Closer To Hell

By Jemmiah

"I want you to stay here. I want you to stay and do what mamma tells you…"

Like so many occasions where things ultimately turned out terrible, the day started as might any other. There were no bad omens to be seen, no signs from above that anything might be amiss. Jemmy, happy to get away from her estate whilst the final touches were being performed on the extensive gardens surrounding her house, had dressed both herself and her son in preparation for a day out. Not that she had been especially thrilled with the choice of destination, but seeing the way that Han's eyes had lit up on being told she knew that it was worth it.

A trip to see her late husband's friend and former business associate Welks' freighter 'Corona Star' had seemed a fairly safe, if uninspiring, way to pass an afternoon. Welks had proven to be just as loyal a friend to Jemmy as he had to Jonas, especially in the way he liked to look out for her son. The boy, barely two years old but with an adventurous mind filled with dreams of speeders and fast swoops, liked nothing better than to look at holo pictures of star ships and gaze wistfully up at their moving images on his bedroom walls. When she'd explained to him that they were going to see the real thing, owned by a close family friend, the child had barely been able to contain his excitement. Even whilst pulling on his shoes, her fingers trying to fasten the clasps at the front, Han had pretended to be a spaceship; his little arms held proudly to the side as if replicating some kind of wings…

It had all been a world away from the childish games she and her brother had once played. Sometimes she wondered if it was healthy for her son just to grow up with only his mother for company. If Emma had survived, she'd thought wistfully, then Han would have had an older sister to look out for him. Then again, if Emma had lived there was every chance that she would still be at the Jedi Temple…would never have married Jonas…and Han might not have been born.

Might not have, she'd added carefully. Given that she didn't know for certain who his father was there had seemed little point in speculating alternative realities.

"I want you to listen to what mamma says. I need you to stay very quiet and very still…"

Han's eager face had made it all worthwhile. That was the image that Jemmy clung onto. His beautiful hazel eyes had been quick to take everything in around him as they had stepped off the transport to head for the freighter bay in which Welks' ship was berthed. Coronet spaceport was easily big enough to get lost in, and Jemmy had insisted on picking her son up and carrying him in her arms, a move that had not been popular with Han. "Not a baby" had been the indignant complaint uttered by the precocious Han Suul; a protestation that had reminded Jemmy exactly how like herself the child was. She herself had felt no particular interest in the day out other than to perhaps catch up with Welks again, but Han's brightness and enthusiasm had rubbed off to the extent she had relished the prospect of seeing things anew through her son's eyes.

They'd never reached the spaceport.

From the moment they had stepped off the transport Jemmy had known that someone was following them. Not possessing any inherent force-related abilities or second sight the Corellian had nonetheless felt the hair on the back of her neck stand up. She'd found herself briefly thinking of Obi-Wan, wondering if somehow he were trying to warn her of some impending danger, all the time her heart pounding in her throat as if it were seeking to escape her body. Han hadn't understood the reason behind her anxiety but he had certainly picked up on it, for his protestations at being carried had suddenly ceased and instinctively held onto his mother tighter than before.

Jemmy had known then that the trip had been little more than a ruse to entice her away from her private estate: she didn't know how, except that she did. With almost blinding clarity the pieces had all fallen into place: the message from Welks - from whom she had not heard in over three months…the death of her husband and his friends. One by one everything and everyone who'd had anything to do with her had been systematically removed. She'd had little doubt that the next time she'd set eyes on Welks it would be to view his body on a mortuary slab. If she didn't join him, that was.

"Whatever happens, whatever you hear or whatever you see, I want you to stay here and hide, do you hear me? Don't move from here…"

She'd made the biggest mistake of her life at that point. Instead of carrying on to the spaceport where there would at least be crowds of people and witnesses in abundance, Jemmy had turned off down one of the side roads towards one of the nearby alleys, hoping to lose her pursuer in the dark and winding passageways that dominated the run-down areas of Coronet. What had possessed her to take that fateful route she could never recollect, except that she had been driven by fear on a level she had never felt before: fear for the safety of her child. She could tell just by the petrified manner in which Han had frozen in her arms that he too was silently terrified, even if he could not express that dread in words.

The alleyways had turned and intersected, leading them closer to hell. All that had existed within Jemmy's mind was the overwhelming instinct to flee, countermanding all other rational thought. As with all nightmares there had been the conviction that as long as she didn't stop and turn round she would manage to outrun the malevolent shadow intent upon…

Intent upon what? Murder? It had seemed likely given all that had befallen her husband and his friends. Death was a spectre that Jemmy had flirted with many times before. But her son…she had been determined that whatever threat was bearing down upon her she would not allow her child to suffer.

And so Jemmy had stopped. And hidden. And waited to face confront her faceless enemy.

"Remember, mama loves you. She'll be right back, okay sweetheart? Just stay quiet, and stay safe in the shadows where nobody can see you. Mama loves you…"

Han had stayed quiet, and had stayed in the shadows like his mama had told him to, but it hadn't been enough. The enemy that had confronted Jemmy not moments after had worn a face that the Corellian had good reason to loathe and fear: a man who had, it seemed, escaped from the penitentiary on Coruscant with the sole purpose of avenging himself against the Jedi for their part in his incarceration. Linus Leaford had been a very angry man, and had acted with typical brutality and violence. Jemmy, outraged at the danger to her son had acted with a mother's courage and had attempted to knock the blaster from Leaford's hand…

But not before he had aimed the weapon straight in the direction of Han's hiding place. He'd squeezed the trigger. There had been a flash of light…a burning, ozone discharge. The sound of something falling…a clatter of metal.

And then Jemmy could remember nothing.

She'd been rescued by Jake Jivinan, husband to her friend and former smuggler Lilith Demodae, as she had once been known. An accident, it seemed; for Jake had planned to give up his old way of life as a freighter captain, and had only agreed to Leaford's terms because the money he was offering to ship his newly acquired slave had been impressive, to say the least. Fortunately for Jemmy - and unfortunately for Linus - Jivinan renegotiated the terms at the right end of a discretely concealed handgun…

Jemmy had been unable to thank Jake. She had been unable to do anything for an entire week. The nerve agent that Linus had used against her had paralysed her entirely for the best part of seven days…some arachnid venom extract, the experts had later said, that was used in the same way a spider might immobilise a fly. For endless hours, both day and night, Jemmy had lain in an infirmary bed unable to speak or communicate anything other than by blinking her eyes. Her body - for all the use it was - remained like a useless permacrete block. Visitors came and went. CorSec lingered anxiously to question her, waiting to ask the one question that Jemmy above all others wanted an answer to:

Where was Han Suul?

Her mind, imprisoned by her grief, began slowly to lose its reason. There was no memory of the journey to Coronet spaceport that day, or of the heroic rescue by Jake Jivinan. In time fleeting memories returned to haunt Jemmy, but by then it was too late to do anything other than hope...and pray. The rest was a blank: a void filled only with the frightened eyes of her son as she had kissed him goodbye.

"Remember mama loves you…"

What hurt Jemmy most was that it had taken so long for her to say it. That and the fact she would never be able to say it again.