Immediately, the odd colorful figure scurried after Savi from his place in the brush, backtracking barely long enough to haphazardly try to collect dropped fruits and pencils on his way, as if he has to remember them from immediately following her bidding. He knelt on the ground as she sat on the log, looking far more obedient and trained than her char hound, and looked up at her expectant for a permissive cue.
She watched him as he came along, collecting his things. Then, she nodded upon realizing he was waiting for her permission to sit. Once he was sitting next to her, Savi stared him in the face for a few, long moments. It seemed they were both interested in the other’s features and physiology.
“Do you like to draw?” asked Savi while gesturing toward his pencils.
It took the other a moment longer to realize her nod indicating the spot next to her, but when he did he shimmied up onto the long and perched there, equally examining her curiously but never with eye contact until she spoke again.
“Yes, Mistress– er, Mast…mrr,” he trailed off. “Um. This one I draw plants. Botanical studies. It is primarily medical journaling but also herbalist recordings. These are for notes.”
With a clear struggle but intent order of operations to the process, he set down all of his fruits one by one, passing from the cradle of what seemed up close to be a half arm, to palm to tail to the ground. Then he placed down the pencils, then drew out one of apparently several journals. He opened it with a flick of wrist and shake and thumbed a page to present to her.
Therein was a detailed etching of a tree not unlike the ones nearby. It broke down further into the leaves and individual components of them, sex organs and roots and such. The fruits he was carrying were also depicted in similar detail. Notes in neat scratch were cramped shoulder to shoulder in the margins.
He balanced that in his lap then pulled out another.
“Plants are this one’s joy and its family’s way. But also I am learning many things. Primarily of laws and behavioral codes and the new rules, as aforementioned. Such as restrictions on nudity in public places, definitions of various sorts of crimes, what ‘pasta’ is, building sandcastles, and so forth. Does this answer Mistre– you?”
Savi blinked. He didn’t know what pasta was? What a shame. Few things tasted as good as a savory bowl of pasta, especially with season meats tossed in.
“Yes, that’s a good answer,” they replied, folding one leg over their knee while observing him. “And what is your name, my colorful friend?”
The man seemed to shine under their praise – literally, his hair and lashes glinting and glittering in the light, and his smile beamed across his whole face, a blush of pink and gold shimmer gathering over freckles and about floret scales. He quivered in his seat.
“We are friends?” he gasped, delighted and amazed by the ease. But then, his other friends, he had but been offered or asked with most tremulous hope. The smile was squashing his gold eyes shut. “This one is designated Senth Pen–um, er, I am also named Rue! Who are you?”
What a fascinating physical reaction. Savi watched him for a moment, observing with a curious expression how shifting colors moved across his hair and skin.
“We could be,” they replied, briefly shifting their attention to their Xolotl. The charhound had seemingly caught the trail of some small animal that it was now stalking after – not to eat, but simply to play with. They shifted their attention back to Rue. “Call me Savi.”
“Savi,” Rue echoed, testing and repeating it as they said it. “Savi…Savi. This sounds so familiar, as if heard before…”
He pondered a moment, but couldn’t recall. Perhaps it would come back to him. Or perhaps he was conflating it with one of so many names over the years, like Salvia…
Shaking himself, he smiled again at the possibility of a friend and of learning. Flipping to a new page in the notebook, he pinned it down with his arm stump and primed a pen to write.
“Well then, Savi, if this one may ask…you called yourself Shani? This is the species?”
Savi nodded. “Yes. We Shani are a very, very old species. Not as commonly seen in these parts as other species are.
"And you seem to be a mix of things, right? A hybrid?”
“Yes, Mistress Savi,” said hybrid answered promptly. He twisted at the waist and lifted his single hand, drawing back the curtain of his scintillating braid to bare the nape of his neck. There were silvery, faintly metallic ridges of raised skin, perfectly smooth and beveled in the way only a brand could be, so old the edges had lost any pucker. In print-perfect machined script it read: SP-FKRD-29-0034991.
“This one’s main genetic components are a mixture of Fierrero, Kessurian, Ryn, and Dowutan DNA. There are other pieces in the code, but these are the primary, particularly the first three, that this one was created to experiment with.”
Savi had heard of genetic engineering before, even gone on missions meant to either support or stifle such work in the galaxy, but they’d never stopped to talk to a product of it. Especially one who was seemingly a mix of so many different species. The branding on the back of his neck and his supplicant nature suggested that his … upbringing, had been an unpleasant one. How sad.
They forced themselves to smile, showing off the pointed fangs that hung lower than the rest of their teeth. “Do you know what that means, Rue?” asked Savi, “It means you’re one of a kind.”
The hybrid had made a mrp noise not unlike some the Shani had heard from small and curious furry animals intrigued by prey out of reach at the sight of her teeth. He stuck his face a bit closer, peering, and was briefly distracted enough from her statement to absently correct it, “That is untrue, Mistress. This one’s genetic code, upon extensive assessment of successful viability, was used many times over in successive modified experimentations in order to further perfect a specimen for Lord God, of course. Few other recombinants survived as long as this one has; though this one is riddled with failures, yes, its durability has been an achievement for the Masters.”
He hummed, and started writing in that notebook, titling the page, so she could see looking inverted, with her species name and beginning a general physical description in rather scientific terms.
Savi nodded, though her expression didn’t change upon hearing what he had to say.
“And my anatomy isn’t unique amongst my species, yet I am still me and not them. And you are still uniquely, you. There are no other Rues, right?”
He paused at that, glancing up and then bowing his head in concession.
“Perhaps not, Mistress Savi. This one does not know if any others in all the Galaxy have been named Rue in all of time.” His thumb brushed the page. “It is much larger out here than this one’s learning could ever prepare for. And time is very, very long.”
He met her eyes again, and there was an age in his stare the Shani might recognize. An old, old sadness, but the hybrid smiled with it, genuinely.
“I have born and lost so many litluns. So many others. Generations. Why do I live still, when they deteriorated or were terminated? I do not know. The Master wished to discover it, and left that work to his daughter when he died. They wanted another to have the same powers the Goddess granted this one but without all this one’s other failings and ineptitudes of physicality and intelligence. A more perfect vessel. But they just…” his gaze grew faraway, and he looked off into the greenery, lifting his face to the sunlight and closing his eyes. Tears tracked free shamelessly, and he blinked before shaking his head. “…did not last. And this one remains. Uniquely itself. There are perhaps other Rues. But only this one barcode.”
Had the saffron-skinned femme not spent so much time learning how to mask their innermost feelings, then Rue’s words likely would have cracked Savi’s mask of cool indifference. They allowed themselves to feel the pang of aching empathy for the man who sat before them with tears on his face, but they didn’t dare show anything other than the same curious, if not benignly predatory look they often wore on their tattooed countenance. But Savi’s words told another story.
“You’re a survivor. Just like me,” they said with a soft shrug of the shoulders, looking away to regard their chimeric charhound as it ran around in its own little world. “Why I made it this far is a mystery to me. Never was the strongest nor the smartest. The luckiest, maybe? Whatever it is, I’m the only one who remains. A relic of a bygone era.”
The commentary drew Rue’s attention more back to the present, and his grip on his pen took up again. “Is this a literal statement? Miss Savi is the last remaining of their species? Are you very long-lived? That is why this one’s genetics include Dowutan code. Their telomeres degrade at a rate significantly slower than any other species the Masters sampled and most of the catalogued Galactic species. The goal is immortality.” He blinked at her, and a troubled cloud crossed his floral features. His next words were very grave and very kind. “This one is grateful the Masters did not find you, Miss Savi. The Mother Goddess guards your steps.”
Savi shook their head upon realizing their error. “No, I’m not the last Shani. At least I don’t think so. We’re a solitary species, so I haven’t seen another one for a few decades at least, but we’ve never been endangered. I meant that I’m the last of the group who I once called my friends and family.
"And yes, we are a long-lived species. I’m just under twenty years shy of three centuries.”
Although they didn’t know who this “Mother Goddess” was, Savran recognized a prayer in earnest.
“Thank you, Rue. And I’m glad you managed to get away from them.”
Rue nodded as he wrote a note down and scratched through a question, correcting it: near extinct? Solitary.
Can live for centuries.
His scribbling slowed though at her kindness to him in response. His grip turned white-knuckled.
“This one shouldn’t have,” he whispered suddenly, looking down and away, shoulders drawing up into stooped points.
“Why do you say that?” questioned Savi, lowering herself a bit to capture his gaze. “You have a right to desire your own freedom, to fight for it. Doesn’t matter why you want to be free, either.”
They shrugged their shoulders. “I broke out of supermax lock up in Coruscant, once. Plenty of people would say I shouldn’t have, either. That I should have served my entire sentence, but there was no way in the hells I was going to do that.”
Saffron eyes struggled briefly up then away again, skittish. He didn’t know what a supermax was, and focused on answering, growing paler and trembling. “This one did not want to be…‘free.’ It is…it belongs where it did. This is God’s will. It disobeyed that will, because it had to warn a frie– a…a someone it knew once. But that warning was for little. And the person is alright. And this one does not belong here. And it needs to be there for others it left behind.”
Savi scooted forward a bit and reached out their hand, the back of which was covered in the complex tribal tattoos of their people. “Take my hand, Rue,” they said, “If you’re comfortable with that, of course.”
The hybrid offered his own immediately, with the speed of one used to complying with orders like breathing air, and set it in Savi’s palm.
Savi took Rue’s hand into their palm and placed their hand on top of it, gripping firmly while holding his gaze.
“You’ve been gifted a shot at being free, and that’s priceless,” they explained, “You may not see it that way now, but this is an opportunity you can’t pass up. And there are people here who can help the ones you left behind. Your friends.”
Saffron eyes obviously struggled to hold hers, but the hybrid did try, clear as it was that Savi demanded his attention. Her words gave him pause, and he swallowed convulsively, shaking like the leaves around them in much stronger winds than the mild summer breezes lazing along the warm ocean.
“‘…help?’” he echoed, seemingly at a loss to convey more.
Savi nodded. “Yes. There are people here who care a great deal about stopping bad people. Making sure that they can’t victimize people who don’t deserve it.”
They used to care a lot more about that sort of thing, when they were still a young, naive Jedi padawan. Before they came to realize how the galaxy really worked. Or perhaps before the galaxy wore down their spirit? They weren’t sure, but they knew that idealism like that was still important.
Rue’s moorless expression focused somewhat, the glassy panic of his disobedience briefly stymied with something familiar.
“…yes, this one knows of this thing. Miss Elly does this work. She is a lawyer,” he mumbled, then grew quiet again. If Savi let him lapse, then he would eventually muster, a fervent whisper as a prayer for salvation, “God is absolute. The Masters and Mistresses are most high and holy. Must be obeyed. Our purpose is to serve. This is not to be stopped.”
“No one is absolute, Rue. Everyone dies, even ‘gods’,” she replied calmly, giving his hand a squeeze.
At that Rue fiercely shook his head, retracting bodily away from her and back down onto the forest floor, though his hand remained in her grasp as if he could not remove it; would not, without her allowing it. But there in the dirt he contorted to bend low and kiss the earth, prostrating himself in frantic fervor.
“No no no no no,” he was muttering quickly. “No, that’s wrong, that’s wrong, God cannot die, God is eternal, no no no no. Please God, please, she knows not what hersey she speaks, it is ignorance, punish this one instead, punish this one for not being strong enough, Mighty Blade, oh God.”
“Hey,” they said, giving his hand another squeeze and tugging at it to coax him into standing up. This was not what they signed up for, but they couldn’t help but feel a bit guilty about triggering this reaction in him.
“Look, I’m sorry what I said. I didn’t mean to offend, okay? Just stand up, will you?”
“Yes, Mistress,” the hybrid gasped in ardent desperation. He stood immediately, hand limp in her grasp, head bowed.
She released his hand and instead motioned to place a hand on Rue’s back while standing up.
“Would you like to take a walk? It’s a beautiful day out.”
The hybrid couched a flinch for that touch, but nodded quickly. “Yes, Mistress, of course, Mistress.”
The Shani’s tattooed lips pulled into a smile as they rose to their feet. “Excellent,” they said, offering their arm in a gesture to loop their together as they walked. A quick click of their teeth prompted Xolotl to snap his head up in attention. The chimeric charhound trotted behind them.
“Have you enjoyed Selen so far, Rue? I adore the weather here. It’s a lot like my home planet, in both climate and culture, surprisingly.”
Rue walked beside the Shani delicately, subservient and pliant as possible, always just a half step behind her own in display of deference. Nonetheless as they walked he seemed to unclench ever so slightly from his god-fearing horror, and took immediately to answering them promptly.
“Yes, Mistress,” he chirped, finally lifting his head from its fixed state downward to turn his face to the sun. His eyes fluttered as they walked, lashes struck my sunlight casting violet, gold, and crimson glints across his cheeks, brows glimmering, hair shimmering. He smiled. “It is. Very warm. And that is Nice. This one only ever knew cold, for the most part. Here there is sunlight. It is wonderful. More than this one’s paltry words can describe.” He glanced back down, but only to Savi’s tattooed throat, not her eyes. “Does Mistress miss her home planet? This one misses home.”
“It is lovely, indeed,” they replied while glancing up toward the sun, their slitted pupils narrowing to occlude more light from entering their eyes, “Cold planets and I don’t mix, being an ectothermic species and all. The Force helps with that, at least.”
Upon hearing Rue’s question, Savi paused to consider their answer. The truth was that they didn’t think of Tamoat often, but they could still feel the heat of its three suns against their skin now that it was on their mind.
“I miss some things about it: being able to see three suns hang in the sky, the earthy smell of our settlements, to taste the pristine waters of the rivers that ran through the heart of my people’s kingdom,” they replied.
“Ectothermic species…” Rue echoed, evidently noting this information for his originally proposed documentation later; it was not as if he could write while walking arm in arm with Savi. But he was otherwise quiet as he listened further to the Shani’s musings, respectfully rapt.
“This one has never seen three suns. It sounds as though your kingdom was very beautiful,” he replied demurely at last. For a moment there was quiet as he considered what next to ask, to press about their home or their species. He settled in the middle for something they had mentioned: “Is Mistress’ species inherently Force Sensitive?”
Savi shook their head. “Based on how big of a deal it was when I was discovered to be Force sensitive, no, we’re not. It’s considered a gift from the gods, at least I think it was … it’s been far too long since I thought about it all.”
They lifted their shoulders in a gentle shrug before turning their head to smile at him. “You know, no one ever asks me about my planet or my people. Thank you.”
“It is a gift from the gods…” Rue murmured, that reverence back. “God or the Goddess, as this one’s abilities, and Grandmother’s before him.” At the smile, he shyly gave one back. “Thank you for telling me. Not only will any information about your people be critical in healing you or any of your species, but to be entrusted the stories of yours is a great honor. This one will treasure them.”
“You’re sweet, Rue,” Savi replied while gently patting his arm. As they came along a small stream running alongside the winding path, they stopped to listen to the sound of the water gliding through the channel.
“So, you’re a healer?”
The hybrid merely ducked his head, giving a demure purr to the pat and praise. He basked too in the calm water’s endless song.
“Yes, Mistress. This one is allowed by the Goddess to channel Her gifts of life. It can heal most injuries and ailments to others or itself. Additionally, it is learned of medicine, surgery, pathologies, biology, anatomy…” he rattled off a few other similar topics, “among other sciences and such. This one’s grandmother emphasized the practices of herbal medicines, which this one holds most dear as well. It was rarely permitted to use its gifts or this knowledge, but now it is here, it wishes to do all it can to heal any harm it bears to witness.”
“Funny,” they said while reaching down to pluck a small knife that had been hidden somewhere on their person, “I’ve only ever been good at destroying things, not putting them back together.” The shani’s tattooed lips pulled into a bittersweet smile as they mused. Would things have been different if Master Jal had survived? Probably so, but they liked who they were now, even if being reminded of how things could have been stung a bit sometimes.
Rue gave a small gasp of surprise at the flourish of the blade. He stiffened and shied from it, though not letting go of Savi’s arm – or rather not pulling away when she was holding it, as if not allowed. He went much stiller, as though waiting for something, breath shallow. But when nothing immediately happened, he wet his lips and asked a trembling, “Is this so? Mistress has seemed kindly to this one. Not destructive.”
Savran’s eyes, ever acute, noticed the sudden change in Rue’s demeanor following her brandishing the knife. It was instinctual, visceral – the kind of reaction that came from having it hammered (or perhaps, cut) into one’s mind repeatedly. They knew that all too well. How often had they caught themselves checking the entrances and exits of any room they came into, ever wary of the sight of goons dressed in white plastoid armor long after the Empire’s demise? Too many. A pang of empathy rippled through them, enough of an impetus for them to put the knife away lest they continue to disquiet their new companion.
“Sorry,” they said, giving his arm a gentle caress to ease any discomfort he felt, “I’m kind to you, Rue, because you’ve extended the same courtesy. My enemies see a very different version of me.”
Rue relaxed the barest amount with the knife disappeared from view, helped by it despite now knowing it was there. The soft squeeze caused an initial flinch, though it was followed by Rue actually tucking closer to Savi’s side, as if hiding against them.
“Mistress need not apologize. Mistress did no wrong,” he whispered. Then, raising his eyes again, his saffron gaze held a sadness, a haunting, as he asked, “Mistress has enemies as well?” There was a note of despair. “It seems as though here in the outside, everyone has ‘enemies ’. Everyone wants… violence. It is not right. I. I think I h-hate that. I think–” His gaze dropped, and his hold tightened, and he shook his head almost violently in rejection of the emotion. “But I do not want my friends to be hurt. I do not want you to be hurt. I would protect Mistress however I can.”
“Apologizing isn’t always an admission of wrongdoing, Rue,” Savi replied, adopting a somewhat maternal tone (at least, as maternal tone as one like Savran Has could hope to adopt) when addressing him, “Sometimes, you just recognize that you did something to upset someone and want to make up for that. Even if you technically did nothing wrong.
"And yes, I have enemies. Some due to know fault of my own, others who are right to hate me. I would be a hypocrite if I said that part of me doesn’t enjoy … well, violence, in some form or another. But only against people who deserve it.”
They shrugged their shoulders.
“You needn’t worry about protecting me, though your willingness to do so for someone who was a total stranger not that along ago is admirable. But tell me, if you’re off protecting all these people, who will protect you?”
Rue seemed to mull on Savran’s words for a long, pensive moment: on their admission of enjoying the violence; on the differentiation between wrongdoing and not…the idea of not being in the wrong for something at all; on Savi’s enemies, rightful or otherwise; and on their question.
“Hunyi,” he answered. “She protects me. And Elly. And…another friend. They are all very kind to me. Like you. Before that, no one. This one was not to be protected. Anything done to it was meant to be. It had purpose. It is what this one was meant for. It was right.” He lapsed into further quiet, gaze faraway again. Then, extremely soft, the barest whisper, “Grandmother tried to make happiness amidst it. And I. I tried to do the same. T-to protect where I could, when I could. My litluns. But. But then. Things changed. But this one. It’s. I wasn’t. They– he–”
He stopped suddenly, clenching tighter.
“ʰᵉ ˡᶦᵏᵉᵈ ᵏⁿᶦᵛᵉˢ too.”
Savran stopped and turned to face Rue completely. They looked at him square in the eyes before opening their arms for a hug. “It’s okay, Rue. You did what you could, and that is commendable. And you’re safe now.”
For a heartbeat, Rue was still.
Then, he loosed a soft sob and ducked into Savran full on, right into their open arms, completely trusting as he cried into their collarbone – the degree he was able to naturally hunch was uncomfortable as it was angering, with a guess as to why his very spinal curvature was so stooped towards servile. They were able then to actually feel how thin he was, under those flowing and flowery clothes, every bone barely padded, every joint a sharp, exposed knob, an exposed nerve. He trembled like a leaf, like the leaves he bore on his twice-knotted belt, but aside from that single, broken noise, he was completely and utterly silent as he wept, obviously not to draw attention, remaining limbs all scrunched close and tail cinching around his leg.
.
Savi enclosed their arms around his tall, gaunt frame and gave him a gentle squeeze while letting him sob quietly in their arms. They weren’t the best with words, especially when consoling people who were as upset as he was, so they instead offered their presence. That was the least they could do when they were at least partly responsible for how he felt now.
“There, there, Rue,” they said while rubbing his back, “I’m here.”
And with him they remained. For as long as he needed, for as long as it took him to regain his composure. And once he had, they resumed their walk through the wilderness, enjoying the sights and making note of the assorted colorful plant life and the occasional animal that scurried by before disappearing into the brush again. Their meeting had been a welcome change of pace from how Savi usually spent their free time. They would certainly have to do this again soon.