You Must (Not) Let Go

Part 2

The wastebasket clattered impotently against the closed door. It didn’t make her feel any better. Unsurprisingly. And now there was trash littering her floor. Bastila let out a frustrated breath and frowned. Should she go after Sera, get her to talk about what she had said? She couldn’t have gotten far. Bastila dug her toes into the rug that they’d picked out together when they’d moved into the apartment, feeling the pile beneath her feet as she thought. No, she said she needed time to cool down and Bastila would respect that.

What had gotten into her, anyway, saying things like that? Whatever it was, Bastila wanted to find whoever was responsible and give them a piece of her mind. Bloody Jedi. What did they say to her? The wastebasket had come to a rest close to her foot after it had fallen to the floor and she gave it a good kick, bouncing it off the door. She changed her mind. That did make her feel better.

She picked up the wastebasket, collecting the trash back into it (she hadn’t made too much of a dent in the door, it was fine, no one would notice) and setting it back next to the entrance where it belonged. Then she stored Sera’s uneaten pastry safely away in the fridge for when she got home and set to tidying up their apartment, diverting her anger and frustration into something more positive as her therapist, Ayla, had suggested. She dusted the various knick-knacks and trinkets that she’d inherited from her mother after her passing, put away the groceries that Sera had brought home and collected their dirty laundry that they’d left strewn on the floor the night before. They could walk down to the laundromat together later when Sera got back.

Bastila huffed in annoyance. Why did she decide that she had to go all the way to Dua Sovv’s place to cool down? Why couldn’t she have just run laps around the station until she collapsed or just sat stewing in the Hawk until she felt better? Bastila checked the chrono on the kitchen wall. It hadn’t been that long. She should have gone with. It was boring being stuck here without her partner. Slipping on a pair of shoes and a jacket, she checked herself in the mirror to make sure she looked decent and made her way down to the hangar.

And, of course, the Ebon Hawk was gone, its berth standing vast and empty in front of her. It had only been a distant possibility that Sera had not left yet, had changed her mind and had gone on a long walk instead, but she was still a little disappointed. Sighing, she turned around and walked back out of the hangar complex, wondering what she was going to do for the next several hours. A thought occurred to her when she saw the hangar’s security attendant ambling back to their post eating a sandwich and she diverted to intercept them.

“Excuse me,” she said, holding up her hand to catch their attention. “I don’t suppose you’ve noticed any odd ships docking here today? Any unusual visitors to the station?”

The attendant looked at her like she was mental. “Don’t ask me, lady,” he said, mouth full of sandwich. “I just watch ‘em. I don’t count ‘em.”

“No, I was wondering if you’d noticed a…” She paused, uncertain if she wanted to draw too much attention to Sera and herself. “If you happened to notice a Jedi anywhere on the station today,” she said, making her voice soft even though there was nobody else nearby that could hear her.

He guffawed, spraying her with soggy bread crumbs. “Sure, there must have been ten or twenty of them all come to have tea with the station manager!” He chuckled merrily at his own joke.

“Alright, fine.” Bastila swatted the crumbs from her shirt and turned away. This is why I leave the questions to Sera. She stomped back to the elevator, held it open for a harried-looking office worker, and rode the way up to the residential level with the other woman in silence.

Exiting the elevator with a polite greeting, she stood looking down their road in thought. Was it worth asking around more for someone who had most likely left after harassing Sera? Skybase wasn’t an especially large station but it was still a rather significant area for one woman on foot to search on her own. Particularly when she didn’t have a name or visual description to work with. Bastila clicked her tongue in frustration. She wished she had thought to ask Sera about the Jedi who had bothered her but things had gotten out of hand so quickly and it hadn’t seemed all that important at the time. It clearly hadn’t been someone she recognized but that was next to meaningless. Bastila wondered if it had been anyone she knew or knew of.

She sighed and the sigh turned into a yawn. Today wasn’t really the best day to play detective, not when she was still tired from the declogging from hell. The light from the artificial sun was starting to give her a headache anyway. She strolled back to their apartment, stretching out on the couch after removing her shoes and jacket. She’d have a quick nap, then lunch, and, by that point, it hopefully wouldn’t be long before Sera got home and they could have a proper talk.

~~~

A loud banging jerked her awake. It was dark and for a moment she didn’t know where she was. What time was it? Had the station had a power failure? She fumbled for the lamp behind her head, blinking in pain at the sudden brightness. Her neck was stiff and sore from the uncomfortable angle she’d been sleeping at, her head groggy. She glanced at the chrono on the wall. It was late. Where was Sera?

The banging registered itself as someone knocking on the door. “Just give me a minute!” Had Sera locked herself out?

Bastila shuffled to the door, wondering what had taken Sera so long. Had they forgotten to refuel the Hawk? But it wasn’t Sera at the door. Tara Bima and Vani stood outside, him fidgeting a little with his schoolbag as he stood next to his grandmother.

“I’m sorry, dear. Are we early?” Mrs Bima said smiling kindly, eyeing Bastila’s dishevelled appearance.

Bastila stuck her head out the door, quickly scanning the rest of the road. “Where’s Sera?” she blurted out.

Mrs Bima blinked. “I thought she was with you. Didn’t she come home this morning?”

She shook her head, heart pounding. “No, no, she didn’t… I mean, she did but then she went out and I stayed here and she isn’t back…”

Mrs Bima bent done and said something to Vani in a soft voice. He nodded and manoeuvered past Bastila, depositing his bag on the counter and switching the kettle as well as a few lights on. Bastila felt a comforting hand on her shoulder.

“Let’s go back inside, dear, and you can tell me what happened over a nice cup of tea. How’s about that?”

Bastila allowed herself to be guided inside and to the couch. Vani was muttering to himself quietly as he searched through cupboards for tea and mugs.

“There was a…” Bastila stopped herself short. How was she going to explain what happened without revealing too much? “We… we had an argument,” she said carefully, “that got a little out of hand.” I should have said something different to her. Why didn’t I know how to answer her? “She took the ship the ship out for a run to cool down and she hasn’t come back since then. That was this morning.” Her leg was bouncing up and down by the time she finished, jittery with emotion. “There’s hot chocolate behind the tea if you would prefer that, Vani,” she said to the boy.

He smiled shyly and reached back into the cupboard. His grandmother made a thoughtful noise in the back of her throat.

“You know, dear, people don’t come home for all kinds of reasons. She might have decided to stay someplace overnight or is safe with friends…”

Bastila was already shaking her head. “She wouldn’t do that. Our friends all live too far away anyway. But she wouldn’t do that.” She twisted her hands together. “Not without telling me first.”

Mrs Bima cocked her head. “Did she not call at all? Tell you of a change to her plans?”

“No, there wasn’t any…” Bastila stopped. Was she so certain Sera had made no attempt to contact her while she slept the day away? “I’m not sure.”

“Well, don’t just sit there, dear. Check your calls!”

She moved to the comm unit with the older woman behind her flapping her hands to get her to hurry up. Sure enough, the indicator light was on with a missed call from a listing that Bastila didn’t recognise for a second until she remembered where Sera had been headed. Hoping that someone would still be there to take her call, she keyed in the information for Dua Sovv’s parts yard.

“Erm, hello? Dua Sovv? It’s Bastila Shan.”

“Hey, girly, you lucky you caught me. I was about to close up for the night. Something wrong with the pump? Or are you calling to thank me for the effusiveness of your girlfriend’s apology?” There was a not unkind snickering on the other end.

“No, Dua, she didn’t come home! So you definitely saw her today? She definitely came by your store?”

“Uh, but, what… Huh?” She heard Dua move suddenly and what sounded like a stack of files being knocked to the ground. “But that was this morning! What do you mean she didn’t come home?”

Bastila took a deep breath, Dua’s panic mirroring her own a little too closely. “I took a nap after Sera left and overslept. When I awoke not too long ago she was still not home. And I was… I was wondering if you knew anything about it. If you knew where she might be.” There was a soft touch to her hand as Vani handed her a hot mug of tea. She took a grateful sip, the fragrant liquid soothing her frayed nerves.

Dua sighed. “I am so sorry, Bastila. I know how much it hurts when family members make you worry about them. Uh, yeah, she was here earlier this morning about buying a grinder pump for one of you kids’ jobs. She said you two had had a fight and I offered her the use of this comm to call and apologise but she said the call didn’t go through. She left soon after that. She, uh, seemed a little down. Said something about a bad thing she’d done in the past?”

Bastila tensed, suddenly very aware of their neighbour and her grandson sitting only metres away listening to their conversation.

“Uh, she didn’t go into specifics,” Dua continued. “I told her not to worry too hard about it, there are far worse people out there than anything she could have done. Um. I’m not betraying any confidences here, am I?”

“No, I know all about Sera’s past. It’s not an issue between us. Not on my end, anyway,” she said, a sour feeling in her stomach at the “far worse people” comment. “How, how was she? When she left you?”

“More upbeat, although I know people struggling with things don’t always show how they’re really feeling.” There was a pause. “Uh, whatever happens, you have my condolences.”

“Thanks, Dua,” she said a little stiffly. I don’t even want to know what you meant by that.

“Um, if I hear anything or if she comes back this way, I’ll tell you, okay?”

They said their goodbyes and hung up. Bastila took a healthy swig of her tea and turned back to face her guests. Vani was sitting at the kitchen counter, his short legs swinging from a stool as he worked on something in front of him. His history project, of course, I forgot. His grandmother, however, was looking at Bastila with a speculative look in her eye. Bastila wondered how long it would be before gossip about Sera Khan’s mysterious misdeeds began to make the rounds around the station.

“Well, you heard all that,” she said awkwardly. “I’m sorry, Vani, I don’t think either of us will be able to help you with your project tonight. I’m going to have to… Well, I suppose I’m going to spend the rest of the night reporting Sera’s disappearance.” She put a hand to her forehead and closed her eyes, suddenly tired, trying to remember the proper procedure for reporting a missing persons. I can’t believe this is happening. This doesn’t seem real.

“Where are you going to report it to, dear?” Mrs Bima said, gentle sympathy in her voice. “I don’t think station security will be of much help.”

Bastila let out a long breath and sank back down onto the couch. That was a good question.

“Um…” Bollocks. “I suppose I’ll need to go to the system capital on Garqi and report it there. But I’m not really familiar with the planet.” And how the hell am I going to get there without a ship?

“My daughter and her family lives there and we pop down to visit quite often, don’t we, Vani?” The little boy nodded. “Why don’t I come with you? The city center can get quite confusing.”

Bastila sighed in relief. “Would you? Are you sure it isn’t too much trouble?”

“Of course not. There’s a regular shuttle that should be leaving in about,” she checked the delicate chrono around her wrist, “twenty minutes, a bit more as it tends to run a bit behind schedule. We can be at a station in a little over an hour.”

~~~

They left Vani with his homework after asking their neighbour on the other side to check up on him occasionally and promising the boy that they would be back in a few hours. Bastila collected the information she needed. Sera had, naturally, taken her ID with her in her wallet when she left but Bastila still had the copy that they had made when registering to live in the system. She dug in the box at the back of her cupboard. Her fingers ran over the edges of a thick folder and the cold metal of the other item in the bottom of the box until she found the thinner folder she was looking for and pulled out the correct document.

The transport wasn’t the fastest in the world but it did its job and Mrs Bima was skillfully guiding Bastila through a maze-like web of public transport in no time. Bastila thought, as the train car they were on rumbled under her feet, that she could probably find her own way with the aid of her slightly rusty training but it was good to have someone with her, to not need to be alone. A nudge to her shoulder told her it was time to move and she followed Mrs Bima off the train and through city streets still crowded with people even this late in the evening.

They ducked into a building and Bastila blinked when she realized that they’d reached their destination. Bastila hadn’t been in many police stations in her life, just the once when all the apprentices got called in to attend a seminar for a drug awareness campaign that the local government on Dantooine had run when she was younger, and she hadn’t expected this one to look so much like a post office. She hurried up to catch up to Mrs Bima who had gone on ahead. There weren’t too many people inside and they were able to walk straight up to a counter without having to wait.

“Go on, dear,” Mrs Bima said softly, giving Bastila a pat on the shoulder. “I’m right here with you.”

“Thank you,” she said, feeling a slight flush of embarrassment on her cheeks. “Um, excuse me?”

She caught the attention of a tired uniformed human rubbing their eyes. “Yeah, how can I help you?”

“I’d like to report the disappearance of my partner?” Bastila pushed the documents she’d brought with her across the counter. “She left home this morning just after nine and should have been back before two this afternoon but… she hasn’t. Come home.”

The officer glanced over the documents. “We only needed a recent photo, not the ID.” They yawned, being polite enough to cover their mouth. “Where was she headed when she disappeared?” they said, reaching under the counter to retrieve some forms.

“Uh, well, she had reached the parts yard just outside Minashee and was...”

The officer was shaking their head. “You can’t report her disappearance here if she didn’t go missing planetside.” They stowed the forms back under the counter. “You’re going to have to report it in the sector capital.”

Bastila was flabbergasted. “Uh, but…”

Mrs Bima banged her tiny fists on the counter. “But why not? She lives in this system!”

“Not our jurisdiction, lady. Anything happens out on the space lanes, you got to deal with the assholes on Cassander.”

With that, the officer turned away and went back to what they were doing before the two of them walked in, leaving them standing lost and confused. They stood like that for a moment, dumbfounded, then Mrs Bima took Bastila by the arm and guided her outside.

They made the journey back to the spaceport in silence, Bastila’s mind churning with what they had learned. Every hour she got delayed with unnecessarily complicated procedure was an extra hour that took Sera further from her. Unless she was already… Panic stricken, Bastila pressed a hand to her chest, desperate to untangle the thread of Sera’s heartbeat from her own, to make sure that she wasn’t alone in this galaxy. It was difficult, her own erratic heartbeat muddying the shadow of a second heartbeat that she’d felt within her ever since she’d first saved Sera’s life, but it was there. Sera wasn’t… She was still alive. Now Bastila just had to find her.

“Of all the useless trips!” Mrs Bima raised her hands up to the heavens as they stood in the queue for the ticket counter and flopped them down in frustration. “I can't believe they wouldn't help us. What are you going to do now, dear?”

Bastila took a deep breath. “There’s not much I can do at the moment other than book a flight to Cassander and hope I have better luck there.” She ran a quick mental calculation of the contents of her wallet. She had enough for the trip there and back but travelling was expensive when not in possession of a ship of one’s own.

“Are you sure? It’s getting late and that must be at least a five hour trip.”

It would be quicker if I had the Hawk at my disposal… “Yes, I’m certain. I can sleep on the transport and…” She shrugged. “I don’t want to waste any more time.”

Mrs Bima pulled her into an unexpected hug. “It’s going to be alright, dear. We’ll find her.”

Bastila stiffened, then relaxed into the older woman’s embrace. “Thank you.”

~~~

Sera’s thumbs dug into the tired muscles of Bastila’s shoulders, releasing the aching tension contained within.

“...you know, I don’t mind a happy ending and all but this felt kinda blegh and cheap. Like it hadn’t been earned, you know.”

Bastila smiled, the hot water of the shower sluicing down her body, rinsing the remains of soap and leaf slime from her naked skin. Her beloved was nattering on about a book she’d read, apparently a less than impressive one.

“I stayed up the whole night reading it too! ...Hope I didn’t wake you.” Bastila felt soft lips leave a gentle kiss on the back of her neck. “Sorry.”

“Is that what you were grumbling and thrashing about for last night?” Bastila snorted. “I thought you were having another nightmare. Why the hell did you stay up reading it if you didn’t like it?”

“Because it had a really good beginning!” Sera began gesticulating, splashing hot water around the cramped confines of the shower. “She was strutting around town like, grr, I’m a badass, and then wham! She hits this chick with her speeder and is all broken and frightened and pathetic and crying and you think ooo! Where’s the story going to go next? But then it ends with her sister berating the chick for getting mad about her hiding the accident and then it’s over like that’s happy or something? Like, oh no! It’s so bad that you’re upset that this woman that’s been wooing you lied about being the one who broke all the bones in your body and almost killed you!” She sighed dramatically and slipped an arm around Bastila’s waist, resting her chin on her shoulder, her breasts pressed against Bastila’s back. “It was really frustrating, babe.”

Bastila laughed, her whole body shaking with mirth. Wooing? “Oh, love,” she said, reaching back to caress the smooth skin of Sera’s backside. “If that’s the worst thing to happen to us this year, then we aren’t doing too badly.”

The judder that ran through the ship jostled Bastila awake. A small child was kicking the back of her seat repeatedly, grumpy and over-tired from a too-long trip, their parent sprawled uncomfortably in the hard seat next to them. Bastila put a hand to the back of her neck. It was sore and cramping from the awkward angle she’d fallen asleep at. She checked her chrono. They must have docked with the shuttle terminal orbiting the planet. The overhead lights flicked on, stabbing her in the eyes with their bright illumination, the small child squawking in sympathy behind her. Bastila gathered the few items that she’d brought with her as an announcement over the PA system announced their arrival. She shuffled into the queue to disembark, eternally grateful that Mrs Bima had pushed a vending machine sandwich into her hands before they said their goodbyes. She was still exhausted and her head was aching and she needed to find a bathroom as soon as she was able to get off the ship but her stomach was no longer trying to eat itself on top of all that.

It didn’t take long for her to book passage on a shuttle down to the surface and work her way through the busy streets of the planetary capital to her destination once her bodily needs were taken care of. The entrance to this police station was more grand. Not ornate but it definitely had more of a presence than either the main station on Garqi or there own little security office on Skybase Station. Bastila entered the building, uncertain whether the busy atmosphere of the station was a good or a bad thing for her situation.

“Excuse me, Officer…” she checked their badge, “Daro…”

The desk sergeant looked up, the annoyed look on his face shifting to something that Bastila presumed was meant to be charming as he looked her over. “Why, hello there. What can the fine officers of Cassander do for you today?”

Bastila sighed, remembering the desk officer on Garqi’s comment about “assholes”. She placed the copy of Sera’s ID on the desk in front of him. “I’m here to report the disappearance of my partner. She was on her way back from a parts yard near Minashee to our home on Skybase Station but she didn’t make it home. I would like for you to find her.”

Officer Daro barely glanced at the document before pushing it back towards Bastila. “Skybase Station is in the Garqi system, isn’t it? I’m afraid you’ll have to report it to them.”

Of all the…! Bastila pushed the document back in front of the man with a little more force than necessary. “I reported it there. They told me that it wasn’t their jurisdiction and that I had to come to you.”

The man sighed and begrudgingly took the document as if he were doing her a great favour. “Well, your first problem is that this copy is no good. We need the original ID.” He offered it back to her with a smarmy smile. “Don’t feel too bad. It’s a common mistake.”

Bastila could feel a vein beginning to throb in her forehead. “I was told that a recent photo was enough.” She tapped angrily at the sheet of flimsi. “That’s all you need to do your job!”

“Did the bumpkins on Garqi tell you that?” Officer Daro laughed. “You’d think with all the caf they grow there that they could wake up for long enough to actually do their job.” He made a rude, buffoonish face that Bastila presumed was meant to mock his counterpart and laughed at his own crude joke.

Bastila calculated the satisfaction of dragging this man bodily over his desk to teach him a lesson versus the hassle it would cause. “Would a certified print of a service record suffice?” Heaven help him if he said no. I am not going to traipse all the way back home and waste more than half a day that could be spent looking for Sera because of some man’s ego!

He shrugged. “Yeah, sure. Why not.”

Bastila turned, not waiting for him to say anything else, and marched out of the station. She thought she had seen a public communications booth on her walk from the terminal, she just had to find it.

It turned out that the booth was almost all the way back to the shuttle terminal. Bastila fed some credits into the machine, keyed in the requisite contact information and waited for the call to connect.

A neat young woman in a uniform flickered into view. “You have reached the offices of the Admiralty of the Navy of the Galactic Republic. How may I help you?”

“This is Bastila Shan.” She rattled off her security code. “Could you connect me through to Captain Onasi on the Ascendency? It’s very important.”

“Oh, um, Ms Shan? That code no longer works. It was retired after you--”

Her stomach clenched. “I know. Please, I just need to speak with Carth Onasi. It’s an emergency.”

The young woman sighed and muttered something under her breath. Then she typed something quickly into her console. “I’m putting you through now. Don’t do this again.”

The other woman’s image dissolved into static and Bastila heard the sound of her call being redirected. “Thank you. I won’t.” Then she waited for Carth to pick up, her head getting increasingly sore in the midday sun. She squinted and rubbed her tired eyes, then stifled a yawn. She hated travelling between systems with different timezones. It always left her feeling for too similar to the single time that Mission had convinced her and Juhani to sample something blue and fruity and far more alcoholic than it tasted, under the false impression that Force-sensitives didn’t get drunk. Or hungover.

The call clicked over and Carth Onasi’s form appeared in the blue light of the communications booth, rumpled and half-dressed. “Hey, Bastila. What’s this about an emergency?”

“I’m sorry, did I wake you?” Bastila spied a shape on Carth’s bed that looked not unlike another person under the covers. Her lips quirked. “Did I interrupt something?”

Carth pulled the comm unit around by its base until an inoffensive was all she could see of his sleeping quarters. “Never you mind that,” he said, his cheeks turning a slightly darker blue in the monochromatic display.

Bastila bit back a smile. I can’t wait to tell Sera this. She’ll be so amused after… Reality hit her like a physical blow, winding her. She couldn’t tell Sera what had happened. There was no Sera to tell.

“Bastila?”

“Sera’s gone missing. Um…” She swallowed thickly and shook herself, standing up straighter to focus on the task at hand. “I need you to send me a certified print of her service record so that I can file a missing person report.”

“What! How? Why? When?” The words came out quickly, Carth clearly as flustered by the situation as she was. “What do you mean? How did she go missing? How did this happen?”

Bastila took a deep breath. How many more times am I going to have to repeat this story? “We had a small argument this morning, or rather yesterday morning now, and she left to get a part for a job while she cooled down. I called after she hadn’t come back and she definitely reached her destination and was on her way back…” Was she truly though? “Um… Anyway, the officer on duty is being a nuisance about what information I need to produce and that’s why I need you to send the print though.”

“Yeah, sure,” he said as he reached into a drawer for a keycard. “I’m, uh, surprised you don’t have a print yourself already. I mean, wouldn’t that be the kind of information you would want to keep with you when you retire into civilian life?”

“Yes, well, I do have the original. As in the very first one?” she said as tactfully as possible, mindful of being in a public space.

Carth frowned and shrugged as he pulled up the file on his system. “Yeah?”

Bastila sighed. So much for subtlety. “I have the original file from when she first entered the Republic military? With all of her information?” Well, all of the information that we could collect anyway… “Besides, that file is five hours away from me at the moment.”

“Five…! Where the hell are you?” Carth peered around her as if he would be able to see more of her location than the projector captured.

“Cassander. There was some nonsense about jurisdiction and space lanes…” Bastila rubbed her eyes, suddenly feeling very tired. “It is a long story.”

“You can fill me in on the details some other time then.” He pressed a few more buttons and inserted the keycard into a slot. “This just needs to finish authorizing before I can transmit it.”

Bastila let out a weary breath and fed a few more credit chips into the machine to stop the call from disconnecting. “Would you mind telling the others what happened? I don’t think I can face repeating myself again when I still have to give a statement and…” A thought struck her. Bugger. “And I’m going to have to call all of our clients to explain why I’m pushing all of their jobs back. And find a ship...” And rent some equipment until we find the Hawk and absorb the cost of a very expensive grinder pump, as well as put out the money for another pump unless I can push the Pashna job back far enough, rearrange some other jobs and only complete after Sera comes home. Damn it all to hell.

Carth typed a final command in and Bastila heard the booth’s internal printer whir to life. “Sure, not a problem. I’ll pass Sera’s description around the Fleet too. She can’t have gotten so far that the whole Republic Navy can’t find her.”

Bastila bent to retrieve the printout, not trusting her voice at the moment. It looked very official with its embossed flimsi and the embedded holographic certification seal. She dug in her pocket and paid the printing fee. “Thank you, Carth. I’m sorry, I wish I could stay and catch up but…”

Carth waved her apologies away. “You go do what you need to do and, look, thanks for telling me, Bastila.” With that, he waved goodbye and ended the call. Bastila collected her change from the machine and strode briskly back the way she came, careful not to damage or crease the precious printout.

She walked straight up to the front desk, hoping that a different officer might be on shift (no such luck), and plopped the service record in front of Officer Daro, who was playing a game on his datapad.

“Is that good enough for you?” she demanded.

Officer Daro sighed and inspected the document, making a face as though it had been found wanting. “It’ll do,” he said begrudgingly. “You know, I’m not supposed to accept anything but original identification documents but,” he smiled his greasy smile, “I’m sure I can make an exception for such a pretty lady.” He inspected Sera’s record more thoroughly. “Oh, a former cop!”

Bastila blinked. “Yes, that’s right.” She’d forgotten about the former career they’d made up for Sera, particularly since Sera herself seemed to have mentally rejected not long after regaining full consciousness. She glanced at the image on the record of a Sera Khan in police uniform, a stern, no-nonsense set to her face that looked so alien on her features as to be almost comical. Bastila remembered the day that photo had been taken, Sera propped up against screen, naked except for underwear and a catheter from the waist down, the skin of her left leg a patchwork of stitches and bruises from multiple surgeries, a mass of wires just out of sight of the camera running out of the back of her head, controlling her facial expression and stopping her from drooling all over herself, the left side of her face still subtly swollen from the insertion of her new eye the week prior, the--

Officer Daro slapped the desk, jerking Bastila back to the present. “Well, why didn’t you say so?” he said far too cheerfully. He turned to cabinet behind his desk and fished out some forms and presented them to Bastila to fill out. “At least I know that you have a thing people in uniform now.”

Bastila snatched the form away and reached for the provided stylus, a scathing remark sitting heavily on her tongue waiting to be released. She took a deep breath and began filling in the form, the stylus digging into the flimsi with the force of her ire. As if she deserved any less notice because of her career choices!

“Deralia… Where’s that?” Officer Daro was apparently still perusing Sera’s record.

“Tammuz sector. It’s a long way from here,” she said flatly. Did she have to list all of Sera’s scars? You could barely see most of them…

“Oh, another bumpkin… So where are you from, sweetheart?”

“None of your business.” You don’t get to call me that!

“Hmm, fine… bitch,” he finished under his breath, loud enough for her to hear but quietly enough to be able to claim that she’d misheard him if she made an issue of it.

She kept her head down, refusing to be baited. There wasn’t much more of the form to be completed. She left out their argument when writing her descriptions of the events that had led to her being in this station. Knowing Officer Asshole, it would only confuse the issue. She scratched her hand absent-mindedly and scanned the document, trying to think of any other information that could be of use to them. After some hesitation, she added their home address and contact details. She knew that Officer Daro was going to misuse that information but it was a necessary evil. She included Dua Sovv’s contact information, as well as a full description of the Ebon Hawk and its registration number. Bollocks, was she going to have to file a report about missing ship as well?

Giving it one last read through to make certain that she hadn’t missed anything or made any spelling errors, she handed the completed form back to Officer Daro.

“Is there anything else you need from me?”

He glanced over it, hmming and hawing at the information. “Not that I can see but I’m sure I’ll think of something soon,” he said with a lewd wink. He took the precious printout, made a copy of it on the rickety copier behind him, scrunched up the original and threw it in the trash.

“Hey!”

“Hmm?” Officer Daro gave her a smarmy grin. “Is there anything else you need from me?”

The loud bang of the entrance doors being kicked open saved him from a punch straight to his smug face. A heavy duffle bag skidded through the doorway, followed by a large, muscular form carrying a struggling Rodian under one arm and another over their shoulder. The figure sauntered casually inside and the stray duffle bag lifted off the tiled floor to join its brethren floating behind the intruder. Bastila stared in disbelief, then growled under her breath.

Aleran Staulkie, apparently-Knighted Jedi Guardian and number one saber deflection champion, Year 6, jostled the kicking and squealing youth on her shoulder, foiling their attempt to escape, as she approached the front desk.

“I say,” she drawled in her obnoxious voice, “I don’t suppose one of you chaps wouldn’t mind taking care of these fellows for me? I picked them up off the street for you.”

Bastila, Year 6 saber deflection number two, quickly turned back around to the desk to avoid detection, only to see Officer Daro scuttling away.

“Hey! I’m not done with you!”

“Well, well. If it isn’t little Bastila.”

Dammit. Bastila turned around, craning her neck up to meet Ran’s gaze. The duffle bags were nowhere in sight and the two youths were being manhandled away by several uniformed officers.

“Hello, Ran.” Although, she never did manage to beat a certain someone’s record, so there is that.

There was a commotion. One of the Rodians was loudly complaining about his rights in Huttese while the other stood crying and shaking surrounded by large men, looking very small. Bastila indicated the situation with a tilt of her head.

“Are you certain that is necessary,” she said quietly.

“A Jedi has to act with justice and firmness for the good of all. Not that you would know anything about that.” The officers hustled the young men out of sight and they were gone, disappeared into the depths of the justice system. Ran shook her head. “What in the world are you doing in a place like this? Bailing that low-life civilian of yours out of jail?” Ran grinned. “Or has she left you for some floozy already and taken all of your money with her?”

Bastila scowled. “No, Ran, she hasn’t left me. She’s missing.”

The taller woman threw her head back and roared with laughter.

“It’s not funny! I want her home and safe with me!” An unpleasant thought occurred to Bastila. “Do you know something about her disappearance?”

This earned her an even bigger laugh. “As if I didn’t have better things to do!”

Bastila bit her lip. Should she risk further complications and tell Ran why a member of the Jedi Order might want to take an interest in the disappearance of “Sera Khan”? It seemed highly unlikely that she had any idea who she was bad-mouthing but someone in the Order did, someone who shouldn’t have access to that information and was spreading it around liberally enough for random Jedi to be aware of it. Acid churning in her stomach, Bastila opened her mouth to take a chance.

“She’s probably at the bottom of a midden, sozzled out of her mind,” Ran said, cutting Bastila off. “Isn’t that what she has you doing? Mucking around in sewers?”

“How dare you! Do you have any idea how much excrement you would be buried under if it weren’t for people like us?” Bastila said, all thought of sharing information evaporating in the heat of Ran’s indifference and the fury of having to already have used her connections to obtain the most basic of help. She poked Ran hard in the chest. “Your position in life depends on people like me and yet you can’t even be bothered to show us some basic decency!”

Ran smirked glanced over at something behind Bastila. She turned her head and saw an officer waiting impatiently for them to finish their conversation.

“Excuse me, little Bastila. Some of us need to attend to business that can’t be done by any simpleton off the streets.”

And she swaggered off, head held proudly high, leaving Bastila to stomp her foot in frustration. It was childish but it was better than standing there impotently while her former fellow student was welcomed with open arms into the very establishment that had her jumping through hoops.

“Excuse me, ma’am? You can go.”

Bastila rubbed her suddenly tired eyes. “What?” It was the officer from a moment ago.

“Daro filed your report. There’s nothing more you can do at the moment but wait for a detective to contact you. You can go home now.”

The woman waited a moment for a response, before turning and leaving when none was forthcoming. Bastila stared dumbly at her retreating back, a flat and empty feeling opening up in the pit of her stomach. She stumbled outside, blinking in the light of the early afternoon. It was honestly a beautiful day. She hadn’t noticed before. There was a light breeze coming off the ocean freshening the city air and people were peacefully going about their business, chatting with their friends, walking their pets. Bastila walked numbly back to the shuttle terminal, a pervasive sense of unreality fogging her thoughts. She bought a cheap and bitter cup of caf before boarding the shuttle for the orbital terminal, which she drank as they took off, her eyes gritty and sore and her hand still itching and aching mysteriously. She watched out the window as the landscape turned small and distant and blue, the sky enveloping them until they pierced the roof of the sky and swam in a sea of blackness.

The trip back home was spent in a restless and uncomfortable slumber. She changed transports at Garqi and arrived back at Skybase a little after ten in the morning. Her head thick and her stomach complaining about missing breakfast, she made her winding way back to the apartment from the Central Quarter where the public transports docked. There weren’t too many people about by the time she got to the gently inclined streets of the Residential Quarter, most people either at work or at school at this time of day, only a few housespouses and freelancers such as themselves that were free to come and go as they pleased.

She let herself into the apartment. The lights were all off and everything was as it had been when she had left the apartment the night before. Even that the note that Mrs Bima had written in case Sera had come back while they were away was still lying undisturbed on the kitchen counter. Bastila switched a few lights on and sank onto the couch, staring blankly at the wall. She knew she needed to do something, make some calls to their clients and suppliers, inform station security of the situation, but she couldn’t bring herself to move. The numbers on the chrono ticked over and the grumbling of her stomach finally pushed her to her feet.

She switched the kettle on and reached for her mug, only to realize that it was still half-full of unfinished tea that she’d neglected to throw out last night. She did so now, washing it quickly and popping a bag in, almost retrieving a second mug out of force of habit. Lacking the energy or inclination to make a proper meal for her late breakfast, she opened the fridge to see if they had anything that would catch her interest. Sera’s Alderaanian Braid was there on the second shelf, the only cooked item in the fridge, in fact. Bastila hesitated. Should she try to keep it for when Sera got home? Reluctantly, she pulled it out, inspecting the item. The glaze was already a sticky mess and the pastry was losing its crispness. It would need to be thrown out if it wasn’t eaten soon. She bit into it, the smooth creaminess of the custard balancing well with the flaky pastry. It was a little sweeter than she liked, far richer than anything she would care to eat for breakfast. But Sera enjoyed it, liked the richness, liked the stickiness of the glaze, the texture of the pastry and the custard.

Bastila swallowed and took another bite, the sticky glaze coating her lips. She imagined what their day would have been like if she followed after Sera, if she had gone to get breakfast in her stead, if she had said the right things to make her stay. She pictured Sera vocally savouring each bite of the pastry, occasionally stopping to critique and review what she was eating or speculate as to the method of its creation, flaky crumbs of pastry and custard sticking to her lips. How sweet those crumbs would have tasted. She licked the jammy glaze off her lips. Perhaps Sera would have taken her line of investigation one step farther, looking up a recipe or asking Mrs Bima. Hurrying down to the Market Quarter for ingredients, swearing and cursing her way through the recipe, waking Bastila from her nap covered in flour and smelling of bread dough and custard.

The sweet pastry stuck in her throat, impossible to swallow. Tears rolled uncontrollably down her face as she collapsed into sobs, shoulders shaking convulsively as she clutched onto the open fridge door for support.

Sera wasn’t coming home.

~~~

Done!

Not supper happy about all of it but I finished it at least.

Part 3 coming soon!