#nandi

Nandi school project

@lullabyes22-blog - "Sisters through and through"

Oh God.

He's had nightmares like this.

And they are legitimately nightmares - not sexy little fantasies. He's not sure which one he'd pick, but the one thing he is certain of is that none of them would be happy with him, and that he'd let each one of them down, in different ways.

His heart yearns to go to Vander. That man was, is, and always will be the love of his life. And Silco is by no means over him. But if Vander showed up, fully breathing, their slate wiped clean and their blood-debt squared, Silco would find himself advancing on the man, not with love, but with with a cold and predatory rage.

There are too many wounds, and they cut too deep. And even though Silco knows he'd forgive Vander eventually, he also knows the forgiveness would take a lifetime, and that in the meantime, they'd both suffer in different ways, because Silco's pain is not the kind that can soften, retract its teeth, allow another to hold him.

Vander would have to bear the full force of his cruelty, and Silco would relish it. He'd also hate himself for it, and Vander, for enduring it.

Nandi?

His soul begs to be with her. She's the only one who truly saw him for who he was, who took his rage at the world as an expression of his love, rather than a repudiation of it. She was his safe haven, and in many ways, she still is. But she's come to embody a saint in his mind, an impossible ideal. And haloed around her memory is his own guilt - at being unable to save her, at not being able to protect her from Topside, at not being able to avenge her the way she deserved to be avenged.

He also knows he's no longer the man she fell in love with, and that there's no way someone as good as her would love the monster he's become. She deserves far, far better.

He also knows that if she accepted him, his possessive streak would reach monstrous proportions. He'd lock her up to keep her safe. He'd never be able to let go of her, because he'd have lost her before, and he knows himself well enough to realize he'd be terrified of ever letting that happen again. She'd end up a prisoner, and he'd smother her by lethal degrees, until eventually he'd end up destroying her spirit in a desperate attempt to safeguard her body.

Which, in his own self-loathing over Bloody Sunday, he'd be unable to touch. And so they'd live in a stalemate of stymied desire and throttled guilt, until entropy swallowed them whole.

Mel?

Oh, Mel.

Mel would be his undoing. Mel would be his death.

Mel has the gift to strip him bare, and she knows it. She can match him, barb for barb, in a way no one else has, and in so doing, she can cut him to the bone, peel away every layer, and reveal the raw and rotted core of him. And as much as the man in him would thrill at that, and at the prospect of someone he could finally, fully, surrender to, the monster in him would never fully allow it.

She's still, whatever else, a Topsider, and his rage at Piltover is so all-consuming that he would never be able to fully let go of it.

And so he'd fight her, tooth and nail, for dominance. He'd fight her, and fight her, and fight her.

And he would win.

He would have to win, because his city is at stake, and Zaun must rise to eclipse Piltover's light if it's to have any chance of survival. And he knows that every backroom deal, every backstab, every treacherous betrayal would cut Mel on the inside, because he would be doing to her exactly what her golden city did to him. And every time he'd make her bleed, every time he'd make her cry, every time she'd kneel and submit at his feet, his victory would feel like a defeat.

Because he wants to love her: fully, completely, unreservedly. Because she deserves a kind of love that he's not capable of giving, a love that's as pure and true as her own. Because he wants to be the man she sees in him, the man he's all but forgotten how to be. And because he knows that, if he lets himself go, lets himself feel the full force of her power over him, that he'd end up betraying everything he's spent his entire life working towards.

He'd let Zaun burn if she begged him to.

And the knowledge terrifies him.

Then there's Sevika.

Beautiful, ruthless, unflinching Sevika. She's one of the few who sees him at his worst, and accepts it. She's the only one he'd trust to take everything he is, and everything he can throw at her. There are no pretenses between them. They've lived in each other's pockets, in a constant state of warfare, and yet never turned on each other. But theirs is a bond born of the trenches, not dreams, and he fears that if there truly is anything viable between them, the moment the war ends, they'd fall apart.

Sevika would be his match, and he knows it. But it's not a match that can light a spark and sustain it. They'd need duty to undergird whatever bond they'd share, because they're no longer the reckless, hotheaded idealists of old, but veterans of a battle that's long outstayed its welcome.

They've carved themselves out, body and soul, until their connection lies in what they fight for, not what they live for.

Maybe, once, they could've lived for each other. But now they're both too hardened, too fiercely committed to the cause, to let their humanity shine through. The only way he'd ever be able to surrender to her, is if she forced his hand, and the only way she'd ever be able to yield to him, is if he did the same.

And while he knows it'd be a pleasure to dominate her, and to let her own him in turn, the truth is that neither of them would find peace in it, but mere respite.

And that's not love. It's not even lust. It's two beasts, circling each other in a den, waiting to see which one makes the first move.

To last the distance, he and Sevika would need a mutual passion to sanctify their base desires, something sublime to give meaning to the brutal honesty they'd show each other in the dark. Zaun might serve in the interim. But in the long term?

Nothing purifies purpose, he's found, quite like power. But power and purpose are nothing without a home, a heart, a hearth. Jinx has taught him that. And she's taught him, too, the joys of loving and being loved.

He wonders if a child with Sevika would help him find that balance.

And help her find it, too.

~*~

Tl'dr: if all four of them came to him, and said the word, he'd turn to Sevika, because at least he can trust her to cut out his heart, and keep it under lock and key, until the dirty business of fighting for Zaun is over, and they can both, finally, lay down their arms. The others would destroy him, and he would destroy them, and Zaun would fall to pieces as he fell to pieces himself.

But Sevika would keep him in one piece, at least until the war is won, and then maybe he'd finally be able to choose her, instead of his ambitions.

And hopefully, she'd choose him, too.

Nandi ~ loyal servant of Senator Padmé Amidala

Nandi wasn't handmaiden, but a servant, who worked at House Naberrie's retreat house at Varykino, in Naboo's Lake Country, during the years leading up to the Clone Wars.

Nandi and her half-sister, Teckla Minnau - future handmaiden of Amidala, at one point lived with their older brother, Rehtul Minnau, in the capital city of Theed, where the two girls attended a private school to learn etiquette, hospitality, history, and the arts. Both relatives of Nandi are shown as a holo near her.

Nandi and Teckla finished their schooling and then went on to work for Senator Padmé Amidala as servants at Varykino. In 22 BBY, Amidala and Anakin Skywalker, used it as a sanctuary after two failed assassination attempts on the Senator's life.

On the painting, Nandi is seen to be waiting to greet Padme and Jedi at Varykino, with their already prepared meal, including shuura fruit as dessert, which Nandi and Teckla served later to the couple. Hardly any of them was suspecting that the love of the pare would have a great impact on the future.

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