It might have been the sugar right before sleeping, but Azix saw Sana in his dreams.
This time, it seemed less like a haunting and more like a memory he couldn't quite place. The mountain paths and thick foliage reminded him of Tython. Sana flitted between the trees, her close-fitting clothes reminiscent of what they used to wear as padawans. He chased, even though a sense of dread was growing in his belly. /I don't want this,/ he thought even as he pushed branches aside, weaving between bent, gnarled trees. /If I find her, something bad is going to happen. Every time I see her, it's bad./
"Az!" Her voice drifted back to him on the wind, melodic laughter cascading between the leaves as the sunlight dappled the forest floor. Nothing SEEMED wrong, and he put on speed without thinking about it, racing after her, panting as he struggled to catch up.
He stumbled into an overlook. The view into the valley confirmed his suspicion – this was Tython, and he was looking down at the temple complex. They were high enough that the Jedi moving about the courtyard were nothing but specks. Despite the familiarity of the landscape, he didn't remember this overlook, with its meadow-soft clover crawling over the ground and branches casting a comfortable shade. He'd explored the mountains thoroughly during his time in the temple, so if a place like this had existed on Tython, he felt certain he would have known about it.
Sana swung around a tree trunk, laughing, and threw her arms around him. He flinched, but she looked… alive. Whole and healthy, her head-tendrils shiny and her black eyes bright. "Got you!" she said almost shyly, and leaned in to nuzzle him.
Az jerked back. "Whoa," he snapped. "What are you doing?"
She blinked, looking up at him with those huge, dark eyes, refusing to let go. "Az, what's wrong? It's just us here." She leaned in again and he grabbed her shoulders, forcing her off him.
"Cut it out!" The air felt thin, like he wasn't getting enough oxygen despite his deep, heaving breaths. "What's going on? What is this place?"
She blinked, her milky eyelids sliding out of the corners of her eyes to meet in the middle. "This is our place. I made it for us. So it would always be sunny."
When Azix shifted, just for a moment, the clover under his feet seemed to turn to duracrete and scuff against his boot. The light pouring between the leaves dimmed, just for an instant.
"This is wrong," he said, straining to get a full breath. "This shouldn't be happening."
Sana backed away. She dropped to sit in the clover, dragging her webbed fingers through the pale blossoms. "A lot of things have happened that shouldn't have. I was just trying to make it better. Aren't you happy to see me?" Her expression was mournful, and suddenly, Azix remembered.
"You're dead."
She twisted as if he'd struck her. "Don't say that."
"You are." His breath rattled in his throat. "I saw it."
"Don't SAY it," she pleaded with him. "If you say it, then it'll be true… oh no." She touched the side of her head, where cracks had appeared – fractured skull, fractured skin, blood dripping down the side of her face. "Az, please don't remember me dead. I can't hold this if you fight it."
"You're not really here."
"I AM." She slammed her hands into the clover, bent, shoulders shaking as if she was weeping, though Nautolans didn't produce tears. "I'm here. I'm trying to reach you, but every time I reach out you run away! I brought you here so it'd be less frightening, so that we could talk. I can feel the wounds in your mind," she whispered. "I know how badly you're hurt."
"You keep telling me to abandon everything I believe," Azix said, backing up until he found a tree to lean against. "How is that supposed to help?"
"The lies you're clinging to are keeping you from accepting what happened to you," Sana told him. "Both before, on Dromund Kaas, and now. You're denying that you've been wounded, corrupted. But the Dark Side doesn't disappear because you deny it." Ominous, her voice seemed to echo off the trees as if they were made of steel and stone. "It's always there, in every shadow, in the corners of your heart. If you can't make peace it WILL break you, like it broke me right before the end."
He swallowed. In the dream, his throat felt thick and clogged. "Sana, I'm so sorry," he whispered, and felt himself choking. "I couldn't stop myself. I couldn't protect you."
"I know." She sat huddled on the ground, her head still dripping from her death wound. "I forgive you, Az. I was never angry at you. You were innocent."
"… Not innocent." He turned his face, trying to force himself to feel the roughness of bark against his cheek, but everything seemed like it was touching him through layers of cotton. "If I hadn't already been corrupted…"
/If I didn't have these feelings, this poison, waiting in me like a monster's claws on nursery windowsill.../
"...Maybe he couldn't have gotten me."
Sana bent, pressing one hand to the wound as if ashamed of it. "No. Examine your feelings, brother. Examine your memories. Does that make sense? Does it make sense that the possession was due to some fault in you? The same fault would have to be present in me, in Master Surro, in everyone affected. All our colleagues, the Republic troops too. And yet, that Sith who freed us…."
Azix growled and thumped his head against the tree, but couldn't feel the impact.
"You saw him, Az." Her conviction was quiet and relentless. "SUCH corruption. So much more than you or I would ever suffer."
He knew. Force, he knew. He'd felt it. The dark thrum, the sensation of pins and needles, the ozone scent of a gathering storm. Like a vine-silk dress on a rotting corpse, the sith was pale and beautiful and he oozed hungry coils of mindless evil. He remembered thinking it was like looking at Nol all grown up. One day, perhaps, the little redheaded siren would feel just as foul, his mesmerizing beauty a lure that led straight into an angler fish's teeth. Even his immature, juvenile wickedness had left stains Azix couldn't scrub away.
"And yet, he stood up to the Emperor," Sana reminded him. "He defeated him, even temporarily. So it's not about the Dark Side, or corruption. He was just too powerful, a creature like that. Only another creature who had left natural life behind could really contend with him. You and I were good Jedi," she whispered, "but there was nothing we could do. We were innocent. You were innocent then, and you were innocent in the hands of Nollok Jen'kari. You did nothing wrong, Azix."
He sank to his knees, drawn down by the sinking sensation in his stomach. "It's not about that," he hitched. "It's about after. After, Sana… I have these thoughts, I have these feelings, they won't go away. THAT'S the corruption. That's the infection. What happened… on Ziost, just made it spread…."
"If you're corrupt, then so am I. I have those feelings too. When you…." She swallowed, head-tendrils curling at the tips, and his blood throbbed hot with memory and shame. "Those actions, they were his. But the want was mine."
No. No. He swallowed over and over, trying to dislodge the lump in his throat, trying to breathe past the ache it created. "That… it was just… it wasn't your fault, Sana, everything that happened…."
Her fingers clenched in the clover, staining fragile leaves with blood. "I know. All I'm saying is that it wasn't yours either. You won't find any refuge in the Jedi's teachings," she whispered. "I'm not trying to hurt you, love. I don't want you to hurt anymore because you think you're not good enough. There IS darkness. There is death. There is need, and passion, and desire. You don't have to become what you hate, but it would ease your pain if you would just… let yourself be a person. Flawed. Contradictory, perhaps, as we all are."
"But I don't want to," he said, voice cracking around the stone in his throat. "I want to be a Jedi. I didn't want any of this."
The light dimmed again. Rough duracrete pressed against his feet. The trees warped, their silhouettes fading to straight, soaring lines and angular buttresses. Walls sprang out of nothing and closed in around him.
"And I don't want to live here, in this memory," Sana told him, her voice cracking on an angry sob. "Denial holds us here, my love. Only forgiveness and acceptance will free us both. You deserve compassion. Mercy is great, Azix, it's the greatest force in the universe, even greater than The Force. It allows for all things."
The overlook was fading, the trees and clear blue skies of Tython vanishing, swallowed by shadow and durasteel. New Adesta, torn and shattered, thrumming with fear and pain. And in the sky above, a vortex of ultra-violet light, so black it turned to color again, swirling and devouring with insatiable glee: the pall of Vitiate.
"Mercy," she pleaded. "Please, Azix."
"I don't want to be that thing!" he screamed, ripping the words from his throat. "I don't want to give in to the dark, I want to be… pure." The ground shook. Sirens went off in the distance. Screams of civilian victims echoed between the buildings, reflected by the glassy black stone. A young technician in a gray uniform lay at his feet. His freckles faded as his body lost color, and the gravity in Azix's core seemed to shift, a terrible and inevitable pull. "No," he groaned. "Force, No…."
"Only two kinds of people are pure." Sana hid her face, pressing the hem of her robe to her crushed skull even as her eyes went milky. Red light, emergency crash lighting, spilled over her skin and suddenly Azix was back in /that place/, in that moment, bound and hanging from a harness, choking on the stench of death. "There are innocents, and there are fanatics. Dromund Kaas and Ziost took all the innocence you had left. Now, you can accept impurity or you can drown in the dark, and become what you hate the most. I've seen it." Both hands covered the wound as if she could stop it from killing her by not letting it bleed. "If you go that route, I'm telling you, you won't be the boy I loved anymore."
"You didn't love me," Azix heard himself saying from a distance. "What happened here…."
"Had nothing to do with me. You were my brother, and I loved you. And I wanted you to be more. That was my temptation," she said softly, watching him with eyes glazed in death, eyelids half-emerged. "That was my sin, Az, and I forgive myself for it. In the end, I was more than a Jedi," she whispered as the ground shook again, stone and glass raining down, somehow missing them even as it shattered at their feet. "I was a sentient being; I was a woman. And you were a man."
Azix looked into her glazed eyes and saw an abyss yawning underneath his feet.
"What do I do?"
The ground crumbled away around him, breaking off in chunks to plummet into the underground rift in which New Adasta had been built. Through the shaking he held Sana's gaze, and despite the gore smeared across her head her expression was gentle.
"Just stop running."
Stop running.
The ground dissolved and he pitched backward into the darkness, but he remembered this was a dream and let go of fear, and falling turned into something else, something dazed and nebulous and shifting.
Stop running.
Acceptance dissolved the boundaries of the nightmare. He slipped deeper into sleep, and into other, less terrible dreams.
He stopped running. The nightmares stopped chasing.
This time, he was allowed to truly rest.
x-x-x
Breakfast was waiting when he woke up.
"You have a domestic side," he told Rye, who merely gave him a dry look, though his droid made a rasping, derisive beep.
"You slept well," he countered. "Did you dream about your friend?"
Azix, who had been sitting up and stretching, froze. "… I… I think so," he said, struggling to pull hazy details of the dream to his mind. "Not a nightmare, though. Well… kind of, toward the end. We were on Tython…."
"I don't require the details," Rye said mystifyingly, "just confirmation, thank you."
"Confirmation?" Azix got up and flexed, and his spine popped in several places, turning his next words into a ragged groan. "Why, was I thrashing or something?"
"No, but I've activated some of my environmental subroutines and I've been collecting ambient data since your experience in the basement," Rye informed him as Azix broke into the soda and spicy yeast crackers Rye had brought him for breakfast. "I may not be able to sense The Force like a biological, but there are measurable side effects to certain Force manifestations."
Azix blinked at him. "Okay, but… why?"
One brow spike arched in a way that made Azix feel profoundly stupid. "What do you mean, 'why'?"
"Well…." Suddenly on the spot, Azix cast about for phrasing that would make his question sound wiser and better thought-out. "I mean, what difference does it make? I AM Force Sensitive, so isn't it mostly my problem?"
The other brow arched, and Azix almost growled at that cool, pureblood judgement. "The difference," Rye explained, "is that you have experienced the sort of trauma that has long-term adverse effects on biologicals. So, are your fears and nightmares and visions a product of that trauma? Or are you actually being haunted by a Force Ghost? Do you know the difference?" he asked pointedly, folding his arms. "And, are you certain?" When Azix hesitated, he said more gently, "I thought it might be of use to you to know exactly what you're dealing with. It isn't your brain making you see things – there is a legitimate Force manifestation, which may actually be the spirit of your dead companion. For what it's worth."
"… Oh." Azix couldn't think of anything more intelligent to say. "Thanks."
"Don't thank me yet. I'll let you know if I have any success modifying this droid's probe emitters to produce a field capable of disrupting that sort of manifestation. It's quite an experimental project, and of course, I am not an engineering program."
"Wait, what?" He stripped the musty-smelling sweater over his head and tossed it on the couch. "Why are you trying to do that?"
Rye eyed him. "If I call you an idiot, and I mean it fondly, will you take it fondly?"
"DO you mean it fondly? 'Cause I have my doubts."
"I do. You're an idiot," Rye said, changing his tone to soften the word. "I'm trying to protect you."
That took Azix by surprise. He brought his food to the work desk and took his time finding the right position for the chair as he tried to figure out how he felt about that. "Do you think that's necessary?" he asked at length, "or realistic?"
"It's been done before," Rye said, but one glance at his holographic face told Azix he didn't plan to elaborate.
"Has anyone ever told you that you're very enigmatic for a program that's supposed to teach people things? Did you do this to your visitors?" Azix wondered, crunching on the crackers and trying to wash away the burning sensation with the soda. "Excuse me, tour guide hologram, but which way are the bathrooms? 'Well, young master, I can assure you that the bathrooms definitely exist'."
"According to my records," Rye replied, "'Where is the bathroom' is the number one most common question I ever received. Followed by 'When does the museum close', although 'Where is the gift shop' competes with 'when does the museum close' if you remove instances of, 'oh, is the museum closed?' or 'the lights went out, does that mean you're closing?' from the data set."
Azix knew an oncoming service industry rant when he heard one, and he dragged over an unfinished mount, prepared to be entertained. "What comes after that?"
"Any query containing both the phrases 'school project', and 'I don't know'. As in, 'I'm supposed to do a project for school, but I don't know what to do it on. Is there anything that's really easy?'"
Apparently, school children were the same all over the galaxy. Azix grinned as he remembered making an almost identical plea to the temple archivist. "IS there anything that's really easy?"
"Anything to do with Naga Sadow or Ludo Kressh," Rye said dryly. "To the point that many instructors removed them from the list of acceptable topics, doubtless after reading a few hundred iterations of the same report."
"So if you're not allowed to do your report on… Naga," he fumbled, grabbing a metal file, "Or the other guy, then what did you suggest?"
"Sorzus Syn," Rye said. "Or Ajunta Pall. Any of the Jen'Jidai. The first. Those were always good for full marks, if you put half a thought into it. But Sith history is filled with fascinating figures, though I doubt you'd find them so."
"What's so fascinating about violence and murder?" Azix asked.
"He says," Rye replied, dripping sarcasm, "As if he himself is not the militant arm of a… Jedi," he said, a hint of a low growl entering his voice when the octave dropped, as if he was a real pureblood with real vocal chords. "If you want me to stop finding arguments, you're going to have to stop making it so terribly easy for me."
Azix smiled over his shoulder. "I just wanted to see if you'd catch yourself."
"Hmph." Rye's projection stalked past him, but Azix interrupted his attempt at a flounce.
"I didn't understand that word you used. Jen'jidai. I don't know anything about The First. Does that mean the first Sith?" The rasp of the metal file forced him to raise his voice. Rye had the advantage of simply increasing his volume without sounding like he was actually shouting.
"In ancient Sith, 'jen' means 'dark' or 'shadow' or 'reflection'. 'Jidai' was the ancient purebloods' attempt to pronounce 'Jedi'. The Sith were Jedi once," he said. "Did your teachers tell you that?"
"... Not in so many words. But I kind of assumed. Sith teachings are perversions of Jedi knowledge. They take the truth and twist it," Azix said, rhythmically sawing at the bracket. "Drown the light in darkness." Before Rye could contradict him, he added, "I'm just saying that's what I was told."
Rye's mouth thinned, but he let the opportunity to argue pass. "They were almost all human, the first Dark Jedi who landed on Korriban. Twelve of them, all that was left from a terrible war that split your Order in ancient times. They awed the native purebloods, deposed their king, and ruled them as Jen'ari, lords of shadow, the first Dark Lords of the Sith. They used alchemy to make themselves genetically compatible with the natives, and their lineage lived on through their hybrid children."
"Explains why humans and purebloods are the only two species it's acceptable to be in the Empire," Azix muttered, not because he was upset but because he'd leaned in to concentrate on shaping the socket he was filing. If it was too wide or uneven, the holoprojector would rattle in its mounting and likely break from the repeated stress of travel.
Still, he was focusing hard enough that, over the rasp of the file, he almost missed Rye's reply.
"The Empire is changing."
Now it was Azix's turn to consider his response and choose not to pick a fight, because he didn't give a single fuck how the Empire was 'changing'. Instead, he considered both his options and his immediate goals, and said, "You know, that story you told about the goddess… that was pretty neat. You're a decent storyteller."
"Your faint praise warms my non-existent heart."
Azix blinked, then compared the interaction to what little he knew of Imperials and realized Rye probably thought he was insulting him. 'Decent' probably meant something akin to 'barely adequate' in the Empire. "No, I mean… I mean you're a really good storyteller, and I liked your story, and I was going to ask if you knew any more stories that wouldn't be super, um… political."
"Oh. Well." Rye paused a moment, doubtlessly searching his memory banks. Azix turned around and pressed the bracket against the droid's chassis, then began unscrewing the bolts on the chest plate. He did his best to make it look like something absolutely necessary and ordinary. "We covered creation myth, I suppose. Perhaps… a nice romance?"
"Do Sith have nice romances?" Azix asked dryly. "I didn't get that impression."
"Well, that's rather the point, isn't it?" Rye said. "They're passionate, for good or for ill. In your case, it was for ill. But there are plenty of stories of mutual love, famous romances, forbidden partnerships. Sith who set the galaxy aflame."
"Galaxy's full of burning balls of gas already," Azix couldn't resist saying, and was rewarded with one of Rye's pureblood dry looks. Unlike an actual droid, Rye had facial expressions he could read, and read easily. Maybe that was intentional, maybe not, but Azix found himself playing to it anyway, desperate for social interaction that was recognizably sapient.
"Stars and black holes, both." Hands clasped lightly behind him, Rye considered his request. "Perhaps the lords of Isa and Aldriss. Though that story contains no small amount of romantic tragedy."
"Let me guess." Azix removed the droid's power converter and draped the wiring over its arm to hold it aside, picking up one of the holoprojectors Rye had uninstalled from the hallway mounts and measuring its wires against the existing tangle. "They both wind up dead?"
"Well, eventually. They were mortal," Rye said, amused. "But in this case, the tragedy was that Cross Aldriss was forced into an arranged marriage by his head of house, and due to his own inherent nobility, he refused to dishonor that alliance by pursuing an affair with the love of his life; Irilisan Isa, a war hero of the Sith and scion of a less regarded House. He remained loyal until the natural death of his spouse. While he and his love were united in the end, by that time they were both advanced in age, and they had only their twilight years to spend together when they should have had a lifetime. Stolen time is the tragedy… that, and passion deferred."
"Man, you could have read me that plot without a shred of context and I would have pegged it as an Imperial story. 'Be passionate and follow your heart but only after you've done your duty to the state'. Kriff." He was joking, and he made sure to shoot Rye a smile so he would understand the jab wasn't serious.
"Actually, in this case, the moral of the story was that only sorrow will come of denying your passions. Things like love are, apparently, what make life worth living. Though of course, I don't necessarily hold with that point of view, as I have found plenty of reasons to live without the demonstrated capacity to love. In modern times, arranged marriages between Sith may only be pursued with the full consent of all parties. Children and apprentices can no longer be forced by their parents or masters to marry for political gain."
"What about Imperials? Can they marry whoever they want?"
"Theoretically, though in truth, familial and political pressure govern most marriages between the upper classes. The lower classes, of course, can do as they please."
"So it's passion for the Sith and duty for everybody else?"
"The reverse of the Republic, is it not?" Rye shot back. "Where Jedi are denied all passion, and even the simple comfort of affection, while citizens are free to pursue their passions with abandon?" When Azix threw him a glance, he merely smiled, and Az snorted.
"Okay, okay. Touche'." He went back to examining the wires, balancing the holoprojector in his broken hand and weaving the fingers of his good hand between the color coded strands. "I don't know if I'd say we're denied the simple comfort of affection."
"But you are. Attachments are forbidden, are they not?" Rye moved closer, and Azix made sure there was nothing objectionable or suspicious about his toying with the wiring. "After what happened to you, whose shoulder did you cry on?" When Az threw him a dark look, Rye raised his hands. "I don't ask to upset you. From my perspective, it is clear that you have not been allowed to grieve or process the violation you experienced. Now, here you are, having experienced even further and more severe violations, and you are trying to divorce yourself from the very natural and understandable emotional upheaval and carry on as if you are immune to harm." He folded his arms and affected a lean against the wall. "I would expect as much of a Jedi, but you are also a sentient being, and sentient beings are not impervious to psychological trauma."
Azix sighed. "You know what's funny? Sana told me almost the exact same thing last night."
"What does she want?" Rye asked bluntly. "She must be haunting you for a reason."
Azix's fingers twitched. He stopped fiddling with the wires and pressed his broken hand in the crook of his armpit, trying to soothe the tightness of the tendons with heat and pressure, even though that made ache crawl up the length of his arm. What did Sana want with him? If she wasn't trying to drag him into death with her, then what was her goal?
/You don't have to become what you hate, but it would ease your pain if you would just let yourself be a person./
"She lost her faith in the end," he said finally, rubbing the rough bumps of a pin adapter between his fingers. "She came to believe that the teachings of the Order… had flaws. She doesn't want me to have the same fate she did."
Rye considered that, and Azix wondered if he had learned how to pause in conversation for effect, or if it really took him that long to run through potential responses. "What fate do you want?" he asked, which was very much not what Azix expected from him, and threw him off for a stuttering moment.
"I… well, at this point, I just want to survive."
"Any single-celled amoeba wants to survive," Rye said dismissively. "You have the luxury of wanting more. Do you even know?"
"What about you?" Azix shot Rye a warning look and delved into the droid's wiring again. "What's your reason for living? Got plans and ambitions once we get off this rock?"
"I suppose it will depend on the reception I get," Rye said. "I doubt the Empire will extend citizenship to an AI, even an exceptional one. I have heard there are emancipated droids in independent sectors and in Hutt space… bounty hunters, mostly, but that's an option."
Azix's brows rose. "You want to be a bounty hunter, you're going to need a better chassis. This one should do okay for getting to the closest shuttle, but it's not built for that kind of combat use."
"I don't think I want to be a Bounty Hunter," Rye said. "Of course, I've never tried violence before, so I might enjoy it. Regardless, there must be demand somewhere for someone with my abilities. But you did not answer my question," he reminded Azix, still watching him as he ran new power lines to the holoprojector mounts. "What do you want?"
"Hey, not to change the subject," Azix replied, "but did you want me to install extra power modules? 'Cause if so, I'm gonna need to start making space in the chest cavity and running extra wiring. I figured I'd ask while I'm staring straight at it."
"I think it would be wise, but do you expect me to let you get away that easily?" Rye asked.
"Nah, of course not." Azix sighed and began pulling out ribbon-like clusters of wiring, carefully disconnecting rows of pins and sockets. "That would require tact."
"I can be tactful. I'm choosing not to. I'm interested in your answer," Rye insisted. One of his hovering cleaning droids grabbed a screwdriver and presented it to Azix just as he was about to start looking for it to remove one of the internal wiring mounts. "I want to know what you want from this, Azix. Why fight so hard to survive? What are you living for?"
Azix leaned his head against the chassis, feeling a pounding in his temples. "You know, sometimes biologicals just instinctively go on living even if they can't answer that question. It's a primal drive, y'know? Survival. It doesn't have to be FOR anything. We just don't want to die."
"I understand that. But in your case, I think the question is important. There will come a point when simply fighting for survival is no longer enough," Rye said, the droid booping softly as it swooped to Azix's other side and offered him a thumb-sized spray can of mechanical lubricant. "You need to pick a direction before you can make any real progress. It has to be more than just 'away from what hurts me'."
He snorted. "Stellar. When did you absorb a psychology program?"
"In my efforts to understand the creatures I find myself surrounded, owned, and directed by, I've read the work of great philosophers and healers. In fact, I can read anything I want to read," he pointed out archly, "so you shouldn't be surprised that I choose to absorb and cultivate knowledge. I'm more surprised that so many who have that opportunity don't take advantage of it. Like you, right now, doing everything in your power to avoid not only answering my question, but even considering it. Are you afraid there's no answer?" he demanded, Imperial accent making his words ring with more threat than he probably intended. "That if you probe beyond the basic drive of self preservation, you'll find yourself directionless, and therefore, meaningless?"
"Is that so wrong?" Azix snapped, patience fraying, though he tried to reel it back in. "Maybe I don't know what the fuck I'm doing, Rye. Maybe I'm just trying to move forward, and hoping to get a clue somewhere along the way. I can't do anything if I don't get off Ziost. Once I get back with the Order, once I'm… home… then I can start worrying about all that other stuff."
"You mean, once the Order tells you what you should be doing." Rye frowned, his delicate brow spikes drawing together. "Don't you decide anything for yourself? What do YOU want?"
"Kriff, Rye, what if I just want to be a Jedi?" He set the screwdriver down a little too sharply in his exasperation. "What if I just want to follow orders, and protect others, and wear brown bantha wool and eat rootleaf stew and feel like I'm doing something good for the galaxy? Not everybody wants to be unique and independent. Some people just want to fit in."
"It seems like a waste of sentience to me. And WHAT is rootleaf stew?" he asked with an expression that implied he expected something awful. Not that he was really wrong.
"Temple refectory staple. If you had taste buds, I'd invite you to try it sometime. Word is, it's got everything a body needs. Vitamins, iron, lots of amino and tannic acids…."
"So, it's bitter and leaves film on your teeth," Rye said dryly. "I'd expect as much of the Jedi."
"It's part of the philosophy," Azix told him. "We're supposed to learn to stop wanting stuff. When we focus on the things we want, we prioritize ourselves over others. That's selfishness, and it prevents us from pursuing wisdom and doing justice for others. Objectivity can only be achieved by the surrender of desire, and self. Anyway," he said, grunting as he pulled a set of pins free from corroded sockets, "if you saute the rootleaf in a little yellow mushroom oil, it gets the bitterness out."
"I'd assume so. It does the same for other bitter greens. But I'm sure those temple refectories don't bother with such simple solutions," Rye snarked. "Bad food, like scratchy robes, builds character."
"Hey, I'm living proof." He shot Rye a look, and smiled at his longsuffering expression.
"I have so many responses to that," he lamented. "But I'm not supposed to be picking fights with you right now."
"Look, Rye, I'll tell you what. When I'm back to wearing my own clothes," Azix said, burying his head in the droid's mechanical guts again, "when I have something to eat besides snacks packed with capsaicin and salt, when I have something to drink besides soda and I'm not constantly either sugar-high or crashing, when I've had a few days to myself to sleep and meditate and take regular baths, THEN you can ask me what I want from life. And maybe I'll have a better answer to give you than, 'all I want is to get through this in one piece'. That's fair, isn't it?" He jammed the head of the screwdriver between another set of corroded contacts, growling as he tried to pry them loose.
As if on cue, the maintenance droid drifted over with a fresh can of soda in its pincers. Lacking any better options, Azix accepted it, popped the tab, and guzzled it down.
Rye watched him. "Sometimes, such things are better tested under stress. But I concede. Perhaps when you've had a few months to recover from this ordeal, I'll send you a text," he suggested. "Ask you again."
Azix smiled. "Somehow, I think once you get out there in the galaxy, you're going to forget all about me and find way better things to do with your time." He was focusing on chipping away at caked, white sulfide, so he missed Rye's thoughtful frown.
"Perhaps," Rye allowed. He left the rest unspoken.
/I wouldn't count on it./
