Private Threads Drawn by Light

[Isla Reingard]

Location: Ilum
Tags: Abishai Jade

​

Isla felt the steady thrum of the shuttle beneath her boots as Ilum's pale glow filled the viewport. A cluster of younger Padawans huddled together, chattering nervously about the cold, the caves, and the test. Isla offered them a gentle smile when they glanced her way. She didn't bother pretending she wasn't trembling; honesty came too naturally for that.

Losing her lightsaber had cut deeper than she let on. She'd tried to make peace with the absence, but every time she reached for the familiar weight that wasn't there, she felt that quiet sting again.

Sleep had been fleeting during the journey. Each time she drifted off, the Force pulled her into sharp visions of a young man, possibly her own age. His hair was the color of pale sand. His eyes were heavy with a conflict that churned like a star on the verge of collapse. She didn't know him, or why she kept seeing him. Yet, the Force rarely offered a nudge without purpose, even if it never bothered to explain itself.

When the shuttle landed, the sudden blast of cold sucked the breath from her lungs. Snow whipped across the landing pad in vicious spirals, and the Jedi escort urged the Padawans forward. Isla wrapped her fur-lined hood tighter, amber eyes narrowing against the wind.

Inside the first cavern, crystalline frost overtook every surface. Here, Isla felt the familiar beckoning: a tug beneath her ribs, the Force nudging her deeper. She glanced back once at the others. "I won't be far," she promised.

The storm outside howled against the rock as she slipped into the narrow passage alone. Shadows flickered in the blue-white glow of the ice. Her footsteps crunched softly, and somewhere deeper within, she felt something call to her. It was a resonance, almost a heartbeat. It wasn't the signature of a crystal yet. Instead, she sensed a tangible presence...

 

[Abishai Jade]

The Quadjumper had likely only one more trip left in it. It rattled. And even sounded like something cracked before he had landed. The Quadjumper was the least of his problems though.

From the bottom of icy slope, Abi questioned every decision that had brought him to this point. He had question running from Revna Marr and the Academy. He had questioned the jobs he had worked for ne'er-do-well low-lives. He questioned stealing that Quadjumper from that specific low-life. He questioned his choice to try and find his own lightsaber crystal from a Jedi haunt. He questioned the notion that he could be a self-made Force-weilder. And he questioned following the voice that had seen him fall down into this icy cavern.

The only thing he didn't question was whether or not he had sprained his ankle.

His teeth were set in permanent grit as he leaned against the ice-wall. What had the voice said? "I won't be far?"

He had not heard it in the cavern. No, it had not really even been in his mind. The words were more felt than they were heard.

"Aaaargh," he groaned, with a hurriedly aborted attempt to walk towards the one wall that could be the place to climb out.

Awareness flared. His eyes widened. And Abi glanced about for the person he knew had heard him. They were there. Right. There.

But no one.

"Great. Just great. Now some stupid padawan is going to find your frozen ass in this god-forsaken cave," he muttered, while easing himself to the ground. Perhaps he could crawl to the wall, and climb?

Isla Reingard
​

 

[Isla Reingard]

Location: Ilum
Tags: Abishai Jade

​

Isla drifted through the glittering corridors of the cave, her gloved fingertips brushing stone. The Force felt strangely quiet here. It was present, but patient, as though waiting for her to stop fidgeting long enough to listen. She truly tried. Yet every crystal she passed simply hummed with the same distant indifference. Nothing called to her.

Her comm crackled, making her jump. "Padawans, return to the shuttle. We'll wait out the storm together." Isla closed her eyes, stifling a long, unhappy groan. Right. Padawan. That meant she was stuck in a small transport with overexcited pre-teens who had already asked if Ilum's ice tasted different than regular ice.

She turned around reluctantly, her boots crunching in a soft rhythm. "We weren't even in here ten minutes," she muttered to herself.

A sound drifted through the tunnels then, a sharp, pained groan, too human to ignore. Isla froze. Someone was hurt. An instinctive unease fluttered through her chest. The caves weren't supposed to have anyone except their group.

She followed the noise, her steps quickening. Eventually, the passage narrowed into a ledge above a steep icy slope. Isla crept forward and peered down.

A blonde young man sat slumped against the wall, clutching his ankle. He looked up sharply, his eyes locking onto hers.

Recognition jolted through her, disorienting. She recognized him from somewhere. He wasn't part of their group, was he? She was asleep for most of the trip but figured she would still recognize him if he was with their group.

Her heart skipped. In complete panic, she ducked back behind the ledge like she'd been caught snooping. "Oh, Force, why," she whispered, mortified with herself.

She cleared her throat, trying to pretend that hadn't happened.

"H-hello?" she called, her voice pitching embarrassingly high. She coughed, tried again. "Are you… are you okay down there?"

 

[Abishai Jade]

He heard her approaching, and did his best to move quickly but the pain shot up his leg. It was all he could do not to scream. That was not an option.

Through the haze of pain, Abishai began to notice the oddity of how she spoke, or rather how he perceived her speech. Everything she said, had the air of deja vu about it. As if he had heard her say it, before she spoke, though he could not predict the words. He was hallucinating, surely.

"Yeah. Nah. Crinkin' sit around all day in ice cold tunnels rubbin' my ankle like it were a magical lamp," he said midst groans and grimaces.

He winced. Eyes closing midst a particularly nasty jolt of pain. Through the mist of pain, he felt the area shift, saw girl leaving a shuttle, saw her with other Jedi. The pain was trippin' his mind-seeing. That was what he called the uncontrolled visions.

Moments before he opened his eyes, he felt something else. "You are like me..." He muttered, not really to her, more about her.

Abishai turned his attention up the slope. "You gotta a rope...or some way of pulling me up outta here?" It was better to be up there than down here. Only marginally better, if she really was a karkin' Jedi.

He frowned, unsure if he should tip his hand and let her know that he was aware of her being a Jedi. But the opportunity seemed too good to pass up. She was likely here for the same reason as he, and... "Or maybe you can just heal my ankle?"

Isla Reingard
​

 

[Isla Reingard]

Location: Ilum
Tags: Abishai Jade

​

Isla eased forward again, just enough for her eyes to clear the ledge. The blonde boy was still there, clutching his ankle, annoyingly talking like this was somehow her fault.

"Magical lamp," she repeated under her breath, giving him a flat, unimpressed look.

He muttered something else, something she couldn't quite make out, except for the tone. Isla rolled her eyes hard enough to get dizzy. Like him? Absolutely not. She was standing on solid ground. He was a boy-shaped disaster at the bottom of an ice slide. They were nothing alike.

She leaned a little farther over, hands braced on the rim. "Okay, first of all, I don't have a rope. Why would I just walk around with one?" Her breath fogged in front of her as she squinted down at him. "And second, I don't know how to heal anything."

Her comm crackled again, another required call to return, the storm getting worse, but she reached up and manually shut it off. Just for a minute. "I could go back to the ship and see if they have something. A rope, a medkit, I don't know. But then I'd have to explain why I'm asking, and that might turn into twenty questions, and I'm already avoiding being trapped in a shuttle full of small children, so…" She huffed, brushing a strand of brown hair from her face. "So unless you've got a better idea, we're kind of short on options."

Her amber eyes narrowed pointedly. "Also," she called down, "how did you even get down there? This is not a normal place for someone to just appear. Did you fall? Did you jump? Did you make some impressively stupid choice you'd now like to share?"

 

[Abishai Jade]

He mouthed her words a quarter second before she said them. It was a habit. One he was trying to break. The premonitions were consistent now, but he did not have control of them to control it. "All I need is five minutes help and I can do the rest. Don't bother anyone else," he said, the words clearly annoying him to say. He hated needing anyone.

"Yeah. Real big fancy tale to tell," he said, eyes avoiding any contact with hers. He didn't elaborate for a moment.

"There's a pile of old wood that someone planned for a fire...it's been there a while," he said, musing out loud, "if youc'n get it...its just to your left and around the corner...'bout 20 seconds or so down...I can make a splint."

Abishai was leaning against the wall now. He wasn't going to complain about how useless she was as a Jedi. No healing. No pulling him up the slope with the Force. Just, questions with no answers. Typical. All Jedi were the same. No practical use. Not in the real lives of people like him.

He could tell this Jedi was annoyed that he had avoided answering her questions about getting here. In a way, it was sorta interesting how her nose scrunched up when she was annoyed. Like rich people. She was probably rich people. "I slipped alright. Big fancy tale. Satisfied?"

Isla Reingard
​

 

[Isla Reingard]

Location: Ilum
Tags: Abishai Jade

​

Isla didn't wait for permission. Something had already guided her toward the wood, and by the time his voice echoed through the cave explaining where to find it, she was already kneeling beside the dusty, long-abandoned pile he was describing.

She grabbed two straight pieces, shook lingering frost from them, and headed back. His annoyed explanation about slipping bounced off the cavern walls as she returned to the ledge, unimpressed.

"Uh-huh," she said flatly, peering down at him with her brows drawn tight. "You sure are grumpy with the one person trying to help you."

She tossed the wood down the slope. It clattered beside him, missing his head by a generous margin, though not generous enough to hide the fact she aimed close.

Then she planted her hands on her hips, boots crunching in the frost. "Alright, Mister 'I can do the rest, I don't need anybody,'" she called out in a mock low-voice. "What now? What's your grand, brilliant plan to get out of there?"

Her foot tapped, a quiet, impatient rhythm. "Because let me tell you, from up here, it looks a whole lot like your plan is 'sit in a hole and complain.'"

 

[Abishai Jade]

Abi bit his lip. Grumpy. Crink you, lady.

But she was probably right. He needed to be a little diplomatic if he was going to get the help he needed. Which in truth, was quite a lot.

"Fine, fine, fine," he said, while scooping up the sticks. He tested one, bending it a little. It held firm. The second had the same result. He nodded in approval. That was all she was getting.

"You are going to have to come down here," he said without hesitation, "I don't like it either..."

He was already lining up the thicker branches on each side of his leg. His eyes scanned the area, settling on his waist. "There's corridor to my left, it might lead out of here. Back to the cave entrance. I have a ship there," he said as he started to undo his belt and awkwardly tug it off from around his waist.

Her words pre-echoed. And they only slightly annoyed him. The pain was thankfully worse than her high-pitched nasally whine.

"Need your belt too," he said, nodding towards her as he awkwardly failed at wrapping his belt around the sticks and his lower leg. The stretch was just a little too much. He winced in pain, and leaned back at the wall.

"Please." It hurt to say it. "I need your help."

Isla Reingard
​

 

[Isla Reingard]

Location: Ilum
Tags: Abishai Jade

Isla sighed dramatically, brushing a gloved hand over her face. "Well, since you asked so nicely," she said, giving him a pointed look.

She plopped onto her backside at the edge of the slope and began to scoot forward. Before letting gravity take her, she jabbed a finger down at him. "Fair warning. If you're secretly some weirdo who's going to attack me, my master is the Grandmaster of the Jedi Order, and my father is literally the Sword of Shiraya. So." Her chin lifted. "Bad life choice for you." With that, she pushed off.

She slid fast but controlled, the ice carrying her in a smooth curve. At the bottom, she twisted, her boots catching just right, and landed lightly on her feet. Her arms shot up in the air as she announced, "Ta-da." If he didn't applaud, that was absolutely his problem.

She stayed a safe distance away, her fingers finding her belt. She unlatched it and tossed it toward him, the leather skidding across the ice at his side. "Here. Don't lose it. It's a nice belt."

Then she finally looked at him. A strange heaviness pressed down over her. Familiarity sharp enough to sting. She noted the exact angle of his face, the way the ice-blue shadows shaped the gold of his hair. The feeling rippled through her like a memory she hadn't lived. She shook her head hard, instantly refocusing.

"So," she said, leveling her gaze at him, "why are you down here? You don't look like a Jedi. I mean, if you were, you'd definitely know who I am." Her arms crossed, her posture guarded but still curious. "And what's your name? Since I'm apparently helping you escape your terrible life choices, I think I deserve that much."

 

[Abishai Jade]

He was glad he looked dumbfounded before she spoke. It likely softened the blow of his reaction to her arrogance. He shook his head, and smiled. At least he knew who he was dealing with.

"Alright then," he said, awkwardly leaning over his leg and trying to tighten the belt around his ankle, "didn't realise I was speaking to a Princess."

He leaned back again, exhausted from the efforts of trying to get the belt tied up. He scooped hers into his hand and looked it over. It was a pretty standard belt, really. Nothing fancy. "Could us some help here," he said nodding to the poorly tightened belt around his ankle. "This one a bit higher if you could. He tossed it towards his foot."

He grinned. That sort of knowing, I-don't-care-what-you-think -of-me-but-I-kinda-do sort of smile. "Look at me. Getting the royal treatment," he said, shaking his hands as a show of mock amazement.

"What would you know about terrible lives, Princess," he muttered, looking away from, before turning back with a smug eye roll, "look there are more than two ways to be Force sensitive alright. You don't have to be Jedi or Sith...if that's what you think I farkin' am."

He swore again on purpose, to watch how precious she would be about it.

"Name's Abishai Inkari," he said, realising that she would not likely let this go, and there was no harm in her knowing the name he was raised under. Giving her the name "Jade" would likely be a bad move, seeing as she thought so highly of the Jedi hierarchy.

"You would be Princess Perfect? Yes?"

Isla Reingard
​

 

[Isla Reingard]

Location: Ilum
Tags: Abishai Jade

​

Isla let out a groan that lived somewhere between frustration and resignation. "Fine," she muttered, dropping to a crouch beside him.

She grabbed the belt he'd tossed and looped it around the sticks with brisk, efficient movements. When she cinched it tight, she yanked harder than necessary, a move she'd call purely accidental, of course. "You don't know anything about me," she said coolly, tightening the next strap with more care but no less attitude. "And I don't care who you are or what… farkin' philosophy you follow." She mimicked his accent on the curse, exaggerating it terribly.

Then she flashed him a bright, sugary, fake smile. "But sure, you can call me Princess Perfect. It suits me." She tapped a finger against her chest. "Though Princess Isla Reingard works just fine too."

She finished tugging the last belt into place, then stood, brushing frost from her knees. Her hands landed on her hips again, her posture returning to one of authoritative annoyance.

"Well?" she asked, looking him over critically. "Now what, Mr. Mad-at-the-Galaxy?" Her brow arched. "Are you planning to insult me the entire way out of here? Because if so, I can go back up the slope and leave you to bond with the ice."

 

[Abishai Jade]

Her bedside manner was...not pleasant. Abishai hissed when she yanked one of the belts tight, far harder than necessary. He didn’t complain out loud, but Force, he had questions. Probably some tragic saga about not getting the right tiara for her thirteenth birthday. It fit.

Her swearing, however, earned a short laugh, and a crooked smirk he couldn’t quite suppress. He looked at her like she’d just told him an unexpected joke. "Prin...cess...Potty-mouth, it is then," he declared, eyes glittering with mischief.

He let her name roll around in his head...Isla...before ruining the moment on purpose.

"Definitely not Princess Perfect. Not with language like that. Your super-dad must be thrilled. Does Grandmaster Sal-Soren know you talk like that?" He tossed the jab lightly, but the edge was dulled. Not gone, just pulled back enough to keep her from walking away. He needed her, and unfortunately, that meant not burning every bridge within a ten-meter radius.

And still…annoyingly…she was kind of cute when she was mad. All sharp edges and bravado. A pretty spark with teeth. He wasn’t about to tell her that, obviously.

"No more insults," he added after a moment, jerking his chin toward the tunnel. The only viable escape. "And you’re a Jedi. You’re not gonna leave me here anyways. Against your code…or whatever.”

He braced, struggling to haul himself upright without asking, because asking felt too much like losing. Once on one knee, he hestitated, then lifted his arm grudgingly. "I…could use a crutch. I figure we try that way?"

Isla Reingard
​

 

[Isla Reingard]

Isla's mouth opened, ready with a sharp, cutting retort that would surely bruise his ego, and maybe his pride too. But then he uttered the name.

"Grandmaster Sal-Soren."

She froze. Her expression twisted as if he'd suddenly switched to speaking Huttese backward. "Grandmaster... who?"

A burst of bright, incredulous laughter escaped her. "You mean Grandmaster Quin? Stars, your information is ancient," she scoffed. "Now I know for sure you're not a Jedi."

She turned towards the tunnel, hair tossed with a smug flair, her boots crunching over the frost. "And for the record, Princess Potty-Mouth will absolutely leave you here if you keep being a jerk. Code or not, I think it makes an exception for," she lifted her hands, performing air quotes he couldn't see but would definitely feel, "Mr. Mad-at-the-Galaxy."

Still, she didn't leave. She took three steps into the tunnel before her shoulders slumped. A loud, put-upon sigh echoed down the icy corridor. "Ugh, fine. If I leave you here you'll probably die and then haunt me out of spite. And I don't need some tragic ice-ghost chasing me around."

She made her way back, crouching to hook her arm under his. "C'mon. Up. You can lean on me, but if you put your whole weight on my spine we're both dying in here."

Once he was braced against her, they started down the sloping tunnel. The ice underfoot was slick, and her boots slid now and then, but she kept them steady. Two bodies moving awkwardly as one, their breaths fogging the air.

Then, a deeper, sharper cold hit her. Not from the cavern, but from within. Her vision flashed white, then blue, then the biting dark of a winter night she'd spent years trying to forget. Snow falling on bodies. Screams muffled by the wind. Vik Krull's massive hand, fisted in the collar of her coat, yanking her forward. She was small again, helpless, shivering, her voice trembling as he barked, "Tell me where your father plans to strike." Her child-self answered. She felt the words again, felt the shame, the fear.

The world lurched. Fire. Ruins. Bodies aflame where snow should have been. She staggered, heart hammering, her breath sharp and thin. She whipped around. Abishai was there, standing in her dream staring at her. As soon as she made eye contact, she snapped out of it.

The vision clung for a heartbeat, as her consciousness came back to the present. Isla swallowed hard, forcing her features smooth even as her pulse throbbed at her temples. "Shiraya, you're... you're heavy," she blurted out, far too quickly, a stutter betraying her. She adjusted his arm on her shoulders, pretending the tremor in her hands was from the cold.

Abishai Jade​

 

[Abishai Jade]

"Some Jedi you are," he mumbled, probably not loud enough for her to hear. But given the type of people he had met at the Jakku Enclave, he should not have been surprised.

"Grandmaster Quin? What sort of stupid name is that?" He grumbled, not intentionally to be a jerk but somehow still hitting the mark. He didn't care to ask what happened to the previous Grandmaster. Besides, from his memory, being pretty hot, she had very little going on that made him care.

A long sigh proceeded him putting his arm over her shoulder. "Mister? Mad-at-the-galaxy I can accept...but Mister? I am not that much older than you, surely," he said, trying to push past the awkward feeling of touching her. It was a most unpleasant experience.

Limping alongside her, he did his best to hop as much as possible, but almost lost his footing on more than one occasion. He decided, a little weight on his foot was going to be necessary, but he found himself closing his eyes more than once. Upon one such wince, he opened his eyes to seeing not the ice tunnel, but something completely unexpected.

Young Isla. A man demanding things of her. Abishai understood instinctively what was being asked of her. Not the information, but the process by which she acquired it. His chest thumped with uncomfortable realisation that they shared commonalities. Having anything in common with a snob like Isla was unsettling, to say the least.

When she turned towards him, his face was grim with understanding, nearing a darkened compassion. And then the moment was gone.

"If you weren't so small..." He put weight down on his ankle, winced again, and opened his eyes to the vast expanse of space.

His feet lifted off the ground, save there was no ground beneath their feet. He clung to Isla, feeling that he would crash down any moment.

A chunk of flotsam, jagged and sharp, bumped into his shoulder. Abishai turned, pushing the wreckage away. It spun out of view, revealing a distant star that gave some ambience to the surrounding debris field.

A ship. And recently destroyed. Sparks still erupted in pockets of trapped oxygen. Bodies, in various degrees of dismemberment, floated among the debris. Their view of the distant dwarf star began to eclipse. A square angled object blocked out the light as it spun awkwardly off axis. And then the light of the star fell upon it as it twisted some more, the light spilling over the form of a young boy frozen, in a single moment of terror, in carbonite.

Abishai breathed out. Steam rising from his mouth. He blinked. And it was gone.

He stumbled immediately, falling to the ground and hitting his shoulder against an outcropping. "For cark's sake, Princess...do your job!"

Isla Reingard
​

 

[Isla Reingard]

Isla whipped toward him, temper flaring so fast it nearly warmed the tunnel.

"I... excuse you! I am not built to carry around grown babies," she snapped, jabbing a finger into his ribs as he leaned on her. "And stop breathing on me, it smells like something died in your mouth and tried to escape."

She meant it to land like a bratty jab, but she barely got the words out before...

Her breath caught as the world folded inside out around them. Suddenly she wasn't seeing the tunnel at all; she was in it with him. The wreckage, the bodies drifting weightless, the silent violence frozen in the vacuum. A boy in carbonite, light rolling over his terrified face, spinning slowly through the void...

Her stomach dropped. Because this wasn't her vision. This was his. But she was seeing it. Feeling the dread crawl across his skin. Tasting metallic fear at the back of his throat. Why? Why him? Why now?

She didn't have time to question it; Abishai lurched, the vision shattered, and gravity slammed back into them both. He stumbled, and she went with him, boots skidding on slick ice. She crashed into his side with an undignified yelp.

They went down hard, sliding, tumbling. She scrambled for purchase, hands grasping for anything. Then her palm brushed his forearm. Another vision exploded behind her eyes.

Abishai but older? No, not older. Just… hollow. Skin pale and slick with sweat, breath shallow like something in his body had turned against him. A sickness running deep. A bed, a mask, a sense of slipping. She ripped herself out of it, slamming backward into the tunnel wall with a startled cry. The cold rock bit her shoulders, grounding her, but her pulse was sprinting.

What was happening to her? To them? She forced in a sharp breath, shaking as she pushed back to her feet.

"Abishai!" she barked, harsher than she intended, hands trembling as she brushed ice from her palms. "I need you to work with me, not against me. If you keep flailing we're going to die down here."

She absolutely refused to look him in the eye again.

Abishai Jade​

 

[Abishai Jade]

He heard her complaints. But when he turned to give her a piece of his mind, the scene changed around him. Gone was the tunnel, gone was the cold, replaced with heat and a driving wind atop a barren peak.

Abishai braced against the wind, leaning fervently forward. He saw boots, scuffed and mud crusted. His eyes followed upwards, realising too late that it was Isla. His cheeks flushed, especially given the look on her face.

She was mad, and grief-stricken. In her arms was a small bundle, wrapped in off white linen. A baby, he confirmed to himself.

He felt Isla's gaze, but it was not directed at him. She did not even seem to see him. A gust buffeted the young man, throwing him to the side, and shifting his line of sight to follow hers.

In the distance, stood a resolute figure. Small. Defiant. Wearing a hooded robe, and wielding two yellow lightsabers. The small figure seemed to be holding off the entirety of hell's swarms all on their own. Abishai's heart raced, fear that the creatures might redirect their aggression towards him. He turned back to Isla to see her ascending a shuttle's boarding ramp before it all became mist...

"You are like me," he said, but this time not to himself.

He pushed back, away from her, and scrambled to his feet despite the pain.

"You see things. Things from the past...stuff from the future...don't you?" He said, voice raised and echoing through the tunnel.

He averted his gaze, and gave a moment to controlling his breathing. Something scratched at the back of his mind, feather light, and scrapping at his awareness.

The ceiling of the tunnel had changed colours. Something purple, and another green, nestled in the ice over head. The glow increased, until the glow converged, creating a brilliant white light in the centre of the two...stones?

"Kyber..." He had forgotten that he was upset with her, forgotten that he wanted urgently to know what she had seen in her visions, if there was information he had missed. The possibility of a lightsaber crystal had completely stolen his attention.

With a few hops, he was in the centre of the hallway, and looking up. It was a good four or five feet above him, and that was going to be a problem.

"That...is why I am here..." He said with a broad grin.

Isla Reingard
​

 

[Isla Reingard]

Isla stiffened at his words, heat rising to her cheeks from a wave of sheer, knee-jerk indignation.

"I am nothing like you," she snapped, the disgusted emphasis sharp as ice. "Don't get ahead of yourself."

She fought a lingering tremor in her hands, trying to rationalize the impossible. "Ilum amplifies everything. The Force, visions, intuition. It's the caves. You don't have my gift..." The very thought made her recoil. "Trust me, if I were like you I'd have thrown myself off a cliff already."

But then he moved, fast for someone with a half-working leg, toward the glimmering cluster in the ceiling. Purple and green light rippled over the ice, dazzling and alive. Kyber.

She blinked, momentarily forgetting to be annoyed. Then, she remembered exactly who she was looking at.

Her eyes narrowed. "Okay, wait, why do you need a crystal?" She folded her arms, leaning her weight onto one hip, judgment thick in her voice. "You're not a Jedi. And the Sith wouldn't tolerate your mouth for more than," she snapped her fingers, "well, longer than I have."

She stepped a little closer, glaring up at the glowing stones, then at him.

"Kyber isn't a toy. You don't just grab one because it looks pretty." She gave him a slow, skeptical once-over.

Abishai Jade​

 

[Abishai Jade]

"Cool yer boosters, Princess," Abishai said, waving off her protest, but he did not fight her over it. If she was going to be stupid and deny the possibility that he too saw visions, and dreamed semi-prophetically...then well...she would just be proving his assumptions about her. Just another pretty face with nothing else to offer.

"Well. You just had your chance. Next time join that Jedi in your dream and die with the demons," he muttered, whilst hobbling in circles eyeing the green kyber with an increasingly gleam in his eye.

"Oh now you want to know what I am...I am not Jedi...I am not Sith...I am just me...and that kyber is mine," he said, pointing at the green one, "I just know it is..." His face turned softer, almost wistful, a rare glimpse at innocence that had long abandoned him. "...I can feel it."

Looking up and hobbling were apparently a bad combination, because Abishai found himself slipping and tumbling to the ground again. He landed with a thud that echoed down the corridor. The sound seemed to morph into a whisper. Children of the Jedi...come to die.

Even though he was still splayed across the ground, he looked up at Isla for confirmation that she had heard it too.

Isla Reingard
​

 

[Isla Reingard]

Isla couldn't help it. She laughed the moment he went down, the sound sharp and bright in the cold tunnel. "Force, you are a disaster," she said, shaking her head. "And for the record, kyber isn't for… whoever you think you are. This is a Jedi sacred site. Outsiders don't just waltz in and claim crystals like souvenirs."

But as she moved toward him, ready to gloat more, something prickled across her skin. A cold, unnatural hush rolled through the corridor.

Children of the Jedi… come to die…

Her breath hitched. The whisper slithered through her mind. She snapped her gaze to Abishai. "You heard that." It wasn't a question, but the look in his eyes confirmed it anyway. A shiver crawled up her spine. This wasn't just the cave amplifying things; this was something else entirely. Something neither of them had any business being near.

"Okay, no. Nope. We're not doing this," she blurted, stepping back as her nerves began to spike. "We should go. We should absolutely go. Right now."

She grabbed his arm, more urgently than gently. "We get you back up the slope, back to my shuttle, and we leave. I should've never wandered this far in the first place. I just needed a replacement crystal, a quick in-and-out, not..." she gestured wildly around them, "...whatever creepy Force nonsense this is."

She swallowed, anxiety slipping through her usually brash tone. "Seriously, Abishai. We're done here. Let's go."

Abishai Jade​

 

[Abishai Jade]

With no small amount of grimacing, Abishai made it back to his feet, no thanks to the Jedi. He gave her a side long glance of judgment as she spiralled. But he did not reply. No one told him what to do. Least of all her. It was a matter of principal.

His stomach churned with the unseen thread, whispered from some unseen foe. He was grateful she did not question why it would speak to them both as Children of Jedi. He could just ignore it, push through the concern.

His eyes focused upwards once more, the reflection of the green kyber seemed to engulf his gaze. Need. He had to have it. It was his.

His hand thrust upwards, pulling at the ceiling. He slipped, but didn't fall, the grip on the ceiling anchoring him. The hair on the back of his neck stood up. Something was coming, he knew it, he felt it. The voice...presence...another vision? He didn't know. But urgency pulled at the fraying edges of his resolve.

"Isla!" He said, urgent, "help me! We can get them both..."

His tone was intensely earnest, a plea for her to aide him. His focus, though, returned to the ceiling. the muscles of his face grew taut, breathing ragged, with the occasional spittle accidentally ejecting from his mouth.

"Come on...we can do this...help me!"

Chidren...of...the...Jedi...

He felt it. Creeping up. The inevitably of it. But the kyber called and he would not relent.

Isla Reingard
​