Ciphered Holos

Aran waited until Xan had fallen asleep and Mishka had left her alone before she stopped pacing the floor of the cell, a clawing push around the edges of her mind and sanity starting to gnaw her control. The Knight's chiding of Mishka had been a good reminder to keep herself under control, letting out a slow series of breaths to stay grounded.

-servant of the Emperor- Her fist slammed, muttering low under her breath again and head turned, staring to try and calm herself, again. Mishka's words struk close to the bone, she could only hope that the other Miraluka - Luka Sene she whispered with a catch on the two small words - didn't know how badly. How easily.

Luka Sene had been a phantom. Something she'd been raised to fear. She could count on a single hand how many of her kind she'd met in the course of her life and the Sene was the fourth. And she'd discovered the old fear wasn't gone. She didn't even know what parts she'd been told about, if they were lies or truths but the other Miraluka got under her skin and what she did know was that the Sene had authority. And the Sene's mocking - and earnest - label of ignorant...

She tiredly leaned against the wall, sliding down and pillowing her head on her arms, avoiding the bed. She had no intentions of falling asleep but she couldn't pace any longer. She'd been awake since... whenever she'd woken up in the cell, nearly a standard day by her reckoning, and sitting for even a few moments dropped her from 'awake' to 'unconscious' faster than a nexu on a flutterby.

"Do a good job Aran, and maybe you'll earn recognition." Irradus' voice was mocking but then his tone shifted, appraising. "You seem to be ready now. Repeat your lessons." The Lord's instructions were rhetoric and dogmatic but he had instilled a true belief in the young apprentice he'd chosen. He'd seen the value in a Miralukan Apprentice and ignored the calls to pick something other than an alien to teach. Set a thief to catch a thief... set a Miralukan to reach the heart of the Republic. Her curiosities were guided to research - Alchemy had turned out to be something the girl was truly gifted with - and languages, and he'd carefully given her just enough to satiate the who of her kind. Now was time to see if the careful work would pay off.

"Power serves the Sith."
"Who do the Sith serve?"
"The Emperor. The Council. Themselves."
"And...?" His tone took on a hint of warning, smirking mercilessly as the child frowned.
"Their Lord." Children did petulant so much better than adults.
"Would you kill for the Emperor and the Empire?" A pause. "For me?"
"O-of course."
"Hmm..." His tone was not quite mocking but simply disbelieving. "...I think you are lying to me. You know how that is handled-"
As he expected, the girl interrupted him but this time her tone was firm, pride provoked. "I am not lying!" She was an improvement on her six year old self, would've accompanied that with a stamping of feet.
"Prove it then," now he taunted, just enough of a mockery in his inflections to push her to follow through now.
"I will."

Even Irradus had been impressed, despite himself. He'd patted the girl on her head - a rare treat of contact - and praised her. The girl had even been grinning, once her concentration had firmed, and he felt she had more than a future now, watching tiny hands unsurely use the knife to cut the slave's throat but critically seeing that her runes had been... flawless. He'd seen her take that power and nearly stopped her before he'd seen the way the girl had instinctively tried to use it.

Interesting... he let the experiment pass without a comment. As long as he could control her, she'd turn into a fine weapon for his hand. A few words of praise had made her as eager to please and continue as a puppy. "Well done, my Apprentice," he repeated. "Well done." And Aran smiled, blood running down her fingers and robes, but hand curled around her creation protectively. "The work of a true Sith."

Aran started awake, head snapping back so quickly she hit her head on the wall, pale and disjointed in her motions. Her breath came between a clenching in her gut, the woman leaning her head and body back against the wall with a shudder, doubling over her knees until her stomach (which was thankfully empty) stopped heaving. She was pretty certain if someone was watching they'd be having a field day but right now the Miraluka didn't care, quickly getting to her feet and starting to pace again, feeling wired and uneasy, stopping to lift a hand up as if staring at the appendage.

She wanted something, aside from her own memories, to sink in to. She couldn't even recall what song she'd left off singing to keep her mind focused just then. She knew this happened when she was closed someplace involuntarily, in an abstract way she knew exactly why. Breathe. Breathe and focus. Find a song. Recite poetry. Making a fist she took a breath and started pacing, shoving her mind away from the dream or repeating what the damned 'Sene had said or anything else. She started to rattle off shipping routes and distances while she moved branching out from Hutt space and using the mundane figures to get herself under control again.

She really wanted to see Ranai now, because there was just enough... uncertainty. "When I get out of here I'm going to figure out what she meant," she promised, knowing what the words Mishka had said meant but realizing she had no idea the import.

As long as she could focus on little bits of life like that, she was pretty certain the next time someone came by (solitary was, in fact, quite lonely, and it chafed her wandering feet something fierce to be still in the cell after even a day) she could handle them. Maybe the nice Knight would actually bring that whiskey by.

That'd be nice.