Bankor

"Sister Mazakin," Garth called out as he followed the local woman from the Command meeting.

"Ah was hopin' to speak wi' ya fer a few minutes, if that were alright. Ah..ah want to know more about the Way."

The woman was working to balance herself on a rock in a one handed hand stand as she said to Garth in Huttese, “You want to know more? Why do you want to know more? Perhaps you should know less. Less may be better for you.”

"Mebbe, but the path ah walk may not permit me the luxury of ignorance. Ah've been told ah'm touched by th' Force, but too old for the Jedi t' train."

He approaches the mystic native slowly, datapad hooked onto his belt with the translator app from the meeting still running.

"Ah've been told that without training, ah'm at risking of fallin' t' darkness. Ah was hoping that your Way, might help."

"You are in darkness now, are you falling?" she responded in Huttese.

Thinking back to the activities of today, Garth wondered that very thing himself.

"In moments," he conceded. "But it sounded in there, like your people don't believe in light or dark, that it just....is."

“We believe in the light and the dark just as we believe in the wind and rain. Night will always come, just as day will always come. Stars will fuse hydrogen until they die, there are things that will be until they are not. The Way cares not for such things, it simply is, we simply are,” she responded.

“When you rose today did you have to ask yourself to be yourself, no you simply were and acted.”

"And that's how ah want it t' be. This...connection, it is part of me, but ah dunna want it t' define me. All ah know is that I achieved a certain clarity when ah meditated with yer people earlier t'day, and then undertook the rite of Venomous Ink. Ah wonder if this Way is a path that may resonate with me, and ah with it."

He loosens the zipper on his uniform, exposing an Anzuri necklace briefly before he turns to display the new tattoo.

“We do not value things, as things have no value… unless you give it value. You do not follow a Way, there is nothing to resonate. You are the Way, a wave does not need to know it is a wave, it simply acts and does as a wave must. You wish to seek the Way, but you must be the Way,” she said with a calm smile.

Garth taps his datapad, and asking it to replay the translation, hoping it would make more sense on a second listening. But it did not, Sister Mazakin's riddle talk was just as confusing a second time.

"Perhaps mah approach is wrong here," Garth mutters to himself before addressing Mazakin again.

"After the war, ah'd like to return and learn more of yer people and yer ways. Is that somethin' yer people may allow?"

((OOC - There's a decided LACK of emphasis on "ways' in that last sentence. Hope that makes sense))

She smiled at his confusion and said, “All are welcome to join to us, live as we do, eat as we do, love as we do. Your way may not be our Way but for a time you can be as we are. Perhaps we are your Way, if you return we shall be here. Unless our Way is snuffed out by our enemies.”

"If'n your Way is as ye say, then can it ever be truly snuffed out? But still ah'll do mah best t' ensure yer people survive this betrayal. Ye've got mah word."

“Then we welcome you as a true brother, Garth Wayne,” she responded.

“Until such time you choose to find your own Way.”

Garth extends a hand for a traditional shake.

"D' ya need an escort back t' yer shrine?"

“I know these lands like I know the Way, I am these lands. I am the tree that has lived one hundred thousand years, I am the wind that dances in your hair, I am the blood spilled in war.”

She lowered herself down into a prone position and then stood languidly saying, “Does your hand need a companion?”

She then shook his hand and laughed.

"And here ah am, just the guy offerin' t' help a lady who's lost more'n anyone should." Garth replies part joking, part serious.

"If ye or yer people need anythin' y' know where t' find me and mine now. Name's Garth by the way, Garth Wayne."

“I know, I just said it,” she replied curiously in Huttese. “We have lost nothing that can’t be replaced. The only true loss is that of Trust and one’s Life.”

"Then ah hope the coming days provide some relief t' the plight of yer people, Sister Mazakin."

“Hope is meaningless, it will be or it will not,” she replied.

There, Garth disagreed with her. He was about to bid her good evening but could not end on that note.

"Now ye're messing wi' me right? Hope is never meaningless. Hope is inspirational, it is uplifting. Hope is th' precursor t' so many things. The hope that tomorrow will be better than t'day is what keeps me fighting wars like this. It doesn't win the fight on its own, but it's been the cause of more righteous warriors takin' up arms than the vengeance ye spoke of earlier tonight. Can one who speaks of the Way as being as ubiquitous as you do, truly believe that hope is meaningless?"

“A stinkfish can hope to not be hunted by a tu’kata, but that will not save it from death. Hope is a tool of those too weak to know that the Way values strength in the self. Hope is for the foolish, Brother Garth Wayne,” she said in Huttese with a serious smile.

"To have hope and then not act to make that hope a reality, that is foolish." Garth agrees unflinchingly.

"But as a catalyst for action, hope is nearly unparalleled, at least in my culture."

“Then you hail from a weak culture,” she responded.

“Hope fosters weakness. You live or die, succeed or fail. You accept it, you do not delude yourself with what could have been. I do not hope to have my vengeance sated. Vengeance will be earned or it will be dashed.”

"Yet you are the one turnin' t' us fer aid." Garth proposed as a counterpoint.

"Ah look forward to the day that my culture helps sate yer vengeance then Sister."

“We have asked for aid, and in turn will render something that you value; we do not expect your Republic to act for free. It is not Hope that spurs our action but a need to survive,” she said in Huttese smiling.

Garth laughs good naturedly.

"Ah didn't know the Republic were gettin' paid fer this gig. Thought we were just helpin people in need. Guess a grunt like me don't need all the details."