Private The Shape of Patience

[Shade]

Shade did not step back.

She did not rise to the heat, the proximity, or the deliberate pressure he applied with his presence. Instead, she stayed exactly where she was, seated and composed, spine straight without stiffness, hands resting loosely where they had been. If the space between them narrowed, it was because he chose it, not because she yielded ground.

When she spoke, her voice was calm, level, and entirely unshaken.

"No," she said quietly. "That is where your reading fails."

Her eyes lifted to meet his without flinching, without challenge, without apology.

"I did not fail to save him," Shade continued, her tone measured and precise. "I was ordered to kill him."

She let that sit, not for drama, but because it was the truth and truth deserved space.

"Verin was a traitor," she said evenly. "His actions compromised more lives than mine alone could account for. I was assigned the execution because I was capable of completing it cleanly and without hesitation."

There was no anger in her words. No grief laid bare. Only clarity.

"I was there," she added. "I looked him in the eyes. I confirmed identity. I carried out the order."

A brief pause followed, her gaze never leaving his.

"That is not failure," Shade said. "That is duty."

She inhaled slowly, deliberately, as if to demonstrate the difference between repression and control.

"And my family were not failures either," she went on. "Their deaths were not the result of negligence or weakness. They were casualties of forces larger than any single person could counter."

Her voice did not harden when she said it. It did not soften either.

"You mistake discipline for avoidance," Shade said calmly. "And resolve for denial."

She tilted her head just slightly, not submission, not defiance, simply consideration.

"I do not hide from what I have done," she continued. "I do not cling to doctrine to excuse myself, and I am not haunted by faces I refuse to name."

Her eyes stayed steady on his flaring visor.

"I remember," she said. "I account for it. And I carry it forward in a way that prevents repetition."

Then, quieter, but no less firm:

"Shame is only useful when it changes behavior," Shade said. "Mine already has."

She did not rise. She did not retreat. She did not attempt to reclaim space.

"You are correct about one thing," she concluded. "Loss teaches. But it does not require spectacle, and it does not demand corruption to be instructive."

Her gaze never wavered.

"Do not confuse my composure with decay," Shade said softly. "And do not mistake your heat for insight."

She remained where she was, calm and contained, leaving him with nothing to push against except the truth he had misjudged.

Varin Mortifer

 

[Varin Mortifer]

He looked her up and down at her composure, he lack in change of stance.

“And that is what you truly believe? That you were just following orders?”

His hands rested behind him.

“No, you were likely told to kill him because he had gained insight that your commanding officers deemed…heretical.”

He leaned in, his eye gauging her closely.

“You did not just kill him under orders, you killed him because what he had in his head scared you. It frightened you to the point where you did not see a choice but to put him down.”

He leaned back and turned away from her, looking at the temple before them.

“You wanted to kill him, didn’t you? That terror angers you, that's why you label him a traitor.”

He breathed deep.

“No, you did not fail to save him. You simply betrayed him.”

He paused.

“Weakness festers in you and your past. A plague spreads over everything you had touched. You are so deep in those doctrines, you do not realise they cage you. Imprison you.”

He looked back at her.

“But, surely you have moved on? Found someone new? Perhaps you are still distant from them because you are still afraid. Scared you will do the same to them, destroy what it is you had not even begun to build. Because when a pile of construction burns it’s less important than a finished building, isn’t it?”

He looked at her in silence after that. The whispers on the wind calling to the both of them.

Shade​

 

[Shade]

Shade did not step back when he leaned in.

She did not shift her stance, did not harden her posture, did not reach for the discipline that usually shut conversations like this down before they could cut any deeper. Instead, she stayed where she was, shoulders square, chin level, eyes steady on his in a way that neither challenged nor yielded. When she spoke, it was neither fast nor sharp. It was measured, deliberate, and unmistakably certain.

"You are mistaken," she said calmly, not as a rebuttal but as a correction of fact. There was no heat in it. No defensiveness. Just certainty.

"Verin did not die because of doctrine, belief, or fear," Shade continued, her voice even as the wind carried distant whispers between stone and sky. "His death had nothing to do with ideology, philosophy, or discomfort with what he believed." She let the words settle before going on, not for emphasis, but because precision mattered.

"He betrayed the Veiled Sight," she said plainly. "He broke containment protocols that existed to protect lives, not to enforce obedience." Her gaze never wavered. "He accessed restricted channels, rerouted intelligence outside approved pathways, and exposed operatives who depended on anonymity to survive," Shade continued. "That information did not remain theoretical or contained within reports."

A pause followed, brief and intentional. "It translated into arrests, disappearances, and entire cells going dark," she said. "Places where there had once been active networks simply stopped responding." She did not raise her voice. She did not soften it either. "I was not ordered to act without context," Shade continued. "I was shown corroboration from multiple independent sources, verified across separate channels."

Her eyes remained steady. "Not belief. Not interpretation. Evidence," she added. She let that stand before finishing the thought. "I did not want to kill him," Shade said evenly. "I chose to, because leaving him alive would have resulted in more deaths than his own." She did not justify it further. The fact stood on its own.

When he spoke of doctrine, of cages and decay, something faint shifted in her expression. Not anger. Not offense. A refusal of the premise.

"You are also mistaken about me," Shade said. "I am not governed by doctrine of any kind." Her tone remained level, unembellished. "Not yours. Not theirs. Not light. Not dark," she continued. "Those distinctions do not inform my decisions or define my values." She drew a slow, steady breath. "They are frameworks used by people who require moral scaffolding to function," Shade said. "I do not." She did not sound dismissive. Only factual. "I live by responsibility," she continued. "By consequence. By understanding what happens when trust is misplaced and information is handled carelessly."

At his final words, about distance, fear, and unfinished structures burning, something else entered her eyes. Not pain. Not retreat. Resolve.

"I have not moved on into emptiness," Shade said. "I made a deliberate choice." The simplicity carried weight. "I chose someone," she continued. "And I did so with full awareness of what that choice requires." She did not break eye contact. "We are building something," Shade said steadily. "Not something fragile, provisional, or easily undone by pressure." Her posture remained unflinching. "It is meant to endure strain rather than collapse under it," she added. She did not hesitate. "I am not distant," Shade said. "And I am not afraid of repeating the past, because I am not repeating it."

A final pause followed, complete and deliberate. "Do you fear love?" Shade asked evenly. "Because I do not."

The wind carried her words away, leaving no doctrine to hide behind and no accusation unanswered. Shade remained where she was, composed and unmoved, not waiting for absolution or argument. Only for him to decide what to do with the truth she had placed between them.

Varin Mortifer

 

[Varin Mortifer]

Her last question brought something out of him. A fear of love. A flash of all of his family framed into his mind, then the screams.

He let out a soft chuckle.

Easy, boy.

Varin paced away from her for a quick moment as his head ran through numerous rebuttals or scenarios he could bring up. But one instinct pulled the trigger.

Easily, he could draw his saber, impale her and be done with it. His fingers even traced the hilt as he thought about it, then he flexed his fist, pulling it away.

Slowly he turned back to her.

“And what exactly, would you do if you had to kill this one too? Surely, you have the strength to do it, but would you have the strength to rebuild again?”

He sighed.

“Nothing endures forever. Foundations always crumble. Walls always topple.”

He paused for a moment as his voice is far more fragile than anyone gives it credit. So much so that once it's broken the shards can be used to stab you in the back.”

He glared at her.

“Am I afraid of love? No. I am disgusted by how weak it makes everyone else.”

He stepped closer.

“They prattle on that love makes everyone stronger, when it breeds weakness. It develops brokenness.”

He took a breath.

“And you would think I would be scared of it? No. Its consequences are far more terrifying.”

His hand gripped around the hilt of his saber, the leather creaking under his grip, but he did not draw it.

Shade​

 

[Shade]

Shade did not flinch when his hand closed around the saber hilt.

She noted it, the same way she noted every shift in posture and breath, but she did not respond to it as a threat. Instead, something quieter settled into her expression, a stillness that was not defensive and not weary. When she spoke, it was not to argue him down, nor to win ground. It was the tone she used when she decided the truth mattered more than advantage.

"I would not kill him," she said, simply and without hesitation.

The words were not defiant. They were absolute.

"Not because I lack the strength," Shade continued, her voice even and composed, "but because the situation you are describing would no longer exist."

She met his glare steadily, neither yielding nor escalating.

"I will not rebuild again," she said, and there was no bitterness in it, only certainty. "I do not live my life assuming everything meaningful must eventually be reduced to ash."

A slow breath passed through her, controlled and grounding.

"I never expected this to happen," Shade went on, her tone level honest in a way she rarely allowed herself. "I did not plan for it. I did not calculate it. It was not a contingency I prepared for."

She did not look away.

"That," she said quietly, "is what love is."

The word was not softened. It was not romanticized. It was stated like a fact of physics.

"It is unexpected," Shade continued. "It introduces variables you cannot fully control, no matter how disciplined or prepared you believe yourself to be."

Her gaze remained steady as she acknowledged his point rather than dismissing it.

"You are right," she said. "Love itself is not what should be feared."

A pause, deliberate.

"The consequences are."

She did not step closer, nor did she retreat. She simply held her ground, her voice calm and unshaken.

"But fear of consequence is not the same as weakness," Shade concluded. "It is the price of choosing something that matters enough to risk loss."

She let the words stand between them without pressing for agreement, knowing they had already landed where they needed to.

Varin Mortifer

 

[Varin Mortifer]

His eye darted to her when she answered his first question.

“Then you are a fool. The exact situation may not linger, but there is always a chance you will have to put him down as well.”

His voice deepened as he slowly turned from her.

“To think that not everything can crumble away, is unrealistic thinking.”

Her answer was impossible for him to wrap his head around. Everything he had experienced contradicted everything she was saying. He listened to her continue to speak, then she said that word.

Love

Varin stopped in his tracks, a deep harsh breath left his chest. The word was becoming a pattern in this conversation and it was digging into him like a knife to his ribs.

“Love caused the fall of both the Jedi and the Sith. It is a volatile emotion that brings more chaos than hatred could.”

He slowly looked at her.

“Choosing something knowing the risks could be everything is far too steep for any sane person. You speak of it as if it were a fairytale, like it were some unseen force greater than anything else. It is not the case.”

He looked at the cuffs on her wrists and flexed his hand. The cuffs spat small sparks before they deactivated, falling to the ground dead. The security that stood outside their building noticed the coffs drop and came by to investigate.

They barked orders towards him, but Varin ignored them both, his eye glaring at Shade.

“The consequences of your love, could leave you shattered and broken, crawling through a valley of stone unable to scream for help. And you believe that risk would be worth it?”

Shade​

 

[Shade]

Shade did not flinch when the cuffs released.

There was no sharp intake of breath, no reflexive tightening of her shoulders, no shift of weight that suggested readiness to strike or retreat. The metal fell away and struck the stone with a dull, final sound, and she looked down at it briefly, as if registering a change in her environment rather than a provocation meant to elicit a reaction.

There was nothing holding her back now. Not restraints imposed by him, not circumstance, and not fear. What remained was choice, deliberate, and fully her own.

She lifted her gaze again without haste, meeting Varin's eye steadily, and adjusted her stance by a fraction. It was not a guard and not an advance, merely a more comfortable alignment of her weight, as though the absence of the cuffs had removed an inconvenience rather than altered the balance of the moment itself.

When she spoke, her voice remained level and unshaken, untouched by the guards shouting in the background or the heat radiating from him.

"One of the reasons I do not choose a flag to carry," she said calmly, "is because Jedi and Sith are paths laid down to make the galaxy feel logical, or absolved, depending on which one you stand beneath."

She did not rush to continue, allowing the thought to complete itself before moving on.

"They reduce complexity into doctrine," Shade continued, "and in doing so, they decide which emotions are permitted, which outcomes are acceptable, and which failures can be reframed as destiny instead of consequence."

Her eyes dropped once more to the inert cuffs at her feet, then returned to him, unwavering.

"There was nothing preventing me from acting just now," she said evenly. "No restraint remained in place except my own restraint."

It was not delivered as a threat or a challenge. It was simply a statement of fact.

"That distinction matters," she went on, "because it is the difference between control and obedience, and it is why your warnings do not unsettle me."

When she addressed love again, her tone did not soften; it deepened, grounded in certainty rather than defiance.

"You are correct about one thing," Shade said. "Love has undone orders, empires, and philosophies that were unable to survive its presence."

She paused, deliberate rather than dramatic.

"That does not make love the weakness," she continued. "It reveals the fragility of structures that required suppression in order to endure."

She drew a slow breath, shoulders still relaxed, posture unchanged.

"I am not speaking of love as a fairytale or an unseen force greater than all others," Shade said. "I am speaking of it as a variable."

Her gaze remained fixed on his.

"Yes, it carries risk," she acknowledged. "Yes, it carries consequences severe enough to leave someone shattered, isolated, and unable to recover what they once were."

Another pause followed, quiet and intentional.

"I accept that reality," she said. "Not because I believe myself immune to pain, but because a life structured entirely around avoiding it is already a form of collapse."

The guards were still shouting. She did not look at them.

"I do not choose love because it is safe," Shade concluded evenly. "I choose it because it is honest."

She stood there unrestrained and unafraid, making no move to attack or retreat, her composure intact.

"And I would rather accept the possibility of being broken by something real," she finished, "than remain intact inside a philosophy that demands I feel nothing at all."

Then she waited, not for permission or approval, but because she had said everything that needed to be said.

Varin Mortifer

 

[Varin Mortifer]

The constant yelling of orders from men who were beneath him irked him, even more so that they interrupted a decent conversation between two individuals they could never fully comprehend.

“Enough!”

His voice pierced the quiet air around them, over the yelling of the security force that approached as he extended his hand, his eye flared a fiery orange as he tapped into the force in the general direction of the security, Shade included.

He flexed his fingers as the security officers began to yell in pain, their knees popping and buckling from beneath them forcing them to kneel.

He watched how Shade would react to being forced to kneel, intrigued as to what would make her special that the Covenant wanted her alive and mostly unharmed.

His gaze fell to the security as their legs snapped from the weight he forced upon their bodies, one of them losing consciousness and falling over, the helmet to his gear cracked.

“Pain, is also honesty. It is much more evident than love as well. It is the driving force after love fails, it existed before love and it will always exist.”

The air vibrated around him as the weight increased around the security guards, the last man now groaning weakly from the pain.

Shade​

 

[Shade]

Shade felt the pressure the instant it reached for her.

It did not arrive as pain or sudden violence, but as intent made manifest, an invisible force seeking to close around her joints and breath alike, testing compliance before demanding submission. The air around her thickened noticeably as the pull attempted to fold her downward, to force her body into the same enforced posture now being inflicted on the guards nearby.

She did not resist with brute force or retaliation. Instead, she resisted with absence.

Shade exhaled slowly and allowed her presence to collapse inward, not vanishing, but becoming dense and immovable, like weight settling into stone rather than muscle. Where the pressure reached her knees, it met something that refused to yield, not rigid resistance, but a grounded refusal to be redirected. The air pressed closer around her skin, growing heavy and compact, bending the intent away from her rather than absorbing it.

Her boots remained firmly planted. Her posture did not shift.

The guards cried out as their bodies failed under the imposed weight, bone protesting against will, but Shade remained standing, the pressure sliding past her like water around rock. She could feel exactly where the Force was trying to take her, could trace the vectors of control and collapse, and she denied each one with practiced precision.

Only then did she lift her gaze to him. There was no defiance in her expression and no challenge in her eyes, only clarity and calm certainty.

"You are mistaking reaction for truth," Shade said evenly, her voice carrying through the strained air without rising in volume. "Pain does not reveal honesty. It reveals thresholds."

The pressure still existed, still pressed against the space around her, but it no longer held her.

"You are also assuming that because I do not yield," she continued calmly, "I am untouched."

Her gaze shifted briefly toward the kneeling guards, not in judgment or condemnation, but in acknowledgment, before returning fully to him.

"That assumption," Shade said, her tone steady and precise, "is how people miscalculate me."

She drew a controlled breath, the air tightening subtly as her containment adjusted.

"They believe resistance must look like opposition, or suffering, or spectacle," she went on. "They fail to understand that endurance does not require display."

She shifted her weight a fraction, the movement deliberate and contained, and the pressure around her responded without breaking her stance.

"I was trained to endure what you are doing," Shade said quietly. "Not because pain is honest, but because it is predictable."

Her eyes held his without flinching, without challenge, without fear.

"If you are trying to learn what makes me valuable," she continued, "this is not where that truth resides."

She paused then, letting the words settle without forcing them.

"And if you are attempting to force me to kneel," Shade finished evenly, "you will find that I only choose the ground beneath me when I decide it is worthy of that choice."

She did not advance. She did not retreat.

She simply remained where she was, standing, contained, and unmistakably unbroken, while the air around them continued to hum with the unresolved weight of his power.

Varin Mortifer

 

[Varin Mortifer]

Her words started to fall under deaf ears until he realised she resisted his will, resisted his pull and his push. She did not retreat nor advance. She simply remained, resolute and never blinking in the eyes of conflict.

That reserved a moderate amount of respect from him.

Especially with her last phrase. It struck hard within him. He was the same way.
And that, irritated him even further.

Flames exploded from his back as smoke billowed from him like a burning building. Flames coalesced in his hand as he flexed his fingers forming the volatile light into a ball.

He was ready to obliterate the entire area.

“Halt!”

Varin’s gaze shot towards the voice as a high ranking Sith Knight approached.

“What are you doing Mortifer? Stand down!”

Varin ignored them, lightning arcing from his teeth, they were of little consequence to him.

The Sith Knight gripped his forearm as the leather of their gloves began to burn, a few more Knights approached one extending her hand increasing gravity on him. The flame was snuffed away as Varin’s knees buckled, a yell leaving his throat as another Knight amplified the same ability over him, the stone beneath his footing cracked.

“Varin stand down!”

Varin slammed his head into the bridge of one of the Knight’s nose as he ripped his arm free, a roar leaving his throat as the lightning between his teeth arced forwards towards Shade. The direction was not chosen by him, but it was the direction that was taken.

One of the Knights dropped the gravity hold around Varin as she attempted to redirect the lightning away from Shade. Varin did not see where it landed, only when a higher ranking knight walked up to him and waved a hand, pulling his consciousness away from him.

His body dropped limp in the arms of a few Knights as they carried him away. The higher ranking official glancing over at Shade to assess damages. Finally a few more security personnel arrived on the scene to escort her back to her cell.

Shade​

 

[Shade]

Shade did not move when the flames erupted.

She did not flinch at the sudden heat, nor did her posture change when smoke rolled across the space like a living thing. Even as Varin's power swelled, violent and unrestrained, she remained exactly where she was, shoulders squared, spine straight, gaze fixed and unblinking. If there was tension in her body, it was the kind that came from readiness rather than fear.

The arrival of the Sith Knights registered only as movement at the edges of her awareness. Raised voices. Commands. Force pressure rippling through the air as they tried to contain him. None of it drew her attention away from Varin himself, from the way his control fractured under its own weight.

When the lightning tore free, arcing toward her in a jagged, uncontrolled lash, Shade finally moved.

Not hurried. Not dramatic.

She shifted her weight and stepped aside in one smooth, economical motion, turning just enough that the bolt passed through the space she had occupied a heartbeat earlier. The energy cracked against stone beyond her, leaving scorched marks and the scent of ozone in its wake. She did not raise a hand. She didn't draw a weapon because she didn't have one. Avoidance was sufficient.

Her eyes tracked the aftermath only briefly as the Knights wrestled Varin down, gravity crushing him to his knees, his rage burning itself out against coordinated restraint. When his body finally went slack, and they carried him away, Shade neither watched him go nor lingered on the destruction he had nearly unleashed.

The higher-ranking official's glance found her. Shade met it calmly, offering no comment, no accusation, no visible reaction beyond steady composure. Whatever assessment was made, it did not require her input.

When security personnel approached, weapons lowered but ready, she did not resist.

She turned without prompting, hands relaxed at her sides, and allowed herself to be escorted back the way she had come. Her steps were measured, unhurried, as though the encounter had been nothing more than a conversation that had reached its natural end.

The cell doors closed behind her with a familiar sound.

Shade remained standing for a moment after, composed and intact, before finally sitting where she had before, her expression unchanged. If there was any evidence of what had nearly happened, it existed only in the scorched stone outside the cell and the quiet certainty that she had walked away unbroken.

Once again.

Varin Mortifer