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Thread: The Molting Cicada

  1. #1

    Closed The Molting Cicada

    With cruel speed, the shuttle left, engines glaring. When it was but a pinprick of light, it dove, knifing into the atmosphere. It was a world of great steely blue oceans, expansive blushing continents, and vibrant swathes of green; it was a healthy world, and, as far as Ireen was concerned, it was a nameless world. She watched from the viewport as the last survivors of the Eris Latombe Orphanage of Nashal embarked on a new life together. They would play in fields under bright blue skies, they would make new friends, they would grow old and have families of their own. She wondered if they would keep in touch with each other.

    The guards kept their distance, and borne their weapons with lethargy; she was of little interest to either of them, and even less of a threat. Once she’d answered every question, Ireen was assigned personal quarters and a security detail of her own. To begin with, the proximity of new weapons in new hands had put her on edge, forever wondering when, if ever, those lazy trigger fingers would awake. The questions had been answered in a similar state of panic, with the words vomit tumbling from her lips in an incoherent mess. But, by the time she was able to accurately relate the tale of the orphanage to her captors, Ireen had come to accept her inevitable end. She only hoped that, when it happened, it would be quick.

    Still, she waited.

    On the third day, she washed, and dressed in borrowed clothes. Scoff was snoring on her bed when she left her room. Though the corridors lacked the heavy glare of Imperial white, the floor was just as unremarkable. Nobody would meet her gaze, she decided. She would not be looked at in the way she had looked at Doctor O. If she closed her eyes, and listened to the steady clip of booted feet behind her, she could be back on Nashal. The only thing that had changed was the colour of her cage. What were they waiting for?

    She opened her eyes. The speck of light was gone and the nameless world was still. Reflected in the immaculate tranparisteel she recognised a familiar face. The leader. She would call her bluff and be done with it.

    “If you’re not going to kill me, let me go.”

  2. #2
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    "Perhaps I wish to slice a small piece off of you every day until you beg me for the release of death," Lilaena said mildly. She nodded to the Mandalorian guards and they returned the gesture, turning and leaving the pair alone in the passage.

    "What would you do, if you were released? Where would you go, that the Empire and their Knights would not find you eventually?" The Dark Jedi master kept her voice carefully neutral, as if she were merely talking about the weather. This Ireen Cole was complicit in the worst of crimes - experimentation on Force sensitive children - but she had been coerced, and blackmailed into participating. She still held a deep concern for the fate of her family; their lives were held in the balance by the Empire, and if she was not found among the wreckage of the lab under the orphanage it was really anyone's guess what the Empire would assume.

    Why was she keeping Ireen alive? Because she deserved the same choices that Lilaena gave to all Force users she came across? She had already made some choices that would condemn her in any court of law, but there was something... something that made Lilaena stay her hand. Perhaps it was the way she had interacted with the children, her obvious compassion for them despite the horrors she was responsible for.



    oh what a tangled web I weave


  3. #3
    Home.

    It was the answer on the tip of her tongue. It was the word around which all other thoughts orbited. It was, Ireen suspected, the bait at the heart of a vast web, a web in which this spider had ensnared every eventuality with the most casual of questions. She suspected this because, no sooner had she considered her answer, than she herself was made painfully aware of the obvious truth: there were no uncertain destinations down that road. She could never see her family again.

    She stifled a gasp. Shallow beaths. She would not spend her last moments a quivering mess.

    "There is half a galaxy beyond the Empire's reach," she said, suddenly understanding the difference between belief and faith, "I can start again."

  4. #4
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    "There is half a galaxy that is politically beyond the Empire's reach," said Lilaena, a bit of steel in her voice. "You would be wise to know the difference between something that is impossible, and something that is merely more difficult than it was before."

    They stood facing each other in the passage, and she folded her arms across her chest. She was wearing clothes in the style of the Jedi, a moss green tunic with black accents, obi belt and pants to match. There was a black cloak to match, but it was a bit much for inside the ship. Ireen was intimidated enough without throwing on a hood and intoning about the powaas of the daaark side or anything like that.

    "You could go to the Jedi." Lilaena raised an eyebrow. "You know you have some potency in the Force. They could take you in and train you in their ways." Her green eyes sharpened, intensity rising as she stared at the girl. The air in the hallway seemed to thicken, a trick of the Force making the atmosphere oppressive and limiting. "Or you can remain here, and explore the full potential of the Force." She dismissed the heaviness of the air with an absent wave of her hand, granting relief.

  5. #5
    Ireen's gaze drifted from empty space to empty space, as if she would be able to see the uneasy pressure as it receeded back into whatever gloom it emerged from. Of course, she could see nothing, but the presence had been so real, like the hand of some giant heavy upon her shoulder, that she really wouldn't have been surprised if she had seen something. It wasn't until things returned to normal that she even realised the woman had spoken to her: she was offering her a choice, but her actions spoke more clearly than any words could.

    "Why did you do that?" Ireen asked, prickling with anger, "Are you trying to frighten me? Is that it?"

  6. #6
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    "Ireen, if you're not already frightened, then you haven't been paying attention." Lilaena let a trace of a smile filter through before she tightened her lips.

  7. #7
    "My life, as I know it, is over." Ireen heard her voice crack, so she took a moment. She shook her head. "I'm a little past the point of fear, right now."

  8. #8
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    "What do you think I should do with you, then?" Lilaena asked. "You were complicit in atrocious crimes against the innocent. Why do you think that you are still alive to have this conversation with me?"

  9. #9
    "What you shoud do with me?" Ireen repeated, incredulous. Questions bubbled to the surface, but she was grasping at the dark, with nothing but smoke for answers. Her eyes narrowed in a challenge. "I don't even know who you are."

  10. #10
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    "If you haven't grasped by now that I am the leader of an army of highly skilled Mandalorians and Force users, then there may be no hope for you," she said, clearly irritated. "You're a smart girl, Ireen, and you know what the Empire was doing ...what you were doing to those children. You wonder why I spared your life? To give you a chance to right the wrongs you've committed.

    "You've been very forthcoming with what information you know, and I do appreciate that. It makes this an easier choice for me - whether to abandon you to the galaxy and probably the Empire's embrace, or to take you under my wing, so to speak. You said your life is over; I say that it's just beginning. Your new life starts now, here, in this ship."

    Lilaena took a breath, and let her irritation slip to the background for the moment. "Do you want to join me, and make sure that something like your little lab of horrors never happens again? We can train you to use your latent abilities. But the choice... is yours."
    Last edited by Lilaena De'Ville; Oct 14th, 2015 at 11:45:25 AM.

  11. #11
    There was still a part of Ireen that doubted, that waited for the other shoe to drop, for the click of a blaster trigger - it was no more than she deserved - but, despite her doubts, there was also a part of her that knew she did not want to anger this strange woman before her. It was the part that wanted to live. Yes, it existed, and it kept her from insulting the proposal with another question.

    "Well, Miss... Leader of an Army of Highly Skilled Mandalorians and Force Users, I am grateful for your offer - really, I am - but... I'm not a soldier."

    Even as the words tumbled out, she winced.

  12. #12
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    "My name is Lilaena De'Ville," she said, not for the first time to Ireen. It had been...chaotic in the Orphanage, of course, but the scientist's response was a bit too sarcastic to take at face value. "And I'm shocked to learn that you are not a soldier!" Two could play this game.

    "I don't need more soldiers, Ireen. Are you trying to tell me that you're not interested in trying to make up for what you've done?" There was a dangerous edge to her voice.

  13. #13
    "I didn't say that," Ireen began. For all the rhetoric about a new life, it was becoming plain how little choice she actually had. The walls were closing in around her. This Lilaena woman presumed to appoint herself not only as judge and jury, but also rehabilitation officer - it was the natural progression, Ireen supposed, when one became the leader of an army of mercenaries. To take issue with her ways was about as pointless as bemoaning the setting sun - in the end, they will both do as they please.

    "If you think there is something that I can do to help you and... your people, then I will do it." She recalled the sterile smell of the operating room and the gleam of cutting tools. "Within reason."

  14. #14
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    "That is all I ask," Lilaena replied. "You will not get your freedom immediately - I do not sense duplicity from you, but even so you will have a guard for the time being. You may go anywhere on this ship except for the bridge and the engine rooms."

    She paused, and added, "Do you want to be trained in the use of the Force? You have the gift."

  15. #15
    "Uh... sure."

    The answer squeaked like a mouse, daring to peak out from its hole. And, though Ireen stumbled over her words, inside she was dancing. For the longest time, she had known - there were only so many times the scientific mind could willfully ignore the evidence before their eyes, no matter how outlandish - but she never thought she'd actually meet someone who could take this mystery, and help her unravel it. On an intellectual level, the promise of discovery was thrilling, on a personal level, she was as giddy as a school girl. A galaxy of possibilities awaited, and she was ready to dive straight in - but she stopped herself.

    Was this what she feared? The glimmer of hope before the end? Could anyone be that cruel?

    The panic shaped her eyes into moons. Breathless, she said, "Really?"

  16. #16
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    Lilaena's eyebrow quirked up a bit at the scientist's reaction, and she said, "Yes, really. The best way you can help - yourself, or future children the Empire will hurt - is to learn how to unlock your full potential. And I will help you do that, in exchange for your cooperation."

  17. #17
    "My full potential," Ireen repeated, distracted momentarily by exactly what that might mean. She had heard the stories and, after the events at the orphanage, she had seen first-hand the sort of talent Lilaena and her kind possessed. Lightswords were cool and all, but Ireen had difficulty picturing herself with something like that. But she was getting ahead of herself, and when she dislodged herself from those drifting thoughts, she offered Lilaena a wisp of a smile.

    "Okay. So, what do I do?"

  18. #18
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    "Have an open mind," she said. "The Force is a mystical energy that surrounds and binds everything in the galaxy. We are all connected to each other and to our surroundings with it. Adepts can learn how to manipulate the Force in order to change the reality of things around them.

    "Walk with me," Lilaena said, and it was not a question. She started off down the passageway, and Ireen followed. "To start with, think of what you are good at. Are you unusually lucky, or unlucky? Good with computers?"

  19. #19
    "I know my way around a computer terminal. Sure. But that has nothing to do with luck and everything to do with my aversions to sunlight and fresh air."

    Ireen's lips thinned, it was more of a wince than a smile. Not that it mattered: Lilaena wasn't troubling herself to look over her shoulder or accommodate her less certain steps. And she was difficult enough to read as it was. What did she expect from her? Laced fingers snapped apart as she renewed her pace.

    "I don't have any interesting anecdotes to share about hidden talents and, as a scientist, I don't put much stock in the mystical at any rate. But... I have a certain... intuition." Her tongue rolled over parched lips, a pause to season her words with taste, "In my field of work, imagination is a rare gift, it is the essence of discovery. And it sounds like I'm going to need it."
    Last edited by Ireen Cole; Jul 7th, 2016 at 07:30:55 PM.

  20. #20
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    "And what is it you have done with this... intuition?" asked De'Ville, slowing her pace to make sure Ireen kept up.

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