Chapter Text
SEVEN YEARS AGO
“Osha, don’t stop!”
“Didn’t plan on it!” Osha snapped, trying to knock her hood away from her face as the rain came down in sheets. It was blindingly cold, and it would’ve been a relief on her aching muscles if not for the nauseating terror eating her up from the inside.
A shriek echoed through the trees, so piercing Osha instinctively tried to clasp her hands over her ears. But Yord’s grip on her wrist kept her arm in place as they sprinted madly forward.
“Where’d the rest of them go?” squeaked a timid, terrified voice at Osha’s side. “Should we be looking - ”
“We don’t need to look for anyone!” Osha barked, too focused on keeping up her pace to bother with smiles and reassurances. “The other Padawans were probably smart enough to make it back to the ship without getting so kriffing turned around!”
Yord’s hand slipped from her wrist, and Osha almost stumbled before straightening and hurrying on. “It wasn’t his fault, Osha.”
“We’d be back by now if he hadn’t gotten us turned around in the storm!” Osha fired back, but Yord’s even stare showed he wasn’t going to argue. He spared a glance past her to the fifteen-year-old boy whose freckles stood out against his deathly pallor. “We’ll make it out of this, Garrow. We just need to stick together.”
Garrow still looked like he wanted to cry, but he just nodded quickly.
Osha growled to herself as she batted aside a drooping branch. She knew whichever Master signed off on N’Gyla as a training ground wouldn’t be allowed to train Padawans for the next couple of cycles. In this realm of rain and mud and howling lyleks at their back, Osha felt disturbingly at home. She was used to this sort of encapsulating fear on Brendok, and part of it still spoke to the darkest part of her she’d tried so hard to ignore all these years.
She still had time, though. Time to become a better Jedi, a proper one, and earn her place as Sol’s student. She wouldn’t let her worst instincts win out.
If Garrow’s foolishness would cost Osha her life, that was one thing. But if he’d damned not only her but Yord as well…
Osha tried to shut down the surge of hatred. She failed.
“Keep it up,” Yord grunted as the three of them turned sharply around a massive tree. “Don’t fall behind.”
Osha knew the instruction was directed at Garrow, but she felt a spike of insult anyway. Maybe she wasn’t the most talented Padawan in her group, but she could still save Yord from this nightmare. No matter what it took.
“Stop!” Nearing a cairn, Yord swung an arm out in front of them, with Garrow crashing into Osha’s back. He pulled back hurriedly, and she rolled her eyes.
“Stay here.” Yord ducked behind the rocks, gesturing for Osha and Garrow to follow him. Another shriek split the night in two, and Garrow clapped his hands over his ears with a whimper.
“I’ll cross the clearing first. When I flash my saber, you come after me. Got that?” Yord looked between Osha and Garrow, waiting for them both to nod before carefully stepping away. He looked between the edging trees, his saber hilt in his fist, and sprinted across, mud kicking up in his wake. As he ran, a numbing black terror fell over Osha. It was the same suffocating emotion as when she heard the first bolt of a thunderstorm and felt a moment of nothing but overwhelming, indescribable fear.
But Yord broke through the curtain of vines on the other side, his dirty robes disappearing from sight, and Osha remembered how to breathe again.
Two quick bursts of yellow pulsed through the rain, and Osha flexed her fingers as she stood. “Let’s go.”
Garrow climbed shakily to his feet, his red hair dripping wet. “Can we rest for a - ”
“No. We can’t!” Yord was waiting for them, having just signalled his location to all the forest, and if the lyleks hadn’t yet noticed him they would soon. “We’re too kriffing close - the ship is just a little farther - come on!” Osha grabbed Garrow’s wrist, ignoring his sounds of protest, and charged forward.
His thin arm slipped out of Osha’s grip halfway across the clearing, but she kept moving. Garrow knew how to run, he didn’t need her direction -
Arm’s reach from the vines, Osha heard a shout, and she turned despite herself.
She caught the exact moment Garrow’s boots slipped on the mud, his arms failing to brace his fall as he landed with a cry of pain or fear.
A new screech broke through the night, so much closer than before. Garrow lifted his mud-splattered head, and his tear-filled eyes met Osha’s.
In a single instant, as Osha watched Garrow’s face fall, she realized he knew what she would do before she did.
And that was as long as Osha waited before leaping through the vines, seizing Yord’s hand, and running as fast as she could out of the forest.
➖
Enveloping darkness.
This wasn’t Osha’s usual dream realm, absence and clarity making way for darkness and light to creep toward her, that ominous black cloud beckoning her to slide her hand into its warmth. This place was dangerous, unsafe and foreboding, and Osha tried to run even as her legs sank into the pitch -
“You know what I have to do now, don’t you?”
That voice.
Did she know it?
No. No, there was no familiarity in it, nothing she could place - but why did it sound like an old friend she couldn’t quite remember, a possible guiding light -
Why did that voice somehow remind her of Sol?
“I do.”
That was a voice Osha knew. Even now, she still knew it better than her own voice - or maybe just as well, given that her voice was as identical as everything else her and Mae had shared.
Or everything they used to.
Osha was so caught up in the listless intonation of her sister’s words that she nearly missed the faint heat building at her left hand. Then -
Then the burning tore through her wrist -
It was too sudden and painful to cry out, all breath leaving her body, her mind going white -
Osha woke with a scream.
She clapped a hand over her mouth, trapping her tongue between her teeth. Automatically, she brought her right hand to her wrist and slid her fingers upward.
Her left hand was still there.
Osha exhaled, letting her arms fall, and squinted in the slanting sunlight coming through the narrow windows at the top of the room. If she’d woken up naturally - though she hadn’t done that in a while - she’d probably have been more caught off guard by her surroundings. She’d traveled here and there across Vetzal during her candidacy, but she hadn’t been in this building in seven years.
Pushing back the sheets and swinging her legs over the side of the bed, Osha took in her first real look at the Temple.
Last night, Vernestra’s ship had been surprisingly fast, arriving at Coruscant with timing so unexpected that Osha would have to ask about it. But still, the hour had been so late for the Core World planet that Yord had suggested they regroup in the morning. Osha hadn’t objected as he led her through the darkened halls, making her feel like a frequent caller and a stranger at the same time. But he’d had to correct her wanderings when, sleep-drunk and automatic, she’d tried to walk down the corridors that led to the Padawan quarters.
Instead, she’d been placed in a visitor’s room, one used for friends and family of the Jedi. It was clean but not ostentatious. From the comfortable bed to the connected refresher, it almost felt hotel-like.
And why did that tug at Osha’s heart in an indescribable way? That was all this room was: a docking port, a waystation, a temporary living space. This was for visitors and guests, those with no permanent claim to the Temple.
Yet Osha still had to remind herself that that was exactly what she was.
The previous night had felt like a dream that would eventually fade, leaving Osha to awake in her own bed on Vetzal, Jura making caf in the kitchen. But here Osha was, in the morning light, back to the place she swore she’d never return to.
Did she have any right to beg a tour off of Yord? Would he indulge her nostalgia and give her a fresh account of the training room, the cafeteria, the astronomy deck? How much had changed over the years? Did these walls still remember her?
Shame and old guilt crept in, dispelling Osha’s blossoming excitement. When she’d treated Garrow like she had, abandoned Yord, broken Sol’s heart - what right did she have to yearn for remembrance?
It’d be better for everyone if the Temple forgot her entirely.
But Osha wasn’t here to indulge in self-pity. She wasn’t even here for her own redemption. She was here for Mae. Mae, somehow alive sixteen years after Osha thought she’d lost her other half for good. Mae, with a Jedi-killer tracking her down. Mae, with some unknown figure willing to pay billions to ensure her death.
Osha was long past the point of saving herself, but maybe Mae wasn’t lost, too.
A sharp knock on the door startled Osha out of her musings. “Just a minute!” she shouted, hurrying to the refresher. Getting ready was almost easy, as Osha made quick work of the shower and offered toiletries. But when she stood in front of the closet, clutching her towel, she found herself faltering. Why hadn’t she insisted on bringing her own wardrobe, even if it was likely too fancy for the Temple?
Of course it made sense. Jedi didn’t dress themselves in fashion and opulence. Their garb was as plain and unadorned as any desert traveler.
Still, though, she hadn’t thought…
Another rap from the other side of the door, and Osha resigned herself to the closet’s offerings.
She steadied herself before finally activating the panel for the door to slide open, and she managed a smile. “Morning, Yord.”
He looked down at her, blinking, and Osha stepped back to hold out her arms in mock pride. “How does it look on me?”
On Vetzal, Osha had always decorated herself with fine fabrics and jeweled accessories, following the style expected by a representative of her stature. But maybe, in all that time, she’d subconsciously ignored muted shades and simpler substances for this exact reason.
Because Yord was staring, lips parted, at Osha in Jedi robes for the first time in seven years.
Osha tugged awkwardly at her clothes - the tan tunic, the brown robe, the multi-purpose boots. Though everything she was wearing could be called cheap, everyday stuff, it felt more sacred than the highest-count threads. She hadn’t wanted to return to the Temple looking like she’d never left, but that clearly hadn’t been up to her.
“Come on, say something. Is it the wrong size?”
Yord laughed, almost to himself, and shook his head. “Of course not. Never thought I’d see you looking like this again, though.”
“Course you wouldn’t.” Osha aimed a light punch at his arm as she shoved past him into the hall. “Remember when we were handling that puffer pig and I had a cup of meiloorun juice? I definitely wasn’t wearing those clothes again.”
Yord’s laugh had more substance to it this time, less disbelieving wonder, and he elbowed Osha as they fell into step together. “You startled it.”
Osha scoffed, rolling her eyes. “You were supposed to watch it!”
Living Force, how was she supposed to pretend she’d ever been gone? Dressed like a Jedi, walking through the Temple halls with Yord at her side… She’d thought the night before that she’d wake up in Vetzal from a dream, but maybe she’d been wrong. Maybe Vetzal had been the dream all along and the Temple was reality.
Oh, wouldn’t that be nice?
It wasn’t as if Osha hadn’t thrived in her time away. Senator Bajaj, her politics, Jura… Osha had made a life for herself on Vetzal, even if it wasn’t the life she’d once dreamed of. That was the real thing, not Coruscant, not even Brendok.
Still, Osha hooked her arm in Yord’s like she’d never left. “Tell me the cafeteria still serves wen-ri eggs? I’m starving.”
Force be damned, Osha would take what beautiful comfort she could in the time she had left.