Soniee is in a constant state of worry that someone will recognize her. It would be such a relief just to be honest with someone.


"I still can't believe Saw set up his new base in the tunnels." Dalla said while the two girls walked along the streets of Iziz toward the nearest entrance. Soniee was more sure of the way now but Dalla also seemed somewhat familiar with their route.

"Well, I don't know about a base." Soniee frowned. "He's been running sort of a charity organization taking in refugees..."

Dalla laughed. "Saw a philanthropist? That I find hard to believe. Still he must have some reason for it all." She drifted off into a mumble. "Maybe something deeper down." Then she perked up again and asked. "It doesn't bother you, then?"

"Bother me?"

"Staying down there. We all thought it was pretty creepy just passing through."

"I thought it was only me," Soniee said softly. Of course she'd felt the heaviness, the pull seeming to draw her deeper into the catacombs. She hadn't mentioned it, thinking it would make her Force sensitivity more apparent. "They were once used as some sort of burial chambers, right?"

"Aye. We all felt it." Dalla assured her. "Ahsoka advised Saw not to use the tunnels for anything other than an escape route. Hope he knows what he's doing."

Soniee's head snapped up. "You knew Ahsoka?"

Dalla looked at her curiously.

"I mean..." She backpedaled. "Saw told me that you all worked with a Jedi. That was her name wasn't it? Ahsoka?"

"Aye." Dalla seemed to drop once again into a memory. "She was friends with Lux Bonteri. I don't know if we would have had the help of the Jedi if it hadn't been for their connection."

"He's coming home you know? One of the girls mentioned it." Soniee rambled, trying not to say too much and give away her own connection to the senator. "I guess you'll be glad to see him? Saw, not so much."

"Aye. I've heard." The northern girl's wry smile returned. "He's the reason we all came down south. Well, that and I don't think Uncle Jamos could have lasted another galactic standard second without seeing Aunt Shara. I'm supposed to be the official representative of House Blackwell at the ball they're throwing in his honor."

Soniee flinched slightly at the word 'representative'. "And Saw is attending for House Kira?"

Again Dalla frowned at her. "Saw told you he was descended from the Kira line?"

"Well, no... it was... Werda Flint actually."

"Werda's still around?" Dalla grinned.

"Yeah she..." Soniee was glad of the subject change but her new friend was not going to let her off so easily.

"You seem to have gotten awfully friendly with Saw Gerrera in the short time you've been on Onderon."

Soniee rolled her eyes. "Friendly. That's the word. I assure you, Saw and I are just friends. I appreciate him finding me a place to stay and introducing me to your aunt so I can learn the language. He's nice." She shrugged. "But we're not going to the ball together or anything."

"He asked you!" Dalla realized at once.

Soniee sighed resignedly. "On bended knee."

"Salt gods! Dara, you should go with him!"

"I - I can't."

"Why not?" Dalla asked. "You said your mother was from Onderon. You have as much a right to be there as anyone else."

"No, I..." Soniee turned the question around. "You should go with him. You two were betrothed or something, weren't you?"

It was Dalla's turn for an eye roll and she groaned. "That story hasn't gotten around, has it?" She was on the brink of explaining what had happened from her own point of view when they heard a voice echoing up from the tunnel entrance they had just reached in their walk.

The 'Da' at the beginning of the reverberating syllables was plain, as was the 'ah' at the end, but what with the acoustics of the chamber and the flipped Onderonian 'r' the speaker should have been shouting for either of them.

Dalla and Dara both called out an answer at once. "Aye!" "Elek!" They looked at each other and laughed. Then Werda Flint bowled into them attacking Dalla with a welcoming hug.

"You're here! I knew you'd come! And Dara! So you two have already met! Great! Maybe you can convince her that she needs to go to the ball! I'll go tell Saw you're here!" Then she was off down the tunnel like a shot, singing the news as she went. And again the echoes from the corridors made it impossible to tell who's presence she was announcing.

"I didn't realize how similar our names were." Dalla laughed. "That's going to make things interesting while were both staying here."

Soniee made a snap decision. She just instinctively felt that she could trust her new friend. "It's not even my real name."

"I admit I wondered about that." Dalla's tone grew more serious as if she knew the delicate nature of the information she was being entrusted with.

"Of course." Soniee threw up her hands. "You probably recognized me straight away as well. Your aunt thought I looked familiar the first time we met and one of the girls in the dorm already guessed. Kason seems to think he's got me all figured out and Saw..." She sighed. "I think Saw's known from the first time he laid eyes on me."

"Umm..." Dalla placed a calming hand on her arm. "I don't know about familiar. I just thought you must be trying to make a new start. New planet? New name?"

"You mean to tell me that... I don't remind you of anyone?" Soniee asked, disbelieving.

Dalla gave her a look over and then shook her head. "No one specifically that I can think of. Should I? Look, Dara... or... whatever your name is, I'm sure you had a good reason for keeping your identity a secret but... if you want to tell me... I swear to the salt gods, I would never reveal your secret."

Soniee closed her eyes. All she felt through the Force from this girl she hardly knew was truth and loyalty. She took a deep breath, looked both ways down the corridor and then whispered, "My name is Soniee Ordo. A couple of years ago I was the Mandalorian representative to the Republic Senate."

It took a moment for the northern girl to register what she had said. Then Dalla's eyes opened wide. Her voice was barely above a whisper. "Salt gods! You and Lux..."

Soniee panacked, "No! No, it was nothing like that. You can't believe everything from the gossip holos. We never..."

"You didn't escape Coruscant to hide away and have his love child." Dalla smirked.

"No." Soniee blushed. "I couldn't. When Lux and I met... I was engaged to someone else. Someone who's identity needed to be kept secret."

"So Lux played along to help you out?" The humor in her eyes melted into true compassion.

Soniee nodded.

"We wondered, because it seemed so soon after Steela..." Dalla broke off and then continued with an honest smile. "Sounds a little like Saw and me with my infamous betrothal, only mine was not kept secret and it was in no way wanted."

"Werda said he was a real Sleemo," said Soniee.

Dalla sneered, remembering. "He was." She shuddered and then as Soniee had sometimes seen Shara do, Dalla touched her thumb to her lips and then held out the palm of her hand. "Thank the salt gods he's gone, him and his whole family. They'll never bother us again."

"His whole family," Soniee muttered. Her whole family was gone too.

"You loved him," Dalla guessed. "Your betrothed. You left Coruscant to be with him?"

Soniee nodded. She didn't seem to need to speak. The other girl read her so easily, like a Jedi mind trick.

"And you married him in secret? Only your closest friends knew."

Or perhaps Soniee was projecting. She'd been known to do that on occasion. Maybe it was this place so close to the... whatever it was, deep under the city. Her hand went to the crystal pendant that was tucked under the neck of her shirt and her eyes rose to meet the other girl's.

Then for a moment Soniee saw not Dalla's face, but what the other girl was seeing. There were Soniee's own despairing green eyes and then a memory of another pair of almost identical green eyes. They were older but sad, so sad, as if the owner of those eyes had lost everything.

The moment broke when another voice called to one or both or either of them from further down the tunnel. It was much deeper than Werda's voice. The two girls smiled at each other just before Saw Gerrera bounded around the corner.

He lifted Dalla off her feet and swung her around. "Welcome, Lady Blackwell! My beautiful wife finally returned to me from the far north!"

Dalla laughed. "I do hope you kept that spot on the couch warm for me."

"If it's cooled down, I'm sure we could warm it up again." He gave her a playful growl.

Soniee knew that they were only joking and she wasn't jealous. She couldn't be. Still, their easy flirtation still made her uncomfortable. She backed away a few paces and called out to be heard over their laughter, "I'll just let you two catch up. I'm sure you've got lots to do to get ready for the ball. You should go together. I'll just... you can tell me all about it after." And then before they could stop her she ran off down the tunnel.

When she reached the dorm none of the other girls were there. Soniee was glad she didn't have to go through an explanation of everything that had happened that morning. Soon enough though the place would be bustling. Saw would show Dalla the way down here and Werda would be back with Myat to get her settled.

Soniee grabbed her holonotebook and her mother's journal. For the first time in a long time she thought of her old display visor that she used to pull down over her eyes to escape the boys' arguments about their favorite meshgeroya teams or one of Lagos's diatribes on fashion, or just the endless noise of the academy. She missed that old thing. She missed those voices too...

She did still have her buy'ce stored on her ship. That would serve the same function but it would also give away more than anything the identity she needed to protect. Maybe that's what Saw had recognized when she first arrived. But no. It was after she'd removed it, when he saw her face...

Soniee sighed. She needed some air. There was one thing good about resembling her Onderonian parents. She could most likely fade into the crowd in the city above.

That's what she was planning to do now. She marched straight to the nearest tapcaf, ordered a drink and sat down to get to work.

Where had she left off? Melaana's parents had begun betrothal negotiations. It was someone closer to her own age, just a few years older. He and his parents were going to arrive in the morning for an official introduction and to discuss how the courtship would proceed. And the name of the family was...

"Soniee?"

Her head jerked up automatically. She should have ignored it, pretended that she didn't know who the speaker was talking to. She only realized after that no one should have known her by that name, other than Chi'ann who couldn't speak and Dalla who's voice wasn't anything like that warm tenor.

"Lux."