Unexpected Visit

[GM Craig]

Trax returns to the quarters he's sharing with Nim to find the door open. Glancing in quickly, he sees an unexpected sight. Maris Brood is sitting on the floor in the corner opposite the bed. Her head is down, and her knees are drawn up to her chest. She is hugging her knees. She looks up as you enter, and you can see her eyes are red and puffy.

She quickly holds up a hand, palm out, and blurts out, "I didn't think you'd talk to me any other way!"

A quick glance shows nothing in the room has been disturbed.

[Trax]

Trax really wanted to be pissed off, Maris had not only undeniably kicked his ass and threatened him, but now she'd come in to what he considered a personal space.  But seeing her there  huddled in the corner, she didn't look like the monster he'd seen on the Rogue Shadow, she looked like a scared young girl.  And that caught Trax completely off guard.

I need to start locking the door. he thought as he entered the room.  With few options for sitting he sat down on the bed.  After a few moments of just looking at her he finally spoke.

"Wasn't aware we had anything to talk about," he began, his voice was calm.  He was certain they'd both made their positions very clear on the Rogue Shadow.

"But I guess I was wrong."  He watched her for a few seconds, trying to decide how he really felt at the moment.  Without coming to a decision he took a deep breath and spoke again.

"What is it you want to talk about?"

[GM Craig]

You note she is careful to move slowly as she returns her arm to hugging her knees.

"I wanted... I... I didn't ..." She swallows, takes a breath. She she speaks, it is hesitant, tentative. "I want to apologize. For my behaviour.  On the Rogue Shadow. I..." She lowers her face and shakes her head. "I shouldn't have allowed myself to become angry. I shouldn't have threatened you."

She looks up, still hugging her knees. "It was wrong. I am sorry."

[Trax]

"You shouldn't have even been involved..." Trax stopped, hearing his voice slowly begin to rise.  He took a calming breath.  Looking like a scared child or not, he knew full well she could kill him before he'd even known what was happening.  And his pistols were at the bottom of his bag with no power packs in the room.  Nim seemed better on the meds, but he wasn't taking any chances.

"Do you know?  Did Nim tell you what's going on with her?" he said, his voice having returned to a calmer tone.

[GM Craig]

She definitely recoiled from the rising voice. She visibly forces herself to relax as your tone backs off a little.

She shrugs in answer to your question. You are struck by how young she seems.

"We didn't get into the gory details, but I know she's going through withdrawal, and why, and what she wanted to do. What she tried to do before. I've seen her scars."

She glances at your bag. "Would you feel better with your guns? I know you want them." There's something odd about her tone when she asks that. Sadness? Her lip quivers.

She looks up at you. "I don't have any weapons - though I suppose that doesn't ..." Her voice trails off, and she lapses into silence.

[Trax]

"Mean I wouldn't probably be dead before I could draw one of them." Trax finished her sentence as he saw fit.  Her tone had registered with him but she'd hit something of a button.

"You?re not the first jedi to threaten or attack me, I know my odds." His voice stayed relatively calm, but there was now a definite note of anger in his tone.

"I've been left for dead by one of your kind even before that one on the station tossed her saber around and gutted a bunch of us."  Trax's hands involuntary tightened into fists at the memory of seeing Nim lying on the floor of the station.  It was only because his right hand began to hurt more than the left from clenching so tightly that he realized he'd done it.  He looked at his left hand and began to relax, slowly moving the fingers of his left hand, acutely aware of the muted sensations.

[GM Craig]

Her tone gets quiet. She responds to your anger with a sneer. "Well I guess we have that in common then..."

She slides up the wall, and crosses her arms in front of her. "... because 'your kind' have been trying to kill me since ..."

She stops, shakes her head, and draws a shaky breath. She shakes out her arms and rolls her shoulders. Her voice is artificially calm as she holds up her hands, palms out, and she says, "I just came here to apologize."

[Trax]

Maris' words made Trax focus on what the woman had said on the Rogue Shadow.

"Since you were five." he once again completed her sentence, without looking up at her.  He squeezed and relaxed his left hand once more before turning to her.

"Why?" he asked with all sincerity and curiosity. "Why did you come to apologize?"

[GM Craig]

She looks at Trax, hovering between anger and remorse. She holds his eyes a couple of seconds before she blinks, looks away and takes a breath before looking at you again. "Because I'm ... trying to be... better..." A pause. "... than I..." A longer pause, then she looks away before continuing in a quiet voice, "... than I am."

[Trax]

"As long as..." he cut himself off as he mumbled to himself.  The man stood up and took a few steps towards Maris.

"Look, I'm not angry that you handed my ass to me.  I've been beat or left for dead more times than I care to admit.  That's just how life goes, sometimes you get to do the beating, sometimes you're the one that gets the beating.  It's that you inserted yourself into a situation you didn't understand." Trax paused, as if about to say something but changed his mind.

"But I get it, your experience with hunters hasn't exactly been pleasant.  And I doubt I'm any better than the ones you've run into.

I never thought you owed me an apology, but I'll accept the one you've offered."

[GM Craig]

She looks like she's ready to argue, but shakes her head as if throwing off thoughts.

She is firm as she says, "It doesn't matter if you thought I needed to. I needed to. And your acceptance wasn't expected, nor required." Her voice softens a little as she adds, "But I'll take it."

She hesitates. "You're not..."

She stops, clamps her lips together, and looks away suddenly. "Thank you," she says without looking at you. She then moves quickly for the doorway, almost as if she were running away, and melts away into nothing as she crosses the threshold.

[Trax]

Why offer an apology if you didn't expect it was required, or need it to be accepted? Trax wondered as Maris vanished.  He took a deep breath, it was odd, she was something of a contradiction.  He'd experienced first hand the monster that was a jedi.  But he'd seen something else just now, a scared young girl.  He wasn't quite sure how to process that.

He looked at the door and wondered if a lock would do any good.