Before - Legends Hunter's Log: Tales From the Shadows [Dear Diary 2016]

Title: Hunter's Log: Tales From the Shadows
Author: SabyneAmberle
Genre: Diary, Drama, Action
Characters: Kybrina (Gammon-Sevrelle) Cadera, various other TOR characters
Timeframe: TOR
Summary: A sleepless night can pique curiosity anew. What secrets does an old, battered diary still hold from a Bounty Hunter's recent past?

A/N: Even though the 2015 Hunter's Log wasn't completed, I would like to go back and continue it as a free-writing project, to catch it up to this one. But I wanted to explore more of Kybrina's story as it is in my head. (Note some of the framing is both headcanon and may have mild TOR spoilers.)

***

He woke with a gasp, sweat soaking his forehead.

That nightmare again…

Swiping a hand over his forehead, Torian stood from his bed and crossed to the window. He leaned his forehead against its cool surface, feeling slight relief in the temperature difference. He didn’t dare close his eyes, not unless he wanted to see that fiery explosion yet again. The one that took his riidur.

Pushing back from the window, he left the room, crossing the narrow hall to the small adjacent room. Touching the keypad, he waited as the door slid open before entering. In the dim light, he could barely make out his daughter’s sleeping form, and a sense of relief filled him as he watched her quiet breathing. It had taken some doing to get her used to sleeping in her own room and her own bed, but she seemed to be taking to it well. Gently, he ran a fingertip over her cheek, smiling sadly as he noted how her features resembled her mother’s.

“Kybri…” Wiping away a sudden tear, he quickly left the room, re-entering his own. As he hit the button to close his door, his hand knocked against a nearby table, causing an item to fall. With quick reflexes, he caught it, turning it over to give it a look. He noted the battered childish drawings and color of Kybri’s journal. He had started listening to it when she had been injured facing Darth Tormen –had that really only been four years earlier?- but with the fight against Revan and Vitiate he hadn’t given it much thought.

But tonight, with tears on his face and her memory making his head hurt, he thought resuming it couldn’t hurt. Settling back onto the bed, he pressed the right button sequence and activated it. Immediately, his Kybri appeared, her hair in its long braid, blue eyes shining with pride.

**

“I did it. Niel, Grandfather, Thracen, everyone….I finally did it. You are looking at the Grand Champion of the Great Hunt. And you are looking at the one who finally avenged her brother.
It was a hard road, no doubt about that. That scum Tarro Blood made sure I only had the toughest, hardest to find targets anyone could come up with. And he made sure there were plenty of obstacles in my way –I’m still sore he tried to use two Corellian kids as thugs against me- but I beat all of them. No, I shattered all of them, stepped up, and took my rightful place as Champion.

And Tarro Blood? Ever the weak-minded coward until the end. He and I were the final two competitors in the Great Hunt, and we were sent to the Aurora. It’s the vessel commanded by Kellian Jarro, the Mandalorian Killer. Tarro had gotten there first, but he was too weak to resist the Jedi’s mind nonsense, so he ended up in the brig. He tried to turn the crew on me, claimed I was his accomplice, but none of them were a match for me.

When I finally found him sitting in his cell, I was tempted to just leave him to the destruction of that damned ship. But the idiot never had much in the way of sense, did he? He started spouting his mouth off, talking about how he turned on Niel. Shot him in the back. I finally had my chance to take revenge, and I did. It wasn’t all that much of a challenge; when you’re a coward like Tarro Blood your fighting prowess doesn’t match up to your bravado. In time, he lay at my feet; and I took a certain perverse pleasure in letting him see my face before I put a blaster bolt through his head.

Everything else feels like a blur. Facing off against the Mandalorian Killer, defeating him and his padawan, none of it feels real. Yet…I couldn’t kill her. I looked at her, and I couldn’t pull the trigger that last time. She wasn’t my target; the kill would have gained me nothing. So I let her go. I let her leave, then rigged the ship’s hyperdrive to go critical before I got out of there myself.

So there you have it. I’ve done what others thought I couldn’t do. I defeated an old demon that haunted my family, I beat a target that had been thought to be unbeatable, and I became Champion.

Oh, Crysta’s calling me, I should wrap this here. And send a letter to my family, they’ll want to know the news.”

 

Sorry! These past few weeks were busy with freelance writing. Here's the new update.

*****
“That was certainly one of the most interesting experiences of my life.

Both the Huntmaster and his assistant acknowledged my victory in the Great Hunt. Of course, there was a celebration; you know there had to be. Grand ceremony, good-sized party…the whole works. I didn’t even bat an eye at all the Mandalorians there. The Great Hunt was a Mandalorian creation, after all. Of course they would be in attendance for the celebration of their new champion.

Pomp and circumstance was never my thing. Get in, get the job done, get out, get paid. That’s all I ever needed. But somehow, I kinda felt like I belonged. It’s something I haven’t felt since long before I left Deralia.

There is one thing I noted. In the back of the group, I spotted one person. I couldn’t get a good look at him, since there were so many people, but I noticed he didn’t have a helmet. All of the other Mandalorians were wearing them, yet he wasn’t. His armor also seemed different, like it wasn’t as well-taken care of or it had taken a heck of a lot more damage. I may not be a Jedi, but I get the feeling I’ll be seeing more of him sometime.

Wait. I just received an invitation to meet Mandalore. That doesn’t seem a normal thing, but apparently he does like to meet the Great Hunt champions. I’ll have Mako dig up some intel on him while we’re traveling. His flagship is way out on the Outer Rim, so I could use the reading.”

 

Well, last time I commented on one of your fics I said I'd learn more about the TOR/KotOR era. That was a year ago and I failed miserably to do so -- video games are just not for me. So I'll be reading this diary without any knowledge of the context, and you may get a lot of silly questions from me.

Now that I confessed that... I really like the framing device that you used for this story. There's a lot of potential in the idea that the narrator's spouse is looking back at her life, and your first post highlights that contrast very well. From Torian's thoughts I imagined a woman who has seen a lot and established herself in life, but the first lines of the diary proper paint the picture of a youthful bounty hunter who still seeks to prove herself -- and that continues with the second entry, where she seems to have quite a few questions about the Mand'alor. Unless I missed something in your other stories about Kybrina, she's not a Mandalorian, so this encounter should be interesting.

So I'll be here waiting for more