A/N: This is a short that I wrote in the middle of working on The Face of a Warrior (which is still being worked on, although it will still be a while before any new posts are up) after I saw the Without a Trace commercial run on TV. When it was first written, it ran somewhere between a missing scene, speculation, and AU, although that has changed now that Invincible has long been released. As always, reviews and suggestions are greatly appreciated. -NS
Where Have You Been?
"…for every reason someone goes missing, the best reason to keep on searching is the loved ones left behind…" -Without a Trace
Dramatis Personae
Ben Skywalker—Jedi Knight (male human)
Han Solo—pilot, Millennium Falcon (female human)
Jagged Fel—Head of State, Imperial Remnant (male human)
Jaina Solo—Sword of the Jedi (female human)
Leia Organa Solo—Jedi Knight (female human)
Luke Skywalker—Jedi Grand Master (male human)
Zekk—Jedi Knight (male human)
Hope—it was an infinite whirlpool.
A lifeline for one man, it served as a permanent torture to his friends.
In its swirls and its eddies, it was a connector, binding together two worlds in a year-long search for answers. Then, in its rapids and waterfalls, it was a separator, holding apart two lovers in an endless quest for their own destinies. A poison and a cure, it would ruin those who lived by it, strengthen those who depended on it, and destroy those who denied it entirely.
In a galaxy governed by war—in a world torn by loss—it was the one reward left for those who survived.
"…for every reason someone goes missing…"
A few days after Darth Caedus' defeat:
Shedu Maad, Hapes Cluster
It was over.
Between bacta dunks, he could feel the lightness in the air even as a ysalamiri bubble covered the entirety of his room. If he pressed his nose against the window, he could see the reconstruction crews and planting droids working on the fields and spaceport outside. In the hospital, too, so much of the fear was gone. The danger was reduced to injuries, and to political machinations—things that, in the eyes of the doctors and nurses, at least operated at their level. Unlike Caedus.
"You don't have to stay here, you know?"
He twisted his head around to the open door: one of the other patients—a young woman whose legs had been crushed—floated on a hoverchair just outside his room.
"Can I come in?" Quale asked?
He sighed, but motioned her in nevertheless. She couldn't have been more than twenty, with trademark Hapan features in addition to a delicacy of face that suggested she had a parent not of Hapan descent.
"Not as if I can leave," he muttered, jerking his head towards the window. There, he could just see the claws of the ysalamir scrabbling against the glass in an effort to reach the occupant inside.
She snorted. "Nobody would stop you. Or they wouldn't really care. They're too busy."
She was right, but that made him uncomfortable. He could, of course, simply leave his room—stride out of this hospital on Shedu Maad and vanish like he had vanished from the rest of the galaxy. Not a person in here wanted to see more bloodshed—not the doctors, not himself, and not even the Hapan intelligence agents who had first presented him with this option.
They had given him a chance at a fantasy—a chance he couldn't help but allow himself to indulge in for a bit longer. After I'm fully healed, he promised himself. Just a few more days, and then I leave.
"Then I don't want to create more trouble for them, do I?"
She rolled her eyes and pointed to him. "Don't be flippant. You're Zekk."
"There's people looking for you." She pointed out his window.
"You should go find them." She folded her arms and glared. "I told you all this yesterday and you're still an idiot."
He had been surprised when she first recognized him, but no longer. She wanted—had wanted before her legs had been crushed—to be a starfighter pilot, she had told him the first time she stopped by his room, as she did with all the new arrivals. She had already been in the hospital for five years, waiting for the supply of bacta to open up so her true healing could begin.
And she was right, except that Zekk was no longer sure whether he wanted for everyone else to find him. The Hapans had given him the chance to simply walk away from the war, to leave Zekk behind and build himself a new life in a place where his choices ranged beyond the hunter and the hunted.
Jaina, he thought, when he could no longer suppress the memories. Jaina would never have done this.
But he had never been Jaina. So, presented with the chance—given the choice—he could not help but hold on to it. If he ever stepped past the ysalamiri bubble—if he ever put himself back into everyone else's scopes—he could never return to this space of mind again.
Selfish, his conscience told him every time he remembered Jaina's face, but he ignored the pricklings of guilt. Jaina had Jag, her family, and the Jedi. Even with his friends, he had rarely shone on his own, instead only casting a shadow by virtue of reflected light. Just a few more days. Caedus is gone. They'll be able to hold on.
Except that it was easier to pretend he didn't have a choice.
"…the best reason to keep on searching…"
Ten months after Darth Caedus' defeat:
Jagged Fel's Office, Imperial Remnant
"I need one more month."
Jagged Fel took the proffered datachip and slipped it into his datapad, entered his personal code, and then put the datachip back onto the table—all without looking up.
There was no need. He knew exactly what he could see: her limp chestnut hair pulled back into a tight ponytail, and dark circles surrounding her eyes. He would see her irises, their brandy color faded to a faint brown. She would refuse to meet his gaze, and he would see that nothing had changed since the day, a week after Caedus' defeat, when she told that she had to know for certain—that she could not bear to leave another question lurking in the shadows.
"That should give you enough funds," he stated tonelessly. He was so tired of fighting with her.
"Jag," Jaina said with both irritation and apology in her voice.
Instead of raising his gaze, Jag dropped his face into his hands and begin massaging his temples with his fingertips.
It had been a year—ten months—since Luke Skywalker's sudden move had left him in charge of the Moffs, and he had talked to Jaina exactly eleven times since then: once in the medward, once a week after, and once more each month when she came to ask him for funds to keep her search for Zekk alive. He, of course, gave it to her—not because he truly believed that Zekk could still be alive, but because he couldn't bear to see her expression when he finally put an end to the search. She never lingered in his office longer than to say a brief thank you.
This time, however, he simply didn't have the energy to deal with it anymore. He was sick of vying against a ghost for Jaina's life, sick of dealing with a Moff Council that only wanted power for himself, and sick of spending his life arguing with people that no longer seemed to care what he said—or felt.
"Just go," he whispered, staring at his tabletop. When he heard no movement, he added, "please."
He didn't look up through his fingers until he could no longer hear the click of flight boots on the floor.
Ten months, one week after Darth Caedus' defeat:
Solo family quarters, Coruscant
After taking a deep breath, Jag knocked on the door.
Leia Solo opened the door with a warm smile. "It's good to see you again, Jag. I'm glad you could make it. Come in," she said, holding the door open.
Jag stepped in. In front of him, Ben Skywalker sat across from Han Solo at a dejarik board, with Luke Skywalker looking on.
Jaina, rather unsurprisingly, was nowhere to be seen. Jag suppressed a twinge of disappointment. He had hoped, however futilely, that Jaina would be there—that, even if she refused to talk to him, she would be spending some time with her family.
"Finally got here, kid," Han said, glancing up for a moment.
Jag offered an apologetic smile. "The Moffs decided last-minute that they wanted more credits for the deal, but the holocomm call didn't get through until just before I was going to leave. I got caught up trying to wrangle them out of the idea."
Ben chuckled. "Should have refused Dad's job offer, then," he joked, and then nudged his Ghhhk forward two squares.
Next to him, Luke rolled his eyes. "Good to see you, Jag," he said, "but feel free to ignore him. If one of the Moffs had taken the job instead, you would probably be busy dodging more assassin darts."
Jag snorted, taking a seat next to them. "I still do that, anyways. My head of security tells me every few weeks that it's a miracle that I'm still alive, and then asks for a pay raise. If I had refused the job, I'd at least me able to shoot the Moffs. Now, I can only threaten to expose their personal expenditures to the public. If I'm lucky, they have to face the repercussions, and I'm free of them for a few days."
Leia brought out a Ryshcate and a few plates, setting them down on the small table next to the dejarik board. "You said that you already had a dinner appointment with Daala"—Han rolled his eyes—"so I thought that we would just have a light snack."
She handed Jag a plate with a generous slice and resumed cutting. When she got to Han, he interrupted the procedure. "What about that Corellian Ale, princess?"
Leia gave him a startled look. "I thought you wanted to save that for the Rogue celebration party."
Han shook his head. "I changed my mind," he said, and pointed at Jag. "I think that Fel here would prefer to be drunk."
Jag raised an eyebrow, Ben winced, and Leia bit her lip.
"Why would I want to be drunk?" he asked cautiously as Leia, who had slipped off into the kitchen, reappeared with a bottle and several glasses. But he didn't really need an answer. "It's Jaina, isn't it?" he asked wearily.
"Well," Luke finally said, clearing his throat. "We're know that Zekk is still alive."
Jag shrugged. "Jaina still believes that," he said, taking a sip of the ale. "That's hardly news."
Luke and Leia exchanged a cautious glance. "How much has she told you?" Luke asked. "I know that she goes to Bastion once a month."
"She gives me the datacard, I key in my authorization, and she leaves," Jag said flatly.
Han winced. "Look, kid," he said, "she'll thank you when this is over."
The last word caught Jag's attention. "Over?" he asked incredulously. His own belief that Zekk's body was floating around somewhere in the Transitory Mists combined with his knowledge of Jaina's stubborn nature had longer ago convinced him against the possibility of there being an end. The search for Zekk had become, for him, an infinite cesspool to be periodically checked and maintained, but to be otherwise shoved into a compartment in his mind so that he could avoid dwelling on the implications.
Luke smiled for the first time. "Over," he repeated again. "We've found Zekk."
Jag straightened in his chair. "Where?"
Luke ignored the question and continued. "But he won't acknowledge who he is."
"Amnesia?" Jag asked, following on the tangent.
Leia shook her head. "He knows, but he doesn't want to come back," she said quietly.
"Where?" Jag demanded again, more forcefully this time.
"He would rather stay where he is—stay who he is."
"It has to be somewhere the Transitory Mists," Jag continued. A year of dealing with the Moffs had given him more than enough patience to deal with the fact that everybody was ignoring his question.
"We need to convince Jaina to call off the search," Luke cut in.
Jag blinked, sidetracked. "Why?" he asked.
"She wants closure," Leia murmured. "Seeing him as he is right now…as somebody else entirely…will just make it worse."
"Take me to see him," Jag demanded.
"You already know what's happened," Luke said calmly. "There's no need."
Jag turned to face him. "I have your word on what happened," he stated. "I also doubt that you would hesitate to lie to me if you thought it were best for Jaina. Those two facts don't make much of a combination."
"Kid," Han started.
Jag cut him off. "If you want me to talk to Jaina for you, then I have to tell her the truth. I can't do that until I know for myself."
The three adults exchanged tired glances, Ben ignored for the moment.
"You've been spending too much time with the Moffs," Han said.
Jag let out a tired grimace. "I'm still alive," he said. "That has to count for something."
"…is the loved ones left behind…"
Ten months, two weeks after Darth Caedus' defeat:
Shedu Maad, Hapes Cluster
"What in Sith's name are you doing here?" A voice—rough, tinged with anger and frustration—asked.
Ennth Tadjuk placidly continued to tweak a screw on his droid. "I have you idea what you're talking about," he stated.
Jagged Fel's glare, if anything, intensified. "Don't lie to me, Zekk."
Ennth's tone remained calm. "You have the wrong person," he said smoothly. "My name is Ennth Tadjuk, not Zekk."
"So the name Zekk means nothing to you?" Jag asked sharply.
"No."
"So the fact that Jaina Solo has been searching for you for eleven months—is still searching for you: does that mean nothing as well? Does it mean nothing for you that the Solos and the Skywalkers believe that you're alive? That they think you're drifting somewhere in space, injured? Does that mean nothing?" He stuck his face in front of Ennth's, forcing the man to look at him.
Ennth thought back to his time with the Jedi—a time when he was fleeing from every bounty hunter in the galaxy and villainized by the press—and then he thought about his crash onto Shedu Maad—about the people that had taken care of him, the ones who had taken him in despite who he was—and about a world where he could live peacefully, making contributions without constantly being beholden to the galaxy.
He had learned that guilt became a lot easier to live with over time.
"No," he finally answered. "It doesn't."
Eleven months after Darth Caedus' defeat:
Jagged Fel's Office, Imperial Remnant
"I wanted to thank you."
She looked not just weary, but bone-tired, as if the only reason she held herself upright was so that she didn't have to pick herself up against after falling.
He gestured for her to come in. "You don't need to. He was my friend, too. I shouldn't have tried to stop you."
She took a tentative step in, but no further. "You were right, though, when you told me to stop looking for him a few months ago. Nothing changed."
And he could hear in her voice that, still, nothing had. "It doesn't mean I wanted to be right."
"I guess…" her voice was quiet, as if she were talking to herself. "I just thought that it would be better to know, for certain."
He had sent her the coordinates to Zekk, both because he was afraid of telling her, and because she deserved to see him for herself—to have a last chance at pulling Zekk back.
"But it isn't."
He nodded, unsure of what to say.
"And," she continued uncertainly, "I know that it hasn't been fair to you. And it still won't be fair to you, because I can't just move to Bastion and leave everything else behind." She sounded defeated.
"Will I see you when I visit Coruscant then?" Jag tried to keep the disappointment out of his voice.
"I can't promise, but I'll try."
Hope left them there, each fearing that if they touched that delicate truce between them everything else would disintegrate.
Because hope had made it too easy to believe that, once the next big problem ended, once Caedus had fallen, no matter how hard the few following months would be, the other pieces of their lives would neatly lock into place.
But hope is not a solid grasp on a future not yet made real.