Author's note:
Yeah… ik, this one took its sweet time to get finished, it do be like that sometimes. I tend to be the type of person that stubbornly tries to break the metaphorical brick wall with endless headbutting hence why I sometimes find a rather sturdy wall. Second Author's note at the end of the chapter.
Argent Stars in the Somber Night
When we gaze up to the stars the two most common reactions are awe and fascination. Those that are part of the latter wish to solve and unveil the mystery before them no matter what lies at the end of that search. Meanwhile, those in awe have not a care in the world.
Why unveil the magic and possibly ruin it when you can simply enjoy it?
Raxus Secundus, Imperia's Estate
Keeping her composure had never been an issue, excluding the rare occasions that did occur from time to time, all of which were rare and far in between to put it mildly. She didn't get the name Imperia just because after all, it is the name which tells all those who hear it that she is at the pinnacle, the absolute zenith…
Even if that rather easily could be construed as arrogance, the simple fact remains that it's true… yet even at the peak you are not immune to the simple realities of being human… a person underneath the layers and facades…
Ever since that damn kiss… it's been nothing but two steps forward and one back… she felt like a tightly compressed spring ready to explode at any moment. She'd tried everything she could think of that could even remotely change the dilemma she found herself in, yet nothing worked. She might've been able to find the smallest shreds of reprieve yet no matter how much she tried to escape it… it would return to the forefront of her mind to haunt her.
She hated this… feeling like this… confused… lost… Weak… it brought out the side of her that she despised… and feared, more than anything. That paralyzing dread, something so thoroughly ingrained in her mind that she'd never be rid of. All of it would come flooding back, the night her family was murdered… the confusion and feeling lost after it happened. She'd done everything after to rid herself of that weakness, yet she hadn't accomplished that goal, because here she was teetering on the metaphorical edge of a mental breakdown.
It had taken so long to bury that trauma underneath her new accomplishments, yet here it was again… all because of one mistake, one inexcusable failure… one indulgence…
She couldn't have been more grateful that the moment in question had been cut short by the search party sent to look for her, she'd never been happier to see battle droids in her life. Yet it was still there… the blissful indulgence of pure paradise teasing her mind to no end and no matter how much she told herself that it was an astronomically terrible decision… it refused to feel as such. Even when it brought up a hell from her past. It was all a blurry mess, she could barely recall how everything had transpired… after their lips had touched…
There in that moment it went silent, in her head and all around her. In the blink of an eye her regret filled thoughts and paralyzing self loathing turned into an unbridled rage and seething hatred. Unable to constrain the sudden rush of emotions she let out a piercing scream worse than most could think possible or even imagine, filled with all her pent up hatred, the self loathing and all the other piled on emotions that spurned her hatred onwards even more. And in a physical reaction to this her muscles contracted and bent her entire body over so that she was unleashing all her hatred into the ground. The entire building creaked and groaned due to the immaterial onslaught which it was on the receiving end of. If the building had been a living thing it would've surely died near instantaneously… and then when there were no more emotions to fuel it the scream slowly faded into eerie silence.
Again… no more than a minuscule shred of reprieve before it all came back to haunt her once more… what had been going through her head in those moments, what absolutely maddening insanity came over her. Nothing seemed right… that entire madness that took place in that accursed forest felt like some nightmarish bliss plucked straight from the deepest confines of her mind, ones which she didn't even know existed.
Today would seemingly be yet another agonizingly sleepless one. She hated this with such a defiant vehemence, not having an answer, being conflicted and confused… all of which she worked so hard to be free of… Since sleep was unobtainable at this point she resigned herself to this horrid fate of hers… to be trapped in her own mind… alone…
Eventually she found herself drinking in the garden, all the while gazing up at the stars above enraptured in their luminous even when faced with such an inexplicably brilliant sight it simply reminded her of the torturous briars plaguing her…
"Out of so many things that could've happened…" Her words were filled with weariness, yet they also contained the careless glee from the alcohol. "I had to fall for a bloody Jedi…" There was no amount of self loathing in the galaxy that matched how she felt about this mess. "And it couldn't have been just some no name, NO… it had to be 'The Hero Without Fear' their bloody posterboy of all people."
When those last words eventually faded into silence even in her own spiraling mess of a mind she couldn't help but begin laughing, it began as mere gleeful snickers, but which slowly transformed into what you could only describe as deranged or insane laughter. Nothing but the sounds of the night and her laughs echoed out in the silent night and it continued until her chest began to ache and her throat became dry against the crisp night air leaving naught but faded rasps of what they'd originally been.
Everything was going so well… and then all of this had to happen… staring up at the stars was the only thing that could seemingly calm the roaring storm inside her mind. Yet, lying there on her back she couldn't help but focus on a particular star, one of tens of thousands up there in the silver dotted sky. A star which was orbited by a particularly loathsome den of a planet… Coruscant…
—
Coruscant, Outlander Club
Coruscant was bustling and sauntering on as it had for millenia, encrusted with a silvery facade hiding the rusting innards that the center of the known galaxy is made up of. Why anyone would wish to live here is a convoluted question in itself, be it ambition or opportunity the by far easier question to answer is why most people live here, they've either no other choice or can't escape it.
On this particular night however something far more interesting than dissecting the complexities of society was set to take place, something that started a long time in the past and which has been slowly but surely burning along its fuse right up to the charge.
"What'll it be?" The bartender said with a distinct balance between sounding energetic and disinterested. Having to say that line over and over again day in and day out would surely sap the energy out of you, that much he could understand.
"A glass of Jet Juice." Simple yet popular and something which reminds those of more humble origins of their past… or present. He'd been holed up in the archives nearly the entire day, for what reason? He couldn't for the life of him express the answer… Why he was searching for an answer there of all places was that which was expertly seeming to elude him. The reason he was searching for answers was comparatively like light and dark… her…
Not a day had passed where he wouldn't be stuck vividly remembering the unlikely series of even more unbelievable and unlikely events. It all seemed like a wild dream when he thought back to it. That which happened was several one in a million events back to back, each more unlikely and wild than the one which came before.
And now here he was, Anakin Skywalker… seeking a blissful reprieve in a hive of what you could only describe as "less than agreeable company" from the equally blissful torture his mind subjected him too. Nothing made any damn sense anymore it seemed.
What he wouldn't give to be able to go back to that forest, to just get some answers… that's all he wanted right now… answers. What kind of web has he gotten himself trapped in? Was it all a sick Sith game or something entirely different?
Deciding that he'd had enough of the "normal" world for one night he made for the exit ignoring everything around him, be it the copious amounts of spice or some other depravity. The the crisp night air surged through his lungs making it almost feel fresh… almost, having grown up on Tatooine and then spending so much time here on Coruscant really made an imprint on you when visiting other planets with more hospitable environs than endless sands and labyrinthine steel.
Surging through the air on his speeder he couldn't help but gaze up towards the stars for it was an unusually clear night, they may not shine as bright as on other planets but you could still make them out. One caught his eye, he couldn't name the system from memory but there was something there… a feeling… something.
Author's note:
I am not an experienced writer by any stretch of the imagination, you might think it strange that there wasn't a direct continuation on the previous chapter but I really wasn't sure where to go with the story. Could've done the obvious and continued but I couldn't figure out a continuation that I was pleased with so to get things rolling again I decided that cutting it like this would allow me to continue writing and not just be stuck endlessly on the same thing.
Do hope that it was at least an interesting chapter.