Star Wars: Conflict

Chapter 8

"How'd you know I had the location, the answers?" Tammy asked Aurra, walking through a daunting alleyway, hapless hobos and drunkards surrounding its corners and edges.

"You haven't forgotten I have the Force" Sing Replied.

Something trickled in Tammy's mind, a spark of Aurra's past. It was hazy, blurred, and disjointed. The only decisive idea Tammy could quickly salvage amidst those words, was The Force.

The Force. Fields of Force. Wavelengths. Energy. History. Past. Present. Future. Emotions. Pain.

Tammy Sikar reminisced of her own past, with her own, uncanny power. Its eerie existence never ceased to haunt her. Despite Tammy's errant mind, land-loping to her own past, she shifted back, towards Aurra.

"Why are you hunting her?" She directly demanded. "Why do you want to kill Ahsoka, anyway?"

Aurra twitched, gritting her perfectly white teeth, and slowly stopped her tapping boots from their active motion.

"Not only had that insipid vermin nearly killed me, but she had me arrested, as well." Aurra's palms began to clench in on themselves, digging their sharp nails into Aurra's cold palms. "Each time that--that fatuous Padawan would show up, she ruined my plans; she ruined me." Aurra turned her chin upwards, gazing towards an elongated alleyway, her path, and smirked "And, I intend on ruining her." The magnanimous Aurra said, maliciously smiling.

Perplexed, Tammy could sense the gravity of Aurra's hatred, and crippling lust for revenge. When Ahsoka put Aurra in prison, it gave her time to plan, to think, and to hate. Day and night had Aurra sat within her cell, dreaming of the day she was let out of that scum-infested hull. The day she broke out was the day her plan was complete. Aurra would continue to partake in bounty hunts, getting her closer and closer to the needed credits, equipment, and information to track down the Padawan.

On one mission, Aurra, accompanying other bounty hunters, held the senate hostage, in an attempt to free Ziro the Hutt, a sealed, greasy Hutt, formally in league with the decadent Count Dooku. Aurra knew the Jedi were closely tied to certain Senators, especially Padme Amidala, in which she also knew Ahoksa had a tied relationship with the senator, having fought against the two in an attempt to murder to Senator, herself. Each attempt drew Aurra all the more closer to where she is, now.

"Can't you feel it, Tammy?" Aurra dabbled two left fingers on her tongue, and lightly rose them from her lips, feeling the wind move in her favor. "We're coming near our end, her end." She exclaimed, "I know we're near, and soon, it will all be over." Aurra turned towards Tammy, fearfully listening, and smiled brightly, twitching her fingers hither through the wind, as it led her down the alleyway, and closer to her past, closer to Ahsoka.

As the two Bounty Hunters staggered from the night's rain puddles, Tammy couldn't help but hone her thought on her own past. She submissively bit her lips, yet let out a fluent, revealing roar.

"Aurra, I was once called a witch." Tammy scarcely breathed, "My parents, my town, didn't know what I was, what my power was. They thought I was a Nightsister. They didn't know what I was, and for that, they hated me." She disclosed, "But, even after they forbade me as their own daughter, and rebuked me as a human, I learned to forgive them, even when they didn't that know what they were doing, was wrong. They were scared, and I know you are, too." Tammy's voice again bolstered her thoughts, "But, I know you can forgive, as I have."

Aurra's eyes grew ablaze, and her fists clenched within themselves, again.

Tammy fiddled with Aurra's abhorrence, continuing, "You may not believe me, at least not now. But, it's surprising how cleansing love can be. Sometimes, it's a greater weapon than any blaster. My family may still hate me, but it doesn't hurt, because I know I forgave them, a long time ago." She carefully smiled, "My battle's over, because I know, one day, they'll realize how their hatred, and my hatred will only stir up strife; that's all it's ever good for. But, my love covers all offenses."

Aurra found herself lost, betwix, unexpectedly open to something. Perhaps.

A voice sprang from the darkness, from a corner.
"That's where you're wrong, bounty hunter."

Tammy was interrupted by a bizarre, strange, seasoned laughter, lurking behind a pile of dusty boxes and abandoned crates. A neimoidian rose from those crates, and nebulously stared at Tammy.

"Ha, ha ha haaa" he coughed, "If we don't decimate our demons, they will continue to decimate us... Forgiveness will only prolong the inevitable; it will not change it!" He grinned, "If we forgive others, we'll have to do it again, and again, and again, and again..." He went on, belaboring that thought.

"That's where you're wrong, neimoidian." Tammy, annoyed by the creature's outburst, replied, "Forgiveness isn't an enclosed statement; sometimes we need to forgive as many times as it takes, to get the message in someone's head."

"Your head?" The neimoidian laughed, fixing his position, "You see, when you keep on doing that, you begin to loose your head." He said. "We are so controlled by clocks; aren't we? Such a small thing, and it commands us to do things, sometimes grabbing us by the throat, screaming: Tick Tock, Tick Tock. Ah, ha ha ha." The neimoidian sadistically chuckled.
He glanced over, at Aurra, "You see, young one, time is running out. Our past isn't what shapes us, no, it's what destroys us. Our own avidity inspires us to so desire to go back, and undo the already done. Listen" he paused, eyes wandering, "can you not hear it tick? As the trod upon heart of the clock still beats, go; find your past, my dear, and eliminate it."

"Who are you?" Tammy Sikar disapprovingly asked, unamused.

The rotten neimoidian placed his arm atop a filthy, dusty crate, and said his name was Mar Tuuk, a former Separatist military strategist, now a ruined, trod-upon hopeless, searching for revenge.

Tammy, unimpressed with the gross neimoidian's status, questioned, "And, what experience with revenge do you have, old man?"

"Anakin Skywalker; he ruined me, my reputation. He destroyed my chances of becoming greater, and I know that if I let him continue to do what he has done, he will kill me. Heh, ha ha, hah." The neimoidian chuckled once again, moving his eyes to and fro, between Tammy and Aurra, rapidly.

Tsmmy lifted one caressed eyebrow, asking, "And once you have killed Skywalker, you have eliminated what he's done?"

"I'm still trying." the neimoidian said, and adjusted his positions again, raising his arm, "Go now, my sweet." His shaking, fleshy hand pointed at Aurra, "Do what must be done, and destroy your past."

Aurra heard what the Nemodian said, and as she left, continuing, his words rang throughout her ears. She would kill Ahsoka.