FAREWELL LOG
Set from October 24th onwards:
( -To absent friends, lost loves, old gods, and the season of mists; and may each and every one of us always give the devil his due. )
( -To absent friends, lost loves, old gods, and the season of mists; and may each and every one of us always give the devil his due. )
He lowered the mug and cradled it in both hands. This would take a few minutes."You know about cells. How most living beings are made out of countless tiny units all working together, and each unit knows the plan of the entire body it's part of. But among them, living inside them, are other cells, smaller, of different species. Some make us sick, some help us digest our food - and there are some so symbiotically adapted to us that we can't survive without them, or them without us."
Luke paused to sip his chocolate before going on. "Living in me there are innumerable other cells called midichlorians. They have a connection to the Force which is - complex." He grinned again, briefly. "I'll spare you the details. The point is that Force-Sensitives host them in multitudes, and in a way, they are as much 'us' as the human cells."
"Some Force-Sensitives have used this to create a technique called the blood trail. Nightsisters mark targets with their own blood, treated in a specific way so that their midichlorians survive in the target's body. They can then track the target. I know a modification of that technique."
"I can't tell you what it's like to be one with the Force. Not really." Luke's eyes closed for a moment, and he seemed more distant. "But I... lose myself. My sense of myself as an individual changes. I can... manifest as myself, but it's an uncertain thing, and easier if I'm called on." He took another sip. "You can see where this is going."
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Although Cephiro wasn't entirely surprised that it had come to this now, it was still difficult to come to terms with. Death, the loss of self - these weren't positive concepts to him. Even if it came with eternal peace and oneness with the universe and they could still talk once in a while, it still seemed frightening - not the sort of thing you would wish on someone you liked. But, however strong or important his will to cling to life may have been, Cephiro's fears were his own.
He had set his cup down and begun tracing a sort of sigil around it in the dirt with his fingertip. It was a strange symbol, involving what seemed to be a rather stylized treble clef with some extra bits. He wasn't the artistic type, but the act of tracing it out helped him calm his mind and focus on the important things. The important things were that he did like Luke very much, and that at some point it was necessary to let go even of people that you liked very much. As a teacher, theoretically he should have been experienced enough at that if he only remembered, but perhaps he hadn't been very good at it. Now was as good a time as any to practice.
"I'm glad that we met," he said quietly and sincerely, before picking up his mug again and taking another sip. The bottom of the cup left a perfectly circular, clean outline in his otherwise imperfect drawing - which, of course, Luke probably couldn't see. Luke might have been able to sense his smile, however.
"Yes, I think I understand." It was evident by his tone now that he was changing the subject to refer more directly to the matter at hand, though even on the best of days Cephiro was awkward at expressing himself verbally. Coming from a society where men were expected to be stoic, he had forgotten the socially-appropriate way to channel the sense of appreciation that Luke was even making such a proposal. Growing seemed to have helped somehow, but he still couldn't seem to find all of the words he wanted to use.
"I-- thank you."
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Culture was a funny thing. The one Luke had been raised in so long ago had encouraged a degree of stoicism in males, especially in emergencies, but it hadn't been as strong an encouragement as in many others. He had taught himself, gradually, to be open, but he empathized with how difficult it could be. "You are welcome."
"If it helps - you don't have to think of it as death. The Jedi have a code, a mantra. I told this to my students." He drew himself up and his voice swelled a little, for a moment becoming firmer, more authoritative - but still his, still compassionate and layered with affection. "'For a Jedi, there is no death. There is only the Force.' As it is with you, so am I. When you need guidance, or solace, or anything, you can ask. Just remember that I can't just step in anymore. This is your turn."
Luke settled back down, shaking his head. "I used to be a little pompous," he mused, self-deprecating. Another sip of chocolate - cooling now, though it was still warm enough. "I could recognize, when they called, because even the ones not related to me had trained and worked with me. They could call on the Force to remember me. A touch of my blood will do something of the sort. It's more giving you a little power over me than the other way around."
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"It does help," he admitted. Perhaps that would help, in general - not thinking of death as the end of life but the beginning of something else. There must be some analogue to the Force in his native belief system--
Cephiro's expression change was palpable: the look on his face was unmistakably that of a young child who has just realized that he has been tricked into eating vegetables. And that he would do it again.
"... Oh, this is religious."
That wasn't the point, though. The point was the last bit, which he nodded to. He wanted to say something like, 'don't worry, I won't do anything stupid like bother you every fricking day' but he felt that something like that should probably be assumed between them. Or else they wouldn't be having this conversation. On the other hand, maybe it needed to be said for some reason. Cephiro had no clue, so he took a long sip of his drink to prevent himself from opening his mouth.
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Luke actually laughed. Settling, he pressed a hand against his mouth, but his eyes danced. After a moment he lowered his hand to say, "Well, there'd be a reason for that. I did reestablish the Jedi Order, and my life has been structured around the Force. It's so much more than a power source. But don't worry, I'm not going to try and recruit you."
"And don't worry about bothering me. My perception of time will have changed. It's..." Frowning, he visibly searched for the words. "It's like a story. Everything has happened a long time ago, and is happening right now, and will happen in the far future." Snorting gently, he added, "That's not quite right, but... well, don't worry about it. It's not like being interrupted."
He let his expression lapse back into fond solemnity. "It won't take a lot of blood. A few drops... but there are two ways to do it, and they both have drawbacks. With one you'll need to suffer a small cut, and you'll have to have have a mild fever, for a day or so. With the other... it will stay with you, but you'll stop noticing quickly. You don't usually notice the feeling of your toes in your footwear, or your tongue in your mouth - it's a little like that."
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"The second one would probably be preferable," he said, doing what he thought was a fairly good job of ignoring his tongue and toes now what he had been reminded of them. "Unless it matters to you."
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Luke drew a small scalpel blade, no longer than the first joint of his thumb, out of a protective paper sleeve. He held it in his left hand and without ceremony drew it just briefly over his right arm, above the nearly invisible seam of the prosthetic, before returning it to the sleeve.
The blade was not bloodied, and the mark showed red but didn't actively bleed. It was a tiny cut, and shallow. Luke stroked and pressed the skin around it with his thumb, coaxing enough blood to well up that it stained and covered the pad of his thumb. He seemed to be focusing intently at it and, simultaneously, very far away.
Almost palpably now there was a sense of focus on that tiny point, of something shifting or coiling just perceptively - flowing - and then something which had tensed relaxed.
"There we go," Luke murmured, looking up. "Now I'm going to need to mark you with this. You'll be able to remove the blood once it's dried, so the spot won't be visible. It will feel acidic, especially at first, but most of it will fade, and you'll stop noticing the rest, like I said before. You'll be able to call on me partly by focusing on the mark."
He held his hand out, fingers loosely curled and bloodied thumb extended. Though he didn't move much otherwise, it felt as if his whole body had come that much closer. "Last chance to back out," he teased. "If you still want this, just take my wrist and show me where."
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"Let me know if this is too awkward," he said, taking the other man's hand and guiding his thumb towards the center of his chest. Close to his heart, though he only realized the symbolism once he had placed it.
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There was a flicker of movement the instant before contact, as if the couple drops of blood on his thumb had started to move. Then the distance was closed, and Luke was almost leaning in as the sense of focus came back, not quite the same.
It did indeed have that acidic feeling of skin getting eaten at unevenly. It wasn't strong enough to hurt, quite, but it wasn't far off, and there was a sort of radiating effect coming off it. Maybe that was just the pressure.
Then, a distinct sense of something splitting off from him, sinking in, spreading - not far, not yet anyway, maybe just a few square centimeters beneath a layer of skin. Luke let out a breath and pulled back.
His thumb wasn't clean, but it didn't quite look bloody now, either. There was a residue. There was a bloody thumbprint on Cephiro's chest, not as bright a red as it had been. A sensation remained, fainter now and warm against each heartbeat.
"There we go," Luke said. He wasn't out of breath, but breathing a little more emphatically than before. "All right?"
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"Are you?"
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When Cephiro let go, Luke took up his mug again and took a deep pull before responding.
"I'll be okay- I am okay. It's all right." He wiped chocolate from his lips and nodded at Cephiro's mug. "You can finish now, if you want. If you can fix this in your mind, all of this-" his gesture took in the fall garden behind Wellspring Clinic, the little fire still going to the side of them, the two of them themselves. -"it will make calling on me easier."
The sights, the sounds, the feel of it, the smells, of course the taste... Luke hadn't picked this place and made these preparations at random. He himself, what he'd done, might work for whatever other senses Cephiro used, but it was good to make an impression with every sense. Ideally there would be an emotion, too, but he had an idea for that.
Luke steepled his mismatched hands around his mug, fingertips meeting fingertips and thumb touching thumb. He couldn't remember if this was something he already knew or not, but he had to ask. "Do you meditate, Cephiro?"
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"Every day," the mage replied, nodding. That was one of those things - he had really started doing that well before he had realized that he was a mage, and even before he took up martial arts. It must have been an old habit.
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He didn't get more specific. This was the kind of thing it was better to figure out for oneself. "I don't think it will work perfectly every time. It won't always be like this, like I'm physically with you. It won't even always be like speaking plainly to me. But if you call on me, I will know." He said it softly, but with great certainty.
What was left of the blood had dried enough, he decided, and drained the mug before setting it to the side again. Slowly, Luke unfolded his crossed legs to get his boots on the ground, and stood, gesturing for Cephiro to do the same.
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His tone implied a lot more confidence than the words themselves did. He stood, then, setting the mug aside, and looked up at Luke questioningly.
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"It won't hurt." Luke stepped forwards and just folded Cephiro into his arms, pulling and holding him close.
He was strong - stronger than he looked - but gentle. Murmuring down into the other's neck, he said, "It's okay to miss me. I know what it's like. But I'll be right here, when you need me."
Luke smelled like clean laundry and human, with touches of machine lube and woodsmoke and chocolate, and just a faint undertone of something like the ground after rain.
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