You could say Time is against me...

[Talau the Ever-Lurking]

Fo Fro!

---

Blasted frelling woman is insane...

The crunching of snow beneath her boots was loud and unpleasant, making the half-frozen figure grouse along with each on in her own mind. Of course, when the snow came up above your knees at points, it really sort of lost its novelty. Why the hell were they here anyway? Well, no...she knew why they were here, but the hooded woman was not at all pleased as to why they had to come to this icy hell in particular for what was, in all reality, a very slim chance at getting a jedi artifact. If she thinks for a moment that it's going to just explain away my absence she's dead wrong...but hells if I'm going to correct her. Maybe she'll be stupid enough to actually send me b--

The location device in her hand beeped several times, barely audible above the raging wind. Lifting it, yellow tinged eyes scanned the miniature display before surveying the bland topography. White white and more white, punctuated only by black rock faces or the vague outlines of crumbling structures in the distance.

She sighed.

That was the direction she was meant to be heading, apparently...

No sense in prolonging things, the woman mused with an almost dismal air to her thoughts...and so she crunched away in her new direction.

The woman in question was a jedi. At least...she had been one. Winds only knew if she still would be, whenever she got back to the temple. This was also assuming she ever actually managed to get back at all. She had been gone for quite a while, after all, and while any normal jedi going rogue was bad, a Shadow going 'rogue' was basically asking to be listed as a dark jedi. It seemed to be the norm for them, after all. Of course, Talau had never exactly been normal, either. The simple fact that her presence was condensed to nothingness was a fairly good example. Of course, on a planet dominated by almost no living things except for the black creepy crawly insects that called themselves 'sith', this sort of skill was a tremendous boon.

"Don't get caught. You won't like what I'll do if I have to come and rescue your pathetic hide..." Those sort of threats had started to instill a very real, very deep, sort of fear for the woman after the first two times she'd crossed her would-be master. She wasn't about to test her this time, on a planet dominated by the sith order. Shaking the memories off again, Talau looked up at the crumbling and dilapidated structure and sighed a little.

At least she could get out of the wind.

Kicking in one of the half-broken windows, the woman worked her way inside from the mound of snow that had build up outside of it. The drop was a few feet down, but her legs and some subtle application of the force negated any painful landing there might have otherwise been. Looking around, she wondered how she might get out again if things went bad...because who knew where the sith were making their nests these days aside from the old temple...

[Fromikeable]

The guards always eyed Vance with a degree of suspicion whenever he went out on his walks. Novus had made it clear that he could take them these days, and to be certain, he lacked the ability, equipment, or suicidal tendencies to throw himself out into the frozen wastes, but he supposed it was their job to be suspicious.

Even if he made the attempt, there wasn’t another settlement, refuge, or landscape devoid of Rhen Var’s usual blowing blizzards for hundreds of kilometers in any direction.

So as he set out today, bundled in his winter robes, black as the night sky, he sighed as they searched him and inspected Hedrax. The poor little dragon was always so mystified by the process, and whenever he bit the crass inspector that invariably prodded his stomach, it was all Vance could do not to chuckle.

Again, he supposed that would be all the reinforcement they’d need to think him a sadistic, twisted individual like his most of his “colleagues”.

But the entire point of the walks was to forget about all of that. Well, that and to let Hedrax stretch his wings. As he became a bit more mature, he found it easier and easier to fly against the wind that was nigh constant. Vance still worried, but even if the small reptile disappeared from sight, his presence never went too far. And the more walks they went on, it seemed, the more ease he was having of riding the currents.

At least one of them could feel like they were soaring.

Beginning to make his way out of the Temple and into the landscape beyond, he ensured that a small tracker the guards gave him was functional. Sure, it let them make sure he wasn't going too far, but beyond that, if something happened, he'd prefer not to freeze to death. The apprentice passed out of the great stone walls into the whiteness, the sight of absolutely nothing but some blowing snow and an untouched tundra greeting his sight.

Hedrax, naturally, leaped into the air with a happy gusto, the little dragon's presence flickering with relief as his wings stretched out fully and he ascended into the sky above. Vance couldn't help but crack a small smile as the microbeast reclaimed his liberty without a moment's hesitance. Lightly tugging at his friend's presence, he began to set out on his own small journey, his own appendages yearning for some use.

He didn't walk anywhere in particular. There were few places to go, save for a few old ruins a small ways from the Temple proper. Picking one without any real thought, he trudged toward slowly, sensing his companion do flips and dives above. The dragon landed on his hooded head a few times with "ferocious" roars, biting a bit of his hair before launching back up. It might normally have made him laugh, but today it only prompted him to swat the dragon on the snout playfully. "You punk."

As one of the ruins approached, he studied it idly. They were all in horrid shape; the Temple had been the only thing maintained or restored, and so the elements had done their number here. Granted, with such thick stone walls and earthy structures, that didn't say much, but-

... what was that noise?

Pausing where he stood in the snow, the apprentice scanned the ruin. It had been a shattering sound... glass, perhaps? There wasn't much left to the windows of these ruins, and there wasn't likely to be glass anywhere inside that he could hear. Had the wind simply shut in another? It wasn't particularly fierce today... perhaps it was simply a moment of relent after a window had had snow stacked against it for a good long while?

Curious more than anything, he trudged toward the sound's epicenter.

[Talau the Ever-Lurking]

Her senses stretched out through the building (and for a short distance outside of it), very carefully brushing against anything that might be living. Mostly small snow and ice creatures that had found shelter in the frigid building for their sleep...but so far nothing that would react to a lightsaber. Well...she had better hurry up then, and melt herself a way out now so she didn't have to later on.

Flicking the igniter on Talon, the violet blade sizzled to life only moments before she shoved it upward into the snow, letting the compacted and frozen liquid turn to slush and steam. It took only a matter of moments for her to clear a way out, including melting the remaining broken shards of glass and some of the wall so that she would easily be able to get out again. Even as she shut the blade off again and stowed it, turning around back toward the building itself, something prickled at the back of her neck. Her brows furrowed at the sensation and she looked around....nothing in particular reached her eyes as far as 'threads', but as she turned back toward the window something flickered in and out of her senses.

One hand reached out as if in a dream, fingers tracing along the intangible thread with what may have appeared to be a sort of trance-like expression. It...it couldn't be....

What would he be doing here?.....of all places....No, it couldn't be him. But what if... This line of thought continued as she stretched her senses along that tenuous link in the force, trying to garner more information without overly revealing herself. Whoever, or whatever, it was...it was headed her direction. Perhaps the best course of action would be to find a spot to hide and wait. Withdrawing her presence again, she searched around the shambles of the room. Rotted and overturned furniture would provide little place to hide, but some of the collapsed ceiling and walls might. In a blur of motion, Talau had swept over toward the crumbled remains of the floor above. It had toppled downward, taking out part of the wall beneath it and creating a crumbling ramp upward. Shooting up the 'ramp' into the darkness above, she lept the distance across to the other side of the second floor room and peered down toward where she'd just been on the first floor through a small hole in the floor.

[Fromikeable]

The wind was rather uncooperative as it gusted in his face, impairing his vision of the window until he was good and close. He squinted, trying to overcome the whiteness of the snow and sky… only to see a rather clean cut through the snow, with even bits of the window simply chopped off. Small puddles of ice were forming where the melted snow water was gathering, but the window’s cuts still glowed bright orange.

... uh-oh. That was without a single doubt a saber cut. And a fresh one. Had Novus said she’d be going into these ruins today? She never went into these ruins; anything of interest in them had no doubt been removed when the world had been seized.

So who the hell was spelunking into ruins with a lightsaber?

Yanking at Hedrax’s presence urgently, the little landed on his hood with a huff, somewhat annoyed over the cancellation of his flight. But as the dragon inspected the cuts curiously as well, smelling them in wonder, Vance took the dragon’s head in his hand and turned him so he would face him.

“Go. Find. Novus. Understand?” Reptilian eyes blinked at him in confusion, the draconic head tilting in further wonder. “Hedrax, Novus.” Another few blinks. For such a smart dragon, the creature had proven to have little understanding of language. Sighing a bit, Vance tried to remember what little Novus had told him of Beast Control. The mode of communication… something something… don’t be arbitrary? He abandoned his words, instead connecting with the reptile’s presence and instead flashing a few images of Novus, then a few of her walking toward the ruins. They prompted the same head-turning, but this time the beast took the sky and soared toward the Temple.

… Vance wasn’t sure if he’d understood the whole “bring her here” part of the instruction, but at the very least, Hedrax knew who he was flying toward...

… hopefully.

Sighing, his saber was in his hand as he slowly lowered himself into the ruins. His presence moved like a mobile fortress, his defenses up, but his senses outstretched, scrutinizing. Walking at a snail’s pace, he pulled his hood down, his hair poofing out as he cleared it from his ears.

Finding nothing in the initial room, he made his way toward the next, step by step.

[Talau the Ever-Lurking]

It was cold.

The longer she remained still, the more apparent this became, even with her long coat and gloves on....it was just damn frelling cold!

Shivering slightly, Talau simply remained where she was as she watched through that slight opening below her eyes. For a long few moments there was no movement...no sound...nothing; then is happened. Into the building came a black robed form, hood up, and presence like stone. Even so, stone had pours, cracks, chinks...stone had flaws...and it certainly was something visible. At this range there could be no doubt in her mind. Same height, same color aura, same presence...even the way the hood fluffed out oddly spoke of only one person she knew: "Vance."

The name was only barely whispered, little more than a slight movement of lips and air, something that would easily vanish amongst the sounds of the blowing wind, but it carried through the force just the same. It was an uncharacteristic, and unintentional, slip from the normally overly cautious woman, but the thoughts that assaulted her mind in that moment had her reeling. It was a wonder she hadn't completely released her hold on her presence because of it. However, as soon as she let that singular thought...no, it was more than just a mere thought, it was thought and emotion all in one...slip, Talau hardened her presence and drew it in even further, tightening down on it as if trying to cut herself from it altogether.

She moved silently into a crouch from her prone position, wondering what she would do now. Sith robes, on a sith planet, with no master in sight or sense...there were few enough logical conclusions she could draw from this other than: he had turned to the Sith. Again she shivered...or was she trembling now? The thought of having to put down a young man who had had so much potential, who'd been so good and kind...guilt gnawed at the pit of her and she swiftly blinked back the tears she felt trying to form. Every learned instinct told her one thing: crying would only get her killed in the end. As much as the thought appealed to her presently, Talau couldn't allow it. If she died here too much else that was at stake would be in jeopardy...and, as sad as it was, the sith were already too dangerous, growing in numbers too quickly.

Her eyes swiftly started draining their color to a muted and stormy grey...

Well, if she couldn't convince him to leave, she would have to do her job. Chronos or not, she was still a jedi Shadow...

Standing, Talau slunk along through the shadows of rubble and dilapidated furniture as she moved to follow Vance from above.

[Fromikeable]

He stood still, listening like a hawk. His eyes darted about like scalpels, his skin prickled from the cold and goosebumps. His nose twitched, sniffling lightly and doing its best to smell what the wind wouldn’t simply carry away. There wasn’t anything here…

… except for the little ripple in the Force that nicked the back of his presence like a single-long itch. His head snapping to the side, his eyes practically memorized the room, squinting with focus.

...this is a bad idea. Most of his common sense told him not to go any further, and he was inclined to listen. He had no idea who or what he was dealing with, save for that it had a lightsaber and was either very, very fast or very, very good at hiding.

Either of the latter implications didn’t give him tons of confidence about his chances if it came after him.

So after a few more steps, looking through doorways and down the length of the room, he stood silently, clearly in deep thought. He would just have to wait for Novus to show up, hopefully with some soliders. It would be odd enough for Hedrax to arrive without hi-

There was a loud cry behind him, causing him to spin on his heel as his saber hissed to life. His robes spinning, he landed in a classic Soresu stance with unprecedented finesse, his saber’s dark green color making the room glow from floor to ceiling.

Hedrax barked inquisitively, having landed right outside the window and looking in.

Forcedamnit Hedrax. Shushing the animal, he beckoned it to come inside. That, of course, it understood (the sly little sonuva-) and looked about curiously, not quite as keen to any apparent dangers as he was. The dragon would come to jump up onto his head again, sitting and looking up, head turning left and right.

Vance sighed, patting the dragon. When it barked again, he looked up scornfully, whispering urgently. “Hedrax, you need to shu-”

When he saw a foot move in the darkness, he went dead silent. Noiselessly plucking the dragon up and placing him inside the back of his robes, he watched the ceiling like a statue.

For a few seconds, there was nothing but the howling wind. In the next second, he made his best guess as to where the foot was going, flicked out his hand, and directed the Force to tear down the rotting wood and crumbling stone above, taking a few steps back in the same motion.

[Talau the Ever-Lurking]

The strange cry didn't just make Vance jump. Up above, Tal flinched and jolted just slightly, her footsteps halting as she flickered her presence out toward whatever animal it was that had made the sound. It had to be an animal, after all, since Winds knew there wasn't a being she knew about which would make a noise like that. Still, she was cautious with the action, just in case. Reassured that the thing was, in fact, a creature of some form, Talau got to moving once more.

She hadn't missed the fact that Vance had ignited his saber, either. If anything she was all the more wary from it, but so far Talon rested within its hiding place, unlit and untouched still. Of course, that didn't stop her from feeling the tension building beneath her. It also didn't stop the pervading silence from putting her on edge...especially when the floor gave out inches in front of her. It was too late to stop, and she wasn't going to go down uncontrolled and lose any chance at being ready for an attack...so she did the one logical thing left: pushed energy through her muscles to bound off the edge of the floor where it had just collapsed and go shooting like a bullet along the wall toward the other side.

With a snap and swish of the hem of her long coat, and the sound of grating dust and small debris, the woman skidded to a halt on the other side, looking down at the figure below. One hand was held out from her side just slightly, palm facing inward, ready to call her saber to it if necessary, but otherwise she remained solid, but neutral, her features only vaguely lit by the green hue of his saber.

[Fromikeable]

A lithe form above him dashed away from the crumbling ceiling, its robes swishing and its feet landing with a small skid just within view. Taking a few steps back and raising his saber to block at an angle akin to the form (and to spread the light a bit better), his presence pressed against it, prodding for information, weaknesses, thoughts…

… why did it feel so familiar? Its defenses were solid, but its style, its flavor, its… form, so to speak, were so eery, like he’d felt it a million times.

... it’s not Tal. No matter how much it reminded him of her, there wasn’t chance in hell that she was on Rhen Var. The Order had declared her M.I.A., and even if she had come back, why would she be in these random ruins barely a kilometer from what was effectively a Sith military base?

No, the far more likely explanation was that someone was trying to trick him. He stared up with a little scorn, not appreciating their effort.

“For someone who knows my master’s presence well enough to imitate it, you’re not quite good enough at sensing to sell it.” He spoke from equal parts nostalgia and a small observation that the individual hadn’t fortified their presence as well as Tal had back in the day. Hers had been nigh impregnable, while small cracks and holes could be found in this one. A small part of him considered that maybe he’d simply never noticed, or perhaps that he’d become a bit more astute at sensing himself, but those were thoughts for later.

[Talau the Ever-Lurking]

"For someone who knows my master's presence well enough to imitate it, you're not quite good enough at sensing to sell it."

Talau blinked.

...then blinked again...

...then she laughed.

She just couldn't help the amused (but short-lived) sounds that escaped her. Maybe he was right, in a way...the woman certainly hadn't been feeling much like herself. Things with the dark jedi (sith as she proclaimed herself) had started to eat away at her, causing damage to her psyche and this...revelation...had caused whatever camouflage she had over those to weaken and give way to the reality. Normally she was so careful....normally she was so good....but Vance, it seemed, still held some connection to her, and that made all the little flaws stick out.

Or perhaps he'd simply grown more adept in her absence...

Her stomach knotted slightly.

"I'm not sure if I should feel insulted, or agree with you..." she said finally, stepping closer to the edge of the toppled floor and letting the light bathe her features just a little more. "I am coming down...don't strike before you see who I am." Waiting until she had some form of acknowledgement that he at least heard her, she took another step and dropped down from the floor above, coat pooling around her on the floor for a moment before she stood once more. From this level it wouldn't be difficult to see just who she was. The features were all the same, if a bit more worn-looking, her hair...her clothing...her form...it was all the same as it had been before she'd left, at least it seemed so upon outward inspection.

Holding her hands out to either side just slightly, palms open and toward him in a benign gesture, she fixed grey eyes on him.

Finally she spoke once more.

"Vance...what are you doing here?"

[Fromikeable]

Finally, he got a response. A woman’s voice, equally familiar. The laugh unnerved him slightly. Another psycho? He’d had his fill of them on Taris. Maybe she was some acolyte of Jess’s come to try and play tricks or… settle some non-existent score. What could that madman possibly think Vance owed him, considering the Zelosian had already extracted any debts and then some when he’d practically roasted him alive.

Maybe the bastard just wanted to screw with him for kicks. Vance would hardly put it past him.

But an offer for this person to at least come down from their position was one he was willing to take. He would take another few steps back, his saber still raised defensively as his left hand curled his fingers at them, beckoning them down. As they landed with a thud, he was about to take another step back, slowly working his way back toward the exit.

When he saw her face, however, the shock that formed in his own was easy to see.

His immediate reaction was that it was still a trick. Perhaps this woman was so good at telepathy that she was making him hallucinate. Perhaps it was a Force power, or-or Sith alchemy…

… even then… no one knew what Rilans looked like.

His jaw hanging open a bit, he rose from his defensive stance, his saber pointing toward the floor dumbly for a second before it hissed closed. His eyes searched her face frantically, as if it was a visual puzzle his life depended on.

“... I… you can’t be....” His body trembled a bit as he let out a small chuckle of his own. His was obviously stressed and confused, doing what little it could to alleviate his sudden anxiety. It was all just a bit too much for him to process.

“... either your some chameleon assassin from Korriban, I’m dreaming…” he rubbed his eyebrows with his fingertips, only letting down his guard the smallest bit, “... or the Force has an awful, terrible sense of humor.”

[Talau the Ever-Lurking]

This was a bad idea, said that little voice called doubt in the back of her mind. Keen sight took in his change of expression and stance, his body language saying more than he did, at first anyway. As his eyes searched her over, Talau simply stood...unmoving and unmovable...for as long as necessary. Honestly, if her eyes and her breathing hadn't given her away, she may have been mistaken for a very life-like and detailed statue.

"I...you can't be...Either you're some chameleon assassin from Korriban, I'm dreaming...or the Force has an awful, terrible, sense of humor."

What could she tell him? What should she tell him? The two were not necessarily mutually exclusive, but that didn't mean that everything she could tell him he should know. How would Toth handle this?... she found herself wondering as she slowly lowered her hands back to her sides. First, she needed to assure him of her identity...but on a sith-run planet she couldn't simply open herself for him to inspect. If she'd not been captured so soon after she'd taken him on as her padawan, there would have been no doubt...he would have known by the slightest hint of her presence...but they weren't afforded that luxury.

For a very long moment there was silence, only the wind outside breaking the still peace as she thought, combing her memory rapidly...

....and then she smiled.

"What does the galaxy really look like? I don't know...there are many more questions that tie into that which would determine the true answer...and I'm not old enough, or wise enough, to answer them for you..." There was a heartbeat's length of pause, giving him a moment to absorb the impact of those words before she continued, a very slight, impish, smirk on her face...though her presence was tinged with bittersweet emotion. "Perhaps nothing we experience is real, and all we are is the very vivid dream of some greater entity..."

A soft sigh escaped her and she lowered her eyes, shaking her head slowly...almost sadly...

"I'm still impressed that you thought enough to ask such a question..." she added quietly, seeming to speak more to herself than to him.

[Fromikeable]

The silence made Vance’s body tense, as if waiting for an explosion of an explosive that should have gone off seconds ago. Was she thinking? Analyzing his stance? In a lull of psychotic thought? Had she died standing? Each thought after the next became more outlandish. He would chastised the pattern of thought, but… frankly, him ever seeing Tal again had been outlandish a few minutes ago, and yet here she stood.

When she did speak, he stared her down like a hawk, as much watching her lips move as listening to what sounds they formed. At first, it was just… random. Maybe that notion of a some sort of random seizure wasn’t so insane. But no, wait… the question was moot, but the answer...

… by the time she was done, he could practically smell the garden in the Temple on Coruscant. It had been a sunny spring day, hadn’t it? Perfect for meditating.

If his wide eyes didn’t convey his revelation, his somewhat shaky saber-hand did. The tool hissed to a close, leaving them both in a small degree of darkness, the only sounds that of the howling wind outside and him clipping his saber to his belt.

“... I… don’t understand.” He shook his head, a few nervous laughs exiting him. His mind very clearly was still just trying to wrap itself around the idea that… well, the ideas that she was… well, alive, and on Rhen Var, and… and talking to him… and alive and on Rhen Var and ta-

God, that was a logic loop and a half. As he tried to unravel it, he rubbed his forehead. He could only think to try and learn more, as if to test if it was all a dream. “... why… why and how are you on Rhen Var?”

[Talau the Ever-Lurking]

There was a short eternity of silence that stretched between them, both lost in their own worlds it would seem, but both recounting the same one they had shared that day. How long ago was that by now? Talau wondered that even as the hum of his saber died, leaving only the frigid wind. It was a far cry from the tinkle of water calmly trickling into fountains, or the soft gurgle of water among the smooth stones of the man-made streams that flowed through verdant gardens somewhere far far away in this galaxy of theirs.

"I...don't understand."

That shook her from her musings, her eyes lifting again to gaze at him instead of seeing only the shadows of a past with a bright future. Her look was one of cautious curiosity...almost as if she were afraid to wonder what it was that he didn't understand, but was curious anyway. As he continued, however, she sighed. Well, it was better than some of the questions he could have asked her to start with, she supposed...but certainly not a topic she wanted to cover. Even so, she owed something to him in reply.

But what to say?

"There's only one 'how', Vance...a ship. As for why...that's...a bit more complicated. Still, I'm looking for something. I suppose I'll know it when I see it..."

[Fromikeable]

Her joke just added his flustered expression, his defensive stance slowly returning to a normal one, his platinum saber gripped a bit more loosely in his hand. It… no one else could have known that, but… she was gone, wasn’t she? Even if he’d never left Taris, even if he’d never left the Order…

… he’d just… been so convinced he’d never see her again. For his relatively stalwart degree of optimism (broken occasionally though it had been in his time with the Sith), even back then, he’d resigned his hope that they’d ever meet again.

And yet, here she was. Whether she be a ghost or a hallucination or… some cruel trick of the Force, here she stood.

Needless to say, he had questions. He just had too many to choose from.

“... we… really, really need to be a little clearer on both of those.” His head shook a bit, chills hidden beneath his cloak. Where had she been all this time? What sort of assignment had she disappeared on? Why did her presence feel so different? What was she looking for? Did she know he was here too? Would she have come to see him if she did? Could she have (probably not, but still)? What about everyone back at the Order? Was he considered a traitor? A casualty? Did she know about his fight with Master Caelum? With Locke and Jazen? Were they all okay? Was she okay?

A million questions a minute, all of them competing for his tongue. The first to win was simply, “... where have you been, Tal?”

[Talau the Ever-Lurking]

"...we...really, really, need to be a little clearer on both of those."

For once (in a long time) Talau chuckled. It was barely audible, but it lightened the thin orange and yellow threads that seemed ever present in her grey eyes. No doubt he would be able to notice that at such a close distance now, too...the foreign grey coloring that shaded her eyes completely, like storm clouds washing the color from the world and making it drab and dismal. They didn't used to be such a color...long ago, in another life, they were much more vibrant.

"...where have you been, Tal?"

He always did ask the hard questions, didn't he? That had been part of what had drawn her to him, his curiosity and the ability to pick the difficult questions to ask. Her eyes wandered the dim room as those orange and yellow threads turned to small spikes in her irises, joined by cracks of deep blue. It would all show vividly for a moment before grey washed over it all once more, dimming and dulling the colors to where they were more easily missed. It was something that was reflected in her presence...an uncharacteristic slip of emotion from her here, a vague waver of her concealment there...What did she tell him? The truth? No, he was probably better off not knowing the full truth...not if he was here, of all places.

Of all the times she needed some remembered gleam of wisdom from her masters...this was that time.

...but she conjured nothing.

Finally, though, she remembered something that had often come to her mind when dealing with difficult situations like this: the best lie is the one closest to the truth.

Winds help me....guide me through this trial...

"Leave it to you to always ask the difficult questions, Vance..." she stated, finally looking back to him with a small sigh. "I...ended up half way down the rabbit hole, chasing a dark jedi."

Half way was putting it mildly, she thought, but....it was almost the truth.

[Fromikeable]

His brows would furrow at her response. She’d been the one to encourage he ask the hard questions, after all. She’d always enjoyed them, and with her, the easy ones were never as interesting, fun, or expansive. At least, they hadn’t been. These days, he didn’t ask questions just because that was the way he was wired. Living with the master of Sith intelligence, you learned what could happen if somebody withheld something, if some secret was left unseen.

No, questions these days weren’t just interesting. They were imperative, and their answers were life-changing.

Thus his brow. Her answer was hardly surprising; it was almost word-for-word what he’d been told by Order when they came to tell him that he was being reassigned. She had “fallen out of contact”, they’d claimed. They tried to sell it as “an expected loss of communication”, though they’d also noted that “the mission’s time of conclusion was an unknown”.

He didn’t hold it against them, not wanting to say she’d fallen off the radar and they had no idea where she was. He just wished they hadn’t left it quite so open for mental debate.

“... half-way, huh?” Cracks in her presence. Her being on a Sith planet that didn’t have much tactical value for a Shadow; the only reason any of them should be here was for Novus, and it’d take far more than just Tal for that. Her almost belabored laughter. Her… sobriety. The way she bit back that sigh. Shouldn't she be happy to see him? Even if she thought he was a convert to the Sith, why not something about how they could go back to Coruscant? Something about how they could both leave right now and he'd be a Jedi again by next week?

Something was off. This was Tal, but it wasn’t the Tal he had known.

“... and what exactly happened with you and that dark Jedi in the rabbit hole?”

[Talau the Ever-Lurking]

It wasn't going to be so easy to lie to the younger man, even if he had been her padawan...perhaps especially because he had been her padawan. What did she tell him? His expression alone was enough to tell her that he was trying to piece things together on his own given what he could already sense from her and what she had already said. Vance never had been foolish or inobservant...it was part of why she'd been so keen on taking him on as a padawan, after all: she wanted a padawan who could keep up with her. Vance had been that padawan.

A bit of snow toppled into the darkened room with a dull and wet sort of crunch, followed by the shrill whistle of the wind outside picking up once more. Taking the momentary distraction, Talau's head perked sharply to peer around Vance's shoulder. Truthfully it was half utilizing the noise as a distraction to buy herself more time, and half truly being startled by the sounds. The woman who had been 'keeping' her made even little things send a shock of cautionary adrenaline course through her more often than not. It was just a mater of location how jumpy she may actually be at any given time. Being on a sith controlled planet seemed the best place to be jumpy, and so she honestly was.

Besides...if she even caught a hint that Talau was up to something other than her task...

The woman shuddered slightly at the thought. Thus far she'd been able to keep knowledge of Vance from that horrible woman, but now? Things were becoming more and more precarious the longer time drew on...

Grey eyes, threaded lightly with orange, would look back to Vance as she knew she couldn't stall the answer any longer. But Winds help her if she was any closer to knowing what to tell him. Finally she sighed deeply and rubbed her face with a hand. "Vance, I can't tell you...but believe me, it wasn't...and isn't...good." Looking up at him once more, Talau dared to reach for him...just to touch his arm. In all honesty she didn't even want to think why she did it. It was a foolish action that would cause no small amount of problems, and questions, and emotions that she just couldn't afford to feel...but she knew why she had. She wanted reassurance that he was alright, even if all of the information she had from their surroundings and their short interaction logically lead her to the conclusion that he was anything but alright.

"Vance...the sith? Please tell me you didn't..."

While her voice may have trailed off, her words continued with her eyes. If he'd willingly gone to the sith because she'd been gone, she would never forgive herself. The slight cracks presence grew as the thought gnawed at her, building on that hate and sorrow she already felt...that already gnawed away at her...and all she could hear in her mind was that frelling, unctuous, seditious, sadistic voice. "Not to worry, my stubborn little apprentice...life will teach you how to follow my ways more easily than I ever could. I'll still give you a head start, though, and I'm sure that soon enough you'll be thanking me for teaching you how to handle the cruel trials life will throw at you."

[Fromikeable]

She was so jumpy, so… nervous. Tal had never been nervous like this before. She was sentient as the rest of the galaxy, and she’d had her moments, but… she’d never been so blatantly anxious before. He couldn’t help but glance over his shoulder toward the exit where she had looked. Was she contemplating running? Would he try to stop her? Should he?

Seeing her so… belabored was almost a little painful. He was hardly relaxed himself, but he wasn’t about to run from his first interaction with her in over a year.

But the grey eyes foreshadowed her vague answer. In a way, he appreciated them, sparking his reaction of a stressed sigh before the words finished leaving her mouth. In another way, they didn’t matter; he had been hoping for… virtually anything aside from a “I can’t tell you”. He’d take anything, whether it was a detailed dossier or the most cryptic and uselsss of hints. He just wanted something, mainly because her telling him anything would be an assurance that she didn’t want to just leave him hanging, to leave him…

… well, to leave him in general. He would never, ever admit it, but deep down the darkest recesses of his being, he’d felt… abandoned. Again.

To his credit, however, he tried to swallow his pain a bit. His presence barely flecked, his only physical indication being the sigh. A small part of him held a twisted hope that if her defenses were so worn, perhaps her ability to sense had been dulled just a hair as well. There were far more important things to talk about beyond topics for their next group therapy session.

Like her question. That made a small lump form in his throat as he swallowed. If she was being so vague with him, how vague should he be back? Was she keeping things quiet for a reason? Should he, in turn?

“... no, I didn’t.” The bare minimum. After a second’s worth of thought and a somewhat guilty expression, he added, “It’s, uh… well, it was complicated.” His fingers drummed on his legs within his cloak as he squinted a little bit, reviewing the entire history himself.

“... it still is.” After another moment of silent reflection, he cleared his voice a little. They could broach that topic more later... he hoped. Desperate to change the subject, he glanced back at the entrance.

"... are you expecting someone?"

[Talau the Ever-Lurking]

He sighed...and that sigh spoke volumes to her. Talau excelled in her sensory abilities, and unfortunately for Vance, her damaged presence was, perhaps, false indication of dulled senses. If anything her senses were only heightened, used almost to a point of paranoia in situations like these...always expecting her to pop up at the worst times. The young Rilan knew she couldn't best the woman in open combat, or even a struggle of wills and abilities, so she always hoped that such interactions as these would remain unnoticed and go by peacefully. Still, Talau didn't need the force to read into that sigh.

What must he think of her? Probably that she had neglected her duty to him...left him to his fate at the temple alone. Nothing could be further from the truth. The truth...hah. She nearly scoffed aloud, only barely holding the derisive sound back. What good would the truth do anyone right now? She couldn't have the jedi helping her or things would get...

"...complicated."

Complicated? Yes that was the word, even if he had used it to describe his own situation rather than hers. Still, he hadn't joined the sith by choice? Then why was he here? Had he been captured? Forced into it? Her mind raced, flecks of color appearing and vanishing in her eyes as a smattering of emotions tried to surface. The only thing that stuck, however, was a dangerous yellow that slowly bled into crimson around her irises as her desire to murder everything that moved on this planet (Vance aside) grew. Maybe if she came up with a good enough reason that little witch in the ship could be useful in....no.

No, she had to stop that thought right there.

Thankfully Vance questioned her earlier glance behind him, giving her mind the opportunity to focus on something other than the growing outrage at both sith and jedi. "Expecting? No....but...if I'm not careful, the person I'm not expecting may show up and..." she trailed off a little, anxiously tugging on one of her gloves in nervous habit. Should she tell him more? Should she just tell him everything? Something? Should she leave it at nothing? "Vance...you have to know that I would never leave you willingly. Please tell me you know that?" She hadn't meant for it to sound like she was begging, desperate to hear that he wouldn't think such a thing, especially since she was almost certain he must have. Tugging on her other glove, the woman shifted uneasily. "No...no let me rephrase that: I would never leave you and not return, unless I had no other choice. Please believe that."

Perhaps the damage was already done, but she could hope that her rephrasing would at least help stave off some of the questions. Or maybe it wasn't the questions she was afraid of, but his possible actions, or the possible pity, or...she just wasn't sure. She wasn't sure of anything right now...

[Fromikeable]

Her anxious response made his eyes dart between her and the exit a few times, not quite taking what she said at face-value. The person she wasn’t expecting “may show up”? So were they expected? He didn’t understand. Who could have the drop on her such that, even in her wildest dreams of security and secrecy, they could simply appear? Was it this dark Jedi? A normal Jedi?

And more importantly, if why did she… fear them so?

Vance shivered. Talau was just as sentient as he was, but seeing her physically afraid set an uncomfortably fine chisel to his conceptions of the world. He was wearing the robes of a Sith apprentice on a Sith planet with a Sith temple wondering about when his Sith master would come looking for him. Tal was dark and battered, thinking with a dark, battered mind, looking over her shoulder for a darker, battering Force-user who made her eyes filter through colors like a kaleidoscope.

Mixed with the remorse, anger, and befuddlement he felt, he couldn’t help being just a little amazed that either of them were here, and furthermore that they had a chance to just… talk.

Her question drew his gaze back solidly on her, his eyes squinted with a bit of thought as he frowned. His automatic response was stopped before he could open his mouth, perplexing him further. Of course she hadn’t simply deserted him, right? She would never.

… she would never... no, not Tal, she wouldn’t...

“I believe…” He paused again, still compounding the words. Swallowing and clearing his throat a little, he stalled for a second more.

“... I… believe… that you’re doing your best.” He seemed to blink, as if surprised by his own answer, then quickly nodding in agreement.

“... I know you didn’t just ditch me, and I know that however much I just… no matter how I felt, it never changed the fact that you didn’t leave on purpose.” He bit his tongue to stop a somewhat more rueful part of himself from mentioning that she had never told him where she was going, or what her mission was. He hadn’t been angry at the time because she’d had to go. He’d been angry because she had been declared missing-in-action, and he had absolutely no idea where or why.

He hadn’t raged, but he’d steamed, and he wasn’t proud to admit that he wept. Because that time he hadn’t just lost another master. He’d lost his master.

With a small sigh, he refined his thought. “I believe you didn’t and don’t have any choice, and I wish I could help you.” He offered up a small, sad smile, but it quickly broke down to another frown. Smiling was a lie at this point, and he wasn’t much of a liar.