Private When the Light Was Kinder

[Fenn Stag]

FENN STAG

AT LAST, WE WILL HAVE PEACE
​

Everything went black, a screech so terrible that it could've shattered windows and walls- if it was real. Then...

Silence.

No voices. No drums. Only darkness, in Fenn's mind. But not the darkness of a cave, not the pitch-blackness of a nighttime jungle. The relaxed, blackness of sleep. It was as if he had fallen asleep for the first time in years. True, blissful sleep. Cora could feel it. No more presence. No more darkness. As if a great fire had come through and burned away all traces of it- even Preliat.

If that even was really Preliat.

Fenn slumped in her chair, taking slow, shallow, gentle breaths. Color returned to his face- his olive skin coming back. Brown eyes fluttered open, looking at the ceiling. He took it in. It was quiet. The Jedi guards were closer to them now, feeling the turmoil too. Cora's gentle hands were on his face. He turned his head into her hands, feeling the softness of her fingertips on his skin.

The air was clean, cool. It wasn't like breathing in shards of glass anymore. He slowly rose to a sitting position, one hand grasping at the chair he was sitting in. He looked around the room, eyes getting used to not fighting. He was quiet, he was.... serene. No conflict, no fighting. The turmoil was gone. There was just Fenn. Just him and him alone.

"I wanted this, my lady."

He said in response to her earlier question. He leaned forward at the waist, his remaining hand rubbing his eyes. He was so... tired. He hadn't slept right for years. And now he felt like he could. He wanted the peace, the quiet, the reclamation of his own mind.

"Was he real?"

He said, half-turning his head towards her, after a long pause.

 

[Corazona von Ascania]

A terrible, pitched screech fell to silence, and the world faded back into view.

Cora's arms felt stiff. Sweat had gathered along her brow, clinging to her skin in an unpleasant sheen that caught the sterile lighting above them.

If the Force had been a churning ocean when Fenn had first walked in, now it was more akin to a placid lake.

She took her time in pulling her hands back, tucking them into the width of her flowing sleeves. In truth, she hadn't been entirely certain that she'd be able to help Fenn. Purification had been her trained specialty, but it bled into the healing arts where her knowledge was less concrete.

Relief touched her as she absently wiped at her brow.

"The way that he felt, was," she said softly.

"Whatever he did to help wrangle this curse - it took him too. A sacrifice." A father's love? Maybe that was for Fenn to decide. She’d merely bee an observer. A conduit.

"How do you feel?"

Fenn Stag

 

[Fenn Stag]

FENN STAG

Corazona von Ascania

DIRTY WATER
​

Fenn looked down at his remaining hand, making a fist, clenching and unclenching. He didn't hear the voices, hear the whispers anymore. His mind was his own once more. He raised his hand above his head, squinting. Fenn's color returned- olive skin, not pale and sickly as it had been. His eyes were normally an intense hazel-brown. Flakes of green, but bright browns that made his eyes glow in the right light.

This was one of those times. He touched the light above him, weaving his fingers between it all, feeling the warmth on his skin. It was like he had shed a layer, he could feel the warmth, feel the heat, feel it all.

"I feel like myself."

He felt his blood in his veins. Untainted. And he remained. He did not lose. He did not falter. He turned his head towards Cora, before fully turning his body.

"You helped me. But-" He looked at the guards in the room. Even with one arm, Fenn still felt dangerous. Maybe he was more dangerous now that his mind was back to it's usual state. "Why? I hate to say but, my people and yours seem dead set on another conflict, another war. I cannot understand your kindness. Please-"

The man who had never known kindness, true and altruistic kindness, found it perplexing.

"Tell me why, Cora. Why help someone like me? Please, help me understand."

His accent was soft, quiet, still. That part of him remained, even in his madness. He spoke just above a whisper, below a speaking voice.

 

[Corazona von Ascania]

Cora observed Fenn quietly as he adjusted to his newfound clarity. To delve into the tangle of the Force around someone’s psyche, especially one so tainted, was no easy feat. Not for the subject, and not for the practitioner.

She was tired, but in a way that made her feel light. Grounded. Pleased for the way that Fenn’s color returned, and the subtle release of some of the tension that had lived in his muscle for so long.

Then, he posed a question that made her frown: Why?

Cora remained quiet as she thought. He raised a fine point: his Mandalorian sect and the Republic seemed to be on course to clash. Why would she help someone who could become her enemy tomorrow?

Cora sighed, rolling her thumbs together beneath the wide fabric of her sleeves.

“The Force has been used to hurt many people,” she said, “when it should be used to help. To heal.”

Her foray into Fenn’s mind afforded her a glimpse of the man’s blood-soaked past. Had he ever known softness?

“I wouldn’t be where I am today without the kindness of others,” she added, voice hovering near a whisper. “I do hope that you can be a kind man, Fenn.”

Fenn Stag

 

[Fenn Stag]

FENN STAG

Corazona von Ascania

BREAK THE CYCLE
​

Fenn rolled his fingers together, clarity not had within his mind, peace, tranquility, he had not known for years now, coming to him in droves, waves of guilt and hate washing off of him, washed away.

Had he ever known softness?

Cora knew the answer to that question- her trip into his psyche was thorough and deep. He had never known softness. Never a moment's peace. To Fenn, there was only war. A war within, and a war outside. In Fenn's life, it was preparation, or the conduct of war, battle, hostilities, actions.

“I do hope that you can be a kind man, Fenn.”

That statement seemed to spur something close to guilt, something close to remorse. Or perhaps, more cruelly, self-realization of who, and what he was.

"Your kindness is understated. I have not known Jedi to be selfless and charitable much like the stories once told. It is.... nice to see that I am wrong in my beliefs."

Fenn sat back down. He just-

Sat down. Relaxed. His body, after years, finally relaxed. His mind, finally, relaxed.

"I didn't realize how tired I was. Am, truly. Just- so very tired." His eyelids were heavy. And Fenn's lips turned upwards, a half-smile. Not a grin, not out of bloodlust. No, just a smile. "Is this what you feel, Master Jedi? Peace? How wonderful."

 

[Corazona von Ascania]

Cora felt her heart sink slowly into her stomach. Fenn hadn't known Jedi to be kind and charitable, and she wondered why that was. Had they wronged him in the past?

Had he been apart of the Mandalorian war machine that rippled over Alliance worlds?

Cora didn't want to know if he had, because despite being a Jedi, she was still capable of bias and spite.

Still, she found it in her to smile as Fenn eased into his newfound relief. A soft, faint upturn of her lips.

"Not all the time," she answered gently. "That's what makes it worth striving for, though."

Everyone experienced pain at some point, even if they weren't victim to a tortuous Dark poison. The peace wouldn't last, but it would become easier for him to find.

Fenn Stag was a killer, a Mandalorian warrior who owed allegiance to a group that might embroil the Republic in war. For now, he was a friend of Sibylla, a man stripped of his armor and weapons, and a patient of Cora’s.

"You look tired. Would you like to rest here for a little bit?"

Fenn Stag