Disinfection (Ibaris)

[Ashin Varanin]

A blast door slid aside, revealing a cargo bay and a unique, if unimpressive, starship. Thirty-five metres from the vaguely phallic prow to the backswept, oblong wingtips; twenty metres across, twelve tall. Agrinium plating, scored by innumerable small impacts to reveal the sheen of ardanium, and durasteel beneath. Odd hullmetals, those, and the gear inside was odder still. The original shipwright had been Mon Calamari, and it showed. Since then, however, any number of hands had modified the Peregrine, most of them in the Unknown Regions. The whole ensemble -- alien work, aftermarket mods, roughed-up anti-rad plates -- commingled under a patina of grime. Ashin confessed herself pissed.

"Here 'tis." The Bothan shifted from foot to foot. "I never-"

"-saw anything, yes, you've made that clear, thank you." Ashin didn't look away from the ship, didn't so much as blink, just pulled a chit of Empire scrip from her belt and handed it to him.

"Ah..."

After a long moment, she interpreted the sound as reticence and felt more than a little stupid. Empire scrip didn't count for very much here. She'd paid him less than half of the bribe she'd promised. Irritation swelled up. By her sides, her knuckles popped. Her chest and throat warmed with the urge to say something irrevocable and vicious.

She plastered a smile to her face and fished out another chit, as if he'd done her a favour. His head tilted, neckbeard flopping, but he made the second chit vanish like the first. "Your health," he said, as if they were sharing a companionable drink rather than standing in a grimy hangar, illegally. His big bovine eyes tracked her -- she could feel them -- as she left him, heels ringing on the deck. She crossed the hangar, into the Peregrine's shadow, and knocked on a clean patch of hull near the ramp controls. She knocked rather hard.

[Ibaris Varanin-Jacobs]

Liam had been working the bribes the past few days, and working them good. Things to do on the station, things he needed to do alone, and she'd been quite happy to have the alone time. Living on a ship with another person for as long as she had with him made alone time hard to come by, sometimes even when they were docked or in port, and as much as sparring siphoned off the frustrations and aggression, time spent without having to see even so much as the face of the guy allowed her to refresh and reset. During his first outing, she took the opportunity to deal with resupply, and now? Now she was catching up on some reading that had been brushed aside in favour of other pursuits, curled up in the pilot's chair with her ever-loyal dog laying at her feet on the deck, one ear plugged with a feed of voice messages from here, there, and everywhere - contacts, friends, her mother. A plate of cookies sat on the console, next to a knife.

So invested was she in these things, that pounding on the hull made her jump, and jumpy was not a thing the youth was. Adas, the canid, perked his head up lightning-fast, the quietest of growls escaping him towards the hatch that she looked on with wide eyes, the earbud having ripped out of her head when she wrapped around one side of the chair just as fast as the way her dark-furred companion moved. She looked to the longtime pet, urging his calm by patting the air above him while unfurling herself from the seat and leaving the datapad where she once was. Not even Liam pounded that hard when she - accidentally or not - locked him out of the ship, and he was far more likely to yell like an idiot. No, this pounding was angry, and she had heard the like of it before.

Still, she could be wrong, so she felt outward while palming a mean-looking hunting knife from where she left it on the console, and went to the hatch, only to stop two steps into it on account of recognition of the presence of she who did the pounding. The young alchemist swallowed and her thoughts went right to the hull, which was far from representative of the inside of the Peregrine, while she hovered a hand by the controls. Cursewords conjured that never made it past her lips; she sheathed the knife in its ever-present place at her hip, punched the open/close button, and watched with some mild anxiousness and a growing feeling of doom as the ramp lowered, slowly revealing the form of the woman that she didn't take after in the looks department.

"I... ah..."

She smiled weakly.

"...hi, papa."

[Ashin Varanin]

Ashin smiled. It reached her eyes, but not in a good way, and that was intentional. "Hello, Ibaris," she said, and strode up the ramp. "What have you done with my ship."

She took a deep breath. The Peregrine smelled like sorcerous reagents (normal), young adult woman (normal), young adult man (normal, to her irritation), and alchemical dog. At least Adas was still aboard. Ashin would have had stronger words for her daughter if Ibaris had been traveling with only a sheath knife and that lunkhead Quez for protection. Rather than think of the words 'Quez' and 'protection' in the same sentence, Ashin changed the subject of the mental diatribe she'd been rehearsing. She changed it again when she realized that the inside of the ship was nowhere near as filthy as the exterior, or the surrounding station. Presumably, Ibaris had taught the blonde lumpenprole to clean.

Ashin let out that long breath and refocused on the fruit of her metaphorical loins. "I'm extremely pleased to see you," she said. She might as well have been commenting on naval maneuvers or bladework, and that particular bit of coolness was not intentional. Nevertheless, it fit her relationship with her daughter. That relationship's defining feature was the daily realization that she had a daughter, coupled with mild interest and a touch of surprise. No, all things considered, she knew she'd never been especially warm toward Ibaris, unless one counted arranging for alchemy tutors and shooting lessons before the girl hit puberty. "Are we alone, or will your semi-sentient friend be joining us? And I'm not speaking of the canid."

[Ibaris Varanin-Jacobs]

On the subject of the outward condition of the ship she had her own words hastily prepared, a defense that may have included placing the majority of the blame on the absent party - 'he flies the ship, not me' - but the deep breath her parent took stayed them, and they fell away while she watched the other woman think while concerned with what was on the other end of that held-in air. It wasn't fear, per se, but the cool-humoured woman that was her papa was someone she never, ever wished to disappoint. A woman that Ibaris took after in ways other than what was reflected back at her every morning, and from whom she'd long since learned to take the value of the words said, not the inflection of them nor the unease or misgivings once felt before she could differentiate between the starkly different natures of each of her parents and begin to relate to them in separate ways. Whatever Ashin felt about her daughter, Ibaris didn't feel quite the same in return.

The reserved breath was loosed, and words came that let her relax, the tension at what could have been seeping out of her muscles, her mind. When that pleasure was followed with more words, Adas made a noise of interest when alluded to, while Ibaris stifled amusement at the commentary on Liam's intelligence or lack thereof to the point that her smile warmed only by a minuscule amount. "We're alone," she replied just as coolly, not elaborating with the reasons for the absence of the subject in question. Quez had been witness to the seamless shift between the demeanours she presented to each parent, that warm and cool, in her dealings with him and had expressed his unease at it with simple words along the lines of 'don't do that.' So of course she continued, as it couldn't be helped. Like the time he had asked her to change her often violent sneeze. It couldn't be done. "I don't expect him back for a few hours, at least."

[Ashin Varanin]

Ibaris' coolness mirrored Ashin's. Even knowing that, Ashin felt a sting. A mild one, though. One didn't do what she'd done, become what she had, without learning to put guilt on a shelf more often than not. "Good," she said for lack of anything better to say.

The ship's interior was much as she'd left it. Absence had stolen her habits and opened her eyes, eroding familiarity until only a handful of anchors remained. The thronelike command chair, modeled on the admiral's chair of a long-gone command ship. The command panels for the miniaturized Kerz-Bhrg generator and the old hibridium cloak. The alchemy lab, miniaturized to within an inch of its life. The bed, just big enough for two. Old memories flooded her, nearly all of them good. She chose to shelve the few that weren't: long nights raging and weeping over what she was and couldn't be, in the realms of parenthood and the paranormal. Ashin took a seat by the dejarik table that she'd never actually used.

He's holding you back, she didn't say. You could be so much more than some vagrant chasing a good time, or whatever it is you're after. She'd expressed a token amount of disapproval re: Liam Quez. Push too hard, and she risked alienating Ibaris beyond an acceptable degree. Besides, Quez had yet to become a real liability. A worry, to be sure, but only when it came to the threat of pregnancy -- and his tendency to enable Ibaris' less responsible proclivities.

"How are your studies coming?" Ashin had lost the momentum of indignation here. She felt mechanical.

[Ibaris Varanin-Jacobs]

She fetched the plate of cookies, "Well," and the datapad, "all things considered," and sat across from Ashin at the dejarik table that she never used for its original purpose either - the surface was covered in materials of her non-alchemical studies, more often than not - placing the 'pad and plate on top of it, and slipping one of the sweet discs from the edge of the plate. The other arm sat just below her chest, hand cupping an elbow, as she nipped at the cookie and considered what she had just said, deciding not to elaborate on what she meant by 'all things considered', assuming that Ashin would assume correctly as to what she meant.

Liam, from her perspective, got in the way, made getting out and relatively close to the beasts she sought a harder thing to do. She knew what she was doing, she knew how to not get herself torn to shreds, but his looming over her was going to get him killed. While she did get what she wanted when he didn't wet himself while in the territory of a rancor, for example, she often wished he would stay with the ship and let her focus instead of buzzing around her with questions and comments that were more than half the time unrelated to the work at hand. The only time that really stuck out was when, out of frustration, she explained alchemy to him in the most basic of terms; he then came around and asked for metal arms, and had persisted in asking at erratic intervals ever since.

She finished the cookie and didn't take another, setting the plate aside.

[Ashin Varanin]

Interpreting the plate of cookies as a gesture of hospitality, Ashin took precisely two, so as not to look like she was giving a token response. She chewed without really tasting them.

"Unlock yourself, Ibby." The diminutive didn't come naturally. "You adore alchemy, so far as I'm aware. I'm rather fond of it myself. Tell me your projects, your challenges, your aspirations. Do you need materials? Resources? Books or holocrons, perhaps? Force knows where I'd find them in the known galaxy, but I'd be more than happy to invest some time in supporting your studies. Frankly, I'd be happy to teach you personally, if you're interested. I know we've only rarely done that, but I can't help feeling somehow deficient as a result."

With a forced shrug, she attempted to relax. She took a third cookie.

"I know your studies are bound up with your independence and so forth. I wouldn't want you to think that I disapprove, or that I'm trying to step on your toes by offering. On the other hand, I won't be offended if you aren't interested. Either way, though -- tell me about your work. Biological? Metallurgical? Crystallographic?"

[Ibaris Varanin-Jacobs]

She had her arms crossed, out of a lack of anything to do with her hands that wasn't consuming the entire plate of cookies to herself or delving back into her reading, which would have been rude. Adas was laid alongside the seat she took up, his expanse too far down to reach from her perch, so she sat. She sat, arms folded under her chest, and listened with eyes on her papa as the woman delved further, attempting to pull more from her about her studies, her work. Out of it all, it was the admission, the offer to be actively involved and have a hand in the further formation of her skills that made her consciously blink and reach for another cookie without looking at the plate. Her surprise compelled her to not look away, eyebrows climbing towards her hairline as the only other visible sign of a reaction to those words.

She chewed as Ashin did a little assuring, knowing that if her eyebrows could climb a little higher, they'd up and leave her face. That the older blonde continued to talk gave Ibaris a minute to gather her thoughts, think of exactly what it was she was going to say. The cookie vanished, she pilfered another, and was still chewing away at it when the end of words gave way to a silence that felt awkward to her when it never was in any other instance, Ashin or no. There were long-smothered emotions found to still be living when the offer came to teach in a realm that had been left almost entirely to tutors in bygone years, emotions now tempered with a sort of understanding. The third cookie met its demise and she brushed crumbs from the corner of her mouth with a finger, prolonging the wait between speaking turns. Pulling the knife from its sheath once again, she laid it sideways on the table, deciding to delay making any decisions or answering the questions attached.

"Metallurgical, mostly items of practicality," she gestured towards the blade, "such as this hunting knife before you. One sharp edge, a raking edge, a gut hook, never dull. Studies into my other field of interest sometimes require survival skills to be able to observe the subjects; carrying as little as possible is key in making a swift exit, if necessary, and what I do bring with me has to be reliable," and crossed her arms again, "but it all has very little to do with my alchemical studies for the time being."

She took a breath in and a sigh out, glancing away to the plate a moment, her eyes tracking back over to the thin face, those words and questions over the direction of her studies still hovering in the forefront of her mind.

"To be honest... even with having Adas around for so long, I'm uncertain about my feelings towards biological alchemy, and crystals?" she shrugged, "I wouldn't know where to begin. In general, I do get ideas that are beyond my current knowledge to fulfill, or are mixed up in whatever it is I'm trying to sort out here," she tapped her temple with one finger, "and here," and softly thumped her chest with the ends of all of them on one hand, and my usual company is about as useful as tits on a bull rancor in any of this, she didn't say. No offense to the dog, or Liam, to be fair. To expect as such was unrealistic. Her arms folded again, she went on, "I admit surprise that you're offering at all, and..." she heaved a sigh; there was no point in going down that road, "...I'm stuck without guidance," what a hard thing to confess to, that it made her need to swallow pride, "I'd be an idiot to say no."

And it stung as it slipped down her metaphorical throat.

[Ashin Varanin]

Ashin picked up the knife and eyed it, hefted it, as Ibaris talked. It certainly looked like good work, a competently forged design. Long ago, she'd rejected insight for strength -- throwing stones, not reading ripples; shouting, not listening. All that to say, her Force senses simply weren't all that good. She couldn't tell a thing about the quality of the knife's alchemy, not without a lightsabre, and she was currently unarmed.

"I've never been terribly interested in the biological side of things myself. I dabbled when your mother and I were younger. Some forms of crystals have their uses, though I'm far from an expert. Metallurgical alchemy, though -- you take after me there, and I could probably offer some useful guidance."

She held up the knife, and for the first time got a hint of her daughter's discomfort. Best to continue on, move past the moment. "Never dull, hm? So you know the uses of Svolten rhyolite. What about the other classical blade properties? How does this respond to lightning? How well does it stand up to lightsabres? Not that either one is exactly common, but it's important to master the classic fundamentals as a foundation for better work."

[Ibaris Varanin-Jacobs]

What was on offer was of use to her, but she was grateful that her papa moved on from it; the ache of wanting and the discomfort of nigh-estrangement were at odds, and she reached for a fourth cookie while Ashin continued on; the thought of putting this blade up against a lightsabre was a source of very mild humour to her, but she was far too engrossed in chewing the sweets that Liam had made to express any notion of it.

"Out of concern for my fingers, I wouldn't try using it against a lightsabre," came her response after swallowing, "it's not at all meant for such a purpose. As for lightning? It won't attract tendrils better than any old piece of metal, and absorption isn't going to happen. It's a hunting knife, papa, and not much else."

She finished the cookie, and gestured to the other woman.

"Would you have done any different?"

[Ashin Varanin]

Ashin shrugged. "Possibly, as a proof of concept, just to see if I could. Most budding alchemists make a nearly-indestructible knife at some point in their education; it's virtually a rite of passage. I seem to recall that I did, yes." But that was going back a good quarter century or more, and a lot of alchemical water under the bridge.

"You made what you made for function's sake. I can't fault that. It follows, then, that your next creation should require more ambitious qualities. It needs to reach for more, and I don't mean that as a rebuke. Pick something that needs to be made, and that needs to be ambitious. Take your dog, for example. It's an immensely ambitious creation, because of what it needs to be and do."

A faint but genuine smile. "The issue, then, is that you likely don't have any particular need for Sith plate armor or crystallographic weaponry or translation amulets. Well, maybe the amulets -- one can always use a good abattar -- but I think most of the classical canon won't interest you. Work with me here. Do you have goals, long-term goals, for your alchemical skills? Is there something you'd like to make in five or ten years?"