In the Wake of Shadow

[Dire Wolf]

Shortly after the Battle of Coruscant’s conclusion

Of all the battles Rhissai had witnessed, all the destruction the Sith’s fury wrought, not once had she believed that their hatred would touch her home. Her home. Where her first steps were taken. The same halls that had seen her play tag with friends as a youngling had been strewn with casualties, both friends and strangers. A window that watched over her during countless hours of study had been shattered; the skyline beyond had once been filled with glittering towers and mountains of metal and concrete. Now? They looked like broken teeth against the setting sun.

Deep down, beneath mountains of serenity and grace, wrath festered. Outrage. So many battles had been lost during this damned war, so many planets conquered to the Sith warmachine. What had scared her most was that this rage hadn’t been focus around the havoc the Sith had caused, but rather the sullying of her home. To her shame, the one moment of privacy she’d enjoyed had seen a trinket thrown against the wall. A little thing; a necklace that had been given to her by grateful tribesmen in the outer rim. That simple, shattered amulet hadn’t left her neck since that moment, and probably wouldn’t ever do so again.

How ironic was it that the most important battle had been won, yet it still felt like a defeat? At least to Rhissai, who had spent her time stepping over the wounded and recently deceased, dispensing healing and comfort where she could. Giving comfort had been the hardest. In the initial stages snap decisions had to be made while triaging the wounded; who could be saved, and who had to simply be let go. While she may not have remembered the faces of every person she allowed to pass on, no one could have forgotten their feelings. The whole gamut of human emotion had been seen, from rage to fear to relief. Relief had sliced through her the deepest.

But that stage of treatment had mostly passed. Energy had been spent on those that could be saved, and most had been. Though desperate people still carried their loved ones into the temple daily, at all hours, for the most part those that had survived would continue to do so. Another moment of privacy was afforded, and rather than throw a tantrum the woman merely allowed herself to slip into a chair after a quick shower.

After days of use, shredded battle gear had been cast aside to be replaced by a set of black pants with a white tank top. Something could easily be thrown over once her shift started yet again, but that wouldn’t be for another few hours. Slumber should have found Rhiss like an old friend, yet it did not. After only a few minutes, a single eye peeked open to see those broken teeth out of the window and wonder what cruel jest the Force intended by keeping her from sleep.

[Ghostie]

The acrid smell of superheated metal wafted on the unmoving air of the Jedi Temple’s main hangar bay, floating nowhere in particular as it lingered in nearby nostrils and rested on the taste buds of those Jedi who had the adequate faculties to sense the burning, cut metal. Though the Jedi Padawan helping her, a Togruta boy with long blue and white montrals framing his rusty orange face and simple cream robes which were now stained with grease and grime, had turned his nose up for what must have been the hundredth time that day, Gaeriel Krieg barely flinched. As the teenage boy peered under the last in a long line of battered Aurek Tactical Strikefighters that the pair had been working on that afternoon, he looked for some sign of progress from the Jedi Knight. But all that Rokaa Bey saw was the brilliant white-blue flash of a fusioncutter, almost blinding even from this distance, and Gaeriel laying on her back as she worked on the starfighter’s underside. The Jedi Knight wore her dark flight suit, the arms of which were secured around her waist, leaving the top half of her body in a simple white tank top, which was nearly as dirty as the Padawan’s robes. She wore goggles to protect her eyes from the blinding light of the fusion cutter, and her golden hair was braided and yet disheveled, somewhere between out of the way and uncared for.

And the Jedi Knight’s face was set in a grim determination, unsmiling, unhappy. For all the time that the Togruta had ever seen Gaeriel in the hangar bay, she never looked this way. She was always upbeat about something. Always had some funny quip to throw out. And Rokaa had assumed that today would be no different. After all, it had only been a few weeks since the end of the War with the Sith and their Empire. While the Jedi were not exactly happy with the stalemate, they were happy with the ceasefire, and the end to the violence. Padawan Bey had seen a certain uptick in smiles around the Temple. In warm feelings of relief and rest across meditation chambers. In the return of Jedi once thought lost, or who had been unable to leave the front lines. So when Knight Krieg had strode into the hangar to work on the Jedi’s fleet of starfighters, the Togruta had expected her to be elated. Instead, all he had gotten was the cold snap of a voice, deadpan glares, and a hard, set face.

Without warning, a square piece of metal flew out from under the starfighter at lightning speed. If Rokaa hadn’t had a prickling sense of Force awareness climb up his neck, there’s no doubt that he would have had a face full of blasted armoring. The piece of metal clattered to the floor a few feet away, not far from the Knight’s feet and the Padawan’s crouched form. There was one large hole ripped through it, and the white paint was scorched and blackened all around. The signs of a laser bolt having torn through the armor. Rokaa studied it for a quick moment, his eyes lingering perhaps a little longer than they should. He had never flown a starfighter before. He imagined that it was hard to limp the craft back to the Temple with such a grievous wound in it’s underside. A curt voice shot out from under the Aurek after the metal armoring, snapping Rokaa back to the present, and the task at hand. It was Gaeriel, and she was not happy with the wait that the Padawan was putting her through. It seemed that with everything else, the Jedi Knight was short on patience today, as well.

“Rokaa! The other piece!”

The Togruta turned towards a metal cart nearby, which held just a few more pieces of armoring, in various sizes, shapes, and colors. The handful that were left had been the less choice pieces that Gaeriel had decided to forgo for better fits. Not that they weren’t efficient, but they perhaps were the wrong fit for whatever craft she was working on. The pieces were a bit heavy for the Togruta to pick up and pass to the woman under the fighter, so instead he used the Force to levitate one off the metal cart. Slowly, and sure not to bump into anything or to drop the piece he had one hand extended towards, Rokaa spun it around flat, and slowly slid it under the Aurek so that it was next to and above Gaeriel. There was a pause for a few moments, and the Togruta started to strain with the metal armoring in his Force grasp. That was when he heard the hiss of muttered curses from under the craft. The teenager felt the Jedi Knight take hold of the piece, and she rolled out from under the starfighter on the small, wheeled table she had been using, holding the metal armoring in her arms with a strength that betrayed her small form.

"Rokaa, this piece is BLUE!"

"Yes, Knight Krieg, I - "

"Karkin’ BLUE!"

"I - "

"You see the Aurek?! What color is is?!"

"White, Knight - "

“EXACTLY! It’s white! So why you are passing me a karkin’ piece of blue armoring, when there’s plenty of karkin’ white pieces still left?!”

Her voice was short, and curt, and left out no hint of annoyance. Plenty was a relative term. While there were certainly a few piece of white metal on the cart still, there were only a few to choose from, and most of those ranged in sizes from small coverings to large expanses, with little in between. And even fewer of those were white. Gaeriel supposed that Rokaa was trying to pick the piece of armoring that was closest in size, but the Jedi Knight didn’t just want close in size. She wanted the piece to be both close in size and in color. She wanted it to be perfect. She wanted whatever Jedi flew this craft next to feel both protected and like they belonged. Standing, Gaeriel tossed the piece of metal aside, not bothering to look as she did so and almost clipped Rokaa’s shoulder. She strode over to the cart of armoring, and examined her options for a few moment.

There were a few white pieces of durasteel armoring left, as she imagined, but they were for the most part much larger than Gaeriel needed. Still, she could scrape something together. Hoisting the smallest of the durasteel plates off of the cart, once again with a strength than betrayed her form, the Jedi Knight ignored the Togruta boy as she took the armoring to the starfighter and laid it across the craft’s nose so that it was balanced, yet free on one side. Lifting her goggles over her eyes once again, Gaeriel reached for her lightsaber out of instinct, and found the green blade missing. Destroyed on Utapau, just before she had been recalled for the Battle of Coruscant. Lost, along with her Apprentice, Aramis. The sudden reminder than both of her constant companions were gone made the young woman pause for a moment, and her face fell. Trying to not give Rokaar a moment to perceive what had just happened, Gaeriel snatched the fusion cutter up and off of the floor, and set to work cutting the piece of armoring into just the right shape.

"Get lost, Rokaa. I won’t need your help anymore." Her voice was quieter, but still held it’s edge as she dismissed the Togruta. "I’m sure Master Fyek could still use a hand clearing rubble from the Great Hall." And without so much as a whimper, the Master-less Padawan left the Knight to her solitary work.

[Dire Wolf]

Sleep refused her, again and again.


Even after that peeked eye had been rebelliously closed to the sight of twisted spires in the distance, and her thoughts cleared, still her mind refused to rest. In spite of her best efforts, twisted images of the battle’s carnage flitted across her mind’s eye. Sulfurous fetors of spent thermite and burnt flesh refused to leave her nose, even after being absent nary a month. AFter what had felt like hours spent paradoxically fighting the urge to stay awake, the old master’s eyes peeled open once again to view Coruscant’s shattered jawline.

A frustrated moan snarled out from her throat before every inch of muscle went slack beneath her, as though allowing herself to fully melt into the centuries old couch would yield appreciable results. It did not. Another groan, this one closer to a growl, came from her after finally relenting to consciousness. It wasn’t uncommon, for sleep to come rarely for her, yet every time it was ultimately irritating. Most would suspect that the high amount of ambient emotion, both positive and negative, had interrupted her sleep. Or, slightly more accurately, that it was the horrors that her mind had yet to process. Event the horrors wrought by the Sith on her hadn’t been the cause. Oh no.

It was a different, more subtle thing. A flitting at the absolute fringes of her mind, where an old bond had been forged. Utmost loss had been passed through that bond for a long time. Too long. Just before the Battle of Coruscant, in fact. In the confusion that had passed by those tumultuous weeks, Rhissai hadn’t the time to pour through the casualty reports nor speak to her old friend. Not that she had to. That same loss had been felt by the Jedi Master, with the loss of her own student decades prior. Time was the best way to heal that wound, and she assumed that if Gaeriel wanted advice she may seek Rhissai out.

Force knew she’d been given a lion’s share of cliches, each one felt like little more than lip service. “It’s in the Force’s plan.” “Remember, death is just another part of life.” “Padawan Miki has rejoined the Force, and she’s a part of all of us now.” Each one had been met with a curt smile and nod, as though that bit of repeated wisdom had truly struck her. Even her masters had repeated the same lines of drivvel, and in the same breath had told her to move on. As though losing a child was that easy.

Miki hadn’t been Rhissai’s child in earnest, but she had taught the girl since age eight. Provided food and fun, as well as lessons and smiles. If the Master isn’t the Apprentice’s parent, than who? Before she could fully realize what was going on, Rhissai found her boots slipped over her feet so that they may carry her across the Temple. Wounded civilians had long since filled up the temple’s Medical Wing, and less critical patients had been lined up against the walls. However, once she passed out of the hospital section the temple was relatively empty barring the occasional restoration service. Fighting there had been heavy, just like everywhere else on the planet.

Rhissai had barely reached the hangar’s entryway when a teenage kid tore through the door like a bat out of hell. A barely muttered apology to the High Councilwoman was quick to follow, but before she could so much as catch the boy for questioning he had rounded a corner. The boy could wait, she supposed, and was probably fleeing the very creature Rhissai had intended to approach.

Through the hangar doors was a flurry of work. Welding arcs flared from multiple angles, casting dancing shadows that stretched across the room. People moved in a desperate attempt to repair the starfighters, should the newfound peace be some manner of trick. It wasn’t. The Sith had committed everything to the final push into Coruscant, just as the Republic had thrown everything they had in her defense. In the end, everyone in the galaxy learned what happened when an unstoppable force met an immovable object; Carnage. Yet, philophy wasn’t why Rhissai found herself in the hangar that day; rather it was the blonde hellion who rested on a white aurek about halfway across the room.

One of Rhiss’ lightsabers, the purple one, lifted from her belt to find it’s way before her old student. It would prove to cut the plate far better than any arc-cutter. The Jedi Master was quick to follow, albeit at a determined pace, until she stood just off the Aurek’s nose. “It was either this, or a nap on Nomi Sunrider's recliner. Thought I'd rather be tired than wake up with a kink in my neck.”

A few deft movements and telekinetic manipulation of a lift’s controls brought her across from Gaeriel’s position on the starfighter. “So, old friend,” she sighed and shot a knowing look, ”how can I help?”