—Chapter 21: Arbitration—
Malfi followed Temiri through the winding halls. She did her utmost to behave as much like a fly on the wall as she could—a difficult fantasy to conjure, tethered to her guide as she was. As they walked, she made it her goal not to bump into him, pull or push on his arm, or in any way interact with anything they passed. She wanted to pretend she wasn't really where she was. She would be a ghost.
This was overly ambitious. The halls were narrow, the path labyrinthine, and most terrifyingly, they were not alone. Though very few individuals besides the two of them roamed these halls, they did pass the occasional acolyte—all of whom were appallingly empty. She would have to fall in behind Temiri to avoid bumping into the Sith, and in doing so had to maneuver herself awkwardly in order not to pull Temiri's arm behind his back. She wondered why the Black Dragons were letting them, her, pass.
The first time it happened, she'd averted her eyes from the passing figure. The second time, she'd braved a glance up at him. Yellow eyes stared back, looking down at her as though he too wondered why she was being given safe passage. After that, she kept her head down.
Finally, mercifully, they arrived at their destination. The door opened at Temiri's command, and the two entered. He released her hand and she proceeded ahead of him, putting a few feet between them. As she looked back at him, the door swung closed behind him.
For a tense moment, neither of them spoke. His cloaked head hung low, and his eyes were closed. Something about him, something else, didn't look right, but she couldn't immediately put her finger on what it was. She stole a brief second to take in her surroundings.
"Malfi," he said, and her head snapped back to him. "Malfi, I need you to listen."
"Tell me what happened to you," she begged. "How did you end up in… this place?"
"The Republic," he began, "our teachers… they all lied to us."
"What are you talking about?"
"They killed your parents," he said flatly. She stood, transfixed, in response to this revelation from him.
"What are you talking about?" she asked again, breathlessly.
"They killed your parents," he repeated. "The Republic did. When they took you, enslaved you, they killed your parents. They wanted us for our power."
"That's… That's insane!" she shouted. "You can't really believe that, Temiri!"
"Don't call me Temiri!" he barked back at her. He started pacing circles around the small space, and she retreated away from him, bumping into the table at her back. "Temiri was a fool!" he shouted. "Temiri was taken advantage of! Temiri was abandoned by his father and left to the wolves to take and mold as they saw fit, feeding him scraps of knowledge in exchange for his fealty!" He stopped pacing and looked at her. For the first time since they'd reunited, she saw his eyes, and she felt frozen. "Temiri was a slave," he declared with finality.
"But… But Tem—" she stuttered, desperate to say his name, but terrified of the reaction he would have if she did. Those eyes… they belonged to someone else.
"I understand this is a difficult thing for you to hear," he said, recovering his composure. "I didn't believe it at first, either, but when you stop and think about it, it makes sense."
"How does it possibly make sense?!" she shouted.
"Because," he said, "we are powerful. The First Order had taken us to use, too, but when the Republic swooped in, it wasn't to free us, it was to seize the spoils of war. Ben, Rey… and Simeon… just agents of the Republic's war machine. Trying to control us so that we won't rise up against them. They fear us for what we can do."
"Then why would they have saved us in the first place?" she asked. "Why not just kill us at the start?"
"Because we're too useful to them—at least, we are as long as we are obedient."
"But… they love us!" she cried desperately, tears creeping back into her eyes.
"Ha!" he shouted, and he raised his fist toward the ceiling. Electricity shot from his hand into the stone above, leaving black marks behind. Malfi took another terrified step backward, bumping once again into the table at her back. She edged herself into the corner, desperate to put more space between the two of them.
He looked at her and softened. "Forgive my outrage, Malfi, but no, they don't. Would someone who loves me try to kill me?" he asked. "Would someone who loves me… mutilate me like this?" he asked.
At this, Malfi finally realized what it was about him that hadn't looked right. The empty sleeve, trailing in the breeze as they'd walked. This lasting hurt was what had inspired his outrage against their teachers.
Malfi trembled. She knew Ben—or rather, the parasitic force controlling Ben—had attacked him, but it never occurred to her that Temiri would believe that Ben would do that in his right mind. Clearly, that was exactly what Temiri believed. "Temiri, that wasn't really Ben that attacked you."
Temiri, Whuhai, dismissed her with a vehemently incredulous stare. "You don't know what you're talking about. You weren't there," he said levelly.
"We went to the hotel," she started explaining, but realized she needed to start further back. "Something bad had happened to Rey—we have her unconscious on the Millennium Falcon right now—so we called Ben on his comlink. He didn't sound right… Ren could tell, it clearly wasn't him. Worried, we tried to call you too, but you didn't answer, so we flew here as fast as we could and investigated. We saw the room where you stayed. I know you were attacked, but it wasn't Ben that did it."
"I'm supposed to believe something other than what I saw because you say Ben 'didn't sound right'?" he asked, unconvinced. "Look, I understand how hard it is for you to believe this, but they don't really love us," he insisted. "It's all a ruse."
Malfi shook her head. "Is it so hard for you to believe that they do love us? That the last five years haven't been a great stupid conspiracy?"
Her old friend sighed, looking down at her. "My dear friend," he said sincerely, "it was this hopeful naïvete, this very instinct to see the good in people in spite of all the bad they put on display that made the two of us such good friends. You inspired me to believe that maybe, just maybe, I had found a home grounded in genuine affection. You could see the good in me, so I tried hard to trust the good in them. My father violated that trust, but you had done so much to help me find hope that my new home was different. That it was real. Really Malfi, it was very difficult to throw that hope away—I didn't do it lightly. Even after I found myself here, I tried to hold on to what you'd wanted me to believe—I wanted to believe it too. But I couldn't deny the facts… Be honest, Malfi… it is simply more logical that I was being used, than that I was being cared for."
Malfi's throat was tight, and she took a long, tortured moment to examine the face of her dearest friend. He truly believed what he was saying. The monster he believed he was… that anyone could love that person was too unbelievable for him to accept.
"Do you know what he said to me before he took my arm?" he pressed. "Before he bore down on me with a look of hatred in his eyes so deep it broke my heart? Before he kicked me to my death?"
Malfi stood there quietly, trembling, afraid to listen, but unable to shut him out.
"He said to me: 'You don't even deserve to be called a Jedi'. And then he cut me in two as I cowered before him, begging for my life."
Malfi's eyes erupted, the floodgates of her tears thrown wide. Her knees gave out underneath her, and she collapsed to the floor, sobbing.
Whuhai looked down at her, sympathetic but satisfied. She was understanding. He was succeeding in convincing her that, yes, the last five years had been a lie. She just needed a little more time to process that truth, and then they could discuss what they were going to do with the liars and betrayers in their midst. How Malfi could go about freeing herself from them…
He got down on one knee and set his hand on Malfi's shoulder.
She looked up at him, an utterly devastated expression coloring her beautiful, innocent face. "Did… Did he really say that to you?" she asked through her tears.
"He did, yes. Every word."
Malfi howled again, and laid her hand upon Temiri's. "Oh, Temiri, you poor, poor fool," she said.
Whuhai cast her a wounded look. He waited, confused.
She reached around his neck and hugged him close, soaking his neck with her tears. "You big, stupid dummy…" she continued, doubling down on her earlier insult. She felt his confusion, and pulled away to look him in his tortured yellow eyes. "Don't you understand?" she asked.
He returned her gaze, but said nothing.
"Temiri," she said, and she touched her forehead to his, "if it had been Ben, he'd have said 'Ronin'."
—
Lonâm had been communicating with his lord and master for the better part of the last hour. Darth Sidious had arrived at Malachor, and soon, Lonâm would be called upon to assist in the rites that would make permanent his lord's return to the physical plane. Now that his attention was back here in Theed, he found it very timely that his new acolyte should be approaching his study once again.
He opened the door in welcome, and before him, stood Whuhai.
"Whuhai, I am pleased to see you. Though, the look on your face is not encouraging. What revelations do you bring?" he asked.
"My lord, I… I was unable to turn her," said Whuhai, a look of profound sorrow on his face.
"That must be disappointing. I am sorry, my son. But better for you to have learned this now than to have trusted her and then been made a fool of. Attachments are fleeting, and often only exist to be exploited by others."
Whuhai nodded his head, doing his best to hold back his grief from his master. But whatever pride it was that made him attempt to hide his feelings, it was for naught—the misery was palpable.
"You try so hard to conceal your pain from me, but your prideful efforts betray you… Do you intend to kill her then?"
Whuhai again nodded, clearing his throat. "Forgive me, my lord. I… had really hoped she would turn."
"Mmm, yes, I know. But you haven't answered my question."
"Again, apologies. I was hoping… That is, I planned to wait until overnight to take any further action. I thought if she… had some time to reconsider…"
"This is a great risk you are taking, Whuhai," said Lonâm. "If she is this determined not to see the truth, she may instead use this time to work out how to manipulate you. It is a defense mechanism the weak employ when they find themselves out of options."
"Worry not, my lord. I am committed to the path," Whuhai's voice cracked as he said this, and he struggled to make it obey. Swallowing hard, he continued, "She will join us, or die."
"As you like it, my son," said Lonâm. "Get some rest, then. Tomorrow holds great promise—best to meet it at full strength."
"Yes, my lord." And with that, Whuhai, acolyte of the Sith, took his leave.
—
"How long have we been in here?" asked Finnie.
"I dunno, kid, they took my chrono when they took my blaster, and my comlink, and all the rest," said Poe.
"How's dad doing?"
Poe listened for the subtle snoring sound he'd come to recognize from the cell next door. "Still sleeping," he said. "Just as well. Unless we can actually treat his head injury, he's better off sleeping than he is thinking. Really, we should all be sleeping. There's not anything else more productive for us to do right now."
"I have to pee," whimpered Ren.
"Kiddo, there's a grate in the corner," said Poe, as though it were obvious. "Just pee into that."
"Hmph," Ren grumbled, but crawled off to investigate the existence of the grate all the same.
"Malfi's sleeping," said Finnie.
"That's good. Poor girl is exhausted. This whole day has been misery for her. I mean, don't get me wrong, it's been a shit day for everyone, but she lost her mentor and her best friend in pretty much one fell swoop."
"Jury's still out on him," said Finnie.
"You're right, you're right," said Poe, apologetically. "What do we… think he knows about Simeon?"
"I don't know. I'm… giving him the benefit of the doubt," she replied.
"When is he coming back, anyway?"
"I don't know that either. This is why I asked you how long we'd been in here."
"How long we've been in here is not the same question as how long before he comes back. The total amount of time we've been in here is a lot longer than just how long it's been since he dropped Malfi back off with us."
"Alright, whatever," muttered Finnie, relenting. "Jeez, you're technical," she teased.
"When you're leading whole squadrons of starfighters into battle, you learn to ask very precise questions and give very precise answers," he retorted.
"Yes, well, I'm… sure you're right about that," she agreed awkwardly.
There was an uncomfortable silence that hung in the air for a bit. Poe hadn't meant to make it uncomfortable, but realized he had. She would be thinking about the fact that leading squadrons wasn't really a thing Poe was permitted to do all that often anymore, and that made it weird—after all, his whole sob story about losing his command, temporarily, even, was small potatoes compared to what was happening right here, right now. "Sorry, didn't mean to bring that up," he said. "I know it's a small thing, really. It's just that I… I was really good at that. At flying and… leading…"
"I know you were, Poe," she said sympathetically. She'd been picking at a frayed edge on the cuff of her pants, pulling the strands apart and unbraiding them from the rest. In the dark, she flossed her fingernails with the loose fibers. "You still are," she whispered, but too quietly for him to hear.
"Will you teach me how to fly, Uncle Poe?"
The question came from out of nowhere, and the two of them almost jumped. "Huh?" asked Poe. "Did you say you want me to teach you to fly?"
"Yeah, I did," Ren said. "I want you to teach me to fly the Falcon."
Poe chuckled. "The Falcon, huh? You know, I think your Uncle Chewie is in charge of the Falcon these days."
"He already said he'd let me have it if I promised to learn how to fly it," answered Ren.
"He did? Well, okay, but why don't you just have your mom or dad teach you?"
"I want to surprise them," said Ren, proudly. "They don't even know I want to learn."
"Why haven't you told them?" asked Finnie.
"Because. They just want me to enjoy being a kid, and they think that means just playing and stuff. I mean, they teach me basic things, like reading and numbers and stuff, but they've never trained me like they train the other kids."
They were quiet for a minute. "I suspect they don't want you to feel like they're pushing you into being something you might not want to be," offered Poe.
"Maybe," said Ren, shrugging.
"Ben does go on about how stupid it is to be hemmed in by people's expectations," said Finnie.
"He does," agreed Ren. "And mama always says stuff like, 'I'll always love you, no matter what you do'."
Poe sighed. "God, your parents are fucking neurotic. They're so desperate to avoid screwing you up that they're blindly inventing brave new ways of succeeding at it."
Ren raised an eyebrow, not entirely sure what Poe was talking about. "Huh…"
"It's weird that people choose to be parents… Expect great things from your kids, set them up to feel like they disappointed you; expect nothing, make them feel like nothing. Seems like kind of a no-win proposition," said Finnie.
Poe creased his brow, considering her words in the context of their earlier conversation. "You say that now, but earlier you said you felt liberated by everyone's low expectations of you," he observed. "That they expected you to be a piece of shit, and you considered it a victory just to be better than terrible."
"Sorry, I guess I was being hyperbolic just now," admitted Finnie, backpedaling a bit. "What I said before is really more in line with what I believe: that we can't avoid being influenced by people's expectations, but we can choose how we let them affect us—whether it's a win or a no-win scenario is really up to the individual. People expected me to be a monster, so I felt compelled to be something contrary to what they expected. Because, well… 'Fuck you for thinking I'm shit,' if you take my meaning."
Poe chuckled. "I do," he said.
"So I'm every bit as affected by expectations as anyone else," she sighed. "Expectations matter, but it's up to us to decide how."
Poe nodded to himself. "Your parents clearly didn't expect you to be shit," he said. "Does it shock you that Finn and Rose chose to adopt you, in spite of… well, in spite of what you are?"
"Frankly, yes. And no," she added, considering. "I'm a genetic copy of the worst person my dad ever knew. Though the galaxy at large may not have known her identity, they knew what she represented, and they feared it—they should fear me. That any sane person would choose someone like me to bring into their lives is something that I marvel at every day of my life. However," she paused, "knowing my parents, and what they believe, and who they are—or were—" she added, fighting back a sudden sting of tears to her eyes, "…knowing them, it doesn't surprise me in the least."
Poe quietly contemplated. His thoughts were on Finn, and on Rose, and on the girl in the cell two doors down. A copy of a killer, or so some would say. What Finn and Rose had done, accomplished… here were the fruits of that effort. "What did Finn—what did your parents—expect of you?" he asked.
Finnie took a quiet moment to remember her parents—the mother who every day modeled what a good person looked like, and the father whom Finnie idolized, from whom she took her own name. She smiled, tilting her head back against the hard stone wall as she reminisced.
"Mom and dad just wanted me to be happy," she said finally. "Dad says everything is about choice. We choose who we want to be. We choose to be happy, or we choose to be miserable. We choose to be good, or we choose to be bad. He said to me once, 'Nothing is thrust on you, Finnie, not even the stars in the sky'. Maybe we choose what expectations we want to succumb to, and which we want to push back on."
"Do you choose the Dark Side, then?" asked Poe, playing a bit of devil's advocate. "Ren said, quoting Ben, that the Dark Side is what happens to you when you lose hope. When you just give in and admit that you're a monster—that being a monster isn't a choice, it's just… who you are."
"Giving in to being a monster is a choice, too," she replied. "You just don't realize what you've chosen—you don't realize that you've chosen—until it's too late…"
"This is making my head hurt," said Ren. "I would choose to get out of here. Can I make that just happen?"
Finnie smiled to herself as she sat in the dark, thinking over everything. Silence settled upon them, and they embraced it like a warm blanket. Eventually, they became aware that the only noise they could hear was the shallow breathing of the sleepers on either end of their chain of jail cells. Finnie was nearly hypnotized by the even rhythms of sound she was hearing, but was jarred to attention by the interruption of approaching footsteps.
She pressed her face as close to the bars as she could, trying to make out who it was who approached. Their visitor looked in on Malfi, still sleeping soundly in the cell next to hers, then continued slowly onward from cell to cell, assessing. He finally came to rest in front of Ren's cell, glancing between the three prisoners who were actually awake, looking up at him cautiously, apprehensively.
"It's time," said Temiri.
