❝ so, what would you be? if you had to power to change all the things making you unhappy, what would your life look like? ❞ from the yearning prompts 👀👀
"I don't have time to write, its finals week" vs "the ONLY way I'll cope with this is writing for ME" fIGHT.
I stuck with it, I stuck with the established premise. The prompt didn't make it word for word into here, but it's more or less all there in what came naturally for Tyr being so damn stubborn about it. (F)
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“Legate.” Ardun’s voice carried the half-smile quirked across the older man’s face.
Something about it washed over him like a balm - maybe the familiarity, maybe the honesty in it… He wasn’t sure. Tyr propped a foot up on the lower bar of the railing as he leaned against it beside Ardun and followed his gaze back out to the docked Phantom. “Wasn’t sure I was ever going to hear that again,” he admitted.
“C’mon, kid.” Ardun grunted as he elbowed Tyr’s arm. “I haven’t turned into a ghost yet.”
A chuckle slipped out of the former Cipher. “Yet,” he said, “And don’t you start getting any ideas about it, either.”
“Ohh, I think I’ve got a few more years in me yet,” Ardun said. “I just got here, after all. I can’t leave you scrambling against this new Eternal Empire now, can I?”
Tyr smiled. “I hope not, old man. It was too damn good to see you, sir.”
Ardun huffed. “Careful, kid. I might accuse you of going soft.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it, sir.”
Tyr turned to put his back against the railing, leaning on arms propped against the top with one foot still cocked against the bottom rail. Ardun let his silence settle as he stared back towards the Alliance base.
They’d done well to turn this place into something functional on such a short time table. He’d caught enough whiffs of dissent in the ranks to know few had been pleased by the last five years, but dissatisfaction did not a rebellion itself make.
It was one hell of a mountain to overcome complacency and the way of things. They ought to know.
The Cipher’s gaze dropped, half-unfocused. “Never would’ve guessed this one all those years ago, huh?” Tyr mused.
“No.” Adrun pushed up stiffly. Damn age wasn’t making half of this shit any easier. “Would you believe me if I said it suits you?”
Tyr almost snorted. “Now who’s getting soft, Ardun?” He shook his head. “I’m not what they’re looking for,” he said. “But I can’t leave them.” Not that he’d been given a choice, he suspected. Lana would throw a fit if he admitted to half of his doubts, and that was to say nothing of Valkorian’s elusive motivations.
“Good leaders are rarely the ones jumping at the front of the line, Deckard.”
Tyr shook his head. “You know what I am, Ardun,” he said. “I’m a spy - a Cipher. I can get by on the battlefield, but being a leader? No. Lana’s put so much into this, so much into… me…” He frowned as his arms folded across his chest.
It didn’t make an ounce of sense.
“What about you, kid?” Ardun shifted, leaning back against one arm still propped on the railing to watch him.
“Sir?” Tyr’s brow furrowed. “I’m not sure I understand.”
“Deckard.” His voice dropped in a way that made Tyr avert his gaze. Ardun sighed. “Do yourself a favor and take a step back from the big picture. Nobody’s just going to wake up and take on the Eternal Empire. The Republic and the Sith Empire have been tryin’ for five years and haven’t done it. But you…”
Tyr puffed out a winded breath. “Hell, I don’t even know where to start…”
“Right here,” Ardun said with a shrug of one shoulder. “You’ve been through a lot, Tyr. It’s quiet here, for now. Take advantage of that.”
He shook his head again. “Ardun, no… I wouldn’t even know where to start. I dedicated my entire life to what I was in Intelligence and now-”
“Everything’s changed.” Ardun blinked and nodded slowly. “Trust me, kid. I know.”
“You already know I trust you,” Tyr muttered. He shifted to his feet and wrapped his arms across his chest.
“And how about yourself, Legate?”
Tyr chewed on his lip, eyes fixed on the ground.
“I wouldn’t have asked you for what you did if I didn’t believe you were at least a good spy, Deckard. But, more importantly, I still believe there’s a good man in there somewhere. Despite what you’ve gone through.”
“That man’s never been a constant, Ardun. You should know that.”
“And I’m sure he’ll change again,” he said. “It’s the nature of things, kid. Not just spies. But I’m not the one to ask for the poetic meaning of life. I’m just talking about you. What are you going to change if the whole damn galaxy’s already changing around you? You’ve got a whole world of opportunity here, Tyr. Make of it what you think is best - what you want.”
In theory, it was simple. Change was the nature of a Cipher - as much a chameleon as a viper in the grass.
Staying on that game had kept him alive. Against the fall of Imperial Intelligence, Marr’s metaphorical olive branch of directives had offered him a purpose in the churning, changing Imperial landscape as the wounds of war had still bled and festered. It’d kept him from being a dangerously untied end, though failure would have been no less tolerated.
Then Lana Beniko had entered his life and found perfect use for his skills. The weeks they had spent hunting, tracking, and manipulating on Rishi were perhaps some of the happiest - or at least most fulfilling - he’d had in…
He’d never bothered to keep count. He’d been too occupied trying to deal with the fallout of Intelligence dismantled around him, extracting revenge on Hunter for the way the galaxy swung on a nauseating pendulum and for dragging him around by the nose, and figuring out where it left him when the dust and smoke from blasters had all settled into the uneasy aftermath.
He’d never planned to stand against Darth Jadus, let alone the Immortal Sith Emperor himself.
‘Tyr Deckard’ was a convenience - as fleshed out as ‘the Red Blade’ had been on Hutta, or the scourge who had rallied a bunch of the Republic’s most dangerous criminals to a siege on Belsavis.
He shook his head again. “None of it’s really going to matter if we don’t deal with the Eternal Empire,” he said. “Whatever else I am or was, right now? This Alliance needs a rallying point. That’s going to have to be enough.”
Ardun frowned - face full of thoughtful, weary, worried lines and ridges. “I know, kid. Just… think about it, alright? Anybody can die for a cause, Legate. Greater and lesser men than us have. That never changed it’s nature. It was still just bloodshed.”
“I know.” More words minted more by a Cipher’s mask - instinct - than… whatever new truth had yet to come for them on the other side of this war. “Enough of this brooding nonsense though. I owe you a drink, you old bastard.”
He's... Passed out at his workbench. Again. How many times has he done this just this month alone? Probably too many. Sorry, Betty, your boyfriend is a workaholic. (aftcnrcbctics)
“ WILLIAAAAAM ~ !
Oh — “
Again ? Something must be up, he’s been passing out way too much lately.
Carefully slinking over to cuddle up beside him, the jolly clown nuzzle under his chin and whined, giving him a little shake,
“ Hey, bumblebee . . when’s the last time you’ve eaten, huh ? You don’t look too good . . “
a lazy roll of a curiously humming head lulls until coarse hairs on his chin find the soft tresses of the top of her head while he idly rubs at her sides, letting her use him as a laying spot. to be frank, it’s rude to stand up a pretty lady when she clears her schedule for you, but in his line of work, he can’t exactly ‘call in’ when his role in his organization is something of a crucial bit - especially when lives quite literally depend on him. even if they were skewed with questionable morals.
lips caress her scalp as calloused pads of thumbs find their way beneath the hem of her (actually, his) shirt, gently grazing against soft skin bruised from assaults from his mouths on prior eves.
“how about i make you dinner?” he asks, fingers splaying wide as his palm skates over her warm body, dipping beneath the elastic band of her pajama bottoms, suavely sliding over the pleasant curve of her ass that his palms help themselves full of as he gives her a firm, almost possessive squeeze. “you can bring the dessert - i think you know i’m quite the cake man, after all.”
