Chapter 4: Jade
An hour after dawn, the red haired woman finally woke from her sleep. She pulled off the blanket covering her and looked down at her ripped clothes and bandaged skin. She wanted to say she looked horrible, but for some reason the woman thought that she had been in worse shape. The woman brushed her hands through her thick hair. She didn't even know why she thought half of what she did. It was as if her personality had come through but the events that shaped her had been wiped from her mind. Frustrating didn't even begin to describe how she felt.
The vaguely recalled dreams did not help her mood any, either. However, they weren't exactly dreams, but nightmares. In her waking state she could vaguely recall blurry images that were sure to fade from her mind shortly. However, the woman wasn't sure that she would ever be able to erase the image of a pair of cold, yellow eyes looking down at her. The rest of the man's face had been hidden in shadows, but the eyes were haunting her.
The woman rubbed her temples as the rest of her nightmare flashed through her mind. Countless deaths. Men, women, aliens all cut down. They were executed right in front of her without trial. A disembodied voice would pronounce their death sentence and they would fall. The method changed. Sometimes a blaster, other times a knife, occasionally even a simple snapping of their neck by a pair of bare hands, but the result was always the same. They died quickly but painfully. She wanted to run away from the images, but where could you get away from what lurked in your own mind?
Regardless, she wanted to go off on her own, but where would she go? She had nothing and knew no one outside of the man that had rescued her. For the time being, she would have to make the best of the situation. Adapt to the circumstances and make the best of what was presented to her. She looked to the small table next to her bed. There was a shirt and pants sitting there. They were men's clothes, but they would fit her loosely. Apparently, Luke had been thinking ahead about what she would need. A change of clothes would help her feel just a little cleaner until she could find time for a shower.
After quickly putting on the provided garments and checking that her bandages were still secure, the woman made her way out of the bedroom and into the main living space of the apartment. She stopped short at the sight before her. Luke was standing on one arm in the middle of the room and various objects that had been presumably lying around the room were floating in midair around his feet. She looked on with wide eyes as the objects circled Luke and gasped when a small stone flew past her head to join the other objects levitating around the man.
Hearing that he wasn't alone any longer, Luke opened his eyes and slowly lowered everything he had been levitating so that it rested on the ground. He hadn't expected the woman to wake so early and was trying to get some Force exercises in, but apparently that was not meant to be. Hopefully, she wouldn't ask too many questions about how he was able to do what he had. An explanation of the Force was not what an amnesic woman needed. She had enough to deal with. It would be better to keep the conversation light unless she brought it up. Luke lowered himself to his feet and gave the woman a broad smile, hoping to put her at ease. "Good morning."
The woman looked on stunned at Luke's nonchalant greeting. One minute he was lifting things with his mind and the next he was acting as if this was a normal occurrence. At least she thought it was his mind Luke was using to lift the objects. Regardless, this was not something a person saw everyday. "How did you just do that?"
Luke scratched the back of his neck, uncertain of how to respond. It was obviously too late to convince her she was seeing things and a mind trick was out of the question. He wasn't going to risk damaging her memory further just because he hadn't noticed the woman wake up. Some Jedi he was. He didn't even think to keep tabs on the woman in case she woke up while he was practicing. Shaking off his self-deprecating thoughts, Luke decided that perhaps it was best to just try and change the subject. "It's a long story. I'll explain some other time. But first I want to ask you something."
The woman raised an eyebrow at Luke's blatant attempt at avoiding the issue. He was hiding something and she wanted to know why. Before she could press the issue, however, Luke had made his way across the room and unhooked a datapad from his astromech. "Does the name Mara Jade sound familiar to you?"
The woman started slightly at Luke's words. Mara Jade? For some reason, she knew that name was important to her, but she couldn't place it. Obviously, Luke had found something and was trying to jog her memory, but it wasn't working. She knew the name, but didn't know its relation to her. "I'm sure I've heard it before, but I can't place it. Why?"
Luke offered her the datapad he had unplugged from his droid to the woman. Just before dawn, R2 had called him over, excited at some discovery. Luke had looked over the file his droid had pulled out of the planetary customs records. Three days earlier, a woman had cleared their checkpoints with an ID stating her name as Mara Jade and a holo of the woman he had pulled out of the lake. Luke could only assume this was the woman's name. "Take a look. I think you're Mara Jade."
The woman snatched the datapad from his hand. It was a copy of a set of travel documents with her likeness and the name Mara Jade right below her image. She wondered just how Luke had gotten this kind of record, but now was not the time to worry about that. She rolled the name around in her head. Mara Jade. It had to be her name. It just felt right. Still looking down at the document in front of her, she murmured her gratitude to Luke. "Thank you."
Luke simply nodded his head and smiled. Helping this woman regain her identity would not be easy, but at least they had a start. He already had R2 digging up whatever information he could on the name Mara Jade and, hopefully, the resourceful droid would pull up something useful. For all Luke knew, someone was looking for this woman. Of course, that could be a good thing or a bad thing depending on just who was looking for her. For now, she could stick with him while they tried to put together the puzzle that was her past. But first, Luke wanted to take care of one thing: breakfast. "You're welcome. Now, if you'll follow me to the kitchen, we can figure out what to do next over breakfast."
The woman nodded absently as Luke walked across the room and entered the apartment's small kitchen to begin preparing their meal. She continued staring at the datapad in front of her. Finally, she looked up and turned to the mirror on one of the room's walls. She looked at her image for a moment and then glanced back down at the datapad once more. Returning her gaze to the mirror, the woman smiled. "Mara Jade." Still smiling, Mara walked to the kitchen to join Luke. Breakfast sounded good.