul, to have greater certainty that she still felt the same, and more. They shared the passion a year of abstinence had conjured in those moments. A passion that made him want to say those words, again and again, enough times to make up for each day they'd missed, and they'd lost so many.

He lingered for a moment when she pulled away, there was still more left unsaid, but through the haze, he heard her heavy breaths, felt his own breathlessness, and saw the contentment in her eyes, and something in him finally came a little more uncoiled. He'd been holding on to the hope she'd return for so long that it had become difficult to let go of hope alone.

The trace of her lips when she whispered almost made him fall into the desire to kiss her again, to catch up more on that long list of days, but instead he mirrored her movements, moving his hand from her back to intertwine with the hand she'd placed on his chest.

"I should have been with you sooner," she said. Her voice seemed uncertain, almost caught between two emotions. Bernard searched her eyes for more clarity, but they'd merely lost the joy from moments prior. He wanted to say something, but she continued.

"I needed you so early on—" His brows furrowed slightly. A thought tugged at him, but he pushed it aside as quickly as it had appeared.

Had she meant to say her brother? What had happened between her and her family since Yavin? And what of the Jedi? Where did she stand with them? What path had she chosen to walk?

Too many questions and they'd never even moved from the doorway.

Bernard stepped back, taking her hands into his to lead them away from the door. "We're—Come inside. Under a doorframe isn't a great place to talk."

The apartment wasn't large. One room big enough a large desk strewn with datapads, books, and notes, a simple chair, and a bed opposite both, among the other basic utilities. Bernard hesitated a moment looking for a place to sit down. This place lacked most amenities needed to entertain company, purposefully decorated this way because he'd never expected to have company to entertain.

"What happened with your family?" He turned toward the desk, still holding on to her hand. Whether by choice or by reflex he wasn't sure.

He quickly made the sacrificial choice to sit on the chair, turning it around to face the bed. Wooden and unwelcoming to organic beings, it didn't come close to comfort, a contrast to the bed's more amenable function for those who might tire of standing. With the Force, he flipped the activator on the caf distiller, surprised he remembered that with his thoughts all thrown into disarray by the abruptness of it all. When they stood together in each other's arms, the world made sense. They were on Yavin again, enjoying each other's company. But they weren't there anymore. A full year had passed, during which both of them had changed, and with all his efforts to keep hope alive, he'd entirely neglected thinking of how this moment might play out, what it would mean and how much change there'd be at once.

"I want to hear about everything you have to say."

Ishida Ashina

 

[Ishida Ashina]

"We're—Come inside. Under a doorframe isn't a great place to talk."

At first, she felt warm. Invited. Embarrassed. Humoured. Relieved. Grateful. Then the coolness of distance replaced the idea of heat, him stepping away, and the reality of his invitation another reminder of the present that was a result of so long apart.

Through the complexity that warred within, Ishida managed a small smile and a nod.

No neighbours had intercepted the pair in the hallway, but having the door seal behind them made their relocation (even just a few steps) all the more private. Respectfully, she paused to slip off her shoes before crossing too far beyond the threshold.

And, she hadn’t come entirely empty-handed. Still with a smile, she slipped a pack from her shoulder and temporarily gained autonomy over her hands — just long enough to produce two aluminum-wrapped rolls. Identical to the ones he’d brought to her bedside on Prosperity what felt like a lifetime ago. Exchanging knowing grins, she left them on the kitchen counter to the left of the doorway.

It was as much habit as it was a genuine interest that drove her to take quick inventory of Bernard’s haven on Denon. The pink from the sky spilled through a lone, wide window, and lit the spartan space in its glow. The desk was, unsurprisingly, what looked the most used in the apartment. Papers, books, datapads that looked hardly organized. He must have been working there just before she’d —

"What happened with your family?"

He managed to ask his question before she did and she sucked in a breath, filling her cheeks with air that faintly smelled of him.

A twinge of regret bloomed at the back of her mind, scolding her for destroying their Elysium of hope actualized. Selfishly, she wanted back in his arms. To forgo conversation and just keep sharing emotions and feelings unresolved through their established language.

"I want to hear about everything you have to say."

But there he was, across from her, wanting all the words of her world to exist between them. His kindness filled the space between them with warmth and she couldn’t look at him for the few seconds her cheeks burned brightly, sinking into her designated seat on the edge of the bed.

Somehow, he smoothly transitioned his desire to genuinely open up the lines of communication — the initial seeking for explanations of what had happened in that year of mutual silence and heartful hope. It would be crueller still for her to leave that wondering between them, and that’s what she’d be doing if they just maintained wordless conversation.

The still rational side of her had known that enough to admit just enough to get the much-needed discourse underway.

They’d torn down so many walls within one another to get here, only to continue climbing over more that had been built unconsciously in their isolation. Each moment another layer, another brick, that demanded navigation around, over, through.

“Not too long after we parted,” Ishida began, and unlooped the belted holster of her katana at her hip and set it to the side, “Inosuke exploited my father, and grandfather’s dishonour. Explaining why he was exiled.

His upbringing had been different than mine.” Her elder brother had actually become close with their father.

"If you could believe it, there was a time where Father and I were very close. A time where he was magnitudes warmer, though not without his callous edge entirely. I was his drive, and he was my hero."

“He saw a different side of our father. One that ––” she drew in a breath, closed her eyes and shook her head. Her fingers moved to grip his hand, guide Bernard’s thumb over the scar tissue on the edge of her palm. “He showed me. A truth that had been concealed for years, lie after lie.”

Her shoulders sunk.

“A truth that died with him, and now I —” she stopped. This was the second time, she realized, that she’d said the fact out loud. She’d told Aiko, and the mogul hadn’t said much in response — only shifted it to an opportunity to revisit the necessity of honouring family and her father.

“Inosuke’s dead.” She repeated as if the words were made out of cotton and swelling on her tongue. Quiet. “I felt my brother die.”

Genichiro would be delighted, the last knower of his lie under the ground. Ishida still supposedly ignorant.

 

[Bernard]

Small lines of worry streaked his expression. His thumb continued to trace the scar after she stopped guiding his hand. She'd finally found her brother and learned the truth about his exile. A revelation that seemed to weigh her down more than it had lifted any burdens. And the truth about her father, it did nothing other than worry her more. She'd accomplished what she'd set out to do but instead of reuniting with her sibling and getting to take the first step towards healing the scars that tore her family apart, her search had ended with his death. That weighed heavily on one's soul. She'd barely started, barely touched the surface of all that had happened to her, and yet all there she told of was tragedy.

And it was likely she'd had to face it all on her own, after everything that had occurred on Korriban, after everything he'd said.

Bernard swallowed quietly, glancing at her hands so he wouldn't have to see her eyes for a moment. A lot had changed over their year apart. Battles against doubt and questions that sprouted from it like a hydra's heads.

He inhaled to speak, but stopped himself, breathing the air out again. Words felt too hollow. The one's he'd almost said would he would have regretted moments later. Would he? Perhaps it was worse not to say anything at all? Words were no cure for a wound so deep, but they could offer support, couldn't they? But then, had she been able to grieve at all? Had there been anyone who'd supported her, been there for her while she faced all of this?

The weight of it all made him wince, almost imperceptibly. This was all so much, so quickly. Her coming back into his life, the fractured Jedi he was supposed to lead, the broken Circle, the burden of responsibility for Coruscant, the death of her brother, her father's truths and the lies, his still unresolved past, his future, their past, their future. So many questions, so many loose ends, new paths, and burdens to carry. Among it all, there stood the guilt and that doubt, like burning coals in a sea of ash.

A sigh escaped him, and he forced the lines of worry away with a softer expression. Still solemn, but bearing kindness.

"I'm sorry," he said, meeting her eyes. "I wasn't there for you, I—" He paused, glancing away, then stood to sit down on the bed beside her. "You don't have to be alone with this anymore though, I'm here for you now, like I promised I would be," he leaned against her, pulling an arm around her as an invitation, and let their fingers intertwine.

"Tell me about your brother, what it was like meeting him. What was this truth he told you?"

Ishida Ashina

 

[Ishida Ashina]

“That’s what we agreed to.” Her tone’s firmness startled her. It sounded so certain, opposed to the pang that came with the unnecessary apology. “To define reactions and choices alone.”

A smile flinched through the corners of her mouth, and she absently wiped at the scar tissue on her hand. It was rare to have memories of anything other than pain marked on one’s skin, no scars from happiness, but this one wasn’t done to purposely hurt. “I can’t depend on you for everything. Remember?”

That day after the attack on Coruscant had been one of the greatest almosts of their time apart. After Qi’yon, after Inosuke, after the devastation to the Jedi temple — after her leg had been repaired, she’d sat in the hospital room, then her own room, opening and closing his contact on her datapad. Hesitation defeating her each time.

Her hip dipped into the shift of weight on the mattress, collapsing into his side while his other arm wrapped around her shoulder. A mirror to their first embrace on Yavin, after she’d come so undone.

She had a better grip over herself now, acknowledged that emotions existed, she had them, confronted them, sat with them long enough not to let them overtake her like that anymore.

I'm here for you now, like I promised I would be,"

Or so she thought. It was a different story to be working in isolation than being wrapped up in the bright warmth of their union. Even if it felt delicate again.

Ishida’s eyes closed and she nodded, sinking into the personification of hope and safety, the spaces of her fingers filled with reminders of that promise.

"Tell me about your brother, what it was like meeting him. What was this truth he told you?"

“Strange. He didn’t even know I’d existed.” Ishida admitted, casting her memory backward. “But easy. Having a foundation of family, even if he was exiled from it, meant shared history in little things.

The day he told me about our father, I was upset with him.” It had been a foolish, childish way to react in hindsight. “He’d interfered with a fight of mine. Maybe he thought it was for protection but —” she exhaled and stared ahead at the kitchen, somewhere the slowly heating caf was staring back. “It doesn’t matter now.” She’d been furious at the time, but if she could undo it and just appreciate the chance to fight alongside him again…

"It never should have. But I was angry at Inosuke for the wrong reasons, more than just that fight I guess. He’d done nothing wrong. Angry, maybe jealous, that even in his exile, he’d managed to acquire an Ashina Moniker.

Ashina the Manslayer.”

Her mouth drew in a thin line, and she looked down at their interlinked hands. Her chest filled with shame, heat rising to her cheeks again. She’d reflected several times on that day, and she’d been stupid. Arrogant. Haughty. Near-sighted. Undeserving.

Inosuke had been so patient.

“My grandfather was Ashina the Undefeated.” She made a small sound at the back of her throat that sounded like a sad click. She’d said that name with pride before. Before she’d known it to be a lie, before Inosuke had told her he’d in fact been bested twice in formal kettō, and then by Genichiro for the seat of Hebo. His death had been staged an illness to uphold the title.

Titles made the man.
Titles made the family.
Lies made the title.
Lies made the family.

“My father is Ashina the Invincible.” Ishida explained, “Which Inosuke challenged before he was banished.

To preserve his name, his title, our father chose to disown his son entirely. Erase him from history. And maim him.”

Her frown deepened, and she forced herself to look back at Bernard.

“And they’d been close, Bernard. Like fathers and sons are supposed to be.” Like the stories sold them as. "I was thrilled once to be heir to the Ashina legacy, now it's just..a thread of lies and ego."

 

[Bernard]

All those questions rolled off his shoulders as Ishida pressed into his side. She filled the space with warmth that washed over him like a content sigh. It was healing, casting out a winter he didn't realize had settled in him. He felt himself uncoil, sink into her, and she did the same. For that moment, they were back on Yavin. Impossibly, the Galaxy stood still for those silver eyes, and nothing else mattered but her. In that brief, wordless moments, this small intimacy stood as their triumph over the heavy burdens of mistrust.

He listened to her tell the story of her encounter with Inosuke. Her characteristic pride in their initial encounter, that unwillingness to let anyone help. He wondered for a moment what those little things they shared history in were. Small idiosyncrasies exclusive to her family. He wondered further if he might spot them if they'd ever met, though tragically that would never come to pass. As she spoke, he absently traced a hand along her shoulder with soft, delicate motions, hoping it might bring some comfort.

She continued to talk about herself on that day, and she showed another side of herself. She talked freely of her shortcomings, of the error she'd made in acting prideful. The Ishida he'd first met would never have admitted to it, insisting on her own capability and wounded by the suggestion she wasn't perfect. She'd grown tremendously since then. And the trust she placed in him, to feel so at home in his arms and to invite him into her world like this...

He paused his admiration, or, perhaps not admiration but a wish to convey this growth even as she continued to speak of everything he'd asked her to. He wanted to interrupt, to bring her out of the painful past and into the present, but that would only push it away to be dealt with at a later time, and hesitation, as Ishida always said, was defeat.

Whenever her family came up it before it had been split. The reverence she held for the achievements of her line, the traditions of Clan Ashina, and the prestige that came with it, with their titles. Excellence in all things. Perfection as a standard, all else was beneath them. But there had always been that edge of resentment to it. Especially when she spoke of her brother and the way her father had split her family. About the pressures and conditions placed on them by an their patriarch, even all those years apart. Now that resentment had an image associated with it. The violence her father had enacted on her brother so callously when he became useless to aggrandize the Ashina legacy. Now that admiration was tarnished also, revealed to be nothing but lies, deception, and plays for power all for the sake of appearing strong.

The same thing tyrants always did, obfuscate their weakness in a web of lies.

Bernard was quiet for a while. He didn't meet her eyes, fixated on some point in the distance as his brows furrowed and the corners of his eyes. The caf machine whistled quietly on across the room while he silently considered.

He pulled up his leg, shifting it under him as he turned toward her fully. The man hadn't been as harsh to her as he'd been her brother, at least not overtly, and Bernard felt a small pang of guilt to shift the topic away from him and to her, but there a small ember of what she'd told him that dug into his side like a thorn.

"Ishida. If he's capable of doing that to your brother, I—what did he do while he trained you?"

Ishida Ashina

 

[Ishida Ashina]

His question brought about both physical coolness, with the absence of his comforting half-embrace, and the jarring lonesomeness of her childhood. Both were unexpected.

Ishida’s silence was covered by the caf’s whistle growing shriller and shriller until it exhausted itself and clicked off. Where there’d been a warning noise was just a low bubbling sound.

Speaking about the harms exchanged between two characters that weren’t herself was one thing, but to reflect on what she’d tolerated and thought acceptable felt like an exposure she wasn’t ready for. What if it cast her in a darker shade in Bernard 's perception? There had already been so much of her that was unfavourable that she'd been ignorant of and was slowly, slowly, slowly discovering. If she had a choice in this, she wanted to keep that bloody history in the past.

Perhaps that was the root of the Ashina Clan’s tenet: Do not trouble yourself with the past — because there was no good to be found there.

“He was different after Inosuke.” She explained as if that was enough to push away from the conversation of her upbringing. The threat of reflection invoked a crawling sensation along her arms. To overcome it, she forced herself into a stillness that bled into even her eyes.

“There was no time for wondering or questioning. Whatever curriculum Inosuke had followed had been tightened and sharpened since. Father had perfected himself to the point that whatever could be challenged about him, or grandfather, or probably anyone else, was simply not mentioned or erased.”

It was as if she didn’t understand the question — or her subconscious was altering her interpretation.

“We focused on the future. Not the past.”

 

[Bernard]

Bernard cocked his head slightly, brows furrowed. The caf's bubbling had nearly waned, but it barely registered with him. A conflict played behind his eyes. That thorn pushed deeper, spread its burning poison. His hand tensed around her's. He was watching her intently, at once present and lost to something else.

Glimpses of Yavin played in his mind. He'd held her hand then, like he did now, and asked her to speak plainly, not in tongues. It hadn't ended well then. But now was different. The desire he felt to push on, to find the truth, was consuming. However, this time it wasn't selfish benevolence nor curiosity that drove his intentions. If he had...

Bernard glanced down at their hands, where their fingers intertwined with each other. He traced the scar at the edge of her palm with his thumb. That poison continued to spread, a crawling feeling of burning discomfort that made his chest feel like it harboured a flame. He heard the plea of his body, felt how the desperation muddied his thoughts and redirected any thought back to that still unresolved question. Hesitation was defeat, but this choice, of whether he should press for the truth and give in to that poison (was it even a poison?) or not, was paralyzing.

"The future is where we should put our attention, yes," he glanced back at her eyes, "but we can't ignore the past. It will haunt us no matter what we do," he stalled for time with one of the painful lessons he'd been forced to learn.

He held her gaze for a few moments, softer than before, and watched for any change in those silver eyes. Ishida had seemed different when she'd answered. She hadn't been a deadly warrior who'd saved his life many times over. She had seemed different...afraid almost.

It struck him then, that the choice he felt he needed to make was no choice at all. The poison, that burning fire, he recognized it.

"You don't need to talk of the past, not now, not later. Only if you wish to, but you do need to tell me something," he still watched her intently, but the tension in his eyes that had been there moments ago was gone.

"What were you afraid of just now, in the present? What is it you feared?"

Ishida Ashina

 

[Ishida Ashina]

Relief flooded her lungs and Ishida exhaled out to give it some room to grow. She nodded, though kept her neutral expression — letting her façade relax would give invitation to how tightly wound that inquiry to the shadows on Hebo had been.

She wanted to talk about the past, but the parts that were relevant to them. How they’d spent their year apart, the wounds incurred, how they’d handled everything, how they were now. But further back on the timeline? That was a place best left untouched. A half-remembered tragedy, parts of swords and blades that left marks unseen.

Life had always been smoother without a heart.

"What were you afraid of just now, in the present? What is it you feared?"

His question stirred barriers within. She thought they’d been torn down, but she could feel the harshness of their spikiness starting to swell and want to rise up. They’d cut her open if she let them, to become nothing but walls once more. It was a contrary thing inside of her. And to let those walls rise up again, after so much effort, breaking at one question would be pathetic. It would be letting the past take over, to infiltrate the present.

“There’s nothing to fear here.” She said, sounding unconvinced. Confusion still clouded her response. Part of her knee-jerk response was trying to negotiate with herself, convince herself that fear was not the reaction that had made her blind reaction spill out. But maybe it was. Maybe that’s what had obfuscated the focus of his original question — her own unwillingness to hear and open up that darkness. She wasn’t afraid. She was Ashina. She was conquering self one step at a time and —

Failure. Failure still stalked around her like an omnipresent, unacceptable shadow she constantly had to shake.

Ishida sighed, closed her eyes, and forced herself to try and let go. To become so undone that there was no foundation for those barriers to rise up again.

“I’m trying really hard not to be a monster.” Was the longer way of saying judgement.

Judgement, the arbiter of evaluation, and the precursor to failure.

She fought through the tremble, desperate that it didn't reach the fingers he still held. "And reflecting on, or giving voice to what I accepted in the past, might make me one in your eyes."

 

[Bernard]

He sat in silence for a while, weighing, considering, deciding finally.

"Back on Prosperity, when I sat by your bedside," he began, a little quiet, a little uncertain. He was reluctant, but when he spoke he felt warmth, and so he continued, "you thought I might be a monster. Monster enough, at least, to consider reaching for your blade."

"You didn't.

"What do you see now?"

Ishida Ashina

 

[Ishida Ashina]

HELP, I HAVE DONE IT AGAIN​

Still wide-eyed, Ishida bit the inside corner of her mouth when Bernard conjured the memory of what might have been. Her eyes darted away from his. To the bend of his knee. To the wrinkle of the dark bedding around his imprint. She looked anywhere but those almond-shaped illimitable pearls.

"you thought I might be a monster. Monster enough, at least, to consider reaching for your blade."

Back then, on Prosperity, years ago now, her judgment had been ferociously concise. Inflexible. Accepting only perfection, demanded by her father. And perfection defined as light and only the light by Sardun. At the time, Bernard had saved his skin by explaining he understood her and his flawed perception of their interpretations of the light.

It seemed right to interject just then, to explain herself. Because of him, patience had its premiere victory over the then bedridden Ashina, and he'd given her reason to understand that patience was not the same as hesitation.

But the reflection to the shadows of their past selves was merely purposed to kickstart.

"You didn't.

"What do you see now?"

His questions pried at her, seeking to understand her boundaries, not necessarily expose them. What she might have been through, what might have been done to her, what she might have done. She hadn't expected it, not after starting with the pain she'd felt from Inosuke's death. And with her wandering eyes, she fixated on the strewn research on his desk. He hadn't expected her either, and here he was giving her full attention despite whatever pressing duties demanded his head.

What did she see now? She looked back at his patient expression. The duties within the pages just over his shoulder didn't seem to exist.

Recalling Ishida and Bernard from that quasi-confrontation after Krayiss was a completely different scenario. In her mind's eye, she saw the ease with which she could argue the difference between then and now. He hadn't been a monster because she hadn't wanted him to be. She'd genuinely believed that there was a chance there'd been some sort of mistake somehow. Despite her training, she hoped beyond all bounds the Sith's trial had been some farce or some other purpose. In her mind's eye, he remained smugly silent.

Maybe she hadn't hoped. Perhaps she'd known. Somehow.

What did he want her to say?

What did she want to say?

Sorting through her thoughts brought about an involuntary physical reaction. Her empty fist tightened the bed cover in her grip, her hand in his flexed. They were subtle movements, but enough to bring her back out of her thoughts and into his apartment on Denon.

Maybe that was part of what was making her so confused, what was throwing her off so much. Them being together. Him being here, across from her. She'd spent a year imagining conversations with him, whether they were replays of ones that had happened or dreams of what if's.

"The same reason to trust." She admitted softly. She had trusted he was more than what the Sith had deemed him as — worthy in their eyes. Now, if she pulled her heart out of her head, those moments on Yavin that witnessed her weaknesses, acknowledged them, and accepted them, was sitting across from her in the same man.

His question hadn't been thoughtless. He'd heard her story, listened to the words, recognized the implications, and intentionally sought to understand some of her connections on a deeper level.

A lost year struggled on her lips.

She frowned. "I shouldn't have hesitated with you. On either occasion."

That barrier that had started to harden within slowly began to soften. Her flight or fight response made a decision, and the version of herself that would have crossed the room to get away from him and stated the obvious about who he was now compared to then and sought to cause a division between them, was obliterated by the fighter that wanted this reunion more than anything else.

She sighed, giving another few inches of insight to prove her progress.

"That." Ishida began her half-answer both questions a few beats too late. Her expression was neutral but faraway. Cast somewhere back to the world left behind on Hebo.

Ashina's Patriarch maimed Inosuke, physically brutalized him and ripped away half of his natural vision. For Ishida, Genichiro had affected her sight differently. She'd kept both her eyes, of course, but he'd kept her blind to the truth and never gave her the chance to see what trust should have been, how understanding and kindness manifested. Love is for the less disciplined minds—those who need to believe in a softer world. The psychological damage ran more profoundly than any of the physical. Bruises faded, blood dried, scabs healed.

But the desperate fear of disappointing those she cared about most remained incurable. A healthy fear he'd proclaimed.

Ishida blinked back to the present, her expression apologetic. "Is what my father did to me during my training."

 

[Bernard]

His worries had disappeared. All those questions, that poisonous emotion and the thorn with it, his reluctance, and his own fears had all taken a backseat as every bit of attention he had was focused on the woman in front of him. He sensed the trepidation. The inner battle she fought, he could feel it too now. Could sense fear and courage wrest away the other's place at the forefront of her thoughts. Resistance came and went, like ebb and flow, against some deeper something.

Bernard couldn't quite place it. There had been hints of it, he remembered, whenever they were close, but he'd always been too preoccupied with other matters. Now he didn't allow there to be any other matters.

"The same reason to trust."

"I shouldn't have hesitated with you. On either occasion."

That resistance faded, that fear lost out in the end, still present but muted, like a storm that had passed. A rumbling that was growing more and more distant, and in its place came...something more painful.

"That," her expression grew distant and only refocused after several moments passed. She seemed apologetic, then, and he didn't quite know why. "Is what my father did to me during my training."

There was a painful edge to what burdened her that made him want to reach out, to ease whatever she was feeling. But he restrained himself, only squeezing her hand where their fingers interlocked. It seemed the better thing to do. Giving comfort now, when she'd already come so far on her own, would only have been a distraction.

Perhaps it was that poisonous emotion that spurred him on, but he wanted desperately to build on this moment. To become a catalyst for her to continue onward to another victory, not a refuge to withdraw to.

"You never learned to trust," he whispered, seeming a little distant.

"Love and affection, what meager forms they took, came with conditions. In the process of making you a weapon he needed to break you down."

He began to piece something together, something more whole. All those fragmented, little insights, noted idiosyncracies, odd details started to come together into a distinct thread.

"But when you were reforged it was in his image, and he's a frail and weak man," Bernard frowned. "He feared your brother, feared who you might become. Feared you both so much that he made you something more frail than he is."

His frown softened for a moment.

"You deserved so much better," he whispered. He lifted his hand, brought it toward her cheek, but froze half-way.

"Except," a determination caught him that he didn't know was in him, "that you're ceasing to be just a weapon for him to wield. Step by step, you're becoming the warrior who wields her own destiny. The more you continue down this path the less you'll need that fear. It's a burden, a shackle to keep you tethered to some broken version of who you could be to protect those lies, that ego. You can grow beyond it."

He grinned with resolve.

"Ishida you can become someone who wears courage, not fear."

Ishida Ashina

 

[Ishida Ashina]

The words Bernard used to describe Genichiro Ashina were blunt and harsh. Worse, they weren’t words she’d ever heard to reference The Invincible. It placed her in a strange role. The listener who wanted to be the defender.

"You deserved so much better,"

It took a measure of strength not to snap back, or argue. Did I? Or to snort the equivalent of a nonverbal denial.

Instead, with a thin voice, she recited: “The finest steel goes through the hottest fire.” Words that were weighty before felt emptier at that moment. A whole life lived with misguiding tenets, principles or motifs.

The only other person who’d spoken insultingly to her father’s character was Inosuke. At that time in her life, she’d still defended him. It was a complicated thing. He was as much her ruiner as he was her maker. And when all was said and done, he was her father. Her blood.

Her mouth tensed, eyes hardened, and her shoulders squared. She could feel herself shutting down. The want to defend, object, was a tightness that locked at her joints. Shackles. Tethers. The words were visceral, and she felt their bind with his enunciation.

She had to move if only to resist the hardening of her joints.

Within the last breath of Bernard’s sentence, she stood from her position and paced to the opposite side of the apartment in quick, measured steps. She wouldn’t allow herself to relapse into monstrous complacency. A monstrousness that was seeking to feed off of the silence between their words, to re-establish itself.

Imbued with emotion on the other side of the room, Ishida could walk no further and turned back around to face Bernard. One arm wrapped around her ribcage, the other rested its elbow on her wrist and her fingers pressed to the edge of her brow.

With meters between them, instead of just inches, Ishida took the time to try and look at the bigger picture. Up close, Bernard’s words had been controlled and careful, but intense. Just because they were Bernard’s observations didn’t make them true. And just because she didn’t want to hear them didn’t make them false.

Everything her father did was to prolong the Ashina name, the legacy of their bloodline. To make it a pedestal of perfection, achieved through violence. Weak children would not see that goal actualized.

She didn’t speak up to refute, however. She was far too uncertain for that. The first time she spoke was to continue thinking through what he was suggesting, exploring the hypothesis with observational interest.

With her arms folded, she looked down at her toes and flipped through a series of memories that sought to invalidate Bernard’s words. They were foggy memories of her father’s hand on her shoulder, wiping away blood from her knuckles, and other infinitesimal gestures. It was like searching through the story of another’s life, page by page, she flipped through her indecision until her mind landed on the recent, painful interaction with her estranged adopted brother on Coruscant. She remembered thinking Qi’yon had sounded exactly like her father.

"I'm on the only side worthy of an Ashina,"

He’d challenged her worthiness, called her weak.

And then she’d behaved just like her father. Sought to put him down and in his place. Forced him to recognize the power behind her name.

Involuntarily, she tsk’d her tongue against the roof of her mouth at the reflection. “Always unthinking violence,” Ishida murmured, mostly to herself. Not putting emphasis on volume.

“The last time I let my father’s influence guide me,” she started, and one foot crossed over the other slowly back to the space she’d abandoned moments ago. There was more projection behind her words this time, inviting Bernard into the experience of her thinking through what he’d just made her realize.

“Was during a fight with Qi’yon.” She was standing back in front of Bernard by now, still holding herself. She turned to shove her chin into her shoulder, avoiding eye contact while remaining distantly attached to that dusty memory on Coruscant. “And I caused enough pain to make him lose sight of the light. I hurt him enough to embrace darkness entirely. And by the time I realized, it was too late.”

Her brows furrowed, internalizing the memory and looking at it from a distance. Just nodes of interaction that seemed distantly repetitive for some reason. How strange to be haunted by someone still alive.

“I repeated his patterns exactly.” Her tone was harsh now, condemning past behaviour. “All of his actions, and the expected behaviour he condones from his bloodline, have driven my family apart.”

With a huff, she flopped backward onto the bed as if the weight of it all was too much for her to remain upright. Back in the space she’d occupied earlier, beside him, her hair fanned around her, and knees stayed bent over the edge of the mattress with feet not quite touching the floor. In silence, she stared up at the ceiling.

Her eyes closed.

“I don't want to turn against him..”

 

[Bernard]

Bernard's determination quickly froze and cracked as Ishida became filled with emotions. The excitement he'd felt about her casting away that fear which kept her so distant to the world was met with anger, defensiveness, withdrawal. Emotions she restrained, but they remained plainly visible, both in her body language, tense and ready, and also in the Force. She stood suddenly and moved to the other side of the room, and he followed her with concerned eyes.

Uncertainty took hold of her there. It was subtle, but she searched for something. She came up short, muttering something he didn't fully catch, however, and instead walked back toward the bed. Was it reluctance that slowed her steps or concentration? A small chill ran over his lower ribs. He couldn't tell. The memory she talked of seemed to captivate most of her attention. A painful memory of her second brother.

She fell onto the bed next to him, causing a few small waves to go through the mattress that bobbed them up and down.

"I don't want to turn against him.."

Bernard didn't move for a moment, lingering on the way her hair splayed out around her like a bright white glow against the dark duvet. The conflict she felt inside still troubled him, but for a moment she seemed so serene in her appearance.

Her conflict extended to him. He felt trapped between a desire to push on, so she might see the light he saw in her as well, and the want to leave it be for now. He'd been incredibly direct, too harsh in his approach, and it had nearly pushed her away. If he kept going, would she fully withdraw? Or were her small moments of triumph against those emotions evidence enough that she'd make more progress? This revelation about her brother, Qi'yon, and the wider truth of her father's legacy, did she see how much it walked the territory of the Dark Side? How would she react if she did?

He sighed, looking at the caf machine as though it might hold some answers. It didn't, of course, beyond the promise of wakefulness in that bitter cup of hypercompressed, heated bean water. His mind seemed to crawl, caught in the mire of possibilities. A cup of caf was terribly enticing. He glanced back to Ishida, still laying there in a small depression on the bed, caught up in painful memories and fearful unease. He leaned back to lay next to her on his side, head propped up on his elbow.

"I'm sorry about what occurred with Qi'yon," his tone was sober. "There's hope he might find it still. And that you recognized what your actions were causing, even if it is a small consolation, even if it was too late, you recognized it. It's coming easier to you," he gave a weak smile and took her hand.

And then there was the matter of her father,

"There are many paths you can take. You don't need to turn against him. You may choose your father and the Ashina legacy, and attempt to change them from within. There is danger on that path, you may fall back to where you were before we met. He may turn on you as he did with Inosuke. You might make no impact at all or push yourself and him to descend further into the Dark which the Ashina Legacy occupies.

Because the road your father walks is the Dark Side. Rule with power and fear, hate everything which is weak, and destroy whatever stands in your path without mercy. These principles are ones the Sith adhere to. Guiding someone who has immersed himself so deeply in them back to the light is an incredibly dangerous or even impossible task. There are stories of those who turned Sith, but they aren't common. The same is the case for your brother, though I don't know the extent of his suffering.

It's important to recognize that even your greatest efforts may ultimately fail."

Ishida Ashina

 

[Ishida Ashina]

Ishida felt the shift of the surface beneath her when his weight moved to mirror hers and the touch of his hand around hers. But she remained limp, unmoving, and heavy.

Silence became her. Bernard’s words were soaked up with no further tangible reactions. No more outbursts, no more necessity in movement. She didn’t turn to look at him either. Instead, she continued to stare up at the ceiling as if the sentences Bernard spoke were scenes she could watch on the durasteel overhead.

“Sith.” Was all she murmured, the stinging word eking out in disbelief.

She wanted to be angry, but there was too little foundation for her to rightfully be. And how could she be upset when Bernard was so entirely on her side? This was a picture she’d painted, he was only interpreting it based on her artistry.

The scenes and sentences scrawled and intermingled in her sight. Replaying parts and mixing them up. Letters that took the shape of silhouettes, interacting and falling, failing and disintegrating in untimely intervals.

After a long while, several heartbeats of quiet stillness, Ishida’s chest rose with a long, drawn-out breath. By the time she exhaled, she was ready to speak again.

The shapes on the ceiling still interacted with one another, illegible ghosts colliding against one another.

“What would you do.”

 

[Bernard]

"I was trained as a Jedi. It's my duty to combat the dark, in whatever shape I encounter it," he said. "It doesn't always come in the form of people, nor from places you'd expect," he glanced toward the window.

He'd never expected he might fall so close, or so deeply, into the dark, after he'd left the temple on Arkania. Fighting another Jedi, the horrible acts committed during the Sith War, they came from darkness, from anger and fear, and he'd done both so readily. It made his skin crawl, still, knowing how fragile the balance between light and dark could be.

He shifted on the bed, taking a moment to collect himself.

"I would confront the darkness.I would try to make certain I had help. In matters of family there are attachments to consider, ones that cloud judgement. Before anything, I'd try to determine whether there was any hope to find common ground in reason. If there wasn't...then, left with no other choice, it would be a Jedi's duty to cut down the darkness."

Cutting down the darkness was an easy way to phrase it. Consulars had the ability to attempt this, to fight without raising their blade. He'd begun to admire them for that, wishing it were that simple for everyone.

"Dark Siders can't be left to cause more pain and misery. We're responsible for the darkness we fail to prevent, too."

Ishida Ashina