“The Light That Blinds,” by Shadows Fall
Tiranae’sioth lay in her bed on her stolen Hound-class vessel - though, perhaps it was no longer stolen and it hadn’t been for quite some time - not since she and Marek had repaired the owner’s rebreather and he signed paperwork for her to bear The Original Syn.
She stared at the ceiling, exhausted. She hadn’t been doing much physically over the last few days, just… running in place. Crying. Screaming. This exhaustion was on all levels but physical. Emotional. Mental. Social. Spiritual, perhaps, most of all.
She’d burned every damn bridge she’d felt slipping away since the Masters said she wasn’t good enough for Knighthood. The only people who still cared were… well, one actively shut the world out to stay loyal to the Order that sought to destroy her, one had become a swirling eddy of despair at the High Council’s command, one was long since fallen to the dark and would likely never come back from it, one threw the match she had lit onto the bridges whose glow was now the only Light she felt, one was the only person who stood on the bridge as it went up in flames, and one… one made her an offer that she had to think on. That she would think about, long and hard, while she repeated Inun’s pilgrimage through the Brightlands.
It was a different path that lay ahead of her - though there were two separate paths she could take. One… one would lead her into the dark depths whose sickeningly sweet strains sang softly. One would take the strength that she always feared in herself and refine it into something worth celebrating, that would work alongside and defend the people.
A singed black leather cord sit on her nightstand - the only remnant of her second life. Her second captivity. One where she was enslaved not to a Weequay crimelord, but an Echani megalomaniac, who was herself enslaved to some fogeys on Coruscant. To the ghost of a man who had never seen a Jedi, but elevated them to quasi-divinity.
“What’s the point anymore? I really don’t know,” she asked no one in particular. “I’ve disappointed everyone who has had faith in me. I’ve abandoned the Jedi but they had abandoned me months ago… so why does this hurt so damn much?” She balled up a fist but instead of punching something, she rubbed her eye to direct the dripping saline out of its corner rather than just welling up until it hit critical mass and spilled out freely.
Instead of just crying in silence, Tira reached for her datapad, pulling up a randomly generated playlist.
Setting her jaw, she listened intently as gentle acoustics gave way to a more… intense instrumentation. Then… harsh vocals. This was angry music, the kind she avoided so long as that braid had wrapped her lek. But… now it felt good. After the first refrain, she started to really get a hang of what was being sung.
As vanity possesses me
I am floating further away
Gripped by belief in empty words
Driven by need to prove
Store bought conformity
Force-fed duality
I warp reality
The comfort that you will find
As you remain hidden
The light betrays
Hiding your true self away
You’ll remain blind
Tira sniffed, nodding, sitting up and wiping her eyes. What providence the Mother would send this song at such a time… as she travels from the oppressive light of the Jedi to the more literal blinding, withering light of the Brightlands of Ryloth.
The shell may wither
But the fire burns eternal
The shell may wither
But the fire burns wild
…so had her shell withered. When she’d been poisoned by bugs, when she’d been drained by Kharriss, when she had been systematically broken down by a broken system designed to uplift ambitious fiends like Vosca to positions to abuse their power while people like Micah were forcibly crushed for daring to do a small fraction of what their superiors did freely.
She couldn’t give up… the title of the song wasn’t “Light Blinds.” It was “The Light That Blinds.” Not all light… just theirs.
You hide behind, cower
The light that blinds, blinds
The fire burns eternal. The light endures. And if she had to… she would be the light, herself. A light that shines, does not blind… but she was still so damn cold inside… it felt like her light within had been extinguished by the light that blinds. Where could she go from here?
The only place there was to go, now, she thought as the ship lurched, inertia of returning to realspace taking hold.
She rose and walked to the cockpit where a man she loved had made way to a different desert planet. But the one before her called to her loudly and clearly. A call which would recieve a simple reply.
Kassurra, Ryloth. Jun panqi chir Tiranae’sioth, sama jehsa Daviide’sioth.