Star Wars Roleplay: Chaos

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The Waves of his Grief had Beaten him Down (Preliat)

Silver Jedi space was a place Ambrose Vizsla promised the new Mand’alor was as dangerous as the Warlock Gate’s other side. The head of the Yalilyr, now Yasha’s personal guard, was as desperate to see her stay firmly on Mandalore as he was to see her alive. Yet, when [member="Preliat Mantis"] messaged his only daughter to let her know where he was, no force of nature, nor collection of soldiers, nor distance would halt the Wolf's daughter from her goal.

An only daughter craved her father’s affection. She craved the mighty, yet broken man who held her at birth, who grieved her during her first death, and who sobbed into her hair when at six she heaved and pulled her comatose mother’s septic body from Hell. When she was new to Mandalore, a child of no peace, her father was with her. When Aditya fled to Atrisia for ‘work’, Preliat was with Yasha, cuddling her up until she slept, smoothing her hair in her nightmares, and soothing her, when she couldn’t eat solid food, when she couldn’t understand the other children, when the universe was too large and she was too small to be in it.

After the cataclysm, the man she returned to believed her a vision of mania. He neither could, nor would, acknowledge her existence those first moments, and Yasha realized how unwell Preliat Mantis’ mind was.

How terrible a burden he bore, so his daughter could live with less fear. How horrific his face, when he admitted to his daughter Aditya was dead, and Yasha was saved by the altruistic hands of a stranger, who found one lone child and saved her. Through the Civil War, Yasha convinced herself that her father’s absence was due to his desire for her to prove she could fight on her own. That he couldn’t stand the burden. Alone, but for Mand’alor the Undying and for Kaden, but for those brief moments of seeing her father suffer, Yasha let loose her grief and anger on her fellow Mando’ade. Each death picking a prize she thought would increase her father and Ra’s pride.

Maybe then… maybe then the spell cloistering Preliat’s heart would be lifted. Maybe then her father would return to hold her, and tell her everything would be alright. Tell her that she was sufficient, that she could hold them together.

Yasha was wrong.

All that occurred was a further fracture, punctuated by the damned Warlock Gate. As she stood aboard her flagship, Yasha shut her eyes and listened to the echo of Preliat’s inhuman scream, when he watched his daughter reach out, and return to the Netherworld. She reminded herself daily that for her father, the fracture of Dathomir was weeks before. Scant months. The wounds were still fresh, when for his daughter, nearly eight years passed before Ember sent her back to the moment of the break, guided most of all, by her father’s gut-wrenched scream.

The Manda sent her back to this exacting time, and now on the other side of the journey, the young woman could not fathom why. When Yasha attempted to take a shuttle down to her father, Ambrose abjectly refused. The Wolf would meet his daughter upon the ship which bore her name, or they came for naught. Her slightly swelling stomach, and the life within, would be protected on the Hell Wolf. Yasha stood in her private quarters, hand brushing against the armoured growth plates designed and manufactured by her mother, yet refurbished to match her own beskar’gam.

Would Preliat Mantis set foot on a Mandalorian ship to answer his daughter’s call?
 
The sight of the Wolf sans armor was a sight for many Mandalorians. But it was now the new normal for Preliat. He was a simple man now, a man of heartache and pain. He needed a break, a journey. Now, nearing 40- he was finally getting a small snippet, a possibility of a peaceful life.

It wouldn't occur with the Mandalorians. But damn if he would not come see his daughter. He entered the threshold of the room, and embraced his daughter warmly.

"Hello Yasha." He said quietly, his gravelly voice coming off warmly. He unwrapped a small cloth bound bundle from his jacket pocket. A great tree bark from Silver Rest.

"A small token of my travels."

[member="Yasha Mantis"]
 
Daddy. I missed you terribly.” Yasha ran to her father, staying in the hug for as long as he allowed her the rare, yet welcome affection. He looked better than she’d seen him since Mama was alive, and in that a rash of jealousy seeded itself in the bedrock of her mind.

Only without Mandalore was he happy.

When he pulled away to reach into his jacket, the wolf’s daughter cringed at letting go. She’d been strong for her parents her entire life, first for Mama, then for Daddy. Tragedy beyond tragedy, horrors and living nightmares kept the Mantis family uncloistered, fragmented. It was not lost on the girl that she should have been thirteen and travelling with him, but those years were stolen from their backs. Her gauntlet-clad hands opened to cup the cloth and bark. Preliat’s eyes shifted from the gift to her father’s aging, yet beautiful face.

“What is it, Daddy?” The bark was unlike anything she’d yet experienced, this child of wolf and war. There were so many experiences Yasha missed to be where she was, a young woman in armour clutching at command.

Her palms held the bark just above the swell of her belly, which had begun its’ unmistakeable protrusion with Preliat’s grandchild. “It’s… I’m sorry, I don’t understand… you look better than… travelling suits you.”

Red-rimmed eyes cast down to her father’s shoulder. Shoulders too young for the tasks at hand bent inward, stopped only by the pauldrons holding up her cape. Yasha blinked heavily, gingerly hugging Preliat’s gift to her chest.

[member="Preliat Mantis"]
 
"I missed you too. Traveling has...enlightened me. Made me see things I could not see before." He smiled at his daughter, cupping either side of her face.

"You should travel too. Much of the galaxy needs to be seen." He missed her love terribly. He was glad to be there with her again.

"How have the Mandalorians been? Has leadership been what you imagined?" His hands slipped from her face and went to his pockets once more. He seemed more relax in the casual clothing he wore.

[member="Yasha Mantis"]
 
“Mandalore needs me, Daddy.” A smaller set of hands held [member="Preliat Mantis"]’ palms to his daughter’s cheeks. She pulled into the affection, drifting as close as she could. Preliat’s daughter grew taller since last they met, at the end of her physical growth. Now capable of looking her father in the eye, Yasha refused to let his hands go. “Gray and Baiko took me to Commenor. I got to dance around [member="Lady Kay"]’s palace and see the paintings and the sculptures and flowers and… Daddy, she didn’t have battlements everywhere! There were no guards at all inside the Palace… and… I didn’t know people could live outside armour and not be scared!”

Since giving her first trophy to Ra when she was eight, Yasha knew she was being groomed for future rule. It was a constant hum in the texture her adolescence, growing in war and at the feet of Ra and Preliat. Baiko told her she’d be Mand’alor, that she had to be ready. Yet she never wanted it to be out of a lonely desperation. No option to hold their people together. There was no time to luxuriate in the guidance of her elders, when the entire Empire was about to crash. Yasha’s face descended as Preliat asked of their people, heaving out an exhale. Walking over to the couch, Yasha kept her hand on her visibly growing belly, and eased to sit down.

“Daddy? When I said I was going to be Mand’alor, I thought you’d be with me. And Uncle Silas. I thought I’d have more time to learn from you, to grow up. That was the deal, wasn’t it? Malika and Aryn are dead, Vilaz went loco and fired a wrist rocket in the throne room and it set off this battle and…” Her father looked so comfortable. An ease she hadn’t seen since he stayed home to be with Aditya and Yasha when she was a child. “Zambrano tried to marry me off to his son Ancius… who died in the throne room. Now Zambrano is calling me to Bastion to answer for the Mando Sith Alliance, and discuss the death of his son, and Shia wants me to declare my pregnancy to the galaxy and show that I can be strong and vulnerable at the same time, when Kaden wants me to stay home and hide… I know what I have to do… I’ve got this…”

It occurred to Yasha that she had to protect her father from the pressures she was under. “… don’t worry about me, Daddy. Where’ve you travelled? What’ve you seen? Tell me everything. Have you seen anything that would work in your granddaughter’s nursery? I want it to have a lot of colour, and life.”
 
It was nigh impossible for him to not worry, yet he wasn't going to press his daughter at the moment. She needed only happy things and pleasant topics, not intrusive and painful questions.

"It is often those closest to us who can do the most damage to us."

He stopped and stared outward.

"Silver Rest is home to a wonderful splendor of color and of life. Hues of white intertwined among the great trees of the ever expansive forest. The wookies lack a desire for simplicity in their color palette."

He turned his head and smiled.

"Trees are peaceful. The forest is full of color and life."

[member="Yasha Mantis"]
 
The attempt to keep worry from his face was not lost on [member="Preliat Mantis"]’s daughter. While the desire to rush back into his embrace and stay there, to doff the armour and travel with her father struck across her face, the young woman couldn’t allow such fantasies. She searched her father’s form, barely remembering the days when Preliat was out of armour and they spent their days playing and learning at the Mantis Estate outside Keldabe.

“Is that why you left? I… I know you had to go, Daddy. I know. You look good, almost as good as…” Yasha couldn’t say it. Her thoughts surged to her mother in the Netherworld, fading away like an autumn morning’s fog, clinging to nothing but the chance to be relevant, to see Preliat one more time. How could she tell her father of the time she spent, seven more years with her mother?

“Silver Rest sounds amazing, Daddy. Wish I could say we have peaceful trees on Mandalore, but we’ve got… shrubs? Baiko designed new vertical gardens so our food rations have gotten bigger. Another harvest, and we’ll be back on track. You should see it when it’s done, Daddy. My scientists and the local companies have been pushing hard. If… if that’s all I get to do as Mand’alor, at least I fixed the planet, right? Tell me more… about the forest and its’ colour and…” Yasha’s voice trailed off as she pulled her feet up on the couch.

“… Daddy? What’s ‘peaceful’ like? How can you tell when life is peaceful?” An innocent question from a confounded being of war. Parents and their children, cycles around cycles.
 
"You have been to Kashyyk before. I need not remind you of the level of....green it has. I don't think you have been so exposed to that much fauna in your life. Save for the deal with the Wookies once upon a time."

He smiled, as much as he could.

"I should see the homestead.... I always wanted a statue built. Perhaps a park. Or maybe a garage. I'm sure your mother would love that."

He stopped. His daughter had never known peace. Not true, lasting peace, anyway. His eyes filled with guilt and sadness, welling up for a brief moment.

"Do you remember the feeling of when you were a child? No worries, no responsibilities. No fights, no quarrels. Only the possibility of a new day. That is the truth of peace. It is innocence attained once more. I pray that all living things in the galaxy experience true peace at some point in their lives. You will, some day, my love. It may not be soon, but you shall. You just need find the peace, seek it out on your own time."

[member="Yasha Mantis"]
 

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