Private Like Home

[Jacen Voidstalker]

"It's like home," Jacen said in distaste as the winds swept more sand across their path.

"Not home home. That's Coruscant, but my family come from Tatooine. That's just as...pleasant as here."

Jacen waved a hand towards the emptiness that was between them and the horizon. The Jakku Enclave was nowhere to be seen. Jacen unclipped a small pouch at his belt, pulling free the Compass Jend-ro had provided. He had also helped him procure a Taozin nodule to help disperse her presence in the Force.

Serya Talith probably didn't want to think or talk too much about the measures taken to hide her from the Taliths just yet. She was still processing. He suspected that she was still resentful that he had kept his suspicions from her for some time. Not that he had ever been the best judge of what was going through other people's minds.

"This way," he confirmed, pointing towards another empty stretch of sand.

 

[Serya Talith]

Serya couldn't help the faint lip twitch. She was more than familiar with his feelings of home. Desert and heat were never his thing. She couldn't really blame him. It was hot.

She fanned herself with her shirt, her expression falling as he pointed to yet another dune.

"Couldn't you have landed us closer?" Her tone bared no strain, no difference in demeanor from this day to last. It was as if Jend-Ro Quill had never unlocked the memories. She ignored the nodule and all of Jacen's prying looks, determined to exist as if they never occurred. She had been dropped a bomb shell.

You determine who you are.

Well, she was just fine.

"What exactly are we looking for, anyways?"

Jacen Voidstalker

 

[Jacen Voidstalker]

"That's a good question," Jacen replied, eyes on the compass. "It's underground and the compass leads us to the entrance."

He turned back and forth and then set off across a dune. He had never learned how to walk the dunes and made an awkward mess of the incline. The sand seemed to swallow his feet and went tumbling down behind him.

He kept going and suddenly the compass swung around to point in the opposite direction.

"Ah," he went pocketing the compass. "Spent over a year in hiding on a planet like this. Hopefully this place is air conditioned"

He narrowed his eyes, stretching out with his senses.

"A door that can be opened with the Force. Can you sense it?"

 

[Serya Talith]

"Behind you," Serya murmured softly, pointing at the rise of a dun that defied the wind patterns in the sand. Her vision followed beyond it, a tug in her chest leading her to notice a blip on the horizon.

"Is that a building?"

The enclave was hidden under it, the harmless power facility hiding a large secret.

She waved her hand, defying caution to send the sand sliding down in a miny avalanche to their feet. A small hatch reveled itself, its metal walls going deep into the sand. "...A secret entrance indeed. I think think that's where we're going," she commented, jerking her chin to the blob on the horizon.

Jacen Voidstalker

 

[Jacen Voidstalker]

J A C E N​

"Well done," he said, offering a warm smile.

He felt as if he was treading on eggshells now. She wasn't giving him any clues on how she was feeling about what he had done. He hadn't done anything or course, other than keeping suspicions to himself. Jacen felt guilty about it and he didn't like things he could not fix.

The lift rose from the sand and hissed open. Jacen stretched out with his feelings. There were people here, hidden beneath the sand.

"For keeping out of sight, this will definitely do," he remarked. "Although...not particularly welcoming. Here's a tube, please get into it."

Serya Talith Romi Jade

 

[Serya Talith]

Serya grimaced, shuffling past him and going to open the door wordlessly. A few tugs and grunts later, the cool, stale air slapped her across the face. She pulled up an easy ball of light an shuffled in first, no fear to the girl as she took lead down the dark, dusty tunnel.

It felt like an eternity until they hit another set of doors, no words passing between then.

She wasn't ever particularly chatty, but one might notice lately she was even less inclined to state the things that interested her.

Knock knock knock. Her knuckles rapped against the metal bulkhead.

A keypad blinked to her right. Her head snapped towards it. She glanced at Jacen, then pressed the comms button.

"Um. Hello?" She murmured through the static.

Romi Jade

 

[Jacen Voidstalker]

"At least it's air conditioned whilst we wait," said Jacen. He sounded as if he was seconds away from humming something akin to elevator music.

According to the compass this was definitely the right place. There was a structure below the ground and there couldn't be many hidden bunkers out in the jakku wastes. Plenty of buried starships from the last great naval battle of the galactic civil war.

"I was given a code, but there are no numbers on the panel," Jacen mused.

He wished Serya was a bit easier to read. Having spent time trying to work with sullen teenage silences this was beginning to give him flashbacks to Trextan a few years back.

"Can you feel that?" he asked her, placing a hand near the door. "The mechanism is hidden, you have to use the Force. Want to try it?" he asked.

Serya Talith Romi Jade