For 20 some years the war had been the one steady thought burned into Gaediiens mind. It was the Republic verses the Empire. The Sith verses the Jedi. The Dark side verses the supposed Light.
It was burned into every acolyte on Korriban, every Imperial in the Military, and every Dark Lord on the Council. To win the war was the main goal, to have complete control of the galaxy. To crush the Republic. This was the ultimate goal.
But down in the under city of Nar Shaddaa, the war that was burned so deeply in Gaediien's mind did not exist.
No, the war did not exist at all. There were no Sith, no Jedi. There was only the sound of suffering on a more local scale. Mothers and children and other innocents just trying to get by in their day were swept up in a much different war.
For once in Gaediiens life he felt right. All the evil he had done as a member of the Empire, all the pain he brought with him where he went. For all the studying he had completed to earn the title of apprentice, to earn the respect of the Masters. To catch the eye of a Dark Council member. He had never felt good. Never felt right.
As the days went on Gaediien realized Nar'na was correct. There was a war going on. It was not a war against the mighty Republic or the powerful Imperials, but it was everyday people trying to survive against the odds. Against the gangs. Against life itself.
The local gangs maimed and dismembered and stole and sometimes, though rarely, killed the locals. It was their idea of fun and too them it was a sort of business. Gaediien desperately wished a chance at them. They might be able to scare and hurt young children but they would go running in fear against a Sith Apprentice.
Former Sith Apprentice, but that's even if he allowed them to run. And they didn't know his standing with the Empire.
Night had fallen, another day had ended and Gaediien began his nightly ritual of meditation before sleep. It the only way he could sleep on the busy planet. The Force jumped like fireworks, shooting in all directions, touching everything and telling him all about it. He tried to release the last few muscles in his back, to fully submit to the Force and fall into oblivion, but he felt someone approach the door in the hall.
He waved the door aside with his hand, without opening his eyes. He already knew who it was. Nar'na stood in the dim light of the hall. Unsure. Something was wrong.
"Come in."
She stepped into the dim room, a bit apprehensive. He felt her standing near him, above him.
"Gaediien? What are you doing on the floor?" She asked curiously after a long moment.
"Meditating."
Silence.
"It's a way to relax, using the Force."
"Oh." another moment, "Whats the Force?" She asked. He had tried to hide it these past weeks, to conceal what he was. If she knew, oh Force if she knew, he was sure she would bolt. The Sith were considered heartless monsters.
That's because they are.
Shut up.
He opened his eyes and watched her. She had sat in front of him now, studying him. He turned it over in his mind. She was so afraid of him when he first came here, when he took out those men. What if she became afraid again and left him or asked him to leave?
You are Sith, are you so weak you cannot handle being on your own?
The voice in the back of his mind repeated the words thrown at him mere weeks ago.
"Pathetic. This is no Sith."
He swallowed and made his decision.
"The Force," he paused, what was it? How do you describe it to someone who does not have it? He pressed on, repeating what the Overseers had told him.
"The Masters at the... Academy explained that it's in all things. It binds all things together. It's in you and it's in me." He gestured to Nar'na then himself. Seeing that she was paying attention he continued.
"Some are born more sensitive to it then others. They can move things around them, or use it to enhance their own abilities. Like running or jumping. It gives you another sense, telling you before it happens. My Master..." Gaediien swallowed, breathe, it's alright, "he was very powerful. He was a highly a esteemed Force adept. His skill, it was unrivaled."
He schooled his features emotionless, betraying not a hint of the turmoil saw see the young girl think this over, compare it probably to what she's witnessed so far.
"Do you have family back on Coruscant?" She asked.
Coruscant? The random question puzzled him for a moment. Gaediien had almost forgotten she thought him a Jedi. He could not tell her he was Sith, and besides, you are no Sith. It would be a lie anyway.
"I do not know." It was a lie of sorts. Gaediien did very much have relatives all over the galaxy. On both sides of the war, he knew. Perhaps some did live on Coruscant. He knew only those on Alderaan and Dromund Kaas.
He saw the young Twi'lek wilt a bit at that.
"I don't know where my family is either." She told him "It was mama and I for a long while, alone. Then she died and it was just Dess and I, running this place." She glanced around the small, dark room. "Now it's just me."
She sounded misrable. Gaediien struggled to keep the mask on his face from cracking. To keep Nar'na, a young girl he had not known for more then two standard weeks, from seeing him break into ruins. He did not know if he would come back once he started. All that Sith learning. Grueling hours of duels and studying the ancient scripts on the tombs in the harsh Korriban climate. Was it for nothing? Had his Master taught him nothing?
He willed it all into the Force. But it did not go away. The pain clung. The guilt leeched his strength.
He blinked a few times to clear his vision, to come back into the real world. Nar'na was staring at him. Concern, worry, fear. He sensed it before he saw it.
It occurred to him that she probably saw his mask slip, a crack in the façade. He cleared his throat and posed to her a question to change the awkward subject.
"I'm sorry, I seem to have drifted a bit. Was there something you needed? A reason you sought me out?"
She looked down at her hands. Turning them and inspecting them. She was hesitant, afraid, nervous is what he finally settled for. He probed a bit, it wasn't a fear of him. That was good. No, it was a fear of his response?
"Go an ask." He encouraged.
Nar'na met his eyes, in them he saw she decided something.
"I can't sleep," it was a mere whisper, "I haven't slept in days. Things, in my head keep playing over and over. I didn't know if you were still awake, I was just lonely." There was more to it then that, he knew, but he would not press. He understood what she wanted. It was something he longed for every night. Company, someone to drive the nightmares away.
"You can stay here if you want company. Nothing too exciting, like I said, I'm just here meditating."
"That's okay. Do you mind if I watch?"
Yes.
"No, there's nothing much to watch though." He smiled at her and she returned it. He felt her relief. She made herself comfortable on the floor in front of him.
Somewhere in the back of his mind, a slim line of panic rose. He closed his eyes after a moment, willing away the thoughts starting to build. Years of Sith paranoia and watching others get stabbed in the back did not go away easily. He closed his eyes tighter and made himself fall into the Force.
It had been many hours later when he woke. A small blue form lay in front of him, sleeping soundly on the cool floor.
He felt a small twinge of pain as, she trusts you, floated lightly through his mind.
He carefully picked up the sleeping form and laid her across his bed, pulling the covers up and over her. She was very young, and very reckless to trust him so easily. It's not that he would harm her, he knew he couldn't, but she did not know who he really was. She did not know where he came from or what he was. And what it was he was running from. What brought him here to Nar Shaddaa in the first place
He got very little sleep that night. Tossing in his mind whether he should tell her or not.
He decided it was better not to. Let the Force decide it for him.
It was a prickling at his senses that woke Gaediien up the next day. He turned over on the floor to see the empty bed above him. Nar'na had awoken before him and left without him knowing.
Strange. He usually would awake when Master, no, no, no. Do not start so soon, it is too early.
Finding his body protesting at having to sleep on the hard, cold ground, Gaediien stretched his back and shoulders before hearing voices arguing down the hall. He enhanced his hearing with the Force and crept quietly down the hall to see who it was making such a fuss so early in the day.
"Today, Nar'na. It's been two months. There is a reason it's called a deadline."
Gaediien could make out the form of a Rodian, not much taller then Nar'na herself standing in front of the Twi'lek. His eyes fell to the worn blaster at the Rodian's hip. Clearly custom made and well used. This was not his first job, nor was he an amateur.
"I can't make it, give me a week!" It wasn't more then a whisper. "I don't have the credits right now." Nar'na pleaded.
The Rodian drew his blaster, slowly, not to kill but to threaten. He lifted it to the young girls face, pointing it between her eyes.
He was pretty fast, but Gaediien was much faster.
"You will give it to me, and I will deliver it to my boss. Either your credits, or your head." The Rodian sneered at the girl.
Gaediien crept up behind the man, igniting one of his twin sabers in front of the man's throat. It hummed to life. A red, searing blade of light ready to do its Masters bidding.
"How about I deliver your head instead?" He whispered in the Rodian's ear.
He could hear the strangers breath quicken for just a moment. But he recovered soon enough and the Force screamed at Gaediien to move. The Rodian ducked under the blade and shot behind him, spinning in place and continuing to shoot. Each blast hit the red blade, shielding the actual intended target. The Rodian took his second blaster and fired off at him. Gaediien activated his second blade, each time he caught the blaster fire with his twin sabers.
In his mind, he sensed Nar'na was hidden. He saw his chance. He opened his palm and the Rodian was lifted in the air and gripped his throat frantically. Gaediien lunged forward, twisting tightly in the air and drove the blades down.
A yell, and then nothing but silence.
His breathing was wild. It was not a massive fight or even a very challenging one. He had fought Jedi and acolytes and beasts, the Rodian did not compare. But it had still been awhile.
His last fight was, no, no, no.
He deactivated the blades and returned them to his sides. Turning about the room he sought the young Twi'lek he had grown accustomed to these past two weeks.
"Nar'na?"
Blue peeked out from behind the medical cot in the middle of the room. It reminded him of the first time he had opened his eyes here and fought those men.
"Is he...?" She gestured to the lump slouched over on the floor near the wall.
"Yes." He replied quietly, then quickly added, "Are you okay?"
"Yes."
Lie.
He could hear her breathing, it was quick and shallow. He sensed it before he saw it, she was shaking. She had grown up around death and violence, surely a small blaster fight wouldn't scare her so?
Perhaps she is not accustomed to seeing a Sith fight.
I am not a Sith. He sneered back at the voices. But perhaps they might be right, it was not the same as the street gang fights down here. He took a step closer. She held up a shaking hand.
"No, no, no."
"Nar'na, I won't hurt you. You know that."
She kept her hand up, backing up till she had bumped into the metal table behind her. He continued to walk towards her slowly, watching her eyes he saw how she looked around the room, she was looking for a way to run. But he was in her way no matter what she chose. This is not good.
"Stop!" She yelled. Gaediien froze in place, and held up his own hands now.
"Nar'na? When have I ever given you reason to fear me? We've lived and worked together for two weeks, I have never hurt you and I promise I never will."
She shook her head. This is really not good.
Then the question he had been dreading since he awoke here, since he landed on this planet, was asked.
"Who are you? Really? Who are you? You're not a Jedi. They do not kill."
He would have laughed if the situation had been different. Jedi do not kill? My dear, they most certainly do.
He did not know what to tell her. The truth, that he was a Sith? Or the other truth? That he had been publicly stripped of that and exiled from the only home he had ever known? No. The Sith were not his home. You don't hate your home. I don't hate it. You don't do that against your home. I had no choice.
This is not the time, he yelled back to the sneering voices.
He was a Force user? He was a dark Jedi? He was an exile?
"I..." Now it was his turn to shake.
"Who are you?" She demanded.
"I... I am no one. I don't... I was trained in the use of the Force as a child. But I rebelled, I... I Challenged their teachings and I was exiled."
There. That wasn't so hard.
If it was so easy then why didn't you tell the real reason you were exiled? Who you really were? What actually happened that night?
Nothing happened. Nothing at all. There was no night.
Nar'na tilted her head slightly, regarding him in an expression he could not read. His mind was reeling, one side laughing at him, one side yelling at him. On one side, his Masters voice, telling him to focus.
"There is a whole world right in front of you? Where are you?"
"Gaediien, focus!"
"Gaediien, side swipe! That is up! Why can you never stay here long enough to listen?"
"Gaediien!"
"Gaediien?"
It was a whisper. Not from his head or his memories, but from Nar'na. He met her eyes. A battle had been fought there, and whether she won or lost he could not tell.
"I trust you."
The storm in his mind did not settle, it merely paused. It would resume again later. The images, the voices the horror. It would be waiting for him tonight, as it always did. It was his only friend for so long now. The only thing he could count on still being there at the end of the day.
She took a step closer, and another step. He could still taste her fear, but she was pushing it aside. He could see it. She was afraid, horribly afraid he would kill her as he did the Rodian so easily, but she pushed it to the back of her mind. He could see it, she was standing in front of him shaking, her eyes betraying what she allowed her face to not.
He didn't know what she was doing. His instinct was to back away or be ready to defend himself. But he decided to take the same risk she was taking. There was an expression an acolyte he knew would use, "Pick up a new pazaak card from the deck and hope it makes twenty."
He watched her carefully. She reached slowly and took his hand in hers, turning it over and examining it as if he were a patient or a test subject. She brought her eyes back up to his. He fought hard not to fidget, not to move under the scrutiny.
He still did not know what she was doing but he let her do it. She was taking a large risk approaching him after what she had just witnessed. He supposed he could extend her the same benefit of the doubt.
She was watching his eyes, studying them. He knew what his eyes looked like, a deep, burnt yellow. They were not warm and inviting, he remembered they were not always that color.
She turned his hand over again. Oh how he hated touch, but he will not take it away from her. Trust her.
"I trust you." She repeated, a small smile appearing.
Why? "You don't know me."
She shook her head. "No."
She moved closer and for a second he almost backed away, but she wrapped her arms around his neck and hugged him tight.
What is...? He froze. He was aware it was a hug, but why was she hugging him? You didn't go around hugging Dark Lords of the Sith. First you are just an apprentice, and now you are no longer even that.
He laid his hands on her back carefully, in a way he truly hoped was considered hugging back. She trusts you, that you will not run her through with your sabers, so why is she still shaking?
"Nar'na?" He asked. It was much quieter then he had expected his voice to sound. He felt her nod.
"Why are you still shaking?" It was a mere whisper now. And why are you hugging me? He wanted to ask as well.
"Gaediien," she began, her voice shaky and quiet. "you have just gotten us both killed and started a war."
