Hard Thoughts

[Karl the Unfettered]

Vivienne Hawke was not the type to feel down for long, when she felt down at all. What could bring her down, anyway? Not even the Archeri Plague could cause her more than a headache, or the occasional nose bleed. No, she was only susceptible to one thing, more insidious than any disease:

Boredom.

And lately she'd been bored, verging on depressed. In some ways she missed the days of the Plague; there was chaos everywhere, her skills were useful, her attitude helped keep people going. Now? She wasn't much use in a reconstruction phase, hence she'd jumped at a shot to head to Circumtore and smooth the way for the Exchange to set up shop there. Intimidating the locals and squashing dissenters, while not as bloody as she liked, was nonetheless entertaining.

But even that had gotten beyond her. She had to branch out, she realized, find a different niche other than wanton chaos and indiscriminate destruction. And while she was happy to learn, she wanted someone to teach her so she wouldn't screw up so often out the gate. And who could stand being around her long enough?

It all coalesced into feeling like she'd hit a glass ceiling in the Exchange. Which was objectively stupid, she knew everyone was just glorified contractors who were assigned work as and when needed. But why did her jobs have to be so few and far between? Lately she'd had to make her own work, it felt like, and even then it didn't pay well enough.

So here she was, sitting at one of the bars, glass of strong shit before her. Normally she'd be guzzling it down like no tomorrow, psyching herself up for some new deviltry in her future, but this time she just sat there, staring into it, head propped listlessly up on one hand with the elbow planted on the bar. She hadn't even bothered with her usual clown-face makeup that morning either, so at the moment she looked more or less normal apart from her eyes.

Her trademark hammer lay folded up on the floor, tilted against her stool.

[Rugs]

Io’an stepped out of the speeder with a yawn as he threw his arms wide to stretch out his back. Nar Shaddaa’s long night was not to last much longer, with the last earliest hints of morning just barely visible above the distant horizon. In a few hours, the sun would crack the sky and they’d trade a few dozen hours of darkness for the same in light.

Regardless, it felt more like early evening to the Sephi, who was returning to the Eye after a brief jaunt into the city’s lower levels. Io’an Aetoris was many things for the Exchange: a slicer first and foremost, but he’d found a happy niche as a field agent in the year and a half or so since joining the Exchange. Since the Archeri Crisis’ violent conclusion, he’d taken up the role of a diplomat of sorts, venturing to meetings with Hutts and other competing enterprises to judge Hutt Space’s newly-reformed landscape.

The Exchange jockeyed for prime position, as ever — esepcially with the Cartels laid low by the Archeri onslaught — but Ms. Faine knew well the value of working relationships with others, especially if they were mutually beneficial. And especially especially if they favored the Exchange over other such parties.

He was returning home from one such venture--a meeting with a smalltime gang that called themselves the Roving Rancors. Their leader had more ambition than sense, and Io’an doubted much would come from the Rancors’ overtures, but they got a hearing, at least.

That was better than some could ever hope for.

“When’re ya coming back to the Gremlin Pit?” Reflex’s deep voice chirped in the small speaker Io’an had yet to pull from his ear. “You got time to grab some of the good shit for yours truly?”

Io’an snickered as he stepped into a turbolift. “Something told me you’d want some, Reflex.” The lift’s doors pinged as they shut and it whisked Io’an off to one of the opulent casino floors. “You somehow always ask me to bring something back from the main tower when I get home.”

“Look, watching your scrawny ass is thirsty work, ok?”

“Is it?” Io’an’s smile was coy, even if no one was around to see it. “Maybe I should bring you some water instead...”

“And maybe I should kick your ass!” Reflex’s threat was all in good fun, though Io’an could only imagine how scary it might seem to anyone who didn’t know the Herglic like he and Qiki did.

The lift settled with another ping as the doors opened to admit Io’an to his destination. “Yea, yea, tough guy,” he said. “I guess I’ll bring you some back.”

“Knew I could count on you,” Reflex said, and then line went silent.

Io’an wandered along the floor for a few minutes until he found the bar Reflex preferred. It was fairly unoccupied, save Vivi, who sat alone with a Force-knew-what in a glass before her. He nodded to her as he came up to the bar and put in his order for Reflex. He was, by all means, going to leave their introductions at that, but noticed a gloominess that hung around Vivi like fog.

Io’an didn’t know Vivi very well, but he knew her well enough to know that was unusual. He drummed his fingers on the countertop, tapping along to some half-remembered song as he turned his violet-ringed gaze to her.

“Something on your mind?”

[Karl the Unfettered]

Oh hey, it was Io'an. Or Yoyo as some people called him. "Some people" being herself and Qiki, and they counted despite some other folks' efforts to make them not count. Normally that sort of thought train could cheer her up, but for some reason it just brought her funk into sharper relief. She glanced backward, met his nod with a half-hearted wave, and went back to her drink. No doubt he was too busy to hang out, as usual.

Except he wasn't. Was he talking to her, or on that earpiece she could see? She let the words hang in the air, and when they weren't followed by more words she had to conclude he was indeed talking to her. Weird.

"Oh hey," she replied with a sigh. "Yeah, I... I got lotsa stuff on my mind." He'd sat down and asked, and he couldn't leave anyway until his drink was ready so she didn't feel bad about unloading on him. Hell, whining to someone else might help her feel better!

"Lately I been feelin' trapped, sorta," she began, twisting the stool to face him directly with her own purple gaze. "Jobs been scarce, kinda feelin'... I dunno, overlooked? Iced out? Tried findin' my own work an' that don't pay as well as th' shit from Missus F, yaknow?"

She sipped her drink, grimacing at how it'd gone flat. "Ugh... I'm thinkin' maybe I should expand, a bit? Learn more skills 'r somethin'? Like, this Force shit that still ain't gone away." She made her glass rise up in the air, then let it tap gently back down. "I'm feelin' shit, Yoyo, an' I don't much like it. Maybe I act all tough 'n shit but it sucks seein' how people really think, an' I dunno how to close it off yet! We got plenty a' Forcies, there's you 'n Vancy 'n who knows who else?"

She huffed a sigh. "I'm not that hard t' get along with... am I?"

[Rugs]

Silence lingered. That was unusual — Vivi was never one to let a good silence go unbroken, for better or worse. Io’an had a deep appreciation for silence for not filling the air with unnecessary words and an understanding of wanting to keep to oneself. He was just about to shrug, to let the silence drag on and mind his own business when Vivi spoke up.

Vivi said a lot, and Io’an wasn’t quite sure how to respond to it. She spoke of feeling trapped, feeling isolated and stuck in a rut, so to speak. Io’an considered himself a pretty empathetic person — especially for a criminal — but he couldn’t relate to what Vivi was feeling. Not in the Exchange.

“Hmmm...” he grunted, fingers still tap-tapping on the countertop, to give some signal that he’d heard and was weighing a response.

“I can only speak for myself, but you can be,” he said, slowly, after a long, thoughtful silence. Might as well rip that bandage off. “I don’t mean that as an insult, though.” He looked at her as he said the second, expression earnest. “We’re pretty different people.”

Vivi was boisterous, feisty, occasionally combative, and often bloodthirsty. Io’an was none of those things. It was hardly surprising, to him at least, that he tended to avoid her.

“As for the rest, well, I don’t know,” he said honestly. “I’ve never felt freer than I have since I came to work here.” Sure, work came and went, but as Io’an saw it, there was always something that needed doing, even if it was just helping out in the repair bays. Money was of little concern to him — he always had enough to cover his needs and most of his wants, and living at work made the personal expense of his own needs negligible, at worst.

“We used to work for the Hutts before we came here,” he said. “Qiki, Reflex and me. I don’t know that that I’d say we felt trapped, but it wasn’t great. So we left. Miss Faine offered us work after the Blind Auction, and we made the switch. Sometimes change helps.”

He leaned forward on his elbows, drumming with his fingers on his forearm. “Not that I’m telling you to leave or anything. Change can be any sort of thing. You can feel the emotions of others now, better than you’ve ever been able to.” Io’an gestured idly at the glass Vivi lifted from the table a few moments earlier. “Maybe that can help you understand the others so that you don’t end up feeling as you do now.”

[Karl the Unfettered]

What was he saying, here? That she should be grateful for what was coming to her and just have faith that more exciting stuff would come along in time? "Don't git me wrong, I'd be dead inna gutter if Missus F hadn't let me stay after she killed my ol' boss." For some reason she grimaced slightly when she mentioned him. 'Boss'. 'Father' or 'Master' was a better word for that old bastard and what he had been to her. Did Io'an know about all that? Probably not, she wasn't in the habit of talking about her past.

She liked people to think she just was, after all. Never mind all the misery that had led to her being who she was, she didn't have time for pain! Not when life was supposed to be enjoyed! But she wasn't really enjoying herself now though, was she?

"Missus F rescued y'all from th' Hutts, sounds like. Might say she rescued me too, my ol' boss was a serious fuckhead." Dammit, she didn't want to, but the words were coming out anyway; may as well roll with it, she guessed. "Boss ain't th' right word though, he kinda raised me... made me who I am, what I am. An' lately I'm thinkin' maybe that ain't such a good way t' be..."

This was probably what really had her down. This unexpected self-awareness of her own deficiencies; all that stuff about feeling trapped or overlooked was just words and symptoms.

"How can I understand someone else when I'm barely startin' a' understand myself, Yoyo? I ain't used to feelin' this sorta stuff and I dunno what a' do with it. Or maybe I just had too much t' drink." Which wasn't true at all, Vivi was a horny drunk and she was still on her first one anyway. She sipped her glass again; it was even flatter than before, and she scowled and waved for a fresh one. "All this Force shit, does it always drag ya down this way? I ain't felt this shit before."

The fresh drink came and she sipped it gratefully. "I ain't gonna leave, I wouldn't make it on me own fer long. I just... I wanna sort this new shit out, is all, can't be feelin' all dragged out when shit hits th' fan, yaknow? Maybe yer ain't th' right one t' unload all 'is on, but ya did ask." Besides, just talking about it with someone who sort of understood where she was coming from was already helping her mood, just a bit.

[Rugs]

Io’an listened, occasionally nodding his head or otherwise motioning to show he was paying attention as Vivi vocally worked through what was going on in her head. He could empathize with her in a way, at least about the sudden emergence of lingering Force sensitivity in the aftermath of the Archeri crisis. He’d been born with the ability to touch the Force and even now, after actively using it for more than half his life, it was still daunting.

Feeling others’ emotions. Holding the capability — which he had in spades--to read their thoughts without their knowledge. Being ever aware of the constant, unending pulse of life, especially on this overcrowded rock.

Io’an shuddered. A chill ran down his spine; a common feeling when he fell into thinking too deeply of the Force in all its terrible wonder.

“The Force is... a lot of things to me,” he said slowly, thoughtfully, after Vivi finished speaking. The question lingered in his mind, about dragging him down. He wouldn’t quite but it that way.

And yet...

“It’s life. It’s strength to carry me when my own fails. It’s wonderful. When I’m truly in tune with it, it’s sweeter than anything I can think of. But it’s also...” Io’an’s brow furrowed and his expression darkened. “Well, you were around while the Archeri were here. All that stuff they did—that was all the Force, in their own weird way.”

He sighed, shoulders sagging. “I try not to think about it too much,” he muttered. “But anyway,” he pushed on, rubbing at the tattooed side of his neck as he glanced at Vivi, “I’m sure you’ll get it worked out. The Force, your place here — all of that. Things have changed a lot out here since the Archeri left. For better or worse.”

Subconsciously, Io’an reached out through the force, beyond the walls of the cozy little cantina aboard the Blind Eye and beyond the floating casino itself. His reach spread over the city below, to the ruins of the Spire, still towering like a broken crystalline mountain over glittering cityscape. Where a consciousness filled that great and terrible structure, now there remained only an emptiness. An echo of songs unsung.

Io’an closed his eyes and drew back into himself. The whole experience lasted a handful of brief seconds, if that.

“I think we’ve all got some shit left to figure out, y’know?”

[Karl the Unfettered]

"Ain't that th' truth," Vivi replied, agreeing with his final statement after listening carefully to his words. "Shit sure has changed! Before I'd never doubt meself like 'is." The Force was strange and mysterious, and lots of people used it for lots of reasons. She was one of those people now, but she had to figure out what those reasons were.

Well, apart from the obvious. Serving Missus F, helping her friends... wait, friends? Well, what else would she call them, business associates? That was too impersonal. Besides, with Io'an specifically here, after dumping all her feelings on him, she couldn't just call him a "business associate" anymore, she was pretty sure.

"I try not t' think too much about anythin', really, but sometimes ya gotta, eh? Like right now!" She sipped her drink a few times, talking and thinking being thirsty work for her. "Yer a good sort, Yoyo, anyone ever tell ya that? All quiet 'n patient-like, we oughta hang out more! An' you can teach me more 'bout this Force stuff!"

She wasn't quite back to her usual self yet, but there was definitely a bit more pep and snap to her movements now as she threw back the rest of her drink and tapped the bar for another. "Git Yoyo one too! Boy needs hair on 'is chest!" she finished cheekily, grinning at him.

[Rugs]

Despite the heavy mood that settled over his mind, at least — as often happened when his thoughts drifted to the Chorus and the violent change they’d affected on Nar Shadda and the broader Galaxy — Io’an found himself grinning just a little bit. It was a small, thing, here and gone as Vivi teased and called for a drink from him, but it at least lifted his mood.

“I try my best,” he said, eyeing the clear drink in a shot glass the bartender brought out alongside whatever it was Vivi was drinking. Io’an was a regular of sorts, seeing that he lived in the floating sky casino, the workers tended to learn your tastes after a while. He nodded gratefully as the bartender muttered something about Refle’s order nearly being complete and returned to his business.

“But I don’t know if I could really teach anyone,” Io’an said, slowly. He fidgeted with his hands and had yet to down the shot sitting atop the bar before him. “I feel like I’ve barely scratched the surface with the Force most of the time, to be honest.” For a moment he wondered if any others within the Exchange now carried the same newfound gift as Vivi. They hadn’t been the only ones infected, and there were reports of newly awakened Force-sensitives all over Hutt Space.

Interesting. Troubling.

“So what do you intend to do?” Io’an arched a blonde brow slightly as he looked at Vivi and raised his shot glass. “Now that things are settling down, I mean.”

[Karl the Unfettered]

Vivi shrugged. "Keep on hustlin', I guess," she replied, toasting Io'an and throwing back a sip. "Can't sit still 'round here, yeah? Sittin' still means sittin' dead after all!" She was feeling better by now, and gave Io'an one of her usual toothy grins. "Cheer up, Yoyo! Ya know more 'n me, an' that's really all I ask for from a teacher!" What else did a person need from a teacher anyway, she wanted to know.

Now that the foul mood was mostly gone, she was starting to feel itchy again, like she needed to do something soon. Meh, if nothing else she could hit the gym, do some workouts, maybe spar with an idiot or two. "Good talk, Yoyo, but now I gotta go git shit done. See ya 'round!" She left a credit chit on the bar for her tab and a tip and stood up, reaching out for her hammer and calling it to her hand with the Force, then clapping it to the magnetic clasps at her back. Then she walked out, whistling and skipping and humming under her breath.

Which was concerning. Io'an would know from experience that Vivi was only that cheerful when someone else was about to get badly hurt.