Help Is On the Way {Meira}

[Ghostie]

The shuttle gave an ever so subtle lurch as the craft rapidly decelerated from hypserspace, and Orren’s heavy heart was nearly left behind. For most of the trip he had been quiet and pensive, inwardly focused as he meditated quietly, and reached out in the Force towards their destination. But it had always been the same. The same twisted vertigo, the same absolute power and authority. The same danger and death. And underneath it all, a small and quiet question of confusion. But now that the shuttle was so close, Orren did not need to reach out into the Force and sense all these dark emotions; they were strong enough on their own to not need sought out. The Miraluka only hoped that his old friend could be found somewhere in the mixture.

Baraduk Tvurl had been a premier Barabel Jedi Master, and Watchman of the Barab system, his homeworld. Orren had known Baraduk well, as they had grown up in the Temple together. However while the Miraluka was always trying to uncover the secrets of the Force, the Barabel was always in the sparring room. Baraduk had been one of the first Jedi to join the war effort against the Sith, and then had later served on the Council for a short period of time. After the fighting had ceased, the Jedi Master had returned to his home, to help his people find peace as well, and bring them into the larger Galaxy.

Instead, Baraduk had found himself on the front lines of yet another invasion.

The Jedi Council still did not know as much as they would like about these Archeri. But they were a threat that was swallowing Hutt Space, coming seemingly from nowhere and thus far unstoppable. And it seemed that they carried some sort of incurable sickness with them. Since the first reports had come in, they had caused Orren many a restless night. And unfortunately Barab had been one of the first planets swallowed by these Archeri. Baraduk had narrowly escaped on one of the last transports, but now it seemed that the Archeri were still with him, in some form or another.

The Barabel transport had been headed for Ukio, a small and little known agriworld on the edge of known Space. Enroute, a distress signal had been sent about some sort of crazed Jedi Master tearing both the refugees and the ship apart, going on about how everyone was ‘discordant’ and that they were ‘not worthy of the Chorus’. Orren had hardly believed that Baraduk would randomly snap like that, he was always so level-headed and as much of a typical Jedi as any one of their Order. But a holo had been sent of the Barabel in action along with the signal, and Orren’s heart had broken. Whether this was part of the Archeri’s illness or simply a reaction to losing his homeworld on Baraduk’s part, the Miraluka didn’t know.

Coming back to the present, Orren swung his head around and perceived the other lone Force presence with him; Meira Valli. Kiffar, and rather young master. But from what the Miraluka knew she was talented and wise for her age, and no doubt a boon to his mission. Giving the woman a small, apologetic smile, Orren hung his head a bit.

“I’m sorry we’ve spent this trip is a rather awkward silence…” He took in a breath, and looked out the window, and towards the transport that was floating dead in Space; the Star Hunter. Thankfully, as the shuttle neared, Orren could see that the escape pods had all been jettisoned. The Jedi had received word while in hyperspace that the survivors had left, and been picked up by another refuge transport. That left just Orren, Meria, and a deranged Baraduk. In a dark, large ship together. And Orren knew that Barabels were natural hunters. “... Master Tvrul is a very dear friend of mine.” He explained. “Tell me, have you ever met him? Or know anything of the Barabels in general?”

[Meira]

Even among the Jedi, rumors had a tendency to spread like wildfire. The rumors coming out of Hutt space were no exception. It was difficult to parse out the core of truth from what had been embellished in the transfer of information. In truth, Meira hadn't really expected any of it to be true. It had all been just that strange. But as rumors turned into reports, and then into evidence, the truth was coming to seem stranger than any fiction that could be invented. An extra-galactic force had arrived in Hutt space, practically leveled Teth, and was consuming other nearby planets like some kind of ravenous swarm. And worse, as if pushed on the tides out before this invading force, sickness spread indiscriminately among the countless species in the area. What might, at fist, be treated as an internal Hutt problem, was now quickly becoming something the rest of the galaxy could not simply sit by and witness. There was no indication that this force would simply stop, and all evidence suggested that the Hutts were overwhelmed.

So Meira had not been surprised when she'd received the summons for a mission. What had surprised her, however, was that she'd been assigned to a mission with the Master of the Order himself. Meira had never been familiar with the man. She knew who he was, of course, and had periphery interactions with him and other members of the Council. All masters had. But she did not know Master Orren. She could only assume that her name had been selected through some random assignment queue. After receiving her mission brief, this assumption had been all but confirmed. Meira knew very little of Barab, its people, or of Master Tvrul. His was a name she'd heard before, but little else.

When they departed, Meira was perfectly content with the silence that she and Orren shared. She had never been one who needed to fill silence with words or actions. Indeed, she had always been most comfortable in quiet contemplation. Even the war had not changed that in her. If anything, it had reinforced her need and appreciation for stillness. No matter what hell the fighting had shown her, Meira knew that she could always find that peace and tranquility within herself. It was something that could never be taken away. And so the majority of their trip was spent in that pleasant peacefulness. Until one of the servos in her leg began to give her grief. She was fiddling with it when the ship dropped out of hyperspace. The whole prosthetic was detached and laid across her lap as she poked around in one of the access hatches on the front part of the shin. She had nearly finished the adjustment when Orren spoke.

His voice might have surprised her, if his presence and attention in the Force not shifted toward her before he spoke. Having made no attempt to conceal his presence -and why would he need to?- that shift in attention was something of a Jedi equivalent of laying one's hand on another's shoulder to gain their attention. There was nothing rude or prying about it. It was just a thing that was done. Flipping the panel closed and putting the small multitool back into a pouch on her belt, Meira turned her eyes toward Master Orren as she reconnected the prosthetic to the port on her leg.

"I have not." she said, giving the prosthetic the small turn needed to lock it into place on the port. "And I am afraid I know next to nothing of the Barabel people. I uploaded some information onto a datapad from the archives, but I did not have much time to review it before we left. I know that they are often considered a primitive people by the galaxy as a whole and that their culture is closely tied to the act of hunting."

[Ghostie]

“More than closely, I would say.” Orren responded on the topic of Barabels and hunting, as Master Valli finished recounting the little she knew of the species. The Miraluka had been expecting this, honestly. Very few in the Galaxy interacted with the people of Barab. As Meria had said, they were considered mostly primitive, and were hostile to most outsiders. Combined with the fact that their world was quite literally on the edge of the known Galaxy, and very few people bothered to travel out to see the lizard people. Baraduk Tvrul had come to the Jedi Order by sheer happenstance, or the will of the Force. Whichever you preferred to believe.

Leaning forward, Orren would have folded his hands together, if he had two. Instead, his voice merely adopted the casual lecturing tones that could be heard echoing throughout the halls of the Temple on Coruscant. His face was directed towards Meira, but his senses were busy trying to perceive a prosthetic leg that simply wasn’t present. Not to him, at least.

“Barabels are natural hunters. They possess retractable claws, and sharp teeth. They’re carnivorous, territorial, and can see in the infrared spectrum. A blaster on stun will simply bounce off of their hardened scales.” Orren went over the most dangerous points of the species, trying to drive home just what exactly the two Jedi were going to be facing down in a few moments. Pausing for a moment, the Master of the Jedi Order continued. “And Master Trvul, on top of all of this, is quite the accomplished Jedi.”

Orren’s attention was still on Master Valli’s leg. Cybernetics, much like droids, always made the Miraluka wary. It was in the way his species perceived the environment around them, with the Force guiding their senses. Droids were simply shells of an artificial being. Prosthetics seemed to be hollow replacements for missing limbs. Vehicles were simply weird shapes that soared across the skies. It was one of the reasons that Orren had forgone his own limb replacement, after he had lost his arm. Of course, he didn’t begrudge Meira her cybernetic; after all, it was necessary for her day-to-day life.

He simply found the cybernetic itself off-putting.

It reminded him on the Baraduk Tvrul that he saw in the holofeed back on the Temple. The Barabel driven insane by whatever plague has just swept through his home planet, as well as the invaders that carried it. That being had been nothing more than a shell, a pale imitation of someone who had once been one of Orren’s friends. The Miraluka found himself wondering just what the Barabel would look like in the Force now, after all of this.

“Master Tvrul is one of my friends, Master Vellia.” Orren reiterated, his face dropping to the floor of the shuttle. “I would, above all, like to be able to bring him back to the Temple and find him the help he needs. As I would any Jedi.” The Jedi Master continued talking, but the next few words were pained. “But I make no mistake about what we’re about to face on this transport. If the worst should come to pass, and we’re unable to capture Master Tvrul…” Orren trailed off, letting Meira fill in the empty gap of his speech with her own assumptions. “... We cannot allow him to escape to another world, where he could spread this plague and havoc in equal measure.”

After a moment, there was the sound of a soft thud against the exterior of the shuttle, and the hiss of gasses as the airlock was pressurized. Remaining seated for a moment, Orren checked his belt, pouches, and lightsaber. Joining Meira at the airlock, Orren paused once again.

“We should grab some environment masks, as well. Just to be safe.”