The Jagged Fel- later Monday

[notconflicted]

It wasn’t that Sia didn’t get emotional ever, it was that she usually couldn’t, not in public. And when she had just seen her father killed after he turned to the dark side, suddenly leaving her with the job she’d always dreaded having to take, she really couldn’t lose it in front of anyone.

Well, maybe Antares, but there were many reasons she didn’t want to.

She handled things, with help from him and Treis. It was easy to blame Darth Maladi for Roan’s death and say that he had sacrificed himself to rid the galaxy of a Sith threat, because from a certain point of view, it was true. Maladi couldn’t defend herself anymore. Krayt's death had caused a shift in the battle, with Sith soldiers losing it without him controlling them, and their splintering forces had ended up going their separate ways in the middle of everything. Sia did get in touch with Cade to confirm that Krayt really was dead; he was, and his body had been flown into a sun, just to make entirely sure. She’d contacted Stazi and K’krukh, letting them know what had happened and announcing that she would be taking things over from her father.

Most Force sensitives fighting would have felt the deaths of Krayt and Roan. Still, Sia had had to deliver the message to the returning forces that both things were true. And then she excused herself to her quarters, where she could lock herself away for a while and not face anyone except those who she would actually want to see.

She’d taken off her armor, leaving just the black garments underneath, and was sitting on the bed with a datapad, making notes of all of the things she still had to do or find out. Maybe it was just busy work. Eventually, she was sure she’d feel something again, but right now she was just numb. But numb was good. Numb would get her through the day.


[Feels a little weird to not have this family trauma in late summer for once. For those hanging out in the GFFA!]

Comments

[suitably_heroic]

"Until they find out some day," Atton mused. "But if you're lucky, the fiction'll have held up for long enough, right?"

There went the rest of his drink.

[notconflicted]

“It might never get out, either. We lucked into a plausible story. And we’re Imperials. We repress,” she said, drinking.

[suitably_heroic]

"These things usually do get out. But sometimes it takes a hundred years, and you'll be dead by then," Atton said.

He refilled his glass.

"But it's good you stopped it. That much death would've really gotten the Sith going." Beat. "And I like being alive, so there's that."

[notconflicted]

"A running theme with us lately," Sia said wryly, before turning more serious. "I really want to thank you for everything you've done. I just showed up again one day, and you helped anyway, and you didn't have to. It means a lot."

[suitably_heroic]

"I have to earn my Jedi points somehow," Atton said.

He eyed his glass.

"I promised you I'd help way back when," he said. "It felt wrong to back out."

And he'd lost one too many women he cared about to grand galactic events already.

[notconflicted]

"I should have taken you up on it back then," she said. "I'm glad I did this time."

Alcohol plus trauma equaled honesty, apparently.

[suitably_heroic]

"You seemed busy," Atton said.

[notconflicted]

"Things haven't really let up for a while," Sia said with a shrug. "At least now that's done, I suppose."

As was her glass.

[suitably_heroic]

Atton held out the bottle, a question. "And you're empress," he said. "That's going to take some getting used to, your royal stubbornness."

[notconflicted]

Sia visibly winced at the ‘empress’ word, so yes, she was handing her glass over for more.

“I’ve already had to start,” she said, pursing her lips. “I really thought I had another twenty years before I had to deal with this.”

[suitably_heroic]

"I don't envy you," Atton said, pouring more into her glass. "All you can do from here on in is screw up."

Great pep talk, Rand.

[notconflicted]

“It’s like you’ve been listening in on my internal monologue,” Sia said, actually a little glad to have it verbalized.

[suitably_heroic]

"Okay, one, I am not trying to do that," Atton said, just to emphasize that for a second. (He was still touchy about anything mind-related.) "Two, good. If you're actively terrified of it, you'll screw up less. You have a grace period going forward, anyway. Everyone loves the new Empress until she's not so shiny anymore."

[notconflicted]

“I know you’re not,” she assured him. “There’s never really been a time I haven’t been terrified of it. Does that make my odds going forward better or worse?”

[suitably_heroic]

"Better, unless it paralyzes you," Atton said. "Right now what they need for you is to look strong while everyone under you picks up the pieces."

[notconflicted]

“That at least I’m good at,” Sia said, sipping from her glass. “Aside from me getting drunk in my quarters with you, but tomorrow will be another story.”

She always got back up until she couldn’t, after all.

[suitably_heroic]

"You can get drunk in your quarters with me as much as you need to," Atton said. "If it helps you get out there and pull those poor schuttas through this, all the better."

[notconflicted]

“You got surprisingly good at pep talks,” Sia noted. Maybe it wasn’t for everyone, but it was exactly what she needed to hear, at least.

[suitably_heroic]

"Uh... thanks," Atton said.

Had not seen that coming.

"For people who don't expect me to be nice, I guess."

[notconflicted]

“You’re honest. That’s more important than nice,” she said, and then, “Yes, I’m aware of the irony in that.”