Finder's Keepers (All Jedi)

[Serya Talith]

Serya recoiled back, the rejection slight but obvious as Atraya's desperation rang as nothing short of unsettling.

"You wha-" A warm light encased her, soft and harmless. The face before her began to erode, the connection she felt growing fuzzy and distant. "No, wait!" She reached out, the gesture pointless as Atraya's image dissolved between her finger tips. She was left staring, now alone in the circle, her chest heavy with the anger of the banished sith.

"What'd you do that for?" She exclaimed, turning on them both. She picked herself up onto her feet, storming over with all the fury of a denied teen.

"He knows me. He had answers!" She had no real grasp on what had occurred. "Bring him back!"

 

[Matsu Ike]

She heard the sound and looked up. the force wrapping around and shifting her air in the wind as the jedi master moved. Across the island aftershe had been returning to her main sanctuary at the summit with the prime jedi's peak. She turned though and moved stoppingnear Jend-Ro Quill as they could both look at Serya Talith and her master Jacen Voidstalker . THe jedi master prepared in case but she waved off the security forces who would be responding before checking it out. She wasn't entirely certain what had happened or been happening but spoke low towards Jend. "I take it this wasn't entirely part of the training or something unexpected?"

 

[Atrayas Talith]

He would never know if he would have felt her if their fingers had touched. The light was blinding. Atrayas couldn't see the source, only feel the heat burning right through him.

Atrayas blinked. The lights he saw now where because he had struck the back of his head on the cold durasteel deck. Blinking slowly, he drew himself back up to his knees. Gone was the wind, the sound of birds. It was just the constant drone of engines.

He was in a meditation chamber of a sith destroyer. He would have to leave on his own ship. She had been in the Outer Rim on Susefvi. What the other sith wanted of him did not matter. She was his goal. She was everything. There was no vision he held where he was ruling and she was not by his side.

If she had been corrupted by that blistering light, that searing heat, then perhaps none of those visions would ever come to pass.

 

[Atrayas Talith]

JACEN

Jacen stood besides Serya, looking at the air that Jend-ro had purged. It had been faint, but he had seen a brief image of what Serya had seen. She was either reaching out to her family on her own or they were looking for her.

He did not like either option.

"Who is he Serya?" Jacen asked. He kept his tone as even as possible, but it was hard when his breathing was laboured. A fight was coming. He needed to get back into shape. He needed his lightsaber back.

 

[Serya Talith]

She both sensed and ignored Jacen's edge, caught up in the emotions Atrayas left behind. "I don't know!" She snapped. "You zapped him away before he could tell me. But he looks like me-- did you see it?" Her own edge softened into almost hopeful desperation. What street rat didn't want to find a piece of who they were.

"He needs me. Bring him back, we can help him."

 

[Jend-Ro Quill]

Serya Talith Jacen Voidstalker Matsu Ike

"Absolutely not," Quill said. "The Dark Side can't ever find this world. But I may be able to unlock your memory and give you answers safely, if you're willing. Then you and Jacen can go out and do whatever you need to do. Would that solve things for you, Serya?"

 

[Jacen Voidstalker]

"Serya I've helped people lost to the dark side before. Many times. But we can't invite him here. You're right, he might need help. We won't be able to if he arrived here with an army of sith."

Jacen wasn't lying, but he was certainly keeping to a particular set of facts. He gave a gentle nod in Jend-ro's direction.

"It's your choice," he said to Serya.

 

[Serya Talith]

Serya’s expression caught, their words unexpected.

Sith?

What made them think that? She would have pressed for explanations, but she was well use to Jacen and his friends being capable of the u thinkable. Their serious tone put tension in the air, the situation balancing in a razors edge.

What wasn’t she understanding? Her eyes searched their features for the answers, but the truth would not be found there.

“You're scaring me,” she admitted, shifting uneasily.

“What is going on? I told you I don’t know- why would- unlock? Just- what-“

 

[Jend-Ro Quill]

Quill exchanged a grim look with Jacen Voidstalker

"We believe you're part of a major Sith bloodline. That means your powers are blocked and part of your memory is missing for one of three potential reasons." He ticked them off on his fingers. "You pissed them off and they crippled you, and now the Taliths are pissed that you're with the Jedi. Someone else did it and the Taliths are searching for you. Or something terrible happened and you blanked out your own memory, what's called a 'flashburn,' blocking yourself in the process. What I'd like to do is try and reopen your memory, but gently, keeping some emotional distance so it's not overwhelming for you. That should give you enough information so you and Jacen can make informed choices about what comes next."

 

[Atrayas Talith]

JACEN POST

Jacen walked around the face Serya, dropping to his knees to be at eye level with her.

"I wasn't certain," he said. "I've made a lot of mistakes before and didn't want to jump to any conclusions. At Susefvi...it wasn't normal to lose consciousness like that. I didn't want to worry you and I'm sorry for that."

It was a long overdue apology, but at least it had been made.

" The boy with amber eyes...if he hadn't been touched by the dark side he would not have fled the light. I'm not going to rush you Serya, we will answer all the questions you have as best we can."

 

[Serya Talith]

Serya took a step back from them both, a sudden sense of helplessness descending upon her.

It would be a lie to say it was a surprise. Somehow, deep inside, the horrible reveal felt.... right. Like a puzzle pit in her gut that click seamlessly into place. It was that sensation that bothered her most of all, her sense of self slipping into questions and the unknown.

A sense of betrayal lashed through her as a memory came to mind-- their first conversation, he was concerned. Not because she needed help, but because without it, she'd hurt others.

He had said that. Those exact words. And the looks he always gave her. This was more than a friendship.

"So, what-- you've been watching me this whole time? Waiting for me to mess up? Was that all this was?" She looked to the man that had so casually summed up three horrible outcomes for her life and felt it hard to reach out, a flash of shame burning through her.

I'm not a sith!" she protested, trying to convince them both. She hesitated for a moment, then jammed out her hand. "G-go ahead. I'll prove it."

 

[Jend-Ro Quill]

Quill sighed and took a seat on a convenient rock.

"It doesn't matter if you were," he said. "As far as I'm concerned, anyway. I was a Raskava when I was your age - basically a Sith. You're clearly a good person now. None of this is an accusation. Jacen and I have just been...putting the pieces together to make sure nothing went wrong for you. If you're ready-"

The die was basically cast, so he ran with it. Easing away a blocked memory was something he knew well - in part because the Raskava had taught him to overcome certain memory blocks, the better to steal what was inside. But the approach he took now was much more in the realm of healing.

"Focus on your name. People have called you by that name for a long time, Serya Talith. Do you remember their voices? Faces? Where you might have been?"

 

[Serya Talith]

Serya gasped, a sense of vertigo hitting her as the full name was said. Her full name. She didn't want it to be true, but even as he urged her forward her resistance melted away. Her mind had been touched before. Frequently, even.

Serya Talith.

A set of lips bubbled to mind, chapped and pale-- framed by dark hair and darker eyes. Mom. But she knew her. She knew her smile, her kindness, the gentle way she'd utter the name Serya.

Serya.
Seyra.

-- Talith. Her mother's scream tore through her mind, the night of her death existing before before the block.

Serya fell to her knees, moisture breaming over her lashes. "I already remember this," she protested, her voice small. "My mother and I traveled together. She was a scientist, not a sith. Not a-"

A ring hung at the woman's neck, reflecting off the emergency lights as a blaster wound pierced her stomach.

A fragmented image of that ring on her mother's left hand trickled forward, slipping past the fog and fabrication that was life before the ship, age ... 10.

 

[Jend-Ro Quill]

Quill's head tilted, a twitch, a jerk-

"Your mother," he said. "A tragedy. Let's keep a little emotional distance for you for now, let's see...no need to drown you in old trauma. I wonder if this was the inflection point that blocked you, or started you in a period of...fog. Let's focus on her ring, other times you might have seen it before and after that moment. A beautiful ring. I doubt you ever saw her without it. Who else loved that ring?"

 

[Jacen Voidstalker]

Jacen's hand snapped out. He grabbed her shoulder as gently as he dared to stop her falling forwards. He didn't want to break the flow of what Jend-ro was trying to achieve.

Already they were digging up some answers. A mother who was not a sith. How did the boy fit into this.

They were breaking through hard walls here. Someone had put them there. He hoped there were no traps lurking on the other side. No trauma that would send her spiralling to a place where they could not help her.

Jacen did not speak, he only kept a hand at her shoulder. He offered a small nod, but he was certain she did not see him. She saw her past.

 

[Serya Talith]

Serya felt him redirect her off the horror of that night and did not resist it. It was a wound that had since scarred. There was relief that he did not want to pry into it, or the pirate that knew that Talith name--

Jacen's hand on her shoulder grounded her, a slow breath leaving her lips. A bit of calm crept forward, like she had practiced all those hours in meditation.


She approached the memory of that ring with a bit more of a level head, the need to prove herself to them still pressing in the back of her thoughts.

"I love that ring. It was meant for me." As oppose to...

She felt it then herself, the slipping of answers that should have been there but wasn't. It was just them on that ship, of course it would be her inheritance. But there was a sense of protectiveness over it that emanated from her chest-- it went beyond her lack of current possession over it and into something deeper. The ring was hers, because she didn't get the sword.

Someone else got the sword.

Golden eyes got the sword.

The progress she had made balanced on the tip of needle, something mechanical about the block-- more intentional than a flashburn as it fought to creep back its control.

She pushed for a moment, desperately chasing those familiar eyes. Atraya's face flickered forward, years younger and fierce. Proud. A hand laid on his shoulder, belonging to a tall figure that struck fear in bones. She felt a flush of cold, her heart speeding up.

She jerked back from it.

"My Father," she whispered, her chest heaving. He had liked that ring very much.

 

[Jend-Ro Quill]

She associated fear with her father - but fear to disappoint, fear of abandonment, fear of anger or violence? Quill couldn't say and wouldn't guess. This was about her reality, not his preconceptions.

"Father and mother...what were they like together? Where was home? When you went away, what did you miss most?"

 

[Serya Talith]

It was growing harder and more taxing to search, like trudging through water that turned into sand. In his questions were the true block, and without his help and her determination to prove herself, she wouldn't be getting anywhere at all.

Even that determination was dwindling away, a pit in her stomach growing deeper as she began to see their concerns as valid and true. The Talith name sat easier on her tongue, the man uttering it with a sense of owed authority. He was power. He was prestige. Through the eyes of a child, he was unchallengeable. Her mother worked with him. No, for him-- gone for weeks at a time only to return tired or injured or proud.

The truths started flowing easier, slipping out of the cracks in trickles. She could start to see the image of two figures-- parental and tall, but when asked about the trip or her thoughts, it all hit that white wall. She couldn't break it on her own.

"I don't know," she admitted, growing frustrated. "I never left. I don't remember leaving. I was only ever on that ship. With her. My whole life, we-" Her words caught, her eyes wild as they opened on him. "What am I missing?"

 

[Jend-Ro Quill]

She perceived a good portion of the block as a white wall, and through that lens Quill finally got a grip on the whole intractable problem.

"It's not your fault."

In his mind's eye he came up against that wall. Maybe she'd built it herself, an industrial-strength flashburn. Maybe its origins lay elsewhere. He didn't need to know.

In his mind's eye, he put a lightsaber through it.

He didn't need to shatter it utterly. A precise hole, a slowish leak, would do just fine.

 

[Serya Talith]

She went still, her eyes dilating at the change.



Pain.

Again.

She couldn't.

Siverth, please!

The prophecy speaks of them.

Fethsake, they’re just children!

They are Taliths. They will do it again.

~

Hush little baby~

~

By your age your brother could blind the whole room.

I'm trying.

You are lazy.

Punishment.

~

Where's mom?

Traveling.

She should be back. What if something's wrong?

Enough Serya , again.

Resistance.

~

Blood, passing her lips. Pain, her vision hazy. Exposed organs. Strength fleeing her limbs. HIs form-- tall. Disappointed. Looking down.

If you stopped resisting it, you could have stopped this.

~

Hospital monitors.

Hush little baby~

Faint joy, she was back.

~

Screaming. They were fighting. Fists. Smashing. She could hear it all, curled up in a ball in her closet. Her fault. All the anger was based around-- Stopping footsteps, the door ripped opened to--

~

She opened her eyes to the inside of the ship, her chest lighter and mind blank. It was just a normal, uneventful day. Traveling. Happily. With Mom.

Like they did every day.




Serya sat numbly on the ground, tears drifting slowly down her cheeks. A hand pressed to her stomach, feeling the faint outline of scars. There were no words to say. Even at a distance it was... so much.

The path of a child saved by a parent. A kidnapping, a start over. No signs of the force in a the new girl that was forged. Unconscious and unaware of the of the changes forced upon her. The mind wipe. The poison. She was a prophecy denied. At least, for a moment.


"Who even am I?" Came the conflicted question, all sense of self lost. Half a life sith prodigy. Half a life a harmless street rat. They weren't compatible. Not at all.