To Appease Iamus

[Epistor of Phasekion]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7BCa9Y8Of8​

~ Equipment: Flask of medon wine / Chiton / Sword ~​

~ Location: Sargus Novis
The Daphis Iceway ~​

~ Day 2½ of Exile ~​

~ Tag: [member="Jyoti Nooran"] ~​

​

Daphis seemed as disappointed in her as the rest of Sargus Novis was the way the wind was blowing harshly, absolutely relentless, against her face.

Eustachya wrapped her light pink mantle tighter around her shoulders, but the sheerness of the material offered her no comfort. She was about to curse Metioch until what little pious resolve she had stopped her. And instead, she pleaded, Cymothoë, please help me...

Looking down at her hands, she forced her tight, blue fists open and rotated her palms up. She didn't know the name of this force, but she knew that she was still reeling--emotionally as well as physically--from the outburst at Ididri. The distant ringing lingering in her ears was amplified by the howling wind, but at least the nipping cold numbed her aching forearms. And most of her didn't want any of it back.

But, as afraid as she was of whatever unknown power coursed through her, and even though she didn't know if it could help her now, she had to try.

Truth be told, it was already helping her, though she didn't notice. She would have if she wasn't surrounded by potential death; she had survived almost two days without a source of warmth...other than herself and the Force.

Unconcious effort driven by survival instinct manipulate the temperature around her. Her innate abilities couldn't do much, but it was enough to stave off hypothermia, for now.

This time, as she perceived nothing happening, she couldn't hold back her shouted disdain for the Novious goddess of knowledge.

 

[Eugen Aker]

Location: SEV Odyssey (Coyote-class Frigate), Deep Space within the Tingel Arm

The Silver Order had long since moved from Voss to Kashyyyk in the Mid Rim, but their missions in the Outer Rim continued. The Tingel Arm, in particular, was still largely a mystery at the edge of the galaxy. So Jedi and of the Explorer Corps worked tirelessly to map out one of the galaxy's final frontier.

For Jyoti, volunteering for a tour, it was a nice change of pace. For the last few years, all she had known was war. Her true passion had always been with the sciences, hoping to have been a Librarian of the great Jedi Library of Coruscant, going around gathering all sorts of new knowledge for the archives. That was never happening, but this tour was the next best thing.

Being gifted with instinctive astrogation, she was given the important task of lead pathfinder.

It wasn't too hard finding new systems to explore from afar, looking for wobbling stars and shadows, but the tricky part was mapping a way to get to the system. This could be an arduous, and oftentimes dangerous task, charting a path around various hazards like gas fields and black holes. fortunately, with instinctive astrogation, Jyoti could do this on the fly. Thanks to her, the mission had reached a few dozen new systems in the short time she had been with them.

Today, she was back on the beat in a heavily modified Talon, on the way to another promising system - TAS643 (Novis System) - having fun bouncing between black holes. Normally people like to avoid traveling near black holes, but the Jedi Master had figured out how to slingshot around them for ever greater acceleration. With the compensators reduced to 96%, she could feel the churn of titanic gravitational forces against her starfghter as she curved around the titanic singularities.

It was the closest thing to touching hands with a god.

Between her slick slingshot maneuvers and other time saving measures, she would make it to 643 in record time. Once she was there, she planned on dropping a probe, making a few passes by sublight, then returning back the Copernicus on a "safer" route that would make it easy for navicomputers to use.

Actually reaching a system for scanning was the least interesting portion of the circuit for her, as she had yet to find life on a single outside microbes. Maybe this time would be different, but she didn't count on it.

[member="Eustachya"]

 

[Epistor of Phasekion]

~ The Farmhouse of Myrian and Jestrista:​

Phasekion Outskirts, Methicea ~​

~ 3 Days Until the Sacrificial Vote ​

{Flashback} ~​

~ Tag: [member="Jyoti Nooran"] ~​

Vestora watched the slightly-straining back of her mother, Jestrista, as she labored to roll out phyllo dough for the family's dinner of sheep baklava. Even if she waited forever, she would never find a good time to ask, so she began now, "Mother--"

Immediately, Jestrista dropped her stone rolling pin and turned about to face her youngest daughter; the very air seemed to drop away from Vestora's lungs with it. "Put it out of your mind," she recommended forcefully. "She will be with Iamus soon enough. Then she will be happy and we will be safe."

Vestora allowed for a long pause, leaning forward in her chair and over the dining table to search her mother's eyes intently. Fear and equal unforgiveness shown through; she was staunchly pious and painfully aware of the Children's historic myths taken as fact by any practicing Novioust. Past warmongering had gotten Sargus Novians nothing in the long term but the startling decline of their population and the theateningly fatal wraith of their Gods.

But, how was she reacting like every other man, woman, and child? So cooly to her very on blood that she had seen into this world? Maybe she felt guilty. "It was an accident, Mother," Vestora began in a soft voice. "Did you not see how terrified Eust--"

"Vestora!" the sudden deep voice of Myrian, who had walked through the door with a parcel of cleaned mutton, interrupted. "Don't venerate her name."

Unwrapping the package as she turned back around, Jestrista ended the argument with a wave of her hand and by saying, "Listen to your father. It was a trick of Saytros, that was all."

And that was what the world thought it was even though they had yet to discuss it: the God of bloodshed had yoked Eustachya with the power to condemn them all, whether that be by ushering in a second neverending war or by inviting Daphis into the warm realms of the Pronedamna.

~~~​

​

Hiking the skirt of her peplos up over her knees as she climbed over the hill, Vestora could no longer keep at bay her anger. She called to Opestor, her brother, and, before she had even seen him, she exclaimed, "Are you going to let them do this to Stach?!"

The young man turned towards the familiar voice and dropped his shepherd's staff to meet her halfway. He caught her by the elbows, stopping her movement, and glanced around nervously--even though his sheep hear was their only company. "Shhh! Don't say her name," he warned.

Making a show of rolling her eyes, she sighed exasperatedly, "Not you too." Opestor was about to respond when she shushed him. "Not everything we do not understand will welcome war. Remember the Pronedamna. We did not understand them then nor now and they keep us safe."

"Stora..."

Breaking her brother's hold, she stepped back, arguing, "Opestor, it is flawless logic and you know it." She accentuated her last point by jamming her finger into his wool chlamys before storming away. A startled sheep that had been grazing was left braying after her, as it had barely looked up and scurried away in time to avoid being trampled on. Opestor stooped to pet the sheep comfortingly.

Yes, he had to admit that it was.

​

~ The Daphis Iceway ~​

~ Day 3 of Exile​

{Present} ~​

About every half kilometer, Eustachya did as the Novikest advisors had told her. She would stop, her feet sinking fast in the snow as she fumbled with the small, painted clay alabastron flask at her ceremonial belt. The contained medon wine had been mixed with her own blood, taken and prepared at the trial, to darken the drink's color and thicken its consistency. She allowed a dozen drops, formed into a short line, to stain the purity of the flakes below before recapping the bottle and forcing herself onwards.

The intermittent trail would lead her true Father to her, who was to punish her for her failure to wrought mortal destruction. The sacrificial lamb was a metaphor that both Cymoth and Basic unknowingly shared. Surely Eustachya was that, dressed in a fine chiton and mantle and adorned with expensive fibula pins. So to say, the wine would be a Godly appetizer if she was to be the main course.

She had begun to ask herself if she was indeed Iamus' daughter. Maybe her love that had blossomed for discus-throwing in her youth had been the first sign, making the gymnasium incident the second. After all, atheletes weren't too distinct from the warriors of old. Maybe she should have realized the former much sooner and self-exiled long ago. Maybe--

No.

A particularly violent shiver ran up her spine, causing her head to shake instinctively. The voice in her head had not been her own--far from it--though she had no energy to have noticed.

Just like that, her mind changed. Rather than Iamus' unknowing devotee, she was Agathonice's. Kriton had attacked her first and, because she had left her discus in the shower rooms, she was therefore rendered defenseless. By that grain, she had done nothing wrong. She hadn't engaged in purposeful violence, but necessary protection.

Though that realization hardly mattered now. Even if she could make it back to the Cloud of Hystranais, she would not be able to reverse her verdict.

 

[Eugen Aker]

As she came near the reversion point back to real space, the Echani guided her fighter drop out near the projected habitable zone of the system, which would put her somewhere between the second and third planet from the sun (Phaleam Novis and Sargus Novis, respectively).

Finally, the fighter reverted, generating a burst of Cronau radiation and other spatial disturbances upon the transition from hyperspace to realspace. Sophisticated sensors made to detect those sort of anomalies could have picked her up, though she was far from any planet and her fighter had only a small footprint.

Still, she practiced due diligence, studying sensor readouts for any start of trouble. This was the most dangerous period for a scout, first contact. Aliens races may not take so kindly to strangers like her suddenly appearing within their airspace and take action. It happened more often than people realized, which was why Jedi within the explorer corps saw so much combat.

Fortunately, there was no such occurrence, alarms remaining silent.

Relaxing, she proceeded with the next step of the procedure, jettisoning several drone pods from the fighter's pylons. As soon as they cleared the immediate vicinity of the Talon, their ion jets kicked on, each pod subsequently disappearing in a flash, all destined for different corners of the system. Within a matter of hours, it would be under complete surveillance.

Now, she could either wait for the network to be established or conduct some exploration personally. It was a no-brainer what the adventurous Echani would do, to so the real question was where to start.

She shifted her head from side to side, looking between renderings of planet two and three. Neither had any obvious signs of life, from the lack of any wireless signals, but intuition tugged at her to visit the third planet. Jyoti still wasn't sure about the so-called "Will of the Force", but she had long learned to trust her feelings as a Jedi Master.

So, to the third rock she went.

[member="Eustachya"]

 

[Epistor of Phasekion]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDS_pIpCRs8​

​

~ Novikest, Hystranias ~​

~ Day 3 of the Sacrificial Vote​

{Flashback} ~​

~ Tag: [member="Jyoti Nooran"] ~​

​

Novikest sat above the Sargus Novian capital of Thyreid atop a study outcropping of bedrock thought to be the dried molten spillings of the great crucible of Panaetius. The forge and fire god had, since the very beginning of Androcles' Never-ending War, allied himself with Iamus, and the now dormant volcano casting the democratic acropolis in shadow was thought to have been his wartime home. Anycrates, after gaining his mission from Cymothoë, turned his eyes up to Mount Glauce. He scaled the perilous slope to trick the God, overturn his crucible to great bodily harm to himself, and chisel out the swords and hearts of the Pronedamna from the newly-formed rock.

As far as the humans here were concerned, it was a perfect place to build a temple, a building, an acropolis dedicated to peace.

But to make sure everyone was well-versed in the story, art accompanied by Cymothë runes were carved onto stelae marking the path up from lower Thyreid. The foundations of every construction above were likewise plagued by realistic reminders of the bloody past.

"Eustachya of Phasekion," the leader of ceremony elected for Methicea's voting day announced, voice bouncing around the theater court-room though he was not excessively loud. The place was accommodating enough in terms of capacity, and Sargus Novis's population was indeed small, but most voting periods of planetwide import, as this was, had to be broken into separate days for each of the four islands' citizenry.

From where she stood in the center of the dirt-covered track field with hands folded before her, Eustachya let out a quiet sigh. She had not been granted much sympathy from either Hystranias, as she had admittedly expected, nor Vathicos. Though, she still had hope--Methicea and Amalos could still smile on her and set her free, but if she lost her home island, she was condemned to death.

The temporary official continued, "The Seers have corrected your motive over the past days. Cymothoë had seen fit to clear their minds and we trust Her to do the same to all of you..."

He paused, perhaps for dramatic effect, to look around the stadium before throwing daggers at Eustachya, something he wasn't supposed to do but seemed acceptable in the situation. "You are not a simple, rare devotee of Iamus. You did not break the law by worshiping he the Old God. No. You are but his bastard!"

The stadium erupted into discord and Eustachya fell to her knees, ripping the fine white cloth of her chiton and bracing herself with both hands. "No, no, no..." she mumbled to herself, fire burning further up her throat with each repetition. Soon she was rendered mute, having to instead think, Myrian is my father! I am of Phasekion, not Sinon! Maybe it was for the best, though, that she couldn't speak, for surely no one, not ever hers, would listen to the desperate ravings of a villainous demigoddess.

In no way did this development bode well for her. Certainly, the votes of Hystranias and Vathicos would have to be recast, but this new revelation would not win naysayers to her side. If anything, it would do much the opposite. No one trusted a kinswoman that worshipped Iamus, let alone one that had been begotten of him.

Yes, she would surely lose Methicea now.

The speaker only rose his voice over the chaos and it began to die down soon after, "Beloved Children, this daughter of Sargus is still charged with conspiracy to make war. Should she be found guilty here today by the people of Methicea, the suggested punishment, as has been custom since the Pronedamna were erected and the first of the Four Clouds descended upon us, is exile into the Daphis Iceway. Let her see her Father!!"

The chant started out slow and quiet, but soon it resonated throughout the voters. "Appease Iamus! Appease Iamus! Appease Iamus!"

 

[Eugen Aker]

There was a momentary flash as Jyoti skipped through hyperspace for a quick microjump, then she was greeted with a giant blue and green orb upon reversion. She brightened at the sight, the planet having all the makings of a garden world from visual inspection. Maybe she could hope to find more than some bacteria this time around!

Moments later, her sensor feed came alive as energy receptors picked up on massive energy signatures on the surface and errant signals.

The telltale signs of civilization.

Her heart fluttered in excitement as she pointed her Talon toward the largest energy source (Thyreid), training advanced photoreceptors to get a visual on the location while still high up in orbit. The holodisplay of her cockpit then filled with the image of a small occupated settlement, full of what appeared to be humans. Passive sensors reported some kind of force field enveloping the settlement, generated by several large projectors. There was a noticeable difference in the environment within this force field, versus the wintery wasteland just outside its coverage. If she were to guess, it was some artificial biome, not unlike the ones used on the lunar cities over Kiribi.

She was already amazed by the discovery of a new civilization at the edge of the galaxy, anything else she found was now just icing on the cake.

It was tempting just to go down and check out things, but protocol had to be followed. First, she relayed a brief message back to her mothership over encrypted comms, then she turned the to begin circling the planet for mapping while also sucking up any signals. The next part of the process was determining just how advanced the civilization was, all to determine if it was appropriate to make contact. The Explorer Corps didn't have any sort of set directive against making contact with less civilized races, but they were still keen to avoid causing any major disruptions.

Making her first rotation over the world, she just got the sense that she had stumbled upon some kind of lost colony. She detected no other discernable signs of high technology aside from the field projectors, no signs of comm chatter except between these machines.

If that was the case...it may be fine to check it out. It may not be some native-born species, but just descendants of wayward humans.

She awaited the final word from Command.

[member="Eustachya"]

 

[Epistor of Phasekion]

~ The Daphis Iceway ~​

~ Day 3 of Exile ~​

~ Tag: [member="Jyoti Nooran"] ~​

​

Suddenly, a shiver ran down Eustachya's spine. She stopped and rose a hand to her eyes to shield them from the snow as she looked about her. There was absolutely nothing around her, there had to be. She was sure of it, for the shiver had been a jolt of warm energy, not cold or numbing as it would have been if the environment had caused it.

She was sure of that too, for she had felt it in Ididri as well. What seemed to be months ago she had turned to find danger about to strike her down...like something had warned her.

"Hello?" she yelled to the howling wind, her voice easily getting lost, even to her.

But she didn't feel like she was being warned about anything now. It was ridiculous, but rather she felt like she was being told to hold onto hope.

But why not; what did she have to lose now? She couldn't be banished again, so she set off again in the way she had come, following the path she had left Iamus of offering wine.

 

[Eugen Aker]

"Chaírete?"

Jyoti shuddered uncontrollably in her, experiencing a sensation akin to a whisper over her ear, and a chill down her spine. She was snug in her vacuum sealed flight suit, but she felt cold, if only for an instant.

The Talon was primed to begin its rotation of the whole planet, but she pulled back on the yoke, trying to process the sensation she had felt. After a few moments, she realized she had just connected with another in the Force.

Only another Force Sensitive could do that.

The realization left her giddy in her cockpit, one chance in a million. Then she calmed down, expanding her senses, homing in on the source of the contact. It wasn't terribly far from settlement she had just uncovered, she guided her sensors by clairvoyance, scanning the wastes until her optics centered on one individual trekking through the snow.

She really should have waited for Command to reply before even a thought of interaction, but she already come so far, probably farther than anyone else in centuries. She just needed to confirm what she had felt was real and wasn't just a product of a bored mind. Either way, she was still safe in space out of trouble in her little starfighter that no one could see.

So, she reached out into the Force in kind, focusing in on the person on screen.

"Hello?"

[member="Eustachya"]

 

[Epistor of Phasekion]

"Hello?"

An almost inaudible utterance came soon after hers that she had not been expecting. With no one around, the only logical conclusion left for pious Eustachya to draw was that whatever whispered back to her was something godly.

But was its word even Cymothë? She squinted, as if it would help her decipher what she had just heard. Just that it seemed to do when she muttered aloud, "...Heílō?" for she could not hear herself think over the raging of Daphis. That word was one known to her, but despite the familiarity, she furrowed her brow.

It meant slave.

Why would one of her beloved gods call her slave? She was used to being called devotee, follower, servant even, but never had she heard slave.

Then it hit her like the wind barraging her back. An attendant of Iamus had finally found her to bring her up to Mount Sinon. Whatever divine punishment awaited her was bound to be much worse than what had already been done to her by the Children of Sargus. But she couldn't find the energy nor the will to care. She might have been asking out of the frying pan just to be cast into the fire, but with every moment that the cold clawed at her, her desperation grew.

"Ei dokeî, voíthia!"

~ [member="Jyoti Nooran"] ~​

​

Spoiler

Heílō ~ Slave
Ei dokeî, voíthia ~ Please, help [me]

 

[Eugen Aker]

Wearing: Flightsuit

Honestly, Jyoti had been half expecting for the woman not to acknowledge her, but she did, the Echani receiving another string of indecipherable thoughts. They were like words, but she couldn't make heads or tails of what was being communicated aside from the underlying emotions of apprehension and need. Without context, those raw feelings meant little to her.

By now, she was determined to see this person. It wasn't protocol, but she had technically already broken it making contact. She couldn't get into any more trouble making some more. She killed the main ion thrusters and shifted completely to her repulsor drives for silent running within the gravity well of the planet, then activated the Talon's active camouflage system. The black fighter then became truly invisible as it melted into the backdrop of space.

Stealth mode set, she finally guided the fighter down, aiming to set down about a couple kilometers ahead of the woman's path. It would give her a chance to set up and scope out the area. While descending, she found a fairly flat patch of raised ground, and touched down. She made one more sweep with her bioscanners - it was still only the woman nearby.

Finally, she popped open the hanger, recycled air escaping the pressurized canopy with a loud hiss, then came the howl of winds. She hopped out of the Talon, making a small crunch as her boots broke through a thin layer of hard packed snow upon landing. After trudging several meters through the snow, the Talon's canopy slid back down, rendering the whole fighter nearly invisible again. She turned to inspect the state of the camouflage, then looked down at her footprints. One by one, they began to disappear as particles of snow rolls over to fill them up.

She turned forward, focused back on the woman she had come from. By her estimate, it wouldn't take too long to get here, maybe twenty or thirty minutes at most. In the meantime, she took a position near a stony outcrop as some cover. While she may not see or feel any trouble now, it was never a good idea to remain exposed on an alien planet.

[member="Eustachya"]

 

[Epistor of Phasekion]

And, just like that, it was gone. The words, the feeling, all of it, slipped away like the snowflakes that landed on her clothes momentarily just to tumble off and away soon after.

Tears welled up in Eustachya's eyes and fell a short distance down her cheeks before freezing her the skin. Maybe what had just happened had been divine, maybe it had been an elaborate trick put on by her kin, maybe it had been nothing but the sleep-deprived mind that had dangled salvation right before her just to cruelly snatch it away.

But she wasn't angry, for it was what she deserved, wasn't it? It was, she knew it was. It didn't seem like such a bad idea to lay down to sleep and let herself freeze now.

But as soon as it had flooded back in again, her doubt evaporated as the light at the end of her tunnel, malicious or benevolent, seemed to flicker for a split second: she wasn't certain what, but there was something out here for her but death. So she amended her path once more and onwards she went, away from Hystranias.

~~~​

​

It was another strange feeling, but now more in her heart than in her veins. Hope rather than heat. Every horizon on the icescape that she had seen thus far looked the same, homogeneous landscapes of naught but ice and snow giving the allusion of her progress on foot stalling, but, this...this was something else entirely.

The tops of a mountain, assumedly similar to the ones on Methicea, rose up in part over the valley. The long, white fingers of Daphis reached up the south side, carving horns and aretes into the bedrock.

Is this Semiri? she wondered. A mountain, named for the ancient town that had once laid atop it, on the long-lost island of Rossos, the first victim of Dahpis' wraith. Chrysaor had tried to ward off the god here with a high-burning brand and still, to this day, the Sargus Novians never stoked open fires during the day, only allowing smoldering embers to burn in winter for fear of offending their overlord.

Eustachya bent to rip her dress and tie it up around her middle thigh. It was a struggle to climb the alpine cirque but she utilized rocky handholds and the icy crevices for footing. When she was atop Semiri, she looked around. The flat top stretched for some distance.

"Emfanísou!" she tried to call again, though, up in elevation, the desert air burned her throat. "Poios eísai?"

~ [member="Jyoti Nooran"] ~​

​

Spoiler

Emfanísou ~ Show yourself
Poios eísai? ~ Who are you?

 

[Eugen Aker]

As she, had hoped she could feel the woman coming for her, but she held her place in cover, understandably cautious. First contact wasn't always pleasant. She mulled back and forth about wearing her helmet when meeting with the woman and decided to to go without. Things may go better seeing another (near) human face.

She reached around to the back of her neck to pop open her helmet, and it came undone with a click. Her long silvery hair fell out in cascades as she lifted her helmet away, then began to billow in the wind. It was certainly cold out, but it didn't bother the Echani all that much, her body adapted for such conditions. Still, she definitely wouldn't find it comfortable being out her for too long.

Now it was back to waiting while munching on a chocolate energy bar.

Over time, she could feel the woman drawing closer, but she didn't dare move from her spot to inspect her progress visually, lest she spook her. Jyoti's stomach began to turn knots in nervous excitement as she finally felt the woman right below.

The Echani peaked out from her hidey-hole she observes the woman as she finally climbed over the ledge. Blonde of above average height. Poorly dressed for the environment, wearing something that looked like a cross between robes and a camisole. In fact, she showed the beginning stages of frostbite and hypothermia.

Just what was her story?

The woman called for her in that strange tongue she didn't understand, but integrated babel droid on her suit was already working to decipher her speech. She just had to keep her talking.

Slowly, she stepped out from behind her hiding place, holding her free hand and chest level to show that she wasn't a threat. She smiled, radiating with positive aura in the Force to try to put the woman at ease. She took a few moments to think about what to say, then recalled what she first heard.

"Chaírete?"

[member="Eustachya"]

 

[Epistor of Phasekion]

Eustachya stopped in her tracks as Jyoti came out from behind the boulder. The poor girl didn't have any clue how to begin describing, much less rationalizing, whatever it was that the Jedi Master was wearing, but she focused upon her face: silver hair and pale skin. "Poiós eísai? Pós eísai...? Ti káneis edó?"

Her speech began to grade perfectly from Cymothë into Basic thanks to the babel droid, though the native movements of her lips were not synced up with her new generated voice. "Eímaste...? Eínai this Semiri? Are you a victim of Daphis too?" It was a possible interpretation of the whisper she had heard in the middle of the Iceway, and, if this, in fact, was the site of Semiri, it would make even more sense. That would make her one of the Semirian nymphs, the citizenry of the same town, frozen alive by Daphis on that fateful day.

"I am Eustachya of Phasekion," she shouted over a particularly harsh gust of wind, hugging her elbows into her chest as it passed. "Daughter of Myrian," she added for good measure, momentarily uncaring towards the evidence to the contrary that she had been given by the People three long days ago.

Spoiler

Poiós eísai? Pós eísai...? Ti káneis edó? ~ Who are you? What are...? How are you here?
Eímaste...? Eínai-- ~ We are...? Is--

~ [member="Jyoti Nooran"] ~​

 

[Eugen Aker]

Everything that came out of the blonde's mouth might as well been gibberish to Jyoti at that point, but reading her body language and surface thoughts, the Echani felt nothing that could be described as ill intent. Her Babel unit was still working to decipher the woman's words, so she content herself with repeating the word she had spoken just before.

"Chaírete."

First contact was successful, but now the stranger may freeze to death if she didn't do something.

Jyoti took her hand off her chest, first pointing it at the blonde, then brought up both hands to her upper arms and began shaking like she was freezing. The Echani then motioned for the woman to come closer with a small wave of the hand, trying to indicate that she could help.

As their exchange continued Babel was beginning to make some headway into analysis into the woman's speech. All indications pointed to some kind of offshoot of Basic that had probably been developed over several generations in isolation.

That made sense to the Echani as the protocol unit reported its findings. Coming planetside, civilization had appeared primitive on initial scans, while the woman before her looked like she had just stepped out of a history vid. Such regression wasn't unheard in isolated communities, but it was the first time she had seen any of it with her own eyes.

[member="Eustachya"]

 

[Epistor of Phasekion]

Eustachya rose her brow as Jyoti started a game of charades. Was she...being mocked? Or did the nymph think that Stach could somehow help her? True, she wasn't as white--which she assumed to relate to coldness--but she was not that better off in truth. Still, she inched forward towards the older woman. "Are you cold?" she asked, attempting to keep the chattering of her teeth minimal as she spoke. Oh, Gods, the chill was so much worse now that she had stopped her trek.

Maybe the white of Jyoti's flightsuit was tightly packed snow, the exiled daughter began to think. And the blue was ice?

Oh! she thought. She glanced down at her side, where the clay flask was tied with jute to her leather belt. Not much medon wine was left, but it was still insulated and relatively warm, in order to melt the snow as she marked her path. She had already taken some herself earlier, though she was barred from doing so, but what would anyone mortal or immortal care if she was to die?

Her ruby red fingertips fumbled with the tie and she offered the vessel out to the Jedi Master she assumed was a god. "It is wine, not nectar, but you can have it."

And then she asked again, "Are you a nymph?"

~ [member="Jyoti Nooran"] ~​

 

[Eugen Aker]

More alien words from the blonde, and then came the offer of drink.

The gesture confused Jyoti for a moment, but then it quickly dawned on her that she had made a mistake when trying to emote earlier. She had been trying to ask the woman if she was cold, but instead it may have looked like she was indicating exactly the opposite.

Instead of accepting the drink, she shook her head, then set her helmet down on a rocky outgrowth behind her. Next, she unfastened the outer jacket of her flight suit and held it open to blonde. She felt a small chill as she had stripped down to her thermal liner top, but for the Echani born and bred in an arctic environment, it was only a small discomfort.

"Here," she said in Basic, shaking the jacket a few times as she beckoned the blonde to try it.

[member="Eustachya"]