Private Echoes in the Forest | The Jedi Order

[Aiden Porte]

Sven Halestorm

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The transmission had come through fractured, signal buried in static, but the call was unmistakable. The emergency beacon of a High Republic Vessel, a transport that was presumed lost over a week ago, had flared briefly to life from deep within the northern forests of Chandrila.

The vessel had carried displaced High Republic citizens historians, engineers, and Jedi archivists who had finally found chance to escape as they hid during the initial Empire takeover of the Core. Their survival was improbable. Yet the faint beacon, encoded in the distorted frequency bands once used by The Jedi Order, told a different story: they were alive. Or at least, they had been.

Now the Empire's shadow had reached Chandrila. Imperial patrols combed the forest regions under the pretense of "ecological survey operations." Rumors spoke of scout walkers sighted in the misted valleys, local villages are on edge. Whatever had forced the displaced survivors to Chandrila had also drawn the Empire's attention and time was running short.

Chandrila

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Aiden's vessel slipped beneath the cloudline in silence, its silver hull cutting through the heavy mist like a blade through water. The forest stretched endlessly below a sea of green shadow, glinting faintly under the faint light of Chandrila's moon.

Aiden stood beside the cockpit viewport, his hands clasped behind his back, the hum of the ship thrumming faintly through his boots. Even through the transparisteel, he could feel it the pressure of the forest's silence. The Force here was muted, as though something vast slept beneath the trees, watching, waiting. Next to him stood Sven Halestorm, stoic as ever. The faint blue flicker of the beacon pulsed again across the screen weak, but constant now. A few members of Shiraya's Hope and Royal Defense Force troops had accompanied them.

Aiden's gaze lingered on the treetops. "The signal's been looping for hours. Whoever sent it… might still be nearby." His tone carried that quiet conviction, bathed in hope.

The landing ramp hissed open with a breath of cold forest air. Mist rolled in, thick with the scent of damp earth and moss. The world beyond was soundless no insects, no birds, only the faint whisper of wind threading through the canopy. Every step crunched softly on a bed of wet leaves. Shafts of moonlight pierced through the fog, catching on roots that curved like bones. Aiden reached out with the Force the way he'd been trained to listen, not to seek, but to invite. The current brushed his senses: faint echoes of fear, hurried movement, and the sharp tang of blasterfire long since faded.

In the distance, lightning flashed but there was no thunder. Only a brief illumination of metallic silhouettes half-buried in the fog: scout walkers, stationary, their visors glowing red.

Aiden exchanged a glance with Sven before he moved forward.

The hunt had already begun.

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[Sven Halestorm]

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Chandrila — Northern Forests
Tag: Aiden Porte

The air was thick with moisture, heavy enough that every breath felt like drawing in the forest itself. Mist coiled low around their boots, and the faint rhythm of raindrops dripping from the canopy above filled the silence that the galaxy seemed to have forgotten how to break. Sven walked beside Aiden, one gloved hand resting loosely near his belt, the other brushing aside a low-hanging branch that had gathered dew. His eyes, calm and measured beneath the faint light of the moon, surveyed the woods with that quiet, contemplative gaze that had come to define him.

"The forest remembers," he said softly, almost to himself. His voice carried that tempered steadiness that came not from certainty, but from acceptance. “Fear has walked here. It lingers in the soil, clings to the bark.” He paused, kneeling briefly beside a cluster of overturned ferns. The mud bore faint indentations, small, staggered, perhaps the stride of those running under duress. “But life endures, even when the Empire tries to silence it.” He rose, the hum of the beacon’s signal faintly pulsing against the static of his comm.

They moved deeper into the haze. The flickering red eyes of the dormant scout walkers loomed through the fog, half-swallowed by vines and damp moss, like forgotten sentinels. Sven’s fingers brushed his saber hilt, but he did not ignite it. There was no need for light yet, not when the shadows still whispered their stories. Instead, he closed his eyes for a moment, letting the current of the Force flow around him. Beneath the stillness, he felt the faint threads of presence, fear, fatigue, and somewhere far off, a fragile ember of hope, flickering but alive.

“They’re close,” he murmured, opening his eyes again. “Not all of them, perhaps… but someone survived long enough to call out.” His gaze shifted toward Aiden, his expression calm but sharpened by purpose. “We’ll need to move carefully. If the Empire’s patrols are already in the area, we may be walking through the aftermath of something far greater than a crash.”

A single wind gust threaded through the canopy, stirring the fog like an exhale. Sven’s robe fluttered briefly before settling again. His tone quieted, a low murmur meant more for Aiden than for any soldier nearby. “There are moments, my friend, when even the Force seems to hold its breath. This… feels like one of them.”

Then, with that familiar steadiness, the balance between restraint and readiness, he began to move forward through the mist, the hum of his boots muted against the forest floor. “Come. Let’s find whoever still remembers how to hope.”

The Mist Had Settled In.​

 

[Aiden Porte]

Sven Halestorm
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"We then remind fear, that it isn't the only thing here. Hope and light are here to breath life into those that have lost it."

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The forest was a living breath around them. The wet earth, ghostlight mist, the steady and very light rain that fell. Every sound felt magnified beneath the hush of Chandrila's canopy.

Aiden crouched low behind a ridge of moss-slick stone, eyes narrowing as the faint red gleam of an Imperial patrol swept across the clearing ahead. Their voices carried in clipped murmurs, distorted by their helmets, moving with the mechanical precision of soldiers who'd done this a hundred times before. One scout walker turned slightly, its sensor array sweeping through the fog in a slow, methodical arc.

Sven's presence was steady next to him, a calm current in the storm. He had become a strong and fast ally in the short time they had known each other. Aiden caught his glance and with a subtle nod, they slid deeper into the brush. The hum of the walker's servos faded behind them, replaced by the soft rustle of rain as it continued. The beacon's signal had grown stronger, much closer now, pulsing faintly against the interference.

The first thing he saw of the crash was the smoke. Thin, grey, curling upward through the trees like the dying breath of something that had fought too long. The vessel lay half-buried in the ravine below, her hull split open and scorched. Small embers still glowed among the twisted metal, casting faint orange reflections across the stones. Aiden sank into a crouch at the ridge's edge, peering through the mist. Blaster scoring marked the flank of the ship precision hits, not random debris impact. This hadn't been an accident. It had been hunted.

A flicker of movement caught Aiden's attention near the starboard wing. He slowed his breathing, letting the Force draw the world into focus. He could sense something living through the force, small, trying not to be seen. Civilian? Survivor? The presence trembled in the Force, raw with exhaustion and fear, but alive.

"What do you think?" Aiden spoke, merely a whispher.

 

[Sven Halestorm]

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Chandrila — Northern Forests
Tag: Aiden Porte


Sven’s reply came after a measured silence, his breath steady against the faint hum of rain and wind. “Then we make certain that hope remembers how to fight back,” he said quietly. His tone was even, soft, but edged with a conviction that had carried him through too many lost causes to ever sound naïve.

He crouched beside Aiden, the faint shimmer of water gathering along his cloak as they peered through the thinning mist toward the crash. The sight below was grim, a wound torn into the forest, where flame and smoke bled into the wet air. The twisted hull still pulsed with fading embers, but beneath it all, the Force whispered of something fragile, something clinging. A life.

Sven exhaled through his nose, eyes narrowing as the glow of an Imperial sensor swept past the wreckage. The red light traced over a fallen branch and drifted away again. “They’ve already begun to sweep the perimeter,” he murmured. “If we separate, we risk losing that signal, and each other.” His hand brushed the mossy edge of the ridge, feeling the pulse of the planet beneath them, damp and alive. “No. We move as one. Silent. Swift.”

He motioned forward, and together they descended from the ridge, slipping between the trunks with the practiced grace of men who had learned how to vanish in plain sight. The fog clung thick around them, masking their shapes. Above, the faint thunder of a walker’s servos rolled like distant drums. Sven’s saber remained unlit in his hand, the silver hilt catching only a whisper of moonlight.

As they neared the wreck, he stopped and extended his free hand slightly. “There,” he said under his breath. “Behind the wing plating.” A flicker of movement, a small shadow, hunched low. “A survivor… young.” The words came like a realization rather than a report, the Force confirming what his eyes could not.

Sven glanced toward Aiden, rain catching in his beard as he spoke softly. “If the Imperials are hunting what’s left of the old Order’s knowledge, then this survivor may be more than they appear.” He shifted his stance, readying to move. “We’ll approach from both sides of the hull, slow and quiet. If they panic, let me speak first.”

The forest around them seemed to still, as if holding its breath once more. Sven drew in the scent of rain and smoke, the faint ozone sting of discharged blasters. His eyes met Aiden’s through the mist. “Together, then,” he said simply. “Hope and light, one step closer.”

And with that, the two Jedi slipped forward through the fog, their presence a calm current threading into the storm, where the shadows of fear and faith met beneath the rain.

 

[Aiden Porte]

Sven Halestorm
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Aiden moved like a shadow through the mist, each step deliberate, every breath measured. The rain had softened the ground beneath their boots, turning soil to quiet mud that swallowed sound. Around them, the forest seemed to exist in half-light a world caught between waking and sleep, where every tree leaned inward as though listening.

He could still hear Sven's voice echoing in his mind calm, resolute, the kind of faith that didn't waver even in the dark. Then we make certain that hope remembers how to fight back.

Aiden felt it once more, that fragile spark. Like it was reaching out. A presence, faint but unmistakably alive.

He crouched near a fallen log, extending a hand to steady himself. The Force pressed around him like breath against glass tense, waiting. There was pain here, fear etched deep into the soil, but not despair. Not yet.

A sweep of red light cut through the fog, the sensor beam of a scout trooper's visor. Aiden stilled, his body sinking lower into the ferns, his hand resting lightly against the hilt at his hip. The hum of the walker's hydraulics rumbled faintly in the distance. He watched the patrol's light drift across the clearing, pausing briefly over the wreckage before sliding away again into the haze.

Only when it faded did he exhale, slow and silent. He glanced toward Sven, a few meters to his right at their plan that he recommended.

Aiden then rose slightly from cover. His eyes swept the wreckage once more, reading the battlefield cover, sightlines, places a frightened soul might run if startled. He could sense it now not just the survivor, but the approaching danger. The Imperials weren't far, their footsteps like echoes pressed against the fabric of the Force. Time was running thin.

Drawing a deep breath, Aiden moved from the left flank and Sven he could see moved from the right.. The smell of smoke and the like thickened as he neared the broken vessel. He moved along the wreckage and he could see the silhouette of whom they sensed. It looked to be a teenager, Aiden crouched low as he approached. He looked like he was startled and Aiden held his hand up, his own presence extending outward. His arm looked to be injured as Aiden closed the distance with Sven approaching from the other side.

"Don't worry, we are here to help." Aiden whispered, giving him a look and smile of reassurance.

 

[Sven Halestorm]

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Chandrila — Northern Forests
Tag: Aiden Porte


Sven’s approach was soundless, his figure little more than a shape moving through the mist. The light rain drummed softly on his cloak, gathering along the edges before dripping soundlessly into the mud below. The Force flowed around him, not as a storm or a surge, but as a calm tide, deliberate and steady, carrying every whisper of the forest into his awareness. The scouts were close, their discipline audible in the rhythm of their movement, measured, professional, relentless. He could sense their tension, their hunger to find what the Empire wanted hidden.

His eyes found Aiden through the haze, crouched low near the wreck. The faint glow of a dying ember caught his profile, and Sven gave a small nod in affirmation. They had reached the heart of the wound. The crash site was quieter now, save for the gentle hiss of cooling metal and the patter of rain along the broken hull. Smoke curled upward in slow ribbons, casting a dim orange glow that made the world feel fragile, suspended between life and ruin.

Sven rounded the other side of the vessel, his boots pressing softly into the mud. The figure came into view: a youth, thin, no older than seventeen, clothes singed and torn. His face was pale beneath the grime, eyes wide with the kind of fear that came not from pain, but from surviving too long when others hadn’t. The boy clutched a small metal case to his chest, its edges engraved faintly with the symbol of the High Republic.

Sven lifted a hand, palm open, his voice a steady whisper beneath the rain. “Easy,” he said. “You’ve done well to last this long.” His tone carried no command, only assurance. The boy’s eyes flicked between him and Aiden, torn between trust and instinct. Sven’s calm presence pressed softly through the Force, a guiding warmth that met the frayed edge of the youth’s fear. “You’re safe now,” he continued, though he knew the words were only half-true.

Behind them, movement stirred again, the faint crunch of boots through wet leaves, the low hiss of a trooper’s vox-filter. Sven’s expression hardened, though his voice did not waver. “Aiden,” he said quietly, not looking away from the boy, “the patrol’s fanning out. We have minutes, no more.” He extended his other hand to the youth. “Come. You’ve carried your burden long enough. Let us carry it now.”

The boy hesitated, then reached out, trembling. As Sven helped him to his feet, the faint pulse of the beacon flickered and died, a final breath from the broken vessel. In its place, the steady rhythm of footsteps grew closer through the fog.

Sven turned toward Aiden, cloak trailing damp against the ground. His saber hilt hung at his side, still dormant. “Hope,” he said softly, eyes fixed on the glow of red visors emerging from the mist. “It remembers how to fight back. Let’s make sure it survives the lesson.”

And as the forest seemed to tighten its hold around them, the two Jedi stood side by side once more, calm against the storm, ready to face what darkness had followed them into the light.

 

[Aiden Porte]

Sven Halestorm
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Aiden watched as Sven guided the boy from the wreckage, the youth’s steps uneven, his breath ragged but alive. The sight struck something deep within him that fragile persistence, the same thread that had bound too many broken souls together in the wake of the Empire’s rise. Hope was a fragile thing, but it was still moving, still breathing, even here among the ash and ruin.

He rose from his cover, rain sliding down his hair and into his collar, each drop cold and grounding. The air carried the metallic tang of scorched durasteel and the faint sweetness of wet soil. Beneath it, the Force trembled, warning, alive, restless. Sven spoke his words reaching him just as he felt the patrol closing in. Their intent was a sharp point pressing at the edges of his senses: disciplined, alert, hunting.

He moved forward, closing the space between them, the fog swirling around his boots as he joined Sven and the boy by the shattered hull. The youth’s grip tightened on the metal case an archive, perhaps, or something more personal. The symbol of the High Republic gleamed faintly beneath the soot.

“You did what was right, you held on.” The boy nodded faintly, his breath shaking, and for the briefest moment, the fear around him lightened, softened by the warmth Aiden sent through the Force.

The moment didn’t last.

The faint crunch of boots came again closer now, more deliberate. Through the mist, the crimson glow of visors blinked to life. Shadows moved between the trees, methodical and precise. The Imperials were tightening the net.

Aiden rose to his full height, shoulders squared but still, cloak hanging heavy with rain. The familiar hum of his lightsaber’s hilt beneath his glove steadied his heartbeat. He met Sven’s gaze across the wreckage, no words needed. The trust showed, as if they had been fighting side by side for years, spoke for them both.

"Let’s make sure the galaxy remembers what the Jedi still stand for.”

The fog thickened as they stepped into the open, Imperials moved through the fog and among them, the hum of their lightsabers igniting in unison cutting through the fog and darkness. The sound broke the forest’s silence, and for a heartbeat, even the rain seemed to pause.

The first blaster bolts cut through the mist. Aiden moved before the sound reached him, blade rising in smooth arcs, deflecting crimson fire into the trees.

Through the smoke and rain, the wreck still burned a beacon of what had been lost, and what might yet be reclaimed. And amid the firelight, Aiden felt the faint pulse of the Force aligning around them, not in vengeance, but in resolve.

Hope remembered how to fight back.

 

[Sven Halestorm]

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Chandrila — Northern Forests
Tag: Aiden Porte


The moment the first bolt screamed through the fog, Sven was already moving. The forest lit with brief flashes of crimson and cobalt, reflected light spilling across slick bark and shattered hull. His saber flared to life in his hand, its cerulean blade cutting a clean, deliberate line through the haze. Where Aiden’s style was fluid, almost melodic, Sven’s was tempered steel, every motion measured, every strike a conversation between calm and chaos.

“Stay behind me!” he called to the boy, his voice sharp but never panicked. The youth stumbled back toward the hull, clutching the case to his chest as though it were his last tether to the past. Sven’s stance shifted, boots sliding into the mud for stability as another volley erupted. Blasterfire hissed through the rain, sizzling against his blade as he turned each bolt aside, redirecting them with precise, almost serene economy.

The fog thickened, curling like smoke around their forms. Red visors cut through the gloom, Imperial shadows moving in unison, fanning out to encircle. Sven’s eyes flicked toward the nearest silhouette, sensing the sharp intent behind its aim. The Force whispered in warning; he pivoted, cloak sweeping as he raised his off-hand and sent a controlled pulse through the air. The trooper stumbled backward, his blaster skittering from his grasp, armor striking the trunk of a tree with a hollow thud.

“Chandrila won’t remember our names,” Sven said, voice low, almost reflective as he stepped in alongside Aiden, “but it will remember this moment.” Their blades burned side by side now, a twin rhythm of deflection and motion. Together, they moved like a single current, Aiden flowing forward, redirecting, Sven anchoring, intercepting. Where Aiden’s strikes sang, Sven’s answered with quiet finality.

A storm of light and sound surrounded them, yet within it, the Force was calm. Every movement followed a pattern older than the war, older than the Empire. The old ways, the balance between restraint and defense, the creed that power meant nothing without mercy. Sven felt that truth alive again in the rhythm between them, between the arcs of their sabers and the grounding pulse of rain on earth.

Another trooper fell, disarmed rather than slain, his weapon cleaved in two. Sven reached out through the haze, catching a fleeting glimpse of fear from the rest of the squad. Not hatred, not cruelty, fear. “They’re only following orders,” he murmured, blocking another shot and sending it harmlessly skyward. “Let them live long enough to question who gives them.”

A final flash of red cut the space between them. Sven’s blade rose, caught it, and flung it aside into the darkness. Then, silence. Only the soft patter of rain, the hiss of cooling metal, and the slow beat of the Force returning to stillness.

Sven stood amidst the settling haze, his breath slow, his saber still humming with restrained light. The forest had gone quiet again, save for the steady rhythm of rain on durasteel and leaves. The last echoes of blasterfire faded into the fog, leaving behind only the scent of ozone and damp earth. He could feel the tremor of life returning to the air, the forest’s pulse reasserting itself after violence.

He lowered his weapon slightly, its glow casting soft reflections across the boy’s soot-streaked face. The youth clutched the High Republic case tighter, his wide eyes flicking between the two Jedi. Fear still lingered there, but so did something else, trust, faint and fragile.

Sven’s gaze drifted toward Aiden through the mist, their sabers’ light intertwining briefly before dimming into the rain. “They’ll regroup soon,” he said quietly, tone even but laced with meaning. “And this one’s burden…” his eyes flicked to the case in the boy’s hands, “…will draw more than just a single patrol.”

He glanced toward the treeline, where the fog thickened again, shapes just barely discernible beyond the drifting veil. His hand rested against his saber hilt, but he didn’t reignite it. Instead, he exhaled, a steady breath that carried the calm before a decision. “We can’t stay here long,” he murmured. “The question is where we run, and what we take with us.”

The boy looked up at them both then, uncertain but waiting. Rain traced lines down his face, mingling with the ash. Sven studied him for a moment, then turned his attention back to Aiden, a faint spark of quiet humor in his eyes despite the danger pressing in.

“You’ve always had a better sense for the next step,” he said, voice low. “So tell me, Aiden… how do we keep hope alive now?”

The forest fell still again, the fog curling close as the two Jedi stood beside the wounded wreck, light and shadow poised for what would come next.

A Game of Cat and Mouse.​