The Laboratory

[Ashlin Li]

Ashlin's next hour and some flowed by with a gentleness that might have been baffling to the staff assigned to supervise the Crusader's prized guests. The two Jedi chatted softly together under the glaringly white sterile lights of their now very-warm quadrant of the laboratory, heavily guarded, and smothered deep in the heart of the Sith warship. The world around them had granted a strange reprieve in the chaos, which Ashlin and Erril accepted without wastefulness. The Force itself ran through almost everywhere, though the energies that had been most fed and kindled in this place were of a darker persuasion.

The two Healers built up a small, strengthened, bubble with quiet laughter and banter, the occasional peaceful word to the staff, and the very gradual amassing of the brighter energies they drew out from the blackness. Even at much weaker than their best selves, both Jedi had spent enough years of their life at this task now that they could pull light from bleak places and make it strong.

Ashlin worked with Erril's lungs before he slept, though they kept careful not to ask too much from her own reserves and elected to keep his pressure mask on for the moment... Maybe in a few hours. He was a little feverish and she wasn't much less, but it seemed the proactive kind. She stayed sitting in the medical bay for a little while after that, blinking and coaxing her vision centers into making a little more sense of the scattered input.

Eventually, she made eye contact with one of the surgeons she'd connected more with and gave the Arkanian man a faint smile. After a softspoken few words, the tired woman thanked him for retrieving two small and carefully rolled bundles of personal belongings from the carbonite casings: in such condition as they were after prolonged time frozen in inferior stasis technology. Ashlin tucked both small rolls beside her in the chair without worrying about them yet.

She raised the rest on the front of her chair a bit higher to keep her leg elevated, and then the darker-haired of the two Jedi rested her head again near the more Sephi-blooded man's arm. Even in the relative quiet, exhaustion, and the small fortress of their own energy, it took a while for her mind to stop fighting her. But she breathed, and eventually the woman fell asleep thinking of rainstorms drumming on stone rooftops while the frogs sang in the puddles.

[Erril Winterhold]

Fingers clasped Erril’s hand for a moment, then slipped away from his reach as the waking world washed his dream away. He came awake with a mild start and reached out after the hand that had been in his. Memories flowed back into view, and so did his conscious thought processes as his eyes turned upward and away from his bed to scan the room. In the far corner of the room, he saw a woman standing at a medical station with her back turned as she worked. Her hair was red. Erril’s jaw clenched and he turned away, rubbing his hands together. His searching eyes fell on Ashlin, lying with her head on the side of his bed, and her body splayed across her chair. He smiled, brushing – or rather scraping – a lock of her hair from her face and back over her pointed ear. He hadn’t had occasion to notice until recent years, but his niece didn’t seem to be very good at sleeping in one place… Or maybe that had just been a product of their circumstances. She wouldn’t have been the only one who slept fitfully when the darkness was heavier than the light. Erril’s eyes glanced back over at the red-head for a moment as this memory ran through his mind, and he frowned.

A couple of deep breaths served to center Erril’s disquieted state, and he focused his mind on his physical state. It occurred to him at that moment that he could see. He rubbed his palms gently over his eyes for a moment, then glanced around the room again. The woman at the terminal was actually a strawberry blonde – not like the girl who had occupied his first few waking thoughts. The difference was comforting, for some odd reason. He continued to glance around, taking in all the details he could about the room, until his sharpened eyes eventually found their way back to his bed. He glanced at himself, and Ashlin, and realized they were both reamed with sweat. Good, that meant they’d both been sweating while they slept, which would be helpful to the chelation therapy regime they’d started earlier. Still, as he lifted his arm to tug the tube from his nose, he felt his sleeve cling to his arm like a second skin. That needed to go away.

The Jedi steeled himself for a moment, then began pulling the intubation out of the port on his pressure mask. The sensation was entirely unsettling, and he felt every uncomfortable inch of movement as the tube withdrew from his formerly embattled lungs, and up through his nasal cavity. When the tube finally popped out of the port on the mask, he pulled the mask down and rubbed his nose furtively. Such experiences were unnatural. Still, he was free of it, and as he savored the feeling of breathing freely through his nose, he realized that he was also, in fact, breathing freely. Erril silently praised Ashlin for her work earlier and removed the positive pressure mask from around his neck.

“Doctor,” Erril whispered, catching the attention of the strawberry blonde physician at the far end of the room. She turned at his call, and approached quietly. When she reached his bedside, she said nothing, but Erril noticed her appraising eye looking over him, and taking in the intubation gear and breathing mask laying at his side.
“I’d like to take a shower, if that’s alright. Are there fresh clothes I could borrow?”

The physician nodded. “Yes, I’ll get something for you. Can you stand alone?”

That was an excellent question. Erril knew that he was physically sound, apart from the blood and respiratory issues, but he hadn’t actually used his body much yet. Pulling the thin sheet away from his body, Erril shifted his legs carefully so as not to disturb Ashlin, and swung them over the side of the bed – he noticed that he was barefooted. The deck was cold under his feet, and his toes took in the texture of the hard, rubberized surface. When he stood, he felt lightheaded for a moment and placed a hand on the bedside while the physician reached hesitantly toward him. He smiled at her and nodded, then moved slowly in the direction of the other room she pointed out.

The shower was hot within a few seconds of turning the faucet, and it felt like he’d stepped into another dream. The sweat washed away, and so did a measure of the weariness as he stood in the downpour. With a mild force of will, Erril reached over and turned the faucet in the opposite direction. The hot water turned cold, and his body immediately reacted to the comparatively fridged water that cascade over him then. For a moment he cringed, but then he acclimated to the new temperature, and then he could feel his body rousing itself in earnest.

Cloths were present in the outer room of the refresher when he emerged, as well as a simple pair of slip-on deck shoes, and he began to don them after toweling off. They were simple grey garments, similar to the ones he’d made for himself in past years, though certainly of a better fabric and stitch. As he started to swing the shirt around he shoulders, he happened to glance in the mirror, and paused.

He let out a low whistle. “You’ve let yourself go, Winterhold.”

Erril had maintained his body at peak physical condition for most of his life, and enjoyed the health benefits that followed, but as he looked at his reflection, he was not surprised that his body had struggled. The two years they’d spent on the expended world cobbling together resources for their journey homeward had been sparse ones. In that time, however, he had never really stopped to notice how much he had thinned out. Much of his muscle definition was still present, but there was significantly less muscle to be defined on his frame. He was… skinny. He shook his head with a regretful smile and buttoned down his robe before returning to the lab.

Ashlin was still asleep when he returned to her side, and he wanted to keep her that was for as long as possible. The sleep had clearly done wonders for him, and she had worked harder than he had before finally following suit. With that in mind, he gently reached out with his mind and checked to see where she was in her sleep cycle. Deep sleep, good. Pulling up another chair, he settled down by her feet, and rested a hand on her ankle. It took him a moment to hone his awareness down to the proper depth, but he could sense the thrombosis in her leg. It was closer to her ankle than her knee, which was good, but he still didn’t want to take any risks. Were he in slightly better condition he wouldn’t have thought twice about breaking down the clots on his own, but despite the rejuvenating cold shower he could still feel fuzz at the edges of his mind, so he would follow the safest course of action.

One of the first lessons Ashlin’s mother had ever given Erril was an understanding of how to manipulate the pain response with the Force – that was, how to redirect it. He’d since learned more of that process, and realized just how profound and minute a process it actually was. Using his index finger, Erril traced a gentle line along the bottom of Ashlin’s foot. A bio-electrical signal carried the tickle response from the nerves in her foot up her leg – and diverted through a shunt in the Force, dispersing itself through Erril’s nervous system before it could reach her brain. It was working. 

A needle filled with transparent green liquid floated off the bed beside Erril and slowly inserted itself into the major artery of Ashlin’s leg. He felt the prick of pain as the needle punctured her skin, and then a slight sensation of pressure as the plunger pushed down and injected the bacta serum into her bloodstream. He carefully tracked the progress of the foreign matter as it moved through her circulatory system and halted its path before it reached the clots in her vein. This was the part he needed to be most careful of. Normally he would have been in control of the entire process, using regenerative energy and gentle pulses of persuasive energy to make the tissues do his bidding, but that was still a bit of a stretch for him just then. Telekinesis, on the other hand, was reflexive for him. 

Using careful attention and delicate control, Erril navigated the fluid through the first two clots without actually allowing the bacta to come into contact with the congealed blood. He needed to break the clots down in reverse order so that no dangerous blockages were formed. A chain reaction at that point could throw a clot into her lungs and cause pulmonary embolism, which he wasn’t prepared to deal with. And so he navigated the bacta carefully, starting with the leeward side of the clot nearest the heart, and allowing the incredible, responsive molecules in the serum to revitalize and loosen the blood cells. It took time, and enough focus that a thin trickle of sweat began to run down Erril’s temple and across his stubbly cheek. 

All three of the clots were dealt with in similar fashion, each one carefully scrubbed away at the cellular level by the bacta serum which Erril gradually allowed to be carried off in Ashlin’s blood stream as it’s usefulness was expended. In the end, the vein was free once more, and blood flowed freely through the former points of constriction. Erril dipped his head and breathed a heavy sigh of relief. Potential crisis averted. When he glanced up again, he startled and turned to look at the strawberry blonde physician who was standing next to him watching. She offered him a candid smile, and a glass of water before returning to whatever she was doing across the room. Erril watched her go, caught somewhere between perturbation and gratefulness, and then turned back to Ashlin. She was still asleep, and Erril’s legs tingled with the multitude of nervous impulses that surely would have woken her by now otherwise. He allowed the connection to slowly fade, and then leaned back in his chair and sipped the cold water. He had a headache now, but it was a fair trade for the peace of mind he’d gained in exchange.

[Ashlin Li]

The Jedi woman found herself returning to consciousness again, although now her mind drifted awake more from a slow tide itching a bit while it lapped in over her feet than from the breathless panic of being thrown off of a sharp ocean cliff in a rainstorm with her limbs chained.

Ashlin let her mind process for a few heartbeats before shifting her body, still breathing in the slow pattern of light sleep while she took stock of her own self. Her body felt... so much better than it had... and her mind, shields, and senses were much more her own. She wondered briefly if the last day had been a fever dream from carbonite sickness... But there were already too many cues confirming that it had not: she was still in that ship's med lab.

Her system was far from in perfect state, but she was so much closer to whole now. The climate controls were closer to standard again; she was sticky with dried sweat, but no longer feverish from blood poisoning or immune reactions. The chelant drip was gone, too. Her oxygen and circulation were drastically improved... The thrombosis, burning, and edema buildup in her leg had all been tended... very skillfully, with more than just medicine... Erril was the only solution that made sense of that; which meant he was in worlds' better state than he had been. That was so good to know. He'd been plenty stable the last she remembered, but she'd still worried about him.

Eventually she blinked her eyes into focus and quietly regarded the large surgical bay. She felt Erril on her opposite side now, so she took in the lab first. Her Arkanian surgeon was across the bay. There was also a reddish-blonde woman, who was probably Human, and a Sullustan doing something with a datapad. Ashlin watched the Arkanian bring a mug of caf to the reddish-haired woman, noticing that at least some of the staff looked about as worn out as her body still felt... Waking and rehabilitating frozen Jedi hostages didn't seem to be their main pastime... but then, what was?

The large medical room itself was much whiter and brighter than she'd expected; more a sterile observation lab than something as visually ominous and Sithly as she'd have half-expected from the first Darksider's leering attitude. But it was his ship. She felt sure about that much. With a long sigh, Ashlin pushed her arms against the edge of mattress beneath her and sat back up, slowly.

She made eye contact with Erril, who was sitting in a chair beside her now, quietly letting her recover consciousness on her own terms. He looked... So much more himself. Thin still, but a world healthier. She realized it was the first time in two years of her memory that neither she nor Erril's systems were grappling with a tibanna reaction, and Ashlin gave him a faint smile.

Erril was also... very... clean. The grease and carbonite residue was scrubbed off of him... and his hair had seen soap... He'd changed into fresh, and much sturdier, clothing that looked like something neutral from the ship's stores... A mostly-empty water glass was set beside his chair on a small metallic table. Ashlin felt her ears flush in her hair.

Everything about the scene had turned so disorientingly... calm. How deep asleep had she been..? Coma? But it couldn't have been that long... The room was the same. The staff shift was tired, but the same. No one had moved her from the chair, and she still had a dozen fresh enough needle pricks across her body.

The ship felt the same. This place was not their friend... Less than 15 hours ago, at most, she'd been drowning and shackled to the other table... right there... with the sub-Sith taunting over her. That had all happened. She had 1 single ally right now on this vessel, unless Erril had learned something very comforting that she hadn't... But she didn't think that was the case... and he had still... Ashlin's jaw twitched, and her eyes flashed hurt briefly at Erril's with a fire quite a bit different than her mother's.

They were fine, though... Nothing happened. No one seemed to have come. The woman breathed in, and then out in a long and steadying sigh... Okay.

"Good morning, Erril," she murmured softly and a little distantly while she stood up.

Ashlin closed her eyes for a few seconds while confirming her body was sound enough to walk on her own. She added a quiet "Stay here, please..." and walked towards the approaching red-blonde woman to ask her about that shower.

When Ashlin stepped back after a minute, she gave Erril a calmer, much more somber and searching look.

(I need to... find a few minutes. That bath looks good. But Erril.. I can't—DO—this if we're not on the same page.) Or she could, but she didn't want to.

Ashlin retrieved a hair comb with 3 chipped-off teeth from her small bundle, and then just took the whole bundle on second thought.

She brushed her hand on Erril's arm when she walked back past his chair, unsympathetic to his headache just then, and lowered her perfect mental guard to quietly hand the man a nearly as perfect mental bomb in an instant before she walked off to find the soap and hot water to get clean and cry under before anyone else decided to come back and change the rules again.

With his mind much more clear again, Erril didn't need to let her pulse past his shields in the first place... But why wouldn't he?

* * *

She was so glad he was better. Her leg was well. She knew he'd kept that healing gentle on her, and she was sure the rest had helped. Her body had needed it... But—The sudden cascade of sharp images and feelings from across three decades of memory, with the odd few even older, was wrapped up in a thin shell that shattered into a thousand vulnerabilities that flew like shrapnel on contact. It was the drastically more advanced version of the telepath 'picture game' from her childhood. She'd used flashes plenty of times with Erril over the years since... Ashlin had always skipped over language sometimes... But not typically like this in Erril's case.

She'd seen what seemed a third of the Order and more hurting on gurneys. She'd wiped away their spilled blood and handed off bandages as a child, and done more later. Jarod. Silme. Kariime. Andrew. Jas. Leyana. Erril last night. Her mother. Svo'k. Burk. Seeing Arphax dead... Karas dead... Jarod dead. Although that idea had always felt like a terrible lie. Some of the experiences woven into Ashlin Faithe's memory weren't even her own to claim. She'd never felt that it was her right to share those, but here and now the telepath was too tired and she needed Erril too badly to waste time. —Blue-tan gardener's skin flayed open from someone's twisted idea of poetic justice. The spines were growing under the cuffs and into the raw sores on his wrists; his hands and mind shaking from poison. ::You're awake. Comfortable?:: Twelve hours ago, or whenever it'd been, right here in this lab, the Darksider's smirk was tangible about her seizing and drowning blind on the table. —The man let himself into the black cell and looked down in guilt, but practiced detachment at the unconscious woman he'd never met. She lacked a hand at the wrist, and the other was badly shattered. The woman lay curled on the floor around a tiny grayish infant wrapped in a thin cloth. He couldn't break cover... Then incredible guilt hit him as he realized the weakening child was dying before his eyes and would never wake again. He— ::Sleep well? Restraints.:: —The woman slowly ran her fingers through her hair, as if that could brush away the memory of that awful mask locked onto her face while she had no hands to claw at it with. It was seven years ago, and she still retched sometimes if a migraine made her remember.— The masked Darksider took a breath and leaned close over Ashlin on the table, gloved hand gripping her shaking wrist too-tightly. —Another Sephi halfbreed lost to himself in another retch-worthy memory of metal and agony, then a dark woman filled with illusions. He'd come back hating her mother, too scarred from mind poisons to look at her— (Or at his daughter.) ::You have questions, Master Li... But for now we have questions for you.::

This ship was NOT their place. Obviously Erril knew that... But he left when she was out deep enough to miss... anything... and Ashlin saw Erril hurt. Or herself hurt. The Sith coming back, or the other one. Herself crashing awake with hands gripping her throat. Or she'd made a wrong choice, and that first one in the mask was pulling her hair with a wicked little knife against her ear. And then they were gone away to put her mother in more danger, with more anger. Or Ashlin and Erril were split up, and she'd just never find out—

These people didn't even—They didn't want her.—

—She wasn't a child. She was Jedi. It was all somewhere in the covenant she'd been raised into, and her soul had accepted long ago that she'd deal with any of that when it came, if she needed...

He was right that it'd been fine. But preciously rare allies risking half the resources they had for finding all of the others—and leaving her too much sleeping to do anything—was not a need she had time for.

* * *

When the 'thirty or so' year old woman came back a bit past a half hour later, she found her chair again and sat across from Erril with her knees drawn up. She'd removed that last IV port from her wrist, and healed up the last superficial scattering of pricks and holes across her skin. The rest would just take a little time now.

Ashlin's frame was as thin as Erril's, but she was whole and healthy enough. Her long hair was clean and combed through, with her ears neatly tucked into it. She'd plaited her hair back into a familiar 4-stranded braid, a bit more complex than her own simpler one, with a few shorter layers that she'd just now cut back into it framing her face. The gray ships' clothes and slippers fit her fine, and someone had procured a simple gray bag for her which she'd tucked her remaining few belongings into.

Okay.

She picked up a 2nd water glass that had appeared, and quietly took a sip while she watched Erril.

[Erril Winterhold]

At first, he thought it might have been pain. Erril knew his senses weren’t quite what they should have been, so when he saw the sleepy smile on Ashlin’s face shift into something pained, his first instinct was that he had missed something while tending to her leg. It took only a moment for his astute eyes to take in the more telling nuances of her expression, however, and then his empathic senses followed suit, and he knew something else was wrong.

He saw the hurt of betrayal in her eyes, and that frightened him more than any threats their captors could have concocted.

Erril watched quietly as Ashlin stepped away, and remained silent and still when she stepped back. Her words stung, and he felt the significance of their implication deep inside. He followed her with his eyes as she collected her things and moved away once more. He was only beginning to process the stirring of emotions her hand on his arm had caused when a torrent of white hot mental force crashed over whatever passive shielding he might have held up around his mind, and drowned his inner being in a profound revelation of agony and uncertainty generations in the making, and something else he could only call anger, lest he belittle it by categorizing it into something more narrow.
Outwardly, the white-headed sephi lowered his head as the burning tirade of images ran their course before his mind’s eye, and as they faded, a single spot of moisture clouded his vision. Once again, he found that he’d made a terrible mistake.

The drops of condensation on the sides of Erril’s glass had gone undisturbed and had run down to form a tiny pool of water around it’s base on the surgical table when Ashlin returned. The Jedi himself sat cross-legged on his chair, resting in a similar pool of his own condensing thoughts. Where the sleeves had been rolled up during his earlier efforts, a keen eye might have noticed that the elder Jedi’s arms still sported a small collection of pin pricks that had gone unattended. He’d forgotten them entirely by then.
When he glanced up, his mind raced for a split second. He’d been greeted by the specter of a second woman, for an instant… Ashlin profoundly resembled her mother at times. Erril experienced a compounded sort of chagrin, finding himself staring almost literally into the eye of not one but two people whose respect he so cherished, and knowing that he had undercut the very same. The more he thought of it, the more faces began to stream through his mind – any number of precious others he could have just as easily… No.

Erril knew he had failed Ashlin in a very real way, but he’d never been prone to melancholy, and he wasn’t about to start – it wouldn’t help their situation any more than any other useless thing he could do just then. He met the younger Jedi’s gaze steadily for a long moment, willing her to understand his frame of mind… I was wrong

(You know,) he ‘said’ after another moment, brushing her mind gently with his internal voice, (I’ve always hoped that as my years added up, I might become a wiser man. It seems I’ve mainly succeeded in becoming an old fool instead of a young fool)

He glanced around the room, taking it all in and allowing his perception of the environment to color his projection as he continued. (There’s a certain degree of objectivity we learn to cultivate in these places… But that’s not really the point this time, I don’t think. I can’t take back anything, you know this. But I’m not blind, either. I see you, right here and now, as you are… and I understand)

Finally, after half an hour or more since he'd been left alone with his thoughts, the elder Jedi reached over and picked the glass of water up out of its small moat of condensation, and took another sip. He could think of no “right words” to end his thought with – his apology. So he didn’t. Instead, he reached back into his own memories and pressed an image gently forward to Ashlin's mind. A book laying open on some long past table. The page slowly turned, and revealed a new place in the story.

He wasn’t sure what he might have to face to regain some of whatever amount of trust he might have lost that morning, but he was determined that he would do so.

A while later, when both of their glasses were empty, and the physicians were in agreement with their assessment of their own physical state, the two Jedi left the place at last where they had been awaked from their carbon-induced hibernation into the starkness of the ugly world around them, and followed an escort to the quarters that had been allotted them until the moment of truth. Erril carried in his hand the bundle of cloth that had accompanied him on whatever misadventures had deposited them on this ship. He didn't have any need of the contents, but having them near was a small comfort that meant much.

Their quarters were every bit as spartan as had been promised, but they suited the needs of the Jedi as well as anything on this ship could. They had now simply to wait for the moment when their purpose on the ship would be revealed. The moment when, apparently, they would have a choice to make. Erril did his best to remain more intentionally aware of Ashlin in the time that followed their departure. She had been right about one thing to be sure. They were the only ally the other had, right then.

[Ashlin Li]

Ashlin kept mostly silent during that final time in the laboratory, gathering her own thoughts and her own self as best she could while she sipped water and dutifully ate the food the physicians brought out for them. It was a very stark place to find her first... not quite 'peace', but still 'quiet'... where for the first hour in over two years' of her memory, there was no fight inside her body and no task to be done. Only stillness.

She'd met Erril's gaze for a long time when they were both ready. Who'd been wrong or not didn't matter to her, and she was at least as glad as he was to move on from the page where she'd reached in to scrape out a thousand of the deepest, most shaking, parts of her and flung them out, still burning, into the light of someone else's mind. Ashlin didn't expect that she'd ever come to regret it, but Erril wasn't the only one who couldn't take anything back.

He'd stopped enough that he could see her now. Ashlin saw Erril more clearly, too... and the Jedi woman gradually realized that in the rawness of grasping for what to pour out at him, she might have not-quite conveyed something.

After some moments, Ashlin got up and purposefully scooted her chair closer to his before settling back into her perch with a worn, but much more real and calm, offering of a faint smile.

She was a private person. Not especially eloquent; but purposeful, and she didn't tantrum. Soul-baring floods of emotion... and anger... from her came from Trust that was already strong and deep-rooted enough to hold onto: not from its breaking, or from the lack of it. Ashlin didn't move until she was sure that her friend and ally knew that, whether it took an image, or touch, or spoken words. After that, she agreed with him on the new page.

Eventually it came time to satisfy the weary medical staff that they were well enough to be discharged from responsibility and cease risking life and sleep for.

The two Jedi said their brief thanks and farewells, and then Ashlin walked companionably near Erril while they calmly followed the vessel's guards to the spartan quarters and whatever would come after that.

---
Continued in the Guest Corridor.
(Link)

[Kaini Khatoin]

New Scene

Hours had passed, time had moved on. Everything from the dinner was a blur to him, everything except the pain in his chest. The pain alone still rang true as if it was a fresh wound that had only happened moments ago. The pain was an inconvenience more than anything, he had dealt with far wars, but along with the physical pain, there was of course the burden of the embarrassment that had taken place.

Kaini marched down the hall, flanked by four armed guards who were well versed in their tactics and trained frequently, he knew them well, and he generally treated them well. They had been assigned to protect him and potentially die for him if necessary, on more than one occasion however, he had saved all of them from death’s fiery embrace. These guards normally only accompanied him on missions that took him away from the safety of the ship, but for reasons that were obvious, they now accompanied him around the ship lest some unfortunate accident should befall him.

He approached the infirmary door and stopped, he looked at the guards and motioned his hand.

::Wait here, no one enters without my approval::

The lead guard answered with a sharp “Yes Sir!” It was then that Kaini entered the infirmary. He looked around and found himself an exam table and motioned for a technician before sitting down.

::Three ribs, cracked. Fix them quickly.::

His gloved hand found the front of his helmet as he cupped it, one of the techs returned with a syringe filled with something and Kaini shook his head adamantly.

::No drugs. Pain is meaningless to me, I have to keep my wits about me, the Chancellor would not be pleased with you if you had to wheel me out of here::

His augmented voice was sharp and clear, he shook his head and inwardly sighed. This was not the first time he had been here, but there was something that was more out of place about this entire situation than it should be. He searched his feelings, and reached out with the force to try and get the sense of his surroundings which should be completely familiar to him, yet something was amiss…

[Ashlin Li]

Ashlin had spent an hour or more in the halls after she left Erril. She’d been told very plainly that they were Chancellor Samja’s guests, and so the dark-haired woman made a point of testing the politician’s hospitality in the open. She’d spoken with several of the guards in quiet but encouragingly conversational tones, catching deeper glimpses into their knowledge of the ship and the spider-like aura that ran through it, whenever she paused to stretch her limbs or with the occasional excuse of a moment's rest. (Her body was still recovering, after all.)

Eventually the Healer’s daughter had turned her path back towards the medical wing, where instincts told her she’d have the best success in terms of easing the staff into giving her more detailed information with minimal influence needed. Ashlin had felt well on track to that goal, when the mood abruptly changed in the outer wing of the medical bay and she felt the unmistakably volcanic presence of a particular masked man.

“This… surprises me, actually.” The Jedi woman remarked quietly to Kaini as she entered the main medical area behind two other staff members. Ashlin took care to remain nonthreatening, and to walk far enough back that none of the medical technicians appeared to blame for her presence. She was simply here.

“I’d more expected to find you later.”

Ashlin kept back while the physicians fretted about broken ribs and painkillers. It wasn’t a complicated fix, but Kaini was volatile enough, and his honor guard seemed unmistakably protective. She was here, though. Jedi Master Healer or the daughter of one, the brunette woman was more than comfortable in this element and looked on past Kaini's retainers with professional interest.

[Kaini Khatoin]

::Later?::

His augmented voice cut the air in immediate response to the Jedi woman. He stood up and shoved the technician out of the way, and turned to face the Jedi, enduring the pain as he did. He calmed aura to the best of his ability and cocked his head to the side, as the hollow eyes on his helmet stared back at her.

::It's a ship. What could you possibly expect?::

He took twos steps closer her but remained more than an arms length away.

::You should be careful, everything breaks.::

His head drifted down and his eyes caught the lightsaber again, immediately he turned away, and stepped back towards the exam table.

::Did you come here to taunt me?::

There was confusion, mixed with anger, and despair in his aura, but it was not as hostile as it had felt when she last saw him. He was not on the verge of drawing his weapon this time, no. More than anything he just wanted to get his ribs fixed and be rid of these two Jedi once and for all.

[Ashlin Li]

The Jedi woman kept her eyes on the masked Darksider. She watched almost clinically for signs of injury while he shoved a medic away and abandoned the bone repair he’d just demanded a moment before. Maintaining her professional calm when he walked toward her, Ashlin gave Kaini a slight nod when he stopped at arms length. Then his back turned and the masked man was pacing again: now glancing at her sister’s lightsaber hilt, talking about broken things, and finally turning his back to her in a mood that seemed more from hopelessness than anything else. She'd seen enough of him to be aware that the man was noticeably attempting to reign back his aura for the moment.

“It’s a big ship.” She answered him after a half pause. “And... No. I was here first.”

Ashlin allowed herself a sigh. Behind perfect shields, she didn’t like this at all. She certainly didn’t trust Kaini’s subdued mood to last for more than a few minutes before he spiraled into the next manic swing of emotion… But here they were.

With a small motion of her hand and a conscious lack of any mind tricks or any mental influence at all touching the staff, the Jedi woman gave the technicians and surgeon simple directions to step away from Kaini or herself, as if her right to the infirmary was just a given. She was the Healer and guest now, after all. They’d clearly be fine here.

“So...” She spoke quietly, regarding Kaini’s dejected form with eyes like the grey-blue calm in a storm. “Earlier; before your last few hours and… experiences, tonight… you mentioned leaving our opinions of each other at the door. I could tend the ribs, if you want to try that.”

[Kaini Khatoin]

His head turned to meet her eyes that reflected back at her from the dark glass that covered his. He did not move the rest of his body and except to raise his hands signaling to the guards and to the medical team that his permission had been granted for her to be in here or this close to him.

::Ashlin Li, you ask so pleasantly and politely if you can kill me.::

He sighed, allowing himself a single moment of emotional expression. He raised his hands and a momentary bubble formed around the both of them, guarding each of them from any prying eyes both physical and of the force. To the technicians and surgeon in the room it would look as if nothing had happened, he then turned to face her head on.

::Join me Ashlin, together we can change everything. You're never going to go along with what Johnathon says, we both know that::

His voice was sharp and direct, the voice augmenters were simple, but they occasionally seemed to add their own touch to his voice that made him seem more sinister.

There was a touch of confusion in his aura and in his words, he knew he could not make this isolation bubble last for more than a minute or two because Johnathon would sense it. There was more to it than that though, there was deep seeded confusion that sat just on the tip of his consciousness threatening to unravel his very being.

::We are not the same.::

Immediately he dropped the bubble and continued to stare at her.

::You...want to fix me? Why Should I trust you?::

[Ashlin Li]

Her nostrils flared in a wry hint of a chuckle at the man’s comment about her polite wish to kill him. Ashlin briefly wondered how Kaini would react if she remarked ’You’re not wrong’ — But then the Darksider took it upon himself to change the situation anyway, so she abandoned the joke.

::Join me Ashlin,:: The man asked her within the sudden privacy of an illusionary shield. Turning directly to face her, Kaini presented her with the most typically Sith offer that she could picture. ::Together we can change everything. You're never going to go along with what Johnathon says, we both know that::

The possibility that this could be yet another trap wasn’t lost on Ashlin. If it was, she suspected that if anything, it might be another test from Johnathon at Kaini’s expense. The pain and confusion like fault lines across the subordinate Sith’s aura seemed in legitimate danger of collapsing his shields at any moment. Ashlin doubted that Kaini had the foresight or mental stability for any kind of elaborate plan at this point.

::We are not the same.::

Whatever he’d meant in that last statement, Kaini seemed to run out of strength for his bubble and his spell broke for the moment, dissolving their conversation back into the verbal and mundane.

Ashlin glanced briefly from Kaini, to the watching ship's staff, and then back to Kaini. She crossed most of the space between them, this time stopping within arms' length, and meeting the gaze of his helmet with a small shrug. Ashlin sighed. She would have very much preferred to keep several walls... and lightyears.. between this volatile Sith and herself until one of them was dead. (Preferably him, and preferably soon.) But the Jedi woman had questions that she wouldn't have forgiven herself for not asking.

Gathering her thoughts, Ashlin privately braced herself. She took a few seconds to make sure that her mind resonated nothing but the same relaxed outward calm she'd been projecting, before she allowed Kaini close enough to directly sense any part of her. 'Fake it till you make it, 'Nana. I was never too sure about that one... But in your case, it should work really well.' She had a stray memory of Jarod telling her that a decade or two ago in a conversation about illusions, and suppressed a faint smile before it showed in her expression. The thin Jedi woman held her hand towards Kaini, palm up, with her most sincere and nonthreatening body language.

“I don’t trust you as far as I could throw you," she offered quietly, with as much honesty as she could find. "But do you want to change something going forward or not?”

When she reached out to Kaini along the deepest of shielded mental channels, Ashlin’s subtle and unassuming presence against the very edge of the Sith’s mind was both relaxed and clear of any grudges other than some ironic humor at this whole situation. (Give me your hand. This is the most private conversation we’ll find anywhere near this ship. Do you usually wear full helmet and armor as a med patient?)

[Kaini Khatoin]

His head turned at her outstretched hand, he had watched her with interest as she moved, there was no mention of his offer but that was fine. He knew she could not respond openly, and of course her remarks made him doubt whether she took him seriously or not.

::And how far can you throw me?::

His head cocked and beneath his helmet an eyebrow raised at the entire situation.

::My armor and helmet are part of my religion, do you not recognize a Mandalorian when you see one?::

His voice augmenters did not give his joke the meaning it would have had if his helmet had not been on. His gloved hand reached out and took hers, he wasn't sure why her was doing it, but he understand that this would give him a moment to speak freely.

(This is fine)

His mental voice would not be one she would recognize without the augmentation, nor would it be a voice that she had likely ever heard before, it was soft, but there was a certain sharpness and hidden charm to it.

[Ashlin Li]

“Not very far, unfortunately,” Ashlin answered the Darksider’s tech-scrubbed voice with a faint smile. “And… nice try, Mando, but I’ll call the bluff. Draw again.”

The thin, chestnut-haired, woman in bland grey ship’s clothes kept up her end of the relaxed pretense and mild-mannered banter she'd committed herself to, while the masked man reached for her hand. Even with Kaini’s gauntlet physically still between them… Ashlin could work with it. She deftly reached out across the narrow chasm between her own presence and Kaini’s, extending a layer of her own shields around them both.

(This is fine,) he confirmed for her.
(—Good.) Ashlin replied after the smallest hesitation and carried on.

Whatever she’d guessed his mental voice was going to present as, Ashlin hadn’t expected the insane mood-swinging Sith with psychopath master, bruised mind, and obviously failing shields to come across as… 'charming.’Really? The Jedi woman narrowed her eyes at Kaini’s helmet.

(What is wrong with you?)

[Kaini Khatoin]

''Not very far" she said. He did not physically react to that as much as anyone would expect he merely mentally acknowledged it and did not change his gaze.

::That's to be expected at this point.::

He half chuckled

::No I am not a Mando, but the helmet must stay on.::

He felt her presence in his mind, it was not in any way intrusive but felt somewhat warm and welcoming. This was normally not something he would allow anyone to do much less a Jedi, but here and now was different for some reason. The masked Sith could not place it in his mind but there was something about her presence and aura that brought him a slight ease and comfort.

(For starters my ribs are broken.)

This time his voice was almost friendly, still possessing that charm just beneath the surface. It might even seem that he was enjoying this mental conversation.

[Ashlin Li]

She was a professional. So, first things first. The telepath went quiet on Kaini for a moment while she finished securing their current ‘safe place’. Outwardly as far as any staff or guards were concerned, Ashlin had already established their alibi of Force-healing activities. On top of that, she lightly layered one of her personal favorite disguises—As far as any of the med staff or guards were concerned, the pair of medical-occupied Force users had become… Unbelievably. Dull. (Move along…)

Inwardly, as far as herself or Kaini were concerned, Ashlin nudged their focus a few levels deeper into a mental wavelength that was closer to REM sleep than waking thought. Perfect.

* * *

"I'm vexed with you right now,” Ashlin Faithe told the armored man. She was gentle about it, all things considered. “We might have saved so much trouble if you’d just started off like this. I suppose that some of it wasn’t your idea, though. ”

This wasn't a dream, but it was closer to that than much else. She let go of the man’s gauntlet and moved a couple steps away to perch on the infirmary bed just across from him with her legs tucked up beneath her, but her boots not-quite touching the bedding. It wasn’t a lab table anymore; just a clean infirmary cot with soft blue linens.

The Jedi woman's features and form overall were healthier now; and she was almost a little tanned. The scatter of tiny freckles splashed across her nose and cheekbones were more pronounced. Her eyes were brighter, and how the Sephi tips of her ears could have been simply tucked into her hair was bit of a mystery.

Ashlin flew an infirmary datapad lightly to her palm with a hint of a pleased smile. She glanced down at it before looking back at the armored Kaini. It was a challenging to visualize him based solely on what she could sense through his armor, but she had the distinct sense that his physiology was a bit different from basic stock. He seemed quite sturdy, with a few organ differences. She’d get to the scarring later.

“I see the ribs… And I’m sorry that happened tonight… You're not quite human either, are you?"

[Kaini Khatoin]

He sighed and turned his head as she moved towards the table. He listened to his words and some of them made sense and were logical questions, but then others felt like veiled insults, he crossed his arms and font of him and lowered his masked head and spoke, his mental voice just as clear as it was before.

"No. None of it was my idea exactly. Not that it matters, my Master is a friend and he does want what is right for this galaxy. What harm is there in ridding the galaxy of evil one evil bastard at a time? Isn't that what the Jedi want?"

His voice grew slightly more stern.

"I'm not exactly human? Because I'm a Sith? That's typical. Jedi dehumanize Sith so that they can kill us, because we happen to do things differently than them. My Master told me what you people did to me, he showed me what the Jedi did to my father. I never knew him because of people like you who made him out to be less than human so that they could murder him. For what? For being a Sith?

So you're vexed with me? Be happy I didn't feel like outright attacking either of you, but then again I'm just a subhuman Sith so you would have expected nothing else I'm sure."

[Ashlin Li]

“Oh, good. You’re back on track with the repressive mood,” Ashlin told him with a slight shrug, and a bit of the tell-tale distance that came from dedicating part of her focus to physical healing instead of telepathic projections. “At least we’re fairly honest with each other this way. Now do both of us a favor… Breathe easy and be still. Your bones will thank you; but it’s going to take a few minutes. This might twinge a little, but it shouldn’t hurt… I’m not Johnathon.”

* * *

In the Crusader's sterile laboratory, Kaini’s glove still clasped the palm of the Jedi woman. She'd drawn enough energy from the Force, herself, and the Darksider's much healthier system to begin gently repairing his damaged ribs. The armored man might have noticed his ribs itching mildly from bone growth, or he might not.

* * *

Ashlin shifted to sit cross-legged on her chosen infirmary bed, and gently flew Kaini the datapad she’d been holding. There wasn’t much on it, at the moment. Something about higher than average bone density, distinct chemical differences she could pick out, and a few abdominal ones.

“No. I mean that your body isn’t.. physically.. Human. Was your father? Mine wasn’t; nothing wrong with that. I could tell you more if you give me something to work with. Pick something. Your father and whatever we did to him? My sister’s lightsaber?” She paused a moment, then added “You have a lot of scarring on your body.”

[Kaini Khatoin]

"Like the mood wasn't justified?"

He snapped back almost immediately and had begun to move before she asked him to stay still. He quieted his emotions and remained there as the itching feeling began.

"Sorry, I just assumed you were referring about me being a subhuman Sith."

He paused for a brief moment as she spoke about scars, and lightsabers. He thought as she spoke, how to answer or what was the answer? That was a better question. What was the answer? He glanced down at the data pad and studied it for a moment.

"No you're not Johnathon."

He stalled while thinking to himself. His entire body tensed at the thought of the scars as if a surge of electricity had coursed through every fiber of his being. His breathing intensified for a moment before he quickly caught control of it.

"My father was a human, a Sith Lord. My master told me that a Jedi Knight killed him either when I was very young or before I was born. The scars he said were from electric judgement, the Jedi captured me and tried to brainwash me, but they had to use electric judgement on me to break my will. I have virtually no memory of it."

Another pause.

"You mean Nomi's lightsaber?"

He said with an upward inflection in his voice. His aura warmed if only for a brief moment before he shut it down.

"I know nothing of her or how I recognized that lightsaber."

[Ashlin Li]

Ashlin regarded the Darksider, carefully listening to him for what seemed like several heartbeats. She watched Kaini’s emotions snap, felt him start to move, and then think better of it and keep still. His interaction with the datapad — there’d been hardly to it; just her bare bones’ impressions about his own physical information beneath the armor. His stalling for time… and then… He tensed, to the extreme, before he caught hold of himself again. Pain memories.

She nodded and listened wordlessly to the man’s story about his father’s death at the hand’s of the Jedi… and later, about the Jedi torment and mind-breaking of Kaini himself… as a young child? Those details made no sense sense to her, but she took the Sith’s story in as he relayed it.

They circled back to her sister’s name, and Kaini changed again. Nomi had only been ever a child in the Temple… Even if this Sith had somehow found her as an adult during the years Ashlin and the others had been in stasis—the lightsaber Nomi carried now was almost certainly Ashlin’s. But Kaini’s mind was fixed on Nomi’s blade. And Nomi.

Ashlin took in a breath. She decided to start there.

“Yes. Nomi's lightsaber.”

The itching in the core of Kaini's chest would have to dulled down for a moment. Ashlin slid her feet back to the floor and returned to standing beside Kaini. She was dressed a little differently here, in simple clothes that didn't really matter, but were not of this vessel. The dark-haired woman wore two lightsaber hilts companionably on her hip now. There was Eshae, her own dear blade; and there was the steely-dark cylinder of her sister's more Guardian-style hilt. Nomi's.

Ashlin lightly removed the second hilt from her belt, and held it out the armored man.

"Nomi leant it to me;" The Jedi woman chose her words thoughtfully, watching him. "She was safe the last time I saw her. You can hold it if you'd like… Nomi was always proud of the grip… Something about the friction, but with the smooth grooves down the side."

[Kaini Khatoin]

He felt the itching subside but that was subconscious at this point it wasn't at the forefront of his mind at the moment. He watched the healer noticing the changes but not noting them, his mind was elsewhere.

"...W.....what do I care if a Jedi is safe?"

He said half heartedly as he tensed up again, his eyes closed beneath his helmet as he remembered the electricity flowing through him again. He tensed once again and opened his eyes to see the lightsaber being offered to him. He reached out and took it. He did not know why he took it, or why he was interested in it but here he was.

"Thank you. You can tell that my ribs have been broken before right?"

Had they? He didn't remember it, but he said it. He rotated the hilt in his hand, it was perfect and ergonomic which would make for the perfect grip for anyone holding it in battle. He angled the emitter away from Ashlin and ignited the blade with snap-hiss. It's dark blue guardian blade sprang to life. He eyed it up and down and he felt his stomach churning, he felt....PAIN! The electric was back he gripped the hilt hard in his gloved hands. The memory of the pain was so intense it was as if it was actually happening here and in the moment, so intense that it threatened to unhinge him and burst out at any moment. He caught his breath and tried to regain his composure.

"It's...good quality, I can see why she made it this way. I can tell that I would never lose my grip on it in a fight. It fits perfectly."

He extinguished the blade but still eyed the hilt. His aura was swirling with a million different emotions as he raised his head and looked to Ashlin again.

"I feel like, I...nothing. I don't know why I feel anything, this makes no sense. Is this a trick?"

He raised his guard just a little bit, but not enough effort was put into it to make a significant difference in whatever it was that Ashlin was doing

[Ashlin Li]

"...W.....what do I care if a Jedi is safe?"

Ashlin didn’t say anything. She’d watched the armored man very closely when he tensed up in that pain reaction again… The same as he’d done hours ago the dining room. How many times had he done that now? The moment passed. Kaini slid back into the hopeless mood, and Ashlin quietly finished passing him her sister’s lightsaber.

"Thank you. You can tell that my ribs have been broken before right?"

“Yes.” She answered the man’s question about his ribs very simply, trying not to introduce new emotions or any line of thought that distracted him from this specific moment. As far as Kaini was concerned, Ashlin wanted his world at a standstill. Except for her sister’s lightsaber hilt.

Snap-hiss.

She watched the armored man stare at the Guardian-blue lightsaber beam for a heartbeat—and then—Fire! The most intense, live-wire, burning wave of electricity pain she could imagine spasmed through Kaini’s system, with far more spillover into her own this time.

* * *

In the Crusader’s real laboratory, the thin Jedi woman gasped. For a moment, she had to avoid falling into the armored Darksider and might have pulled away from him if he wasn’t clenching her hand in his glove. Ashlin caught her breathe and finished repairing his ribs in the next moment. It wasn’t her finest work, but his system was perfectly healthy and would have no trouble filling in any small imperfections.

* * *

In the shielded level of their conversation, Kaini caught his breath and recovered composure. Ashlin didn’t move or ask for the lightsaber hilt back yet.

“No... It definitely is a trick. But it’s not mine. We should... talk... hard about that electric pain. It's locking up your whole memory. Can you tell?" She paused and added as an afterthought. “You can breathe deeper if you like; I finished your ribs.”

[Kaini Khatoin]

"Not your trick Ashlin Li? Then whose trick is it?"

He tensed up yet again feeling a slight twinge of the electricity.

"We need to talk? So you want me to talk with a Jedi about the Jedi electricity that surges through my body at different times?"

He rotated the hilt and offered it back to Ashlin. Who was she to question his state of mind "She's trying to help you" A voice whispered silently to him in his head, a voice that sounded so familiar and yet so foreign to him.

"There is a memory block surrounding my toture and when I am reminded of it, I feel the pain that I felt in those times. It's not something that is pleasant for me, but I am a Sith Lord and I deal with it as part of my life. Why do you care?"

[Ashlin Li]

“It’s a trick,” Ashlin repeated, despite that she felt 'trick' was an outrageous understatement. She purposefully tried to choose the plainest language, shutting any imagery out of her tone for once. “And it’s not mine. You’re strong, but it's damaging you. Badly.”

She accepted her sister’s lightsaber when he returned it, and moved back to perch on the edge of her simple infirmary bed, just across from Kaini’s seat on the surgical lab table. There wasn’t much sense trying to explain anything about why she cared. He wasn’t likely to accept “morality,” and trying to justify anything deeper to him would either provoke him, trigger the shock memories, or arm him with more insight into her psyche than she was willing to allow.

“I’ll tell you some facts from around the time you’re blocking out. Try not to think about them emotionally or challenge me on it. It’s alright if you don’t believe me. Don’t visualize them too hard. But see if you can bear with it up to the end. Is that alright?”

[Kaini Khatoin]

"Not your trick? Then whose?"

He paused and stared at her, his dark aura was swelling up again but he made a conscious effort to burry it down deep inside of himself. He sighed audibly and listened to that voice deep down inside of him once again. He knew that for some reason or another this Jedi was indeed trying to help him which was a foreign concept to him, but it was not worth fighting either.

"I will try to believe you, but I don't know if I should trust you. Jedi have been nothing but my enemies, so we are in uncharted territory."

He fixed his gaze on her eyes.


"No tricks Ashlin."

[Ashlin Li]

“I couldn’t tell you whose trick without making assumptions, and I don’t think that would help.”

Ashlin met the inky-reflective gaze of the man’s helmet with another gentle shrug. She knew herself and her shields well enough to know that Kaini had no sense of how quickly her own heart was pounding, or the extreme caution she was treading with. (Fake it till you make it, 'Nana.) The part-Sephi woman flashed the man a faintly sad smile and continued to project her chosen calm mind-state regardless of whether he wanted more tricks or not.

Okay... Ashlin resisted her rather childlike habit of saying ‘Once upon a time,’ and went back to the beginning point she'd decided on. She was more carefully guarded against spillover pain for the moment; she knew she'd need to be.

“Years ago in the Temple on Coruscant, that lightsaber was crafted by a talented, but still very young student. Leave her name alone for now. She was… nine at the time? Maybe ten. She trained in bladework for hours every day with her people. It was Shii-Cho at first, but by this time she'd probably begun moving into the other forms. She lived and breathed with that lightsaber. She never loaned it out.”

The Healer's elder daughter watched the armored man carefully while she privately ran through old memories; mostly her own.

"I didn't train with her much; though I wish sometimes that I had. I was older, still the taller one then. She was a only child, so the blade never saw ‘real’ combat at the time. She sparred for countless hours with her teachers. And with most of the students, I think. But especially with her two brothers, and especially with the students closer to her own age. A few of the students were just as hard-headed as she was. Those few were bound to become her closest friends. They sparred and trained together for hours every single day, knocking the breath out of each other, kicking, pushing, giving each other concussions. A few broken bones, but improving every day, and mostly loving every instant at that age. There was no fatal combat yet. No Sith."

Ashlin paused, hoping to give Kaini enough respite to let him at cope with the pain reactions. There was no getting around them right now, but pushing him fully over his breaking point wouldn't help anything. "Are you managing?" she asked very quietly.