The Blood That Moves the Body [LE3]

[Daunt]

There wouldn't be a hot dinner tonight, Daunt didn't have time for it, but there was enough left from prior days. His wounds didn't fully heal, so he took time washing them in the refresher that was perhaps the most modern part of the building. He left it uncaring of being dressed. Not that it mattered.

[Juri Saizesh]

She returned, as always. Her boots removed first thing upon entering the home, bare feet to the ground. Her eyes gazing about their home, her medical kit slung over her shoulder. A smile as she saw him, and immediately moved to him.

Her arms wrapped around his torso, holding onto his stomach, as she rested her cheek against his back.

"Everything else is collapsing, yet you are always constant."

[Daunt]

"In the sense of being here every evening?" He asked, cupping her hands with just one of his. One was enough for both.

[Juri Saizesh]

Warmth radiated from her smile as she felt his hand. "No. Not just because of your physical presence. I can feel you, the eddies of the Force. Someone I can always rely on because I know you also rely on me." She breathed in against him, as her arms squeezed in the embrace.

[Daunt]

His fingers combed through her hair, and he leaned over to take a whiff of them. Hair were a wonder, he didn't have them. "Eddies of the Force... it sounds quite funny when you think about it. How do you feel them?" The odd thing was that he didn't dismiss the notion as he had done many times before.

[Juri Saizesh]

"Like I was drawing breath, or feeling the sun on my skin." She shrugged, content as her hair was combed through. "It is instinct and without looking. It just is. The way the Galaxy works, everything connected and bound together, a story that is told across the stars. Each being only gets a few pages, maybe even a few paragraphs, but it is all there for time immemorial."

She didn't release the hug, not wanting to let go.

[Daunt]

"I have instincts too. But I feel awkward making a transcendental philosophy out of them. It's just biology, no? Or choice and commitment." Daunt looked over her shoulder, into the the space beyond, somewhat uncomfortably at the thought. "I don't like the notion that my existence is just narrated." But he kept holding her tight.

[Juri Saizesh]

"Just because the story is written, does not mean the story is finished. While the Force predicts, it does not control. We influence the flow with our actions. The stream bends." She whispered back. "It is a path that grows when you pursue it, but it can be left to happenstance if you choose to not take those steps, Daunt."

The Witch leg her nails bite into his skin, scratching gently up and down his broad back.

[Daunt]

"Honestly, Juri, I don't get it. I'd like to, but I don't. It all sounds so silly." He squeezed the next curve his hands met across her in reaction to nail bites. "Either there's a choice or there isn't. For all the constraining conditions there are other, more mundane names than the Force."

[Juri Saizesh]

"It is always a choice. A choice to act and forge your destiny. Or choose to not act, and your story is written for you." The sensation of touch against her body was welcome, and she continued the scratching, gentle and soft, yet pointed.

"The Ashla and Bogan, the Bendu. Many names but they do all mean the same thing. In all things, there is always the Force."

[Daunt]

"No wonder I've felt compelled to make some choice." He murmured, lifting her much lither form. "And I may have made it."

[Juri Saizesh]

She allowed him to lift her, both hands moving to wrap behind his head, fingers laced as she supported herself a little on his shoulders. Her eyes found his.

"And what choice is that?"

[Daunt]

"I've decided to learn how to fight with a new weapon." Green and purple connected.

[Juri Saizesh]

"A new weapon?" She asked, raising an eyebrow, but she didn't draw away. "Would it replace your traditional Zhaboka?" She asked, the word perfectly pronounced with her Dathomiri accent.

[Daunt]

"It wouldn't. It can't. Drawing it in public can change everything for me." He pecked her lips, then seated her on the bed. Himself, he reached to his things - a small bundled pile - and drew out a cylindrical hilt wired to some electronics inside it. "Don't ask me where or how I got it. You will not see its light here. But this is a decision I have made, to be able to fight with it when there's finally the time I decide to do so."

[Juri Saizesh]

She didn't say anything, but took in the cylinder. She had seen one like it before. The Witch recognized it. One leg swung over, crossed over her other thigh, almost perched on the bed as she recognized it.

"I see." She finally responded, looking to his eyes. "An elegant thing. Yet it can reflect a certain savagery."

[Daunt]

"I believe it can reflect the spirit of its user. And as you know, mine is still moulding. Perhaps it can make me more aware of who I want to become." He took in her form, her reaction, her expression. He listened to people, but to her he listened in particular, making her opinions a part of himself even if he routinely rejected some of them in speaking. Now, at this nexus, he wanted to know more of he mind. Even if he were dressed, he would still be feeling naked. "Whose did you see?"

[Juri Saizesh]

"There was a Sister. I had only seen her in visions... when Soltzai and I returned to Dathomir." She spoke softly. "She had two weapons with curved hilts, that could be joined to one."

She pursed her lips. "And there were the Jedi during the Clone Wars. I only ever saw one in person. Who they were I couldn't tell you. Just one of those things in my journey."

[Daunt]

Daunt was never thoroughly educated about Dathomiri affairs to know the names of the people Juri had just mentioned. "So a weapon of a bygone era." He put it back into the bundle. "Still, I am looking forward to wielding it. That once a Sister had a pair only reassures me."

[Juri Saizesh]

"They cost her dearly." She seemed slightly sad. "Her presence with the Coven is what drew the Confederacy to Dathomir... they were hunting her." She looked away.

"I don't know what happened to her. I only hope she survives to know. She had such fire."

[Daunt]

"If the CIS thugs came for her..." Daunt turned silent. He approached their bed and half-lain down by her side, eyes to the ceiling, arms crossed beneath his head, feet still on the ground. "I suppose wielding a lightsabre is like stepping into an arena."

[Juri Saizesh]

"It says you are ready for a higher class of warfare. One with terror in its soul." She looked at the Zabrak as he lounged, her head tilted ever so slightly.

"She made a choice, to return to the Coven, than serve the Confederacy. And they made Dathomir burn..."

[Daunt]

"And then they were forfeit, with no chance for us to exact vengeance. I mean we could go after their holdouts, if there are any still. There is a Neimoidian on the planet that gives me the vibes. But what's the point now?" He puffed through nostrils. "My body has long been ready. My mind.. must get there."

[Juri Saizesh]

"No." Juri shook her head, resting a band on Daunt's chest. "The Confederacy died, just as the Republic, with the rise of the Empire. The ones responsible for what happened to Dathomir are long dead now. To satiate a lust for Vengeance wouldn't serve us, or bring our people back." She smiled softly, and watched him.

"Your path will be made clear. And I promise, as always, to help find those gaps, and help."

[Daunt]

He stayed silent for a time. "What about you, Juri, and your path?"