Vibrant Eyes | Din Djarin

43: begin.

The moment Ira loaded the blurrgs onto the Razor Crest, she knew what her role in this mission would play out to be. But she didn't really mind. If she was needed, she would know.

Otherwise, she would have a moment of solitude she never truly had in a very long time to meditate. The others could float off into the horizon, mingling with the lifeforce within them, and join the infinities of the stars around them. She would be with them, as she always was. 

One with the force and protected from the harshness of reality within its embrace.

Before they left, she made sure to tell the child to let her know, should he need help. When the ramp closed behind them, she patted around with her hands until she found a small cushion. She set it down facing the wall, just an arms-length from the top of the ramp were it to lower and lowered herself onto it.

Crossing her legs, closing her eyes, and releasing the Force caught within her breath and then exchanging it for more, she delved into the cosmos.

~*'*'*~

Ira opened her eyes a day later.

At first it was to a vague bleariness, a starker disconnect between the solid world and the Force at its core. For a moment she had to blink to clear her mind of whirling stars and whispering civilizations. Then she could sense it, what called to her in her state of nothing and everything, what pulled her back to her mortal body.

The cry of a child in fear.

Focusing on his fear, on the ground beneath her and the air in her lungs rather than the Force within it all, Ira attempted something she hadn't in many years. With tooth and claw, she crawled from the fog of her mind. Against all that intrinsically screamed to stay where it was safe, where the universe could no longer touch her, Ira broke free from the Force.

With her first clear mind in ten years came the first tear for what was lost long ago and nearly forgotten by one of the only people to ever remember it as it truly was. Her eyes stung and her throat nearly closed up. But Ira could not afford to be weak, not when Grogu sent thoughts barreling her way. The feel of being cradled in a soft blanket. The pounding of blurrg feet beneath them. The panic in Kuiil's voice and the roar of speeders approaching from behind.

Ira didn't waste a second. 

Wiping her eyes from the burn of tears and memories, she lowered the ramp at the same time she unclipped her lightsaber from her side and held it in her palm. As the opening lowered, she glanced down in the direction of the handle that fit so perfectly in her grasp. She could count on one hand the number of times she'd held it with any kind of intent in the last decade or so.

It felt right. But it felt wrong for it to feel that way. For everything to feel so right with the sign of what had been lost out for the entire universe to see. For the calm that came with terrible memories.

The shape of a blurrg ran for her, not far from the ship. Ira could make out the Ugnaught upon its back, the Force whirling in the child in his grasp, and something rushing through the Force behind them, closing in. She took one deep breath, centered herself with the air of life, death, reality, and everything... and then leaped.

Ira shot into the air and let its grasp cradle her in eternities of memory, her finger falling upon the switch of her lightsaber with half a thought. She spun in the air with a practiced ease of eons past, the world around her undoubtedly lit in shades of burning violet light. She cast every sense she had out to the world, registered it all, and acted accordingly.

Before she made it to them, she felt the blurrg die. She heard it crumple to the ground with the sound of two others falling beside it. She could sense other things, too. The blaster shots fired through the air, the beating of Kuiil's heart, and the intent to kill him from one of the three hunting them down.

The path of a single blaster shot carved its way through the world. Ira landed in a crouch, feeling more alive than she had since she was young. The energy of her lightsaber and the blade of blinding heat and infinite power found its way into the path of the shot. 

And Ira deflected it into the horizon with a skilled twirl of the wrist, lifting her chin and standing strong before the crumpled form of Kuiil.

His shock was... satisfying. So very satisfying. But the trooper's was even more so.

Rage of the kind long forgotten and dwindled into nothing rose as a tempest in her veins. It blinded her to her other senses, to the feel of something being scooped from the ground and two retreating life forms with another in their grasp. As she took a deep breath and let the tempest sweep her into its current and remembered a fire that once burned so bright.

One that would rage once more.

Ira threw her hand out and captured the trooper's speeder in her grasp. Without giving him a moment to breath, she yanked it from beneath him until it hovered idly at the ship's side. His armor clattered against the rough sand shifting beneath her feet and he gave a low groan.

Ira held him in place, walking to stand over his prone form. Then she tilted her head and smiled where she thought his face might have been.

The trooper cursed inside his helmet, "Ah, shit."

She drove her lightsaber into his chest without a word and watched the Force abandon his pitiful mortal form.

Someone grunted behind her. Ira froze and looked over her shoulder, remembering Kuiil so very suddenly. And with remembering him came remembering the child, the one whose presence she could no longer feel.

She switched her lightsaber off and clipped it to her belt as she turned around. "You are alright?" she hummed.

The Ugnuaght stayed silent.

"I know," she said, walking his way after giving the dead trooper a farewell kick. She stopped before where the Force gathered and swayed and extended her hand. "And you know as well, or enough. Yes?"

A hand grasped hers as he pulled himself up. "Yes."

"Hmm. Come, we will get IG to seal that cut."

"How did you—"

Ira walked back to the ship. "I sense more than it seems."

Kuiil followed. They got IG-11 to administer bacta spray on a nasty cut he'd received from scraping against the ground. They sealed the Razor Crest with him inside. Then as the IG unit ran after the kid, Ira mounted her newly acquired speeder and followed, intent to remember the feel of this rage.

To let it burn once more.