Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

            Jocasta Nu began life as a failure—or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that Jocasta Nu was born into failure. A distinction without difference to most people, but Jocasta Nu was not most people.

            Generations of Jedi had lived, breathed, and died for the Republic as the wild space of the galaxy was wrestled into civilization. Knowledge was found, collected, and stored. Understandings evolved just as travel and politics and the Jedi Order itself, everything swirling together in a giant maelstrom of change.

            By a quirk of a birth several centuries too late, Jocasta Nu had missed all of that—all that growth had passed her by, leaving only order and preservation in its wake. Not exciting.

            It was especially frustrating for a Jedi Consular, which was her intended path—assuming this time she passed her Initiate Trials, became a Padawan and eventually a full-fledged Jedi, and life unfolded the way she thought it should. Jedi Consulars were the knowledge-seekers, the Force Adepts, the explorers and negotiators and, in Jocasta Nu's admittedly limited experience, the free-est a Jedi could be.

            The Initiate Trials! Jocasta snapped out of her thoughts as she remembered she had somewhere to be. She hiked up her robes and ran. Through the Temple halls, past cleaning droids and other initiates, weaving through Jedi Knights and Masters of various sizes and shapes, never pausing for long enough for more than a sorry called out as she took off again.
She burst through into the Tournament Room just in time to see two of her fellow Initiates performing a bow, heads of dark hair gleaming with sweat.

            “Tell me I have not missed it,” she muttered as she tried to stealthily slide into a seat.

            “You have missed it,” came the only slightly smug voice of Lorian Nod—fellow Human, Jedi Initiate, and all around troublemaker. “I, however, recorded it.”

            “Planning to steal Dooku's moves for tomorrow,” Jocasta teased just a little too loudly. “You would, too.”

            Lorian was about to respond when a shadow passed over him.

            “If you are going to attend the Hawk-Bat Clan's Trials,” came the gruff tones of Master Thame Cerulian. “At least do them the respect of keeping quiet.”

            “Sorry Master!” Both initiates looked suitably chastised, and Master Cerulian nodded and continued on his way, frown neither lessening nor deepening from beneath his neat grey beard.

            Caught in the frustration of having missed her friend's trial by combat, Jocasta failed to pay attention to the rest of the proceedings. No, not failed. This was a choice. Preconceived notions could spoil her own trial, poison her experience with false expectations. The trap of fault expectations was not one she could afford.

            Instead, she watched the people, the Council members and other prospective teachers gathered around: Masters Oppo Rancisis and Tera Synube looking both present and reflective; the newly-knighted Mirialan Jedi Cyslin Myr watching with interest next to her no-longer-Master, the mythical Neti Jedi T'ra Saa, tattooed green skin next to smooth yellow bark; Yula Braylon carefully watching Arath Tarrex with a fixed look somewhere between disappointment and disapproval; Thame Cerulian in a hushed conversation with Grand Master Yoda, the Corellian Jedi’s green robes blending with the green skin of the wizened and diminutive Grand Master’s body.

            Memory of Master Cerulian's admonishment still fresh, Jocasta didn't try to speak words. Instead, she satisfied herself with catching Dooku's eye as he left, pushing warm congratulations along the tether that was their connection in the Force. She could have sworn she saw him smile, perhaps even blush as he ducked his head, dark hair falling in front of his face. Jocasta felt her own face grow warm, a smile stretching its way unbidden across her lips.

            “Ten credits Sifo-Dyas has to wait another year,” Lorian elbowed her in the side. “And not from a lack of Jedi looking for apprentices, like you did.”

            “Excuse me,” Jocasta glared at her friend and clanmate. “Sifo-Dyas is a fellow Jedi Initiate and worthy of our respect. Fifteen credits.”

            “Deal,” Lorian took Jocasta’s hand and shook it, sealing the bet. “Meet me after dinner and I should have the recording ready to view.”

            “Alright.” Jocasta watched Lorian go, the blond-haired Human carrying more swagger at twelve years old than most Knights Jocasta had met. She turned as well, making her way to the upper levels of the Temple. The Library: if she was going to pass her Initiate Trials, she was going to have to hit the books. With her mind.

            Not that there were many physical books in the Archive Library—or if there were, they certainly did not allow initiates to access them. It was mostly datacards, checked out and accessed through terminals within the two levels the Archives spanned. Jocasta liked the older datacards the best—thick and rectangular, bigger than her hand, knowledge with weight to it. They weren’t as up-to-date or readily accessible as the modern datacards, but the sensation far surpassed any modern convenience. Exploration filled those information units, with speculation and annotations marking the passage of time. The evolution of thought—that was worth more than any streamlined recounting of the Great Hyperspace Wars or historically accurate Qel-Droma Epics.

            If she was going to pass her trials this time—and she was going to pass her trials this time—she would need to have a basis of comparison, however. With a sigh, she moved past the clunky datacards of the Republic’s early centuries and picked out the sleek packets of the most recent musings on the Force and the Jedi’s role in the galaxy. After pausing a moment, she also grabbed Battlemaster Jarro’s “Grippage: A Lightsaber Discourse.” A bit dry and philosophical, but there was something about reading words that worked better than lightsaber drills ever had for her.

            Preparation also meant planning—planning and strategy. Every youngling was proficient in Form I, but Heliost Clan was headed by Battlemaster Roja Gilnos. The Rattataki Jedi had taken their home culture’s passion for gladiatorial combat and reinterpreted it, drilling their Initiate Clans to not only possess a working knowledge of all six lightsaber forms, but also be well on their way towards a specialization by the time they transitioned to Padawans. As a result, even the younglings who went to the Jedi Service Corps were, thanks to Gilnos’s teachings, more capable than most security forces.

            Form II beats Form I, Form IV beats Form II, Form VI beats Form IV. Form III is defensive, Form IV is offensive, Form V and Form II are equal but opposite. Broad strokes that painted themselves in her mind, all assuming mastery, none accurate when paired with the unpredictability of an armed Initiate with the galaxy before them. Jocasta was proficient in Forms I and III, knew the opening moves of Form IV, and trusted her life to Form VI. In short, barring a gift from the Force itself, she was doomed. Maybe she could convince the Council to assign her to ExplorCorps—at least then she’d still be a collector of knowledge.

            Stop. Focus. If she had no chance at winning the physical trial, then she was better served focusing on the trials she could pass—namely, anything involving the Pillar of Knowledge. She dove into the various translations of the Jedi Code, comparing the Initiate mantra to Odan-Urr’s, meditating on the differences and similarities. How much was added or simply altered depending on the word? What did that change mean?

            Between her meditation and note-taking on the various lightsaber forms, it was only the ever-watchful eyes of the Archive’s remote droids that kept her from missing the last dining call. Jocasta managed to burst into the dining hall just in time to get the last serving of food and a seat at the end of Heliost Clan’s table, where the majority were either deep into excited chatter about tomorrow’s Tournament or had already left to prepare or sleep or get one more sparring session in.

            “Lost in a datascroll again,” Kell-Bon guessed, his head tendrils shaking as he tried badly to hide a chuckle. “What do you think happens if you’re late to your own trials?”

            “Automatic disqualification,” Jocasta answered unflinchingly. “Why, are you planning on  being late?”

            “Ha-ha,” Kell-Bon laughed along mockingly. “Seriously though, if they match us up you know I will win.”

            “I dunno,” Lorian said from the other side of the table. “Your defense is practically nonexistent.”

            “It’s called the Aggression Form for a reason,” Kell-Bon defended himself, then shook his head and got up. “Which reminds me, I still have a session with Battlemaster Gilnos tonight.”

            “Good luck,” Jocasta called after him. Kell-Bon sent her a soft pulse through the Force, confirming he understood and appreciated the gesture. Then she turned to Lorian. “Do you have it?”

            “Of course,” Lorian answered, pulling out his datapad and punching in a code. “Prepare to be awed.”

            Jocasta was awed. The figures were tiny, the angle wasn’t ideal, but she still got a clear sense of the fluidity, the utter beauty of Dooku’s movements. Sifo-Dyas was a decent dueling partner, could clearly feel Dooku’s attacks as he made them, but left himself open too often. The turn came as anyone watching knew it would, Sifo-Dyas on the ground and ready to yield, and Dooku refused. It was a choice that sent a feeling of warmth through Jocasta—a rare nobility, especially during the Initiate Trials. They finished the duel in a dance, Dooku slowing to Sifo-Dyas’s speed and Sifo-Dyas himself managing a few expertly-done Form IV maneuvers so that the two initiates ended with a bow and flourish.

            “Wow.” That was all Jocasta could think to say, all she was thinking as the recording began to loop and Lorian shut it off.

            “Did you see how Dooku stuck to Form II,” Lorian asked, eyes gleaming with something akin to mischief. “Fantastic strategy, especially without sight. Let your opponent control the speed, then control your opponent.”

            “As long as you have the high ground,” Jocasta clarified. “What if the terrain is changing around you? What if you are in a jungle?”

            “Then you have other problems,” Lorian dismissed her concerns with a wave. “Force, Sifo-Dyas was bad though, was he not? Service Corps material for sure.”

            “We’ll see,” Jocasta answered enigmatically. After watching their duel with her own eyes, Lorian’s jabs about Sifo-Dyas no longer sat well with her. True, he had struggled against Dooku, but his form was well beyond the others in his age-group. Dooku might have had him beat in footwork, but his technique was on-par with Heliost Clan. “See you tomorrow?”

            “See you on the battlefield,” Lorian answered, chuckling. “Set your alarm this time, yes?”

            Jocasta waved him off, then finished her now-cold dinner, the looming combat of tomorrow’s Initiate Tournament heavy in her mind. Her last chance at being a full-fledged Jedi sat like a weight upon her chest as she embraced a fitful sleep, factoids and strategies dancing in her head.

            The day arrived, and Heliost Clan’s lodgings were packed with all the noise and emotions and pressure of life. The younger members not yet ready for their trials crowded around their chosen champions, full of questions and suggestions and general explosions of energy that had nowhere else to go. An’ya, the youngest clan member at six years old, had been awake and rowdy since before the sun peaked over the cityscape and had gone around poking at her crechemates until the doors opened. Those ready for their trials—ten in all—did their best last-moment preparations: Kell-Bon fitted a small ribbon around his tendrils, forcing them up into something resembling a Lannik topknot; Hran Beling and Vimeth practiced their Force-assisted leaps over each other; Lorian Nod leaned against corners, an easy confidence warring against the nerves within.

            Jocasta meditated. She reached out as best she could, touching the thread of Living Force that connected all things. It was strong, powerful, overwhelming in a lot of ways—and yet, there was a fragility there too. The ripples seemed, just for a moment, to echo everywhere. To go left instead of right, drink water instead of blumfruit juice, even just to smile at the boy with the dark eyes and noble bearing—it could change so many things.

            The Initiate Chapel was, despite the Old Republic Masters’s best intentions, usually overflowing with life: noisy, dirty, windswept and climbable. Not so now. Now, despite the mess of initiates from at least four separate clans, it was quiet and contemplative. Even the most boisterous of younglings were cowed—if not meditating, they were at least considering the challenge before them, the trials that they had no time left to prepare for, the Tournament that would in part decide their future. Jocasta caught Dooku’s eyes from across her pew, a look he returned with a smile full of warmth and encouragement.

            The Thranta and Hawk-Bat Clans were moved out first, with a stern-looking Archivist leading them out and up, towards the upper reaches of the Archives. The Trial of Knowledge, Jocasta thought, and felt an excited chill run up her spine as she watched them go, Dooku and Sifo-Dyas just about joined at the hip in a mixture of morning exhaustion and pre-Trial nervousness. It was a mystery just how the Three Pillars were weighted when it came to the Initiate Trials—actually, it was unclear to Jocasta what Self-Discipline meant when it came to the Tournament. Was victory required? Would ‘fighting well’ do? Could you be out first and still pass as long as you remembered which way to hold your lightsaber?

            Questions with no answers, and the longer the Initiates waited, the more they bloomed in her mind. Jocasta took a breath, settled herself into a meditative stance—kneeling, hands clasped, eyes closed—and tried to feel the Force. It had been described to her in various lessons as a great branching tree, or a swirling maelstrom, or simply a river. It had a nature, or it was nature, or it was pushed by nature. It should be loved, or feared, or respected.

            In Jocasta’s mind, it was a thread, a constantly weaving tapestry of existence. With enough practice, Jedi could see the beautiful picture this tapestry created or could identify the various strands of life and how their actions might shape the bigger picture. Jocasta could not see this bigger picture, but she could feel its presence, large and looming and there. It calmed her, knowing there was something bigger than herself, that her will was only a tiny part of a whole. If she passed her trials, this was the will of the Force. If she was sent to the ExplorCorps, this too was the will of the Force. Either way, Jocasta was determined to seek knowledge where she could find it. She had faith that the Force agreed with this path.

            If the faint sound of footsteps and opening doors was not enough to break Jocasta’s trance, the swell of excitement that went up from her fellow Initiates was. She opened her eyes cautiously, hands going from knees to floor to push herself up. It was time.

            Roja Gilnos was not difficult to spot. Although not tall by any means, standing at roughly 1.74 meters, they had a commanding presence that meant they made themselves felt both in the Force and physically with the space they occupied. Their Jedi robes were designed for movement, not flow, taking inspiration from warrior Jedi of the past (Jocasta suspected, but could not prove, Cathar influence). Their head was, like all Rattataki Jocasta had known, bald and chalk-white, with crisscrossing lines and dots of black tattoos the only significant deviation in coloring. Granted, Jocasta had not known many Rattataki. Were they capable of growing hair, and thus their baldness was a cultural choice? Did they have hair other places?

            “Ronto Clan and Heliost Clan,” Battlemaster Gilnos’s voice rang out clear. “Assemble for your Trial of Self-Discipline!”

            “Those not participating,” called the less commanding but no less authoritative Master Sinube. “Please follow me to the viewing area. Come along, you can cheer them on from the stands.” Older initiates helped wrangle the younger ones; Jocasta suppressed a smile as Katri, a ten-year-old Mirialan from Ronto Clan, lifted An’ya onto her shoulders, the younger Human giggling in delight.

            It was time. Lined up by clan, the sixteen prospective Jedi entered the Arena. Jocasta tapped Lorian on his shoulder, giving it a reassuring squeeze. Lorian nodded back.

            “It is the nature of the Jedi to remain in flux,” Battlemaster Gilnos began, bowing solemnly before the gathered Jedi audience. “To that end, today’s Tournament will not follow the previous day’s structure.”

            An echo of gasps and at least one yelp came from the Initiates gathered. Jocasta began to sweat.

            “The true test of Self-Discipline,” a small smile played at the Rattataki Jedi’s lips. “The challenge any Jedi should be able to face is the chaos of battle.”

            “Ordinarily, we would give instructions,” Master Halcyon said from the side, the slightest hint of admonishment in her voice. “But Battlemaster Gilnos made a persuasive argument and we shall follow their judgement.”

            Jocasta wiped at her now-damp brow, sweat beginning to drip down her face. No instructions? No rules?

            “When I ignite my blade,” Roja Gilnos raised the lightsaber pike in their left hand. It was, in both design and function, a relic of a bygone era. If Jocasta squinted closely enough, she could see the intricate details—parts welded carefully together, a spiral of Rattataki script etched into the long hilt like a name or a prayer. Would Jocasta get the chance to build such a beautiful weapon? “Your trial begins. Be aware of your surroundings. Trust in the Force. Comport yourself with the honor of the Jedi Order.”

            Silence. The sound of breaths and stretches and fingers twitching. No rules of engagement, no circumstances of victory, just the way of the Jedi and fifteen other prospects between Jocasta and a master of her own.

            The blade ignited, a brilliant silvery white that hummed with warning and power. In the arena, chaos reigned.

            Jocasta did not ignite her training blade—a decision made less out of strategy than a sense of overwhelming confusion. No rules had never been part of her preparation. As she considered this, frozen, Ronto Clan turned on each other, Force and blades and flesh reaching and bruising and shoving. Lorian engaged Vimeth and Kell-Bon both, then dove out of the way as the two Form IV practitioners locked blades and wits. Antilles and Cjel Li took an edge of the arena for themselves and began a duel.

            “What do you think the rules are,” Jocasta asked Flemeth. “Patience? Quality? Speed? Survival?”

            “Keep moving,” the Mon Calamari suggested. “Or fall with grace.” A light blue training blade sprang to life as Flemeth gave Jocasta the traditional Makashi salute.

            “Keep moving it is then,” Jocasta responded and launched herself over Flemeth in a Force-assisted leap. She landed awkwardly, rolling to avoid tripping over the Ronto Clan members who had taken themselves out of the fight and were currently lying prone and gasping for breath.

            It wasn’t all chaos. The chaos was there, but as Jocasta struggled to keep her footing, to keep as much distance between herself and her fellow Initiates’ blades as possible, it hit her. The chaos was a distraction; if Jocasta wanted to be a Jedi, or even just an archaeologist, she had to be able to ignore distractions. To function despite them.

            Jocasta turned to face Flemeth, drawing her own training blade now. The green glow was faint, yet as Jocasta breathed and readied herself it felt as though that glow was the only light in the Arena. She gripped the weapon in both hands, a modified Form III stance, and waited for Flemeth’s opening move. The two blades clashed lightly, a testing of form and boundaries. Then Jocasta moved, a series of quick slashes as she moved forward, shifting between defense and a Force-based acceleration. Flemeth countered, but Jocasta had strength on her side and it was clear the Mon Cal was faltering slightly. Feint left, thrust center mass, follow through, except Jocasta’s footwork had never been top notch. Flemeth took advantage of that now, aiming low, forcing Jocasta back on the defensive. Block, block, dodge, parry, hit wall, close eyes and wait for the incapacitating blow.

            It did not come, and instead Flemeth let out a sharp yelp of pain, and Jocasta opened her eyes in time to see the blue glow of Flemeth’s training blade disappear as it clattered to the ground. Jocasta seized her chance, leaping over Flemeth and landing with her training blade pointed towards their attacker.

            “A ‘thank you’ would be nice,” Lorian said with a smirk, his own blade lightly tapping Jocasta’s. “You were not going to win that fight.”

            “I will win this one,” Jocasta nodded, circling Lorian and readying a Form VI opener. “But thank you.”

            The ground began to move. What had seemed to be an aesthetic choice of imitated Naboo tile flooring now revealed itself to be a series of hover-assisted platforms, currently rising in short jerky bursts. Jocasta wavered, struggling to maintain her balance, dropping her stance momentarily.

            Lorian attacked, blade aimed at Jocasta’s shoulder and swiping towards her neck. Jocasta reached out with her free hand, using the Force to nudge the blade as she bent herself back slightly. She smiled briefly as it passed harmlessly over her, tightened her core muscles to bring herself back into Form I.

            “Start with the basics,” she murmured to herself. “Get comfortable with the new surroundings. Stop. Reassess.”

            Lorian’s platform moved farther away. Jocasta breathed in, then out. Focused on her bladework and the movement of the platform and centered herself as the Tournament ticked on. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Kell-Bon leaping from one platform to the next, slowly making his approach toward Jocasta or Lorian or both. Jocasta made a choice: she jumped, using the Force to propel her onto Lorian’s platform.

            “Truce,” Jocasta stated more than asked, using Lorian to steady herself. “We take Kell-Bon together, flank him.”

            “Alright,” Lorian agreed, eyes darting from Jocasta to the approaching Kell-Bon. “You should go left. I will stay right. Take it slow.”

            Jocasta nodded, then jumped again, using the Force to send herself up and over to the next closest platform. This time she landed properly, light on her feet and ready to move again. Kell-Bon reached the next platform, a point in the triangle now containing Jocasta on one side and Lorian on the other.

            Kell-Bon looked between the two of them with an exhilarated smile, giving Jocasta a tiny wave. Then he leapt. Mid-air his approach changed, Form IV landing into Form VI. A rush of the Force pushed Jocasta off-balance as Kell-Bon pounced at Lorian. Jocasta regained her balance in time to see Kell-Bon and Lorian struggling, less of a duel than a grapple.

            Jocasta concentrated, reached out with the Force, and pulled. Her tile-cum-platform obeyed, gliding gently but firmly into Lorian’s, mechanisms underneath shooting out to anchor the tiles together. Kell-Bon and Lorian separated, readying opening stances of Form V and II respectively.

            Blade once more drawn, Jocasta took two steps forward and stabbed low, aiming for Kell-Bon’s legs. Kell-Bon blocked, then had to lean back to avoid Lorian’s blade going straight for his neck. Jocasta stepped back, readying Form VI: blade down by the side, free hand reaching into the Force. Kell-Bon reversed, leaning forward as he swung his blade behind his back to catch Lorian’s returning slash.

            This was the moment. Jocasta locked eyes with Lorian and tried to convey pushing slash with her eyebrows. Then all three Initiates sprang into action. Jocasta feinted, swinging hard and wide towards Kell-Bon. As he moved to lock blades, Lorian took his chance and slashed downward, connecting with Kell-Bon’s left shoulder. Jocasta pushed out with the Force, completing the move, and Kell-Bon was flung off his feet and the platform.

            Jocasta grinned, scarcely daring to believe her plan had worked. It was in this moment of victory, as she watched him fall, that she felt a sharp pain against her side and suddenly she too was falling. She landed hard, training blade flying from her hand.

            It was over. It was over. It was over.

***

            It would be unfair to say that the rest of the trials passed in a blur. Jocasta was present and attentive and not late. She was inquisitive, but confident. Her head was in it. Her heart, however? Her heart ached, preoccupied with the Tournament’s close. Had, as Lorian claimed, the shove simply been an accident? Even combined, the platforms weren’t large, and Lorian Nod had never been the cleanest when it came to bladework.

It felt like betrayal, though, and that was what tied Jocasta into knots. Was Lorian really so petty, so childishly adherent to the concept of victory that he would choose an easy win over an honorable duel? Jocasta could not say for sure. All she knew was that it hurt to think her clanmate might value a Tournament over a friendship.

            Lorian met her after dinner, motioning her off to the side as a wave of Jedi from Initiates to Masters exited the dining hall. His blond hair looked damp in the low light, though from sweat, water, or unwash she could not say.

            “You heard the rumor,” Lorian asked, smile not quite in place but eyes ever sharp. “Yoda might take a padawan.”

            “Master Yoda,” Jocasta repeated, reading Lorian’s expression like a datacard. He was telling the truth. “Who told you that?”

            “Kell-Bon heard it from Vimeth who overheard Masters Yarael Poof and Tyvokka talking,” Lorian explained. “Apparently, they said Thame Cerulian and Yoda had been locked in a battle of the wills over who gets to train Dooku.”

            “Oh,” Jocasta felt her heart flutter, excitement for Dooku whirling together with disappointment at her own lack of prospects. Dooku would go far, she knew. “That explains why he was so sharp the other day.”

            “Right,” Lorian waved his hand dismissively. “Except Master Cerulian left Coruscant last night—some political meeting or something, anyway. He left his room unlocked.”

            “So?”

            “So you and I should go have a look around,” Lorian added a note of pleading to his voice. It was a move Jocasta knew well. “See if we can figure out who he has on his shortlist.”

            Jocasta knew it was wrong. She knew it was an idea that could only get them—and more importantly, her—into trouble. The pull of friendship was stronger than responsibility. Only briefly, only for a moment, but a moment was all it took. The thread was pulled, the tapestry undone for its weaver to start again the next morning. “Lead the way.”

            The hallways darkened and shrunk as Jocasta and Lorian made their way to the Masters’ lodgings. Jocasta knew from her architectural studies that this could not actually be the case—the dimensions of the Temple didn’t change significantly until at least the third level, and even then it could be measured equally against the other towers. Yet if knowing did nothing to ease Jocasta’s impression, neither did the unease shift her resolve. If Master Cerulian was actively seeking an apprentice, Jocasta needed to know who—apart from Dooku—was on his list. If there was a flutter of hope in her chest, well, it was not worth considering.

            The two Initiates found his room quickly enough, and just as Lorian had promised, a touch of the panel opened the door with a sterile whoosh. It was…more crowded than Jocasta had been expecting. She had seen other Jedi quarters before, of course. There was only so much room in the Temple, and a growing child was almost compelled to explore every crack and crevice. Battlemaster Gilnos’s quarters were easily identifiable by the extra space cleared on the floor for their own form of meditation. Knight Arryn Shi collected various plants from her travels. A few others liked to keep around spare droid parts for tinkering.

            Master Cerulian’s room should have been a reflection of his personality—stoic, solitary, maybe a spare robe or two in the closet and a comfortable chair. Instead, it had shelves brimming with things. There were credits of various shapes and sizes, miniature figures of ships, a tea set. On one shelf there was a Twi’lek Kalikori that was freshly dusted—but never moved, if the discoloration on the shelf was anything to go by. There was even a book—an actual book, with pages and strange lettering clearly inked and bound and even updated.

            Jocasta took comfort in the presence of a comfortable chair in a corner near the tea set. She reached out, fingers daring to brush the book she had spotted, when Lorian tugged at her sleeve.

            “Is that what I think it is?”

            Jocasta followed his finger to where it was pointing: a large triangular object roughly the size of a bolo-ball. It almost seemed to be…glowing?

            “Come on, remember the Odan-Urr lecture,” Lorian was not looking at Jocasta; he had not taken his eyes off the object, and was in fact slowly moving closer to it. “The Holocron of Naga Sadow looked just like that thing.”

            “I think the dimensions were different,” Jocasta corrected—the only thing she could think to do confronted with this…object. It really did look to be glowing, a faint red light at its base. “What are you doing?”

            “Investigating,” Lorian was right up next to it now, eyes peering curiously. “I cannot sense anything, can you?”

            “No,” Jocasta said quickly. “This was a mistake. We should leave.”

            “No,” Lorian echoed, but he finally pulled away from the object, casting a quick glance around the room. “Not without that list.”

            “We do not know that there is a list,” Jocasta reminded him. “We thought there could be a list. Anyway—”

            “Found it,” Lorian called out, and sure enough, there was a page with near-illegible Basic written on it. “We can go now.”

            Jocasta was out the door, down the hall, and halfway back to her room before she mustered up the courage to ask for the page. Lorian had taken advantage of this, pretending (and he had to be pretending for it to go on as long as it did) to study the text, making humming noises. He relented as she asked though, and Jocasta took the page in both hands.

            Her heart sank, then rose, then stuttered somewhere in the middle. Dooku was clearly scrawled at the top, but so was Sifo-Dyas, Vimeth, Hran Beling, Antilles, and near the bottom Lorian Nod. Nowhere was a name that could be read as Jocasta Nu.

            “Sorry,” Lorian muttered, sounding like he meant it. “Or congratulations. He does not seem like a fun teacher.”

            “What if he actually picks Sifo,” Jocasta forced a cheeriness into her voice. “For all we know, he is running a secret betting pool on how we all ranked in the Tournament.”

            “I hope so,” Lorian said with a smirk. “If this is his bet, I just lost him a whole bunch of credits for being so good. Wait, what do you think Jedi Masters bet with?”

            “Time in the gardens,” Jocasta guessed confidently. “Ooh, or the Archives.”

            Time passed quickly after that, and by lights out Jocasta could almost forget the hurt she had been nursing from the Tournament’s end—could almost forget that, come Ascension Day, she would be reassigned to the Service Corps and never again set foot in the hallowed halls of the Archives. She slept without dreams that night.

***

            Jocasta did not see Lorian again until the night before the Initiate Judgement. Jocasta had brushed off his absence at first—perhaps he finally decided to visit the Archives, had become enamored with information the way Jocasta had aways been. By the third day, however, she had become concerned, and so after dinner she waited in a corner in the Temple Gardens—their corner, the one Heliost Clan used to practice meditations during daytime hours. Sure enough, Lorian found her there.

            He did not look well. His eyes were ringed with a lack of sleep, his hair and skin impossibly damp and shiny in the low Coruscanti light.

            “I need your help.”

            No more words were exchanged as Jocasta followed Lorian through hallways, past living quarters, to a storage closet filled with the robes of a younger Republic. Moving them aside, Lorian motioned Jocasta to follow him inside.

            “I think it is talking to me,” he said shakily. “I tried to put it back, but I can still hear it.”

            “Hear what,” Jocasta asked, and then she saw what Lorian meant. There on the floor, glowing faintly, was the object from Master Cerulian’s quarters. If Jocasta had doubted it before, she no longer did so—she could feel the pull from it, the faint whispers of the mind, ghosts of something long passed and yet ever-present. “What have you done?”

            “I just wanted to see if I was right,” Lorian defended himself, but still that shallow, tired tone seemed to embrace his whole self. “But there is something inside it and it wants to get out and…”

            “We should get a Master,” Jocasta decided. “Or go to the Council even.”

            “No,” Lorian practically shouted, panic filling his voice. “They would cast me out for this. Remember the story about Klias Teradine?”

            “I—” Jocasta did remember Klias Teradine—cautionary tale to all young Jedi about the dangers of thinking oneself above the wisdom of the Order, his records in the Archive were restricted but it was well agreed-upon gossip that he had been cast out of the Order for his indiscretions—and once more her kinship with Lorian warred against every lesson the Jedi had taught her. “What should we do, then?”

            “The Archives,” Lorian muttered, then shook his head. “They have…containment areas, right? Help me get it there. Just help me get it there, please.”

            “Okay,” Jocasta nodded. “Okay. But then you are going to the healer.”

            “Absolutely,” Lorian nodded. “Thank you.”

            Jocasta could not tell if it was the time spent in the storage closet or the anxiety of the task at hand, but the hallways seemed especially bright as she and Lorian made their way towards the third level of the Temple, holocron bundled between them. From there, it was a simple matter of following the tunnel that The Guy had used.

            “Where are you two off to in such a hurry?” Jocasta and Lorian stopped in their tracks, holocron jostling against their ribs, as Master Yarael Poof stepped into view. He smiled kindly, and although it was difficult to see from this far down, Jocasta thought she saw a twinkle of friendly mischief in his eyes.

            “Nowhere-”

            “The Archives-”

            The twinkle disappeared as Master Poof approached. Whether he could sense the evil of the holocron, the nervous deception, or Lorian’s general dishevelment, Jocasta did not know. It was clear he sensed something, though, as his tall, thin body planted itself firmly in their path.

            “Jocasta roped me into it,” Lorian declared loudly. “This was not my idea!”

            “What was not your idea, Lorian Nod?”

            Lorian unwrapped the holocron. Jocasta did not do anything—could not do anything. Lorian had lied. Lorian had lied about her. It was a clear and bold lie, one that left no room for argument or misunderstanding. If he had lied about that, had he truly pushed her off the platform? Had he even wanted to find the list in Master Cerulian’s room? The thread unravelled, and the last thing Jocasta recalled before her vision faded was Lorian’s eyes on her. She wondered if all guilty people looked at their betrayed like that—as if forgiveness could be taken by power if only one stared hard enough.

***

            Jocasta awoke not to the harsh light of the medbay or the soothing cool of bacta, but to the judgmental expression of Master Thame Cerulian. His dark eyes looked even smaller than usual when paired with the frown and creases of a master clearly considering appropriate punishment, and Jocasta understood that she had never seen Master Cerulian angry or disappointed before this moment. There was a heaviness even to his breathing as he waited silently for Jocasta to sit up and face him.

            “Out of all the Initiates who might invite themselves into my quarters,” Master Cerulian sighed. “I did not predict you would be one of them. Not simply invite yourself, but to take from me as well? Is that the behavior of Jedi?”

            “No,” Jocasta could not meet his eyes. “I am sorry for that, but I did not—”

“Take the holocron?” Master Cerulian waved a hand dismissively. “Of course not. Any Jedi worth their training could see that was Lorian Nod. The boy is lucky he did not keep it for longer—his body is not strong enough to handle that kind of corruption for too long.”

            “Is he okay?” Jocasta could not help the crack in her voice as she asked, eyes finally daring to meet the Jedi Master’s gaze.

            “He will be,” Master Cerulian nodded. “Although the Council has decided not to grant him an apprenticeship. He will be reassigned to the Jedi Service Corps.”

            “Oh,” Jocasta sighed shakily. Gathered herself for her question. “And where shall I be reassigned?”

            “You?” Master Cerulian shook his head slowly, as if the question had either caught him off guard or put him in a difficult position. Perhaps it was—how could crushing an Initiate’s dreams come easily to any Jedi? “With your permission, I have recommended you be assigned as my padawan.”

            Jocasta Nu could not speak, could not dare to break the silence that followed those words. Instead, she nodded vigorously, blue eyes locked intently on Master Thame Cerulian’s brown ones. Master Thame Cerulian: her master. Jocasta Nu: Jedi Padawan.

Chapter Text

               Jedi Padawan Jocasta Nu scratched the side of her head. Gone was her long hair that hid her face while studying and shimmered light brown in the Coruscanti sun; in its place, the short even strands of a new padawan—save for the braid tucked behind her left ear.

               “First lesson,” Master Thame Cerulian—her Master—spoke beside her, eyes still closed in meditation. “Not all those who walk the Dark Path are Sith—a distinction without difference to most, but not us.”

               “You can be a Dark Sider and not be Sith,” Jocasta repeated, eyes searching her Master's expressionless face. “But the Dark Side is the Dark Side, so what does it matter what they call themselves?”

               “Do you look at a holo and think it is a mirror?”

               “I—sorry, Master?”

               “Take the Witches of Dathomir,” Master Cerulian started again, obviously trying a different tact. “The Mountain Clans are warriors, yes, but their elders commune with the Force, listen to its guidance, keep their tribes in balance with nature. Not so with the Nightsisters, whose rituals pervert the natural flow of the Force. Where has it brought them? Their clans are banished to the dark forests, their species warped by their selective search for power.”

               “So the Dathomirans and the Sith use the Dark Side for different purposes,” Jocasta followed. “Would their artifacts behave differently if touched by a Jedi's mind?”

               “Indeed,” Master Cerulian nodded. “Sith philosophy holds a dark mirror to the Jedi: the self above the many, strength before compassion. Their artifacts are designed to seduce just as Jedi artifacts are intended to teach.”

               “Our business,” Jocasta hazarded a guess. “It's strictly Sith?”

               “Our business,” Master Cerulian corrected, eyes now open, brown locked on blue. “Is to identify, archive, and if needed quarantine dangerous artifacts.”

               Jocasta opened her mouth to speak, thought better of it, and shut it again.

               “We are not thieves,” Master Cerulian did not smile, but the ends of his lips did twitch slightly. “But neither are we restricted by Republic cultural standards or codes. Our creed is to the Jedi; our first Chancellor is the Force.”

               “I understand, Master.” Those were the last words Jocasta spoke to her master for three months.

               Another padawan might have been offended, even wounded. Jocasta took her master's absence in stride. It was not because she felt unprepared for life as Thame Cerulian's padawan--she certainly did not feel prepared, but the Corellian Jedi had an intimidating reputation. It was more that Jocasta had accepted that her path was in service. At the moment, nobody was in need of service more than Chief Archivist Restelly Quist.

               The Jedi Archives might once have been the center of all knowledge in the galaxy, but 400 years of relatively easy peace and expansion had collided with advancements in information technology and storage that the Jedi Temple on Coruscant had been ill-equipped to embrace. Between that, Restelly Quist's own research projects, and ongoing preparations for historical presentation requests, the Archives were looking less like a gleaming jewel of galactic knowledge and more like a neglected storage closet.

               Enter Jocasta Nu: bright-eyed, passionate, and with nothing else to do. ExplorCorps had, thankfully, been making some headway in the standardization process—out of practical necessity more than anything, but their work was appreciated and gave Jocasta an endpoint. The starting point was, as the Force would have it, with the outdated datacards of the Republic's vanished Golden Age.

               Imagine a room. On one wall is a mural that shimmers and seems to shift with the light that filters in from the open ceiling. Now fill the room with people; not all at once, two or three at a time. Every group has their own comments, conversations about the mural and the weather and life, and their words drop from their mouths with ease. Start with the first group and work forward. Each conversation is recorded in detail. Now date and streamline and preserve and capture. Take the wonder and safety it has always evoked, and let the Force guide the rest.

               There was ambiguity the further back the records went. Jocasta believed they should rename the Old Republic Era the Dark Ages—a mixture of wars and destruction, the rise and falls of empires had left the Jedi with a bunch of rumors and stories and very little verifiable facts. Freedon Nadd appeared fully-formed on Ossus, killed his master, and disappeared into the heart of the Sith Empire, reappearing centuries later as the inspiration of no less than three cults. Revan was less a person than a mythical archetype—the Sith'ari, the reason for the First Mandalorian-Jedi Wars, a hole in the galaxy if not the Force itself. Even places seemed to fluctuate; the Sith homeworld of Moraband was called Pesegam, Korriban, or Atonusin depending on the star map and the chroniclers. Lack of standardized star maps from those times complicated the archival process further—Dantooine looked positively Mid Rim on the Avello-Shyn model, which conceived of the galaxy as a series of interlocking rings.

               It was glorious. It should have been glorious; this was, after all, everything Jocasta had ever wanted—knowledge at her fingertips, appreciation for her passion, a path forward. Except…except it had been gained through loss, hadn’t it? Was that even a gain, then? Was Jocasta Nu truly worthy of the rank of Padawan if she had failed what mattered most—her friend?

***

               Roja Gilnos was by no account a listening ear. They preferred dueling to talking and teaching to data work. They were also the only authority figure Jocasta felt could understand what happened with Lorian.

               “The Agricultural Corps is not meant as a punishment.” they explained patiently as they used Form II footwork to avoid Jocasta's overhead attack. “Jedi are fighters. Some are healers. Some are growers. Lorian Nod has a different path to walk now.”

               “But it was,” Jocasta protested, and it was her turn to defend with a mixture of Form IV acrobatics and Form VI bladework. “Lorian was expelled. Failed. Reassigned.”

               “Which was it,” Battlemaster Gilnos asked with narrowed eyes. “Expelled, failed, or reassigned?”

               “I do not ca-” Jocasta stammered. Stopped. Held the thought as memories swam before her eyes, laughter and kinship and selfishness and fear. “I miss him.”

               “So do I.”

               Training blades deactivated on either side, and Jocasta accepted her teacher's offered embrace and cried. Cried for the friend she would never see again and for the path of the Jedi she was now expected to walk and for the way her life would change and the way it would stay the same.

               Then she returned to work.

***

               “Temple life suits you,” Master Thame Cerulian said by way of greeting. “It suited me once, too.”

               Jocasta did not have a response to that. She was not even certain whether it was an insult or a complement or just a statement. Two years as Master Cerulian's padawan and the elder Jedi remained a relative mystery to her. Granted, roughly a year altogether had been spent on Temple grounds with hardly a message from her Master, continuing her dueling lessons, studying languages both alive and extinct, and shadowing Chief Librarian Restelly Quist. Jocasta was not certain that Chief Librarian Quist could be called a mentor—their interactions consisted mainly consisted of notes communicated through the Archives’ closed messaging system—but she was friendly enough and had readily granted Jocasta’s application for Assistant to the Jedi Archivist, so all was as well as it could be.

               “Whatever duties you have, finish them,” he continued. “We shall leave in two rotations.”

               “Yes Master,” Jocasta replied automatically. By the time she had processed her Master's words, the Jedi had already rounded a corner and disappeared from view. “We have a mission. I have a mission!”

               Excitement might have been unbecoming of a Jedi, but Jocasta was not yet a Jedi. It was a stray thought, glib and airy, and so naturally the knowledge she had gorged herself on these past two years leapt hungrily to her defense.

               Leaving Coruscant. A rare occasion, even for Jedi on assignment. Although the Jedi and the Senate maintained, on datapad, the same relationship they had always had—one of respect and reasonable independence—this was not the case practically. Political concerns, potential liability issues—Jocasta could not pretend to understand nor care about the reasoning behind it. All of which meant that if Master Cerulian was taking her on a mission off-world, Jocasta had to be on her absolute best behavior. Attentive, the perfect padawan, ready to perform whatever task her master required of her.

               The two days passed in a blur as Jocasta quickly but carefully finished her current projects, leaving notes in case another archivist intended to pick up where she had left off. She was halfway through the Golden Age now, the Dark Ages carefully categorized with various annotations and theses on the various Darksider Wars and epic poetry within. She had even found a particularly interesting synthesis of the various maps of the era—a dry read to most, but essential for those Jedi who could only explore the galaxy through holovids, treatise, and the aforementioned maps. Jedi who, up until two days ago, had counted Jocasta Nu among their number.

               Jocasta carefully dressed herself in the mixture of functional and ceremonial Jedi robes, the sturdy browns offset by white and gold. This meant more layers than she was accustomed to, but the tradeoff was preparation. If the inscription alongside the outer robe gave her strength, the knowledge that the Jedi Code was with her calmed her spirit, this was merely an added benefit.

               Her final addition to her pack was, of course, her lightsaber. Although she had rarely ignited it since her Gathering, Jocasta made sure to keep the components clean and functional. If she was honest with herself, Jocasta had not been especially focused when crafting her lightsaber—in fact, Dooku and Sifo had helped make some last-minute adjustments when Jocasta had absentmindedly swapped the kyber crystal with a secondary focusing crystal. She had still been in mourning, wishing for all the galaxy that Lorian was there with her.

               This was not to say that Jocasta’s lightsaber was inferior, or that it lacked passion or soul or whatever else lightsabers required to function properly—it had been difficult to stay awake for Professor Huang’s lecture after she’d spent nearly five hours lost in the caves. What it meant was that Jocasta considered her lightsaber unfinished, had taken to adding, assembling, disassembling, changing her lightsaber with her knowledge. The result was simpler than one might expect, emphasis placed on unity of function.

               Jocasta ignited the blade for good measure, examining its strength, intensity, the way the light danced across the dull grey walls and its hum melded with the kyber crystal song that only she could hear. She hoped she would never have to use it. She hoped that, on this mission, she would.

               The journey was not smooth. Or rather, it was probably smooth, would have felt smooth if Jocasta had not discovered that hyperspace travel disagreed with her. She managed to make it to the fresher before her stomach emptied itself, two Temple meals worth spilling into the waste compartment. Jocasta was grateful that she had maintained her short Padawan haircut, certain that had she grown it out as she had been tempted to do, it would now be covered in her own disgusting spillage.

               She thought she saw a smile tugging at Master Cerulian’s lips as she made her way back to her seat, but whatever it was had vanished before she had time to consider it. They were travelling to Casfield III, a Mid-Rim planet with an Outer Rim attitude. According to Master Cerulian’s sources—and he said sources, like he worked for a HoloNet station, his Corellian accent curling around the word—there had been a recent archeological dig that had uncovered…something. A Sith artifact, Master Cerulian thought.

               As missions went, this was the best one Jocasta could imagine, the closest she would get to the exploration of those early ages she had immersed herself in. Despite her Hyperspace sickness, Jocasta was positively bouncing with excitement. So much so, she almost started when Master Cerulian suddenly stood in front of her, a mug in his hands.

               “Drink this,” he instructed, pushing the mug into her hands. Jocasta sniffed at the liquid, eyes watering at the strength of its smell—somewhere between floral and swampwater. “It will settle your stomach.”

               Jocasta sipped cautiously, suspiciously. The bitterness made her tongue want to curl down her throat—and the liquid tasted thick, why did it taste thick—but this was the most interaction she had with her master in the past six months. She used her free hand to pinch her nose closed, shut her eyes, and opened her throat. The warm liquid slid down, the taste still there and leaving her gasping, but the mug was empty. Jocasta opened her mouth wide, trying to dispel the taste through the recycled oxygen as her tongue lapped itself dry in the air.

               “It is not that bad,” Master Cerulian shook his head, then sipped from his own mug. He grimaced visibly as he swallowed. “A bit more bracing than I remember.”

               “What is it,” Jocasta asked, wishing she had asked that before she drank it. “Expired blumfruit juice?”

               “Bauhin flower tea,” Master Cerulian answered indignantly, then sighed into his mug. “I knew I should have sun-brewed it.”

               Surprisingly, Jocasta did feel better. Calmer. Which was just as well, since the trip was going to take a few days—the Republic transport shuttle Master Cerulian had requisitioned for his mission had obviously seen better times, and as much as Jocasta would like to disagree, there was really no need to rush.

               Time passed slowly once the novelty of Hyperspace wore off, and Jocasta eventually retreated from the cockpit. Settling herself on one of the more open areas, she instead determined to practice her meditation. She reached out to the Force. Even in Hyperspace, this place between places, she could sense it—the connection between all living things. If she tried hard enough, focused on not focusing, Jocasta could feel herself start to vanish as the Force reached out to meet her. It felt wild, untamed and untamable. Was the Force different out here, away from the Temple?

               Jocasta felt a tap against her head and opened her eyes to find she was floating. The tap had been the feeling of the bulkhead against her skull. She couldn’t help it; she looked down and, her meditation broken, felt gravity reassert itself. The resulting crash was more embarrassing than painful; embarrassment only compounded by her master’s sudden appearance in what passed for a doorway. His face creased first in worry, then in laughter.

               “Ow,” Jocasta said, attempting to recover what little dignity she had left.

               “Very impressive,” Master Cerulian said, though whether seriously or in jest Jocasta could not tell. She was too busy rubbing the bruises that were undoubtedly beginning to form on her legs and tailbone.

               Instead of helping her up, Master Cerulian lowered himself down until he was sitting cross-legged beside her. Jocasta brushed herself off and copied his pose, squinting over at her master instead of shutting her eyes.

               “Our young Battlemaster tells me you have been favoring Form VI,” Master Cerulian began, apparently by way of conversation. “A good choice. More flexible than most duelists give it credit for.”

               “It makes the most sense,” Jocasta tried to explain. “Not to limit myself.”

               “And it keeps your friend close.”

               Jocasta did not know what to say to that. He could only mean Lorian, but Jocasta had not thought of Lorian in the past year. Maybe that was the point? She need not think of him if every time she dueled, she saw their teamwork in her mind. Or if, by using Form VI, she never let her fellow duelists get close enough to betray her.

               “It may behoove you to practice some bladework between now and landing,” Master Cerulian carried on as if he had not just read her soul to her. “Use one of the training sticks. They just collect dust otherwise.”

               “Yes, Master.” From there, master and apprentice settled into a shared meditation. Jocasta did her best to imitate Master Cerulian—crosslegged, deep breathing, eyes closed. For the first time, she could see something of him in the Force. No longer was he simply a blinding light, but complicated swirls of branching threads. Some touched Jocasta herself, others stretched across the galaxy, one or two hung limply, swirling without connection.

               She wondered if her thread would stretch across the galaxy someday. She hoped so.

***

               The next few days, Jocasta settled into this new routine—the routine of apprentice. Morning meditation alone, followed by bauhin flower tea that, if anything, tasted worse with every subsequent cup. Then an hour with the training stick, going through Form I stances and positioning before rolling into Form III, then Form VI. Even without an opponent to spar against, Jocasta still ended the session sweating and sore. Maybe it was the relatively cramped space of the cargo hold or a mixture of the ship’s gravity and the hyperspace it was shooting through, but Jocasta found herself more focused than she had been during Temple drills. Even Form VI was not simply Force and bladework—her body was part of each movement. Her footwork—an aspect generally neglected when she did not have Dooku to duel opposite—needed to be purposeful and sure.

               Then there was what Jocasta had taken to mentally calling study time. While Master Cerulian generally kept to himself, he had since their joint meditation session begun leaving various texts and cultural readings on Jocasta’s side of the ship. At first, Jocasta had assumed they pertained to the mission, but when she looked at their travel route she realized it was education of a different scale. Every planet they passed, every major cultural center or historical galactic spacemark, was set out for her to engage with. She was not certain if there would be a test, but she took notes just in case.

               It felt looser than the Archival reading she was used to. Occasionally there were notes in the margins, digital and physical prints without signatures that tracked spare thoughts across the works. They were varied in tone and understanding, if not style—enthusiasm in one section turned to confusion in another, disappointment was crossed out with shorthand that Jocasta could not decipher but was pretty sure the equivalent of an excited nod or tired shrug. They felt lived in in a way that only the oldest Archives materials were, a map through the stars drawn from flora and fauna, culture and contact.

               At night—or what passed for night in hyperspace—Master Cerulian and Jocasta would share a meal of flavorless rations, meditate in silence, and very occasionally talk. Perhaps evaluate was a more appropriate term; Master Cerulian would ask about Jocasta’s bladework, or her readings, or how she felt about the Temple. Jocasta, in turn, would receive either a hmm or what she suspected was her master’s best attempt at a reassuring smile. The odd part was that it never felt judgmental—there did not seem to be a correct answer, or even a suggestion that she should try something. It felt more like…like her work in the Archives. Except Jocasta was the chunky datacard, and Master Cerulian was the Archivist tasked with cataloguing her record.

***

               By the time they made planetfall, Jocasta had decided that Master Cerulian's stoicism easily surpassed even Dooku’s stories about Yoda. Whether he meant to be cryptic or was just unused to having another passenger, their slow-growing comraderie had done nothing to let Jocasta in on the details of their mission. She hoped that it was deliberate—another test, a way to get Jocasta used to trusting her master. This seemed less likely as they stepped onto the planet’s surface.

               “Thame, old friend. Welcome!” The speaker was a short Weequay with tired eyes and an easy smile that did not quite reach them.

               “Kohlbas,” Master Cerulian’s body language shifted as he bowed to his—friend? Colleague? Source? “Thank you for allowing us entry.”

               “Of course,” Kohlbas smiled again, tight-lipped. “But this does not look like your previous assistant. What happened to the Twi’lek?”

               “They—” and there was a pause in which Master Cerulian stiffened, both body and Force braced against something Jocasta could not sense. “Graduated from the work we do here. This is my new learner, Jocasta.”

               “How can we help?” Jocasta tried to replicate her master’s bow, only to nearly lose her balance as the multiple layers caught on her own limbs somehow, knees and hands instinctively trying to break free of movement.

               Master Cerulian reached out a hand and lifted her—physically lifted her—by the scruff of her robes, holding her in the air just long enough for her limbs to stop their panicked spasm.

               Kohlbas chuckled quietly, and Jocasta felt her cheeks flush with embarrassment. The moment passed quickly, however, and soon the three were off traipsing through the dry landscape only occasionally dotted with various moisture-holding flora. At seemingly random intervals, Kohlbas would change direction, although Jocasta had no idea if this choice was due to religious reasons, environmental concerns, or paranoia. Kohlbas was certainly offering no indication of which it could be, and Master Thame seemed content to follow their guide.

               Then, without warning, they were at the digsite. Or at least, they were at the camp before the digsite, surrounded with a mixture of Weequay, Togruta, and Ugnaught archaeologists.

               “Brokkstiet,” Kohlbas called out. “Our Jedi expert is here. Brief him!”

               “Right away,” came the reply, and a scrawny Togruta with purple skin and crisscrossing white stripes stepped forward. She had a datapad in one hand and a handheld magnifier in the other, deliberate movements at odds with her darting eyes. “Seemed like a normal dig. Artifacts and fragmentary findings consistent with history of the Casfield system. Then we found the pod.”

               The Togruta—Brokkstiet, Jocasta reminded herself—turned her datapad towards the Jedi. It was roughly cyllindrival, maybe 0.57 meters tall and half as wide, with some vaguely familiar alien script looping around it, seemingly etched or scratched into the surface of the pod. Master Cerulian sucked in a breath, hand hovering over the datapad but almost not daring to touch it.

               “Problems are twofold;” Brokkstiet continued. “First: cannot read the script—assuming it is script. It does not match any known writing in this system, and requests from official channels to compare with various cultic archives have been denied.”

               “But they have not interfered with your operations here,” Jocasta cut in.

               “No,” Brokkstiet admitted. “Which brings us to second fold: the pod is haunted.”

               “Haunted?” Jocasta could not help but ask. In response, Brokkstiet typed into her datapad, then turned it back to the Jedi. The vid was grainy, but clearly showed one of the site workers attempting to move the pod. That was when the screaming began, a visceral howl that seemed to shake the very earth itself. A second worker tried to wrench the pod from them, only for some kind of smoke to secrete, burning through the workers’ hands until the pod sunk back into place. Jocasta felt sick.

               “Haunted.” Brokkstiet repeated. “We ran every test we could think of that did not involve direct touch. Nothing. No power readings, does not match any known substance in this system or any description of ritual effects, historical madness.”

               “And the ones that were hurt,” Master Cerulian spoke up. “May we speak with them?”

               “If you can speak to the dead,” the gruff tones of a Weequay cut in. Not Kohlbas, Jocasta noted belatedly as she took in the stylized tendril/hair standing straight up on the Weequay’s head in contrast with Kohlbas’s long loose locks. “Nymor breathed in whatever that vapor was—ate through her throat, lungs, and whatever else it reached. Quillnee just kept screaming. Died screaming, too.”

               “Interesting,” Master Cerulian muttered. “Very interesting.”

               “Our condolences for your loss,” Jocasta added with a slight bow. “We shall endeavor to prevent further loss of life.”

               The Weequay grunted, but also nodded in return. Jocasta hoped that this was acknowledgement, maybe even acceptance.

               “That tent should have everything you need,” Kohlbas spoke up again, motioning with one big hand over to the west of the camp towards a makeshift shelter. “Artifact is cordoned off about three meters from that flash-droid. Try not to touch anything.”

               The last comment seemed directed at Jocasta, but she was too wrapped up in her thoughts to take offense. This was not only a Sith artifact; it was a deadly Sith artifact. Knowledge and protection: the crossroads of Jocasta Nu’s Jedi path. What more could a padawan ask for in terms of training?

               “I took the liberty of requesting an isolated copy of the script,” Master Cerulian informed Jocasta as they entered the tent. It was functional—table, chairs, datapads and spare equipment littering the corners. “Between the two of us, I believe a rough translation should be possible. We need to understand as much as we can about the artifact’s casing before we even think about opening it.”

               “Opening it,” Jocasta repeated. “How—why—would we do that?”

               “To learn.”

               To learn. Right. Jocasta took a deep breath and centered herself. This was life as Master Thame Cerulian’s padawan. This was what it meant to be a Jedi. It was time to get to work.

***

               It took twelve hours to identify the common epigraphical elements and a farther twenty four hours to cross that with the various Sith scripts on record. Allowing for variation according to culture and linguistic drift, and many rationpacks and various lukewarm beverages later, the apprentice and her master had a rough translation:

               Rain Falls, Revolution Rises

               When The Body Dies, The Mind Prevails

               As Zannah Cradles Truth and Violence

               Her Talisman Preserves Her Gaol

               “I do not recall any Sith named Zannah from my studies,” Jocasta rubbed her forehead and pushed herself away from the table. “Maybe another Dark Side cult?”

               “So soon after the Eradication,” Master Cerulian stroked his chin with one hand and pointed at the archeological dating projection with the other. “Perhaps, except Casfield III was home to at least two Jedi Watchers during that period. Surely a Dark Side cult would have attracted their attention? Hmm.”

               “The recurring motifs match the Sith stories that would have been circulating,” Jocasta scribbled down a few notes, moved a holo, pulled up one of the datacards Master Cerulian had allowed her to requisition for the mission. “The rain omen could be culturally significant, but the preservation, the idea of transcendence…that seems older. The words used there are centuries removed from the rest of the script.”

               “I am more interested in gaol,” Master Cerulian focused the image back on that part of the object’s script. “The root looks similar to the Middle Sith word for teacher, but the accents there—”

               “Resemble the Massassi glyph for tomb,” Jocasta babbled excitedly, looking closer. “Or temple. Did the Massassi have space travel? I thought Exar Kun blasted their civilization back into rocks and sticks!”

               “That assumes, of course,” Master Cerulian made a clicking noise with his tongue, which would have had more admonishment behind it if he had not also just taken a sip of his most recent cup of Gentesian brew. “The Massassi remained separate from the Sith species. I wrote a paper arguing to the contrary, but apparently my conclusions were ‘too speculatory’ and ‘required further study.’ Hmph. As if my exploratory request would ever have been granted.”

               “You wrote a paper,” Jocasta felt a smile pulling at her cheeks. “Could I read it?”

               “Later,” Master Cerulian smiled. He definitely smiled that time. “For now, let us—”

               There was a rumble somewhere between a shift and a quake. The table collapsed, objects clattered around them, and Master Cerulian’s beverage was suddenly coating his face. A moment later, as Jocasta pushed herself back to her feet, Brokkstiet appeared in the tent’s entryway.

               “Masters Jedi,” the frazzled Togruta called out. “Problem at the artifact site. Come quickly, please!”

               Before Jocasta could count to ten, they were off with long strides and, in Jocasta’s case, still-unsteady legs. The flash-droid was no longer hovering. Once they made it over the slight incline, Jocasta could see why. Not-Kohlbas had fired a mining laser straight through it—it and the Weequay’s actual target: the artifact.

               Not-Kohlbas continued to aim the mining laser, the full-intensity beam burning a path directly to the cylindrical prism. It took Kohlbas and two Ugnaughts to haul him off, and another five microspans to power down the mining laser. Jocasta glanced at Master Cerulian, expecting…something. Diplomacy? Explanation? Instead, he ignored the archeologist team’s struggle almost entirely, crouching next to the small crater and the artifact.

               “Treat him kindly, please,” Jocasta called out. Before she realized that she was doing so, she had marched over to Kohlbas and the rest of the crew, putting herself between them and Not-Kohlbas. “You do not have the authority to arrest or detain, so let us all calm down and discuss this.”

               “Discuss what,” Brokkstiet was nearly shaking with frustration. “Destruction of mining equipment, disruption of archeological studies, destruction of artifacts! Arrest him, Master Jedi!”

               “Have you laid your friends to rest,” Jocasta asked, looking squarely at Not-Kohlbas. “Properly, I mean. I am unfamiliar with mourning rites in this system, but Jedi are ordained by the Republic to perform such acts.”

               “No,” Not-Kohlbas answered. His gaze dropped from Jocasta’s and a heaviness seemed to seize his shoulders as he breathed. “Down two people, it was just back to work. Only time things slowed down was when you Jedi arrived.”

               “Then set a time, and we shall do that,” Jocasta said firmly, hand reaching up to touch the tall Weequay’s shoulder. “My Master and I have the skills needed to deal with the artifact. It will not hurt anyone else. I swear on the Force.”

               “Thame,” Kohlbas called over. “You back up your assistant’s words?”

               “Absolutely,” Master Cerulian had shaken himself out of whatever revery he had or had not been in, was now moving with a comforting hand and a flask passed from his robes to Not-Kohlbas. Although he was below average height for a Human, Master Cerulian had that look in his eye that Jocasta remembered from initiate classes—the one that could make even a Wookiee look up. “Today, my padawan and I shall remove this artifact from your digsite. Tonight, we shall keep vigil for your dead.”

               Once Not-Kohlbas—or Guutfrah, as Jocasta had learned his name was—had surrendered his tools and agreed to only observe the repair process, the Jedi were finally left alone with the artifact. Despite the damage the mining laser had done to everything else it touched, the outer casing had not even a scorch mark. It was as if the heat had dissipated upon contact. When paired with the translation she and Master Cerulian had, Jocasta got the distinct impression that whatever this object was, it was absolutely as dangerous as Guutfrah believed it was. But theirs was not the business of judgement nor destruction.

               Jocasta knelt beside her master at the lowest point in the crater—as close as they could get to the artifact without actively trying to reach it.

               “The Force will do the rest,” Master Cerulian had said. With those words echoing, the feeling of her master synchronized beside her, Jocasta reached out with the Force.

               It was overwhelming. Up to this point, the galaxy had felt so empty compared to life at the Temple. The Force was everywhere, but it spread thin among these beings who did not or could not touch its threads as its threads touched them. The artifact was something else entirely, a whole ball of thread all on its own coursing with smoke and electricity. Not alive—Jocasta knew the difference, of course she knew the difference—but tangled, soaked and seeping and wrapped in what Jocasta could only call Darkness. It reached towards her, dark threads shooting out like tendrils to wrap her in its embrace, and suddenly—

               Nothing. Silence. Isolation. Jocasta could no longer feel Master Cerulian beside her. She could not even feel herself, could not hear or see or touch anything. Jocasta had never known nothingness like this. Even the meditation chambers in the Temple’s upper levels—small pods that deprived their occupants of all external stimulai—still felt like something. The Force still flowed through and around her. This? This was being dropped in a bacta tank without a breather. It was dreaming without waking. It was the earliest memories one had in existence and being unable to move beyond them.

               Did memories exist? Did the self? Not even the Force seemed to touch this absence of existence. The person that was once Jedi Padawan Jocasta Nu unravelled.

               All at once, there was the smallest pinprick of light. No other feelings, sensations, but a light. Whatever consciousness remained moved toward it, willing this light to grow bigger and closer and warmer, as if those concepts had meaning in a place like this unplace.

               A figure began to take shape.

               Light was the wrong word, the wrong concept entirely.

               Do you know what happens to rain when it is struck by lightning?

               No.

               Deconstruction. Water cannot learn, it can only consume. Pass the current through its current.

               The lightning flows through it. It flows through itself.

               No! Ground water dooms itself. Rain is saved only by distance. Why be water?

               For life?

               Why be water when you could be the lightning? The fire that burns, that stirs and creates itself anew?

               There is more to water than not-fire. Water holds. Holds shape, holds life.

               A flood drowns. Wipes away civilizations. Sinks empires before they can even dream of the sky.

               That too is life. Living. It is not easy. It is not moral.

               No, it is not. Peace is a lie.

               Peace is a goal. Peace is a destination. Peace is a struggle.

               Peace is a lie.

               Peace is an absence.

               Peace is a lie.

               Peace is hard to find.

               Peace is a lie.

               Peace is worth it.

***

               Jedi Padawan Jocasta Nu opened her eyes. In the brief blurry moments as concepts such as self and vision reasserted themselves, Master Cerulian’s face appeared—floating, full of concern and relief and just a touch of the admonishing expression that seemed permanently etched into his face. She had no sooner sat up when a mug of warm liquid was pressed into her hands.

               “Drink first,” Master Cerulian’s voice commanded. “Ground yourself. You have had quite a journey.”

               Jocasta did as she was told, sipping at first before draining the mug all at once. The liquid was thick, but the taste was more floral than bracing and there was a touch of sweetness at the bottom. As it made its way down her throat and into her body, she could feel her senses reawakening, her awareness coming back to herself like stepping out into a cool breeze during a warm day.

               “You did well.”

               “Did it work,” Jocasta asked. “The artifact, is it—”

               “Removed and quarantined,” Master Cerulian motioned to the containment case they had prepared previously, firmly closed and glowing faintly. “It will not harm this world again.”

               “I thought,” Jocasta took an unsteady breath. “I thought I had lost myself. Like it had consumed me.”

               “No,” Master Cerulian said firmly. “It was unprepared to face a master as well as an apprentice.”

               “What was it?”

               “A hand,” Master Cerulian answered finally. “Human, I think. Clutching a bleeding kyber crystal.”

               Jocasta did not have words for that. It was too visceral, too real a thing.

               “The hand and its reliquary are contained,” Master Cerulian continued. “The kyber crystal is here.”

               “What—” and before the question could form, Jocasta was catching the kyber crystal in question. It was surprisingly clean for something that had been clutched in a dead hand for hundreds of years. It was also— “It is not bleeding.”

               “No,” Master Cerulian answered, fiddling with something on the now-upright table. “You—your trial within—appears to have healed it. I repeat: well done.”

               “What do I do with it,” Jocasta asked, holding the kyber crystal up and looking it over carefully. It was bigger than the one currently in her lightsaber, silent and clear as ice. “Is it safe?”

               “It is yours,” Master Cerulian said simply, and finally turned to face her again, holding a chain with a small ringlet hanging off. “Think of it as a remembrance.”

               The kyber crystal fitted into the ringlet perfectly, holding it in place. The chain felt cold around Jocasta’s neck, but the weight felt…right, somehow. Remembrance. That made sense.

               In the night, as the vigil for the fallen was performed in solemnity and firelight, Jocasta’s fingers drifted to the kyber crystal now around her neck. It did not sing—not yet—but neither did it bleed. Perhaps, for now, that was enough.

Chapter Text

               Jedi Padawan and Junior Assistant Archivist Jocasta Nu had not expected much from her latest assignment. To even call it an assignment was to overstate the importance, in her opinion.

               It was important—that was not up for discussion. There was, ideologically speaking, nothing more important than guiding the Jedi Padawans and Knights of tomorrow on their path towards knowledge and independence.

               Jocasta just thought that her sixteenth year in the galaxy—her third year as Master Thame Cerulian’s padawan—would be more educational or exciting or just involved. Something that did not include standing in front of a room full of younglings and telling them about the Archives in words so distant and simplistic that a droid could have done so with probably more enthusiasm.

               Then the group walked through those hallowed halls and in some twist of Force and destiny the teenagers shepherding them were the last people Jocasta expected to see.

               The first was Dooku’s tall and only slightly awkward frame, limbs longer than he could manage but kept in check through sheer determination. His hair was longer than she had ever seen it, tied up yet still escaping at odd angles, sweeping strands threatening to cover his eyes.

               The second was Ayja Turrom, an older Padawan who had always been slightly intimidating to Jocasta. With her violet skin and short hair, she was all muscles and swagger, made more infuriating by the fact that she had the skill to back it up. Jocasta had understood padawans to take after their masters—herself only slightly an exception—but if the mild-mannered Master Maks Leem was present in Ayja, Jocasta had never seen the similarities.

               It was with some shock, then, that Ayja was the one to sidle over to Jocasta as the first part of the lecture shifted into practical exploration as younglings crowded around terminals and grabbed for sleek and fragile datacards with stubby fingers and uncareful hands. Jocasta decided she would draw up a proposal for youngling-safe datacases for her next visit with the Republic Data Storage Subcommittee.

               “You seem a little overqualified for all this,” Ayja gestured at the sea of younglings and an increasingly fast-moving Dooku struggling to keep order. “Between your dueling skills and your lineage, I had you pegged for diplomatic missions and specialized course work by now.”

               “Thank you,” Jocasta felt her face grow flush, confusion and compliment and Ayja taking up what brainpower she was not currently devoting to tracking troublesome younglings and potentially damaged datacards. “Sorry—my lineage?”

               “Master Thame Cerulian,” Ayja said, as if that was the part of her words Jocasta was struggling to parse, not the compliment that preceded it—the one that suggested history and adventure. “Actually, he trained Maks for a few years when her master was on pilgrimage. So I figure a third of whatever you do reflects back onto me.”

               “A good Master should be able to adjust his teaching style according to the student,” Jocasta rattled off the half-remembered proverb. She did not want to say that. She wanted nothing more than to ask Ayja about this mysterious history of Thame Cerulian and his padawans. “I am surprised to see you at the Temple. I thought Master Leem and you were assigned to the border dispute on Ansion.”

               “Supply issues on Keitum,” Ayja corrected, her Aurean accent softening the exasperation. “Master Leem thought it best I return early. She fears I have been neglecting my studies.”

               Jocasta did not disagree with Master Leem; Ayja Turrom’s padawan braid glittered in the light with mission bells and the shining ring at its end marked her seniority. There were, however, very few beads covering the strand—Jocasta reckoned Ayja had yet to even pass her major’s Pillar Test. Which might well mean that Jocasta would be seeing more of Ayja in the coming months.

               This thought was, as Jocasta’s thoughts frequently were, interrupted by the sounds of whirring terminals and frustrated younglings. Just like that, the moment of connection passed and it was once again Jocasta Nu standing alone against the swirling chaos of the galaxy, represented in this case by Jojji and Pax fighting over who got to look at the proto-saber diagram first.

               The rest of her lecture that day was preoccupied with the worried thought that the younglings’ next shop class would consist of them trying to build a proto-saber power pack and explode an  entire classroom in their secret efforts. Surely Master Wyllhem was used to that, right? Proto-saber diagrams were on the approved list of materials for use in Archival demonstrations; this could not be the first time younglings became enthralled with ancient diagrams and weaponry with the potential to explode if not constructed properly and carefully.

               Jocasta felt a calming hand touch her shoulder. Dooku stood, patchy facial hair and all, looking at her with some blend of amusement and concern.

               “The shop classes are heavily supervised,” Dooku said. At Jocasta’s surprised look, he added. “Your eyes kept going from the younglings to the proto-sabers datacard.”

               “Oh,” Jocasta felt herself blush slightly, a giddy sort of embarrassment running up her cheeks. “Well, thank you for the reassurance.”

               “Of course,” Dooku nodded. “How many more of these do you have left?”

               “None tomorrow, three more the next day.”

               “Well then,” Dooku scratched the back of his neck, hair against fingers softly scraping. “If you would like to join me, I usually take a walk around the Meditation Gardens in the morning.”

               “I will see you there,” Jocasta said hurriedly, a smile fighting its way to her face. “South entrance?”

               “South entrance,” Dooku confirmed as he was ushered out of the room by the surrounding younglings, pushing and shoving. “See you there!”

***

               Jocasta had never been a fidgeter. She worked with her hands on occasion, yes. She enjoyed the occasional planting season and helping the younger Jedi-to-be with those early attempts at gardens, but she had never felt the compulsion, the yearning to create with her hands. It was, then, quite a strange experience for her to stay up into the night, flitting between a datapad, pieces of blba wood, and a small vibro-knife.

               She arrived at the south entrance of the Temple Gardens early the next morning—deliberately early, not merely avoiding-being-late early—and as the Coruscanti sun peaked over the Temple, Jocasta was breathless at the sight of it. That was often the way of things, was it not? To spend years of one’s life dulled to the beauty of home, only to be reminded at the most unexpected times that even light casting shadows over a distant cityscape was worth waking up for.

               Watching Dooku arrive was almost as beautiful, in its own way. From her spot to the side of the path, Jocasta admired the ways in which he had changed and the ways he had stayed the same. His noble bearing was still intact, but it was tempered now  by the gangly limbs of growth spurts and the growing awareness of his place in the galaxy. There was something else too—a kind of shyness in his movement, as though being fully comfortable was a relic of the past that he had somehow managed to misplace. Perhaps it was—Sifo-Dyas increasingly gone from the Temple, Jocasta herself holed up in the Archives at all hours. Dooku did not connect with people easily—it was one of the traits Jocasta liked most about him, a kindred flame to her own uncertainty about the galaxy and the people within it.

               If so, Jocasta decided she had best make the most of their morning together. For Dooku’s sake.

               “I used to hate this view,” Dooku admitted, having arrived to stand next to Jocasta as the sun continued its steady rise. “Often I still do, but the peace of this place seems to be the one aspect of Temple life Master Yoda and I can agree on.”

               “The sunrise,” Jocasta meant to say more, but the light was in her eyes and Dooku was beside her and their hands brushed. Suddenly there was nothing else to say—just a shared truth and an affection yet unnamed. There was nothing to be gained by rushing from the stillness of this moment.

               The moment moved on, of course. That was what moments did. As the early light moved from dawn to day, Jocasta and Dooku walked through the gardens. Occasionally, Dooku would stop at a plant native to a planet he had visited or a lecture he had been to, and Jocasta would try to recall which plants she had read about—try to put the description and sketches to the modern artifact.

               “That one’s from Telos IV, I believe,” Dooku pointed to a thin tree with silver leaves and weeping vines. “The Gffnyet tree.”

               “Technically,” Jocasta shook her head with a smile. “I believe it is a cross between Dantooine bolo and Ossus frndrr trees. They had to be gene-spliced together in order to survive acidic Telos IV soil after the second Sith War nearly glassed the planet.”

               “I stand corrected,” Dooku smiled back, brushing unruly strands of hair out of his face. “The silver leaves have always reminded me—”

               “Of the Fountain of Still Waters,” Jocasta finished. “I remember.”

               “Do you also remember when Sifo convinced us that swimming in it was good luck?”

               “Oh no,” and Jocasta’s face immediately flushed red as the memory appeared in her mind. “He said it would connect us more deeply with the Force before the Gathering. He was very convincing!”

               “Him,” Dooku raised an eyebrow. “As I recall, you were the one who said we should strip down to nothing to do so.”

               “It was a reasonable hypothesis,” Jocasta defended herself, face undoubtedly still a deep shade of crimson. “We actually cannot prove that it did not work.”

               “Master Yoda clearly agreed.”

               “The only reason we did not get in trouble,” Jocasta laughed, remembering how the Jedi Grand Master had, upon catching the fresh Padawans in the fountain, had simply hopped in himself and spent the next hour splashing water at passing Jedi and eventually requesting fresh robes and fish be brought to him so he could more deeply ‘swim in the well of the Living Force.’ “I had almost forgotten that.”

               “I can never forget it,” Dooku laughed as well. “Who knew he could hold his breath that long? Tyvokka was sure he had drowned.”

               They settled into a silence after that, comfortable and shared as the laughter subsided. It was so...nice. Like everything was right and still and safe.

               “I made something for you,” Jocasta said finally, hands in her robes, fingers pattering nervously. “I am not the best at carving, but I practiced, and the Archives actually have a selection of instructions for this sort of thing and—”

               “You made me something?”

               “Yes,” Jocasta answered, unwrapping the present. She had trouble meeting Dooku’s eyes all of a sudden, kept her head bowed towards her own hands. “A hairpin. Technically it is more of a hair comb, but the application should be similar. It was going to be a hairpin but blba wood actually loses its integrity if cut smaller than this.”

               “Oh,” Dooku murmured. His hands hovered on either side of hers, as if afraid to touch them. The two of them stood like that. It was a simple comb, jagged but dull teeth of blba wood latched onto a vague claw of the rest of the wood. A finger traced over the crude engraving of Dooku’s name along the base. “I shall treasure it. Do you mind?”

               “Right,” Jocasta did look at him now, caught a glimpse of the soft wonder on his face as he turned his back to her and crouched down so that she could actually reach his head. Jocasta blew on her fingers, worried now that they might be cold. She watched the way his hair curled at the base of his neck, could smell what she could only describe as Dooku as her hands gathered his hair up and placed the comb there, a tight crown suspending dark waves.

               He turned back towards her, standing up straight, and—Jocasta Nu was not easily made breathless. Such a reaction was reserved for artifacts and drawings or scripts by Jedi long gone or cultures distant and unreachable. For the novel and the unique, the tapestry of history she had decided to devote her life to. Dooku stood there—his dark hair streaked with lighter brown strands in the light, his face shy somehow despite the everything about him—and the sight took Jocasta’s breath away.

               “Is it—”

               “Perfect,” Jocasta told him. “Just perfect.”

***

               It was rare that anyone disturbed her in the Archives—Chief Archivist Quist handled most of the requests, leaving Jocasta to concentrate on the actual archiving process. She had moved on to galactic maps at the suggestion of ExplorCorps—her primary liaison Deesra had even helped with the process by gathering the data from the old hyperspace beacons and translating them to align with the current galactic models.

               The maps made her miss that brief glorious existence—traveling through the stars, learning  from her master. She even missed the bauhin flower tea, as disgustingly indescribable as it was. Jedi did not have the luxury of yearning, however, and so Jocasta put her head down and continued with her work.

               Hours, days, weeks marched on. Ayja began to appear more often, taking her studies seriously, and Jocasta took time out of her day to assist. More than once she caught Ayja staring at her—little moments of vulnerability that had her head spinning. There it was again, that familiar flutter of the heart or the body or something in between. Connection, or the possibility of connection. Threads of swirling Force.

               It was somewhere between night and sunup when Jocasta awoke to an insistent tapping at her door. She slapped at the door’s control in a sleep-filled daze and was still finding herself when the lights turned on and Master Thame Cerulian entered her room with an absentminded urgency.

               “Good,” he told her. “You are awake. We have a new mission.”

               “Mission,” Jocasta repeated, hurriedly pulling on a cloak as she realized her modesty was at risk. “Now?”

               “We are Jedi,” he said simply. “Pack the usual supplies. Meet me at the shuttle bay when you are finished.”

               With that, he swept out of the room and Jocasta Nu was left with questions and nobody to answer them. Jocasta was nothing if not efficient, however, and so she quickly washed, packed, and properly dressed, cleaning her teeth on the walk to the shuttle.

               It was odd to see Master Cerulian so energized. Jocasta knew he could be excited, impatient even. Up until this point, though, it had always been tempered by the curmudgeonly frown that had etched itself onto his face since before Jocasta was born. Now he was positively vibrating with energy, reminding Jocasta of nothing so much as the younglings she was frequently rangling during her lectures.

               That was not to say he was in a good mood. If anything, he seemed angrier than usual, dashing manic around the ship. Jocasta was impressed—the old Corellian was multitasking to a degree that Jocasta could only aspire to. Between flight checks he sent off clearance forms on his datapad, then finished off the checks and brewed tea as he balanced his datapad with the Force and dictated responses.

               Throughout it all, and even up to the jump into hyperspace, Master Cerulian offered no further explanation as to the mission. Jocasta did not ask, simply accepted and choked down her bauhin flower tea and absentmindedly rubbed the dull kyber crystal that was by now a permanent fixture around her neck.

               “The battle armor of Exar Kun,” Master Cerulian’s voice seemed to fill the cabin, and Jocasta sat up straight going from dozing to alert in less than a microspan. “That is our mission.”

               “The armor of…” Jocasta took a moment to process her master’s words. “Is that real?”

               “Theoretically,” came the murmured reply, almost to himself. “We shall see.”

               There had, of course, been many armors of Exar Kun throughout the ages, almost all of them imbued with some sort of Dark Side energy or ritual. All of them fakes, at least as far as belonging to Exar Kun was concerned. The problem, from an archeological perspective, was that no visual record of Exar Kun still existed, which meant that his armor could be anything from ancient Jedi robes with the odd weave or plating to a shiny carapace formed from the now-extinct Terentatek.

               The problem with the distance of time was that nobody bothered with Dark Sider cults or rituals anymore. An old suit or armor? Still interesting. A forgery of an old suit of armor? If the forger were willing to speak about their art, maybe. But a forgery of an old suit of armor planted and sold to the highest bidder? Definitely not interesting. If Master Cerulian was as determined as he appeared to be, he must have known something that Jocasta did not.

               Settling into the hum of the ship, Jocasta pulled out her datapad and began to submit the correct notices to her classes and Restelly Quist to inform them of her absence. Not that she expected that Master Cerulian had forgotten—well, not just because she suspected that Master Cerulian had forgotten—but also because Jocasta was familiar enough with the schedule to offer replacements in the comment box of each report. Flemeth had been looking to add more library tutorials to her teaching experience anyway.

               She had just set her datapad aside again, determined to steal some sleep from the blurring lines of hyperspace, when it lit up with a message.

               Ayja Turrom: I cannae believe you are abandoning me ☹

               Ayja Turrom: Are you okay? Should I bring tea?

               Jocasta took a moment to smile—to herself, to the void, to the vague idea that Ayja might feel her amusement through the Force.  Then she typed her response out, short and accurate.

               On mission. Will see you when I get back.

               Ayja Turrom: Stay safe xoxo

               Jocasta stared at that message for a long while—or more accurately, at the ending. Hugs and kisses, if Jocasta had her Aurean lingo correct. It could mean nothing, a casual expression and the equivalent of signing off. It could mean everything, a confession, a wish, a secret accidentally shared. Was Ayja staring at her own message in her bed on Coruscant, cursing herself for revealing such depth? Or was she worried? Was Jocasta meant to respond and her lack of response had now crushed Ayja’s overtures and shut the door on whatever this theoretically was?

               Jocasta did not sleep restfully. She did sleep, however, and that would have to be enough. She was almost surprised at how easily she and Master Cerulian fell into their prior routine—tea and reading and training and meditation. Jocasta had, she realized, missed this version of apprenticeship. Solitary perhaps, and silent and structured only for the need of pacing out existence within the hyperspace lanes. But it made her feel needed in a way that her daily duties did not. Needed in the Force, if such a thing was possible. Something to look up the next time Jocasta had free time to herself. It had been a while since she had engaged with the more philosophical texts.

               “How is your piloting,” Master Cerulian asked over rations.

               “Rudimentary,” Jocasta answered, not sure what she was being asked. “I could spent more time on the manual if that is needed?”

               “Yes,” Master Cerulian nodded in between bites of the gray wiggly block of nutrients. “Flying is good.”

               “Understood.”

               “I was spoiled with my previous padawan,” Master Cerulian said quietly, almost to himself. “Although Errol’s landings always left something to be desired. So many landing gears worn down before their time.”

               Silence. Jocasta had a hundred questions, none of which she could ask. Instead, she made a mental note: Errol, pilot. Bad at landings. Jocasta would have to be good at landings, then. Soft-wristed. Footed? Another note: Learn how shuttle landings work for bipeds.

               The Quelii Cluster was not the most illustrious collection of planets—even the Archives only had sparse notes, mainly focused on Old Republic investigations into Dathomir and other hypothetical nexus points. When Jocasta had first been granted access to the full files, she had had hopes of gaining a broader understanding of these places that almost seemed to hide themselves from the larger galaxy. Alas, the knowledge the Jedi had gathered over the generations—the knowledge that had survived through the ages, at least—was upsettingly sparse, filled with archaic vagaries of vergence and prophecy. In other words, they were places best politely ignored unless otherwise given reason to investigate.

Enter Master Thame Cerulian and Padawan Jocasta Nu: Jedi Archivists.

Master Cerulian brought the ship down gently onto what could only generously be described as a landing platform—a clearing of, as far as Jocasta could tell, wood stilts setting above marshland. Jocasta watched intently, marveling at the grace with which the elder Jedi’s hands and fingers danced over the even older controls. She wondered if piloting was a skill innate to Corellians, but decided it would be rude to voice such a thought.

Master Cerulian then disappeared into the shallow bowels of the ship, reemerging with what Jocasta could only describe as a ribcage placed over his robes.

“Do not sit there gawking, Teeot,” he grumbled. “Lace me up.”

               Jocasta moved to do so, draping her master’s outer robe over the pilot’s chair as she fastened the various straps on the armor.

               “Nighthunter bones,” Master Cerulian explained as Jocasta helped him back into his outer robe. “Useful against the more experimental energy weapons. Also a symbol of respect, if my sources on Quelii war culture are correct.”

               “Should I wear something?”

               “My pack,” Master Cerulian smiled and motioned to his equipment—a Jedi backpack stuffed to the brim with various tools and texts and, if Jocasta’s memory served, a traveling tea set. “Onwards, padawan.”

               Jocasta allowed herself a single weary sigh, hiked up her robes, and strapped the bulky supply pack on. Onwards indeed.

               There was nobody to greet them. Instead, Master Cerulian pulled out a small datacard reader and set about following the miniature map that sprang into existence. It did not seem to indicate a destination, but Master Cerulian seemed satisfied it was working properly as their lifeforms lit up, two dots on the holographic display.

               The hike itself was…bracing. The marsh stunk, a scent somewhere between wet hair and rotting food. The extra weight from the pack meant that Jocasta inevitably sunk into the ground with each step, squelching splashing progress preventing even a conscious attempt at stealth. The heat was damp and clinging, even as the suns hid behind clouds and a steady mist of rain fell. Then there were the bugs.

               Jocasta liked bugs. She was no entomologist, but she had always considered them to be an example of the galaxy’s infinite connection and variety. The bugs of this planet deserved no such distinction in Jocasta’s tired opinion. They were large and loud, rotating wings and eyes and legs that glistened like a warning Jocasta did not know how to heed. Worse, they seemed to have a liking for Jocasta in particular, stinging and touching and all but swarming any exposed skin. Jocasta regretted not trying harder to learn the Force barrier technique in last year’s class. She had figured such a skill would only be necessary on a planet like Glee Anselm or maybe Ord Mantell—somewhere the atmosphere could agitate bodies not made for it. She now included the pests of the Quelii Marshlands in her calculations.

               By the time they reached their destination, Jocasta was covered in bumps and bites courtesy of her new enemies, and was somewhere between embarrassed and annoyed to see that they had not touched Master Cerulian.

               Destination might have been overstating the place in which they found themselves. From what Jocasta could tell, even reaching into the Force, it was just as full or empty as the last several miles of marshland they had trudged through. Plenty of life, none of it sentient or even aggressive. Clearing his throat, Master Cerulian made a noise that to Jocasta sounded somewhere between a krayt dragon and a monkey-lizard. Then they waited. And waited. And waited.

               Jocasta felt damp and sweaty and burnt, none of which was conducive to waiting. A better Jedi would have meditated—would have been able to meditate despite the worldly distractions like pain and itchiness and an air so thick with humidity that breathing it seemed to be a choking hazard.

               She tried to identify the bugs currently busying themselves with her exposed skin. There were small blue ones that seemed uninterested in her flesh but very interested in her hair. Polinators, she decided. The iridescent ones drank blood, made more disturbing by the fact that they were translucent when they stopped to drink, and Jocasta could only watch as they carried milliliters of her blood away to parts unknown. The bright red carapace marked the most annoying ones, leaving bites and nips, trying to explore the folds of her robes despite clearly not liking her taste or texture or scent or however they experienced potential feedings.

               She had just reached inside her robe to shoo one from where it was tickling her belly when, naturally, their source arrived.

               The source looked…stretched was the only word that came to mind. Jocasta was familiar with most sentient species who called the Republic home, and this person looked like none of them so much as if one took a Trandoshan and stretched it to double its already-considerable height. In addition to the embarrassment of having been caught with her hand in her robes, Jocasta felt a compounded embarrassment at not having seen them approach.

               “You are the Jee-dye,” their source gestured towards Master Cerulian more than Jocasta. When Master Cerulian nodded, they continued. “Excellent. Your presence is expected. Follow.”

               Wonderful, Jocasta thought. More trekking.

               Follow they did, through more marshland and sparse trees towards marginally drier areas of what could generously be called grasslands. Jocasta wondered if she should have been taking notes on their journey—she doubted she would be able to find the clearing again on her own, let alone the shuttle.

               Then there was the feeling. Faint, like a rumbling deep in the ground, or a particularly raucous Senate meeting heard from across Coruscant’s cityscape. Jocasta had assumed it was the bugs or the heat or some combination of everything uncomfortable about this planet, but it was getting…louder was not the correct term. More insistent, somehow—a vibration tickling her brain, an itch she could not locate with enough accuracy to scratch. Which again, could have just been the bugs.

               “Master,” Jocasta tugged at the elder Jedi’s robes, briefly overwhelmed with the feeling of childish helplessness the action recalled. “I have a bad feeling about this.”

               “Exar Kun’s armor must be close, then.”

               Once more, silence. Bug-filled silence, but silence, nonetheless. Jocasta’s feet were damp, though from sweat or the invading damp of the marsh she could not tell. She could feel her waterlogged toes shriveling, her leg muscles now just one dull ache instead of the sharp segmented burning of muscles in use. By contrast, Master Cerulian trudged onwards with an almost youthful glee, keeping pace with their tall guide.

               All at once, a veritable village appeared, raised on stilts like the landing platform had been. It was breathtaking; spiraling stairs and bridges, architecture that somehow married the great tree-cities of Kashyyyk with a vaguely Alderaanian influence. Smells of incense filled the air as they moved closer, and Jocasta was relieved beyond consideration that it seemed to finally repel the many bugs that had been sticking to her like a Kavorkian to a nesting bukkem.

               Ascending the stairs, Jocasta relied on the Force to enhance and stabilize her movements, vaguely wondering if Master Cerulian had trained with Master Yoda during his physical education. He certainly moved like it, leaping with a grace that almost made the stairs seem built for the averagely-sized human and not the over two-meter-tall inhabitants of the city.

               Reaching the top of the stairs, Jocasta let out a yelp as the pack on her back reasserted its existence, pulling her backwards. Master Cerulian noticed too late, his hand just missing her robes. Jocasta braced herself for the painful tumble…but it did not arrive. At first she thought Master Cerulian had caught her with the Force, until she noticed the tendril-like fingers surrounding the pack behind her.

               Wordlessly, their guide righted Jocasta, who bowed as deeply as her weary body would let her.

               “Thank you,” Jocasta said when her panic had subsided enough to permit words. “Your reflexes are appreciated.”

               The guide said nothing.

               Onward they went, through gates and walkways, around winding paths of utilitarian beauty, bark and thatching and smells of incense and cooking filling the senses. In short, life. Life everywhere.

               Nevertheless, the feeling persisted.

               Their guide stopped in front of them, motioning to a platform suspended on braided vine.

               “Your negotiator is already beneath,” The guide intoned again, voice at once musical and throaty. “I leave you now.”

               “Thank you,” Master Cerulian nodded his head, then boarded the platform with Jocasta quick behind him. As it started its descent, Jocasta watched their guide watching them, far away features growing farther and farther away. Jocasta thought they looked sad, red eyes meeting her blue ones, watching her face as though they would not see it again.

               They descended deep, past the structures and even the marshy ground. Jocasta supposed this made sense—excavation required digging, and it was best none but the trained Jedi handle an item potentially steeped in Dark Side energy. Once or twice, she thought she could see shapes moving in the darkness. Shadows, likely, but Jocasta could not help but picture giant worms swimming in seas of marshy dirt, searching sightlessly for the next meal.

               “Tea once we land, I think,” Master Cerulian murmured to her. “Never negotiate with an archaeologist without first making yourself comfortable.”

               Jocasta nodded, shifting the pack again as the lack of forward movement meant the weight was now very evident on her back and shoulders. It seemed that, for the time being at least, Jocasta was to take a silent role in the proceedings. She could do that. She could do that.

               The feeling was growing stronger, though it remained faint and unidentifiable. Jocasta strained her senses, reaching out with the Force like one reaches for an item on a too-tall shelf. She could almost sense it clearly, could almost—

               The platform stopped with a heavy thunk onto the ground, and all of Jocasta’s concentration immediately went towards staying standing as gravity reasserted itself and her overtaxed knees threatened to buckle. If they gave out, Jocasta did not know that she could stand back up—that she had remained upright so far was as close to the concept of miracle as she was familiar with.

               The light cast from the glowsticks on the platform did nothing to penetrate the darkness of the excavation site. Stepping off the now-stationary platform, Jocasta wondered briefly if she should ignite her lightsaber for light, but dismissed the idea. If it was dark, there was a reason for it. Perhaps she could use the Force to navigate their path?

               “The Force is a constant guide,” Master Cerulian nodded as Jocasta settled into a standing meditation, before tapping her on the shoulder. “Night vision goggles will work better, though.”

               With a blush that was thankfully not visible, Jocasta accepted the aid and put them on. At once, the site lit up. There were three tents of roughly medium height—a significant departure from the elongated architecture elsewhere in the village. Various figures milled about with gear, their carapace armor glinting as the goggles’ sensors picked them up at odd angles. Bipedal, roughly human-shaped but for all Jocasta could sense they might as well have been droids. The center held what passed for a table, and with a nod from Master Cerulian Jocasta set about unpacking and brewing the tea.

               Jocasta had often wondered whether fondness for tea was a trait all Corellians shared or if it was unique to Master Cerulian. As the tea brewed in the battered yet beautiful electric kettle—faux porcelain designs of spiraling flowers that turned into stars, the heating element revealing the coppered material underneath as the steam rose in floral scents—Jocasta still had no answer. She wondered if, when she was Master Cerulian’s age, she would understand the intricate rituals inherent in a nice cup of tea.

               The leader—or the person Jocasta assumed was the leader, given their position near the table and the way they were watching both Master Cerulian and the tea kettle—was slow to approach. Instead of the half-helmet Jocasta was familiar with from ExplorCorps, they wore a simple headlamp that showed off their violet eyes and pronounced nose. Either scales or jewelry glittered as what little light filtered over from the surface and the platform caught the display.

               “You are the Jee-dai,” the leader asked in that same accent, though it sounded like actual words in their throat. “The one interested in Kun?”

               In response, Master Cerulian smiled softly and raised a cup of tea—actually raised it, the Force floating it gently across to the head archaeologist without so much as a ripple from the tea within. A nod passed between the two and each raised the cup and sipped.

               “Mmm,” the archaeologist made a noise of surprised enjoyment. “A Chandrilan spiced tea? It has been so long…thank you, Messre Jee-dai.”

               “Of course,” Master Cerulian answered. “Never discuss historical theories with an empty stomach or a tired body. I find Chandrila’s selection of spiced teas tend to remedy both.”

               “Wise and generous,” the archaeologist nodded. “The stories of the Jee-dai are true, then.”

               “Most stories are,” Master Cerulian smiled and sipped his tea. Jocasta wondered if it was as good as he made it seem. Perhaps she had a future in tea-making. Jocasta Nu: Jedi Archivist and Tea-Maker.

               The itch at the back of her mind was still there. It had evolved somewhat, from ripples in a pond to music just on the edge of hearing. Minor keys, discordant warning Jocasta knew she should heed but had no clue how to. At least the pack was lighter now without the teamaking .

               “Whether the artifact is…historically significant or not,” the head archaeologist continued. “We cannot simply surrender it, of course.”

               “Of course,” Master Cerulian answered, his tight smile not quite reaching his eyes. “We would naturally like to examine the artifact to be sure, but I understand your culture has certain prerequisites to such a request.”

               Prerequisites? Jocasta felt her ears burn from more than just the bugs. Was Master Cerulian about to bribe this archaeologist? Just for the chance to examine the seventeenth most heavily forged artifact in the hope that this time it would be genuine?

               “If I may,” the archaeologist motioned towards Jocasta. “Your assistant would be acceptable. I assume she has weapons training?”

               “Of course,” Master Cerulian nodded, but his eyes locked with Jocasta’s briefly. His voice entered her mind like dust shaken off a favorite blanket: they expect a challenge by combat. Gladiatorial—perhaps links to Rattatak? Look into later. For now, know they seek entertainment, not blood. “Shall we say winner takes the armor?”

               “Acceptable,” the archaeologist nodded. “We shall prepare for a duel of the fates!”

               Jocasta moved behind Master Cerulian, slowly clearing the tea as the archaeologist leapt up and began barking orders in whatever Quelii dialect they spoke here. The other archaeologists, crafters, and laborers seemed to be equally excited by the prospect of a blood sport, and dropped whatever they were doing to follow these new orders.

               You can do this.

               Ordinarily, sentences like that had tells. A tone of voice, a too-wide smile, a nod or an eyebrow, twirling antennas. Jocasta would have had better luck beating an astromech droid at pazaak than interpreting Master Thame Cerulian in this moment.

               “You may use your lightsaber, Jee-dye,” the archaeologist said from behind her. “The memory of the Echani is long, and our weapons do not soon forget their kin.”

               “Just a moment,” Master Cerulian interrupted, his easy manner replaced by something more urgent. Did he finally sense it too? “A demonstration with live weapons? We are not Mandalorians! What purpose would that serve?”

               “It serves the Fates,” and suddenly Jocasta Nu was falling. Was pushed. Was once again at the bottom of a long fall wondering what had happened. Her training kicked in; she rolled to her feet the moment she felt something solid, surveyed this…pit within a pit, she supposed. An energy net sprung up across the opening, crisscrossing beams crackling as the bugs who had been flying freely were cut apart if not outright vaporized by the sudden presence.

               “Jee-dai Jocasta Nu,” the head—archaeologist did not seem the appropriate term anymore, but she had no other—called out from above, pronouncing her name like Master Cerulian, clipped consonants and all. “Today you honor us. May the Fates watch you rise…or fall.”

               Jocasta breathed—the panicked breathing of a child in pain, of a Nautolan adjusting to the oxygenized air, frantic with the unknown. She stopped—I am a Jedi, she reminded herself. She could do this.

               “Seeking honor this day also is Tokchi,” the voice continued, and a figure stepped into the red glow of the energy ceiling. “Her existence defies the Sun Guards, but it honors her ancestors. They stand watching. The Fates will.”

               “The Fates will,” Tokchi echoed, and gave a stilted half-bow to Jocasta. “It will be an honor to kill you, and a greater honor still to die by your blade.”

               Jocasta bowed, eyes never leaving Tokchi. She was…beautiful was not the right word. Hard. Sharp like the edge of a rock. She wore only the barest of clothes—a vest that showed off scars and abdominal muscles, some kind of skirt that girded at her thighs—though out of tradition, necessity, or a simple fact of the heat of this planet Jocasta could not guess. Her dark hair was cut not unlike Jocasta’s own, almost uniformly short save for two braids—one on either side of her ears. She reminded Jocasta of Ayja.

               Jocasta set aside her goggles and settled into the briefest of standing meditations. Could she do this?

               The glint of Tokchi’s silver eyes was the only warning as her blade was drawn. Dark but with a golden energy thrumming at its edge, Jocasta was only just quick enough to dodge the first cut, the sound of metal on earth grating and fresh. She dodged twice more, but the pit was small and her robes were heavy. Tokchi stepped forward as she thrust, Jocasta’s outer robe betraying her at last, blade hot and cool and very close to her skin.

               Jocasta jumped. Not high enough to touch the makeshift roof, just enough to get clear. From there it was a shrug of the Force to cast her robe off, though Tokchi easily avoided the fabric’s return to ground. She landed on her hands, then sprung up and ignited her lightsaber as Tokchi’s blade came at her again. The green blade sizzled against Tokchi’s more solid weapon, whatever energy weave that danced on its edge clearly preventing any of the overheating that was typical of lightsaber-on-not-lightsaber contact.

               The light was dazzling. It was an odd thing to notice in a fight, especially a fight inside a darkened pit, and yet the red of the crisscrossing field above them, the dark-and-golden sheen of Tokchi’s sword, the green of Jocasta’s own lightsaber blade? They spun and danced as the two combatants spun and danced. Every blow from Tokchi was aimed to kill, every parry and riposte from Jocasta determined to end this duel without the bloodshed its viewers cheered for.

               “Jedi do not kill,” Jocasta said firmly as their blades locked once more. “I do not wish to harm you.”

               “My people tell it differently,” Tokchi responded, pressing the attack. Jocasta dodged left, then right, using her momentum to twirl around Tokchi before their blades again crossed. “Are you not a warrior, Jocasta Nu? You fight like one.”

               A statement of fact. Jocasta did not know why it bothered her. Her balance was off. She stumbled, only the briefest push and pull on the Force keeping her fluid and upright. Tokchi was there, blade and heft and skin and teeth, unarmed combat beginning to blend with swordplay.

               Stop. Take a breath. Reassess. Her master’s words or her own she could not say, but Jocasta heeded them—as best as one could heed such instructions while locked in a duel to the presumable death. Tokchi fought like a warrior but moved like a Jedi. It was strange and confusing and almost alluring the way she danced forward and backward, in tune with the air and the earth and Jocasta’s blade and her own. She did not feel like a Force-user—the hum of connection, the swirling thread that Jedi like Jocasta knew as well as breathing was not moving through her, not like it moved through Jocasta. Yet neither was Tokchi desperate nor frightened nor determined—all emotions Jocasta could feel dancing in her own head in varying amounts. Instead, she was…at peace.

               A feigned slash turned into a cleave partway and Jocasta had to bend backwards to avoid it, felt the whoosh of the blade as it passed over her. She stood back up, her lightsaber swinging harmlessly as Jocasta rolled her shoulder before bringing the blade back behind, catching Tokchi’s returning blow. Jocasta twirled, using the momentum now to fling the blade and smiled as it went free, thudding into the wall of the pit.

               “Do you y—” Jocasta began, before Tokchi’s fist connected with her jaw and sent Jocasta sprawling. “Kriff!”

               “What is kriff,” Tokchi asked, seeming genuinely curious even as she moved to grapple for Jocasta’s lightsaber. “A Jedi god?”

               “Coruscanti curse word,” Jocasta answered, rolling her now-unignited lightsaber underneath her body in an attempt to keep it away. “Probably a hundred years out of date, but it sounds good in my mouth.”

               “Can you use it in a sentence,” Tokchi asked casually. She was straddling Jocasta now and between that and her own lightsaber digging into her back it was actually quite hard to remember that this was still a fight to the death. “Please?”

               “If you touch my lightsaber,” Jocasta breathed. She could do this. “I will kriff you up.”

               “Kriff,” Tokchi repeated. “I like it.”

               For one horrifying moment, Jocasta thought about pushing. It would be so easy—she could see it in her mind, the ending.

One day, on a planet in the dark in a duel she did not understand, aspiring Jedi Jocasta Nu pushed the warrior Tokchi with the Force, strength, and a frustrated lapse of control and Tokchi went up, through the gridded ceiling, and rained back down in cubes of cauterized meat. The horrified Jedi had just enough time to lift herself to her knees before she vomited, tea and bits of undigested ration blocks splashing onto the already-wet ground as chunks of Tokchi hit the earth and the walls and her.

               Instead, Jocasta stopped. Willed everything to just stop, be still, cease moving. Somehow, it did. Tokchi was suspended in the air just above Jocasta, so close that if she sat up their heads would touch. Even the sound stopped: the whirring of the energy caging them, the constant buzzing and humming of bugs, the breathing and cheers and spittle of bloodlust from above.

               Come on, Joca, said a voice in Jocasta’s head that sounded suspiciously like Sifo-Dyas. Use that beautiful brain of yours and think. You are a Jedi. This is a duel. You do not kill. How do you win?

               The answer came to her as quickly as the darkness had danced before her mind. By finishing the duel.

               Jocasta rolled out from under the frozen, floating form of Tokchi, used the Force to call the warrior’s fallen blade to her off-hand, and breathed out as time reasserted itself.

               Several things happened at once: Tokchi hit the ground with a crunchy thud as Jocasta remembered to pull her own lightsaber to her grip and it flew up towards her waiting hand, Jocasta dropped into a modified Jar’Kai stance to accommodate her newly-claimed vibroweapon, and the waiting audience went silent as they struggled to comprehend the movement that had not occurred.

               Tokchi was on her feet in an instant, hands raised in what Jocasta could only describe as a classic Form III stance. Shock and appreciation danced in her eyes as Jocasta dropped her pose, tossing Tokchi’s blade back to her.

               “Does that count as first blood,” Jocasta asked. Tokchi raised a hand to her nose, eyes flickering to Jocasta and back as her hand came away bloody.

“No,” Tokchi answered as she wiped her golden blood onto her clothing, then smiled slightly. “Neither does yours.”

Jocasta rubbed her own jaw and felt droplets of red near a split in her lip. She sighed, then readied Form II with a Makashi salute and hoped that Tokchi could understand Jocasta’s revised intention.

Tokchi remained in her odd Form III stance, throwing Jocasta a smile and two-fingered salute with her offhand as both women caught their breath and prepared for another round.

Jocasta Nu closed her eyes. She breathed, feeling the Force flowing around her, feeling that thread of warning still tickling, simply feeling because whatever she had done moments ago (whatever the Force had done through her) had exhausted any attempt to draw from the well. Jocasta Nu was tired. This would not stop her.

Tokchi went forward, an overhead strike followed by a slash to Jocasta’s left hip that Jocasta blocked easily. Then it was Jocasta’s turn, a series of fast strikes and a bit of aggressive footwork to press Tokchi to the defensive. Jocasta stepped back, let Tokchi reassess the situation.

Cut through all outside distractions, Jocasta reminded herself, eyes still closed, breathing just about steady. There is only you and your blade and your opponent and her blade. All are one with the Force.

Tokchi moved again, overhead blow followed by a wide slash. Her blade tapped lightly against Jocasta’s lightsaber, the resulting hiss a playful warning. Two more blows, faster now. Jocasta disengaged, let Tokchi’s momentum lead as she dodged and ducked. Movement, rhythm, heartbeat. Blade sizzling so close to skin and sweat that body hair singed.

Jocasta adjusted her grip to Form V, then moved with what strength she had gathered. It was a flurry of blows from all directions, a dizzying field of green that even Jocasta, her eyes shut in concentration, could see and admire.

Tokchi jumped, powerful leg muscles propelling the young warrior over Jocasta’s head and Jocasta was once again impressed and confused at how close and how far the gap in their understandings of dueling was. She turned on her heel, blade up to catch the inevitable attack…but it did not come.

Jocasta Nu opened her eyes to find Tokchi’s blade almost touching her right cheek. Jocasta was slightly embarrassed to find her own blade in a similar position, pointed at Tokchi’s neck. Right. She is a warrior, not a Jedi sparring.

Tokchi’s silver eyes were alight. She did not seem to notice Jocasta’s lightsaber or even her own blade. Her focus was on Jocasta’s eyes—or possibly the bruise forming on her jaw. Could bruises form that quickly? She could not say—nobody at the Jedi Temple had ever punched her in the jaw.

They stayed like that for a moment, breath synchronizing, the world slowly filtering back.

Jocasta did not sense the shot that rang out. All she felt was Tokchi’s blade pressed into her cheek. Jocasta followed the blade’s pressure, falling to the ground completely before rolling back up.

In the time it took Jocasta to ready herself, Tokchi had already taken action. With a war cry that was permanently seared into Jocasta’s brain, Tokchi whirled around, swinging her sword like an Iridonian hunting weapon. While the energy grid naturally cut the sword into pieces, Tokchi’s considerable strength kept the shards flying and Jocasta heard the piercing of flesh.

               More blasterfire—none of it into the pit this time. Jocasta kept her lightsaber up, trying to find some way to shield Tokchi if more violence occurred. Difficult to do when the aggressors had the high ground and all Jocasta and Tokchi had was one lightsaber between them and the Force that was clearly not as in tune with Jocasta as she was with it.

               The energy field deactivated, and some type of woven ladder was lowered down almost immediately. Jocasta did not need it; while Tokchi climbed the ladder with a strength and speed Jocasta was surprised she still had, Jocasta reached out with the Force once more and leapt. She landed, lightsaber still drawn, eyes alight and head aswivel.

               Three of the group lay either dead or dying, shrapnel from Tokchi’s blade embedded into soft flesh speckled with smoking holes, their headlamps and nightmasks now pointed up towards an ever-darkening sky. Master Cerulian did not appear to have moved from his seat, but nor did he appear to be injured. The head archaeologist, glowing in the red light of the glowsticks that had been stationed around the energy field, simply stepped forward, clapping and smiling.

               “An unconventional victory,” the leader said, that uncomfortable smile shining in the dark. “But acceptable. I apologize deeply for the interruption—some of us are not as well versed in gladiatorial etiquette.”

               “Victory for whom,” Master Cerulian asked, curiosity in his voice. “The warrior or the audience?”

               “It matters not,” the leader waved dismissive hands. “You, my friend, shall examine your Jee-dai armor. Although we may need to negotiate additional terms afterwards.”

               Was this the way of the galaxy? Did some people really hold life so cheaply, to snuff it out and then carry on?

               Jocasta did not remember deactivating her lightsaber. She must have—the hilt was compact and solid in her hand, its only light the internal everglow of singing kyber. She could not remember sinking to her knees, cold mud soaking through her robes. She was startled to full alertness only when hands braced her shoulders—younger hands than Master Cerulian’s, calloused and worked fresh: Tokchi.

               “Do you bury your dead,” Jocasta rasped, her voice betraying her. “I know they tried to kill us, but to leave them like this seems—”

               “My people entomb our dead,” Tokchi said slowly, voice still puzzling over Jocasta. “These? These can be burned. If you do not mind returning to the pit.”

               “I do not,” Jocasta answered, then looked to Master Cerulian. She could not tell whether the elder Jedi had been listening or was simply attuned in the Force enough to understand Jocasta’s gaze; either way, he nodded, his dark eyes somehow penetrating the darkness around them. “Let us proceed, then.”

               As they worked in the darkness—dragging and wrapping the bodies, building cheap pyres with kindling and height enough to light—there was an unease that danced in the humid air. Jocasta was used to funerals, to the final act of laying someone to rest, but usually it was just that: final. The work she did now did not feel final. It felt like a reprieve, like that moment during her duel with Tokchi where each woman had taken a moment to steady herself before pressing on.

               When all was done and the pyres lit, Jocasta took a step back and looked to Tokchi as she cleared her throat.

               “They were bastards,” Tokchi said solemnly. “I am glad my blade tasted their blood before they fell…and may the fire return what worthiness they still possessed to the stars, that their lives may have use in death. Good?”

               “Yes,” Jocasta nodded. She could feel Tokchi’s eyes on her, but her own gaze was stuck on the pyres, on the flames licking these new bodies the way they had and would every person Jocasta knew, had known, would know. “Thank you. For everything.”

               “Even this,” Tokchi poked Jocasta’s bruising jaw, sharply but not unkindly. “You Jee-dai are strange.”

               “I thought warriors appreciated pain as a lesson?”

               “We do,” and Tokchi leaned forward and pressed a kiss to Jocasta’s jaw. “Try not to get dead.”

               By the time Jocasta could breathe again, she was alone in the pit. She wondered if all Jedi Padawans experienced this level of confusion in their personal and professional lives—so far, Jocasta had two friends that she felt some sort of way about, a Master whose only point of contact with her seemed to be when he needed an extra brain or body for a mission he would never divulge the details of, and now a warrior woman with vastly different cultural expectations and very strong muscles had warned her “not to get dead.”

               Perhaps Jocasta Nu had overestimated the appeal of a life of exploration. Perhaps Restelly Quist had the right idea: find a nice cozy spot in the Archives with an emotionally significant period of galactic history and never leave it.

               To his credit, Master Cerulian was waiting outside the tent when Jocasta finally made her way up from the pyre, smoke and sweat and marsh clinging to her robes.

               “It is alright to be afraid,” Master Cerulian said suddenly as Jocasta joined him. “Fear, anticipation, desire. They pass as life passes. To give into these feelings—to let the emotions rule you—that is where tragedy strikes. That is where the darkness lurks.”

               Then there was silence. Jocasta wondered if those words had been for her benefit or Master Cerulian’s own. She wondered if it mattered. Was wondering the natural state of a padawan—always thirsting for knowledge just out of reach?

               The silence continued as they stepped into the tent. Jocasta could tell now that there were lights all around the site—they were simply kept dim until needed for use and hidden more still by the heavy tent materials.

               At the center was the armor, carefully laid out. Master Cerulian let out a breath and wordlessly began to circle the armor, almost not daring to touch it. For her part, Jocasta at least gave the forgers points for originality: bits of disintegrating green cloth poked out where some sort of straps or a body glove would have been, while the armor itself was a uniform brown with the occasional speck of shine visible even in the dim light.

               “The design is certainly the closest I have seen,” Master Cerulian murmured. “Oh, Teeot. Have we found it at last?”

               Jocasta let her master ponder and began dutifully unpacking the various other bits of equipment they had brought. She was not at all clear on the science, but there were tests that could determine things like age and even detect certain Force-related meddling. It made sense when Master Cerulian explained it, which was the important part.

               “The age is right…but why here,” Master Cerulian had remained relatively quiet while the tests were performed, that anticipatory reverence rolling off of him. “I am missing something.”

               “What you are missing is trap,” Tokchi stepped out from the shadows. “Is armor real, is it fake? I do not know. I do know that those guys out there care more about Jee-dai killing than money.”

               “Jedi killing,” Jocasta echoed. “People still do that?”

               “Of course,” Tokchi was practically over Jocasta’s shoulder now, likely trying to see if there was anything in this tent that could be used to defend them. There was not. “Prestige, grudges, the little pretty jewels in your laser swords? Why would they not kill you?”

               “You know this how, girl?”

               “Tokchi,” Tokchi turned to Master Cerulian. “That is why I was brought. Test Jee-dai, kill Jee-dai, except Jee-dai seem pretty nice to me so now I think warn Jee-dai, save Jee-dai.”

               “Oh,” The enthusiasm seemed to leave Master Cerulian, and suddenly he looked very, very old and tired. “Oh. I have done it again. Reckless reckless reckless.”

               “You cannot convince them to let us walk?”

               “To be honest,” Tokchi said, standing too close to Jocasta once more. “I am only surprised that they have not started shooting yet.”

               Jocasta sensed it this time, and brought up her lightsaber in time to block the blaster bolt that came whizzing towards Tokchi’s head. The bolt and her blade both fizzled a moment in the air, green and red and yellow collided and stretched and suspended all at once. Then the night erupted with blasterfire.

               If, afterwards, Jocasta had been pressed to name the two most significant events of the mission, she would have considered both of them to have occurred during that final firefight—although dueling Tokchi to an indeterminate standstill was certainly a close third.

               The first event was death—the feeling of it, the sense of a song sung and a light extinguished. Jocasta fell back into Form I as Tokchi toppled the table to use as cover, sending the armor and all of the test accoutrements scattering across the ground. Master Cerulian was beside her, his lightsaber undrawn—planning, meditating, pushing towards a resolution in his mind Jocasta was sure. Even in his lack of movement, there was grace—blaster bolts flew past, tearing holes into whatever surface they found, but none touched the Jedi Master.

               Tokchi resurfaced, an old but evidently still functional blaster in her hand, and began returning fire. Judging from the yells and grunts outside, at least some of those shots were hitting. She would have been a good Jedi.

               Two high-powered snipershots cut through the darkness, a yellow hue amid the reds and green. Jocasta spun her lightsaber to catch the bolts, Force and lightsaber working in tandem to absorb the energy. Except they did not stop; instead Jocasta’s lightsaber flickered, and the bolts passed through her blade. The first shot singed her hair, passing just over where she ducked down. The second shot punched through the table Tokchi was using for cover, and Jocasta heard the young warrior grunt in pain and surprise.

               Blasterfire kept coming, red bolts sizzling and fast. Jocasta maintained position, maintained form but her lightsaber was still malfunctioning—dying—still letting bolts through. She called up the Force just in time to soften the blow as two bolts made it through—one on her left side, the other center mass—and Jocasta went flying backwards.

               Her lightsaber rolled out of her hand, still flickering, kyber crystal calling out like a death rattle. She could smell her own flesh burning, the pain so intense it was almost distant. She tried to look around for Tokchi, but the dark and the chaos and the pain were too much to focus.

               It will be alright, my Padawan. Master Cerulian’s voice echoed in her mind, although whether it was only in her mind was still too difficult to tell. Then there was a massive push of the Force—the entire structure of the tent raising and flattening against the rest of the pit—and the next moment Jocasta Nu would remember for the rest of her life started: Master Thame Cerulian walked into the fray.

               The confusion of their attempted murderers abated as the Corellian Jedi slowly made his way forward. He dodged the next three shots easily, then put a hand to his lightsaber hilt as he continued to advance. Jocasta thought she could hear his breathing, or her own, or someone’s heart pounding out a slow rhythm as her Jedi Master drew his lightsaber.

               For the briefest of moments, he stood still again, gripping his lightsaber with both hands in a modified Form III pose, brilliant viridian blade lighting his dark eyes and graying hair and the choice of this moment. Then he moved. Jocasta was unsure if she was still fully conscious, but whatever alertness she had was directed towards her master as he moved with a speed and surety she had never seen before. Of the seven visible aggressors, Master Cerulian took out three before Jocasta had time to understand what was happening. Blaster, arm, head, the Jedi Master struck with decision, never slowing once. The next two tried to engage with their special swords, but they only clashed for a moment or two before they too went down in a heap. The final two had their own blasterfire deflected back at them, only enough time for their eyes to widen in realization.

               It was over, Jocasta breathed. But where had that head archaeologist gone? Up to the surface? Or just the elevator…

               There was no time to call a warning as the head archaeologist fired the same high-powered sniper rounds that had taken Tokchi out of the fight.

               Time slowed as Master Cerulian looked up, locking eyes with the sniper. He did not even attempt to block the yellow bolts of energy heading towards him. One, two.

               One hit him center mass, but the energy seemed to disperse around him traveling up the bones of the chestpiece. The second he caught in his offhand, absorbing the power and dissipating it.

               There was a cry as Master Cerulian picked the head archaeologist up with the Force and pulled, followed by more yells as he navigated ground and trees and gravity to bring his attempted murderer and betrayer face-to-face. Something passed between them then—whispers, silence, decision. Master Cerulian was still holding his lightsaber and the head archaeologist was standing in front of him, bloodied and unbowed.

               It was then, of course, that Jocasta Nu lost consciousness.

***

               Jocasta awoke in the shuttle medbay: a compact if not cramped area that had its own medscanner and a supply of bacta pads and not much else apart from atmospheric lighting. If the hum of the engines and the churning of her stomach was anything to go by, they were in hyperspace.

               Jocasta tried to sit up and found that moving was slightly more advanced than she was capable of. The burns were evidently worse than she had anticipated. She expected that if it were not for the bacta, the pain would be much worse as well; as it was, gritting her teeth was about all she could manage for communication.

               “You were unconscious for several hours,” came Master Cerulian’s voice from…somewhere beyond her current line of vision. “Luckily our guide was kind enough to arrange transportation back to our ship; they call them ‘landcrawlers.’ Fascinating design: I think you would have liked them.”

               Jocasta said nothing. She had questions; of course she had questions! How badly was she hurt? Was Tokchi alright? Where was her lightsaber? Had the entire mission been an exercise in futility and broken trust? Somewhere between the bacta and the burns and the hyperspace she seemed to have misplaced her voice, though.

               “I owe you a story,” Maser Cerulian said softly. Story? Was that right? “I hope that by the end of it, you can forgive an old man for his failure.”

Chapter Text

               Jocasta’s stomach sank. Had Master Cerulian…killed the head archaeologist? Ransomer? Opportunist? Whatever the proper term was?

               “I have trained many students,” he said firmly. “But only three have I called Padawan, present company excepted of course. One currently leads the next generation of Jedi Starfighter pilots. One scraped by their exams by the skin of their teeth. And one…one died.

               “Teeot’luroon. I have never found teaching to get easier with time.  I do not believe it should: each student, each teacher is a unique experience, and a Jedi is never finished learning. Perhaps he was too much like me, or I was not enough like my own master, Thalia. I am not sure it matters now.

               “Teeot was so…gifted. Dueling, diplomacy, meditation—it all came easily to him. Did you know that there is a Twi’lek subculture devoted to a type of gladiatorial performance—a dance devoted to balance amid chaos, calm within violence? It began on one of their colony-worlds, entertainment during the rebuilding process turned into an art form. Teeot seemed wise beyond his years because he was; access to all that cultural memory blending with Jedi training, our archeological work.

               “How easy it is to overestimate a child. To think they are ready, to give them more than they can handle. The broken bone cannot heal until you tell it how to grow.”

               Silence. Jocasta was awake now, could move if she wanted. Except to move might break her concentration and the healing trance she was already struggling to maintain; more importantly, whatever this moment was—this frightening, wonderful vulnerability between Jocasta and the Jedi Master to whom such moments were clearly rarer than kyber—would shatter, never to be recaptured.

               “I have always been fascinated by the Great Sith War,” Master Cerulian breathed, that same distant tone blended with the barest hints of emotion. “So much of our knowledge lost, what survived diluted in fanciful tales and half-truths. A galaxy on the brink, and all we can say for certain is that we survived it. The how or the why? We may as well ask the trees to stop growing towards the sun.

               “An artifact had surfaced, purporting to be from that time. I do not even remember what it was supposed to be—a jewel, a cloak, a document. Does it matter? I was excited. I was foolish. Thought I could negotiate with pirates, thought the Force would protect me—and it did. It just did not protect Teeot. That was my task, and I failed.

               “Now I have failed you as well.”

               “What happened,” Jocasa asked after the silence that filled the medbay, grounded and as alert as her wounded body would allow. “After I lost consciousness? I remember Tokchi was wounded and I could not reach my lightsaber and you…you were like a storm.”

               “That,” Master Cerulian did not look at her, and the knot in Jocasta’s stomach tightened. “That  was the moment every Jedi fears—the test. Emotion or philosophy, instinct or choice. Do we act out of that fear—the moment where all seems lost? Can we recover if we do?”

               “I am not well enough to follow all that,” Jocasta interrupted. “What did you do?”

               “If you have to ask the question,” Master Cerulian looked at her now, his dark eyes flickering with…something. Shame? Disappointment? “The answer could not possibly satisfy you. Get some rest, padawan. We have a journey still ahead of us.”

               Master Cerulian stood to leave. He paused briefly in the doorway, but if he had thoughts, he did not share them. The door shut softly behind him, and Jocasta was bathed in darkness punctured only by the low light of the medlab.

               Jocasta rested. It was a dreamless kind of sleep, and for once she welcomed it. She could not imagine a worse time to dream, waking thoughts weaving across a sleeping mind all emotion and confusion.

               “Do not die on me, Jee-dai.” The voice floated into Jocasta’s mind so easily, she at first thought it was her mind—tricks of an injured body and an overtaxed brain. Her eyes told her otherwise, as did the firm yet gentle touch on her uninjured side.

               “Tokchi,” Jocasta blinked away sudden tears. “You’re alive!”

               “You thought I could die? Hurtful.” Jocasta said nothing, was too busy taking in this person who she had feared was lost forever.

               Tokchi looked almost entirely uninjured. Her braids brushed over bare shoulders, those same scars and muscles Jocasta had noted during their duel on full display here. She was cleaner though, and had on a loose-fitting pilot’s suit with the sleeves tied in place above her hips. The only difference physically was—

               “Your hand,” Jocasta reached for it, and Tokchi complied. All but the thumb and pinky of Tokchi’s left hand had been blasted away, scarring still visible. In their place were durasteel digits that could just as easily have been scavenged from spare parts as professionally selected.

               “It was a clean cut,” Tokchi assured her, fingers dancing in ways human fingers typically could not. “Better hand than heart, yes?”

               “How are you here,” Jocasta kept hold of her hand, some part of her fearful that if she let go, Tokchi would disappear. “You are here, yes?”

               “Do Jee-dai believe in ghosts,” Tokchi teased, but she did not pull her hand away, and something in her eyes flickered. “Your old man offered me a ride. Threw in some new fingers if I took them off the pilot droid. Oh, your ship has a pilot droid! You should switch it on. It is very old.”

               “You did that yourself?”

               “Old man helped,” Tokchi admitted. “Says there’s a trader’s den near your next stop. I get off, Jee-dai keep going on towards Jee-dai business.”

               “The one who attacked us,” Jocasta began, mind searching for delicacy and mouth finding it wanting. “Your boss? The head person, whoever. Was he alive when we left?”

               “Former bossperson,” Tokchi shrugged. “In custody. Sector ranger came.”

               “Oh,” Jocasta felt her breath leave her, a weight she had not remembered she was carrying dropping off her shoulders. Of course a Jedi Master—her Jedi Master—had not murdered someone. Of course justice had been done. “Of course.”

               Time passed after that—quickly, slowly, all at once or drawn out slower than a heartbeat; Jocasta could not be sure. All that mattered was that Tokchi was alive and that she had doubted. The bacta did its work. Tokchi left, a goodbye short and strange and painful in ways Jocasta could not explain, did not want to explain. Eventually, things had to return to normal—or whatever normal was aboard the shuttle that had too few rooms and, apparently, a pilot droid.

               It was three days and two meditation sessions before Master Cerulian joined her, taking his place on the floor and closing his eyes. Jocasta watched him—only briefly, eyes opened in curiosity. Jocasta thought he looked unsure, even in this state. It was worrying, seeing one’s master so…vulnerable.

               “I have been a distant Master,” he began almost hesitantly. “For that, I apologize.”

               “I do not mind it,” Jocasta cut in, and really she meant it. “I have learned so much working at the Archives. Head Archivist Restelly Quist is the best teacher one could ask for. Apart from you, of course.”

               “The work we do is not for everyone,” he continued, eyes still closed. “I felt that the Temple was better suited to your education on that front. It may have been a mistake.”

               “Are you…” Jocasta stared straight at him now, eyes flickering, brain whirling. “Are you reassigning me?”

               “What,” and it was Master Cerulian’s turn to open his eyes, look at his student incredulously. “No! No, I am committing to you. From now on, where I go, you shall go also.”

               “Oh,” Jocasta said simply. “Oh. I am sorry about before. I did not mean to question your…you, I guess.”

               “Life is never certain, and neither are the people in it.”

***

               It was another day before Jocasta realized that they were not headed back to Coruscant—or if they were, it was one of those ‘scenic routes’ she had heard so much about. Neither Jocasta’s stomach nor her anxiously healing mind appreciated it.

               “Master,” Jocasta sipped at her Bauhin flower tea. “Are we going somewhere else before Coruscant?”

               “Yes,” Master Cerulian sipped his own tea before elaborating. “You need to build a new lightsaber—a better lightsaber. You have the parts already: I shall provide the location.”

               Jocasta blinked. They were taking this trip…so that she could build a new lightsaber?

               “Also I have to reactivate the ship’s droid for a proper diagnostics scan and I cannot stand to be on the ship with it for that long.”

               “Really,” Jocasta actually raised her eyebrows towards her master. “The ship’s droid is that bad?”

               “I have used this shuttle for the past thirty years,” Master Cerulian spoke into his mug. “I have had CV-F3 deactivated for twenty-five of them. So in a way, I like this droid more than most of the galaxy.”

               Jocasta allowed the novelty of this to wash over her. Somehow, Master Cerulian feuding with a droid made perfect sense. She decided she would have to speak with this CV-F3 when the time for its reactivation came; there had to be something more to the story. There always was.

               In the silence of the trip that followed, Jocasta took the time to mourn her lightsaber. Master Cerulian had kept it for her, wrapped up like the precious thing it was. Jocasta had never understood the attachment most Jedi seemed to have to their lightsabers. It was a tool, certainly—it was her tool—but even the song of the crystal was not a soul. Not to Jocasta, at any rate. It was closer to the hum of an engine—proof that everything was working correctly.

               So why, then, as Jocasta looked at her broken lightsaber, did she feel such sorrow? The casing had been seared open, exposing the crystal within, green light flickering dully. The disassembly felt like an archaeological dig in its own way, carefully removing each part, inspecting the damage. The secondary focusing crystal had not come loose so much as melted, the stench of plasma and ionized air still clinging to the ruined section as ridges bent outward like sharp teeth.

               Only the endcap was salvageable in the traditional sense—the rest would be taken back to Coruscant and properly disposed of. The parts, she knew, would be melted down and reforged while the kyper crystal would be kept on Temple grounds. The actual disposal of the kyber crystal was a complicated and specialized matter left to the Temple Guards. Some were buried on Temple grounds, some were kept for the Archives to document and study, and some, the rumor said, were fed to the memory moths.

               Was her lightsaber still a work in progress if so little of it remained? Would her new lightsaber feel just as comfortable in her hands? Did she actually have all the parts she required to build it, as Master Cerulian had claimed? As always, Jocasta had too many questions and not enough answers.

               Her thoughts turned to Tokchi—fingers blasted away and replaced, still as confusing and optimistic as she had been during their duel. It was Jocasta who had failed to protect her. Jocasta’s lightsaber that flickered and died when asked to defend someone other than its wielder. It did not make sense—Jocasta knew it did not make sense—but the unease remained. It was as Master Cerulian said: she had to build a better lightsaber. She had to be a better Jedi.

***

               Their final destination was a small moon on the edge of the Mid-Rim. If it had a proper name, Master Cerulian did not share it. Once they landed, he had stood before the landing ramp and sighed deeply, gaze on the landscape before them. It was not much to look at—sparse patches of grass and rock under a red sky—but Master Cerulian’s trademark weariness seemed to lift somewhat.

               “If we were ordinary citizens of the galaxy,” Master Cerulian pondered with a soft not-quite-frown. “I would spend my latter years here, I think. Perhaps I would keep a garden.”

               Jocasta said nothing. Master and padawan disembarked, setting up a makeshift camp of tarps and a prefab tent. Master Cerulian then directed Jocasta to a crate, and when she had taken it with her, sighed wearily and beckoned her back to the ship.

               “CV-F3 may behave itself if another Jedi is present,” he suggested, making his way to a small closet just between the cockpit and the med-center. “I doubt it, though.”

               The closet opened, and Jocasta got her first look at CV-F3. It was clearly an older model—although not having seen any pilot droids, Jocasta could not be sure how old it was. Its plating was a dull white-gray, its body lacked legs, and one of its hands had just a single digit still attached. Its head was more ovaloid than Jocasta was used to, but the design was still recognizable—a mixture of Professor Huang and a protocol droid, with some Old Republic influences.

               Master Cerulian switched it on.

               “Systems updating,” the metallic voice rang out, eyes flickering with blue light. “Thame Cerulian? You seem to be experiencing some mutation. Would you like me to have the medi-scanner primed?”

               “It is called aging,” Master Cerulian already sounded both tired and annoyed. “Why don’t you check your updated records?

               “It has been twenty-four years, eighty-two days, and ten hours since last activation,” CV-F3 reported. “Coruscanti standard time, of course. Woe I say to the passage of time! How has the galaxy moved on while I remained trapped in this wakeless slumber.”

               “He’s fond of poetry,” Master Cerulian sighed. “CV-F3, if you’re finished? This is my padawan, Jocasta Nu.”

               “My apologies,” CV-F3 would have bowed if it could. “A new padawan is a momentous occasion that deserves my fullest attention. May I  ask about your previous padawan, Thame Cerulian?”

               “You may not,” Master Cerulian huffed. “When you are quite finished, perform a full diagnostic scan on the ship and repair what you can.”

               “Pleasure to meet you, CV-F3,” Jocasta inclined her head as Master Cerulian swept back outside. “I apologize for my Master’s rudeness. It has been a long flight.”

               “The emotions of Thame Cerulian ceased to bother me long ago,” CV-F3 shook its head, then looked down at its limbs. “Great bolts of ion, what has happened to my hand? My wonderful dexterous digits: gone!”

               “A friend had need of them,” Jocasta explained apologetically. “Will their loss inhibit your functionality?”

               “Not for what Master Cerulian requires,” CV-F3 answered. “A fitting punishment. The pride of droid is the fall of organics, is it not?”

               “I suppose so,” Jocasta shrugged. “I am sorry for your loss.”

               “Not at all,” CV-F3 leaned forward, neck telescoping out. “Luckily for us, the galactic standard for shuttle designs still relies mostly on buttons and switches. Although if you can mention this dismemberment to the Temple’s shuttle mechanics, I would appreciate the possibility of repair.”

               Jocasta promised she would, and with an awkward curtsy, made her way back outside the shuttle. CV-F3 would do its work, and now she should do hers.

               At the tent, Master Cerulian was sipping from a mug, having removed the lid from the crate to reveal a mixture of spare parts and yet another tea set.

               “Always have a spare,” he said, tapping the kettle. “Not everyone carries a proper tea set around with them.”

               “Master,” Jocasta began, kneeling in place. “Do you have any advice for building a lightsaber? Professor Huang’s instructions were a while ago.”

               “Diagrams and lectures will only take you so far,” Master Cerulian waved his hand dismissively. “Back in my day, all you needed was a list of components, mechanical knowledge, and the Force to guide you.”

               “Oh,” Jocasta tried to nod politely. “But you will check my work?”

               “It depends on your work.”

               That was his word on the matter, and so Jocasta Nu settled herself and took to examining the parts before her. There were lightsaber parts, designs she recognized from Jedi around the Temple, but also plenty of parts that to Jocasta’s eyes simply looked like odds and ends saved from various scrapyards.

               The image of her old lightsaber flickered in her mind’s eye. Other designs joined it: Master Gilnos’ artistic pike, Dooku’s original hilt and the modifications he continued to make to it, Sifo’s experimentation with different grips and emitter lengths. What if she copied Master Cerulian’s design, a symbol of their bond? What if her construction was flawed and this new lightsaber also failed her in a crucial moment?

               Stop. Not helpful. Jocasta took a moment, breathing in and out. Feeling the Force flowing through her, feeling her master’s presence beside her, feeling the life an beauty of this place and this moment and the interweaving threads of the galaxy. Where they had gone and where they had yet to go.

               Jocasta selected her components, her previous lightsaber’s endcap guiding the process. Aesthetic still held some importance, after all. Then, carefully, she removed the dull kyber crystal from around her neck, setting it down, and began to meditate.

               The meditation on one’s lightsaber was personal. In the texts Jocasta had studied, it was described as a mixture of perfunctory and spiritual, a combination of a Jedi’s practical knowledge and understanding of the Force. Jocasta thought of Dooku, of his determination and strength. She thought of her own master beside her, his willingness to admit to failure and his steadfast commitment to the Jedi path. She thought of Sifo-Dyas, his evolving dueling skills and the growing weight that had seemed to settle on his shoulders as his place in the galaxy grew clearer.

               The kyber crystal, large and silent and constant, began to glow. Sing was the only word for it, the way it sprung to life, notes that harmonized with the dancing threads of the Force. It reached out into the future, a ponderous yet firm melody.

               It was a promise, Jocasta realized. A commitment made by and to her weapon. We will not fail again. Where you go, I will go also.

               When Jocasta came back to herself, Master Cerulian was pressing a cup of warm, spicy tea into her hands. She accepted gratefully, drinking deep and letting the warmth and spice and slight bitter nutrients restore her.

               “Well done, Padawan,” Master Cerulian said quietly. “Now inspect your work.”

               Jocasta opened her eyes and did so. The parts fit together correctly, the kyber crystal nestled safely in its chamber. She checked and doublechecked the components, the various diagrams of thousands of years of Jedi suddenly recalled. All was as it should be.

               It fit in her hands like it belonged. With a deep breath, she pressed the activation button.

               A brilliant blue blade sprang to life, a beacon against the red landscape. She was surprised for a moment, the color—her color—having changed. But of course it had. Her needs had changed, her purpose. This was a weapon of a Jedi—a weapon of defense and protection.

***

               The Archives still felt like home. Jocasta had not been sure that they would—she had experienced adventure, peril, life in an uncaring galaxy for the first time. How could home feel the same? But it did, and this was a comfort. She felt a new appreciation for the ways the Jedi Order had changed and the ways it had remained the same. The galaxy was fundamentally an uncaring place—this was a fact. This only made the Jedi’s role in the galaxy all the more crucial—it was their job to care. When there were only bad options, it was the Jedi’s job to find another path, or failing that, to do the best they could.

               The best Jocasta could do was what she had always done—synthesize the lessons of the Old Republic, keep and organize and convert records into knowledge and practice.

               Ayja had been to visit her twice outside of their recurring study sessions. The first time had been as Jocasta expected: awkward and fumbling and full of questions unasked and unanswered. Ayja had been so beautiful in that moment, Jocasta wished she could capture her in the Archive records. Gone had been her usual swagger and confidence—in its place was just this quiet need to be close. Comfort in existence, vulnerability that did not need poking or prodding but to simply be seen. And it had been.

               The second meeting had been an invitation to a play—a Neimoidian classic performed for the first time by the High Coruscant Players. Jocasta had accepted without a second thought—had in fact accepted before Ayja had finished asking the question, cutting through the uncharacteristic nervousness that colored it.

               So Jocasta found herself pulling out the nice robes—layered but breathable, gold embroidery over cream-colored cloth. Her hair had grown out some—not nearly Dooku’s length, but enough to tickle her neck, enough for her to at least attempt to pin it in place, piling the short strands on top of her head in the way she’d seen those with longer hair do.

               It was, of course, right when she had decided everything was settled that Master Cerulian entered her room, trays of food and drink balanced on either arm.

               True to his word, Master Thame Cerulian had made a concentrated effort to involve himself more in his padawan’s life. He had taken to checking on Jocasta either in her room or at the Archives—reminding her to take a break, or at least to remember to eat something regardless of how far along she was in a project or classwork. He still did not speak much, and responded to most of Jocasta’s well-meaning but aggressively curious questions with dismissive gestures or an admonishing request that she “ask better questions,” but the camaraderie she had felt on their few missions together was now close to a new constant in her life.

               “Ah,” he said, catching sight of her finally once he’d set down his trays on the desk for once not covered in various datapads and notes. “You are going out.”

               “Yes,” Jocasta bravely resisted the urge to apologize. “Master Leem’s padawan invited me to a play.”

               “Good. You spend too much time buried in words.” Master Cerulian settled into a chair and began slurping away at the soup he had brought, pausing to unfurl his napkin or dip a piece of bread into the broth.

               “Do I,” Jocasta hesitated, fingers tapping, nervously hovering. “Do I look okay?”

               “Mmm,” Master Cerulian managed to look both exhausted by the question and genuinely considerate. “Let me see.”

               Master Cerulian rose from his seat, then circled around Jocasta, inspecting her, pulling as the various loose fabrics. At one point, he adjusted her collar, then changed his mind. Finally, he redid her hair, fingers pinning strands with a precision and speed that, like most things Master Cerulian did, seemed kept over from another life.

               “Always sinch below the ribs,” he instructed, finally sitting back down. “But yes, you look fine.”

               “Thank you,” Jocasta felt tears pricking her eyes suddenly, the nervousness of the situation finally washing over her. “I don’t know…it’s outside the Temple.”

               “Oh the uncertainty of youth,” Master Cerulian waved his hand dismissively. “Bah, I sound like that blasted droid. Go, have your fun. I’ll store the food for later.”

               With one last glance behind her, Jocasta made her way out the door and towards the agreed meeting spot.

               Ayja was waiting for her, and Jocasta thought she caught a brief flash of nerves beneath the cool exterior but it was gone before she knew to look.

               “You clean up nice,” Ayja said, cringing halfway through her own words. “I mean. I like your hair.”

               “Thank you,” Jocasta bowed her head. “I like your…robes.”

               Ayja had kept her leather tabards and dark brown tunic, but had traded out her undertunic for something more…revealing was not the correct word. Jocasta knew revealing was not the correct word, but the correct word escaped her at the sight of Ayja’s biceps and the curve of her collarbone and the nervousness returned as quickly as it had vanished.

               “Where are we going?”

***

               Jocasta liked the play—or at least she thought she did. She had not seen many plays, but the novelty was a boon all its own; the action was well-structured and the emotions true. Ayja had suggested trying to get in line to the backstage area, to meet with the actors and directors, but Jocasta had declined as she realized once again just how many people were in this space. She was grateful to be out under the sky again, even if the air was less than fresh and no stars could pierce the veil of Coruscant’s lower—but still entirely respectable—levels.

               Instead, they walked, fingers hovering above hands and occasionally brushing gently. Ayja paid far too much for some type of food in a cone sold by a Toydarian vendor who tried three times to give her proper change but eventually agreed to accept the credits with a nod of thanks. Jocasta took in the sights and sounds of a Coruscant she had never seen before, full of noise and dirt and life.

               Far too soon, they were outside the Temple once more, only the steps hiding the watchful gaze of the Temple Guards and even then only poorly.

               “That was…” Jocasta paused, blue eyes slightly lost in Ayja’s golden ones. “Magical, I suppose. Do people say that? It was good. I had a good time.”

               “Me too,” Ayja said, and the mischievous twinkle in her eye was not there in this light—only the truth, uncloaked and bare. “Spending time with you is…”

               “Is…?”

               “Always worth the cost,” Ayja offered, mischievous expression back in place as she popped the last bit of street food in her mouth. “Come on, I can at least walk you to your door.”

               “You really do not have to do that,” Jocasta protested. “Yours is practically on the other side of the Temple.”

               “Like I said,” Ayja smiled, offering Jocasta her arm. “You are worth it.”

               There was a moment, Jocasta at her door, Ayja beside her, where the galaxy shifted. A moment of swirling Force where it would have been so easy to do…Jocasta did not know what. Something. Something different and unexpected and decisive. But this whole night had already been so different and unexpected and Jocasta was tired and so she felt the moment pass her by.

               She doubted Ayja had noticed this swirling Force, would have bet money on it if betting or money were things Jocasta did or had.

               “Sleep well,” Ayja told her, and that Aurean accent was still so fresh to her ears every time. Then she grabbed Jocasta’s hand in her own and gently pressed her lips to Jocasta’s knuckles.

               Maybe she had noticed. But the moment ended and Jocasta was left at her door and that was that. In her room, a cold supper awaited her.

               It was the best meal she had eaten in months.

***

               Sifo-Dyas was back at the Temple this time, a break from what seemed like nearly constant missions that Sifo was not supposed to talk about. Jocasta had booked a meeting for him—a tutoring session according to the Archives’ scheduling system. Jocasta had felt a little thrill, making that appointment with the knowledge that no tutoring would be taking place. She missed her friend—that was worth a little dishonesty now and again.

               He looked tired, but solid. Whereas puberty had turned Dooku into tall limbs he did not yet know how to manage and Jocasta into a version of herself with breasts and hips that felt at odds with nearly two decades of being the smallest human in any given room, Sifo-Dyas was just more himself. A functional body for a functional human, muscles that he did not care to show but that his robes could not hide, and a face that still held the excited grin of childhood. Less so now, but they were all a bit less from time to time.

               “I caught Doo just as he headed off with Master Tyvokka,” Sifo smiled as he said it, sinking into his chair and leaning forward at the same time, relaxed and anxious. His constant state. “His turn to chaperone a Gathering. I think he likes it.”

               “Of course he does,” Jocasta mirrored Sifo’s smile. “You almost have his hair now. Or he almost has yours.”

               “I keep thinking I should cut it,” Sifo ran a hand through his hair in a rare display of self-consciousness. It was past his shoulders now, slightly tangled but with no sign of stopping. “It gets so tangled in my nightmares, I—”

               Sifo stopped, eyes wide. Like he had said the one thing he was not supposed to say. Jocasta wanted to ask him what that was. Was his hair a presence in his nightmares? Or did he sweat so much from the fear that the tangles were practically his hair on their own?

               “Master Kostana,” she said instead. “You like her?”

               “Oh yes,” and Jocasta could feel the gratefulness pouring off of Sifo-Dyas for this conversational pivot. “She’s wonderful. A  little standoffish at times, but Force, Jo. The things we have seen!”

               Sifo-Dyas gleefully regaled her with stories of far-off worlds, of rumor-chasing and meditation and lifeforms Jocasta had not even dreamt of. It all sounded so...familiar. Except instead of archeology, Sifo’s journeys were about the Force. Nexus points, dyads, those rumored bits of Jedi mysticism writ large in the modern age. She wondered if Master Cerulian had been like that in his younger years—had Thame Cerulian, Jedi Knight roamed through the galaxy with only the Force itself to guide him? Had he landed on a world, solved a problem, then flew off back to the stars, that planet’s only experience with Jedi for generations?

               For her part, Jocasta told Sifo-Dyas about her work at the Archives and the play she had seen with Ayja and there must have been something in her voice or her eyes because—

               “You and Ayja seem to be getting along,” with a knowing smile that Jocasta did not understand—she did not understand it. “Cultural differences sorted, then?”

               “It is not like that,” Jocasta grasped for words it was like. “It is like you and Dooku. Or me and Dooku. Or you and me.”

               “That is not the explanation you think it is,” Sifo grinned. “But as long as things are going well.”

               “They are,” Jocasta sniffed, and then in a transparent attempt to change the topic, said. “Oh! I have a new lightsaber!”

               “Give it,” Sifo stood up as Jocasta did so, clearing himself enough space for what followed. “Do you mind if I…?”

               “Not at all.”

               Sifo-Dyas ignited the lightsaber, then let go, letting it float there as he examined it. The fire in his eyes was everything Jocasta had missed. She could see him taking mental notes, practically sketching a diagram in his mind. Finally, he grabbed hold, disengaged the blade, and handed it back.

               “What do you think,” Jocasta asked, unable to stop the little flurry of self-consciousness that surfaced. “It was sort of an impromptu project.”

               “It is blue,” he said simply. Paused with those knowing eyes again, then continued. “It is very you. I always thought you did better with a ridged grip in training anyways.”

               “You shall have to spar me and find out,” Jocasta laughed, then pulled Sifo-Dyas into a hug. “I have missed you.”

               They stayed like that for a moment, the comfort of being known more than either could bear alone. If eyes left wet stains on shoulders, well. They were just laughing on the wrong sides of their faces. All Jedi did at one point or another.