Ithor - Hammer Song

[Tagal Saxon]

The sound of his hammer repeatedly striking the metal of the beskad he was just finishing up resounded throughout the small encampment that he had set up in a large clearing in the forests of Ithor. It was surrounded by trees and nature... and was, strangely enough, probably only a few hundred feet from the main port.

Ithor was a strange place.

It was a place where the locals did everything they could to preserve nature and yet here he was, allowed to use his forge in the open air. Still, he wasn't complaining. Instead, he set the blade into the water to cool as he set his tools down and took a break in the middle of the clearing, his portable forge burning merrily away.

Sitting there in the middle of all of this nature... Tagal could not help but feel so incredibly bored.

He was going to need to start getting some more friends, more contacts and set up some kind of shop if he was going to continue. Moving around Ithor like some kind of space gypsy wasn't going to make him some friends.

Or was it?

The foliage moved and Tagal prepared to meet someone... only to be disappointed at the sight of this planet's version of a squirrel.

"... well that was anti-climatic."

 

[Merrick Helmsdottir]

Force, why had he come here?

Ever since his rather uninspiring loss to the Pyke's and his subsequent capture, Merrick had become more than a little disenchanted with his position in the Empire. Kark, he'd never been enchanted by it in the first place, he was fully realising it now. He was a Sith in name only, not in spirit. The words you see, the code, 'The Force Shall Free Me'. That was the part he'd lived by, the only part that stuck: Freedom.

The Empire just wasn't giving that to him.

While he'd kept tight lipped about it since his ignominious escape from the Pykes, he'd never called back in to command, never alerted them of his freedom. It was almost a better feeling than being off Kessel. He didn't have orders, nor did he have direction though. Not something he was exactly seeking just yet though.

And so, hopping planet to planet, keeping his head low and his eyes open for something, anything that would draw him in, he found himself here, almost listless in the planets forest. However, he did not have to stray long to hear a voice not far, catching the words as they fell dissapointedly from the speakers lips,

"Most things usually are" Merrick added, brushing past the foliage as he came into view of the man, eyes elsewhere even as he had his hands by a steaming blade, the whisps of water falling up into the trees,

"But sometimes that's for the best" he'd spoken to so few in recent days that he couldn't help but enjoy the chance to.

That, and he enjoyed the sound of his voice, anyhow.

@Nefieslab

 

[Tagal Saxon]

Who the bloody hells was this guy then eh?

Tagal stared at the other man across the clearing from him for a moment before shaking his head and going back to hammering away at the weapon he had been working on. It wasn't a commission piece or anything but that didn't mean it wasn't worthy of the attention in his eyes.

He looked up from his work at the other man.

"So... you're lost right?" he asked with a raised eyebrow, "No one comes to Ithor without being lost and no one ends up at my forge without either being here to collect an order or being lost."

A few more hammer swings before he spoke again.

"So which are you? Lost? Or looking to get yourself some steel?"

Dear Gods he could do with a bloody customer.

@Nightfall

 

[Merrick Helmsdottir]

"A good question I should think. What am I doing here?" Merrick mused as he moved past the brush and meandered across to the mans forge as he glanced around at the trees. The man seemed more than comfortable as he was, though Merrick could tell her was probably a disruption from the mans focus,

"Well, I hadn't planned on a blade, though I've never seen one forged before I must admit" a rare skill it was to see something like that handforged, Merrick couldn't help remark at the mans particular style. It only set him apart from the many other travellers he'd passed on his way down, so caught up in trade or travel that it hardly felt worth interrupting them. But this one, no, he was something different,

"So, lost, then" he played with the words in his mouth. He was doing that a lot nowadays, letting the words roll about as he found them, unsure of exactly where they would go next, much like himself,

"Lost and looking to find. If that means anything" he wasn't even sure if it did. But he was directionless for now. What he meant to find, kark, he didn't even know. For now he was just a simple man making his way in the universe, trying to make his last few credits last as long as they could. And trying to figure out what exactly he was going to do for credits now that he was, in effect, deserting.

@Nefieslab

 

[Tagal Saxon]

Oh by the Gods the man was going to be a talker wasn't he? The kind of person who liked the sound of their own voice and spoke for the sake of killing time or silence alone. He very much doubted that the man actually had anything to say that wasn't obvious and already he was beginning to wish he actually had more work to do so he could use it as an excuse not to pay attention to the other man.

Unfortunately he was actually pretty much done for the day and it was beneath him to ruin a decently made blade just to make it look like he was too busy to chat to this guy.

"Most people haven't." he allowed simply, "Most people buy factory made."

It was clear from his tone that Tagal didn't hate factory-made weapons, it was just that he was dismissive of them. A weapon made in a factory was, to him, a good tool and that was fine. It was also something that would be soulless and pale in comparison to something uniquely made for that wielder in particular.

Lost and looking to find?

Oh lovely.

This guy wasn't a customer - this guy was the same as Tagal had been in the immediate aftermath of his family's death. He was more interested in the looking for meaning than he was in looking for a weapon. Tagal set the dagger aside for a moment before setting his tools down.

"Where have you come from, stranger?" he waved a hand, "Not physically... mentally. What's got you lost?"

@Nightfall

 

[Merrick Helmsdottir]

He held back a little smirk and quite laugh as he thought on the mans question, the answer forming almost as quickly as the thoughts came to mind,

"I uh, huh" he paused, a little laugh, as if the realisation he was coming to made him chuckle at it. At how simple it all really was "how honest do you want me to be now?" a pithy little retort but one that saved him a moment of honesty out loud. He needed to internalise it for a moment, to feel what he was saying before he shared it, to make sure it was true. By the look on the mans face he was sure the man could call banthadust when he saw it anyhow. An answer that wasn't real? Well, that'd have been no use at all,

"Cause if I am, then I think I'd say I always was lost" you could hear the sigh beneath the apparent humour he delivered it with. It was the same humour he'd been delivering everything with for so long, a disguise for himself as much as anyone else,

"I grew up in that Empire, but I don't think I was ever a part of it. Acutally, I know I wasn't, much as I put off that thought" the facade hadn't fallen just yet anyhow. Nothing was quite that easy. But from what he could tell the man knew that just as well as he,

"Merrick, by the way" felt like a good a time as any. Extending a hand as he wandered across.

@Nefieslab

 

[Tagal Saxon]

How honest did he want the man to be? Well ideally, Tagal would like for this man to be as honest as he possibly could be. For all men to speak nothing but the truths that they held to their hearts... but that sounded far too poetic and naive to actually be given in answer to the man's question. Instead he just stared at the other man for a long moment before shrugging slightly and giving his answer.

"Honest enough to be able to live with any degree of falsehood you indulge in."

Always lost?

Well that sounded like a fair enough assessment. It sounded like something that was probably at least somewhat hard for the man to admit and he counted that as something that made it more likely to be true. More likely to be honest.

Most people liked to pretend that they knew what they were doing and where they were going in life and, for most people, this was just purely untrue. Most of the people in the Galaxy just kind of existed, floating around and letting the deeds and events of others carry them along from one moment to the next.

It was so common it was natural these days.

"Then you grew up surrounded by weakness and decadence; it's little wonder you are lost." he replied almost instantly upon hearing that the man was an Imperial, a dull rage beginning to coil in his gut, "Ah yes I forgot... you Sith get to choose if you are Sith, don't you? If you do enough 'good' you become one of the Jedi. Must be nice to say a few apologies and not be held accountable for your actions."

He scoffed before collecting a beer from a cooler. He didn't offer one of the man to Merrick.

"Tagal."

Nothing more.

@Nightfall

 

[Merrick Helmsdottir]

"If the Sith were that likely to let you choose what you wanted to become as their code claimed... well, I don't think there'd be quite as many terrorists and civil wars as there karking have been" Merrick moved back from the man as he cracked a beer, and instead took a seat on the ground before him, one knee up, splaying his hands back. He could feel the mans tension in his words, and on neutral planets one could never be sure who exactly he was speaking to. Kriff, the Sith were a touchy subject even to other Sith, the self-obsessed gits.

Not that he didn't think a whole lot about himself, just, not in that way anyhow. Hell, it didn't matter to him who the others were half the time, just how he got by. And nowadays it was seemnig like the way he was getting by was just as likely to get him killed instead,

"I didn't become a Sith because I chose to be. Try living in the Empire with force sensitivity and see if you come out anything else but that, or dead. Not that I'm looking for pity, but, you know, it's a hell of a place at times" he laughed through the last couple of words, trying to make the pain dull a little as he thought about it. A man who'd blurred through life without so much as a pause,

"Still, Tagal, I don't think it's a place I'll be staying within much longer" he replied quietly, trying to brush of the mans last words as he looked up to the sky, the steam from the mans blade still wafting high above,

"What about you then? Fairs fair. Trade me a story for another. Not much else out here to offer"

@Nefieslab