A chime came at the door.
The tiny Nautolan paused in her dancing around and belting about haters and shaking them off into her little disposable duster. She grabbed the remote to pause her music, then ran towards the door, sliding expertly on socked feet.
Remembering almost a second too late, Minnie caught herself on the wall, using it to swing herself back about in a 180° turn and dashed back towards her kitchen. She snatched her lacey fingerless gloves off the counter where she’d left them, yanking them back on, tossed the duster towards the caf table – ha, success! – and then sped back towards her destination.
With a huff and a beaming smile, she finally smacked the keypad and then made sure to pose as the door slid open, leaning with hip cocked and arm up.
“Hey, Kitten,” she greeted the Zabrak in the doorway.
Bril’s face brightened when he saw his Nautolan standing just beyond the door. She looked as stunning as ever, and he told her as much while stepping forward to place a kiss on her lips.
“Hey, pur'ka,” he greeted her in kind, “May I come in?”
If she agreed, Bril would step into her apartment while carrying a large paper bag in his left hand. “You hungry? I brought us some food. An Iridonian curry. And I promise it’s not spicy, this time.”
“Get in here, big boy,” she bid with a grin, tugging on the front of his shirt while she fell back down from her tiptoes after their kiss. She looked happy about the prospect of food, though she squinted at him and waved a finger as the door closed behind him. “‘Not spicy’ is what you said last time, Mister. I’m starting to think it’s not possible to be Iridonian and mild.”
She sniffed, huffily, then shot him a wink to take the bite out.
“You’re sure hot stuff.”
So said, the woman flounced back down the tiny entrance hallway into her apartment proper, waving at the kitchen where Bril knew to find disposable silverware if needed.
“Get settled, I was just finishin’ up cleaning a lil’.” She plucked the duster off the caf table where it had landed and only knocked over like two holozines, then took a second to remember where the hell she’d stopped and just shrugged and went for the wall and mantel. With great care she picked up and set down the turned down frames, as much shielding them from her own view as from her guest’s, dusting under them before putting them back. Then she stood on her toes again to reach the framed photos of her and Foxxie and her various squads. She bypassed the medal, dustier where it sat, going on to more pictures. She shook her hips just in case Bril was watching her do it.
Hearing her mild comment, Bril looked back at her with a grin and a wink. “Well, that’s certainly true … in a sense.”
When she made a similar joke, he began chuckling contentedly to himself as they moved into the kitchen. He came back when she was in the middle of arranging the picture frames, and noticed the care with which she handled him–and how she avoided looking at them. She’d avoided the medal altogether.
The playful swish of her hips brought a smile to his face, but it did little to sway the cautious curiosity he was beginning to feel.
“Hey, pur'ka,” he called out to her in a tone she’d surely come to recognize by now.
As he was watching, he surely noticed the way the tiny Nautolan stiffened up just a little, but she still turned to look over her shoulder and smile at him, cocking a hip and setting the duster on it.
“Yes, Kitty?” Her own tone seemed open enough, trailing high in question.
“What was it like? When you were still active duty?” he asked, carefully wording his question so as not to unnerve her more than he already had.
“Oh.” The Nautolan looked a bit surprised, but also relieved, seafoam eyes darting to the things she’d been dusting before looking back. She set the duster down on the mantel and lightly wiped her hands on her (short) shorts, walking over to plop down on the couch with a bounce and pat the seat beside her. “Well…what do you wanna know about? Like, I don’t mind telling you, it’s just a little broad, yanno? What was it all like.”
He looked away for a moment, trying to find something else in the room to distract him a bit. Maybe, then, he wouldn’t feel so anxious.
“Well, uh … surely you served with a lot of people. What were they like?” He rubbed the back of his neck.
It wasn’t hard to tell that her kitty cat was oozing nerves. Her headtails drooped slightly, and she bit holes on the inside of her cheek, pinking with frustration at herself. It had to be her own fault. She could see that, even if she couldn’t make herself stop.
But she could try other things.
“Well…gosh, yeah, it’s a lot. You wanna plate food and I’ll start talkin’?” She forced cheer, a smile on for if he looked back at her. “Like, obviously there’s Foxxie and Jaxxie. Tho Fox never enlisted-enlisted, like us, but like the other non-enlisted Erinos he served, yanno? Or no, you don’t know. Sorry, it’s kinda complicated of a paramilitary structure. Not all Erinos are required to enlist in the AAF, but part of our collective social contract with the Arconans is, essentially, one of service. At any given time, it is our duty to serve and protect the will of the Clan, by which I mean Arcona, not the Erinos, and its members, and to lay down our lives for them if need be. That’s what it means to be oathsworn to them as Mandalorians. But that doesn’t mean we gotta march with their military and follow that military’s rules and regulations. We can…be a waitress, and give back a portion of our pay, kinda like it’s taxes, anyway…”
She grabbed one pink pillow and hugged it, crossing her legs under her and looking towards the photos for places to start that weren’t her brothers.
“Hmmm…”
He hated seeing her like this, upset and nervous. If it were up to him, she’d only be her usual, bubbly self. But unfortunately, life wasn’t so simple.
As she began speaking on her past, he moved into the kitchen to do what she’d suggested, taking out the large container of food and setting it on the counter. He grabbed two plates next, then a spoon.
“And this pledge of service that your clan, the Erinos, have to Arcona. How long has it been in effect?” he asked her. This was a start. and he was glad to learn more about her culture, but it still felt too … superficial.
“Uhhhhhmmfrak,” Minnie said at that, her brows squinching. She flopped back some more. “Geez, I wasn’t even bad at history, yanno, it’s just, like, that time weird gap where it’s old enough to be not current but new enough to not be like, covered in a text, yanno? Ummm…shit frak when were we founded… Jaxxie would be clutching his heart ri'now. It’s like. I dunno. Forty or forty years ago. Or sixty…seventy? Story goes that the Erinos Clan came from Clan Kodiak, who were a buncha ‘Users that came to Arcona and took power, ruled everything, right, and Clan Skirata, who hailed from Mandalore after the Purge and got subsumed by the Kodiak boys and their family. Basically, Mando Clans are themselves, right? But they can swear to each other in different ways, or merge, right. And when one particular Clan has multiple Clans sworn to it, and rules them all, that becomes a House. You know House Wren and House Kryze, right? From back then? So Arcona is like our House. The Erinos are sworn to them. But we’ve incorporated other Clans overtime. When I was little, there were a lot of us. We’re small now.”
She paused, words trailing off and her grip on the pillow going white-knuckled.
“Ahhh but that’s not what you were asking about right?! People I served with! There’s lots of them. All amazing folks. I mean, not like I liked everyone, yanno, there’s always some douches, but everybody did their duty and all that. I was in a couple different squadrons, had my original group from Basic, different units I deployed with…missions me and Foxxie ran.”
Bril listened carefully, making a mental note of the other names she mentioned and how they all related to her current clan. One detail that stood out to him was the fact that Erinos was smaller than it was in the past. That made sense to him given their lives as warriors, but it still made him frown. Was that why she didn’t speak about them, much?
After placing a modest portion of the curry on the plates alongside two large pieces of flatbread, he brought them over to a small table to place them in front of two chairs that were at right angles of one another. Then, he made his way over to her.
“You grow up in this life,” he said, reaching out to touch the top of her knuckles in a gesture that he hoped brought her some calm. “That explains why you kicked so much ass on the battlefield, then. I knew you were skilled but you exceeded all expectations.”
The touch to her gloved hand and the compliment, recognition, did draw a small smile from the Nautolan. Her death grip on the pillow eased slightly under his fingers, and the other slowly let go and smoothed at the lace ruffles while she pushed it out of her lap to stand up again.
“Yeah. Yeah, I did.” A stream of pride colored her words, grim though it was for being back in a battlefield in that ethereal war. Her chin lifted a bit. “I’m Mandalorian. And a soldier. I guess I don’t seem the part, huh? Heh.” She shot two finger guns at him, striking a twirling pose with wink and smile; exemplary movements from her roller skating waitress nights and holonet social accounts. “But they’re both me.”
Approaching the table, she took a cautious sniff, mimicked by Femi who finally decided to come out from her nap, stretch, and start nosing around the people food. She put her socked paws up on Minnie’s chair to stretch her nose towards the flatbread, opening jaws to try and drag it off the plate.
“Upupupup! No, ma'am, that’s mine.” She scooped up the tooka, who was pliant in her babying hold. “You can have some of the curry if it’s too spicy even if daddy says it’s not.”
“You have many layers, like an onion,” he said with a chuckle at both his comment and the little pose she struck to emphasize her point. Two lips found their place on her cheek before they headed into the kitchen. “One of many things I love about you.”
Settling into his seat, his eyes drifted to their little tooka upon hearing the little chirp she made upon being plucked from the floor by her mama. “Don’t worry, little Femi. This time I made sure it was very mild for mama.”
He reached out to give Femi a few scritches beneath her jaw.
Many things I love about you.
Pink touched her yellow skin, and the Nautolan used the tooka and generally getting settled for cover, sitting down while Bril gave Femi some lovings too. She let go of the animal, letting Femi stay in her lap or hop back down as she pleased – just not up onto the table for five seconds plz ma'am – and reached to grab the bread, using it to sop up some of the curry.
As if braced for impact, she took the tiniest bite…waited…and then opened one eye that had closed. Licked her lips, chewed a bit. Took another, a bit larger.
“Okie,” Minnie conceded with some relief. “It’s mild enough. Good job, Kitty, thank you.”
She scooped up a bigger amount and actually dug in, liberally letting Femi lick her fingers of the sauce between bites.
Of course, he noticed the subtle change in her skin’s hue. He had gotten very good at noticing when he had such an effect on her, and he let her know that he’d noticed by offering a quick wink before shifting his attention to his food.
He pinched off a piece of the oven-roasted bread with one hand and scooped up the curry in one, fluid motion, an indication that he had done this enough that it was like second nature to him. “See? It doesn’t always have to be hot. You should trust me more,” he laughed before sticking his tongue out at her.
“So, my darling soldier. How would you rate my performance in the field? It was my first time in such a large engagement, after all.”
“I trust you,” the woman protested, puffing out both cheeks indignantly as she moved more carefully to manage her food; not as fluid as Bril, but no beginner either. “It’s all y'all’s tongues and spicy I don’t trust.”
She took a few more bites, and made sure Femi did get some bread after all, though her chewing slowed at his question. It certainly wasn’t one she’d expected, and her full on blink indicated the awkward surprise.
“Uhm…you. I dunno, Kitty, you did fine. Very brave. You’re… amazing.” It was a stumbled through response, the Nautolan looking away and rubbing at one arm before she caught herself and looking back, dredging up a smile. She sounded genuine about her compliments, at least.
His ears perked up at her response, at the hesitation. He appreciated the compliments, of course, but he was more concerned about how she responded than anything. It didn’t register at first, but a quick review of how he’d asked the question and the suddenness of it gave him ideas.
“Oh, geez,” he said, mentally kicking himself for his blunder. “That was … not okay. I’m sorry,” he stammered through his own answer, “Topics like that should be treated more seriously than that.”
And then, he remembered their heated disagreement in the middle of battle. He remembered how irreconcilable that difference of opinion felt in the moment, and the frustration they both felt with one another. Admittedly, he hadn’t chosen his words as carefully as he should have, and that had contributed to how tense the conversation became.
“Minnow, about what happened out there. Our … disagreement,” he began, though he took a moment to eat another handful of curry if only to provide himself with a bit of breathing room before the conversation continued.
The Nautolan had stopped eating altogether, watching him scoop up his handful with a guarded look. Braced, like she’d been for the curry to be spicy – for it to hurt.
“Thanks,” she slipped into the silence, tight and clipped but sincere. “It’s– yeah it’s a…serious question, actually. And I’m not really qualified to answer you well either…”
Gloved hands were gripping both arms now, and Femi, going ignored and displeased by it, headbutted her mama. Minnie let go to pet her, well trained by their spoiled tooka child, her jaw working as she chewed on the inside of her cheek and Bril chewed on his bite.
“What…about it?” It wasn’t ideal, and she knew it wasn’t. She needed to sound more open than that, less defensive. These were important topics. This was important. But all she wanted to do was say, can we not talk about this now?
Bril shifted uncomfortably in his seat, not only because of how he was feeling but because of the trepidation and unease that Minnie projected into the air around her. He wasn’t prying, of course; he respected her boundaries, but his Force senses also didn’t really have an off switch unless he was actively focusing on that and, well … this was already difficult enough.
“I want to apologize, for the way I handled that,” he began. “Tensions were high and I didn’t choose my words carefully.”
This was more difficult than he thought it was going to be, and he took a breath to calm himself a bit.
“I don’t blame you for making the decision you did even though I wouldn’t have made it myself. I don’t think less of you.”
Minnie’s jaw locked. She was obviously warring with something, and Bril’s senses, so tied to her, could easily detect the turmoil of waspish anger his apology provoked, mixed up in a mess of relief and regret and something else cold that he would have to look deeper to suss out.
Despite all that he could sense though, outwardly, Minnow blew out a long breath after some more chewing and sighed. Inhaled hard.
“Thank you,” she repeated, “for the apology. I’m…glad…*that you don’t think less of me, exactly. But I also– didn’t exactly worry you *did. Think less, I mean. Because I don’t think what I did was the lesser choice, morally or otherwise. I don’t think you have a place to judge it or me at all.” Another inhale and exhale. “I’m sorry that– well. I’m sorry you had to see any of it, really. I know you fought a lot. And I know you’re not sheltered or anything like that. But there’s a difference between all the experiences in the galaxy and going to war. Being on one side and having an enemy and you kill them because that is your job. Because you’re following orders. Because you’re protecting your people. And who you…love.”
Her gaze finally dragged back to meet his, holding for a moment, before sliding slightly over his shoulder. If he followed her gaze, he’d see her staring through the wall where her pictures and the medal were.
“I’ve killed a lot of people in combat, Bril. And I’ve lost a lot of them too. There isn’t room for empathizing on the battlefield, and especially not with jediit. You fraking blink, and– and that’s it. You’re dead, they’re dead, everyone is dead. So you don’t blink. You shoot.”
He sighed, and his shoulders drooped a bit when she mentioned him not having a right to judge her. Everything she felt was valid, of course, but he just couldn’t understand why she already felt so angry with him when he was doing everything he could to ensure that she wouldn’t be. He couldn’t understand it because she wouldn’t let him understand. Just when he was beginning to feel defeated before the conversation had truly begun, her emphasis on the word “love” snapped him out of it.
He held her gaze and smiled weakly while mouthing the words, “I love you, too.”
Then, he followed her eyes to the mantle, and shook his head in an attempt to shake away his regret … his guilt, for bringing up this conversation and handling it so poorly. Surely, he was a better communicator than this?
“I’m sorry for your losses. I wasn’t trying to–”
Another sigh. He opened his arms while looking at her. “Come here, pur'ka,” he beckoned in a much, nuch softer tone.
The consoling words had her stiffening more, but then he stopped, and the gentle call seemed to put a crack in the dam. Her eyes darted back over to him, weighing a moment, as if judging whether or not accepting the comfort would come with strings attached, before she sniffed and stood up, taking the two steps necessary to fall into his lap and his arms.
She didn’t cry; but she sagged there, fingers knotting into his shirt with trembling tension.
When she fell into his embrace, Bril let out a sigh of relief while closing his arms around her. Things had gone awry so quickly and now, all he wanted to do was hold her and make everything better … somehow. He traced small circles on her shoulder while she gripped his shirt, and began to hum the tune of a lullaby his mother often sang to him when he was younger. It always made him feel better when he was upset, so he hoped it was something he could pass on to his Nautolan in this time of emotional difficulty.
Silence blanketed the room. Now wasn’t the time for words. He just needed to hold her and show her that despite the disagreements, despite the miscommunications, that he was here for her; he would always be here for her.
After some minutes of hard breathing into the silence, Femi winding around the chair and brushing at their legs in intervals, Minnow sat up. She didn’t pull out of Bril’s hold, but adjusted some in his lap, perched to stay or get up, depending.
Her face was dry, but no less splotchy with reds and pinks of stress that made the darker gold and white speckles of her skin pattern stand out starker. Her headtails were scrunched up closer to her skull, retracted.
“That’s pretty,” she said, slightly hoarse. “What is it?”
Moving his hand to take hers, Bril intertwined their fingers while holding their gaze. He searched her eyes for a moment, not to gauge what she was feeling because he was familiar enough with that, but to hopefully reassure her that he was here.
“It’s a lullaby that my mother used to sing to me. It’s about the bond between a mother and her child,” he explained before beginning to sing the words allowed. He sang the line in Zabraki first, then translated it in Basic so she could understand.
Little one, who dwelled in the darkness, now you’ve come and seen the sun. Why the crying? Why the worries? What has made your peace undone?
You have roused the household spirits; you have scared the guardian-gods. “Who has roused me? Who has scared me?” “Little baby woke you up!”
May you settle into slumber, sweet as plum-wine, deep as love.
“That’s beautiful,” Minnie sniffed, and smiled a little, though it evaporated quickly. “Nice your mom sang it to you. Reminded me of– well Foxxie used to. When I was little. Could never really sing like that, you sound pretty good, but he’d do some. Just quieter. Said they were ones our mom sang for him.” A breath, and her gaze skittered from braving his back to the wall of pictures. “Aketa used to sing a Chiss one sometimes too. But I don’t remember it well.”
He paused for a moment to ruminate on her words, reflecting on his past conversation with Foxen about their upbringing. He would have to ask him more about their mother the next time he saw him. The thought of the Nautolan hybrid taking care of Minnie the best he could brought a smile to his face. “Would have loved to see little Minmin,” he chuckled.
Then, he heard a name he didn’t recognize. “Aketa?”
“We’ve got plenty of pictures of me and stuff,” she huffed a bit. “None of him tho, of course. There’s some around here somewhere. And Foxxie keeps a bunch of my stuff.”
She rubbed her arm slightly as she trailed off there, obviously thinking of the question itself. The tiny Nautolan got up out of Bril’s lap, patting his arm to show reassurance, then went over to the wall. She stared up at it for a moment before slowly reaching out and taking down a few photos, picking up some others, and then reaching under on the lower shelf under the massive holoscreen to pull out an album. She carried the lot back over, having left all the turned down ones and some others too.
The Zabrak helpfully pushed their plates over a bit, making room. She set down her lot carefully for the frames, then picked one from the pile and showed it to him.
Several figures stood on a tarmac in front of a line of X-wings. They all wore flight suits, helmets under their arms. Minnie was one, another a silver-haired Echani, a Chiss, some Selenians. She pointed at the Chiss woman.
“That’s Aketa. She was Evelyn’s wife,” a point to the Echani, “and a family friend. One of Jaxxie’s trainees, they were really close. Evelyn and Foxxie used to practice swordplay. Aketa liked to have dinner parties a lot. We’d both organize. This was Siren Squadron. My last squad before I went reservist. They’re still active, new folks.”
“I’ve seen pictures, silly. I mean in person. That way I could pinch your cheeks.” He chuckled while reaching out to gently pinch her cheek between his index finger and thumb. Keeping the atmosphere as jovial as possible was another priority for him. That Minnie had never willingly broached this subject herself was as big a hint he needed that he was now venturing into precarious territory, and he wanted to make things as easy as possible for her while still getting answers. Learning more about her.
When he noticed that she began collecting photos from the wall, presumably to bring over, he slid their plates over a bit and scooped up little Femi who was in the middle of creeping up onto the table to have another taste of the curry. The little tooka mewled in protest of her plan being thwarted, only to nuzzle into her father’s arms once he began to bounce her up and down like a baby.
Bril listened intently while Minnie explained who they were and how they were related to one another. Although he said nothing of it, he made note of her use of “was” when referring to Aketa. Based on the tone she used when discussing her, he presumed she had passed. Unfortunate.
“Looks like a great group, Minnie,” he replied, paying close attention to his words. “…What happened?”
Watching Bril bounce their tooka like a baby seemed to ground the Nautolan some in good spirits. She kept glancing over and her lips would twitch back up in tiny half-second smiles, to be pulled sharply back down again, like gravity was centered on those photos, on the medal. She brushed her thumb back and forth over the frame of Siren Squadron when she answered.
“They were,” she began, and then, “Nancora Campaign, 36 ABY. Bad place for pilots. Bad for all of us. The ‘Nocks used 'tugs as suicide bombers. Aketa went down. Wasn’t a body to bury.” Her hand dropped. “Just like Foxxie. But this one we knew. Evelyn got put on leave. I was reassigned. Some of the others stayed for a few more flights, Mirin’s still in, but soldiers keep coming, yanno? We get rotated wherever they send us.”
She paused again, seafoam eyes distant, then refocusing. Her hand reached for the one of her and her brother in front of a barracks building. A copy of the one at Foxen’s home, except not folded over to only show Minnie.
“Two years after that…Jax…they declared Foxen dead. Over three years AWOL is…yeah. That’s when I left. I just couldn’t.” She tapped the picture, taking a hard breath, and smiled. “This was the day I graduated the AAF academy. I beat everyone’s asses. Had the best trainer, yanno?” A wink indicated her big brother. “Evelyn’s still enlisted. And she still talks to Jaxxie sometimes.”
Bril felt his lips tighten against one another as she explained the details of an event she called the “Nancora Campaign.” War was a messy, horrid thing that took and took. He was beginning to see how fortunate the lot of them were to have made it out of the Mortis war mostly unscathed. After placing Femi on the floor, he slowly made his way around the table, picking up their food so they could eat it later … and so their silly little furbaby couldn’t get a taste of it while they weren’t looking. He did, however, make sure to prepare a small bowl of curry for her to eat while they spoke.
“I…hm,” he tried to offer some words of consolation, but he wasn’t sure what to say. What could one say to something like that? A hand found its place on her shoulder, and he gave her a supportive nod, his crystal blue eyes conveying his utmost sympathy for her losses.
Glancing at the picture again when she mentioned her stellar graduation, he felt a feeling of pride well up within him. “That’s no surprise, you never fail to impress.”
Minnie had stiffened again when Bril started to speak, but then he trailed off. She seemed relieved, even gratified, lifting her chin and shoulders under his hand, when he didn’t say some variation of I’m sorry for your loss.
“I try,” she said simply, throwing a weak fingergun with a thin smile.
There were still more pictures, and she gestured to each in turn, speaking briefly of various flights, squadrons, and activities, more focused on anecdotes of the people involved and shenanigans than additional campaigns; though it was clear Minnow had been to war many times now.
Things stayed mostly lighter, at least until she ran out of pictures, idly scratching Femi when the tooka wound around their chair legs, making baby eyes for the meal she knew her daddy had prepared. Then there was just the medal. She took a deep breath, then picked it up, using the edge of her shirt to polish it a little.
“I got this for ‘unusual gallantry and also extraordinary fidelity and essential service,’” she read from the plaque, which bore her name, unit, and year of service. “That’s the nice way of saying fraked up a lot of shit. There was…” A grimace crossed her features, something haunted in her eyes, an abyssal shadow in the seafoam. “Well, I can’t tell you details. But suffice to say, we couldn’t let the enemy get close to us. Literally, close. So…it was a time to be a sniper. That mission was only…I think five days. But it had the most kills in my whole career. Everyone was proud of me. I’m proud of me. I kept people safe. But it. It seemed like a joke, yanno? I could do that. But I couldn’t do anything for my Clan when– or for my brother.”
Bril listened intently as Minnie regaled him with tales of her time in service, of the people she met and fought alongisde, of the antics they sometimes found themselves in. It reminded him of the stories people used to tell around campfires back home. He offhandedly mentioned with a chuckle that he thought it amazing that she was doing all this when he was still in primary school and extolled her for her “badassery.”
But when she mentioned her failure to keep her clan and Foxen safe, and when he felt the feeling of disappointment eek across their bond, he shook his head. “You’re one woman, Minnie,” he began, “An incredibly capable and amazing woman, but there’s only so much you can do.”
“It’s not in any way close to what you’ve been through, but I felt similarly when Sivall and the others were kidnapped. I wasn’t here, helping. I blamed myself for not being able to help them, and what did you tell me?”
The Nautolan bared her tiny razor teeth at the table, fists balling against the wood. Still, she said softly, echoing herself, “That it wasn’t your fault, Kitty. And I know. I know I did everything I could, we all did, but– but it’s still r-really fraking hard some days not to hate that.”
Her head tails had crimped up towards her skull again, and they relaxed into limp defeat when she exhaled, unclenching her fists and staring off.
It wasn’t long until she felt his hands atop her own, his thumbs gently kneading her palms to relax any tension that had accumulated there. He dipped his head a bit to meet her gaze and give her a reassuring nod.
“I know. I know it’s hard,” he reaffirmed, the sincerity of his words hanging in the space between them. “But it won’t always be that way. And I’m here for you, every step it takes to get to that point.”
Slowly, under his massaging touch, her hands went looser, then relaxed. The lacey gloves bunched up under his thumb, in danger of pulling down. She stared at them for a moment, then pulled her hands deliberately out of his grasp.
Bril might have been crestfallen by the blatant withdrawal, had she not moved to simply slip the coverings off and then silently extend her hands back for more pampering. She usually never bared them except for in the shower, and when they took one together, she was particularly tricksy in bubbly soaps and positioning to generally keep glances to a minimum.
“I don’t want to talk about it yet,” she warned very quietly, but still kept them out, the puckered scars up her forearms visible. She inhaled hard, looking away from his sincere blue gaze. Back to the photos. Away again, to Femi; something easy. “I’m better than I was. I know it gets…easier. But a lot of it isn’t yet. I guess…I’m…glad you’re here.”
He was well aware of how sensitive she was about her hands and feet and didn’t look at the scarring on her canary yellow skin save for but a glance here or there. He didn’t have to, to do what he was doing. Instead, he gave her a gentle kiss when she finished speaking, letting his lips linger there for a moment while he continued to massage her hands. Even amongst the scars her skin was smoother than his own, a trait he figured was common amongst nautolans.
“I know,” he said reassuringly, “And that’s okay, pur'ka. And I’m glad I’m here, too. Meeting you has been the best thing that’s happened to me since I joined the Brotherhood.”
He had never said that explicitly until now, but he hoped that as much was clear based on how much time they spent together, and how much he expressed his admiration whenever they were together.
“I just want you to remember that you don’t always have to be the helping hand. Sometimes, I can do that for you, too.”
Bril cracked a smile. “Besides, I have to pay you back for all the times you’ve came through for me. I’d be a possessed rage baby without you.”
“Rage baby–” the Nautolan choked, sniffing. “Psshsaw. Pay back nothin’, Kitty. It’s not a debt. But…you do help sometimes. Just being here. I hope you know that.” She kind of tried to squeeze his hand while he was massaging hers, tension still in her body but bleeding out slowly, like a wound after hemorrhage. Her gaze stayed away, and her brow crinkled at the idea of being the best thing to happen to him since the Brotherhood – that said something for his lacking adventures, given how passionate he was about philosophy, artifacts, all that stuff. But it was still nice to think of.
When she squeezed his hands, he lifted both of hers to his lips to place a kiss on the backs of her fingers. “I know it’s not, but I wouldn’t feel right if I didn’t return the favor somehow.”
Hearing that he did help ameliorate her troubles did help put his worries to ease a bit, but it still felt like something was amiss. He knew he couldn’t always be the one to fix everything, but he felt like there was still so much he could do if he could just understand more–if he could know more about her.
Dipping his head again to catch her gaze, he offered another encouraging smile in the hopes of enticing her to do the same. “I love you, Minnie,” he cooed, “You know that, right?”
The Nautolan’s seafoam eyes flicked to his, and her cheeks pinked slightly, a tired smile pulling briefly at her lips.
“I know, Kitty.” She took one hand back to cup his jaw, leaning forward to kiss him for a moment. “Me too.”
Then she took her other hand back, rubbing at her arms nervously. She looked over at the containers he’d packed up that Femi was still sniffing around.
“You wanna finish eating, or… Curl up and watch a holo, maybe?”
She didn’t say it back. They were having such an intimate moment, and she still didn’t say it back. As the words “me too” echoed in his mind like a joke with no punchline, Bril felt his bottom lip twitch. A momentary crack in the Zabrak’s concerned yet otherwise placid visage signaled that something had bothered him; was it her words or something she felt that slipped across their Force bond? The ensuing kiss took some of the sting out of her avoidance of the phrase, but it would take more than that to free his mind from the feelings of doubt and insecurity that began to dig its miasmic hooks into him.
He broke away from her gaze to regard Femi for a moment, stepping over to where she was investigating the leftover food so he could place it in Minnie’s fridge before scooping the tooka up.
Although he would’ve preferred to continue with their meal, he knew now that he could use a distraction from the supposed implications–true or not–of her response that buzzed in his mind like a swarm of mynocks.
“…Yeah, let’s watch a holo,” he replied, doing his best to not sound somewhat deflated, but trying to manage that and keeping his thoughts in order was proving difficult. “Your pick.”
A flash of a smile was enough to throw her off his trail, right? He didn’t wait to see, turning on his heels and heading into the living room while leaning over to give Femi a kiss on the head,
Minnie knew instantly that she’d been caught out; that it had been noticed, finally. Or maybe just now it hurt too much. But she saw the way Bril’s blue eyes widened briefly in a stabbed look and his lip wobbled before he looked away and moved for the tooka. Moving, active, doing something, the way he most often dealt with his excess stress, much like she did; though he could meditate it out too. But this time as her Zabrak walked away carrying Femi in a way that was a lot more hugging the kitten for comfort than it was just ferrying her towards the couch, the way he wouldn’t look at her for long, the catch in his voice …
And the buzz of anxiety and disaster along her headtails. In her chest. This strange thing she didn’t like to focus on, ignored as much as possible, like a little second heartbeat. Bril’s heart beat. The…whatever they had. A jediit thing.
Unasked for. Invasive. Uncontrollable.
But not unearned.
“Bril, wait–”
The tiny Nautolan got up and dodged around the couch and her big chair after him, nearly wiping out on a stray pillow and the other holoscreen remote that only worked the input switch and not the volume or channels. It was unimportant and she usually just left it wherever it fell (or whenever Femi batted it to). The Mandalorian snatched his bigger hand with one of her exposed ones, clamping it between them and stepping up onto the tops of his feet on her tiptoes to gain leverage.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I know I’m– I know I don’t say it, okie, I know that’s not…fair to you, it’s just–this is hard for me, and I. Dammit, I don’t. I don’t want it to. I– I do yanno? I l…l…uuuh, ahh. Ugh!”
Her mouth opened and closed but it just sounded like gagging instead of words, like the words wouldn’t come. She let go with one hand to scrub at her head.
- This always happened. Every time, though they usually left way, waaaay earlier. She pushed them out way earlier. She didn’t let people this close anymore.
“Me too. Me too, okie, as much as I. Can. I’m just. I’m really. Really still broken. And you– frak, you’re so–” you’re so young, you deserve better than this kriff, you’ll fall in love with someone who can give it back, “patient, and good to me, I just. I’m. I’m sorry.”
Of course, he felt it the second it dawned on her what had happened … how she hurt him. With his own raw feelings twisting knots behind his eyes and in his chest, Bril possessed little hope of maintaining the carefully placed mental blocks he’d created to keep himself from feeling her emotions. They came crashing down like a collapsing levee, leaving the highly sensitive Zabrak to bear the full weight of the tidal wave of emotion that came rushing from his Nautolan’s mind. It nearly floored him. He reached out for something, anything, to keep himself upright. Femi leapt from his arms with an agitated mewl. As he caught himself on the couch, he felt his breath shallow, and his hearts quicken. Was he having a panic attack?
No.
He was going to be fine. He had to be fine, for both of them. A deep, desperate breath created some space between himself and what he was feeling. Then, he took another. And another.
His pur'ka’s voice cut through the noise with ease. But he didn’t respond. How could he, with the tension in his throat and salty wetness so dangerously close to breaching his eyelids? Before he knew it, she was holding his hand and standing on his toes. He avoided her gaze at first; it was just too much. Don’t look, pur'ka, please … I should be helping you.
I should be helping you.
The thoughts took flight and filled the space between them, pulling their bond in the Force taut and letting it thrum with each mental intonation inadvertently freed from the confines of his own mind and left to reside in anxious liminality. And there it remained, ready to pass to her should she open that door. Bril’s eyes widened when he realized what had happened, and he looked to her with an expression torn through remorse and sympathy.
“You’re not broken,” he said sternly, yet soft as was befitting his love, “You are beautiful. I know it’s hard for you. I’ve felt how you feel about me, about us. I understand. And it’s okay. It’s just hard sometimes because I know you do, but not hearing it still feels … I don’t know. I’m sorry for the bond. I know you never asked for it…”
Minnow’s seafoam eyes widened and her breath stuttered with the onrush of it all, like the tide coming in. Waters drawing back from the shore, leaving damp beach bare and shellfish scuttled on sand, the ocean rearing back before it darkened the horizon in a solid wall; a tsunami bearing down.
She could have run. Let go. Turned and sprinted for higher ground. Like she so often did now. Not wanting to drown again.
But Bril was crying right in front of her, heartbeats fast in his chest, guilt and apology and anxiety all brimming over, holding back so much of himself just for her.
But the thing was. She was a creature of the sea. She could breathe in the undertow. If she just stood there and let it happen.
Stared at the tsunami and let it crash over her.
She’d been brave enough for that, once.
She wanted to be again. She was a Mandalorian, dammit.
And she did. Love. Him.
So the Nautolan breathed of the waters and shushed, thumbs wiping away tears that fell down his chin and spattered her headtails, igniting starbursts of emotion so intense along her skin that each one was like a rocket shot. PANIC. LOVE. HURT. DESPERATION. GUILT. HELPLESSNESS. REJECTION. Her own emotions too, echoing from him, doubled back at her, whalesong. PANIC. LOVE. HURT. DESPERATION. GUILT. HELPLESSNESS. FRUSTRATION. LOSS.
“I’m not sorry,” she told her kitty firmly, looking back at him. “It’s okie, you can…come in. You do help, you don’t…don’t blame you. It’s just part of you. And I. Care. About you, Bril Teg Arga. Just. It’s okie.”
Stepping off his toes, she nudged him forward, pushing him to drop back onto the couch and following to straddle his lap, pressing their foreheads together. At least they could be sitting when the wave hit.
He could feel it all, and he knew she could, too. Even as she proved that she was more than capable of handling the most tumultuous of emotional storms that they could conjure together, Bril’s every breath was nonetheless laced with the leaden weight of remorse for the burden his Force senses placed on her. The smoldering heat of frustration bubbled up from the cracks, but he didn’t know if it was hers or his own. Although it was accompanied by a dozen other sensations, Bril felt genuine relief and happiness to feel the ardor radiating from his Nautolan’s mind as intensely as a nascent star.
Offering no resistance when her hand found its place on his chest to push him backward, he fell into the soft plush of the couch, looking up at her through the blur of watery eyes of crystalline blue. The crashing waves of emotion steadily came to rest when she moved atop his lap and pressed her forehead against his own. Her embrace had always had a calming effect on him. A sigh escaped his lips, and he reached out to stake his claim upon her hips, giving them an affectionate squeeze not only to ground himself a bit more, but to remind her that he was here, too. It wasn’t long until his lips found their place against hers and lingered there for a few, long moments before dotting smaller pecks along her cheek and the taper of her jaw. Nestled amongst the growing sense of security was a budding feeling of long for her continued touch, for her affection, and for the opportunity to make everything right in the way they both knew only he could.
“I’m always going to be by your side, Minnow Erinos,” he said, words punctuated by loving kisses.
A frission of fear snaked through the cosmic tempest of emotion between them, a supernova that was settling, unspooling into new bodies, eddies and binaries and clouds, with a new center of gravity weighing them into anchored spiral. It was a flavor Bril was familiar with, tinged with rejection and grief: Minnow’s fear. The kind that leaked from her dreams in their shared bed to his bare-nerve soul.
They couldn’t hide it like this, and so Bril knew, even as she felt it, that she didn’t believe his statement. But she didn’t run, didn’t shy back. Because it wasn’t him she didn’t believe in.
“I’ll hold you to that, Bril Teg Arga,” she whispered back, and cupped his face to wipe away tear tracks while returning more kisses, deeper and longer, hands at home on her hips.
Later, they could watch a holo. Finish eating. Snuggle with Femi. He could help her put the pictures and medal back up.
For now, there was them, together.