In Faith and Truth

[Daria Nytherciria]

It was a bitter thing, to admit failure. Werrin Youta had not been trained to fail. He had studied countless textbooks on human and alien psychology, observed first-hand the biochemical changes the mind and body went through whilst under stress or duress and, to top it all off, conned a Corellian sabacc dealer out of near a million credits. Deception, misdirection, and deceit had been his tools before being recruited into the Rebel Alliance, and since becoming a member of the Intelligence branch he had found a great many opportunities to keep those tools sharp. Regretably, it seemed that no matter how well honed they were, in this particular instance they simply would not do.

“This is bantha-shit,” he muttered, watching as the door to the interrogation room slid open once again. Arms folded tightly across his chest, he ignored the presence of the others crowded around him, also peering through the two-way mirror. “If he is a Jedi, what difference is it going to make having her in there?”

Silence was the only reply, as they watched the redhead come to a halt, just within the threshold. “She's blind, for frell's sake.”

“You know what they say about the blind, though,” another voice ventured, with an air of mysticism. “Their other senses get sharper...”

As if on cue, Daria's head turned slightly towards the mirror. Her profile was dispassionate, the exact focus of her white-white eyes indeterminate. She wore the gray robes of her ilk, well-worn fabric pooling at her feet as she sat down opposite the only other person in the room. He had claimed her attention and though she could not see him in any traditional sense, she felt his presence, and the energy that moved in ebbs and flows around him, in a way that was entirely unique.

“...Doctor Ollisen.”

[Ilias Nytrau]

In admission, it had been a while since he had seen a person of Miralukan descent. A long, long while. Even longer since he had seen a Jedi of that kind. The sight of the woman before him brought some curiosity into his mind, but he dismissed it, as now was not the time for such idle small talk. Rather, it was the time for questions. Theirs. His. Hers. In turning himself in to the Rebellion upon his arrival to the convoy, the authorities had deemed it necessary to shackle him. He was, after all, a wanted man of the Empire - there was no telling whether or not it was all a ruse. No man or woman was irreplaceable in the Great Machine and the Empire's detractors were well aware of this ruthlessness.

Despite his admonishments that restraints would not be necessary, it was caution that was. What man would waltz into a Jedi protectorate, claim that he was, de facto, a Jedi himself unless he had nefarious purposes? Already, his appearance and admissions had those few of the convoy that were privy to this information on edge. Or alternatively, just maybe, he was telling the truth.

And that? That was what the 'blind' woman was here for.

Doctor Jefsran Ollisen - or more truthfully, Jedi Knight Ilias Nytrau - lifted his eyes from the quiet speculation of his thumbs to give the woman his full attention as she spoke. Hearing the faint note of unfamiliarity as his false name passed her lips made him want to smile, oddly enough, but in this case his visual demeanor remained stoic.

"It does not take mere blindness to become more acutely aware in these other senses, if one so wished to." He lowered his thumbs from their tenting and blinked, still watching her in the one way that she could not return. "Tell me, what is it your senses tell you?"

[Daria Nytherciria]

What indeed, the Knight thought, suppressing the frown that came with such an uncertain contemplation. It wasn't a question that Daria felt confident answering to herself yet, let alone to the man she was supposed to be questioning. In place of a reply, she offered a question of her own.

“How is it that you came to be aboard this ship, Doctor?”

[Ilias Nytrau]

"By the very way that I am certain others have come to be here: I know someone." He offered a very small smile and brought his focus to her face alone. "Or, at the very least, I have acquainted myself somehow and happened to have, by fortune, ended up here."

He unlaced his fingers and having little other place to put them, given the restraints, lifted his hands and looked at them, feeling that particular warmth returning to them as he had allowed it, and dropped the shackled appendages into his lap, where he once again rejoined his fingers. That familiar warmth that almost ached him to have coursing through him without worry for need of restraint.

"Of course, I would not have known to look, were I not in just the right place at the right time. Some would say... guided by the Force." Ilias relaxed his posture then, settling against the backing of the provided seat.

"Certainly, such ridiculous nonsense that is. I am, after all, a doctor and not a Jedi. So it would seem..." He glanced away at the two-way mirror, a knowing look crossing his face before he looked again at the female Knight. "...what with all of this skepticism."

[Daria Nytherciria]

Behind the two-way mirror, muttered words were exchanged. “Evasive son of a bantha, ain't he? Freller enjoys the sound of his own voice a little too much.”

In the interrogation room, Daria tuned out the myriad distractions of the ship – the voices and energies that bled through its walls – and let her eyes drift down to the Doctor's hands. What had those hands made and, perhaps, unmade?

“What do you know of the Force?”

[Ilias Nytrau]

He smiled. The Force - an old friend, an ally, a most wise instructor. What did he know of the Force, indeed? There was, at least, a great deal he could impart on that question alone.

"Enough." He began, following her gaze, wondering at her thoughts. Did she have any belief in his words? "Enough to know that I myself have asked that question countless times in the distant past, with variation. It is my intuition, child. The Force is not something to be shaped or defined - rather, it shapes us, defines us. I am not what I am without it. Nor are you."

"These hands..." He paused, looking down at his hands that sat palms up on the tabletop, then back up at her. "...these hands are merely a means to an end. A symbol of purpose. Yet, only one of the purposes for which my life has been written for."

Ilias laced his fingers, the smile fading from his lips, leaving only a frank look upon his face. He blinked, watching her face. "I hope I have sufficiently answered both of your questions."

[Daria Nytherciria]

Child, he called her, yet there was no mocking in his tone. Daria wondered at his age, whether he was old enough to remember the collapse of the Republic. Her own memories of that time were hazy at best, the recollections of an infant mind, pieced together with the help of holo-films that the Empire would rather have confiscated and burned.

“Your answers lead me to more questions, Doctor. Tell me about your life.. where do you come from?”

[Ilias Nytrau]

Her inquiry after his life, his past, left him little to do but examine her face, further. It may have been that she simply had asked one question for the moment, but there was more wanting of knowledge behind that one, non-offensive query. He wondered how much he would be willing to impart, considering all the efforts in decades of hiding right out in the open. But she was Jedi, she was, in a way, kin. The men observing were of no threat. Therefore, he would answer in full honesty and frankness.

"Coruscant, for as long as since my mind began being able to retain memory as a wee child. Before that, I am not certain, though certain evidences over the years have lead me to believe that I am not of Coruscanti origin." He felt as if a sigh would belong in this space, but he did not loose one. "I have memory of being brought to the Jedi at so young an age, of the man who called himself my father and had brought me there. I remember, after so many years, so vividly I remember how I could feel his nervousness and worry, not at leaving a two-year-old boy with people who were effectively strangers, but something else like that, though not so much like it, caused him this distress. The memory, as have and will all my memories, remains so very tangible."

[Daria Nytherciria]

It struck Daria as odd at first, how alike Nytrau's childhood seemed to her own, yet when she gave it second consideration it was not so unusual at all. In the time of the Republic, most all Jedi had begun their lives as such. Now, young Jedi went undiscovered – and those that did find their abilities in the spotlight were persecuted, vilified. Now, to become a Padawan was a trial in itself, thanks to the merciless doctrines of Emperor Palpatine.

“And what of your relationship with the Galactic Empire?”

[Ilias Nytrau]

"Such a relationship was merely the option of placing myself where I might inflict the greatest deal of help and use in this life, rather than hiding to save my own skin." He said this without spite, without distaste. "The healing hand cannot be in all corners of the known universe, but other avenues to cure and inoculate against disease could be found. Such has been my life's work for over two decades now. And with the benefit of my unexpected physical change, for which I still have no explanation, becoming this other man, this 'Jefsran Ollisen' was a simple task."

He opened his hands, laying them palms-up on the small table at which he was seated, looking down at the lines through which he felt that the power ran along them. He knew it would be little issue to free himself of this chamber, but it was he who willingly turned himself in, so that there would be as minimal an amount of finger-pointing over who he was as possible.

"The Force itself gave me no more proper course. I thusly believed that where I had been was the right place to be. Until I started seeing signs in the past six months that lead me to believe my time of change had come. It was time to be a true, undeniable Jedi again. Such a call could not be ignored, especially coming in the form of faces, persons I long believed to have died in the cullings. There were others, that I knew had passed in cuttings of other means. Ones I regret having not been able to free from their fates."

He didn't know why he was sharing this, other than that... all the words seemed connected somehow. It was her of whom he spoke. She, doubtless, that he would never forget.

[Daria Nytherciria]

<meta http-equiv="CONTENT-TYPE" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"><title></title><meta name="GENERATOR" content="OpenOffice.org 3.1 (Win32)"><style type="text/css"> <!-- @page { margin: 2cm } P { margin-bottom: 0.21cm } --> </style> It was strange, to think of a Jedi willingly offering themselves into the service of the Empire. At the core of Daria's being, she could not reconcile the two opposing concepts with one another. A rational part of her mind understood that Nytrau had made the choices he had on the basis that a necessary evil was required, but the threads of the Force that ran through Nytherciria rang discordant when she pictured herself in the same role, trying to bridge the gap between tyranny and mercy.


“The Empire.. were they aware of your affinity with the Force?”

[Ilias Nytrau]

He shook his head.

"Not to my knowledge. I imagine I would not have had such wide success in my work for over two decades if they had known. It is a known fact that the Empire does not abide wielders." A small smile crept over his face. "Outside of their own control, I am meaning. Rarely does any one galactic government have only one face."

And just like that, the smile vanished.

"I fear they seek me for the secrets they believe I have stolen away with, rather than the supposition that I am Jedi. However, I would not put it past ones such as the Inquisition to chew on the possibility that I might be, though no such face as mine graces the records of known past wielders. Paranoia can be rampant, girl."

[Daria Nytherciria]

<meta http-equiv="CONTENT-TYPE" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"><title></title><meta name="GENERATOR" content="OpenOffice.org 3.1 (Win32)"><style type="text/css"> <!-- @page { margin: 2cm } P { margin-bottom: 0.21cm } --> </style> “Secrets?” The wonder begged further questioning. Whilst the Alliance undoubtedly had its spies within the Galactic Empire, there were few Jedi who could claim to have escaped the clutches of their enemies alive. Always, in such times, she thought of Zabian Bal-Wandler. They had been of such similar ages, that it might well have been Daria herself who was captured and – a coldness crept into her – tortured. Would she have been able to steel herself against interrogation, as Zabian had done? In times gone by, she'd known so little about the Jedi scattered about the galaxy, that there would have be little to yield, but now... It was a thought that did not bare consideration.

[Ilias Nytrau]

"Research. Experiments." He replied. "My position in the medical community afforded me knowledge of such items, as a valued advisor, or with personal involvement, heading projects. I have seen much, have been implicitly trusted."

He steepled his fingers here, elbows on the table. He could sit here as long as was necessary, but he knew he would be getting 'peckish' in the near future.

"I forget nothing. I remember everything I have seen, heard, smelled, tasted, touched, textures, emotions evoked... Everything I have done, every detail of every process. Everything." Ilias smiled. "Which, admittedly, might be unsettling for some."

[Daria Nytherciria]

Now there was a talent she did not envy. The past held many lessons to be learned from, but there were times in her life that Daria did not care to look back upon too closely. They were not forgotten, by any stretch of the imagination, but to dredge them up again would only invite pain and sadness into her heart.

“You have an unusual way with words, Doctor,” the Miraluka observed. “You say so much, and yet you tell me so little.”

[Ilias Nytrau]

The halfbreed flexed his fingers in their steeple, expanding and contracting.

"It is the nature of words, child." He said, quite plainly. "They are so malleable. I could just as easily say less and mean far more. Words only mean so much, however, yet on occasion, they can be everything. A word of bond, an oath, for example."

Nytrau stopped the movement of his fingers and hands for a moment and set his eyes on his questioner with a rather pointed look.

"The oath of a Healer, a Doctor, a Warrior are three of such words to which I am bound and have always sought to never fall astray of, in whatever way I could make the most impact." His smile dimmed, his face set in a more serious way. "Life is sacred, girl. The sanctity of life is an ever-present theme in the life and actions of a Jedi and has been such for countless, countless generations. I have done everything within my power to assure the instance of life is prevalent, from healing its wounds to defending it."

He pulled his fingers apart from each other, dropping one hand to lay on the table, palm up and balling the other in a fist, leaving it propped up by the elbow.

"It is what I am, this healing hand, this defending fist." Then he dropped his fist to the table, bringing the open hand over to blanket it. "This Jedi of the Old Order." He quirked a brow. "Much the same to Miss Laran, in ways. By rights I should be an aged man... and yet..."

He smiled again.

"...here I am, appearing barely a day over thirty. My appearance does me no favours, I fear."

[Daria Nytherciria]

Every time he called her child, it teased a memory of the past closer to the forefront of her mind. Many memories in fact, but most potent of them all was that of Darth Stratus, who had thought to make her his child and apprentice, his bride in the Dark Side. There had been a time when the thought of him would have set her stomach churning with anxiety and sickness, but she felt only a cold, calm void inside now.

Watching the Doctor as he gestured to emphasise his point, she merely nodded, her eyes narrowing faintly as she studied his face, his skin not quite smooth but lacking the lines of age and wisdom that marked Serena Laran.

“The Force does work in mysterious ways...”

[Ilias Nytrau]

"It does." He said in agreement, nodding. "Unquestionably."

Ilias' smile warmed and he reflected inwardly, thinking of just how mysterious it has been in his own life. There were many things, not the least of which was his very self. There were many years to look back on and... from the distinct impression he got of just how things had happened for him, there might possibly be many more of those years to come.

"Now..." he led in, "...are there any further questions? Curiosities?"