Brushing a stray lock of dark brown hair from her eyes, Yuthura Thul adjusted the focus on her terminal's holocam, just wanting to clear things up a bit. Tech was never her strong suit, and more than one person had complained about her grainy footage during holochats. This was Jornan she was talking to, and she wanted him to pick up every little cue, every little tic in her face as she spoke. He was good at that. He may well have even been better at reading her than she was at reading herself. Come to think of it, her whole family was, which frustrated her no end. But at least Jornan never judged her.

On the other side of the room, the rewarmer worked its magic, bringing life to the dehydrated flaxbread she had put in there. The tablet started off no bigger than her thumbnail, and as such would take quite some time to reconstitute itself, time that she could use to talk to her brother over the holonet. She could never remember her way around the transmitter, so she fished the instructions for calling him from a sheet of flimsiplast she kept them nearby. "Activate the power…initiate the program...set to frequency 1 mark Aurek 998 Aurek...press initiate." The dots on the screen connecting two planets glowed green, indicating the call was being attempted. She breathed a sigh of relief. At least she'd gotten that right. "CONNECTED", the device said, and an image popped up on the screen. "Jornan!" she recognized her brother's face.

"Hey Thura!" The wavy brown-haired man with a hint of stubble waved to her, "Always great to hear from you. How's training going?"

"Oh, about how you'd expect," she fiddled with the drawstrings on her turquoise hoodie.

"Let me guess: You're kicking everyone else's tail and kicking against the rules?"

Yuthura laughed. "You know me too well, Jor. Yeah, the instructor's really riding me for how I pack my locker. I don't get what the big deal is as long as I can fit all my field gear in there. Which I can."

"Yeah, that does sound overly controlling. Have you asked her why she wants you to do it that way?"

She waved her hand dismissively. "Nah, I don't bother. I figure she'll just say it's because she ordered me to do it that way. She doesn't even care that I'm still unbeaten, even by the guys who've challenged me."

"Would it really kill you to try following along? At the very least, you'd get her off your back."

Yuthura looked at her fingernails, cleaning them with her fingers curled. "I'm not gonna do that, Jornan. You know why."

He sighed and let off the same words his younger sister usually gave. "Because once you capitulate to one pointless rule, you open yourself up to being the sort of person who does whatever she's told, just because she's told to do it. Yes, so you keep saying. And I keep telling you…"

"...that it doesn't necessarily follow that I'll do that. Maybe, maybe not. I'd rather not get into the habit of obeying for the sake of obedience. That's what the Jedi did, and look what happened to them."

"Hey, c'mon," Jornan looked around, paranoia on his face, "You know we're not supposed to talk about them at all, especially not like that."

Yuthura groaned. "I know, I know. I was just using them as an example. I don't have strong feelings about them one way or the other."

"That doesn't matter," Jornan shook his head. "Don't you even remember why I had to contact you like this in the first place?"

"I do," she sighed, "And I'm sorry GalaComm enforces their conduct rules so arbitrarily."

"It's not that arbitrary," Jornan pressed, "Did you really think nobody would take issue with what you said?"

"It needed to be said. You know I'm right about him."

Her brother looked around frantically, then leaned in closer. "There's always a time and place. And you won't be in the right place for another four months. After all, he is your commander-in-chief."

"If I were saying it on an official military network, you'd have a point. But I wasn't. You know who was behind it, even if they use GalaComm as a proxy."

For the first time in their conversation, Jornan looked apologetic. "Sadly, not too many people keep that in mind. And you just have to deal with that. Still, you should be more careful of what you say. If you're suspended from here, too, I can't get a hold of you. Neither can your wife."

Yuthura let out a long groan. "Come on. She doesn't need to check up on me constantly. You know we don't have that kind of marriage."

"No, of course not. And everyone knows it. Still, you should at least put on a show of it, just for the sake of her feelings. Few Panteers have much choice in who they marry and we need…"

"To put one over on the Organas? That's another thing I don't get. That ridiculous feud. The Organas have never done wrong by me."

"You don't remember when Leia spilled wine on you?"

Now, Yuthura growled. "You know that was an accident! Brynn tripped her!"

"Why are you defending her?!" Jornan's eyes were wide.

"It's not that I'm defending her, it's that I'm getting sick of people using that accident-and yes, that's what it was-as an excuse to pick another fight with the Organas. A few wine stains doesn't make me some kind of a martyr. I don't want to be a pawn in this pointless dejarik game the Houses keep playing!" She slammed her fist onto the desk. "Even if Aranna somehow sat on the throne and gave the Thuls whatever sort of power you think we'd get, there's no point! The Organas will just take our place sooner or later. I'd rather focus on more important things, like.."

"Like declawing the Empire? No, that won't happen."

"How are you so sure?"

Jornan tilted his head. "What, you didn't hear? The Senate's been dissolved."

"Wait...what?!"

He nodded. "You know House Thul has Coruscant's ear better than Organa. If we cooperate with the Emperor, he'll have that much less reason to…"

"To what? Tax us to death? Ship dissidents to Kessel?"

"Probably not that dire," Jornan looked around again. "But still, we should-" His face disappeared and a message flashed across the screen: "This user cannot be located." Her ages-old instincts kicking in, Yuthura jiggled the camera cord in its socket, then hit the top of the relay box. It did as much good as usual. Well, no sense in fretting. Her flaxbread was just about to finish reconstituting. Whatever it was, if it was important enough, Jornan would call back.

He never called back.