Genuinely so happy I was able to have the motivation and energy to draw that going to bed a little late is worth it. I sat down and scribbled out a bunch of helmet ideas until I landed on that one! Is that a super refined piece? No but I DID it! I sat down and made art and it doesn't suck! The joy of creation or whatever
The black hole absorbing all that meets it’s path! Not even the market is safe from it’s overpowering reach! Get sucked into this kitty for exactly 0 dollars today!
The ragged gasp that betrays his true feelings on the matter is what sucks all of the tension out of the room, what allows Malavai to breathe himself, and for him to realize just how far this has spiraled.
Perhaps the past three weeks should have clued him in. How rigid he held himself, as if always on the edge of snapping if pushed too hard. Decisive, in a way that felt more like quick judgements than him truly knowing what he meant to do. And actions like these, where he’s cornered Malavai just for asking, prodding on whether he was truly as fine as he said he was.
It’s truly unsettling just how different the man in front of him is, and how much none of this is truly about him. He’d thought it had been. The anger that had crossed his face so suddenly upon the question, the briefest of mentions on how the search was going, had nearly gotten his skull split open on the wall. He knew where he stood with Zanya and figured this was expected. That this was a consequence of assuming too much.
Thought it’d been the result of six long years of some pent up and twisted revenge for his previous betrayal that he was finally taking out on him after his return from Iokath. A penance that he still had to pay, and yet, all it takes is one heavy intake of air for it all to click.
“You don’t want this.”
It’s a simply, four words. Five, if he wanted to be asinine about the contraction. But enough is said in a whisper to see the edges of his expression crack under the weight of the previous few weeks. The simmering gold of his irises shines slightly in the low light of the Fury’s overheads, a heavy contrast to the way his brows draw together in fury at the very notion.
“You. Do not know what I need.”
“Nor do you, I fear.”
His nails aren’t as sharp as they once were, he realizes when the grip on his jaw falters. They’re chipped in fact, he noticed when they first departed for the mission earlier today. Among the other oddities of his appearance, of course, its telling, metaphorically, to the way he’s shaved down his once-near-claws into something less predator-like. As if he wasn’t expecting to need them any time soon.
He’s softer around the edges. Or he had been, when he’d encountered him on Iokath. Malavai can still perceive these edges, except for where he’s intentionally put the plate armor back on. Where he’s hiding the most vulnerable parts of himself, notably over his chest and torso.
His nails still hurt, blunt or otherwise, when they dig into his skin, but the pain is dull in comparison to the anguish that roils under the facade he wears.
“I will not have the likes of you,” The forced emphasis makes him flinch, but his gaze does not waver. Unfortunately, it tells him everything. Tells him, that even with the conviction Zanya has right now, it isn’t fully honest. It isn’t what he really means, “Tell me what I want or what I should have. I am fine.”
This is usually where there would be an addendum. That he was Sith. That he was the Wrath. That he was the Empire personified. Or at least, that was how he remembered it. He can almost hear in the back of his mind how the cadence of his voice would flow like lava in righteous fury over a perceived slight at his person.
It doesn’t come.
He still feels slighted, clearly, but he doesn’t reach for his titles right away anymore. And Malavai is still off-balance in the new world order that revolves around a changed Zanya Ariidek. He moves to take his wrist, not enough to hurt, but enough to move his hand and release his face. He struggles for a moment, but eventually Zanya tears his hand out of his grasp. Rough, uncoordinated, unsteady.
“You are hurt,” He continues, the way one would notice a gash torn across skin or a bruise under a chestplate. The words feel like sandpaper in his mouth — to be attempting to talk Zanya of all people down is near disturbing, he’s never been in a position where he’s needed to do so and feels so wildly unsure of himself when he’s this volatile already. Any wrong move and this goes south faster than he can rectify it, “And you are lashing out.”
“I am not lashing out. I am well within control of my mental faculties, Quinn,” There’s a tightness in his throat that he can hear, when it sounds like he’s choking out sentences rather than speaking them fully. It’s distressing, when he notices that Zanya’s hand is shaking at his side. He can’t take another step closer, and the taut line of his lips dares to twitch, “I do not have regrets. You know this.”
“I know as well as you do that you are not yourself, and that perhaps, you should allow yourself the space to grieve rather than working until dawn,” Malavai breathes for what feels like the first time in hours when Zanya steps away from him, watching as he tenses under his armor set. The words feel wrong, and though he isn’t sensitive to the force, he can only imagine the storm that lingers just beyond his perception, “I would believe that anyone in your place, in your shoes, would understand that.”
“I am not going to grieve a man who has dug his own grave. He has made his decision,” Zanya won’t turn to face him when he rests his hands on the nearby table, and he’s left to only assume from his tone that while he doesn’t like what Malavai has said, that he may be right. It’s not hard to see from the way his shoulders creep upwards that the stress is drawing a deep crack down his psyche that’s threatening to snap completely, “He has made his decision and I will live with that because I am not weak enough to allow it to upend my life. I cannot afford such a thing.”
“I would say that no one on your inner council would blame you if you were to take some time away. To process it all. A betrayal like this, it’s —“ He finds it ironic that he’s the one saying this, squeezing his eyes shut while he settles the thought in his mind. Was there someone who said the same thing to him all those years ago, when he had done the same to Zanya? It curls like a barbed briar branch around his throat, “It isn’t your fault.”
“It is and I am tired of the half dozen people on base telling me it is not!” The common room furniture shudders under the weight of the outburst, not enough to break but enough to rattle just about everything nearby. A breath caught in his throat that sounds more like an uncharacteristic sob, “I failed. As the commander, I had a responsibility to the galaxy to bring peace. Stability. A future better than the one I had almost lead to ruin. That was my responsibility and through a thousand tiny cuts, my own blind spots and the fact I was unaware of such disapproval brewing beneath my own nose, I failed the galaxy. I failed the people closest to me and now the Alliance is paying for it.”
Another breath, “I may lose everything I built because of my own self-assurity. I will not be told there is nothing I could do when I should have done so much differently.”
It’s not his place. Really this is a conversation that Zanya should be having with Vette. Or Lana. Or perhaps even his siblings. Someone else who would understand that perspective. Someone closer to him that would be able to offer a perspective that would absolve him of the undue stress that he didn’t seem to deserve. Anyone else other than Malavai, who was part of the reason they were even here. What good his perspective would do would fall on deaf ears surely.
He stills his hand. Stays where he is, a few paces behind him. He could absolutely leave, as the others already have. Really, he should. But in some deep part of him that’s slowly been unearthed in past few weeks, he remembers that he hates to see Zanya crumple. As if the entire weight of the galaxy sat heavy on his shoulders, and he refused to let anyone else take it on. Of course he was still the same man he met on Balmorra and supported his campaign through to the end as the Wrath. The world had just changed, and Zanya had been forced to adapt.
Forced in a way that doesn’t truly feel fair to him.
“That isn’t fair.”
“It is. When I took the throne, I made a promise. That I would be better and rectify my mistakes where I made them. And I am unable to even do that, in the here and the now.”
The idea irks him, even if he doesn’t know where the annoyance comes from, “Self-flagellation rarely fits on anyone, much less you. The Alliance is what you created, not the Empire or the Republic. You cannot control what they do, nor what they don’t do.”
“Yet I—“
“You cannot blame yourself for the actions of an idealistic man unfairly scorned, regardless of whether you cared for him personally or not,” Malavai can only grit his teeth at that. Why does he feel a level of offended that is entirely undeserving for his station? He barely knew their traitor beyond a few weeks of interactions, “Agent Shan’s choices were his. You can only make your own, and deal with the consequences in the interim.”
Zanya’s grip on the table warps the edge of it when he says that, making Malavai flinch and think that he’s perhaps going to be shouted at for insubordination, maybe flung against a wall if he’d really done it this time, but all he can hear is the quiet sound of air cycling about the ship. The murmur of sentences he doesn’t catch on Zanya’s lips and the way that he sounds like he needs his respirator again. He’d used to carry an inhaler for him, but years spent apart had removed the habit from his routine.
He steps closer, to tell him as much, until he realizes he’s shaking, using the table for support with the way his weight is bowed forward. And there’s the quiet sound of water plinking onto the durasteel.
Tears.
The discomfort immediately crawls up his throat.
Malavai has never seen Zanya cry. The very thought is entirely incongruent with the person that he is. Not that he ever saw many emotions from him to begin with, but this was one that had never been on his expression when he served him before. He never would’ve allowed such a thing in his presence, the perceived weakness of the action would drive him directly up a wall. Zanya refused to be seen broken then, and considering just how tightly he’d clung to the routine of completing missions with ruthless efficiency as of lately, this was the result of desiring to still hold all those pieces to his chest.
So much had changed. And yet so much had stayed the same as well. He’s so far out of his depth that he no longer knows the man in front of him, but at the same moment, he recognizes him as still the same person he’d followed — cared for, for so long.
He rests a tentative hand on his shoulder, and though Zanya recoils at the touch, he settles a moment later. Leans every so slightly into it, if Malavai is particularly perceptive. His head is turned at an angle that Malavai cannot see his face, a curtain of hair shielding Zanya from having to look at him. He figures, even now, especially now, he is not privy to the things that he keeps closest to his heart.
“I will not let something this juvenile this destroy me.”
“I know you will not,” Malavai responds, “Each and every time you have returned stronger. This too will change you, but it will not break you. I am sure of it.”
A beat of silence passes, “I am undeserving of that confidence.”
“Perhaps. But you do deserve to know that you are not the sum of your consequences, rather your intentions. You have done all you can, and the galaxy will respond in kind,” Malavai continues, “The sooner you acknowledge that where your responsibility ends and others’ decisions begin are further than you realize, the more content you will be.”
“Quinn, that is a ridiculous notion.”
“Try as you may, I fear even you cannot pull the entire galaxy into a peaceful coexistence. It likely will not happen in our lifetime. It’s an ideal many of us cannot afford to have,” He’s more likely to believe that he’ll watch it implode upon itself, but figures this wasn’t the time to be that honest with Zanya, “I am meaning to say, allow yourself to be hurt by this. It does not demean you. And acknowledge that regardless of how many fault trees you torture yourself with, that you could not have seen this coming.”
A whisper, “I should have been able to. It is not the first time a lover has blindsided me in such a manner. I should know better.”
Malavai sucks in a breath. He can’t think of what to say for a moment at that. To think of the blaster scar that he still wears on his shoulder that belonged to the same protocol gun he used to carry, and the fact that wound still existed on his worldview as well pains him. And yet …
“His actions are not a reflection of you, or what you put into the relationship you shared,” He pauses, letting his thumb glide against his shoulder plate, “If I am not to overstep, he seemed to care a great deal for you. You knew better. And unfortunately it was taken advantage of.”
Zanya shudders, “And how easy it was to use that advantage on me.”
“If —“ He swallows thickly. Words he had never thought to say, in all of these years having thought that Zanya was gone spill out of what feels like a part of his soul, “If he felt, in anyway, the way I felt for you all of those years ago, then I can only imagine how excruciating it was to take that shot. To walk away from you. To turn his back on you. None of this absolves you of deserving to expect better from the things you put your heart into.”
Whether he believes him or not, or even if he likes that answer or not, Zanya can only make a noise of acknowledgement. His grip loosens on the table as he stands straighter, still ducking his head enough to remain almost entirely unseen. If Malavai looks just right, he can see the still watering eyeline of gold irises just beyond his auburn bangs. He certainly won’t look to him, but lingers his hand on Malavai’s forearm when he moves to remove it. He seems as if he wants to say something more, but decides against it at the last moment.
“Leave me. Be prepared to leave at 08:00 tomorrow.”
Malavai nods. Whether anything he’s said has mattered, he doesn’t know, but he takes it as a better sign that he isn’t be dismissed indefinitely, “As you wish.”
He’s halfway to the blastdoor when he hears the rough tone of Zanya’s voice come from behind him, “Thank you.”
He isn’t there when he turns over his shoulder, but the quiet footsteps padding away are enough to denote his presence. Malavai is still trying to determine the kind of man that Zanya is today, in comparison to the man he was so many years ago, but he figures this is the closest he’s going to get to understanding.
I wish all Black girls a clear shot at this world. I wish all Black girls a full belly. I wish all Black girls a respite from their many troubles. I wish all Black girls nothing but grace, prosperity, and ease. Black girls I am hoping for your continued safety and success every single day.
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