Ro-ina's Funeral March
Locations
Tia’s Apartment
Dathomiri Hospital
Outskirts of the City, Nigita
Witches' Loft
Factions
Dathomiri Witches
Players
Tia O'Mandalorio (Laurie)
Sabbath Rune (Jack)
T-3PO (Scott)
NPCs
Lt. Lee Meriweather
Junero O'Mandalorio (Uncle J)
Ro-ina
Veeja
Sosterine
Unn’dra
Short Public Excerpt/Summary
Tia broods, wallowing in her spectacular hangover before preparing for Ro-ina’s funeral. After holding silent vigil through the night, Sabbath joins the funeral procession and mourns the loss of his witch sister. Ro-ina, murdered only the day before, is laid to rest on her pyre while a crowd pays their respects.
Tia sits at her kitchen table, nursing a cup of espresso as black as her mood. She frowns as a stray beam of sunlight filters through the window, then winces, pinching the bridge of her nose. She'd overdone it last night, and today she was paying the consequences - she felt like the floor of a hover cab. Vaguely, she considered using the emergency stim she had begged off Lee, but she had left it in the pocket of a past day's pair of pants, and she couldn't quite work up the energy to go hunting for it. Besides, the headache matched her overall state of mind - glumly, she held it to herself, and while she refused to acknowledge so to herself, at some level she was almost grateful for its presence, as it interfered with her ability to think too deeply on much of anything at all. "No wonder Lee keeps a stash on her at all times," she mutters, rubbing her temples. "I should have grabbed a spare one when she was passed out in my bathroom." She glares into her cup. "Uncle would say that I was losing my touch." She frowns, then sighs. After staying out far too late with Lee, Tia had stumbled her way home with T-3PO. She knew she still needed to talk to the droid and fill him in on her beloved Uncle's visit, but she had been in no shape to do so last night. T had wanted her to go straight to bed, but instead she had drunkenly insisted that she needed some air, and sat out on the front stoop with another bottle for a good hour. Staring across the way for shadows that never materialized. Ultimately, she had finally given up and dragged her sorry ass to bed. Once more, she scowls into her cup. Today was Ro-ina's funeral. She'd seen the announcement, although she hadn't heard anything directly from Veeja, or Sosterine... or Sabbath. Leaning back, she blearily scrubs at her tired eyes. She hadn't known Ro-ina well, but she had liked what little she knew of her. She almost smiles at the memory of Ro-ina celebrating during the fire festival, but it quickly fades as she remembers the image of her broken body on the floor. She could only imagine how Sabbath must feel. From what she had heard, they hadn't been brother and sister long, but that didn't matter. They were family. Family was everything, and on top of the horror of Ro-ina's death itself, it pained her more than she had expected that he had lost this member of his new family so soon. She hadn't really been in the mood to go to the bar with Lee in the first place, but Sabbath had been pretty clear about kicking her out with everyone else. She'd be damned if she was going to wait around after that. She frowns again, eying the clock. Draining the dregs of her cup, she pushes herself unsteadily to her feet, wincing as her arms twinge, still aching from the grueling workout they'd gotten the day before. Time to get ready to go. It wouldn't do to be late, and she had a feeling that it would take her longer than usual to get herself moving and out the door on this shithole of a day.
The dawn may have brought light, but it was a dark day as word quickly spread throughout the city of the death of Ro-ina, the mystic witch. Throughout the night, her remaining sisters and brother stood vigil over her body, chanting, painting it, all while trying to understand last night’s course of events. There was no investigation. The cause of death was clear - a single pin-point piercing through the chest into the heart. The wound was cauterized from the moment of creation. She was killed by a lightsaber. The sisters were conducting their normal evening rituals after a long day at their new hospital. Unn’dra, the Zabrak pilot who is still unconscious and recovering, had brought them new herbs she obtained. Herbs that they now realize were poisoned. They used them in their nightly ritual; burning them in the small pyre they had set up inside their open air loft space. The effect quickly set in - mental impairment and a loss of motor function, including the ability to clearly communicate. Veeja, realizing what was happening, saw that her sisters were already too far gone to heal. She had to get help. She had to find Sabbath. But in the end she was too late, and the burden of guilt Veeja felt was painfully obvious. Shortly after dawn, a crowd of mostly resettled refugees begins to gather outside their loft. By mid-morning, the crowd grows to several hundred mourners coming to pay respect to the sister that had helped so many of them after the crash. Inside, the final preparations are made to Ro-ina. The sisters, Sabbath, and their small group embrace one last time before heading outside. Veeja, embracing Sabbath tightly, whispers to him, “They are trying to break us, Sabbath. They lure us to the dark side with anger and suffering. We shall be stronger than they are, brother. But make no mistake, we shall have our revenge…” The doors to the outside open, and the procession taking Ro-ina to the pyre outside the city begins its slow march. The chanting by the group is soft, “Too-so Ro-ina shom kasteru mah-to. Veeja Sosterine Sabbath.” A Dathomiri Witch death prayer. “Our sister Ro-ina may she find her path …”
Revenge. It was such a small and hollow word. Sabbath had no rage, only emptiness. To anyone who knew the strange relationship he had with the Sisters, his pain would seem trivial or contrived. He had only known Ro-ina, any of the three for so short a time. But, those people would never understand how intimately he knew her. Or Veeja. Or Sosterine. Sabbath allowed his tears to fall as he walked with his sisters, surrounded by so many who had not really known the diminutive sorceress at all. But, they knew she was an angel of mercy, like Veeja and Sosterine, who cared for the hurts and woes of the surviving refugees who had crashed onto Nigita only weeks ago. They did not know her, but they felt her loss just the same. And not one of them had felt her soul. Sabbath had. On the night of the crash, Sabbath had been urged to join their circle, complete their circle, by the Tree. Together, they summoned their collective will, their collective Force, to try something, anything, to save those people. And when their strength was not enough, they bent their collective Force to remove the fear and pain of dying. For so many. They went to their fiery end at peace. But, it was in that collective effort that the four, Roina-Veeja-Sosterine-Sabbath; the chant haunted his mind; became one with the Force. They became one with each other. And he lost himself in them during that act, but he found them. He had never been a part of anything. Now, though they were born at different times on different worlds, they were family. And Ro-ina was gone. But, the part of her that was his soothed him. It was that part of himself that was with her that was gone. He took a deep breath and straightened himself. He would be strong for his sisters. For Ro-ina. Because, while Sabbath had no Faith in much in his life, he had Faith in this...... One day, he and all his sisters would be one with the Force again. He took comfort in that. Strength. Revenge? Sabbath had no thought for that now. All he wanted now was to remember his little sister dancing around a great fire, smiling childishly, her large wondering eyes reflecting the embers in pools of joyous innocence. Through his tears, he smiled.
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