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Dark. Everything was dark. It wasn't simply the absence of light; it was an all-consuming hole, misery and fear and distrust all wrapped up in the dark and she was scared.
How old was she? She didn't know. Old enough to wonder how old she was. Old enough to feel scared and alone and to fear the quiet nothing all around her. Where were the others? The bigger ones, the ones who felt safe?
Suddenly, light. A brilliant blue light cut through the darkness, a line of hope against the shapeless nothing. It hummed strangely, a song half remembered. From the light, a hand reached out.
The girl grabbed the hand and felt her heart lift with her body as she was pulled into the light...
Sar Labooda awoke not with a jerk, but with a sigh. Quiet, discomforted yet content. Alive, for everything that entailed. Over thirty standard years was too old for nightmares, she thought. Yet the nightmares persisted.
Jedi walked a narrow path, galactically speaking. Becoming a Jedi meant forsaking all other worldly possessions and allegiances—their loyalty was to the Force first, the Republic second. Yet the galaxy was large, and as diverse as the Jedi Order was, homeworlds and cultures inevitably found themselves represented by individuals who had never known them.
Chalacta was in the news again. Not for anything they had done—Chalacta was barely a footnote in current galactic affairs—but because the Trade Federation's embargo on Naboo had spooked every Mid Rim planet with half an import/export license to its name. They were preaching a line of strict neutrality, and wanted to ensure their representatives on Coruscant did the same.
Sar Labooda was not Chalactan. She was from Chalacta—her fathers had called the world home and her birth certificate was undoubtedly filed at one of the numerous bureaucratic buildings that dotted its major cities—but that place and its culture had never meant anything to her. Her home was Coruscant. She was a Jedi. What else was there to know?
Dressing was a ritual. Take the robes from their hanger. Undertunic first, soft light tones like the Temple stones. Trousers and belt next, darker brown, the color of earth and ground and potential for growth. Overtunic, lighter than the trousers but darker than her skin, light gold stitching that embroidered the Code into the folds. The outer robe wraps around her like a cloak, a memory of fine coats worn by men who are less than a memory to the Jedi named Sar Labooda. Stop. Breathe in and out. Feel the Force flowing around and with and through. The journey to victory began and ended in the mind. Know what you must do, then do it. Her master, Coleman Trebor, had given such advice numerous times over the course of her tutelage.
It was, Sar knew, the type of advice designed to focus rather than soothe. It was the type of advice she had needed at the time.
Which was why she now found herself, barely a day back at the Temple, seeking out that same giver of advice.
Jedi Master Coleman Trebor was something of an enigma. He was not among the oldest in the Order, though he was indeed old and wise. It seemed that every time a seat on the Jedi High Council opened up, the name Coleman Trebor was mentioned, considered, and ultimately rejected. More than once as his padawan, Sar had expressed frustration for her master, and more than once he had said in the same slow, serious voice he said everything, that he was “just too much of a maverick.” Sar had yet to decide whether or not he was joking.
She found him, as expected, by the fountains. Although Vurk were not an aquatic species as far as anyone knew, Master Trebor had always found the waters soothing. Sar did as well, though whether she had arrived at that decision independently or just become used to its presence alongside her master was a mystery for shrewder minds.
“How,” Master Trebor breathed deeply as he spoke, his voice acknowledgement enough for Sar to settle down beside him. “Was your…dare I say, pilgrimage?”
“Diplomatic event,” Sar corrected, pulling off her boots and rolling up her pantlegs, needing to feel the cool ground beneath her feet after so long away. “I wouldn’t know a pilgrimage. That’s Depa’s territory.”
“Mmm. You wish,” and Master Trebor had felt that spark of annoyance in her tone, that immature sullen clip, Sar knew it. He went on anyway. “To speak about it? Or are you simply here to visit an old friend? Or something completely different?”
“I thought I would feel something this time,” Sar admitted as she dangled a foot over the edge of the pool, straddling the fountain rim. “The ceremony at its height, the air filled with incense, the All-Jewel shining bright. Nothing. I don’t even believe in the stupid thing but to feel nothing…”
Master Trebor said nothing. He breathed in and out in that heavy way he always did, the kind of breath that as a child Sar believed could shake the walls.
“What if,” Sar hesitated, knowing what she was about to say was ridiculous but unable to stem the flow. “What if they’re right: our souls flow up from the All-Jewel and find the bodies crafted for us. What if I’m just part of a soul, and I couldn’t feel anything because the part of me that’s connected to all that just…isn’t there?”
“Chalacta,” Master Trebor put a rough hand on Sar’s shoulder, the closest thing to a comforting squeeze. “Has its ways of seeing the galaxy. To us, the Force. To them, the Enlightenment. Do you seek the Enlightenment? Hmm?”
“No,” Sar almost scoffed. “No, I just. I should, shouldn’t I? It’s my culture, they don’t have many Force—many Adepts—on Chalacta. Isn’t it my duty to carry that on?” Like Depa, she almost added.
“If you train a padawan,” and the if was not lost on Sar, this reminder of choice in a galaxy in motion. “Would you train them to know of the All-Jewel?”
“I—,” Sar paused. Would she? Could she, when she didn’t even feel connected to it? The Chalactan Adepts had talked about their culture as a shared experience, but did that apply when you had never known it, never felt ‘shared’ in return? “Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because…because it is my past,” Sar struggled out. “Sort of.”
Sar had been barely three years old when she was brought to the Temple. She knew, logically, that the memories of her life before that were at best imprints, and likely just cobbled together dreams of something that never existed. But it was Chalacta to her. The way Aba’s cooking would fit the whole galaxy into a single bite of food. How he and Papa danced laktesh without music or care, just for the joy of living. How there was nothing left of them but the names Sar and Depa carried: Labooda and Billaba.
LOVING FATHERS, their memorial plaque had read. THEIR MEMORIES LIVE ON.
“It’s about honoring the past, I guess,” Sar decided. “Even if it’s just in a recipe or a story about why stars seem to sing.”
“Do you remember,” Master Trebor turned back to watching the water fall from the fountains. “What I said the day you were knighted?”
“No,” Sar splashed her face with water, embarrassed. “Sorry.”
“Vurk memories,” he hummed, and Sar wondered if her answer had changed his response. “Are long. I have known Jedi here whose memories are so fleeting. As if the past has no need of them. Yet all are connected. Through companionship. Through the Force. Change, yet constancy. Death, yet renewal.”
He paused a moment, and it was Sar’s turn to wait. Quiet. Attentive. Around them, the water rushed and the leaves fell and the light shined. Like she was fifteen, not thirty; like they were still master and padawan and time moved slow or not at all.
“Your sister,” Master Trebor’s eyes met hers. “Remembers Chalacta. You do not. Your path and hers are separate. Sar Labooda and Depa Billaba are two people—two souls, as the Chalactans say, yes? Hmm, yes—what one does, should not concern the other.”
“It doesn’t,” and Sar stopped again, already feeling silly and small for the words she was about to say but saying them anyway. “It doesn’t make me wrong? That I can’t feel what she can?”
There was so much wrapped up in that question. Sar felt it as she said it, could feel the resentment, the way she’d never meant to but always did compare herself to Depa and found Sar Labooda wanting. The Marks of Illumination, the master without a padawan, the Council position—all ways Depa’s understanding and skill with the Force outstripped Sar’s. Or her hair, always in those perfect Chalactan braids that Sar could never manage, her skin that Sar literally paled in comparison to, the way she brewed tea and stayed centered when the galaxy was falling apart.
Yet it was also the way Depa always knew what to say to calm Sar down, how despite different clans and ages and masters, Depa had always been the first person Sar went to whether she succeeded or failed. The time Depa had shown her the only family picture they had—one where Aba and Papa smiled warmly outward, babies Sar and Depa cradled and safe—or the way Sar would annoy her with a half-remembered lullaby but Depa would never ask her to stop. Was that just how it was when you were the only two people who knew what the other dreamt about and the exact moment those dreams turned to nightmares and hopes to memories?
“Wrong,” Master Trebor tilted his head. “Wrong? Wrong is a judgement. Do you judge yourself “wrong,” Sar Labooda, for what you cannot change? If so, your master must have neglected a crucial lesson in your training.”
“No,” Sar said reflexively. Stopped. Considered. “No, I don’t. I just…feel sometimes. Feel like I’m not the Jedi I should be.”
“The Jedi you should be,” Master Trebor repeated. “The Jedi you should be, Sar Labooda, is exactly the Jedi you are. One maverick to another? Being yourself is much more rewarding than being somebody else.”
There were so many questions Sar wanted to ask at that—so many words left unsaid and lessons she thought she’d learned that suddenly came undone in her head, then just as suddenly reassembled themselves. A Jedi was never finished learning. That was life, after all.
“Wem Yar-Dho,” she said finally.
“The Sakiyan youngling,” Master Trebor breathed in, seeming to consider this. “Hyper. Too much brain for a body still growing. But insightful, if given the time. A challenging first pupil.”
“The Force does not give us challenges,” Sar smiled, slipping only half-willingly into an impersonation of her master. “Merely opportunities for growth.”
“Hmph,” Master Trebor made a show of shaking his head, but there was a smile in his eyes. “You were a great opportunity for growth yourself.”
They sat there, thinking and breathing, the sounds of nature and far-off bustle of Temple life filling the air.
“When the time comes,” Master Trebor said at last, looking straight at Sar in the way he used to—the gaze that made him seem taller than a mountain and just as sturdy. “Wem Yar-Dho would be lucky to have the wisdom of Sar Labooda as a guide, I think.”
“I see,” Sar said with a nod, and she did. As always, her master had given her just what she needed. She stood, purposeful and centered once more. “Thank you, master. I think…I think I will go speak to Depa now. I haven’t seen her since I got back.”
“A good idea,” Master Trebor spoke the words slowly, almost breathing in as he said them. “I shall stay here.”
Sar bowed and left her master behind smiling and peaceful at the fountain. Boots in hand, she walked quickly through the Temple halls, passing busy younglings and busier padawans. Without thinking about it, she skipped through the hallway towards Depa’s room, bare feet slapping the tile, an echo of another time and a younger Sar.
She nearly barreled into Depa as she reached the door, her sister about to exit as Sar reached the open doorway.
“Sar,” Depa said in what Sar hoped was surprise rather than annoyance. “Careful.”
“Careful,” Sar echoed as she caught herself from teetering, her forehead lightly bumping Depa’s face in a mix of greeting and not falling over as Depa’s hands went instinctively to catch her. “Do you have time?”
“For you? Always,” Depa smiled. “Come in.”
Sar did so, dropping her boots at the doorway and settling into her usual cushion at one end of the room. Depa was already pouring her tea, offering a mug and grabbing one for herself. Sar drank deeply, savoring the warm spicy liquid that, more than anything she had experienced during her visit to Chalacta, felt like home.
“So,” Depa began as she too settled onto the floor, knees touching Sar’s feet as she did so. “Your pilgrimage: how was it?”
“Your descriptions didn’t do it justice,” Sar began steeling herself for the conversation to follow. “Chalacta is…beautiful.”
“I wish I could have gone with you,” Depa smiled, a wistful tone in her voice. “To see the All-Jewel for the first time, to feel that first touch of everything…it must have been wonderful.”
“I didn’t,” Sar said sharply, then stopped. Head bowed because she couldn’t possibly meet her sister’s eyes in this moment. “I saw it, and it was so…and the Adepts, their words were wonderful and I will carry them with me. There’s a lot to think about. But I didn’t…I didn’t feel anything. It was just a temple. Just a temple and a tree and a jewel and a culture and it. It meant nothing, I felt nothing. I’m sorry.”
“Oh,” Depa said softly. “Oh, Sar, I…”
Sar was crying now, the fluids of grief and shame running freely down her face as she struggled to keep her breathing even. She barely registered Depa’s arms wrapping around her, and for a moment just let herself be held by those arms, hands stroking her head the way they used to as children when the galaxy felt too large and their bodies too small for the emotions that rocked them.
“I did not mean,” Depa said at last as Sar finally sat up, wiping her face and drying her eyes on her sleeve. “The experience is a personal one. Chalactan Adepts train for many years to attune to the All-Jewel, the Enlightenment. Perhaps you just need to—”
“I don’t need—it’s not my home,” Sar almost yelled, the grief turning to frustration. This would be the one thing Depa couldn’t understand. “I already have the Force. I don’t care if Chalacta doesn’t want me. If you don’t—”
“Stop,” Depa commanded, and Sar felt her voice leave her. She’d only heard that tone from Depa in her dreams, in those half-memories of a scared little girl and her protector alone in the dark. “I was wrong. I should not have said that. You are right, little sister. You are Sar Labooda, Jedi Knight. You walk your own path.”
“I wanted to feel something,” Sar admitted quietly. “To be like you for once.”
“Sara,” Depa spoke the nickname softly, then sighed, looking for a moment older and younger at the same time. The weight of being Depa Billaba, Sar supposed. “I have not been a very good sister, have I? I never meant to…overshadow you like this. To direct you to a path that was not of your own making.”
“Why not,” Sar laughed sadly. “Everybody else does.”
The two sisters sat in silence then, nothing but breathing and tea and Sar couldn’t help but note the differences even in their silence. Depa took small sips, her mug held in one hand, her pinky extending as she sipped in a move Sar didn’t think she was even aware of. Sar, as she had always done, gripped the mug with both hands, slurped and gulped her tea like it was the only thing that could quench her thirst.
“What were they like,” Sar asked at last, cautiously breaking the silence. “Papa and Aba?”
“They were,” and Depa paused like she had lost the words, tapped her chin rhythmically as she thought. “Do you remember laktesh?”
“The dance,” Sar tried to remember, but could only find glimpses, still frames and ghosts. “Was it a wedding dance?”
“For them, I suppose it was,” Depa said, looking thoughtful and wistful and still so small. “It is more about existence. It is the Chalactan call to the galaxy: we are here and we are alive and we thank the All-Jewel for that most sacred gift. I think they were just that: a sacred gift.”
“Could you,” and Sar paused again, banished the shyness and gathered her nerve. “Could you teach it to me?”
“Of course,” Depa said at once. “And unlike when we were children, maybe this time you will not get under foot.”
Sar laughed at that, and the two of them rose, clearing a space in Depa’s room. Slowly, step by step, Depa Bilaba and Sar Labooda began to dance laktesh. Depa knew the steps and Sar did not and there were mistakes and laughter and more than one tumble to the ground as they tripped over each other’s feet.
For the first time that she could remember, Sar didn’t mind their differences on full display. As they danced laktesh, their movements matched and reflected back, they almost looked the same.