I am Euphoria

Chasing The Past

All I can do right now, is keep breathing.

Euphoria
---

A day had passed since I had learned about this place. And since then news had traveled to us, that the squad War had sent out to Drift's signal, had found Naz on Ord Mantell, but no sight of Drift. They were on their way back to D'Qar now, maybe they soon would be here. And then Naz and I would reunite. Finally!

The sun wasn't up just yet, but glimmers of sunlight already peaked through the woods as I sat on the porch and let the first rays of sunlight warm my cold skin. Nobody else was awake beside of me and that was the best part. I couldn't sleep anyways, my body still was in some kind of fight or flight modus to keep me from settling. Nightmares kept me on my feet and awake, what definitely showed in my appearance.

My hair was in a messy bun on top of my head, my lips chapped. The dark shadows underneath my eyes almost looked like I had two black eyes and I was overall pale as the walls inside Leal's house. I was physically and mentally drained to the point where I was just absolutely done.

"You're awake early." I didn't need to look up to know, that War had approached and sat down next to me. He felt responsible and tried to help as much as he could, but whenever I looked into his eyes he just reminded me of Stone and a slight pang inside my chest erupted. I looked up nonetheless in hopes of being wrong by some miracle. But next to me sat War and not that impossible grumpy best friend of mine.

"I wanted to see the sun rise." I lied and looked from his sleepy eyes towards the horizon again. I wondered if I watched enough sunrises, then some day he'd appear over there on the edge of the forest out of nowhere. "Are you feeling alright? Did you-" I sighed and War immediately stopped his rambling.

After a while of silence he got up and patted my shoulder and left. I knew I didn't make this easy for him and to be honest, I probably didn't make it easy for me either, but there was just no ounce in me left, that cared anymore.

Somewhere near the lake in the distance a frog croaked, birds already started singing and crickets chirruped. I closed my eyes and listened to nature's noises only to hear a ship land in the distance, feet walking through the grass and then silence again.

And when I opened my eyes, Naz was there, her arms crossed and a sad smile on her lips. She had changed, physically. Her curves were more defined and instead of the usual black hair, she now spotted a bleach blonde hairstyle, what kind of suited her. Her turquoise armor had seen better days and looked battered and scratched, but still just fine. She held her head high and I didn't know how she got the strength after what had happened and what she must have gone through.

"Sister!" I sighed in relief and heaved myself up. My hip still kind of made itself noticable every now and then, but in a few days, it was probably gone just as my many bruises as well. The only reason, I wasn't fully healed was, because I didn't want to spent a day in a bacta tank, I always got the worst headache from it. Plus I didn't want to burden War and Alema with another trip to the Pathfinder to get into a bacta tank.

"Euphoria!" Naz smiled, but it didn't reach her eyes. News must have traveled far already then. She looked behind me at the house and her eyes saddened. But she didn't allow herself to get emotional. Instead she squared her shoulders and strides the last few meters up onto the porch and hugs me. Her touch, even though it's anticipated, makes me flinch away and her eyes immediately harden as she takes in my physical state as I am doing with her. She certainly had changed. The year had made her tougher and stronger than I was.

"You look..." She didn't finish as her eyes stopped at my neck and jaw, where the strangulation marks and the hand prints of where the storm trooper had touched me were the most visible. "Like I nearly died?" I tried to joke, but she didn't laugh and so I gave it up. My humour was probably too dry to joke about what had happened to me. Not even I could laugh about it honestly, it was just a pathetic try to lighten the mood.