The holographic image of a developing fetus floated in the air of an Alderaanian medical facility. A medical droid was studying the data, making sure that everything was developing healthily. "The child is developing within normal parameters," the droid said with it's almost personality devoid voice, making both Jorec and Lia regret not actually getting an organic doctor. "At the moment, we are not able to determine the gender of the fetus. A further examination will yield greater results," the droid continued. "Would you like me to schedule a follow up appointment for one month from now?"
"No," Lia answered, already annoyed by the droid. "We'll schedule another appointment later." With another medical droid or an organic doctor, she mentally added. She stood up out of her chair and walked outside of the medical office. She could hear Jorec and someone else speaking about something relating to Selvernos. "What's going on?" she asked.
"Something for you," Jorec replied as he handed a datapad to her. "He didn't say where it was from," Jorec said as he pointed to the man standing next to him, "save for a local resistance cell in Gevest. Probably the same one that delivered the message to your parents almost a month ago."
"Could it be a response?"
"Could be," Jorec replied as the deliverer of the message walked out of the medical facility. "I'd hate to hear what it has to say if it is, however. You didn't tell them the truth about me."
"At your own request," Lia reminded him. "Whatever bad things they have to say about you is your fault."
"I have a bad feeling about this," Jorec groaned as the two began to walk back to their room in the Alderaanian Royal Palace. "You might not be treated with complete respect either," he warned her. "I might have to explain to them the complete reason for your sudden departure from the planet."
"If it has to come to that…"
"Everyone in this galaxy will know I'm a, you know, in about twenty years the way I'm going," Jorec joked, hiding the word Jedi from any potential eavesdroppers in the few people that walked the streets of Aldera.
"Hopefully in twenty years it won't matter if someone's one or not," Lia replied. "This Empire has to fall sometime."
"The sooner the better, but with two Sith in power, I doubt it's going to be over in the near future."
The two eventually arrived in their living space in the royal palace. Lia sat in a chair inside of the general room and activated the datapad. A two-dimensional image of Lia's father appeared before her, his slightly graying and balding head appearing from the projector. From his face came an expression of both joy and shock over what the previous message had reported. The timestamp on the edge of the recording put the date that the message was recorded on at two weeks previously. According to what he had heard from one of Organa's couriers, Lia's father had recorded this message a mere day after receiving his own message.
"We're glad to hear that you're safe, Lia," her father began. "Your mother and I were frightened to hear about that shootout that occurred at your apartment. It still amazes me that you were able to survive that thing at all. I suppose that that's one good thing that Jorec is capable of doing. Although it that shootout would have never happened if that traitor hadn't have shown his face. Hell, if you had never gotten involved with him in the first place--"
Here he goes, Jorec thought as Lia's father began his rant. Everything that is wrong about me, with most of the stuff being false.
"You should have listened to me a year ago when I said that he wasn't the kind of person that you should be dating. It seems that recent events have proven my original thoughts to be correct! He is a terrorist that was captured, tried, and imprisoned for attempting to bring down the Empire!" Lia's father exclaimed as he tried to yell some misguided sense into his daughter.
"He says that like it's a bad thing," Jorec responded to no one in particular.
"—and now you've gotten yourself knocked up by him. You two aren't even married! I told you that's all those people at Sentiss wanted out of woman, their bodies. I bet he isn't there now; he probably skipped out as soon as he found out."
How dare he say those things? Jorec thought as anger began to rise throughout him. He knows nothing about me! After a few seconds he quickly calmed down, realizing that Mr. Garent's opinions on him weren't based on the "real" Jorec. Although he knew that if Mr. Garent knew the entire truth, the man still wouldn't like him anyway.
The tape continued, making more scathing remarks against Jorec and every once and a while questioning Lia about her decision making abilities. The big shocker that the holorecording contained was yet to come, however.
Lia nearly dropped the datapad she held in her hands after her father had finished speaking. "He—he practically disowned me," she whispered. She felt Jorec's hand rest on her shoulder, and she knew that he was trying his best to comfort her at the moment. The ultimatum was simple: she had to leave where ever she was and return home. If she refused to, her family would sever almost all contact with her.
"They're trying to get you to return home," Jorec softly said. "Even though your father obviously doesn't like me, and probably never will, they only want you to be safe."
"Are you actually trying to convince me to go back?" Lia asked him.
"I'm just saying, like I did before, that there are going to be dangers if you stay with me. You're going to be hunted just for the simple fact that I love you. I want you to be safe too, you know. I'm not trying to convince you to do anything."
"But you do want me to go back…" Lia whispered as a feeling of loneliness began to come over her.
"Personally, no," Jorec replied. "Sometimes I feel selfish in wanting you to stand by me, though. I feel terrible about putting you in so much danger. You heard what your father said, and what you saw back on Gevest. They're actively hunting for you just because of me!" He paced around the room, the stress of the events of the past two months finally catching up with him.
"I told you on the Dancer's Dream that I was willing to take those risks," Lia said as she watched him pace.
"I know you said that," Jorec sighed. "It just seems like it's hard for me to actually accept those risks sometimes." Jorec stopped pacing in front of a painting depicting a sunset near the Royal Palace. "A lot of bad stuff has happened to me, Lia, and at times I don't want for you to be caught up in it."
"I'm already caught up in it," Lia answered as her voice started to rise. "I hope you remember that about two months ago there were Imperial Stormtroopers were quite actively shooting at me!"
"That memory is exactly what caused me to start this conversation," Jorec replied. "They were shooting at you because of me, your father is nearly disowning you because of me, Master Fionst died to save me!" It was then that the root of the issue was finally exposed. Even though the years of therapy had caused Jorec to finally accept that the deaths of the other Jedi that had been betrayed by the 135th Legion on Selvernos wasn't his fault, these feelings were unfortunately back, a side effect of the recent string of events.
"Do you think every single one of those things is entirely your fault?" Lia simply asked.
"Sometimes it feels like it," was the answer she received. "I'm sorry," he apologized, "I shouldn't have gone off like that." Jorec slowly walked towards Lia, and kissed her forehead. "I need to go meditate, alone, for a while. I'll be back in two or three hours, so don't worry about me."
"I'm not going to jump if that's what you're worried about," Jorec said an hour later to the small group of security guards that had assembled near the balcony he had been meditating on.
"Ms. Garent is worried about you, sir," a guard replied.
"I know she is," Jorec replied. I can feel it from here, he thought. "Two of you can stay here if it'll make her stop worrying so much. They have to be quiet, though."
"Sir?" the head guard questioned.
"Humor me," Jorec replied. He looked up towards the Alderaanian night sky, seeing the stars as he did so. A few constellations were visible in the sky, some that were even visible from Selvernos in winter. Alderaan had no moons, a fact that Jorec hadn't truly gotten used to yet, despite staying on the planet for over a month already. That was surely a product of living on a planet with two moons for a little under half of his life. He closed his eyes again and attempted to meditate on his problems. It wasn't going to be easy, but with the Force as his ally and with the help of Lia and what few friends he had, he was sure that he would finally defeat the problems he had acquired nearly eleven years previously.
Before he began to meditate again, he made a mental list of things he needed to do in the very near future: speak with Master It'kla about what happened during the end of the Clone Wars and try to get some advice on how to handle the guilt, talk with Senator Organa about finding Master Yoda's location (even though he wasn't planning on leaving Alderaan until his and Lia's child was born), and finally make sure that Lia knew that he still loved her and wanted her to stay with him. And as Jorec finally felt the calm presence of the Force around him, he knew that that last thing he thought of was the most important to him, he had known it all along.