"Done with Coruscant. Back on Brentaal ~2200, flight 12A. Love you, Sarah."
Carth wasn't sure just what to make of Sarah's terse message, except for the obvious. She'd been gone for just a handful of days, and she was 'done' with Coruscant? Did she mean that she had left it without permission? That this was a frustrated 'done'? It seemed to be the most valid answer, there was no way that the Jedi Council could have concluded their trial of Revan the Butcher in less than a week, could they? Especially one that ended with her release...he must be missing something.
"Dustil."
"Hmmm?" Although that sounded almost stereotypically teenaged lacking in enthusiasm, Dustil gave him a full measure of attention, staring at him over the edge of his school screen. Carth passed him the message and was unsurprised to see immediate doubt and suspicion in his son's dark eyes. "I...don't feel anything hidden in this. Nothing beneath the words. This came in the open?" Dustil finally admitted, closing his screen and standing, moving towards the expansive windows that looked out on the base's shipworks and landing yards. He closed his eyes, resting his palm against the glass and taking a deep breath. "She feels fine. But again, she may be masking. I may not be able to read her correctly through that. You?"
"I get nothing out of the ordinary." But Dustil was the force user, he wasn't...really. He knew he was tied to Sarah, but he wasn't able to manipulate that on his own.
"So...what do we do?" Dustil stepped back, waiting for instruction. Carth still found that odd, sometimes it felt like he was living with an ensign and not his teenaged son. What do we do? What do I do? Dustil expected him to lead, and that was usually a role he was comfortable in.
"For now, nothing. Tonight, you and Mission go to the Hawk and wait there. Just in case." Just in case. That would put them close to where he'd be picking Sarah up at, if she even showed up. And if she didn't, then they'd definitely need to be there, because they'd be leaving. Once, the very idea of throwing away a two decade career, of desertion, would have never crossed his mind. He was just months away from what was pretty much a guaranteed promotion...to Admiral. Probably just weeks away from receiving the highest honor that the Republic military gave, but the words fell easily enough from his lips. He'd changed so much that sometimes he barely knew himself. And Dustil did not so much as blink or pause at them, giving him a sharp nod in reply. For years, Carth had been struggling to be loved by his own son, and in those years, he'd never seen respect, only resentment. But there it was, more than just a hint of what he was striving for. It wasn't why he'd made the decision, and hopefully this was just overactive paranoia, that he'd be right where he was tomorrow morning...with Sarah. But if he wasn't, that would be where this led.
"Understood."
Good. Carth didn't want to have to explain, not that Dustil needed much explained to him anymore. "I'll see you later." He would go into the office today, ride a desk and act as if everything was normal in his life. He'd get as much done today as possible, focusing on those things he'd already started or those that needed his particular attention. Again, just in case.
He went into work and it was easy to be just as he had been before... he'd been distant, held apart because of his newness in his position and the fact he'd never tried to settle into what he understood was supposed to be a temporary posting. And he had come with an obvious injury and a new reputation of being a bit of a dark soul. It had not been deliberate, but now it worked in his favor. He was left undisturbed in his office, able to plot and plan. Since he was verifiably not dead, all of his accounts had been unfrozen when he'd returned to duty. It wasn't a huge amount, but substantial enough, especially with the earning potential of the Hawk. He played with it, not drastically enough to trigger flags in the system, just enough to make it look like he was cleaning house and taking care of his responsibilities... creating accounts for Sarah, Dustil and Mission, fattening those with credits. Nothing at all out of the ordinary, nothing that he wouldn't have done anyway, given more time. It was all easily covered by plausible deniability, he was just taking care of his new, or newly recovered, dependents. He left at the same time he'd become accustomed to, took his usual path home, and once the door shut behind him, galvanized into action. He packed his and Sarah's belongings, checking the kids' rooms...but Dustil and Mission were gone, as were their things. Good, good. Now, all he had to do was eat dinner and wait.
When it was time, he gathered his deck jacket off of the back of the couch and stepped out, traveling to the civilian star port to wait for her arrival. He did his best to seem calm, even though he watched and weighed everything around him. All he had to do was see her, then he'd know.
The doors slid open, the first through was a glut of naval officers in uniform. He recognized none of them and that seemed to go for them as well, none of them gave him a second look as they passed by. It saved him from having to come up with pleasantries while still keeping an eye out for Sarah.
She appeared in the opening and he studied her warily. She looked fine, she looked damn good...oddly so for someone who had gone to Coruscant for trial. Calm, at ease, hints of a smile crossed her features as she nodded her way through her final checks. He got absolutely no feelings of threat from her, no warning in the glance she gave him. But she looked much more like a Jedi than he was used to, and that sat uncomfortably with him. Had it gone badly in the way he'd never considered before? He'd been expecting a trial, condemnation, but had the Order managed to bring her back? Change her mind completely, in only four days? She'd left telling him that the Order would never bring her back, she was going to stay with him if possible, but there she stood... in muted gray and maroon short robes, her lightsabers blatantly displayed at her hips, her hair up in a severe knot. Of all the things Carth had planned for, this was not one of them and he had no idea how to proceed...
"Hey." She greeted, giving him a smile filled to the brim with reassurance and he was not reassured in the slightest. "No kids?"
"I wasn't certain if we were staying, leaving or leaving in a hurry. They're on the Hawk."
"Oh. We're staying. Everything's fine." She sounded almost as if she was trying to convince herself of that and he gave her a dubious look, then shook his head. No, not here. Not now. If she said they were staying, then he'd believe her at least until they had a chance to discuss it fully. "We go get them?"
"Sure." That would put them headed towards the Hawk. If this was just an act, if she was being watched, it would give her an opportunity to let him know. If she was, she didn't seem in a hurry to warn him, spending her time staring pensively out of the windshield. Maybe if she actually seemed like things were fine, he'd believe her more. But she'd spoken through the Force to him, put her words directly into his head before. Wasn't that secure? Could another Jedi 'overhear' that, even between them? As he understood it, they had a bond...but that was a bond he didn't completely understand. He sighed, taking the back way through the yards, headed towards where the Hawk was parked in her inactive vessel berth, unsurprised to see the faint glints of her ramp lights on low brightness. The kids had begun the first stages of a power up, exactly as he expected. "I'll go get them." He said, after parking and waiting for a few moments to give her the chance to get out, to go into the ship, but she didn't move.
Dustil met him immediately on the inside, tilting his head to the side as he studied the vehicle she waited in. "Well?" He demanded and Carth shrugged in answer.
"I don't know. She's back. She says we go home, so I guess we go home." Carth only wished he understood what was going on, because he still had the urge to make his way to the cockpit and start the engines cycling for real. But he wouldn't do that without Sarah, and Sarah had very deliberately not come onboard with him.
"If that's what she says, then yes. I still don't feel any real warnings off of her. I'll go get Mission."
"Right." Now he was beginning to feel foolish, had he completely overreacted? No. Sarah had a way of letting him know when he had, there was a bounce to her head, an arc to her brow, a vague smirk on her lips. She'd had none of those, she just felt distant and disagreeable. Things had not gone exactly as she'd planned, or more probably, as she had hoped. But she was back, the worst thing he could imagine had not happened. Or it had simply been put off until later, but if that was the truth, she'd be right behind him on the ship. They'd be running, just like his mind was running.
He felt the engine power die, then Mission and Dustil appeared, both carrying small bags. Mission had obviously expected them to flee, to the point where she'd settled down to wait in her pajamas. It was almost enough to make Carth laugh outright, but he held it to himself. Sarah could probably sense his flitting, inconsistent mood, but he didn't want to stir things up if he didn't have to.
"Hey, kiddo." He stated when Mission gave him a quick hug. "We're staying put." For now. He was not surprised when she replied with a noncommittal shrug, she'd be perfectly happy leaving Brentaal and this 'new life' behind. He knew it hadn't been easy, but he still felt it was the right, best way to handle it.
The kids settled into the vehicle, Dustil pointedly remaining silent and insulated from Sarah. Mission followed his lead, but Carth could feel her confusion and doubt. She was expressive and outgoing, she'd love to hug Sarah, to let Sarah know how happy she was that Sarah was back with them. That needed to wait, though. He drove in silence, pulling up in front of their new quarters building. Sarah glanced up at it, the faintest ghost of a frown, of a question flitting across her features before her expression closed down again. So that was how this was going to go. It was bad, he just wasn't certain how bad it was yet, or exactly what parts of it were bad.
She followed him up silently, simply glancing around the main room of the apartment. He knew it was still sparse, still institutional, but it was nice. It was nicer than anything he'd had except for the home he'd had on Telos, after that, he'd been a mid level officer without dependents, he'd never warranted more than a small apartment. That had changed, and this was the fruit of that change. He'd hoped for a little bit more excitement, contentment from her, but he wasn't going to get it.
That thought must have filtered through to her because she gave him a pained look, moving close enough to weave her fingers in with his. "It's very nice, Carth. I'm sorry, I'm being terrible." He pulled her in, wrapping his free arm around her and letting her proximity wash over him. Now that she was focused on him, he could feel her pushing back against his dread, his uncertainty, and he snorted in amusement. "Yes, yes, yes." She grumbled, "I know that you know. But stop worrying. Things are not as bad as you think they are."
"Hopefully you are correct." He paused as the kids moved through, headed for their rooms. "I just want things to work out." It came out sad and resigned and he would have taken the last words back if he could have.
"Hmmm. So this is the new place?" She pushed away from him, stalking around the main room, running her fingertips along the wall and peering intently out of the windows overlooking the shipworks.
"R.H.I.P." He chuckled and she nodded in answer. It was weird to have the rank to get these privileges. "Come on, let me show you." He was eager to please her, or at the very least, make things slightly less dire. She'd tell him eventually, probably when she was certain that the kids were not going to interrupt. She followed him, gazing around the kitchen, the 'fresher for the kids' side of the apartment, and then stepping into the master bedroom. He knew it was beige highlighted with tan, but he'd been waiting to do anything with it. Even though she had been raised Jedi, and beige highlighted with tan seemed to be a favored palette for them, she was openly flamboyant and he'd never seen her deliberately choose any sort of neutral hues. Even now, wearing robes, she was in much richer, bolder colors than the norm. And it seemed like she had lost patience with those, dumping them onto the tan tiles of the floor with disdain, kicking them without ceremony into the corner. Her hair followed, she released it from its tight twists and scrubbed her fingers through it, trying vainly to create mayhem. It fell back into its normal fall, straight and full, completely without chaos and she growled her disapproval.
He dropped his shoes on the floor and stretched out on the bed, admiring the show. It was like watching her peel away a false front, revealing the truth again. This was his Sarah, clad only in a slip of an undershirt and skin tight shorts, her hair free around her shoulders. He welcomed her when she climbed on the bed next to him, resting her head in his lap. It was a joy to stroke her hair, to feel her finally begin to calm down, relaxing into a heavy weight on him. "Well?" He asked when she had been quiet for a good, long time.
"I have not been released from the Order." Her voice shook and he closed his eyes. They had sent her home just to tell him goodbye... "Yet, I am not serving in the Order for the most part."
"I don't understand." He'd never paid that much attention to what went on in the Order, in their temples and enclaves. He'd never needed to know before becoming involved with Sarah, and they'd never invited the scrutiny of outsiders.
"I belong to the Order. I can call myself a Jedi, openly. I can call upon them for aid and care. I will begin to draw a support payment. They will keep an eye on me, in case I become ill again. But, for the most part, I live my life as I see fit; with you, with the children."
It sounded almost too good to be true, but. "Sarah, if it's the money..." He had very little understanding of how Jedi aged, it seemed as if they were cared for internally, which meant that Sarah had been raised with the understanding that her service would be rewarded with care. No pension, no retirement, even after her years of service on the front lines. She'd jeopardized all of that to respond to their pleas for assistance in the first place. It didn't matter that she was broken, he was in a position to be able to care for her without the Order's care or support. He was well aware that she would probably never be able to hold a job, but that didn't matter. It was somehow fitting that Revan, broken from the war and whatever had come after it, would become a Navy dependent. They had begged for help, she had helped, and he was certain that had been what had set her on the path to her downfall.
"It's not the money, Carth. I... may have led the way in, but I also led the way out. We...you and I...saved the Republic. I'm just fine with them paying me for it. I worked myself into believing that I was going to a trial, another showdown with a Council, and it got ripped out from underneath me with the finest show of reasonable I've ever seen. I don't do reasonable well."
That was an understatement and Carth laughed out loud, burying his fingers in her hair. Always the warrior, it seemed like the best way to completely unbalance her was to deny her the option of a fight. She was intrinsically good at fighting, at struggling, both with a weapon in her hand and with her words, but she floundered when she couldn't fall back on that. "So, that's it? They want to put you out to pasture? I guess we can deal with that." It was a crime, a shame, but he was in the mood to be selfish enough to go along with it.
"I served as a Sentinel for the Order. My job was to watch, and look, and to get into things. I'd say I succeeded at the last part perhaps a little too damned well. I know I got into something I shouldn't have. The problem is that we don't know what it was and I can't remember it. They want me to watch for it, because I will be able to recognize it."
He tightened his fingers in her hair. The last time she'd gone looking for it, she'd fallen and destroyed a large section of the Republic in her wake. He loved her, desperately, but he'd desperately loved his wife as well, and she had been killed in that destruction. He could forgive Sarah, but he could never completely let himself forget just what she was capable of. He knew that better than almost anybody. "We are not going looking for it again."
She shifted, making herself more comfortable. "No. Not going looking for it again, my dear." They were the right words, and he knew she meant them, but she also shared a hint of doubt along the bond. She wouldn't go looking for it until or unless she felt forced to, compelled to. And that was as good an answer as he was ever going to get. She couldn't promise him completely without knowing. And she couldn't know without going. It was just something he was going to have to deal with, one more thing that came along with the very messed up package. But he couldn't stop loving her, he wouldn't...even though he knew it was dangerous and brilliantly foolhardy.