Private Last Transmission

[Sophelia Ardemark]

"Your Uncle?" Soph's brows furrowed. Trying to recall what she'd read from Thyferra reports. She hadn't been there. A big chunk of guilt still festered inside her about that. Although, from what she'd read, she doubted she would've been able to change things.

"He escaped the Sith Order recently?"

That's the only detail she remembered.

"Are you two close?" Eyes flickered away from the comm screen even as she started the download onto her device. She frowned, wondering how long his uncle had been captured. And what that had done to Jackson. If that happened to Helios? It'd eaten her alive. Bit by bit.

"I agree. We don't tell Itz or Praxon. Keep this to ourselves and I guess....tell your Uncle if you trust him?"

Jackson Lesan

 

[Jackson Lesan]

Wearing: xxx
Tag: Sophelia Ardemark

Jackson watched the download finish before he answered. Soph's question about Judah was fair, though the answer was more complicated than he wanted to unpack while they were still sitting aboard a stolen pirate ship with an unconscious senator's aide in the next compartment.

"Yeah. He escaped not that long ago."

His eyes drifted toward the hyperspace tunnel beyond the viewport. For a long time, Judah had simply been someone they had lost, and now Jackson was still figuring out what it meant to have him back.

"We're close enough that I trust him with this. He knows how to keep something quiet, and if this is connected to the Sith, the Republic, or somebody operating between the two, he'll have a better idea where to start than we do." His expression softened slightly before he added, "And he's family."

Jackson looked back toward the data on Soph's device, then reached for the navicomputer.

"Naboo. He's got a place there. Winery, vineyards, whole thing. If he's home, that's probably where we'll find him."

He adjusted their course, and the decision settled something in him. They had spent the entire mission reacting to one problem after another. For once, they were choosing the next move.

By the time the pirate ship dropped out of hyperspace above Naboo, Itz had improved enough that Jackson was comfortable leaving her in the medbay for the short descent. He transmitted a simple approach code and guided the ship down toward the Lake Country, where green hills rolled beneath them and long rows of vineyards broke across the countryside around old stone buildings. After the jungle, the quiet almost felt wrong. Jackson brought the ship down on a private landing area set away from the main house and winery, then looked toward Soph once the engines began to wind down.

"Welcome to LeStar..."

The walk from the landing area took them along the edge of the vineyard. Jackson expected they would have to go looking for Judah inside, but movement between the rows caught his attention before they reached the house. A man was working among the vines, dressed far more like someone tending a vineyard than a Jedi Shadow who had recently escaped Sith imprisonment. Jackson slowed and glanced toward Soph.

"That's him."

He stepped between the rows and raised his voice enough to carry.

"Uncle Judah!" Once the older Jedi looked their way, Jackson kept walking toward him with Soph beside him. "I know you just got your life back, but Soph and I found something we think you need to see."

 

[Sophelia Ardemark]

Considering Naboo was where the Sanctuary was, her own family home with her brother, Helios, and their mother, Soph was glad. She hated ship travel, so it was nice not to have the idea of needing to get back into one to fly across High Republic space. It would be a short stop from here to Theed where they could return Itz to her own home.

Soph could sense there was something Jackson wasn't telling her.

She wouldn't press him, though.

With the data on her comm in her pocket, she followed him out of their stolen ship. Greeting the solid ground with no small amount of gratitude. That Nabooian sun warming her face. Fresh air doing wonders to chase away the nausea that had started to build from the motion of the ship and the ship's stale, recycled air. Surprise sparkled in the depths of her ocean blues.

Jackson's Uncle was...loaded?

A sideways glance to her fellow padawan. She didn't say anything, though. While the setting might unsettle some, Soph felt instantly at home. She was a noble from a royal house. Vineyards, lavish estates....that's how she'd grown up. In reminded her of the ones by the sea on Pelagia. A frown as she realized how she looked. She still had on those jungle clothes. Her hair was an absolute mess, she was covered in patches of dirt, and STARS she needed a sanisteam.

Fingers tried to smooth down the dirtied, rumpled fabric.

She stepped forward. "Hello. I'm Sophelia Ardemark. Not sure if you've heard of my brother, Helios? Jax said you might be able to help us with some information we found. But we would appreciate the utmost...um, discretion." She couldn't help her curious gaze flicker between him and Jackson.

VERY interesting.

Jackson Lesan

 

[Judah Lesan]

TAG: Sophelia Ardemark | Jackson Lesan

Judah was halfway down one of the vineyard rows when Jackson's voice carried across the vines. He straightened with the pruning shears still in one hand and looked toward the pair approaching from the landing area, but the ship behind them caught his attention almost immediately. That was definitely not Jackson's ship.

He wiped his free hand against the side of his trousers while they approached. Jackson looked tired beneath the confidence he was trying to wear, and the girl beside him looked like she had been dragged through half a jungle before deciding she had suffered enough. The dirt and rumpled clothes should have made her look out of place against LeStar's vineyards, but she seemed remarkably comfortable with the estate itself.

When she introduced herself as Sophelia Ardemark and mentioned Helios, Judah searched for the name automatically. Nothing came back, though that did not mean much anymore. There were still too many holes where memories should have been, and he had learned not to trust the first blank space his mind gave him.

"Helios," Judah repeated, brow furrowing as he tried once more to place it. "Sorry. Doesn't mean I don't know the name. My memory's still a mess."

He gave up on forcing it and offered her a small nod.

"Judah Lesan."

His gaze shifted briefly toward Jackson when she called him Jax, and a trace of amusement touched his expression before passing. Sophelia's request for discretion brought his attention back to her fully.

"That I can do."

Judah closed the pruning shears and slipped them into the pouch at his hip. Whatever they had brought here, she clearly took it seriously, and Jackson trusted her enough to bring her to LeStar. That mattered more to him than whatever details he had missed while he was gone.

"If Jackson trusts you enough to bring you here, I'll trust his judgment. Though I am going to need the story behind the pirate ship."

There was a little more humor in that line, but not much. Judah gestured toward the estate and started walking with them between the rows.

"We can talk inside. Somewhere private. And after this, both of you can get cleaned up and find something to eat. You look like you've had a long couple of days."

As they walked, Judah caught himself trying to place Ardemark again and stopped. Digging at the missing pieces never helped. He let the thought go and focused instead on the two Padawans beside him and whatever had been important enough to bring them here.

When they reached the winery, Judah held the side entrance open and let them pass through before following. Once they were inside, the casual edge faded from his expression.

"Alright, Sophelia. Show me what you found."

 

[Jackson Lesan]

Wearing: xxx
Tag: Sophelia Ardemark | Judah Lesan

Jackson caught the way Judah paused over Helios's name, and whatever answer he might have offered died before it reached his mouth. He had seen that look before. The brief search behind his uncle's eyes, followed by the quiet frustration when something that should have been there simply was not. Jackson had learned not to fill those gaps unless Judah asked him to.

"Don't worry about it," he said instead, keeping his tone easy. "You've got plenty of catching up to do."

The comment about the pirate ship earned a faint grin.

"That one's a little complicated." Jackson glanced toward Soph, then back at Judah as they started toward the winery. "We were supposed to be escorting a senator's aide. Easy assignment. Pirates shot us down, we crashed in the jungle, lost the pilots, found out the aide had been captured, then found out she'd been poisoned. After that, we stole the pirate ship."

He considered the explanation for half a second.

"Actually, maybe it isn't that complicated."

Jackson let Soph walk beside him rather than allowing the conversation to turn into something between the two Lesans. This was her discovery as much as his, and she had been the one smart enough to listen when Itz's delirious muttering turned out to mean something. Jackson still did not know exactly what she had found in the jungle before they reached the pirate-occupied village, but he knew enough to understand that without her there would not be a datachit to show Judah now.

Once they were inside, Jackson followed Judah farther into the winery, taking in the familiar surroundings with a strange sense of relief. After the last several days, LeStar felt almost offensively normal. His ribs no longer hurt, Itz was stable aboard the ship, and for the first time since the transport had gone down, somebody older and considerably more experienced was about to help carry the problem.

Jackson looked toward Soph when Judah asked to see what they had found.

"Show him everything."

He waited while she retrieved the data, then looked toward Judah as the files came up.

"Itz hid the chit before the pirates caught her. We didn't know what it was until we were already on our way back."

Jackson's expression tightened as the same phrases appeared again. A prison the size of a moon. Weaponized. Classified incidents inside. Coordinates attached to all of it.

"That's why we came here."

He folded his arms loosely and looked toward his uncle.

"We don't know what any of it means, and I'm not going to pretend we do. But people died trying to keep that information from getting where it was going, and somebody poisoned Itz over it."

Jackson glanced toward Soph before finishing.

"We figured if anybody could find out what this place is without announcing to the entire Republic that we're looking, it'd be you."

 

[Sophelia Ardemark]

Sophelia felt a pang of emotion as she watched Judah Lesan 's face try to recall a name. She didn't expect everyone to know her brother's name. Or her own. And her lips parted to say as much before Jackson cut in. She had to wonder what horrors he'd seen being captive among the Sith Order for so long. And how similar their stories might've been had she not gotten out of Tapani. Had she not escaped with those others.

She would've been killed.

Or worse.

She would've been in one of those prison camps wishing she'd been killed.

It only made her more determined to help her people. To help those who couldn't help themselves. Lips pressed into a hard-thin line. "It's okay," she added gently when Jax said not to worry about it. Her eyes flickered quickly to Jackson. A quick, silent look. She walked beside them into the estate. Her belly rumbling at the mention of something that wasn't a ration bar. Cleaning up sounded lovely, too.

Fresh clothes.

Unpocketing her comm, her fingers brushed the surface clean of some mud and she showed Judah what they'd found.

"Mister-Master Leson," she corrected herself. Unsure of proper protocol on titles. The jedi world and culture was still relatively new to her. "Itz is Senator Praxon's aide," she further explained. "Jax and I were assigned to escort her back to Theed. It was explained to us as an easy mission. They didn't account for the pirates or this information that Itz would be carrying. Have your head of this before?"

Soph scrolled down on the comm screen.

"What does in-between worlds mean?"

 

[Judah Lesan]

TAG: Sophelia Ardemark

Judah accepted the comm from Sophelia and looked over the information without immediately answering. The correction from mister to master earned the faintest shift at one corner of his mouth.

"Judah is fine."

His eyes returned to the screen as he worked through the names and references. Praxon. Itz. The prison. Some of it meant nothing to him, and some of it tugged at half-formed pieces that refused to come together. He had learned not to force those moments anymore. The harder he pushed at the gaps, the worse his head tended to get.

"I haven't heard of this place. At least not that I remember."

The qualification still bothered him every time he had to make it, but there was no sense pretending his memory was cleaner than it was. Judah scrolled back through the files and studied the wording again. A moon-sized prison was concerning enough on its own. Weaponized made it worse. The reference to strange occurrences inside pulled his attention harder than anything else on the screen.

When Sophelia asked about the phrase, Judah repeated it under his breath.

"In-between worlds."

He leaned back against the edge of the desk and thought through the possibilities, not searching damaged memory this time so much as testing the wording against things he knew from experience.

"If I had to guess, they're talking about something between this world and the Nether." His eyes lifted toward Sophelia and Jackson. "The Nether isn't just some story Jedi tell each other. I've been there. There are places where the boundary between it and this side gets thin, damaged, or opened entirely. If somebody built a prison around one of those places, or found a way to use one, that could explain why everything happening inside is classified."

Judah looked back toward the coordinates and the word weaponized, his expression tightening.

"It would explain that too. Maybe they weren't trying to weaponize the prison itself. Maybe they were trying to weaponize whatever sits between the two." He handed the comm back to Sophelia after another moment. "I could be wrong. 'Between worlds' might mean something else entirely, but if it means what I think it does, then this is a lot bigger than somebody hiding a prison."

His attention stayed on Sophelia as he continued.

"And if Senator Praxon wanted this information badly enough to send Itz carrying it without telling either of you what you were actually escorting, then I want to know why before that datachit goes anywhere near him."

 

[Sophelia Ardemark]

Soph absently picked a small stick and leaf from her hair and set it on the table. She grimaced, wondering how many of those things were stuck in there.

Gross.

But, she forced her attention to remain on Master-NOPE-Judah. Gilded brows furrowed. "I always thought the nether was just stories the adults told us to scare us when we were children. I never thought...," she frowned, glancing at Jackson. As if silently asking him - did he know about this?

"But you've been there?" Sophelia didn't know whether she was impressed, scared, or baffled. Maybe a mixture of everything.

"It's clearly sensitive information. I can see why he'd want as few people to know about it as possible. Including two padawans assigned a simple escort mission. We don't have much time. We're already past the return window." Soph's fingers tapped lightly on the table.

Once. Twice.

"Should we just ask him? Or, do you know anyone else in the senate that could be trusted enough to dig into Senator Praxon a bit more?"

There was probably another option. They could potentially give Itz something else to take back. She knew that would only buy them a little more time.

Judah Lesan

 

[Judah Lesan]

TAG: Sophelia Ardemark

Judah caught the look Sophelia gave Jackson when she asked about the Nether and gave a small nod.

"Yeah. I've been there."

He did not elaborate. There were some places a person could describe and others that never sounded right once they were put into words. The Nether belonged firmly in the second category.

Her question about the Senate drew a different reaction. Judah leaned back against the desk and rubbed a hand across his jaw as he considered it.

"When the Galactic Alliance still stood, maybe." He shook his head. "Now? I wouldn't know where to start."

That bothered him more than he let show. There had been a time when Judah could have named people across half a dozen governments who would take his call, pass along a quiet piece of information, or tell him which senator was lying through their teeth. More than a year in Sith custody had changed that. Governments shifted, alliances changed, people disappeared, and some of the names he remembered probably did not matter anymore.

"I've been gone too long. I don't know who's sitting in the Senate, who owes who favors, or who can actually be trusted. Calling somebody because I trusted them before I disappeared could make this worse."

Judah looked toward the datachit again, thinking through the problem the way he would have before Jutrand, even if some of the pieces came slower now.

"And I wouldn't ask Praxon directly. Not yet. If he's clean, we tell him we went through information his aide was supposed to deliver privately. If he isn't, then we tell him exactly what we know and that we kept a copy. Neither option helps us."

His eyes moved toward Sophelia. "You two still have an easy way out of this. Take Itz back to Theed. Let her tell Praxon whatever she remembers. As far as either of them knows, you rescued her, brought her home, and never found the chit."

Judah pushed away from the desk and looked between the two Padawans. "Keep the copy. I'll start digging from this end. I may not know the Senate anymore, but I still know how to follow money, ships, construction records, military contracts, and people who go to a lot of trouble to make something disappear."

There was the faintest trace of the old Shadow in his expression then.

"If somebody built a moon-sized prison between here and the Nether, they left a trail somewhere. We find that first. Then we decide whether Senator Praxon is somebody we ask questions or somebody we start asking questions about."

 

[Sophelia Ardemark]

Soph nodded, her eyes shifting to Jackson to see if he agreed. It made sense to her. There would be some kind of audit trail for something that big. "Thanks for helping us. Even if you don't know me."

A small, timid smile. Sincerity showing in the corners of her mouth.

"I'm going to clean up." With that, Soph excused herself, finding her way to the refresher and spare clothing Judah pointed out they could use. She took a hair longer in the sanisteam, trying to scrub the last of that jungle dirt and grime from her skin that had been collecting there for several days.

Stars, these small mercies felt so good.

Thoroughly cleaned and in a fresh set of clothes, Soph wandered back to the main living area, noting Jackson must've been still cleaning up. She joined Judah back on one of the hover couches. Folding slender legs beneath her, she took a moment to appreciate the view outside the floor-to-ceiling glass of the vineyard beyond. The Naboo sky a bright, warm blue. Much like her eyes as she turned them to the Jedi Master.

"You've got a good one. In Jax, I mean. He's a good guy. I'm sure you know that already, though. You mean a lot to him. Being family. I'm sure he'd be happy if you could stick around."


Judah Lesan

 

[Judah Lesan]

TAG: Sophelia Ardemark

Judah sat back against the couch and looked out across the vineyard for a moment after Sophelia spoke. The view had become familiar again surprisingly quickly. Rows of vines, open sky, the quiet of Naboo. There were still moments when all of it felt borrowed, as if someone might eventually come and tell him he had imagined being free.

"He is."

Judah looked back toward her.

"Jackson's a good kid."

There was no hesitation in that. Whatever else his memory had lost, whatever pieces of the last year remained scrambled or simply gone, Judah knew that much. Jackson had always cared too much, pushed too hard, and somehow managed to make both of those things look like stubbornness until someone paid closer attention.

"He's got a habit of deciding everybody else matters more than he does. That's going to get him into trouble if he doesn't learn where the line is."

A faint smile pulled at one corner of Judah's mouth.

"Though judging by the pirate ship outside, I'm guessing you already figured that out."

He let the humor sit for a moment before his expression softened again. Soph's last comment stayed with him longer than the rest.

"Being gone that long does something strange to family."

Judah's eyes drifted toward the hallway Jackson had disappeared down.

"You spend enough time convincing yourself they're better off without you because that's easier than wondering what they're doing without you. Then you come back and realize they kept living anyway."

He did not sound bitter about it. If anything, there was relief buried beneath the words.

"Jackson grew up some while I was gone. So did a lot of people."

Judah looked down at his hands for a moment before returning his attention to Sophelia.

"I'm trying to stick around."

The admission came quietly.

"I don't really know what that looks like yet. There are days when this place feels right, and there are days when my head still thinks I'm somewhere else. But I'm here. And if Jackson thinks enough of you to bring you here after everything you two just went through, then I'm glad he had you with him."

A little warmth returned to his expression.

"He could use somebody who tells him when he's being an idiot." Judah paused, then added with a trace more amusement. "Family's been trying for years."

 

[Sophelia Ardemark]

Sophelia watched him quietly as he spoke. She could sense he cared about Jackson. It was genuine. She knew not everyone had good relationships with their family. Or even any family left or around. Or who had been there at all. The way Judah spoke, gave her a small sense of relief.

Because even though she and Jackson had just met for this mission.

She cared about him.

He had an odd way of quickly feeling like family.

She wanted to make sure someone was in his corner. A few someones. "I think what you said counts. I think it's okay if you're still trying to figure things out. Because you're trying. You're here. And you're showing up. It doesn't have to be perfect. Just that you're willing. I'm sure that means a lot to Jax. I know it would mean a lot to me. If I was in his situation."

She was hoping she was being encouraging and felt a trickle of embarrassment and mortification if she sounded like something else.

"Aaaaaand, you don't have to worry about that," a sheepish grin that ignited across her face before extinguishing into something meeker. "He knows I speak my mind and get after him when he's being ridiculous."

Or, the hero.

Even if she was the speck criticizing the splinter.

Judah didn't know that.

"And if you need anything, I've got family here, too. We came from the Tapani sector," she paused, wondering if one day she'd be able to say that without feeling that sudden, sharp pain in her chest. "My brother is Helios. My mother lives with him and we have an estate in Theed in the lake district. I'm sure they'd love to meet you. My mother will certainly fuss over having you over for dinner. It's nice for them....to meet new people."

Since they'd all lost so much.

Judah Lesan