Private The Scars We Carry

[Briana Sal-Soren]

The hum of the hyperdrive was a constant, low, steady vibration that pressed in from every side, a reminder that they were leaving Sepan 8 and its burning skies further behind with each passing second. But even as the stars blurred into streaks and the planet fell away, the losses of the day couldn’t be brushed off. Every soul aboard carried new marks, some visible, others... buried deeper.

Her cerulean gaze remained locked on the sealed medbay doors, ever since they boarded. The ship had been in hyperspace for less than an hour, but the time stretched like pulled wire, every minute feeling like an eternity with Bastila's life balanced somewhere between this side of the Force and the other. The moment she'd found her in the heart of all that chaos, was seared into Briana's mind, sharper than any holorecording. Blaire had been knelt over Bastila in the middle of it, knees pressed into glass, hands slick with blood, Bastila's shirt split open, an incision just below her ribs. The pale, almost waxen stillness of their younger sisters face... the shallow, faltering jerks of her chest, the ugly tubing drawing dark red from her lungs so she wouldn't drown where she lay.

Briana shifted in her seat, trying to push the images from her mind while keeping her movements slow.

The multicolored bruises that'd settled over her ribs and stained her skin like a spreading fungus, had made even the slightest of motions unbearable, while the arm she kept hidden beneath her robes felt heavier by the minute, like it was no longer truly hers. It hung there like an afterthought, a useless weight tethered to her body. The mangled hand at the end was far past the point of pain now, the nerves having gone silent hours ago. Angry red streaks made a slow march up her wrist and fanned out in trails that reached halfway to her elbow. A dull, relentless throb had taken root there, pulsing upward toward her shoulder in a steady rhythm that matched the beat of her heart.

She'd done everything she could — everything besides what needed to be done, anyways — to try and rectify the situation, while ensuring none of the medics would be pulled from Bastila's side. They didn't need to be dividing their focus, they just needed to save her life.

Her hand had been almost unrecognizable as a human appendage by the time she'd truly looked at it, which had been followed by immediately wishing that she hadn’t.

Her saber hand, the one she'd trained with for years, and her strongest weapon as a duelist — was grotesquely swollen like a bloated bag, blotched with red and purple, the fingers dangling at crazy angles. A white shard of bone poked through between the torn skin of her fingers and where the remnants of her lightsaber hilt had been fused, her knuckles puffed into shapeless dimples.

Bacta patches had been applied to the worst of it, a syringe driven into the swelling just at her wrist when she could still feel it. She'd hoped it'd be enough to stem the tide until they'd reached Naboo's shores and they could somehow, miraculously, save what she'd always known was beyond saving... not wanting to ask the question of, without it, would she still be the same? In reality, all she'd managed to do was slow the fever now making her head swim and the corners of her vision blur in and out of focus. Briana closed her eyes against the burning taking over her skull. She didn’t need a medscanner to tell her the truth, she’d seen enough battlefield wounds to know when the clock was running out.

It was why she'd finally sent a message to Lorn from wherever he'd gone to on the ship, to meet her, alone. To do what couldn’t wait and take the arm mid-way, clean and cauterized, before the infection took more than just her hand.

TAG: Lorn Reingard | FYI: Blaire Sal-Soren , Bastila Sal-Soren | EQUIPMENT: Ligthsaber, Echo Stone, Astor's Dagger

​

 

[Lorn Reingard]

​

The ship's corridors felt narrower than usual. Low ceilings pressed in, and the dim glowpanels barely held back the shadows. The hum of the hyperdrive was constant, a reminder they were leaving Sepan 8 behind, but Lorn knew the worst of the battle had come with them.

His chest burned with every breath. The vibroblade cut into his chest still felt wet when he moved wrong. A jagged gash tore across his left hand, the skin raw and angry beneath the hasty bacta patch the medics had slapped on. They hadn't lingered; too many other bodies needed attention. He'd told them to go, to save the ones still bleeding out.

They'd been unprepared from the first shot fired. The attack, the chaos, and the losses: none of it should have happened. And now, the aftermath was even worse.

Near the medbay, movement caught his eye: a flurry of medtechs clustered around a gurney. In their midst was that infuriatingly familiar face. It was a Sal-Soren, the same woman who'd dropped him with a stun charge on Katabasis like she was swatting an insect. He'd have words for her one day, if she survived this.

She looked utterly wrecked. Her hair was loose, skin pale under the harsh lights. The sight of Bastila nearly stopped him cold. She was half-hidden beneath IV lines and monitors, her chest rising in a shallow, faltering rhythm. A tube snaked from her side into a catch basin that was far too red.

Right outside Bastila's room sat Blaire. He recognized her instantly. Her shoulders were hunched, her gaze distant, as if she were watching something far away that only she could see. He dropped to his knees beside her despite the fire that lanced through his side.

He checked her over, his hands quick and clinical. She had scrapes and bruises, but seemed intact enough to still sit upright. No bleeding that couldn't wait. She barely reacted to his touch, her eyes locked somewhere down the hall.

"She's fighting," Lorn told her quietly, jerking his chin toward Bastila's door. "Your sister's stronger than this day. Stay with her."

Blaire didn't answer, just rose as he did, following his stride down the narrow hall. He didn't slow to argue, not yet. They passed the threshold into the next compartment, and the medbay door slid aside with a soft hiss.

And there was Briana. She was seated on the edge of the cot, robes draped to hide her arm. Almost. The moment his eyes found her hand, the galaxy narrowed to the sound of his own breath.

What was left of her dominant hand didn't look like it belonged to her anymore. It was bloated and broken at unnatural angles, streaked with infection that crawled halfway up her forearm. Bacta strips clung where they could, but it was too far gone for patches and syringes.

Her gaze met his, calm in a way that made his chest ache. There was no fear in it, only resolve. They both knew what needed to be done.

He took one slow step forward, then another. He stopped, not because he needed to, but because it felt wrong to cross the last bit of distance until the moment demanded it.

Without turning his head, he said over his shoulder, his voice low and flat: "Blaire. Go. You don't want to see this."

Briana Sal-Soren | Blaire Sal-Soren | Bastila Sal-Soren | @Blorn Sal-Soren​

 

[Blaire Sal-Soren]

Blaire Ostana Sal-Soren

Is that who I am? She wondered

This again?

Fine.

It was once, why not still?

I’m not what I was once.

I thought the question was ‘who’ not ‘what’

What?

“She’s still fighting, your sister is stronger than this day.”

“What?” Blaire asked stupidly, not understanding. It was as though her brain was full of static. She knew the voice that spoke but could not think to whom it belonged.

Someone was stooped in front of her, she knew that much, though, she could not make out who it was despite their closeness to her. They were little more than some figure blurred and unreadable like trying to make out a face through a glass covered in frost.

The Force?! She thought in a panic for maybe the five-thousandth time. The question came to her over and over as she sat staring into nothingness before being interrupted by whoever was in front of her right now.

They were looking over Blaire’s hurts of which there was none to make concern over. Even her hands so covered in tiny and some not so tiny cuts from crawling through the broken glass to hold on to Bast did not require the figure’s attention. She pulled them away sharply. They responded with a sharp gesture the other direction, right at:

Oh… she thought wearily. Bastila, right.

Behind the grey door of the medbay, her baby sister was fighting for her life and it was no sure thing she would make it through. Blaire had done what she could to help. She was no surgeon but even with an amateur’s eye she had thought that far too many of Bastila’s injuries looked…catastrophic. She had been informed of Bastila’s injuries but she could not recall a single one at the moment.

The overwalk shuddered and swayed as she sat cradling Baby Bast, the sounds of war a million miles away, except, the war was right at their feet. Blaire’s hands, her legs, her boots, were all covered in shards of broken glass and she sobbed a prayer.

“Blessed Shiraya, I…I…

Blessed Shiraya, I have no right. No right at all to come to you again. You gave me my children. You spared their lives and mine. You showed Brandyn the way and he gave me back my Baryn. Through your mercy I have more than I could ever ever hope to deserve. I know…no right…please, you must let Bastila be alive. Blessed Shiraya, please let her be alive.”

Briana found her then, cradling their baby sister, refusing to believe Shiraya would answer her oldest prayer, would give her the ability to keep Bast from falling only to let that, that, creature, yes, that’s what that woman had been. Some sort of monster. How else would that vile woman have been able to put both of her sisters in the medbay? Only to that that creature claim her life. Shiraya would spare her.

The figure rose. Blaire rose too. It didn’t really feel as though it was her decision to do so. It was as if she was on autopilot. Blaire was vaguely aware of walking through the narrow corridor. Twice she was nearly swallowed by the wake of frenzied packs of people rushing from here to there dealing no doubt with life or death. The figure she followed had a way of causing these packs to part that she just did not care to possess.

It was some miracle that she kept pace with whoever it was but she did.

It was she thought the smell that broke her malaise.

“Blaire. Go. You don’t want to see this.” Said the figure who turned out to be Lorn.

“Shiraya’s breath, Briana.” Blaire said ignoring Lorn. “That’s disgusting.” She did her best to sound casual as though Bri was merely going to be given a splint and some pain meds and sent on her way. Blaire knew better. It bears repeating that Blaire was not a surgeon but this was not her first warzone and she knew a lost cause when she saw one.

He meant well.

They always mean well.

Blaire was less than an hour ago wet to the elbow in her little sister’s blood, desperate to keep her alive, terrified of her failure. She would be happy to stay here and support her older sister. This was something she could do and she would be run off by a bit of blood.

| Outfit: xxx | Tag: Briana Sal-Soren Bastila Sal-Soren Lorn Reingard Brandyn Sal-Soren | Equipment: xxx |​

 

[Briana Sal-Soren]

She looked up at Blaire's words then, her face dead-white and sheened with a cold sweat that had soaked her dark chestnut hair and the front of her tunic. "Don't sugar coat it for me, or anything" Briana huffed in a hoarse voice, giving a feeble attempt to try and crack a smile that was more resignation than mirth. Her gaze flicked past Lorn and fixed squarely on her sister. "Let her stay, if she wants."

With exquisite care, Briana gingerly shift and use her left hand to pull back her cloak, revealing more of the ruined hand that she'd been keeping concealed and cradled in her lap. "Bring that table over here," Briana said, forcing the dryness in her throat down as she nodded toward the steel prep table tucked into the corner of the room.

When the table was dragged and settled beside her, Briana lifted her gaze back to Blaire. “Thank you,” she managed, unaccustomed to this feeling of vulnerability, of being forced to lean on others like this...on Blaire, in particular. For so long, their lives had been a tangled mess of rivalry, misunderstandings, and unspoken bitterness, each of them pulled in different directions. The Force had chosen her, not Blaire, and they'd let that wedge drive them further and further apart as the years stretched on. But, between Bastila's life hanging in the balance, the exhaustion from the rigors of the day, and the sickness and fever settling into her bones, none of it seemed to matter.

Stubborn will all but melted away, leaving room enough to admit that she needed her sister, needed the other life who'd been born beside her. "When he does it…" she began, using her left hand to position her arm across the table. "I might not stay conscious. If that happens —" she broke off, murmuring something beneath her breath that might have been a curse or a prayer, eyes squeezing shut for a heartbeat before she forced them open again. No longer did she possesses the strength to draw on the Force and wall away the agony, to keep the feeling of the fire from lancing up her arm. "—I'll need you to catch me."

Looking back to Lorn, her chin dipped once, a firm, deliberate nod that sent a stray strand of sweat-dampened hair sliding across her pale cheek. Her lips pressed into a thin line, her chest rising and falling in shallow rhythm as she forced the words past the tightness in her throat. "Do it... just above the elbow should be enough."

TAG: Lorn Reingard , Blaire Sal-Soren | EQUIPMENT: Echo Stone, Astor's Dagger

​

 

[Lorn Reingard]

​

Lorn stood rooted in the narrow space between the sisters, he felt the quiet courage in Briana's eyes, the jagged tremor of Blaire's voice, and the fragile threads still binding them despite the recent carnage.

He had seen too many wounds like this: fever creeping, flesh decaying, lives slowly claimed. This was no longer a battlefield decision, but a clear, unrelenting matter of survival. He despised the role, always holding the blade, always the one who had to sever limb from body or flesh from flame when there was no other choice.

His throat felt too tight to swallow, his chest burning as if his own wounds had reopened. His gaze flickered from Briana's shattered hand to Blaire's pale, drawn face, then back again. This was a moment that would burn into all three of them. Lorn knew it with the bitter certainty that he would dream of it repeatedly in the years ahead.

He took one deliberate step closer, careful that his boots didn't scrape the deck and break the fragile silence. His hand slipped beneath his robe, closing around the familiar weight of his weapon. The hilt was warm against his palm, his calloused fingers curling around its ridges. He drew it free.

For a long moment, he just stood there, lightsaber angled low, not yet ignited. His expression held a mix of resolve and sorrow. His usually steady eyes flickered with doubt as they moved between the sisters. This was not a contest or a triumph, it was a profound breaking.

"I've done this before," his voice soft, almost too quiet for the ship's hum. The words, a confession rather than reassurance, hung heavy and raw. He then shifted his stance, squaring himself against what he knew had to follow.

The next breath he drew shook faintly in his chest.

With a snap-hiss, the blade sprang to life, a bar of brilliant light casting sharp shadows across the cramped medbay. The hum filled the silence, thrumming low in his bones, too alive for the stillness of the room.

Lorn's gaze flicked once to Blaire, meeting hers with a silent warning, a plea for steadiness. Then, back to Briana. He gave her that look, the one soldiers gave each other before stepping into fire. No masks, no lies. Just the unspoken truth: this would be agony, and it would be final.

He drew a steady, controlled breath, centering himself against the tremor of his own chest wound. Both hands closed around the hilt.

One last, small nod.

The blade arced down in a clean, practiced motion. The air cracked with the scent of scorched flesh and metal as light met flesh. For a heartbeat, the world was nothing but the blinding flare, the hiss of vaporized blood, and the sound that tore the air.

And then, silence. The saber hummed on, but the deed was done.

Briana Sal-Soren | Blaire Sal-Soren​

 

[Blaire Sal-Soren]

"When he does it…" Briana began, using her left hand to position her arm across the table. Blaire made an awkward gesture, as though she was moving to help but changed her mind halfway.

"I might not stay conscious. If that happens —" she broke off, murmuring something beneath her breath that might have been a curse or a prayer, eyes squeezing shut for a heartbeat before she forced them open again. "—I'll need you to catch me."


A new unease settled over Blaire. She was so used to Briana being the steady one, the strong one. Her, Briana, Brandyn, they were triplets yes but Briana was the oldest and there was never any mistaking it. Even growing up, as loath as Blaire ever would've been to admit it, even now she would deny it to her death but there had always been some level of comfort knowing that Bri was there. That she was heir.

"First time for everything," she quipped. Whether she referred to Briana admitting she needed her or the fact that Blaire was there to be relied upon at all, was up to interpretation.

In the brilliant glow of the lightsaber, her eyes met Lorn's for a moment. She could see him try and will her to be ready. Her gaze turned sharp and hard as a blade. He thought her some squeamish rich girl, the little ballerina with no stomach for the real world, that stung more than it should.

For all he knew, for all anyone but the smallest handful knew, that was the truth of her, and really she would do better to remember it and lean into it. Her life in The New Way, the things she had helped achieve, the things she had done, she should be grateful none of them knew. Grateful that this Jedi thought her unaccustomed and unprepared for blood, for the pain, for the sacrifice of being a hero.

No matter how wrong he was.

His strike was pure precision. Blaire didn't even have time to marvel at how quick and clean a cut it was, or rue not having more lightsabers on Jakku, the amputations she performed with those worn down, overused bone saws in the war zone had left her shoulders aching for days after.

Briana's knees sagged, Blaire was right there, she shoved her arms under Briana's, grabbing a handful of her sister's robes, she bent her own knees for balance and strained to keep Bri on her feet, not sure if she was still conscious or not.

"Looks better already," she told no one in particular.

| Outfit: xxx | Tag: Lorn Reingard Briana Sal-Soren | Equipment: xxx |​

 

[Briana Sal-Soren]

"I've done this before," his voice soft, almost too quiet for the ship's hum. The words, a confession rather than reassurance, hung heavy and raw. He then shifted his stance, squaring himself against what he knew had to follow.

I have too.

She thought grimly, Justice’s face surfacing unbidden out of her sea of memories like a summoned specter. Barely sixteen, she'd been more girl than woman, still carrying the illusions of invincibility that youth offered. The Sith Spawn they'd hunted had nearly ended her life that day, and likely would have, if Justice hadn't fought to intervene. For the first time in Briana's life, she'd been faced with the truth she was not invincible, that choices carried weight. That some demanded a price paid in blood. She recalled that day so clearly, including the way the blade had shook violently in her hands; so badly, she'd barely been able to keep hold of the thing as she followed through on the deed. The wretching and emptying of her stomach, had promptly followed after.

There was no such hesitation, fear, or tremor in Lorn as he paced forward. For that, she was grateful and saddened.

The irony of the moment wasn't lost on her, but if this was the price demanded of her in exchange for Bastila’s life, then she would pay it without protest. These pieces of herself, she would always give of herself for them.

Resting back into the warmth of her sisters embrace, she set her gaze to fix on the ceiling above. Her head continued to swim, heavy and light and hot, all at once — her senses narrowing in on the smallest of details surrounding her. The faint scuffle of Lorn’s boots, the steady breath of her sister, the duel scents of dust and sterile bacta intermingling in the air, the snap-hiss of the blade that would take her arm.

Several seconds passed until the strike was at last delivered, sure and swift. A bolt of heat shot through her arm from the point of impact and up through her shoulder and neck, like an arrow being loosed through the center of the basin of her bones. She could hear voices muttering, but was unable to make them out as the ship, and all that encompassed her, became instantaneously dark at the borders of her vision, taking the edge off the pain, but crumbling the rest of the world into a blackness without end, the harrowing deed finished.

------------------------------------------------
​

There’d been no telling how long she’d slept, or what day it was, when her eyes finally opened. It might have been the same day, for all she knew. Time had lost all meaning after she’d passed out on the ship, whether from fever of the infection, or the suddenness of her arm being severed from her body. The truth likely existed somewhere in the middle, dragged into the merciful dark where pain and memory could not follow.

The room to her window was open, the gauze curtain fluttering gently in Naboo's summer breeze as she tried to prop herself up on her elbows. The effort was clumsy at best, and her body awkwardly titled to the right, confusion flashing hot through her chest before the truth slammed into her. Her right arm wasn’t there, just a bandage wrapped stump in its place.

The instinct to brace on it had been automatic, the way breathing was automatic, and the absence was a hollow, staggering void. The amputee froze, taking a staggering breath and holding it as the acceptance of it all cascaded around her with brutal clarity. Slowly, she let that breath back out, her chest and body sagging into the pillows of her hospital bed.

There was no regret in the choice she'd made. She'd been a sister, and she'd been a Jedi. Sacrifice was the ultimate duty of both those vocations. Yet, she found that conviction did nothing to ease the sullen weight crushing into her chest. Raising her remaining hand shakily, Briana covered her eyes as the tears began to swell and stream down her sun-kissed cheeks. Each forced breath hitched within her chest, uneven and ragged, her body rebelling at what it'd been made to surrender.

TAG: Lorn Reingard , Blaire Sal-Soren | EQUIPMENT: Echo Stone, Astor's Dagger

​