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Odessen felt strange, rough-hewn and still unformed. Not the shining, planned surfaces of Zakuul, the shadows of the Sith, or the brighter lit varieties of the Republic. Something all its own. Something without the taint of his father in its origin. Once it had been merely a target to conquer, but now it had an aura of potential. Of the chance to make things anew.
Mostly so.
Arcann still had bruises from his last mission, and the flicker of lightsabers lingered in his eyes. A screech of durasteel. The flash of lightning from behind him that meant success: that he’d protected the Sith he was there to aid. Surely that was why golden eyes, dark hair, skin in a softer shade of red had settled into his thoughts, captured in that one moment of brilliant light. After all, had he not been paying more attention to the styles used by Sith and Jedi alike, wondered at their differences those of Zakuul, or dwelt upon those varying techniques of the Alliance that spoke of common origins all intermingled.
But he’d lose himself in the knots of the past if he dwelled too long in contemplation. So he stood out in the open air, felt the movements of the force across this balanced world, and ignored all the stares that came his way. He had been the very thing they’d united against, until he wasn’t. That such things happened with some regularity out in this wider galaxy lingered oddly in his mind.
But on this day it wasn’t just the stares. A Sith-no, the Sith he’d fought beside, strode up and leaned one arm against the rail. The crimson spine of his brow twitched as he lowered his head in a gesture between a nod and a bow.
“I wanted to thank you for assisting my team. We wouldn’t have made it out in time otherwise.”
“I serve the Alliance,” Arcann said. He could feel the brittle edge beneath the rasp in his voice. How long did that have to be true before they trusted him?
“Yes.” The pause stretched itself out at first before the Sith continued. “I am Cytharat. Lord Cytharat if you wish to be formal, but I believe you’ve earned the right to be otherwise.” Even leaning against the rail Cytharat seemed utterly poised, an embodiment of formalities Arcann had only started to comprehend.
He’d remember this one. And the face attached to it. He’d meant to drift back in quiet, but his curiosity soon got the better of him. “Who asked you to come up here and talk to me?”
“The team was mine, it was my place and honor to thank you.” A shuttle alighted behind them and for a moment its roar silenced them both. Cytharat leaned in closer. His brow furrowed, then smoothed back out. “The Empire and Republic fought each other even before Valkorion and yet we can still work with each other given cause. I see no difference in your case.”
That made Arcann pause. Valkorion had seemed to extend on endlessly in both past and future, a shroud that obscured the rest of the world behind it. But no longer.
“The rest of the Alliance doesn’t seem to agree with you,” Arcann said.
“That doesn’t matter. I also wanted to ask if you’d work with me again. Presuming the mission doesn’t involve lava.”
Arcann could feel the scars on his face shift at his own uncertain smile. He’d settled for being feared before, and then for being useful. For some small chance to undo his mistakes.
What followed could have been called quiet, though a low hum remained in the Force, a sense of acknowledgment, of almost connection.
“It’s the waiting that’s the worst,” Cytharat said, continuing. “With nothing to focus on besides the terrifying potential of duty. I once nearly died upon such a mission. The scars never let me forget it”
He met Arcann’s eyes straight on, without fear. Only, perhaps, a sense of recognition.
“Yet you keep on.”
“I spent a lot of time waiting in a bed, before. The Sith do badly with such things. Weakness is an opportunity to kill each other, the endless scramble for status. But no one cared enough to find me a threat, then. Or to find me at all. So I had to make something of the space on my own.”
The tale and contemplation could have felt distant to Arcann, from a world far outside its own. And yet as he looked out into a galaxy without his father, it seemed all too applicable.
“You made a better job of it than I did,” Arcann said finally. “I filled every space with paranoia and grasping, and broke everyone who’d ever cared for me.”
“Why do you think I came here?” Cytharat set a hand on Arcann’s shoulder, and that simple touch was enough to draw forth a shiver. “I had to rebuild myself before. To find something new to fill all the spaces that had been taken from me.”
“What did you lose, then?”
“My master. My strength, for a time. And my status with them.”
Arcann paused, and turned to Cytharat. He felt something more than a shiver, then. Some connection through the force, or some remnant of the adrenaline of the mission. No, hints of all of those and something more. The moment when wanting finally took form.
And Cytharat was so very close. Close enough to feel the heat of his breath, to see every hint of pale red spikes. Cytharat leaned closer, and Arcann couldn’t have said which one of them started the kiss. The intermingling of air and flesh, the softness of lips.
He couldn’t say how long it lasted. Not enough. Not when he had so much more to learn.
“I’m glad you came up here,” he heard himself say, still breathless. “I hope it isn’t the last time.”
“No. Just the first.”