Star Wars: Vode An (closed for Apollo Wilde and BewareTheDream)

[Apollo Wilde]

Though she was usually quite attentive to Raeth (in ways, perhaps, that he may not have noticed - though, considering how observant he was, the likelihood of that was quite slim), Saudaji’s attention was fully captured by Te Kohe. Even after the easy chiding of Moerangi, there was no change in his jovial manner.

The giant of a man lingered, briefly, before giving Saudaji an affectionate - light - pat on the head, and dashed off. She stood there, rubbing the top of her head, with a wrinkled smile, almost as if she was going to start twisting her foot in the dirt, a youngling all over again. It wouldn’t be the same wavy smile of someone in love, but that of a younger sister who adored an older sibling. Moerangi, watching the scene from a comfortable distance now, had a wry, knowing smile on her face. Notable, in the sense, in that it was the first time that the older woman had actually allowed herself the expression.

“…He hasn’t changed at all,” Saudaji said, gently winding a lekku around her hand.

Moerangi, raising an eyebrow, made a chuffing sound.

“Yeah, well. Once a di’kut, always a di’kut.” Moerangi turned, walked a few steps in the opposite direction, going south on the well worn village path. Te Kohe had gone off in the direction of the east. Above the neatly thatched roofs of the village, one towered higher than the others, the roof, possibly once, a vibrant red, now faded to a sun beaten and well worn burnt orange. Moerangi stopped, idly placing her hand on the handle of her well worn blaster at her side. Rather than being a threatening gesture, it was one of ease, a natural stance to a woman long used to fighting. She looked at Saudaji - before a second, less penetrating glance at Raeth. Perhaps he’d already passed muster with her - or perhaps her mind was simply elsewhere. It would be difficult to tell.

“You still know the way?”

Saudaji, still absently stroking her lekku, nodded. “Past the Pukepoto pool, right?”

Moerangi, appeased, simply smirked. The expression added a cat-like gleam to her eyes that seemed to blow the years away from her face, instantly rendering her younger. “See you at the Meeting House.” She turned away from the pair again, and set off down the path - occasionally shouting at a child.

Saudaji dropped her leaky as if waking up. Turning to face Raeth, she gave him a smile. The crimp of her mouth kept it from being an expression of pure joy - more like she’d just finished a monumental task, and was still awaiting the true outcome.

“Well…we’re going to be towards the northwest of the village,” she said, then, pressed her tongue to her lower lip. “We typically don’t have much by way of…” she paused, searching for the right word, “ ‘visitors’,” she finished. “Usually when people get together, they build their own homes.” She waved a hand dismissively. “Families usually pass homes down if they can. Anyway,” she clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth. It wasn’t the most thrilling information - and the sooner they got settled, the sooner the other shoe could potentially drop. She was stalling, and she knew it.

All right, Saudaji. Put on your big girl panties…

She moved to stand by Raeth’s side, and looped her arm through his. Her armor, heated by the balmy nature of the planet, was warm against his bare skin. “Come on. We’ve got time for a nap, at least.”

____

Despite the normal murmur of the village, no one stopped them as they wound their way through. There would be the occasional stopping, staring, then, breaking out into a bright smile as they recognized Saudaji. Quick, rangy words exchanged in Mandalorian without breaking their stride. Whatever was said, it was clear that all reunions would be put on hold until that evening’s meeting.

Towards the “back” of the village (though their meager wanderings through the place would show that the “head” of the village was southern facing), past a collection of steaming pools of water, there was a cul-de-sac of huts, before branching off towards the west. It was past this collection of huts that she took him. The beaten path, while still there, was slowly squeezed in by dense foliage. Brightly colored blossoms seemed to tease them, even as the road was slowly being devoured. Before it seemed Saudaji would walk them directly back into the depths of the surrounding jungle, one lone hut materialized in front of them. The open doorway was covered by, from the looks of it, a freshly woven cloth, in hues of deep red and black.

“This is us,” she said, amiably, too amiably, and pushed the cloth aside.

Lit by the sunlight outdoors, the inside of the hut was spacious, surprisingly so. Though it did not have extensions, sections of the interior were blocked by similar strips of cloth, intricately woven and impeccably clean. And, despite the rustic appearance of the hut (and the village, overall, really), the inside boasted “modern” conveniences, such as a holoscreen, a kitchen, a comfortable bed - a modest refresher. True, there were no permasteel fixtures - everything seemed to be carved out of wood-, but it was modern “enough.” Enough so that it wouldn’t be “roughing it.”

With a sigh, Saudaji sat down in the middle of the floor, and rested her forehead in her palms. Compared to the elation that she expressed earlier, it was a disturbing change of attitude. Long moments passed as she sucked in one long breath after the other, between her palms. Then, she lifted her head from her hands, tilting her face back to the ceiling.

And let out one shaky laugh.

“Well, that’s out of the way….” She patted the floor beside her. “Come sit with me. I could use your arms around me.” Uncharacteristic of her to be so open with wanting physical attention from him. Endearing and frightening in the same breath. But when she turned that smile on him, any fear should have been chased away.

 

[BewareTheDream]

The village made Raeth feel uneasy; he was way too out of his element, here.

For starters, it was too outdoorsy. Ever since he and Saudaji stepped off the Patient Pylat’s ramp, he wanted to turn around and go right back inside. That urge to once again be surrounded by metal and conditioned air grew and grew the longer he spent on the planet’s surface. He had hoped that things would be more comfortable inside of the village, but unfortunately for him, there was barely any difference between the village interior and the jungle.

Thankfully, the hut that they’d be staying in actually had modern amenities. Those amenities may not have included a door, but the electronic entertainment system and the big, comfy-looking bed made him literally breathe a sigh of relief. Before entering the hut, he started to think he’d go crazy after only one night here, but now he thought he’d be fine.

The people bothered Raeth, as well - something that he told himself not to tell Saudaji or else he’d offend her or worse. Actually, it wasn’t her people that set him on edge, but the way they treated him. Raeth felt like all eyes were on Saudaji, and by extension on him as well. He never felt this way before, not even in the most crowded of city-worlds. In fact, one of the reasons why he liked cities so much was because it was so easy to hide among the crowds and the swarming airspeeders. One face among millions or billions was so easy to lose.

But here? All of the villagers knew who Saudaji was, and because of that, everybody stared at him and her. He felt like he had a big, red targeting reticle on his face.

Raeth felt like he was about to have a panic attack, something that had happened at least one other time since he learned about the existence of Raeth Prime. Ruefully, he noted how he was quickly becoming familiar with panic, even though he used to believe he wasn’t afraid of nuthin’. Now that they were alone in the hut, and now that there were no longer any eyes on them - at least, no eyes that he could see - he told himself to calm the fuck down.

Saudaji would help him calm down; she always did. When told him that she could use his arms around her, he eagerly obliged. He was always eager to touch her.

“A lot of people are happy to see you,” he said as he eased his butt down next to hers and put an arm around her back. Closing his eyes, he rested the side of his head against the side of hers. The two of them settled into a familiar, comfortable cuddle within moments.

“You okay?” Despite how distracted he was by this alien environment, he did notice that something was off with her. Naturally, he was curious to find out if something was bothering her, and if so, he wanted to make it go away.

 

[Apollo Wilde]

“It’s…” She stopped, the words stuck. She closed her eyes, leaning harder into him. She fumbled, blindly, unsure, for the hand not around her. Laced her fingers through his, and let out a slow exhale through her nostrils.

It’s okay.

I can tell him later.

It’ll be fine until then.

“It’s,” she repeated, with another slow inhale, “Just a lot,” she exhaled, her words leaving her in a rush. “It’s been a long time since I’ve been home. Surprised everyone’s handling it so well.” It would be better, she thought, not to speak of the horror that brought them here to begin with. Not now. Not yet - not until she had a better handle of what was happening now, what the village could have expected from her.

Too much, she thought, with a small twist of her lips. Too much - otherwise she never would have left.

“So…” She trailed off, before giving his fingers a slight squeeze. She was going to comment about being back in the jungle - then remembered the last disastrous mission in the jungle, and decided against it. It was tempting to try and reassure him; to say that they would be safe here. But she couldn’t promise that either - not with how things were. Yes, this ‘Prime’ could track them here, if he was anything like Raeth (which he clearly was), and he’d meet some opposition, that was also true, but…what sort of operation was he running? A cold curl of fear snaked her stomach. Had she put her family in danger by being here?

“Well,” she tried, starting over again. And once again, found herself without anything to say. She couldn’t predict how her family would truly react - though, she thought, with a small smile. Te Kohe’s reaction was a surprise. Though it wasn’t, at the same time: all it showed was that maybe some things didn’t change. “Te Kohe likes you.” It was weak, but there was warmth there.

After that, it didn’t make sense to speak any longer. Instead, she leaned further into him, not bothering to attempt to get up from the floor, and just breathed. Outside of the hut, she could hear the distant sounds of the thermal pools, the faint voices of others, and above it all, hanging over everything, the sound of the jungles around them.

 

[Apollo Wilde]

Life on Mandalore is strange until it isn’t.

The seasons pass - though there seems to be hardly a difference from the balmy spring to the humid summer, to the whisper of chill, and then, inexplicably - snow caps the mountains, and there is frost on the ground. Still, life continues here as it has for eons - there is little reminder that in a few hours, there is a technological hub, a glittering city that sends light scattering into the atmosphere, a place that Saudaji barely acknowledged on their hurried descent.

And Saudaji?

“Uneasy” would describe those first few tentative months; of trying to find a groove in a place that has moved on without her, and yet, keenly felt her absence. In those first weeks, she clung to Raeth, a child on the verge of taking her first steps, but still leading him, still all too aware that he was looking to her for guidance, for comfort. In that, she proves herself a capable leader, a strength that suggests that others would naturally follow her. She seems to be effortless in this guise; easily giving orders and not asking anything of others that she would not do herself. And so, as she guides Raeth into this new life, she is beside him, feeding nuna, training the smelly (and always eagerly friendly) strill into faithful hunting companions. Despite using machines for further distance travels, there are a few fathiers on planet - creatures that Saudaji seems to be especially attached to. Though she has been gone for years, there are a few that still seem to remember her, and eagerly approach the ends of their enclosures to greet her.

Even in training, she is with him. There are no questions asked about Raeth’s presence; he is simply folded into her family as if he was always by her side. And a large family it is - To’a: the eldest brother, a leader in the village. A mountain of a man, with muscles that were more like rock than flesh and blood. He is a stoic quiet man, whose general attitude feels like the skies over the ocean - heavy, constantly churning - present, yet beyond the grasp of those around him. The distance he exudes is not one of coldness, however; but merely that of a man with years of experience and a constant vision for the future. He is cordial to Raeth, but he is also cordial to Saudaji - a stark contrast from the overwhelming welcome (and some tears) from the rest of her family. Still, despite this, no one has anything negative to say about To’a.

Moerangi has been present since the day they arrived, with that constant wry set of her mouth, constantly biting back some sarcastic remark. She is the second eldest, and handles Saudaji as if she never left. Her gaze is biting to Raeth, but in a sweet way - she is constantly assessing him, and seems to be proud of his progress. Her stare is less emasculating and more one of summation; she is measuring Raeth’s adjustment, and in her own way, gives him nudges in the right direction. In the first weeks of adjustment, of trying not to bump into one another, she serves as a defacto guide, even while managing her own brood of children. Saudaji has a natural knack for children - it would seem that all Mandalorians have a soft spot for them.

Te Kohe is the one that proves to be Raeth’s shadow. He is overwhelming at first, his presence turning Saudaji into a bratty younger sister, but his overweening affection is what makes him so endearing. He calls Raeth “Rae’ika” as if it’s his given name, and though, despite his age (the third eldest, with gray in his wild curling hair), he appears a giant, forgetful child, it belies a deep compassion and understanding. He easily takes Raeth under his wing in his warrior training, spending hours, days, weeks, with the man to ensure that he is able to truly fit in. “You’re with us now,” he’d said, his Basic heavily accented. Though it was quite common for Mandalorians to take in children, it was a different matter to take in a grown man. For whatever difficulties there may have been, Te Kohe hand-waved them away, accepting personal responsibility for Raeth’s growth. It seems a simple gesture, one taken up with great alacrity - it’s only in quiet moments with Saudaji and her family that the weight of the gesture becomes all too apparent. To’a has to field all complaints, questions, concerns, about bringing in an older outsider, one that has ties to danger outside, that could bring war and battles to a village that, while comprised of warriors, has its own methods of when and where to fight. On occasions, Saudaji has to leave Raeth on his own - she is gone for hours meeting with the Council, serving as a witness, speaking in tones that she thought she would never have to use again.

The rest of her siblings are younger - and don’t carry as much weight. Taika, the dreamer - unable to find his place wedged between such mighty and illustrious brothers. The headstrong Te Ao, one of the best warriors in the village. Gorgeous and independent, there is an air of fear around her, a sour aura that suggests she still has yet to be tempered by age. Unsure if she wants to travel, if she wants to follow what Saudaji could have been, she is constantly on the verge of everything and nothing at all. Boy, the youngest - his true name never once uttered. He is a child compared to the others, but with a smile that melts the hardest heart and a nature that suggests he is much too gentle, too kind, for the life that lays before him. For the roughness of the relationship between Saudaji and Te Kohe, there is an outpouring of maternal nature to Boy. He is her favorite; the one she babies and favors, and he, with his shining smile, eats up and spins back out into the world in greater waves of sweetness. He is the entire village’s child, and, as he comes to know Raeth, he looks up to the Offworlder.

It is still longer before the full story quite unravels. To their credit, the villagers keep their mouths shut, speaking of matters that are in the day to day. The catch. Training. The summer festival. And it isn’t from the villagers that the story becomes clear, but from visitors.

They arrived on a late spring day, in a hail of ocean foam and silken robes. Their ships exhaled perfume and heavy narcotic smoke, as dream-like and as beautiful as the beings that stepped forth. For all of the rustic, natural beauty that surrounded them in the village, these visitors are a manufactured beauty; carefully kept and managed hot house flowers. They are all Zeltrons - pink and red flesh glimmering in the sunlight. They hailed from Yukaku, the Pleasure District - a technological wonder, offering any sentient being any level of pleasure, from heart-stopping euphorias to pain that bordered on salvation. Through their beauty, unnatural, unreal, their eyes were old, older than their bodies, suggesting an understanding of the world around them, and a deep sorrow at the way things constantly turned out.

The trio of Zeltrons moved as if floating through the village, never rude, but never what anyone would suggest as friendly. A woman lead them, her deep magenta skin offset by the pale gold she wore and the heavy diadems in her startlingly scarlet hair. Her face held a familiarity, a tugging at the corners of memory that wouldn’t be entirely settled until both Saudaji and Raeth were bundled onto a ship headed towards Yukaku -

She was Mahoroba’s mother.

In quiet, dulcet tones, she took Raeth aside once they landed on the splendor of Yukaku. From space, from a distance, did the place no justice. It was a gilded flower in the middle of the ocean, space ports constantly shuttering back and forth, a hum of life that never ceased, but never seemed quite as overwhelming as those on Corusant, or Canto Bight, or a million other pleasure seeking planets. Perhaps it was because Yukaku was simply smaller, or because, as Raeth would quickly surmise, Yukaku was a place of high tastes and high credit value. Only the best of the best would do here. Flowers blossomed along delicately maintained and crystal clear waterways, inhabited by great colorful fish and boaters of both (and indeterminate) sexes, singing in reed clear voices as they ferried lovers from destination to destination. Restaurants, theaters, open air music, elegant brothels where beings sat, idly watching traffic go by - it was an entirely different place from where they’d left. And perhaps, under different circumstances, it was one that could have been indulged in -

Save for Saudaji’s tenseness. She was on edge, more so than she had been at “home.” Anohi, the elegant mother, fanning herself with an ornately carved fan of scented wood, tipped in metal (truly, the only thing that would give away that, even in the midst of this pleasure drowned place, she was still Mandalorian - that this was still a place of warriors), pausing occasionally to run her taper fingers along a flower blossom in this ornate garden, would tell Raeth everything.

“They were never married, her and my son,” she sighed, more if recounting a story she’d merely heard about, not actually experienced. “They did not get the tattoos. But there was a great promise in their union. Things have been strained between the cultures on this side of Mandalore. This district, this place - we are the results of slaves. Brought here to be merely bred and to bring pleasure until we die.” A drop of bitterness in the sweet tones of her voice. Her knuckles paled to pink as she clutched her fan tightly, the corner of her thin lips tugging down as she swallowed. “Saudaji was meant to be brought here. The second group of Mandalorians that took her, the ones that raised her, saved her from this place.” Irony on the word “saved,” a strange word, a strange sentiment that defied normal language.

“As Zeltrons prefer not to fight, or to encounter bloodshed, we developed our own society here. This is what you see now. But we are still Mandalorians; we are bound by the old ways. Had she stayed, had things been different, she would have been a leader, my son, her consort. There would be a mended rift between the tribes. And still,” she closed her fan, looking at Raeth with vividly amber eyes, “She tracked him through the stars - unable to bring him back. She’s become a bit of a romantic hero here,” the last, said with an airy laugh that was not strong enough to hide the sharpness of tears. “Once we heard she was back, it was only fitting that we welcome her. Show that there are no hard feelings. And you,” she tapped Raeth under the chin with the fan, both beautiful and lethal, “But you…” She trailed off, unable to finish her thought. “The moon is lovely tonight, is it not?”

Reunited with Saudaji after this encounter, she seemed more at ease - at least, that some sort of peace had been made. The two of them were made much of - treated to the finest of plays, of food, of lodgings. Raeth’s being there calmed her, it was true, but it was clear that Saudaji didn’t like being reminded of her past, to be made much over.

“It’s gone,” she said, one night as they lay in bed. “This isn’t…” she stopped, started over. “It’s home, but it’s not. Too much has changed since I’ve been here. It’s funny, isn’t it,” she rolled to her stomach, turning to face him better, “That you can spend so much time longing after a place, and then, once you’re back, realize the place you looked for no longer exists.” Her fingers laced through his, her unspoken words, my home is with you, settling between them.

Still, Saudaji being Saudaji, there was only so much home-coming that she could stand. And so, now, as they were back in their home in the village, her tending to the two Fathier that she had purchased (one for her, and one for him - she’d taken him riding several times along the beach), she pressed her forehead against the creature’s great head, and as it snorted in pleasure, she raised her voice, loud enough for Raeth, who was on the other side of the corral, to hear her -

“He’s going to find us here at some point, you know.” It wasn’t meant as a threat; if anything, she was more secure on Mandalore than she had been in years, but ignoring the fact that this older Raeth, this…man, was out there, wasn’t going to help anyone. “We have the eyes and ears of the Yukaku Pleasure Districts -“ A promise given to them by Anohi - royalty of sorts, among the Pleasure District leading families. “So it’s possible we won’t be caught by surprise.”

She clicked her tongue - there was the desire to say more. But an unspoken rule between the two of them kept her from alluding to the nightmare of the Raeth clones, of who this older man actually was. “Your beskar'gam should be ready by the end of this week…” Said calmly, but it did little to hide the excitement bubbling beneath the surface for her. His own suit of armor - and not a disguise. After all of this time, the weeks, the months of training, he was truly being accepted. Not even the most hard-headed on the council could deny that Raeth would be an asset to their clan, a more than worthy partner for Saudaji, the would be leader, and a strong, intelligent warrior in his own right. Though she was sure that he would know what getting his own armor would mean, she could still hardly hold back that thrill. “Moerangi’s going to make her uj cake for you.” That in and out of itself was cause for celebration - simply put, Moerangi made the best uj cake in the village, and she was hardly persuaded to make it even for her own children's birthdays. "She said you'd better like it." Which, as he would know by now, meant that the older woman was making it with plenty of affection.

 

[BewareTheDream]

Posing naked in front of a full-length mirror, Raeth admired what his body had become. The lines around his muscles had deepened, and he’d grown muscles in places where he’d never seen them before. For example, for the first time in his life he had rippled obliques, the kind that body builders or comic book barbarians had. By raising an arm, flexing his midsection, and twisting his body just a bit, he got the sexy little guys to pop along his side, much to his delight.

The obliques weren’t the only new additions to his body. His skin - which had once been pale and unmarred, almost like that of a sheltered child’s - now sported a tan and several scars. There was a time not long ago that having a scar would’ve bummed him out, but now he actually liked them. More accurately, Saudaji seemed to like them, and he liked anything that made her appreciate his body more.

There was a thin scar on his left pec that almost looked like a parenthesis. While touching the scar with his middle finger, his eyes got drawn to the reflection of the scars on his forearm, all of which were acquired during his training with Mandalorian blades. His gaze then drifted to the trio of claw-shaped scars on his right upper arm, just below his shoulder. Those pissed him off, because those he got from Te Kohe.

Frowning, Raeth recalled the morning Te Kohe clawed him. The mountainous Mandalorian asked if he wanted to see a new unarmed striking technique he’d developed by watching shriek-hawks grab prey in their claws.

“Sure, let’s see it,” Raeth had said, foolishly assuming Te Kohe would’ve demonstrated by clawing at a palm tree or something. Well, the ‘or something’ turned out to be Raeth’s arm.

Gods dammit, even his fingernails are huge, Raeth thought as he stared at the scars. Feh, serves me right for not seeing the attack from a mile away.

Well, if I want to get rid of them, I can use the dermal regenerator on the Pylat. Rubbing his arm, he considered whether he should get rid of them or not. No, he probably wouldn’t. If someone ever asked how he got them, he’d say he was attacked by an honest-to-goodness shriek-hawk, not an overgrown man-child pretending to be one.

Raeth’s gaze dropped low on his body’s reflection, to his Adonis belt. That, too, was new. Straightening his body, he admired the ‘killer V’ that reached down toward his fun zone.

Scars or not, I look fantastic! It’s probably just my imagination, but I think even my dick’s gotten bigger.

Fists on his hips, he did a full-body flex. I look like a pit fighter! Although it almost looks like my head’s been photoshopped onto a pit fighter’s body.

Raeth snickered at the thought. He really did look like a pit fighter. (From the neck down, at least.) Not a heavyweight, of course, but a tight, toned welterweight. And these weren’t just glamour muscles, either. Thanks to his recent immersion into the Mandalorian lifestyle, Raeth not only looked like a warrior, he could also fight like one, too. He was still no match for Saudaji in hand-to-hand, but when they sparred, he no longer got the sense that she pulled her punches that much.

Nowadays, she actually broke a sweat when she kicked his ass.

His thoughts lingered on Saudaji, as they so often did. He reminisced about those first training sessions with her in the Patient Pylat’s gym. That was less than two years ago, but it felt like it happened a lifetime ago.

Raeth took his eyes off his reflection in order to look around the hut that he and Saudaji shared. It was weird to think of it as ‘home’, but it kinda felt that way. Besides, what else should he have called it? They lived there for the better part of a year now. He and Saudaji slept together on that bed more often than they slept together on the Pylat. (He knew that for a fact, because he counted and memorized every single time they slept together.) And although he continued to hike back to his ship every other day or so to use his workshop, conduct precautionary scans, and to pester Sebastian-v2, he no longer felt anxious to get back to its sealed, air-conditioned environment whenever he could, like he did during those first couple of months.

Chuckling, Raeth remembered how rough his first eight weeks on Mandalore were. He hated this place. He hated the hot days and the muggy nights; he hated the insects; he hated the sounds and smells of the jungle. Hell, if Saudaji had asked him for his opinion during one of his worst moods, he would’ve told her that he hated the air itself here.

More than anything, he hated being around so many people all the time. He hated not having his privacy, and it used to irk him, immensely, how many of Saudaji’s family always wanted to stick their noses into his business. (They weren’t actually nosy, but to Raeth it sure felt that way.) Keeping secrets had been an essential part of his life for so long, so living in such an open culture required a lot of adjustment.

That was then. But now? Raeth wouldn’t go so far as to say he liked it on Mandalore, but he didn’t hate it anymore. At best, it felt comfortable, which was a huge improvement from before. Saudaji’s family treated him like one of their own, which was cool. Yes, it did feel odd to be accepted by them so fast, and it was also odd to have family members who weren’t figments programmed into his head by the Sith, or a genetically-identical ‘father’ who was trying to kill and/or manipulate him, but mostly it was cool.

It was also cool to share a home with Saudaji. The Pylat never felt like a home that they shared, for it was more his than theirs. But this hut - with the dressers evenly split between his clothes and hers, the hi-tech entertainment system that they used to watch concerts from far-off planets, and the bathroom filled with oils, soaps, and creams that Saudaji let him use whenever he wanted (which is often) - was actually starting to feel like home.

That’s enough of the sentimental stuff. I’m almost late. Raeth was naked because he was in the process of getting dressed, and he was getting dressed because he and Saudaji were going to Yukaku. They’d gone to the Pleasure District a couple of times before, but this time was different. This time, they were going with a group of Zeltrons, and one of them was someone special, according to Saudaji.

He got dressed in a warm-colored outfit that straddled the line between casual and tactical, armed himself with his most easily concealed weapons and gadgets, gave his reflection one last look, and then exited the hut.

*****

Yukaku was normally a super-fun place; it was required to be, since it was called the Pleasure District, after all. But an unexpected one-on-one chat with the mother of his lover’s ex sorta dampened Raeth’s good time.

In spite of the awkwardness, Raeth kept his cool during his encounter with Anohi. When she touched him with her weaponized fan and insinuated there was bad blood between them, he stood there, chin up, and met her gaze with his own.
“I have a habit of disrupting things,” he said to the woman who had nearly been Saudaji’s mother-in-law. Using two fingers, he lowered her fan away from his face. “In fact, I’ve recently begun to think I was born to be disruptive. But when it comes to the relationship between Saudaji and your son, I figure that was already disrupted before I entered the picture.

“There’s no point in having any quarrel with me, lady.”

Raeth and Anohi’s pleasant, little talk ended soon after. Once he and Saudaji were reunited, the two of them began to carouse around the Pleasure District with the Zeltrons as their guides and hosts.

At first, Raeth was annoyed that Saudaji hadn’t warned him about Anohi. Not only was he annoyed, but he was bothered on a deeper level by what the Zeltron had told him. The annoyance didn’t last, though - it melted away so easily in the haze of cantina smoke, exotic foods, expensive booze, and explicit entertainment that filled the rest of their day and much of their night.

Zeltrons really do deserve to be called the best party people in the galaxy, he thought as he and his partner retreated to their hotel room.

Because the threat of surveillance and snipers was ever-present for them - especially now with Prime out there, somewhere - they kept their windows shuttered. The mechanical blinds blocked their view from the endless lines of air speeders flying above, as well as from the sea of neon lights that surrounded the hotel. Even the interior of the room would’ve been pitch black if not for the ghostly, blue light emanating from the digital clock on a nightstand.

The blue light gave Saudaji’s green skin a haunting sort of allure. Smiling, Raeth remembered that he always found Saudaji’s skin alluring no matter what kind of light she was under. Closing his eyes and crawling into bed, he kissed the back of her shoulder, wrapped his arms around her, and pulled her down to the mattress.
Snuggling and tender body kissing inevitably turned into making out. Their booze-flavored kissing then transitioned, so easily, into love making. And then their love making turned into sweaty, raucous, athletic fucking that went on until they got too exhausted to move.

That was another benefit of the Mandalorian training and fitness regimen: increased stamina. Raeth still tended to cum fast, because Saudaji felt and fucked too good for him to last long in that regard. But in total, he could go for much longer than he used to, as long as they took brief breaks to recharge and rehydrate, and as long as Saudaji wanted to fuck for that long.

Raeth always wanted to, of course.

In a sweaty heap, the two of them fell asleep in the Pleasure District. When he awoke the next morning, Raeth felt no hint of the annoyance he felt the previous night. However, Anohi’s words still weighed heavily on his mind.

*****

Days after their latest trip to Yukaku, the two of them were back in their own bed, talking. They could converse in Mando’a now, as long as Saudaji didn’t mind how thick Raeth’s accent was. He picked up the vocabulary and grammar in record time, but there was something about the language that kept tripping up his tongue. And although he could imitate pretty much every other accent and dialect when needed, he had a tough time with this one.

Rolling in her lover’s arms, Saudaji told him that this village, this island, this planet no longer felt like home to her. In one of those rare moments, Raeth didn’t know what to say, for he was no expert on ‘home’.

She entwined her fingers with his, and without saying a word she reminded him that she was at home as long as they were together - a sentiment he wholeheartedly shared. Smiling, he closed his eyes, touched his nose to hers, and nodded. They fell asleep softly, that night.

The next day, while tending to the animals, Saudaji expressed her concern about Prime, as well as the surveillance agreement she had with the Zeltrons. Raeth liked knowing that Anohi and her people were willing to help them. He maneuvered around the pen and got closer to her so he wouldn’t have to raise his voice.

“If I were him - which I guess, in a way, I am - I would’ve already guessed that we’d go here to lay low. Ever since we arrived, I’ve been scanning for drones, ships, anything that looked suspicious. I haven’t found anything, yet.”

He picked up a brush and was about to brush one of the other fathiers, but she spit at him and made a weird and distinctly annoyed sound. The beasts only got along with Raeth maybe half the time; since this was one of those times they didn’t like him, he rolled his eyes, put the brush back, and backed off.

“I don’t know what it is, but something tells me he doesn’t want to find us right now. Maybe he’s busy waging his war against the Empire, or some shit. But when he wants to contact us, he’ll contact us.

"To be honest, I’m sick of thinking about him.”

Saudaji changed the subject to his armor and what it symbolized. Raeth already had modification plans drawn up and saved on the Pylat’s computer. He was eager to start augmenting his own suit of armor, just like he had augmented hers. He was also looking forward to eating Moerangi’s uj cakes.

As for how he felt about being accepted into the Mandalorian family - he was still on the fence. Here he was, a guy who never really cared about having a family, and all of a sudden he’s got two to think about - the Mandalorians, and his clone-father.

Raeth glanced at Saudaji. With just one look, he was reminded of the fact that the only family he needed was her.

“Hey,” he called out, stepping closer to her. “Do you want to get married?”

 

[Apollo Wilde]

“What? Married?” She made a sound, caught between a snort and a laugh, and looked at the fathier, as if the beast would know the true answer. The fathier shook her long eared head, glanced over at Raeth, and, if sensing something between the two humanoids, whickered to her pen mate, and ambled away from the fence, swaying her long tail lazily over her hind quarters.

“What made you think of that?” She turned to lean against the face, facing him a bit more fully. Her laughter was out of sheer surprise - and her face, though with the outlines of the warm smile she reserved for Raeth alone, was perplexed. Marriage had never come up between the two of them - once they’d gotten past the “I’m going to fuck you but I’m also going to murder you” phase, it had been easier to open up. As she’d told him what she knew of her life, it was only natural that Mahoroba had come up. Bits and pieces, here and there, laying in bed, cooking, murmuring to herself when she thought he’d drifted off for the night - over time, the teaspoons added up. He’d know, by this time, about the matches between the tribes, the initial meeting, the “marriage.” How she’d gotten her scar. And, by now as well, with a sense of resignation, she’d finally told him why she’d left.

It wasn’t just Mahoroba; it was the idea, the mythos, that she had become. This warrior prodigy, the one who would mend the bridge between the Pleasure District and this tribe, the idea of a united tribe system under a shared leadership, one that she had been groomed for. And the same one that she’d left, without so much as a hint of who would be her successor. There had been some bad blood, yes - the tenseness that had characterized their first months back. Nothing directed at him, truly, but her. Though she was close to Raeth most times, there were others when she had to go off on her own.

She looked down at her hands, the battered knuckles, the slight bruising around the ring and middle finger of her left hand.

“Well…” She licked her lower lip. She could taste the dust of the pen, the sting of salt. “It’s pretty simple here. You say a vow, no one has to be around to see it, and you’re married. That’s the gist of it, anyway. Though our folks typically insist on getting tattooed. You’ve seen Moerangi’s and Te Kohe’s?” She pointed to her chin and cheeks, looping in long spirals. All of her married siblings had tattoos on their chin, some spiraling into their cheeks - their respective mates had the same designs. “It’s an older tradition, that’s why you don’t see the younger people do it, but…” Trailing off, she felt her cheeks get hot. Now, there was a rarity - a shy Saudaji. “You don’t have to.”

She couldn’t even begin to tell him, how, when she was little, still smarting over her strange lot in life, that seeing those tattoos on her foster parents had been something wonderful. A shining promise, that even though life was hard and rough and dirty, that there still could be something good out of it. Her adoptive grandparents had the tattoos as well - and even as they yelled and cuffed their children, they still looked at each other with this…glow that she could feel in her bones and wanted for her own.

“You don’t have to,” she repeated, a bit softer. “It can be a liability issue as well, when it comes to hunting. Though the younger ones have taken to not taking off their helmets once they’re off world. Only within the comfort of their homes or with their tribe can they take their armor off. At this rate….” She tilted her head up to the sky. The air was calm, not a hint of wind. It was the pleasant coolness, verging on the knife’s edge of heat that categorized early spring on the island. “I’m not sure what we’re really doing anymore. Working for the Sith, rogues, humble farmers…” Laughing at the last bit, she nodded back at the smaller fathier - the one that’d hissed at Raeth. “Though you still have a long way to go. I don’t know what you do to her - she’s so hot and cold towards you.”

 

[BewareTheDream]

On a basic, objective level, Raeth understood why Saudaji had left her homeworld. But although he understood her reasoning, he couldn’t relate to her situation. Here she was, a gifted young warrior raised to become a leader to people who were important to her, and pressured to do something that no one else had been able to do. Then there was Raeth the lifelong loner. He wasn’t expected to lead anyone, nor did have anyone important to him - no one besides her.

That’s not entirely true anymore, now is it? You now have another important person in your life - Clone Daddy. That annoying, little thought invaded his mind on the night when Saudaji explained why she left. That night, he brushed the thought away so he could concentrate on her, which is the same thing he did that day among the fathiers.

Saudaji asked him what made him think of marriage. Raeth was honest with her. He spent so much of his life lying, but with her, he had become a (mostly) honest man.
“When I spoke with Anohi, your ex’s name came up, once or twice. It was inevitable. That’s what got me thinking about it.”

Wiping his hands on his denim pants, he approached her from behind. Dirt crunched underneath his booted feet. “It occurred to me that you and I already live like a married couple. (A married couple who live as killers-for-hire, anyway.)

“We’re the most important people in each other’s lives, right?” Once he got right up behind her, he wrapped his arms around her waist and crisscrossed his forearms over her tummy. He loved hugging her from behind. He also loved smelling her. Despite the fact that she’d been working with the fathiers today, his nose was able to cut through the smell of animals and get to Saudaji's sweet scent.

Resting his chin on her shoulder and his cheek against one of her lekku, Raeth continued. “We love each other. We live together. We spend a majority of our time together, just the two of us. Really, the only thing we don’t have are matching rings, not to mention a set of ‘Mr. and Mrs.’ bath towels.

Something that Saudaji said moments ago tugged on Raeth’s memory. Actually, it didn’t just tug on it - it yanked on it like a gambler yanks on a slot machine lever. “She’s so hot and cold towards you” - she said that about the hissy fathier, but her words immediately made him remember how Saudaji treated him early on in their relationship, back when they meandered through that awkward, dangerous space between ‘enemies’ and ‘lovers’.

Raeth hated that memory. He hated how cold Saudaji’s eyes and words were back then. If he never, ever experienced that coldness again, and if he could spend the rest of his life seeing her smile and hearing her laugh, then he’d consider that a very happy life, indeed.

“Getting to this point was the hard part. Getting matching rings is the easy part.
“So what do you say, ‘Dajika? Want to get hitched? There’s nothing in the galaxy I want more than to be with you.

“Besides, the ‘Mr. and Mrs.’ towels sound nice.”

 

[Apollo Wilde]

She couldn’t be angry at Anohi - though the mention of her name was enough to catch her by surprise. Anohi was the textbook definition of a “cool warrior” - deceptively cold and calm for a sentient being, let alone a Zeltron. The woman was so chill that not even butter would melt in her mouth.

“Huh..” But before she could say more, Raeth was behind her, looping his arms around her midsection. The warmth of his fingers leeched through her loose coveralls, and she stopped, enjoying his touch. Though she’d experienced for a while now, in several different situations, it was always reassuring. Grounding. So she did what she always did when he approached her now - tilted her head backwards, and closed her eyes, letting her lekku drape over his shoulder. Though she couldn’t kiss him from the angle, the way she bumped her forehead into the bottom of his chin was her way around that.

“You make a sound argument,” she said, laughter still tickling the corner of her words. “But I think monogrammed towels are a bit much. Besides, who said I’d take your last name, anyway?” She twisted herself around, so that her side was against his chest. Looking back at him, there was a teasing quirk to her mouth.

“We’re not much on formalities here,” she continued, though she turned back around to press her back into his chest. “You pretty much recite your vows and that’s it. No fancy ceremony.” She knew that if he was this serious about it - enough to ask her - that he’d probably already done his research. There truly wasn’t much to a Mandalorian “wedding,” if it even could be called that. It was meant to be as functional as the rest of life was. “Though in our tribe, depending on your ranking, you might get tattoos.” Now it was time for her to confess, though the words dried and threatened to crumble on her tongue, choking her. After all they’d been through, how could she not tell him how she actually felt?

Because it’s hard.

Because you’re scared of sounding silly to him.

Because you’re scared he’s going to laugh at you.

She swallowed hard, hoping that fear would be chased away by the gesture.

It wasn’t.

So she sighed. Spoke, trusting what was bubbling her gut to guide her through. “If you laugh at what I’m about to tell you, I will kill you,” and it seemed much easier to be able to speak now. “When I was younger, I used to dream of getting my tattoo like To’a and Moreangi.” Both of them, Raeth would recall (in fact, all of Saudaji’s foster family would have variants - something his sharp eyes would have undoubtably noticed), had ornate tattoos that started under their chins and curled round their cheeks. To’a, being a leader, actually had tattoos that covered his entire face. “But you know,” it was slipped in, as quietly as she could stalk their next victim, “Once you become a member of the tribe, there’s no more taking off the beskargam. Not in front of strangers.”

The Way, as it was loosely called - creeds that kept Mandalore running, identified peoples across a myriad of different cultures all housed on one planet. Those that had their own armor, those who took up The Way - no matter where they were from, it was all the same. It was something that she herself had been remiss in, when she’d first met him - maybe that had been a sign from the beginning that he was someone special. That he would end up her companion, lover - and something she still sometimes had a hard time believing - her friend.

They’d rushed into each other’s bodies as if they were making up for lost time, but somewhere along the line, between the frantic fucking, the desperate reassurance that they were alive, that they could feel, being dragged along by the flesh, she’d started to open up to him - and he to her.

Actually…why shouldn’t they get married?

It wouldn’t actually change anything about how they lived - it just meant… “You’d always have a family here,” she said, suddenly. “If anything were to happen to me, you can always come here.” She said it without thought, but with conviction. Marriage would bind him to her, to her people - he would be welcome here. And the thought filled her with warmth.

She threaded her fingers through his. Family may not be that important to him; perhaps she was the beginning and end of his world, as he was rapidly becoming to her as well, even among her family. But he could always have a place that was his, that he could belong to, people who loved and would protect him because she loved and protected him, because they also loved him.

For the first time in a very long time, she felt at ease all the way to her core. “Let’s do it, then.”

 

[BewareTheDream]

Even after they had become more than lovers, Raeth had laughed at her maybe a handful of times. She’d laughed at him, too. But more often than not, they laughed with each other, as loving couples ought to.

Today, though, the seriousness of their discussion, coupled with her warning, kept him quiet as an unpowered engine when she shared one of her childhood dreams. All he did was listen - something he became better at doing because of her - and snuggle the front of his body to the back of hers.

She dreamed of this? The tattoos must represent something very important to her, something beyond marriage. Or maybe marriage is very important to her, even though she never talked about it before?

I won’t let her down, then.

Raeth could only guess what it was about the tattoos that made Saudaji dream about them as a child. He knew exactly how he felt about them, though - he didn’t want them. Tattoos on my handsome mug?!

Like a slideshow, images of all the facial tattoos he’d seen in the village - Moerangi’s, To’a’s, and many others’ - played inside his mind. Using mental photoshop, he superimposed those tattoos, one after the other, onto his own chin and cheeks; in To’a’s case, Raeth imagined what he’d look like with a full face tattoo. He didn’t like any of the results.

However, this was Saudaji’s dream, and he’d do anything for her. If fulfilling her dream and making her smile meant he’d wear tattoos on his beautiful face for the rest of his life, then he would happily pay that price. Maybe he’d even learn to like them over time.

I won’t let her down.

He didn’t say a single, negative word about the tattoos. He also didn’t say anything when she mentioned how Mandalorians shouldn’t take off their beskar’gams in front of strangers. He had questions about that rule and others outlined by the Way, but those questions could wait.

However, when Saudaji mentioned that he would be welcomed here if something were to happen to her, he immediately responded. “If something happened to you, I’d…”

I’d kill myself.

Realizing those words would probably put a damper on the romance of the moment, he stopped himself and told her the truth in a different way. “...I don’t know how I’d live without you, ‘Dajika.”

Much to his delight and excitement, Saudaji agreed to marry him. The level of excitement he felt was a surprise to him, for he honestly didn’t think much would change between them. Surprise or not, he let the excitement wash over him like a wave. It felt exquisite.

Gently, slowly, Raeth turned her around so he could see her face, and to see the smile on her lips as well as in her eyes. Of course he grinned in return; there was no way he could not.

There really is nothing in the galaxy more beautiful than Saudaji when she smiles.

Raeth touched his forehead to hers. “When do you want to say our vows?”

Without giving her a chance to answer, Raeth moved in for a kiss. Their lips and tongues united, and he sighed, for it felt like forever since he got a taste of her. His arms criss-crossed behind her back, underneath her lekku, and he held her as close as could be.

While an early spring breeze whispered around them, and while the fathiers watched them, curiously, from their pens, Raeth and Saudaji hugged and made out for a long, long time. They lost themselves in each other, as they had done so often before.

 

[Apollo Wilde]

She lightly grasped his nose between her pointer finger and thumb, and gently tweaked it. “If something happened to me, you’d keep living. Or else I’d come back and haunt you.” Her tone was light enough, but the look in her eyes spoke volumes. But now wasn’t the time, nor the place, to get into such thoughts. Instead of continuing the conversation further, she eagerly let herself be carried away by his mouth.

Before the kiss could reach its inevitable conclusion, she pulled away, touching her forehead to his. “I’d rather not in front of…” She trailed off, letting her line of sight drift over to the curious fathiers. “You know.”

Without any additional preamble, she’d lead him from the pen into their home.



Dusk settled across the landscape, the sounds of the jungle transitioning from the trill of sun loving birds to the calmer calls of night creatures. It had surprised Saudaji how quickly the sounds had become familiar again. Even though she’d been away for years, it’d only taken a few nights for her to accurately what made what call and why. And now, as she lay on her back, Raeth’s head across her chest, she looked up at the ceiling, her mind listlessly cataloguing the sounds outside.

She felt…content.

“Ease,” perhaps wouldn’t be the right word. There was still too much on her mind for her to be completely settled. There was the workings of the village, her family, the distance and machinations of Anohi, the clone of Raeth. As her fingers carded through Raeth’s hair, she could tell by his breathing that he wasn’t asleep. Resting, yes, but asleep? Not quite. The lovemaking from earlier hadn’t been that much of an exertion. But it had been a welcome distraction.

Reaching down, she began to draw long, intricate loops across his shoulder blades, the nape of his neck. “I know you’re awake,” she whispered, against the crown of his head. “Credit for your thoughts?”

 

[BewareTheDream]

Making love with Saudaji - his girlfriend and partner in crime - always made Raeth feel alive. Today, making love with Saudaji - his fiance - felt even more exhilarating, which surprised him, because he hadn’t thought about marriage at all for a vast majority of his life. Now, all of a sudden, it felt important to him.

Well, that’s another thing she’s changed my mind on.

Raeth loved using Saudaji’s boobs as pillows. Smiling with his eyes shut, he enjoyed the feel of her cushiony swells against the side of his face. Turning his head and snuggling into her a little bit more, he pressed his mouth against one of her slopes and nuzzled it, briefly and lovingly.

Raeth’s hearing wasn’t as keen as hers, but he could still hear the nocturnal creatures filling the outside with soft sound. Unlike her, he had very little idea about what made which noises. There was terabytes of information about xenobiology stored on the Patient Pylat’s computer, and even more was readily available on the holonet, but he had only studied an infinitesimal amount of it. The only biology he was interested in was that of sentient beings, especially when it helped him become a more efficient killer.

And, of course, there was Saudaji’s biology, which he found to be endlessly fascinating.

She broke the comfortable silence between them with a question about his thoughts. As usual, Raeth had multiple things running through his head at the time.

I’m thinking about flipping you over so I could eat your butthole. Again. That was his immediate surface thought. He didn’t share it with her, because instinct told him that now wasn’t the time to lick her butthole. Just mentioning it would ruin the moment.

Later, then.

“It hasn’t been bad here, has it?” he asked her as he reveled in her touch. The invisible patterns she drew upon his skin made him shiver ever so slightly. “It’s been a lot better here, with you, then I thought it would be. I could see us living here for a little while longer.”

Sliding his head off her breasts, he pressed a kiss to her tummy, then he lay his head against her bosom once more. That was when an unsettling thought bubbled up to the surface.

She and I both know we can’t stay here forever, though. Raeth was silent again for the next minute or two.

“You know, I’ve been conducting regular scans of the area. I even have Sebastian running scans when I’m not on the Pylat. I haven’t picked up anything - no drones, no ships in low orbit, nothing. But I’m sure he knows we’re here.” Although they rarely talked about Prime, he was usually in Raeth’s thoughts, nowadays, and always in a bad way.

“Maybe he doesn’t know our exact location, but he knows we’re on Mandalore.” Before, he didn’t want to spoil the moment with lewd talk, but he figured he spoiled the moment anyway with talk of Prime.

You’re talking about your clone daddy while in bed with Saudaji? Not cool, dude. Not cool at all.

 

[Apollo Wilde]

He could feel her relax - a deeper sinking into the mattress. Though the interior furnishings of their “hut” were not nearly as comfortable (or as high tech) as their accommodations on the Pylat, they were… “home-y,” in the sense that it blended in seamlessly with the rest of the village. Trips to the Pleasure District had them picking up various odds and ends to add their own touch to their home - something that Saudaji had been slightly amused by. With her being back “home,” the idea of accumulating things for the sake of it…seemed odd. “Materialistic” wasn’t quite a way to describe her - though in her time away, she’d taken to buying little things that caught her eye simply because she could; there was no fighting, no having to hide and hoard favorite items from siblings. And every time she bought something, no matter how small, how silly, it felt like she was buying herself. Little things that chipped out who she was, outside of the constraints of Mandalore, free from the definitions of Yukaku. Free from who she was supposed to be - but also free to be completely lost as to who she really was.

“No…it hasn’t been bad at all.” Even with the political negotiating, with the awkward homecomings, with the questions and lack thereof. Even with Anohi…

Was there residual guilt? Of course. Anohi had been a large part of her youth; at one point in time, Saudaji had even looked up to her. Her grace, her beauty - her calm. Things that, at one point, the brash young woman had longed to possess. And as for Mahoroba…Who knows where he was off to? She’d recalled bits of conversation with Saboten, the passed message that he was dying, something to do with the Force, transferring healing energies from one to another, perhaps due to his healing her - trading his life for hers. Perhaps she should feel indebted to him. Perhaps not. Because she couldn’t find an answer easily, she opted to toss it aside - for now, at least.

“What do you think he’s waiting for?” Her response would come after a calm silence, the continual rise and fall of her chest as she breathed deeply, easily. Her hands moved from his back to his thick hair, across the nape of his neck. Sun exposure had tanned his skin, dusted the nape of his neck and shoulders with freckles. She thought they were cute. “Anohi has her people on it as well - but I doubt he’s spending time in the Pleasure District.” Though, however, she could be wrong.

For a moment, she thought of an older Raeth, still lurking, still stalking - but being drowned in all of the hedonistic experiences that the Pleasure District offered. There was all kinds of sex for sale, yes - but love too, and fine dining and theater and music. The flower of the planet, where men and women of with discerning tastes and pockets full of credits could be pampered. Even the poorest man could lose his cares for at least 30 minutes - an hour, if the whores were feeling charitable. There was always room for a bleeding heart among the right brothels.

Would he…of course he would. She had to bite back a smile. Talking about the potential sexual proclivities of their newest adversary probably wouldn’t be a good turn in the conversation. “He’s got to be planning something. And while we have a bit of an advantage…I don’t want to put the village in danger.” She was firm on this - though she knew her family, and the entire village, for that matter, would fight to the death if any one of them were threatened, the last thing she wanted was to pull them into something that didn’t truly involve them. The village itself, more than her immediate family, were her family as a large collective - they’d all accepted her back like it was nothing, and Raeth as if he’d always been there. Bonds like that could never be severed, she knew, but now…it felt uncomfortable. “I’d rather us leave and have him follow before anything happened here.”

 

[BewareTheDream]

“Mrrrmmm…” Practically purring like a cat, Raeth luxuriated in Saudaji’s affection. What she did was simple - she just played with his hair or caressed the nape of his neck - but to him, there was nothing better. In silent thanks, he ran the back of his fingers along her neck before cupping her cheek in his palm. He kept his hand there so that she could nuzzle it, a feeling he always adored.

She asked him what he thought Prime was waiting for. It was a shame that they discussed such an unpleasant subject while doing such pleasant things. But both were important, and they were both excellent multitaskers.

“My best guess is he’s busy,” he replied. From her cheek, his hand glided down her neck, along her shoulder, and to her arm. With either the front or back of his fingers, he caressed her upper arm. Now and then he’d use his fingernails to scratch her skin, ever so tenderly, back and forth.

“He’s supposedly engaged in war with the Sith. Forgive me for stating the obvious, but such an ambitious endeavor must take up a lot of his attention. So I don’t think he’s necessarily waiting for us, or waiting for anything. I think he’s busy, and he’ll contact us when he’s not.

Raeth’s hand fell from her arm down to one of her thighs so he could rake his fingernails upon it, softly. For several seconds of comfortable silence, he considered their odd situation. He also considered what he would do if he were Prime.

What do you mean, ‘if you were Prime’? You are Prime. Heh. Raeth frowned. Feeling his mood start to sour, he cuddled with Saudaji to chase the worst of his thoughts away.

“I wouldn’t worry about the village. There’s nothing to gain from attacking Mandalorians, except really dangerous enemies with really long memories. Besides, Prime has probably thought of ways to get your family...I mean our family...on his side. It’s what I would do if I were in his position." The thought of Saudaji's family now being his family would take a lot of getting used to.

“Anyways...Since my scans haven’t picked up any drones or suspicious ships, I’m guessing he’s got spies on the planet.”

He remembered something Saudaji said that afternoon. “You told me ‘We have the eyes and ears of the Yukaku Pleasure District.’” His memory of her words was as accurate as a recording. “That’s because of Anohi, yeah? Please, tell me about her and her network.”

Yeah, tell me about Anohi so I don’t have to think about Prime so much.

He didn’t really know he did it, but Raeth clung to Saudaji in the dark.


*****

Prime had sent three freelancers down to the surface of Mandalore, where he suspected Raeth and Saudaji had been holed up for the past several months. Two of the freelancers were relatively new to him; he had hired them for only two other jobs, each. The third - who went by the codename “Reliable” - was someone he had worked with multiple times over the past few years. All three said they were familiar with Mandalore, all three worked separately from the others, and all three centered their investigations around the Yukaku Pleasure Districts.

Even if Raeth and Saudaji weren’t staying there, they probably visited at least once. Based on what he knew about his clone - and based on what he knew about himself - Prime determined that the probability of Raeth hiding in the Mandalorian wilderness this whole time was low. For one reason or another, Yukaku would be too tempting for him to pass up, which made it the best place to begin the search.

The two freelancers with whom Prime wasn’t that familiar had gone silent within a couple days of each other. He suspected they were dead. That was unfortunate, but not at all discouraging, for it all but confirmed that Raeth and Saudaji were on the planet.

From the safety of his starship, which was lightyears away from Mandalorian Space, he sent an encrypted message to Reliable.

“Job over. Get out, now. Rest of payment will be transferred upon confirmation of your departure.”

With that out of the way, it was now time for Prime to arrange contact with his ‘son’.

 

[Apollo Wilde]

Busy, hm?

Hopefully that meant, one way or the other, that Anohi’s extensive network were steadily tripping up the elder Raeth.

I can’t keep calling him that.

Under the trail of his fingernails, gooseflesh rose. She shivered mildly, enjoying the simple pleasure of his touch. She seemed to sink deeper into the mattress, her arms enfolded around him, taking him with her. Lightly throwing a leg over him, she held him there, in the vague shadow of a leg hold, were it a combat situation. Now, it seemed that she just wanted to wrap herself around him entirely.

Which wasn’t too far from the truth.

The gesture had pulled his crotch closer into hers. Between her legs, her sex was warm, still damp from their last tryst, and, from the way she gently rubbed again him, her cool down period was coming to an end. “They’ll fail,” was all she said in response to Raeth’s comment about her family. Their family. The fact that he’d even tried to verbally include them as his meant worlds - and she was about to show him how much.

“Hey,” she said, softly, her voice verging on a purr. Her hands traced long trails up his back, his shoulder blades, his shoulders, his neck, to rest on either side of his head. Gently, she shifted him further up her body, so that they were face to face. His head still cradled between her hands, she leaned up, touching her lips to his. Softly, a whisper of flesh against his. Rubbing her nose against his, she moved her hand to kiss his cheek, the bridge of his nose, his lips again.

They could talk later. Especially about Anohi. That was a tale for time - and she had a better idea of what to do with the rest of the night.

_____

“Reliable” knew she was being tailed.

To her tailer’s credit, they were very good. She didn’t know what they looked like; just that no matter where she went, there were eyes on her. She'd done her best (and, at times, she didn’t have to act at all) to blend in with the other inhabitants of Yukaku. It’d been years since she’d been back; she was more than pleasantly surprised to see that her favorite girl, Hoshi, was still on planet. Though she was no longer “working”, she had gladly taken her on for a night of glowing pleasure that still sent her nerve endings singing.

Not a bad assignment -

Ah. They were close. Too close.

From what she knew, the Crown was the one that ran this planet. “Matron,” “Empress,” “The Head,” “The Dawn,” - different ways of referring to this mastermind, but it all meant the same thing. And she knew she was on The Crown’s radar. Everyone that moved within Yukaku was dancing within the palm of their hand. From what she knew (and verified), the Crown wasn’t one to directly get their hands dirty. They observed, yes, but were content to let Yukaku move along, guided by the hands of commerce and art. The Crown had different cells that all reported to them (in moving from one district to the next, she’d been all too aware that her tail, subtle as they were, had indeed changed, meaning that she’d crossed an invisible border.), but was never directly involved. That was what the organization was for.

She paused in the middle of a busy street. She was entering into the Theater District; safe place to move. Anything could happen within the Red Light District; or, surprisingly enough, within the Dining District. Here, though - there was a certain amount of safety. She glanced down at her chrono. She was making good time; her temporary base of operations was just a few streets over. She'd hopped from one performance to the other; some maudlin, some full of action, others, full of romance. All were beautiful, all were entertaining - and still, as she glanced at the coded communication that chirped to her, she felt a pang that she would be leaving again. Maybe, once she’d had enough, she’d re-settle here. It wasn’t so bad -

“Do you happen to have the time?” The voice was female, cheery - perhaps a bit overly laden with seduction. Though Yukaku had its Districts, the unifying principle was pleasure.

This wasn’t her tail; she could feel it. She glanced up to respond - and the world went black.

____

“I’m beginning to think that, perhaps, Saboten, I should be taking a rest right about now,” Anohi spoke lightly, but as she struggled to get to her feet, she was reminded all too well of how cumbersome pregnancy could be. Though she had her pick of any willing surrogate who would have been more than honored to carry her child, for each pregnancy, she had opted to carry the fetus to term herself. The pain of childbirth, then, the joy of hearing that first wail would always be a bond that could not be severed between her and her children.

Mahoroba…

Though, she supposed, she had lost a blood son, she had gained another. “And a troublesome boy he is,” she murmured, more to herself and the growing child in her belly than to anyone else. But she smiled all the same. In her brief interactions with Raeth, she had seen, all too clearly, why Saudaji was attracted to him.

“And give all of this up, Mother? You’re kidding.” Saboten was wiping her hands down, removing the last traces of blood. “What would we do without you?”

Anohi chuckled, then clucked her tongue. “Follow the next one who proved to be worthy, of course. I was not born to this position,” she grunted softly as she stood up, holding onto the edge of an ornate table to steady herself, “But merely trained for it.” Anohi turned a knowing eye to Saboten, “As have you.”

“Mmm, I’m not ready to get out of the field yet,” Saboten responded, her gaze going distant as she glanced over the flickering lights of the city. “I didn’t think I’d be called back here so soon.”

“Has Zeltros captured your heart, then?” Anohi folded her hands primly over the swell of her stomach, her eyes twinkling with merriment.

“It was…interesting to go back. To see what could have been my home.” Saboten moved from the interior of the lavishly dressed room to the balcony. Glanced down, before gripping onto the railing. “What was, I guess.”

Silence floated comfortably between them, before Anohi spoke again. “Well, to business, then. Has the last operative been caught?”

“Yes - she’d received a coded message from the First, but I could not decipher it in time.”

“No matter; the message is clear. A little sloppier than I would have liked, but we are still learning about our First.” Anohi sighed, rubbed her stomach. “And our power is still firmly in place. I am not concerned.”

“I believe that the First will not attempt a violent contact. The odds are against him; he knows of the Family, he knows that his Second has been accepted. It would make a full on frontal assault fool-hardy.” Saboten folded her hands in front of her lap, bloodied cloth clutched between her fingers.

“I believe you are right. He has been observing.” Anohi trailed off, her gaze drifting to a goldfish swimming placidly in an ornate glass bowl on an end table. Such beautiful, filthy creatures. “Should we extend him an invitation?”

 

[BewareTheDream]

Raeth used to be a light sleeper. He only needed around four hours of sleep each night to be fully functional the next day. And because he always had projects to work on, equipment to build or modify, droids to construct and program, and assassinations to plot, all those extra hours of wakefulness came in handy.

That period as a light sleeper felt like it ended a lifetime ago, even though it really ended less than a year ago. Now, he slept nearly twice as long and much more soundly. A lot of that was due to his nightly activities with Saudaji, which were as exhausting as they were sublime. Her loving knocked him out better than most sedatives. But even the softer things they shared - namely, their late night cuddling and pillow talk - lulled him into sleep that was deeper than what he’d known in the past.

Thanks to Saudaji, Raeth fell asleep peacefully. Unfortunately, he didn’t always wake up peacefully.

*****

The corridor was made of metal the color of dried blood. It was dark; the lights were on, but they were weak, flickering, and did so little to dispel the darkness. Raeth didn’t know where this place was, and yet he knew it terrified him.

He also knew he was being chased by something that terrified him even more.

Somehow, he knew his pursuer wasn’t a person, but a thing. As he raced down the corridor, he forced himself to glance over his shoulder to see the thing, but he couldn’t see, for the darkness concealed it. No, it was more than that - it seemed like the darkness molded around the thing, became part of it.

Can the thing control darkness? Is it darkness itself? What did I do to piss off darkness?!

Although he couldn’t see the thing, he could hear it. He could hear the slap of its slimy flesh against the metal floor, and he knew it wasn’t running, but crawling after him. No matter how fast his own legs carried him, the horrible, wet sounds of his pursuer kept getting closer and closer.

Raeth spotted a turn up ahead and tried to take it, but he slipped and fell onto his side.

Get up! It’s coming! GET UP!

No matter how much he screamed at himself to get up, his body wouldn’t move. Terror had taken over. Terror pinned him to the ground, and it didn’t allow him to do anything except turn his face in the direction of the thing, and stare.

The darkness finally began to ooze off the thing. The first thing that got revealed was its face, which wasn’t the horrible face of a monster, like he expected. No, no, it was a face with which he was familiar.

It was his face. It was the face of an Other Raeth.

“There’s no point in running, Brother,” the Other Raeth said in a voice that sounded like his, but wrong, somehow. “Family always catches up with you.”

The darkness slithered away from the rest of the Other Raeth’s body, and immediately, Raeth wished it had stayed. For the Other Raeth may have had the same face, the same hair, and the same cocky smirk, but its body was that of a lab-grown horror. It had too many limbs, and each limb was misshapen and huge. Two of the lowest limbs looked like the flippers of a diseased sea turtle. Its torso was covered in humps, pustules, and something that looked like scales. And from the neck down, its body dripped with slime.

“Come on, Brother. It’s time to join your family.” The Other Raeth didn’t just reach for Raeth - he began to crawl on top of him.

Raeth could do nothing but scream as his deformed clone-sibling smothered his head with its body.

*****

Raeth snapped awake, screaming and flailing. He woke up violently enough to kick a pillow off the foot of the bed. Frantically, he reached for his face, his hair, and the sides of his head, as though he expected to be covered in slime. Thankfully, there was no slime, just cold sweat. It took a minute or two to calm his breathing down and shake the cobwebs from his mind, but only a moment to realize that Saudaji wasn’t in bed.

That wasn’t the first time he had a nightmare about an Other Raeth. They didn’t happen often, but when they did, they were bad. And last night’s was the worst.

Aw, fark, I may need to see a therapist. I wonder if I can find one who specializes in clone trauma.

Forcing himself out of bed, Raeth went to the bathroom to shower. After an especially long shower, he left the hi-tech hut in search of Saudaji.

 

[Apollo Wilde]

It was a rarity for Saudaji not to be there when Raeth woke up. She’d realized, without it having been said out loud, that her presence in a strange place in a strange land would help ground him.

However, there were still duties that she needed to carry out on her own. Catching up with her family to smooth out the edges of awkwardness that age and time naturally brought (let alone her long time away, and the business with Mahoroba), to train on her own - to reabsorb the land that she had called home for years, to find where she was. It would be so simple to say that Raeth was her home and leave it at that - which was true, but for so long, she’d been chasing after someone else that it had become easy to forget who she was, who she was supposed to be. And what she ultimately wanted out of her life.

These “morning meditations”, or simply whenever she could get away, took various forms - sometimes she swam, sometimes she went for long hikes, but most times she trained. No matter how many forms she mastered, no matter how many weapons she could wield like they were extensions of herself, she could not get to the root of what was bothering her the most now. Family had been placated; she supposed that some of the oddness of being back now was residual from Raeth; it must be hard for him to realize that her family had accepted him just like that. Indeed, he was treated as if he had always been there. But perhaps there was hesitation on her part, that she felt like she shouldn’t have come back, that she was bringing something evil with her.

The Elder Raeth…

The hard set of her mouth as she walked back from the beach now, salt spray still fresh on her lips, did nothing to untangle the knot in her brain. This early, there were people waking up - but sensing her mood, they did not openly call out to her, simply giving her nods or a casual wave if she happened to look their way. Not that her troubles were her own; several tribal meetings had discussed the possibilities of what to do with the Elder lingering. Not that they needed to know ALL details of what she had been up to; they were warriors enough to know that only the basics were needed. There was the idea that the village would all take up arms if need be, but there was an unshakeable faith in Anohi’s network; a true sign that times had changed. The Pleasure District was one to be eyed with a sense of distrust; no place that traded in dreams could be trusted.

In the time that she had been back, Saudaji indeed had had some one on one time with Anohi. Though initially the woman had made her nervous -imagine that, someone like Saudaji nervous - and it had taken her time to admit that to herself, time with her, with the soothing presence of Raeth to return to, and age and time and distance had given her the ability to be more objective about the older woman. Once she was able to look past the cold beauty, she realized that Anohi and her had much more in common than merely Mahoroba. The irony of the situation was that her mistrust of Anohi simply accepting her as a daughter was the same as Raeth’s confusion at being accepted by her own family.

Too many things going on in her mind. Why couldn’t things be as simple as battle? You knew who the enemy was and what needed to be done. Even though she could throw together a battle plan with the best of them, if not was the best at it, she knew that she appreciated the simplicity of the actual battle itself more than anything else. The purity of feeling fire in the veins, her heart pound in her chest and her breath in tune with the wheel of the world - there was simply nothing else like it. She wished that the Elder would just…she didn’t know, maybe just magically materialize in the middle of the village, one on one, so she could get this over with. Funny how people felt the need to dress up violence with a reason.

As she rounded the animal pens, she was surprised to see Raeth dressed and…something about him felt “off.”

“Rae’ika?” The nickname hung in the air, hoping to calm him. "Talk to me."

 

[BewareTheDream]

Saudaji knew Raeth better than anybody - Raeth was aware of that. He appreciated it, too. Still, it surprised him how quickly she was able to notice that something troubling was on his mind. She had seen him for like five whole seconds - just long enough for him to wave to her - and that was all she needed.

He thought he was inscrutable to most people. At least, that’s what he wanted to think. But she could read him as easily as one of those trashy romance novels. (Speaking of which, he actually had a few of those novels saved on his datapad; they were a guilty pleasure of his.)

That morning, Raeth was dressed in sandals, dark green cargo shorts, and a tropical shirt that he didn’t bother to button up. When they first arrived on the island months ago, Raeth covered up every inch of skin in either clothing or insect repellant. He was also pale back then. Now, though, he had become comfortable with the climate and the environment, although he still wore a little insect repellant. He also sported a healthy tan.

Looking like he was on a tropical vacation, Raeth joined Saudaji at one of the animal pens. He rested an elbow atop the fence, watched the creatures within for a few moments, and then looked her in the eye.

“You know what’s funny? I don’t often dream. And I almost never have nightmares. But I had a real doozy last night.”

As the heat of the morning gradually rose, he described his nightmare to her, sparing none of the gory details. Theatrical as always, he presented it like a scene from a horror movie.

“I can’t help but wonder how many of my ‘brothers’ are out there,” he told her after sharing his nightmare. “And I wonder how nasty they are.”

 

[Apollo Wilde]

She listened to him recounter his nightmare with a thoughtful face. “Thoughtful” could have come across as impassive, perhaps a bit bored, but Raeth would know her well enough to know what she looked like when she was carefully weighing each word, searching her own vast experiences for something similar, something that could be planned out and a solution found.

It wasn’t long into his narrative that she simply hooked her arm in his, and as he talked, she goaded him into walking with her. No distant excursion - just a slow loop around the grounds that were known as “theirs” - the faithers, the squabbling nunas, the small plot of land that Saudaji had spent many evenings trying to eke out a small garden. Tending live animals came much easier to her than tilling the soil, and as a result, the garden always looked defeated, battered by an unseen foe. It was in front of this sad little garden that Raeth’s story ended, and they came to a slow stop.

Through the emerald leaves of the trees above, the sky filtered through a clear blue, though at the edge of the horizon, fat white clouds were turning gray. There would be rain before nightfall for sure. But for now, the sky was a clear ripple above them, disturbed by the wing beats of the occasional bird.

"I don't know," she said, after a long silence, of her eyes searching the deep shrubbery in front of them, the high arc of the sky. She couldn’t recall how many clones were in that laboratory; nor did she want to plumb her memory in a desperate attempt to try. “But you are you,” and before the words left her mouth, she wanted to kick herself for how lame, how trite, they sounded. There was a kernel of truth there nonetheless - the other things may have been distorted mirror reflections of his physical appearance, but his experiences, his time with her, surely, that had shaped him into his own person, his own being? He certainly had his own personality when she first met him. “You’re insufferable, and cocky, and a know it all, and a trickster,” each word, laid on top of the other, was less of a prod than a soft kiss, gentle teasing. “You’re a technical genius and far better with the crops than I am. Don’t think I haven’t noticed.” She pointed to a small, but growing part of the garden that looked to be recovering, faltering green among the beaten brown of her attempts. “But what I do know, about these others,” and she pulled him closer against her side, “Is that you won’t face them alone.” She said it with such conviction - and truly, she had no reason to think or see it as any other way. She certainly wouldn’t leave him in the face of danger, no matter what it was.

The dream did bring back to her the precariousness of their situation. Though they’d been on Mandalore for months, the threats against them were still out there, hovering round their heads like chaotic coronas. “You’re getting impatient of waiting; I know,” the words were a long sigh from her mouth as she tilted her head back. “I am too. We can’t do anything; I have no idea where to go or even how to smoke anything out. There’s too much going on…” She trailed off, before taking a deep breath. Might as well get it all out there. “Things…haven’t been easy since I’ve been back,” she started, licking her lower lip. “Home’s changed.These things happen, but I didn’t think they’d change, while what they wanted for me still stayed the same. So we’re caught on all sides,” she grinned at him, though her eyes were a bit sad. “All we can do is take it day by day. And I hate that too."

 

[BewareTheDream]

Saudaji may have had an eye for nature’s details, but Raeth did not, so he didn’t notice the distant, chubby clouds turning gray. He did, however, know that rain was likely to fall starting tonight or tomorrow - and that it would probably be a fairly powerful storm - because Sebastian v2 had told him. The protocol droid called its master every morning at a precise time to give a report on the weather and the latest in galactic news - it was like Sebastian was Raeth’s personal news anchor.

There was another storm he was waiting for. For the past several mornings, he expected his droid to tell him of war - of how the Sith Empire had emerged from the darkest reaches of space to attack the peaceful Galactic Republic. But so far, there was no such news, which was fine by him. The longer the Sith continued to plot and wait, the longer he could stay here with Saudaji and pretend like this little island, its people, its animals, and its crops were the only things they ever had to think about.

Part of him admitted it was a pretty lie. It was especially pretty at that moment, when he could walk, arm-in-arm, with the only woman, the only person he could see spending his whole life with.

Saudaji teased him and complimented him, one after the other, which got Raeth to laugh. He didn’t deny any of the things she said.

She brought up the crops, too, and how they flourished under his attention. “Well, if you used the fertilizer I developed, your end of the garden would be green like mine.” The fertilizer he referred to was developed within the medical & science bay of the Patient Pylat. And at that very moment, there were varos seeds stored within the bay that Raeth was running genetic experiments on. He figured that with just a little gene tweaking here and there, he could create something new kind of super crop. Caution was necessary, of course; he didn’t want to create a strain of varos that would dominate the other flora of the island. He just wanted something that was easy to grow and that grew abnormally large fruits.

“I’m going to plant varos next. Maybe jewel-fruit, too. I read that those two plants don’t get along well, and I’d like to see for myself if it’s true.”

When Saudaji pulled him closer and assured him that he wouldn’t have to face his clone brothers alone, Raeth couldn’t help but feel all warm inside. Grinning, he stopped their stroll, turned her so they faced each other, and then looked her in the eye.

“I love that you’re on my team, ‘Dajika.” It felt like the right time to kiss her, so he did. Of course, Raeth thought that any time was the right time to kiss her.

The two of them made out in the middle of their land, holding and enjoying each other sweetly and without any hurry. They made out long enough for a few members of their tribe to pass nearby, spot them, and shake their heads in amusement before moving on. Eventually, the lovers’ lips parted, and they took several moments to just stand there, forehead to forehead, catching their breaths. Raeth had to tamp down his horniness so they could resume their stroll and continue talking.

It was Saudaji’s turn to speak of what was bothering her. This was one of those rare moments where he didn’t have a long list of ideas, for family matters were a mystery to him, and Saudaji’s extended family seemed more complicated than most.

“What can I do to help?” Raeth didn’t remember the last time he asked that question. It’s possible he had never asked it before.

Regardless of what Saudaji said in response, Raeth would follow up with another question: “Hey, you know that project I’ve been working on? Want to see how it’s coming along?”

There was a technical project that he had begun almost a week ago - a project that required him to visit a trio of sites outside the village. So far, he had only told her a little about what it was, like how it was something that would benefit the tribe. If she agreed to go with him, then this would be the first time she would see what he was working on.

 

[Apollo Wilde]

In a way, she mused idly, her mind half-consciously processing the though as she walked, the sky reminded her of their current situation. Things were fine, now, but soon, there would be a deluge. Storms in this region of Mandalore could be devastating, the wind whipping the sea into gray walls of froth, the winds that tore the oldest trees from the roots, the rain rushing hard enough to take off skin. They were, thankfully, rare, and this brooding storm held none of that dread. Mild storm or not, it didn’t change the fact that they were in for something.

With “Prime” lingering over their heads, it had been easy, at first, to keep running (because that’s what she was doing, if she was going to admit to herself) from her responsibilities here on Mandalore, left neatly where she’d left them: all she had to do was blow off the proverbial dust from their surface and they would be ready for her to pick up again. Something she'd been avoiding, using Raeth and his troubles as an excuse. Not like they had been much by way of “excuses”: he had needed to get acclimated to the village, to this way of life, to her family.

His comments alone weren’t enough to bring her back to the here and now; she knew he was proud of his tinkering, and she wouldn’t take that from him. She thought, with a passing twist of a smile, that she had indeed grown a bit since she’d been with him. Their relationship certainly had. Though she never would have admitted it out loud, the fact that he was so good at so many things had rankled her seriously. Being second-rate wasn’t a feeling that she was used to - and being back home had reminded her of that. There was the fear that her time away had weakened her skill, further chipping away at who she was. That hadn’t been the case, and, though she was also loathe to admit it, she was still relieved that Raeth wasn’t quite her equal when it came to hand to hand combat. He was considered, with relief from her, a suitable addition to the tribe. Not on her word alone (though anyone who had questioned that her time away had dulled her senses were quickly proven wrong), but through his own merits and technological workings. He’d been accepted on his own terms, as his own person, and while that was a load off of her shoulders, it wasn’t enough to set her completely at ease. And here he was again, “proving” himself to be worthy, plunging elbow deep into a world that wasn’t natural for him, and excelling. She’d hoped that he’d find a project there on Mandalore; some sort of tinkering that would help him place roots there. So that it wasn’t just her, wasn’t just her home.

She briefly rested her head on his shoulder as he spoke about the seeds, finding comfort in the sound of his voice alone. She was no longer as threatened by him, thinking that he could turn on her at any moment. And that had really been the root of those initial fights - her constantly falling deeper, getting more and more entangled with someone that was not merely as dangerous as her, but moreso. Someone who had her dancing on the palm of his hand, not for the first time, but the second time in her life. She wasn’t sure what was worse; the realization that she could feel like that again, or the fact that it seemed to happen so easily with him. Or the thought that it could have all been a ploy, some scheming from the Sith, or, worst of all, something just from him to pass the time in space.

When he stopped, she lifted her head from his shoulder, and moved so that he was standing in front of her. It was made a bit easier as his hands slipped to her waist, steading her, though she didn’t need it. “Of course I’m on your team,” she scoffed, as if she found it ridiculous that he’d even question it. Well, maybe not all that ridiculous. There had been some rough spots at the beginning. But the time for further words was ended as he kissed her. She felt herself lifting to her tiptoes, ever so slightly. The difference in their heights wasn’t much, but for her to get a “good” grip on him, it was easier for her to do so - and, if she was going to be completely honest, something she enjoyed doing. She liked feeling that he was taller than her, that she had to reach up to drape her arms around his neck, to run her fingers through the fine hair at the nape of his neck. Her lips parted against his, deepening the kiss.

In their time together, she’d learned that, all over again, that she wasn’t quite so good with her words. Actions were her language of choice, and lately, she’d hoped that her touches, her kisses, the way she twined her body round his when they made love was enough to constantly speak to him, whispering her feelings when she couldn’t force the air out of her. Now would be no exception; she let her body speak for her, not caring that their little walk had taken them from the somewhat secluded path of their home towards one of the main thoroughfares of the village.

He was the one to end the kiss this time, and she was fine with it, her forehead resting gently against his. In her village, there were many ways to express affection beyond kissing - hugs, grasping the forearms, rubbing noses (one of the more intimate exchanges), and, this, pressing foreheads together. Her arms trailed down his, her hands finding his, her fingers threading through his. Her lips were still close to his, hardly more than a press forward would bring them together again. But she didn’t take that last step, as where they were fully sunk in.

She laughed, softly. “Family’s complicated,” she said, seemingly putting an end to the conversation, batting away his offer of help without saying more. Then, a pause. The heavy rise and fall of her chest as she made a choice. “….Here’s not the place to talk about it,” and a quick motion of her brown eyes showed that, even as people were going about their business, they were being listened to. “Maybe the next time we go back to Yukaku.” That was odd; from their travels there, Saudaji had made it all too clear that the relationship between her, Anohi, the district itself, was strained; that there were eyes and ears everywhere. But perhaps not that strange: interfamilial workings were probably of not much value to Anohi, and lesser to the rest of the Network. “Or on the ship,” she added, almost as an afterthought. Since they’d made the little homestead more theirs, it was easy for her to forget that the ship was still there. Funny, considering that it’d been their living space for so long. Something about having solid earth beneath her feet, she supposed.

“Of course; I’ve wondered what’s kept you skulking about in the shadows.” Lightly, airily. Of course she’d allowed him his space, not wanting to hover around him as he grew more at ease with his surroundings - and the overweening affections of her family. They’d all taken to him, with Te Kohe being the most demonstrative (of course). The children (of which there seemed to be a plethora of), had taken to calling Raeth “ba’vodu”, Uncle, though among the smallest, “Rae” was the lisping word of choice. “Besides, if you don’t reveal what it is soon, I think Te Kohe is going to explode.”

 

[BewareTheDream]

“If you wanted to know, all you had to do was ask. As for Te Kohe and the others, they’ll just have to wait.”

Raeth took Saudaji’s hand and guided her toward the nearest of his secret project’s locations. A few steps was all it took for them to ease into a stroll. For a few, precious moments, they were just two lovers taking a walk through nature, and not two of the galaxy’s most dangerous killers.

As he enjoyed the warmth of Saudaji’s palm against his, as well as the faint, flowery scent of her body wash - which he could differentiate from the more overpowering scents of the jungle - it occurred to him that he probably should’ve loved living here on Te Ika. After all, he was with the Twi’lek of his dreams on an island paradise, a situation that many sentients would’ve envied.

He thought of the Talz, a little-known race of tall, furry, and literally four-eyed sentients who lived on a frozen planet called Alcoz III.

There must be at least some Talz who’d jump at the chance to blast off their frozen-ass planet and come here. Some might even love it.

But Raeth didn’t love it. He loved being with Saudaji, of course. And it didn’t take long for him to grow to like the tribe and family that adopted him so readily. But as for the island itself, he wasn’t too fond of it. In fact, there were aspects of it he downright hated, like the rotten egg smell caused by the hydrogen sulfide ejected into the air by the nearby volcanoes. The Mandalorians who grew up here didn’t seem to notice it, but he was keenly aware of it almost all the time. At night, he even dabbed a pleasant-smelling ointment under his nostrils so that the egg stench didn’t keep him up at night.

Regardless of how he felt about Te Ika, he wanted the people who lived here to be safe. That was the motivation behind his secret project.

The two of them held hands and made small talk until navigating the jungle became too difficult to do leisurely. It got to the point where they had to scurry up a short hills, climb over large roots, and use a branch to swing over a narrow creek. It was enough activity to get sweat pouring down Raeth’s face, but when he glanced at Saudaji, he noticed that she barely sweated at all. That didn’t surprise him; she handled the outdoors far better than he did.

She was raised here, after all. Meanwhile, I was raised in a vat. He couldn’t help but chuckle, ruefully, at that thought.

Before long, they got to the site. There, Saudaji could immediately recognize what Raeth had been working on: it was a sensor installation.

It was over three meters in height, thick and blocky at its base, topped by a curved dish, and painted in camouflage. Directly above it was a wide opening in the jungle’s canopy; the sensor’s dish pointed at the sky through that opening, and every minute or so it would rotate to point at it from a different angle. The camouflage didn’t hide the installation that well from anyone on the ground, but it was quite difficult to see from the air.

Suddenly, a battle droid - also painted in camouflage - sat up from its hiding place underneath the plants that covered the jungle floor like a carpet. Amidst the whirring of servos and the crunching of twigs and leaves, it rose to its feet and approached Raeth with its arm-mounted blaster cannon aimed straight at him.

“Identify yourself!” the droid demanded.

Looking unperturbed, Raeth stood there and waited. A second later, the droid stopped and lowered its weapon. “Oops! Apologies, Master. I did not expect a visit from you.” It turned toward Saudaji. “Both of you.” Because it had no neck, it had to turn its whole body when it looked at her.

“No worries, Fourteen,” Raeth said. “I’m just showing Saudaji around. You can go back to your hidey hole, now.”

“Roger, roger!” the battle droid replied, almost sounding cheerful. Noisily, it turned around, stomped back to its hiding spot, and then sat back down to resume its silent vigil.

Raeth gave Saudaji a smile, then gestured toward the sensor installation.

“It’s an early warning system,” he explained as he stepped up to the bulky base, popped open a panel on the side, and checked some readings on the screen within. “I’ve got two others just like this installed in different parts of the island. Together, they track any vehicles approaching and leaving via the sky and the water. Right now, the readings get fed to the Pylat’s computer, but I’ll set up a station in the village so that someone there can use these things while we’re away.

“I’ll also have to train some people on how to use and maintain it, but that should be quick. I reckon many of them already know how, so this may not even be an issue.”

After shutting the panel, he began to walk around the sensor, inspecting it. “This is only phase one. Next, I’m going to have ion cannons installed around the island. Big ones - the kind that can knock fighters out of the sky. I’ve already placed the order, so the parts should arrive in Yukaku within a week. Installing them will take some time, but my droids can do most of the work.”

Stopping in front of Saudaji, he looked her in the face. “After the cannons are installed, they can either be automated, controlled manually, or controlled from that station I mentioned earlier. I’m guessing there are many within the village who are familiar with operating gun fixtures? You probably learn how to do that as kids, right?” He grinned.

“What do you think?”

There was more that Raeth had planned for beefing up the village’s defenses, but he’d tell her about that later.

 

[Apollo Wilde]

“Oh, I don’t know about keeping Te Kohe waiting for too much longer. You know how he gets.”

It went without saying that Te Kohe was simply her favorite, and she, his. As close-knit as the family was, favoritism among siblings wasn’t readily apparent. For Raeth, it may have been painfully obvious. Te Kohe was simply crazy about Saudaji, and, to a certain extent, that affection had transferred to Raeth as if he was an extension of Saudaji. Possibly overweening, Saudaji knew, even suffocating, but she’d hoped that by now, Raeth would come to understand it. Maybe, if she was being honest, hoping against hope, that Raeth would find comfort in it, perhaps even a confidant.

Stranger things had happened.

Following him through the depths of the jungle made her feel like a child all over again - the hours she spent, whenever she could sneak away from her new “family” exploring, getting lost. When exploration was something fun, and not a requirement. As time went on, jungle excursions would turn into survival trips - part of her training that would ensure that no matter what terrain that she found herself in, she’d know how to make the most of it. This was deeper than she had been in a while. Not entirely unfamiliar, but she was confident enough to admit when she was rusty. And, to be fair to herself, since she’d been back, for the most part she’d been village bound. That - and wanting to give Raeth his space whenever he seemed to need it.

For moments, passing over into the awkward, she was speechless, taking in the installation. Mechanics weren’t her thing (clearly), but she knew hard work when she saw it.

As well as precaution.

She didn’t glance in the director of the droid; she had enough situational awareness to know that it was an armed thing, but under Raeth’s control. She seemed stuck in place, gaping at the installation in front of her, even through Raeth’s explanation. Only when her mouth became painfully dry did she close it, and blink, trying to clear her vision.

And all she could do was let out a low whistle.

Clearly impressed, she crossed her arms, and took a step back. “Wow.”

Defenses were…a weak point for her people. At least, technological defenses. As Raeth spent time there, it was clear where Saudaji had gotten her mistrust for droids from. There was a mania among her people about being the best that they could physically be, with a minimum of technological interference. Sure, one could make the argument that their armor was often on the cutting edge of tech - but the rebuttal was always that it was the warrior that made the armor, not the other way around. If one was being unkind, it would be easy to write them off as yokels, behind the times - but that wasn’t entirely true, either. There certainly were a few Mandalorians that were interested in tech - just…not that there were many of them. The few that were inclined, however, had attached themselves to Raeth, shyly.

After spending so much time with Raeth, Saudaji was easing in her own mindset about technology - she certainly enjoyed their innovations in the bedroom - and because of that, she pressed her tongue to the inside of her cheek. “If this had been anyone else but you, they might’ve taken it as an insult,” she said, coyly. “Te Kohe is going to flip when he sees this. He’s been one of the main members talking about how we should bring more tech into the world.” She uncrossed her arms, looking up at the scanner. “Old habits die hard - and because of where we are, it’s been so long since we’ve had an outside threat that I think we’ve gotten a bit soft. I’ve sat in on a few meetings and getting them to change their minds about this has been…a task. They’re already on my ass because they think I’m speaking unfavorably of the tribe, since I’ve been gone so long, since I’m apparently bringing trouble to us.” The last was said with some bitterness, as if the words were spat. If he looked at her now, he could see her scowling, plainly. It was something that she had perhaps hinted at in the past, but never stated openly. “They have gotten soft since I’ve been away. The whole point of us leaving, of us exploring, doing bounties, is that we’re constantly learning. We’re seeing what’s out there, constantly getting better, bringing back better ways to fight. The surest way for any way of life to die out is to stop changing. Something happened since I left - and I don’t know what it is.” Sighing, she hung her head, frustrated. Then, as quickly as her bitterness had come on, it seemed to pass as she lifted her head again. “Well. I think this is excellent - and part of me can’t believe you did this all on your own.”

She paced closer to him, before walking past him to get closer to the station - but not before giving his butt a light pinch. “Though you may need to rethink the droid.” Before he could protest, she lifted her hands. “Don’t. Just listen for a tic. I think if you dismantle the droid, you know, in complete pieces, and put it together with one of the boys, you’d do a lot to ease minds. It’ll be helpful if they feel they’re a part of it, instead of just being given this.”

She had a point; even he would have to admit it. “Besides, if you can’t tell, Paikea has been itching to show you all of the stuff she’s worked on in the past. I think she has a crush on you,” and her grin grew large. “I’ve been debating if I should be jealous or not.” Of course, this would be a joke. Paikea would be the closest thing to a “nerd” that Mandalore was able to produce - a gangly, clumsy adolescent human girl with scads of coarse black hair, spotty skin, and poor vision. What she lacked in coordination when it came to fighting, she more than made up for in inventiveness. Raeth would probably recall the girl literally trailing behind him like a shadow, too shy to speak to him directly (usually ducking behind something, anything, if he turned to catch her watching), but always watching and waiting.

 

[BewareTheDream]

The pinch Saudaji dealt to Raeth’s buttocks sent a shock through his system and elicited a child-like giggle. It also slowed his response time, so when she suggested he dismantle Fourteen the droid, he didn’t voice any objection. Instead, he listened to her reasoning.

Unlike Saudaji, Raeth was not a natural leader. Far from it. Sure, he excelled at manipulating people, especially through chicanery. But leadership - true leadership - wasn’t about manipulation. Instead, it was about connection. And Raeth didn’t connect with anyone except her.

After she explained her rationale, Raeth stood there for a several seconds, thinking as he stared at her, and then stared up at the jungle greenery and the sky beyond. She was right, of course. She knew these people all her life, so she knew better than him how to present these defenses to them in a way they’d accept. More than that, it was natural for her to see people as people, whereas his instinct was to see people as playthings.

Little by little, Saudaji was changing the way Raeth saw the universe.

Finally, he nodded, but his expression made it evident that although he knew she was right, he was still struggling with the concept.

“Fine. I’ll host a workshop that any of the village’s tech enthusiasts can attend. We’ll dismantle and reassemble you-know-who,” he said while using his chin to point in Fourteen’s direction, “and assemble some other droids that’ll be stationed around the island. I guess I’ll have to teach them how to program, too.”

Saudaji had mentioned Paikea, but the name wasn’t familiar to him. It took him a moment to recognize who she was talking about. “Oh, the girl with all the hair?” Yes, he’d spotted her stalking him on multiple occasions, but he didn’t think much of it, since he noticed how a lot of the Mandalorian younglings like to shadow him and other adults. They were like kittens stalking full-grown cats to practice how to hunt.

He guffawed when she joked about being jealous. “What is she, 13? I admit I’m a sex creep, but I’m not that much of a sex creep. When she becomes old enough to get a pilot’s license, then you can start to worry.”

Raeth glanced in the direction where Fourteen had hidden. “Fourteen, get up.” Immediately, the camouflaged droid first sat up and then stood up.

“You’re coming with me and Saudaji back to the village,” he said as he finished a quick diagnostic of the sensor dish. “I’m going to...ahm...update your targeting software before sending you back to post.”

“Roger, roger!” the guard droid replied. The enthusiasm in its voice caused Raeth to chuckle.

Satisfied with the diagnostic results, Raeth slid the metal cover over the sensor’s control panel, and then turned to Saudaji. “Shall we?” He gestured in the direction from which they came.

Together with Fourteen, the two of them made their way back to the village. Along the way, Raeth thought about his first lesson plan for the villagers. He wasn’t a natural teacher, which was why he was surprised to find he was a little excited about the thought of teaching.

 

[Apollo Wilde]

Raeth’s path to teaching ran surprisingly…smooth.

Something that Saudaji had seen to, pulling whatever strings that lay behind the curtain of the tribe’s political machinations. Sure, on occasion, there had been the occasional onlooker that openly scoffed, arms folded, grumbling, but they would hardly be a deterrent. The children (and adults that came) seemed to attend out of pure curiosity; the numbers would fluctuate as people drifted in and out, sifting through the information that Raeth provided for what would benefit them the most.

Paikea, of course, was a regular.

And through her influence, the numbers did eventually measure out - children, mainly - a grand total of three, and two adults that seemed to vacillate between embarrassment, and then, honest, wide-eyed interest. Te Kohe would come as time allowed - most of his time spent on campaigns and training. Paikea, by and large, was the most adept, with Te Kohe showing a surprising dexterity and seriousness for his size and general personality. In the “classroom,” there was no playful ribbing, no reminding Raeth that he was younger than Te Kohe. Instead, Raeth was treated with all of the respect that Te Kohe would have given any elder. With the example that he and Paikea set, the classes were…positive. Something that brought Saudaji no small amount of joy as, time went on, her presence became less and less of a staple. Like Te Kohe, she had tribal matters to attend to - more since the classes started - but she did try her best to be there at the beginning and at the end.

She had to cut the apron strings at some point, after all - to let Raeth understand that the village was now his family; that they all saw him as a brother. There was no guile, no treachery, hiding in the corners. Not every member of the tribe was as demonstrative or as clingy as Te Kohe and Paikea, but they acknowledged him in their own way. Even those intrinsically opposed to adding technology to the village admitted (to his face, no doubt), that he was quite good at what he did; invited him over for meals, would bring him along in training.

And Saudaji?

Slipping back into a leadership role was as ill-fitting to her now as it was all those years ago - and was a constant reminder of why she’d left to begin with. However, her time away had gifted her with something unexpected: more diplomacy. Some of Raeth’s speech patterns (and thought processes, if she were to be honest) had rubbed off on her - and she found herself engrossed more in long speeches than in trials of strength as had been in the past. Her eldest brother, To’a, had stepped up in her place; his position originally to be hers. It wasn’t quite tension between the two of them, but there was an uneasiness there, if not a clashing of ideals, then a clash in communications. Many times when she came back to the classes in the end, she would look tired, sometimes pissed. Regardless, she usually blew off steam by pulling him into bed, and, once they’d tired each other other, she’d either place her head on his chest or her head on his, and tell him about what was going on.

The days would pass; Saudaji would make slow but steady progress towards “modernizing” the way of the tribe, Raeth would teach, and in-between, they’d train together, farm, and continue to live.

 

[BewareTheDream]

“Teaching is exhausting,” Raeth complained to Sebastian-v2, who had no choice but to listen to its master gripe. “Consider yourself lucky you don’t ever have to teach little droidlings how to droid, Seabass.”

“I thank my lucky stars every night before bed, Master.”

Raeth laughed. Nobody does deadpan better than a droid. Obviously. And I’m glad to see that the sarcasm upgrade I uploaded this morning is working so well.

The two of them were in the classroom, setting up for today’s lesson. Sebastian did the heaviest lifting, of course—it hauled in the engine from a tractor and placed it on the center of the floor. Raeth, meanwhile, carried a toolbox and nothing more. He also moved the tables and chairs away from the engine so the students could gather around it later. As far as he was concerned, the amount of work that he did was comparable to Sebastian’s; it was more, in fact, since he was the teacher.

Sebastian directed its robotic gaze to the engine on the floor. “This is very old machinery. I estimate it to be 100 years old. Tell me, Master, for what purpose did I carry it here?”

“You brought it here because I told you to! Simple as that!” Raeth cackled, which appeared to annoy Sebastian. Then again, since it had the head of a battle droid, it always looked annoyed. “Okay, today’s lesson plan is for the younglings to upgrade this bad boy using the parts I was able to scrounge up from the Pylat and some other places. We’ll get this thing away from the Stone Age and closer to the modern age.

“And in case you’re wondering, no, I’m not making them do this just to help out the farmers. Next class, the young ‘uns will use what they learn today to upgrade a droid. See? It’s all part of the plan.”

Sebastian didn’t look convinced.

“What do you say, Sebass?” asked Raeth. “Wanna be tinkered on by a bunch of dirty-fingered kids?”

“If you tell me that’s your wish, Master, I have no choice but to obey. However, if I have a choice, then no, I’d rather not.”

“Ah, suit yourself. Remind me to delete your party pooper protocols after class.”
“Of course, Master.”

While Raeth laid out the tools needed for today’s lesson on a cloth beside the engine, Sebastian asked him a question. “Master, why are you displeased with teaching? Technology is a subject you are fond of, is it not?”

Raeth murmured, thoughtfully, before answering. “You’re right, of course. Not only am I fond of it, it’s one of my deepest passions. Considering how wonderfully-made you are, I’m sure you’re well aware of this, already.

“Also, I do so love the sound of my own voice.”

Sebastian nodded. “Yes, I’m well aware of that, too.”

That got another laugh out of Raeth. “So the subject matter isn’t the issue, at all. Public speaking obviously isn’t the issue, either. And because I know this scaz inside and out, backwards and forwards, I barely need any time to come up with each lesson plan. I planned this out like a minute before asking you to lug it all the way here,” he said as he gestured at the tractor engine.

“So I’m only a little displeased,” he continued. “Maybe displeased isn’t the right word. I’m just tired, because the act of teaching is tiring.”

That answer appeared to satisfy the protocol droid in a battle droid’s body, but it wasn’t the entire answer. Teaching tech to the villagers should have been easy, but for Raeth it was truly taxing. He blamed the kids, with all their wide-eyed fascination, non-stop questions, and exuberance for learning. Most people would have found their behavior adorable and encouraging, but Raeth wasn’t most people. For him, dealing with kids was draining, even though his students were always on their best behavior.

All of them, except for Te Kohe. He was the most exhausting to deal with of them all. Dude acted like a child, yet looked like he could’ve devoured a dozen children and still have room for dessert. Raeth considered Te Kohe to be a funny guy, and he generally enjoyed his company, but as a student he was distracting and draining.

Raeth figured he just wasn’t cut out to be a teacher. But he did it anyway, for Saudaji.

Before the tinkerer and the droid could say anything else, chatter and footfalls from outside caught their attention. The younglings (as well as a couple of adults) began to filter into the makeshift classroom.

Paikea was the first one there, of course. Eagerness to learn, eagerness to please, and the shyness of an awkward teenage girl were all painted clearly on her naturally tan face.

Raeth put on a smile on his face, one that he didn’t really feel. “Hey, kiddos! You ready to learn something fun and helpful to the village?”

The children looked excited, and Raeth put on a mask that made it look like he was excited, too.

*****

By the end of class, the tractor engine had been upgraded, the students had each picked up at least a little more technical knowledge, and they did something that would benefit the village. Sebastian-v2 hoisted the engine onto his broad, metal shoulder and marched out the door to return it to its farmer.

While the students were leaving, Raeth called out to them. “Remember! Take what I teach you and apply it to anything and everything you can find outside! Don’t let your parents tell you not to! The best way to learn is by doing!”

Although Raeth had complained to Sebastian about teaching earlier, this was one part that he really did enjoy: encouraging his students to engage in technological mischief. That was his gift to this village, this island, and this world.

Paika looked like she wanted to stay and ask him questions, but once he made eye contact with her, she scampered out with the others. Once she was gone, he planted his butt on a table and slouched, exhausted.

At least Te Kohe couldn’t make it today.

Raeth’s forearm-mounted datapad chimed, indicating he had received a message. He tapped the screen to bring up the message, and what it said made his eyebrows rise: the Patient Pylat’s sensors picked up an incoming spacecraft. By tapping and swiping at the screen, Raeth brought up his ship’s sensor readings. He watched the digital image of a ship, already in Mandalore’s atmosphere, rapidly approaching the island. It could have been friend or foe, but considering this was Mandalore, and considering Prime was out there somewhere, he thought of it as foe until proven otherwise.

With his eyes half on the screen, he raced out of the classroom and in the direction of his ship. Along the way, he activated the comm stick attached to his datapad and opened a channel to Saudaji.

“Daji! We’ve got incoming! I’m headed to the Pylat now. If you want to come with, meet me there!”

She’ll probably get there before I do, he thought as he exited the village and ran into the jungle.