Chapter Text
“Anakin! Anakin! Stop it, please!”
My pleas fell on deaf ears. The blue blade of Anakin's lightsaber swung through the air, and I watched in horror while it sliced easily through the bodies of my friends. I tried to run to help them, to bring out my own saber, but I couldn't move. My legs felt like poles, rooted to the ground and impossible to make work. Meanwhile, I watched while Anakin waved his lightsaber through the body of my friend, Bazi Maa, and he fell to the ground with a gut-wrenching scream that seemed to shake my very core. In front of me stood the last remaining member of my former clan, Votren. My best friend, who turned to face me with a look on her face as if pleading for help. I furiously willed my arms to move, to grip my lightsaber hilt and rush to her defense, but still my body would not respond. As if I stood in a thick substance too viscous to move through, my limbs remained glued in place.
The blue fire of Anakin's saber blade struck through Votren's chest, and she stiffened, her mouth opening in a silent wail of terror, before she, too, fell to the ground. Now I faced Anakin, only I hardly recognized him anymore. His face was shrouded in shadow, half concealed by the hood of his Jedi robes. But when I looked up into his eyes, which gleamed in the dim light of the Temple, I knew he no longer carried the values, or the title, of a Jedi. His eyes were a vibrant yellow, and beneath them, tear stains streamed down his face. “Anakin, please, no!” I begged, but I couldn't be sure he had even heard me speak at all. He lifted his lightsaber high into the air, then brought it down with frightening speed, and then…
My eyes flew open, breath coming in a ragged gasp as I finally dragged myself from the clutches of a nightmare. I looked around my surroundings, trying to ground myself in reality. Slowly, my eyes adjusted to the sparse lighting of the environment, and I began to silently name familiar things in my head. The kitchenette across from me, and beyond the wooden pillar in the centre of the small space were the two entrances of the place I called home. Both were covered with overhanging roots and lichen tendrils, offering a sense of security. Although limited, given anything could simply push the lichen aside at any given time, but I tried not to think about that part too much. I sat up, my mind still fuzzy from my sudden awakening. I pushed myself off my cot, made from a single, tattered mattress and reinforced with soft, mossy padding underneath, and headed for one of the entrances. I remembered to keep my head low so as not to impact the ceiling above, and ducked out of the right-side entrance. I pushed my way through the lichen screen, then turned and clambered my way up the thick, gnarly looking roots which adorned the frame of my home. I reached the top of the roots and sat against the tree trunk. Beneath the roots of a massive tree in the swamp was where I had built my home, with thickly packed mud being the basis for much of the structure. Stones and rocks reinforced the walls and the winding roots of the tree helped maintain the roof. It was a small place, yet it exuded comfort for me.
I looked up as the first few rays of dawn light just managed to peek through the dense canopy of leaves and branches above me. As usual, heavy fog hovered mere inches off the ground, drifting aimlessly over the dry ground and the dark waters that surrounded the little plot of land on all sides but one. My mind drifted back to my dream as I stared into the fading darkness of the swampy forest. I shuddered as I remembered the events of the nightmare. Then it struck me how unusual it was. I hadn't had dreams of that nature since long ago, when I first arrived on the planet I now called home. For over a year after arriving on the swampy surface of Dagobah, my nights had been plagued with similar terrors as the one I'd just experienced. It had taken a lot of time and reassurances from my hutmate to finally escape the haunting memories of my past. Now, just under eight years after the dreams had faded away, it was back, and just as horrific as I remembered. I shifted position on the root, staring up at the sky. It was dawn, but already it was as bright as it would ever get during the day. Dagobah's swampy atmosphere and tangled canopy never allowed much daylight through to the ground level, so I was used to the dim habitat.
Movement coming from inside the hut drew my attention. I pushed myself off my perch on the root and ducked back inside the hut, to see my hutmate was awake and already busying himself in the kitchenette. A pot hung on a few bars of metal situated atop the fireplace, and a small, steady little flame was heating the contents. Beside it on the stone counter were two cups. I smiled slightly as I watched him. My hutmate was the only person who had kept me sane over the past ten years. Barely reaching a height up to my own knees, with pointed ears that could hear nearly anything and everything, and sporting one of many of the same Jedi robes he'd brought on our journey, my old Master was still as calm and collected as ever. “Master Yoda, you're awake,” I greeted him, bringing his attention onto me. His expression softened when he spotted me. “Ahh, there you are,” he hummed in response. “Reversed, our roles have been, Corde. Now, awake with the dawn, you always are.” I smiled, remembering distant times in the past, in the Jedi Temple on Coruscant, when my Master had always been awake long before me. I nodded, seating myself nearby and crossing my legs. “Yes, although this time… I didn't wake up willingly.” I looked up to gauge his reaction, and his hazel eyes narrowed slightly, head tilting at me. “Alright, are you?” He asked me softly.
I dropped my gaze to the floor, running my finger along one of the cracks in the mud. “I had one of those nightmares again,” I admitted. “Like the ones I used to have when we first arrived here.” Yoda's eyes flitted to the ground briefly, then back up at me, taking on a gentle expression. “Hmm, see the Temple again, did you?” I nodded, remembering the horrors of my dream. “Yes, and I saw Anakin again, only… He looked different. It was still Anakin, but… He'd changed… I barely recognized him anymore.” Yoda looked away from me as the contents of the pot above the fire began to boil, and he removed the pot from its hooks to pour the water inside into the two cups. “Lost to us, Skywalker was, a long time ago,” Yoda murmured in a soft tone. I sighed. “What does it mean, Master? Me seeing that dream again, I mean. It was so sudden, I thought I had finally escaped those night terrors for good.” Yoda picked up one of the cups on the counter and turned, handing it to me. I took it, peering inside to see the water had turned dark, and a soothing scent of herbs wafted from the hot liquid. “Sometimes, mean nothing, dreams do,” Yoda answered me, and I looked back up at him. “Worry about it, you should not.” I nodded slowly. “Right… I guess you're right. It just felt so… Real. I know how cliché that sounds, though.” Yoda only hummed in response, and I closed my eyes, trying to push away the memories of the dream. I shifted position, carefully standing and ducked back outside, and I heard the soft tap of Yoda's gimer stick on the floor behind me, indicating he was following me.
Apart from my dream, this was routine for us. Wake up, drink herb tea and eat similarly made stews and soups, and occasionally go out to look for more herbs, spices, and other various plants Yoda and I would use on the daily. Other than that, I spent time either watching one of the same ten holo-films on the only working holo-tablet we had, or reading the old texts that had been copied to the tablet's files. Although the device was powered by one of the old panels from our escape pod, we had decided it wasn't safe to access anything on the Holo-net, for fear of the signal being traceable. Over the past ten years, I had watched each holo-film five plus times each, and read through every word of the old Jedi training texts I had been given a long time ago. Remembering the texts reminded me of what it was like before. Before the Empire had taken over the galaxy, before the Jedi Order was destroyed, and even before the Clone War had started. As easily as if I had been there yesterday, I could still see the Jedi Temple walls, and the room I had shared with my Master so many years prior. After our clone troops had all turned on us, wiping out the majority of the Jedi Order in a single ten-minute span, Yoda and I had gone back to Coruscant, in hopes of finishing off the evil Emperor, who turned out to be the Dark Lord of the Sith. When that plan failed, Yoda chose to go into exile, and I insisted on coming along. Now, so many long years later, those memories seemed distant, a haze of the past buried deep in my mind and yet, even now, I couldn't escape it. Such horror, however brief, had been engraved into my very core, a haunting reminder of what was lost to us. Our friends, the family we forged along the way, gone.
All except for one, I reflected as I glanced down to see my former mentor with one hand in the air, tracing the path of an insect which darted in front of his vision. I slowly eased myself to the ground, sipping my tea. “Do you ever wonder if things could have gone differently?” I asked suddenly, drawing his attention onto me once more. Yoda turned, fixing me with the same, gentle expression I had grown so used to. “Corde, change the past, we cannot,” he reminded me, but I shook my head. “I know that,” I replied dismissively. “But I mean, don't you ever think about it and wonder, if somehow things had played out differently, where we'd be now?” Yoda took a deep breath, dropping his eyes off me again. “Plagued by the past as you have been… I am,” he admitted, shaking his head. “Mistakes made, yes, by us all. If change them I could, perhaps very different, our reality would be.” He lifted his head to meet my gaze steadily. “But undo what has been done, a skill no one has learned. Regret, lead us to a dark place it will, yes. Carry on, we must, and learn from our mistakes.” Everything he said made complete sense, as it always did, and I nodded in understanding. Still, a part of me knew I wouldn't ever be able to fully let go of the past. But it was ten years ago, and a lot had changed in ten years. Including myself. I knew I couldn't continue fretting about that which I could not change. I gulped down the rest of my tea, glancing apologetically at Yoda.
“Forgive me, Master,” I sighed. “I guess I'm not as good at hiding my thoughts and emotions as I used to be.” Yoda tilted his head at me, offering a comforting smile. “Apologize not, Corde. Troubling, the past can be. Learn to move on, difficult at first, hmm?” I shrugged, shifting position. “Yes but it's been ten years. You seem to have accepted what happened to us a long time ago.” He seemed surprised as I said this, and I noticed his ears turn up slightly, giving the look of a startled animal. “Believe this, do you?” He asked, and I nodded. “Of course. I haven't seen you get any nightmares or dwell on the past as much as I have.” Yoda looked away. “Hmm, deceiving looks can be,” he responded, and I suddenly got the feeling that he was hiding something. Before I had a chance to ask, however, a noise from nearby drew my attention sharply off of my Master. I shifted, trying to see the source of the noise, but at first I saw nothing. That was until the thick foliage by the water rustled, clearly disturbed by a passing creature. I narrowed my eyes, watching as finally, the creature causing the sounds emerged. I drew in a breath as I recognized the slender head and short front limbs of a dragonsnake. The thing was too big to remain hidden by the brush and foliage lining the swampy ponds. Yet still, I easily recognized that it wasn’t nearly the same size as the ones I’d seen before. Although bigger than myself, the reptile seemed small in comparison to its many kin lurking about the swamps. Perhaps it wasn't fully grown, I thought. That thought offered little comfort as it turned its head to stare at us, tongue flicking out of its mouth, tasting the air. I instinctively began to edge towards the hut, silently cursing myself for not keeping my lightsaber on me at all times. Yoda, on the other hand, seemed unafraid despite the water-dwelling reptile approaching us, and he didn't make any moves to flee or to fight.
“Hmm, back again, are you?” He asked, and I glanced sharply at him. “Master, what are you-” he didn't let me finish. “Seen this creature before, I have,” he told me softly, not taking his eyes off the reptile as it paused in front of us. It still towered over me despite being young. “Unlike her hostile kin, she is.” I stared at him in mild shock, before glancing back up at the dragonsnake. It tilted its head, emitting a soft, unthreatening hiss. Yoda smiled up at it. “Bright eyes and a curious spirit, have you,” he told the reptile in a soft tone. “A fearsome beast, one day you will be.” The creature simply gave a deep, purring like noise in response before it turned away, slowly dragging itself back down into the swamp waters. I stared at Yoda, mouth agape, as he turned back to me. Amusement sparkled in his eyes when he saw my expression. “Think not with your lightsaber, Corde. With your heart, hmm?” I blinked, nodding slowly. “Right,” I drawled, glancing back as the dragonsnake's tail flopped into the water, out of sight. I couldn't quite grasp what had just happened. Just another day on Dagobah, I thought.
-
It was two days later that I was out collecting more rootleaf, as per Yoda's request. Despite his certainty that I would grow to enjoy the peculiar food he enjoyed, I still hadn't quite developed a taste for his infamous rootleaf stews. Granted, most of the stuff that was available on Dagobah wasn't exactly the tastiest, but most of it beat starving, so I'd learned to make do. Along the way to collect the rootleaf, however, I did stray a bit to fetch some yarum and a few marsh fungi. Not only were the seeds of yarum great as a variety of the tea we drank, but they were a relatively tasty snack as well. The marsh fungi were another thing I had grown to like over the past ten years, simply because they created a sweet-tasting yoghurt when ground into paste. What to most normal individuals would seem a poor lifestyle and even poorer diet, to us was normal, part of the routine we'd developed over the ten year span we'd spent here.
I began making my way home with a satchel of the fresh supplies slung around my arm. As I walked carefully through the thick, swampy forest, I thought again of the nightmares. It was as if I hadn't spent the first two years on this planet trying to get rid of these nightmares, because they'd returned as regular occurrences again. The past three nights, my sleep had been interrupted by the vivid visions of destruction and death I'd worked hard to forget about. It didn't make any sense. I wondered if perhaps the Force was trying to tell me something, but then I thought how unlikely it was. I wasn't even sure I could access the Force anymore. There had been no need while on Dagobah, and as the years passed, I began to wonder if I could somehow lose my Force abilities through years of disuse. Then again, Yoda had seemed as connected as ever to the Force, and I realized I could still feel our connection when I looked for it. The bond that had been formed, twenty-three years prior when I'd undergone my Padawan ceremony, still remained strong despite everything that happened. The Dark Side, the Sith, had tried their hardest to rip the Jedi apart, and still my connection to Yoda remained. It gave me a spark of satisfaction to know that not even the Dark Lord of the Sith could break us apart. I was still thinking about it as I returned to the little circle of land that our hut sat on.
I became aware of a high-pitched, rhythmic beeping coming from somewhere as I neared the hut, and when I ducked inside, I spotted Yoda standing by the little storage space we'd created within the hut. A small space carved into the mud walls and kept secure by winding roots, most of our old belongings and devices were stored there. Yoda had retrieved a small metal box from the space, where the beeping was coming from. He glanced up at me as I entered the hut, and I placed my satchel down to approach. “What is it?” I asked as Yoda opened the box. Inside were two things. One was my old Padawan braid, tucked neatly in the corner of the box, and beside it was the small, circular communication device we had put away. We had kept it when we arrived in case there was any need for communication between us and the few people in the galaxy we knew we could trust. Still, I hadn't actually expected to ever use it, but here it was, beeping incessantly with an incoming transmission. Yoda glanced up at me as he retrieved it, and I looked back, meeting his gaze. “It seems, radio silence has been broken,” he said thoughtfully, and I nodded, swallowing. I wasn't sure what to expect when Yoda placed the device on the counter and accepted the transmission. What popped up were the holographic images of none other than Senator Organa and his wife. I sucked in a breath, a million thoughts and emotions running through my mind at once. I hadn't seen the Senator in ten years, the last time being when we had escorted him home to Alderaan after the destruction of the Jedi and the birth of Anakin and Padmé's two children. The Senator had agreed to take care of the baby girl after he, Yoda, and Obi-Wan Kenobi agreed to separate the children in hopes of raising them safely, hidden from the Empire's watchful eyes.
Now, Senator Organa looked afraid, as did his wife, as they stared at us through the hologram of the transmission. I noticed even Yoda seemed surprised and concerned to see them. “A surprise, this is, Senator,” he greeted. “Forgive me, Master Yoda,” Senator Organa began, and I got the feeling he was fighting to keep his voice steady. “I know we were meant to maintain radio silence, but this… This is an emergency. We need your and Corde's help.” His eyes flitted to look at me through the transmission. “What is it?” I asked, tilting my head. “It's about Leia,” the Senator told us, his voice quavering. I glanced at Yoda, whose eyes were narrowed at the transmission. “The Princess,” he hummed. “Alright, is she?” Senator Organa took a deep breath, glancing down before looking back up at us with a pleading expression on his face. “I don't know,” he answered shakily, and I watched his wife place a comforting hand on his shoulder. “I don't know,” he repeated. “Because she's been taken.”