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Like Riding a Swoop
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| Karth_DeQora | Date: Thursday, 06 Sep 2012, 1:08 PM | Message # 16 |
 Colonel general
Group: Administrators
Messages: 1157
Status: Offline
| His eyes stung from the mixture of sweat and exhaustion that had suddenly gripped him; and after bidding Varitek good-night, Karth began the short trip from the cargo bay to his quarters. Muscles sore, countenance dour, De'Qora crossed through the threshold of 'his' room and found the one person he had been avoiding the entire trip. His dark eyes settled on Daneira's crystalline-blue ones, but he was only able to hold her gaze for the briefest of moments before tearing them away. There was a lot of pain there; a deep reservoir of it that he just couldn't begin to face. It wasn't just about their time apart, anymore. It was also more than the fact that they'd both changed. Seeing her now, ten long years after the war, reminded him of just how much suffering and pain he caused in the name of their love. Innumerable crimes that the Jedi would burn him for, if they ever discovered the extent of them. And while he regretted them, he'd do them all over again, because she was the single reason he had kept fighting.
"Hi," he breathed, setting his lightsaber and shirt down on the small desk beside the bed, his gaze still refusing to meet hers. "What are you doing here?" It's her ship, jackass, screamed his mind, and he made a note to slap himself for such a ridiculous question once she'd gone. He was never this idiotic around her, at least not that he could remember. But then, they were far better people back in those days; now it was as though fate had plucked two random, complete strangers out of their lives and placed them in a single confined space. A place where time moved painfully slow, every second stretched out beneath the tension and guilt that thickened the very air they breathed. He felt choked, chained by the past; he'd managed to run from it for ten years and yet here it was, an amalgam of his numerous failures framed in porcelain skin and caught up in wondrous, oceanic eyes.
Man, Myth, Administrative God. Also plays a mean kazoo.
Jace Varitek: In Northern California we just have gangs of vigilante interior decorators.
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| Daneira_Farris | Date: Thursday, 06 Sep 2012, 5:57 PM | Message # 17 |
 Lieutenant
Group: Users
Messages: 73
Status: Offline
| In the brief moment that their eyes met, Daneira realized something that was more painful than the experience of finding Karth had been so far. He didn't want to see her. It was there in his eyes, and it only took that moment for her to realize it. She choked up as she came to the realization that coming here, even with the best intentions had been a bad idea. It was not only a bad idea, but a stupid and selfish decision. Finally, when he spoke, she cleared her throat and responded.
"Hi." She said quietly. "It's my ship?" It was pretty self-explanatory in her mind, but then again it was his room, and she probably shouldn't have just shown up there. It wasn't the first time she had done that in his life, however. Her gaze followed him around the room as he moved and she rose to her feet.
"Slim, I....." Dani started, feeling quite choked herself. The room was suddenly stifling, like she was smothering in a wave of tension and pain. "I owe you an apology. He just got the best of me. My temper isn't what it used to be." She explained, if it would make sense or be enough for him.
A moment later she shook her head. "I know what you must think. I know what he must think. Right? That I work for the Empire collecting bounties, or I'm one of their Inquisitors, right? One of those dark Jedi that everyone hears rumors about? I'm not. I'm not either of those things. Do you want to know what I've been doing the last ten years? Do you care?" She had not even given him a chance to interject, and she didn't stop now to let him either.
"Trying not to die." She said, her voice catching. "And I don't mean trying to stay alive because people were trying to kill me." Dani paused a moment, swallowing back a sob. "I mean trying not to die." Dani would pick up the battered journal and hold it out to him, followed by the rusted hilt of her lightsaber for safe keeping until he felt he could trust her. "I never took one bounty, except Jacen Hall's, that would hurt someone innocent. I never hurt anyone if I could help it." Whether he believed it or not, she had been helping those that had been hurt.
"I died a little every day you were gone, Slim. But I'm not lost."
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| Karth_DeQora | Date: Thursday, 06 Sep 2012, 6:13 PM | Message # 18 |
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Colonel general
Group: Administrators
Messages: 1157
Status: Offline
| His heart softened with every word that escaped her lips, which he noticed were starting to tremble as she held out the book and the hilt to him. Hesitantly, Karth's hands reached out to take those two objects, and the realization of just how profound a gesture that was finally hit him. He'd treated her like dirt since Kolatill, and it finally came back around to hit him square in the jaw. Karth had been too caught up in his own issues, disguising his pathetic self-loathing with sarcasm and hostility, and up until now she hadn't acted out. She was here, helping him, a decade later and she was still there for him. And as his hands passed over hers, however briefly, to grab the diary... he felt what he used to feel for her, something thought long-since dead and buried. It took everything he had to not pull her to him and never let her go again.
"I'm sorry, I-" he struggled for the right words. "I don't know what to say," Karth finally admitted. With a long, pained glance into her eyes, he said the only words that would come to mind. "We've all done things, D, thing's we're not proud of. But you have nothing to apologize for, not when every day's a fight just to live." His words bit to the core of him, speaking more of himself as he continued. "I have no fantasies about putting all that behind me, but I try, every day." He set the diary and saber hilt down on the desk, gaze still locked with hers. "I guess I'm the one that's lost, here." His lips drew into a grim smile, his rough hands lingering on hers for a moment before dropping down to his sides.
Man, Myth, Administrative God. Also plays a mean kazoo.
Jace Varitek: In Northern California we just have gangs of vigilante interior decorators.
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| Daneira_Farris | Date: Thursday, 06 Sep 2012, 6:35 PM | Message # 19 |
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Lieutenant
Group: Users
Messages: 73
Status: Offline
| She watched his movements as he put down the diary. "The old man that saved my life, Dominic, gave me that one day. I hadn't told him who I was....he called me Nora." She said, steering the conversation away from the self-blame that they were both experiencing. "He went fishing one morning and came back with something of mine in his net." Dani lifted her chin some, nodding to the lightsaber. "He said he had a feeling about me, and said I talk in my sleep." There was a brief pause. "....Do I?"
Daneira shook her head briefly and continued on. "I told him one morning that I had forgotten what you looked like. It just hit me one day and your face wasn't there anymore. He gave me that so I could write and draw and wouldn't forget. Dom always said that we should never forget the ones we love, even if they're long gone."
When he dropped his hands, she finally tore her gaze away briefly. "Someone hurt him, and that's how it started; the bounty hunting. Mostly women and children who had been hurt by abusive husbands. Murderers. Rapists. That sort of thing. But I was with him till he died. You would have liked him. I buried where you....I mean....where I put your marker." A single, crystalline tear slid down her cheek then. the salty liquid stained her skin, and she didn't try to hide it because she knew there would be more.
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| Karth_DeQora | Date: Wednesday, 12 Sep 2012, 2:54 PM | Message # 20 |
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Colonel general
Group: Administrators
Messages: 1157
Status: Offline
| Karth nodded, shuffling quietly over to her and placing a calloused hand on her cheek, thumb slowly wiping away a few tears before he drew her into an embrace. As hard as it was to be around her, he couldn't send her away now. This conversation had been ten long years in the making, and she was finally talking to someone about it. With every pained word it soon became obvious to him that while he'd struggled to forget her... she'd struggled to remember him. She never wanted to bury that part of her life, whereas he'd tried to bury her. That stung more than anything.
Her hair still smelled of Alderaan, at least to him, and he drank in the scent as he held her. The familiar curvature of her back, the smooth skin of her arm; old details he'd never truly forgotten. "He sounds like one hell of a man, D." It was all he could manage, and as she continued on about the life she'd led, he began to realize just how dangerously close he'd become to those she hunted. A lowly hitman, the employee of a damn Hutt, a murderer.
"And no, you don't. At least, you didn't used to." He pulled back a moment, so he could see those eyes again.
Man, Myth, Administrative God. Also plays a mean kazoo.
Jace Varitek: In Northern California we just have gangs of vigilante interior decorators.
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| Daneira_Farris | Date: Wednesday, 12 Sep 2012, 4:11 PM | Message # 21 |
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Lieutenant
Group: Users
Messages: 73
Status: Offline
| Daneira gasped as he pulled her into an embrace, but then melted into it. It was like some sort of a dream, something that couldn't possibly be real. But it was. She breathed in his scent, curled her fingers in and dragged her nails gently into the flesh of his back, felt his heart beat against her own once again. Her tears flowed freely now, dampening his already sweat moistened skin. "Karth...." Her voice was barely a whisper as she breathed his name heavily.
She didn't want to let go, not so soon anyway, when he pulled back. Dani would look up and into his eyes immediately, as if she was searching for and answer or a reason. "We're not dead." Her voice was a hoarse whisper from the mix of tears. "And I'm sorry I punched you...." She whispered as she drew her fingertips down his jaw. "I thought I was dreaming you." It was a lousy explanation, but it was one none the less.
Somehow, Dani managed to force a smile when he said she didn't used to talk in her sleep. "You still snore." A small, choked laugh escaped her throat, but the tears down her cheeks had not ceased.
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| Karth_DeQora | Date: Thursday, 13 Sep 2012, 6:09 PM | Message # 22 |
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Colonel general
Group: Administrators
Messages: 1157
Status: Offline
| The pit of his stomach burned, a familiar mix of longing and sadness that seemed to devour him whenever they were close. A combination of their proximity to one another, her fingers tracing his jawline, the way her eyes shone when wet; it kicked back into the forefront of his mind memories of when they were happy. And that they weren't in that place anymore just killed him, though he would never show it. Better to act as though he was fine with everything, even though it felt as though a part of him had been thrust back into his chest without warning or consent.
He chuckled as she finished speaking, his smile wide and no-longer tinged with its usual melancholy. "Yeah, it's a wonder the Empire hasn't found me from the volume alone." That knot in his stomach continued to twist, and when Daneira's slender fingers reached his chin, Karth turned away. "We... we have issues to work out, don't we." He spoke those words to the viewport, where the stars beyond twisted in a radiant blue vortex.
Man, Myth, Administrative God. Also plays a mean kazoo.
Jace Varitek: In Northern California we just have gangs of vigilante interior decorators.
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| Daneira_Farris | Date: Thursday, 13 Sep 2012, 6:41 PM | Message # 23 |
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Lieutenant
Group: Users
Messages: 73
Status: Offline
| Daneira would let her hand drop to his chest when he turned his head. "Probably. We've both been dead for ten years." She said quietly. A moment passed when she thought that maybe she should pull away, but he had made her so calm, aside from the tears. They were more happy than sad anyway, and was also something she had not done since the day she "buried" Karth ten years ago. So maybe it was good for her, healthy.
"We've got time, Slim. More time than either of us ever thought we would." She started, before she hesitated. "But first we need to get this bounty off of your head. I have no idea how, but we will figure something out." Dani would lift her hand and touch his chin again to turn his head to face her so she could look at his eyes.
The former Jedi would take a deep breath. "There is something that I am going to need from you first though...."
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| Karth_DeQora | Date: Thursday, 13 Sep 2012, 7:00 PM | Message # 24 |
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Colonel general
Group: Administrators
Messages: 1157
Status: Offline
| Every time she called him by that old moniker, it stung. But the pain wasn't unwelcome, rather it was quite refreshing that she could still elicit such pain, even if it was unintentional. In ten years, Karth had never stopped loving her, or at least the memory of her. He nodded along with her sentiments, they were only a few days out from Commenor, and soon there wouldn't be time for such peaceful conversations, however laden with guilt and longing they were. Without even realizing, Karth had leaned into her hand, however slightly, and the familiar touch sent sparks shooting up his spine. Her touch was always so gentle, just on the edge of grazing skin, and the nerves throughout his body often tingled beneath it.
His breath caught as he realized just how suffocating... stuffy, the small room had suddenly become. His dark eyes met hers, and he responded in earnest to her latest words. "Anything." Anything, if he hadn't had the excuse of exhaustion, she might have caught the urgency and almost-pleading nature of his tone, which instead could simply be passed off as simple weariness. But he began to slowly realize, as the notion coalesced in his mind, that even after ten years he still needed her. In whatever capacity she was willing to give, he would take it without question, and do his best not to betray it. His breath hitched again, his calloused hands reaching up to brush a stray hair out of her eyes.
Man, Myth, Administrative God. Also plays a mean kazoo.
Jace Varitek: In Northern California we just have gangs of vigilante interior decorators.
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| Daneira_Farris | Date: Thursday, 13 Sep 2012, 7:20 PM | Message # 25 |
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Lieutenant
Group: Users
Messages: 73
Status: Offline
| Dani stopped breathing a moment when he spoke. Anything.... The word hung there between them. Her request had been one of simplicity, the way their relationship had started; with time together meditating, then training, all of which obviously led to other things. More....carnal things. But now, that word just stayed. Anything. Daneira bit her lower lip lightly as she tried to come up with something to say to him. Nothing came.
She would look up into his eyes again, those dark obsidian pools that she loved so much. While he was ten years older, he was still her Karth, the man who had been her best friend from childhood and grew into the person she loved more than she could have ever imagined. her fingertips rested on his bare chest again and she flexed them, digging the fingernails ever so slightly into his tan, muscled flesh.
"There will be time for anything, Karth." Dani whispered, her voice suddenly catching in her throat. Her mind was screaming at her to tell him she loved him, or to show him, but her body resisted for the moment. "You look tired...."
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| Karth_DeQora | Date: Thursday, 13 Sep 2012, 7:33 PM | Message # 26 |
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Colonel general
Group: Administrators
Messages: 1157
Status: Offline
| "I don't know," he breathed, flinching at her fingers on his chest before he felt them dig, ever-so-slightly, into him. He'd mourned her for a decade, driven himself into a pit of abject despair and misery out of a sense of failure, of regret. And here she was, pressed up against him, as though their youth had never ended; that they were still the same young, wide-eyed kids with nothing but an outdated Code holding them back. He sucked in a breath when she pulled her hand away, and it took more patience and control than he thought possible of him not to throw caution to the wind completely. But no, they couldn't go back to where they used to be, they were too different now, right?
He was tired, but a sudden resurgence had grabbed hold of him in that moment when their eyes met. In those he saw everything he both loved and hated. "Yeah, you're right, I should sleep." He said the words, repeated them over again in his mind, and yet here they still stood. Rooted in place, in time, with nothing but the vastness of space around them. His hand lingered on her side, her skin warm beneath his touch. The corner of his lips tugged up in a small smile, both grateful and slightly mischievous, an expression she was most likely all-too-familiar with.
"I, uh--" his words caught. "I should..." he breathed, his forehead leaning in to rest upon hers; that long-forgotten part of him desperately clinging to the memory of a time when we knew pure, unbridled joy. An ember of passion, of residual longing had sprung up in the core of him, and they had been stoked tonight.
Man, Myth, Administrative God. Also plays a mean kazoo.
Jace Varitek: In Northern California we just have gangs of vigilante interior decorators.
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| Daneira_Farris | Date: Thursday, 13 Sep 2012, 7:51 PM | Message # 27 |
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Lieutenant
Group: Users
Messages: 73
Status: Offline
| "I should....too...." She hadn't slept well in ten years, not since the night on the sofa in his run down apartment. Maybe she would sleep better knowing he was just a few doors away, but she doubted it. "I should maybe.....you know....go....?" It was more of a question than anything, and it was obvious in her inability to move that she didn't want to go. It would have, perhaps, been the right thing to do though, for both of them.
Finally, despite the desperate longing and burning desire that she had, Dani steeled her resolve. "I'll go so you can rest." She murmured, her forehead still against his, their lips just inches apart. Karth wouldn't know that she had never kissed another man, touched another man, let alone anything else, and ten years was an achingly long time for just a simple kiss.
It couldn't be something she did on her own, it had to be on both of their terms. And while she knew Karth, she also knew that she wouldn't push him if he wasn't ready. His body language, however, indicated otherwise. Finally though, she turned her head slightly and pressed a tender and chaste kiss on his cheek, lingering there as she took one more moment in his arms, before she pulled back.
Everything she felt was right there for him to sense, and he would be able to see it in her eyes. He knew her, whether he wanted to remember that or not. Whether he wanted to give into what they both needed, and wanted, he knew. "Sleep well, Slim. You know where I'm at if you need me...."
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| Karth_DeQora | Date: Saturday, 15 Sep 2012, 6:45 PM | Message # 28 |
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Colonel general
Group: Administrators
Messages: 1157
Status: Offline
| "I..." he forced out, voice somewhat hoarse from the sudden lack of moisture in his throat. Karth was unsure as to the how or why of their current predicament; when every fiber of him screamed out to kiss her, to make her know just how much he still wanted her, needed her, but some forgotten part of himself continued to fight against it. Logic dictated that it was simply the wrong time, they would both be better served attempting to forge a new relationship rather than bandage the wounds of the past. Common sense demanded that he let her go, now, before they do something they might regret.
The thing about Karth De'Qora, though, was that he was far from logical. And while he possessed a modicum of common sense, he had an awful habit of ignoring it. Her lips pressed against his cheek; chaste, innocent in it's intent. Her breath was hot on his skin, the nerves throughout his body sparked. She lingered, and he knew why she didn't leave. She was just as scared of what might happen as he was, the last time he allowed himself to feel this way he lost everything. But if he persisted in that endeavor; forgetting, moving on, it would mean that fate had won out. He didn't subscribe to the idea of fate, or the 'Will of the Force', so he'd be damned if he were to play the hand he'd been dealt. No, he'd make a choice; his choice, and damn the consequences.
So when she pulled away, half-heartedly attempting to retreat before her mental barrier broke down any further, he caught her hand. Firm, not painful, his grasp begging her where his words could not. Damn the consequences.With a nervous gulp, he pulled her back into his arms; his hand snaking around the back of her neck as his lips planted firmly on hers. He wasn't about to let her walk out on him, not now... never again.
Man, Myth, Administrative God. Also plays a mean kazoo.
Jace Varitek: In Northern California we just have gangs of vigilante interior decorators.
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| Daneira_Farris | Date: Sunday, 16 Sep 2012, 5:49 PM | Message # 29 |
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Lieutenant
Group: Users
Messages: 73
Status: Offline
| Time stopped. It stood still the second his lips touched hers. And in that brief second, a wave of emotion hit Daneira so hard that she could barely stay on her feet. It was like the past ten years; all of the pain and anguish, the loneliness and loss, and the things she had done washed away. His touch was so....right...and she was still his. Always.
She returned the kiss fervently, sliding her arms around his neck as she pressed her form close to his as she realized that she was exactly where she wanted to be for the past ten, long years. Dani finally, after several lingering moments, pulled back. She was barely an inch from his lips when she spoke. "Tell me you are sure...." She whispered. One hand dropped down from its perch on his shoulder to his chest, and then she snaked it around his waist and curled his fingertips into his spine ever so lightly.
The only thing that she worried about was that Karth wasn't sure. Since the night she found him, she had been nothing but sure. She had also wondered where they would have been had the war not happened, had the order to kill them all not been made. That was something she couldn't think about anymore, however. They had a future, which was something they might have never had.
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| Karth_DeQora | Date: Sunday, 16 Sep 2012, 6:06 PM | Message # 30 |
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Colonel general
Group: Administrators
Messages: 1157
Status: Offline
| Karth had long since thought his soul empty; a dark, hollow shell from which no light escaped. The prevailing opinion was that time healed all wounds; as though the passage of years could somehow lessen the break in a person's soul. That had not happened for him, rather the break had only widened with time. Time spent dwelling on what might have been, replaying millions of scenarios again and again in his mind; a blood-stained staccato that invaded his thoughts and dreams, unwilling to disappear and give him peace. What Karth realized now, in this moment, was that it was time that they now had. Circumstances might be more dangerous, their lives would be spent on the run or on a battlefield; but there was an absolute that had suddenly wedged itself in the hollow shell of the man he used to be. Dani was here, and he wasn't going to lose her a second time.
It was that crystallizing realization that spurred him on, even when she broke apart to briefly ask her question. He said nothing, diving back in and speaking with lips, with a passionate, guttural rumble in the back of his throat. His hands clawed at her back; as though he was experiencing the contours of her body for the first time. He felt her fervor and returned it tenfold, a decade of lost time hungrily urging him to waste no more. Calloused hands slid down her back, locating the lip of her shirt and ascending up her back, fingernails digging lightly into the soft skin beneath. There was no doubt, no second-guessing this. His soul, a part of him he'd long thought fractured, suddenly lit up with the warmth of her love.
Cold and hollow is the soul of an empty man, kindled back to life by her brightly-burning ember.
Man, Myth, Administrative God. Also plays a mean kazoo.
Jace Varitek: In Northern California we just have gangs of vigilante interior decorators.
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