Last time: Kait and Admiral Sulam learned that Selina doesn't remember her.

Now: The truth comes out.

Chapter 13- The Mystery Continues

Viran contorted his face as he tried to grasp at Sasha's light in the Force. Oppie and him were trying again to reach her, but it was proving to be more difficult as more time passed.

Sasha! It's me and Oppie! Please respond! Viran cried out, exhaustedly as he was feeling the strain from this starting to wear on him. He sighed after a moment of no response. "Anything?" He asked Oppie.

"No." Oppie said tiredly. "It's like there's something blocking us from reaching her, it doesn't make any sense, unless she's blocking us. But I can't think of why she'd do that."

"No, she would never do that," Viran said, shaking his head. "It definitely feels like something is blocking us from reaching her."

Oppie wiped his face. "I'm not sure - " He started.

The curtain was pulled aside, and Op straightened up seeing the Admiral along with Kait stepping in.

"We need to talk." Kait said in a tone dark with seriousness.

"Uh, is everything okay?" Viran asked, concerned as he straightened in his seat.

"'Cien' lied to me." Kait responded. "She has no idea who I am."

"She did say that some of her memories were fuzzy." Oppie said, a little confused.

"Op, she has no idea who I am," Kait said. "And if she can't remember me, fine. We've only known each other for a short time. But she lied about how you and I met. That she set us up. She was trying to cover the fact that she didn't know. If she just couldn't remember, she'd have no reason to do that." Kait stated.

"Wait, what?" Viran asked, confused. He rubbed his eyes and looked back at Kait and the Admiral. "How do you know? Did you go and visit her?" He asked, clarifying.

"Yeah, we just came from there." The Admiral said.

"What did she say?" Oppie asked curiously.

The curtain parted slightly as Kyr walked up to them. "Hi guys, I…" He trailed off as everyone turned to look to him. "What? What happened now?" He asked worriedly, tensing up.

"We just came from talking to, uh…" The Admiral started.

"Cien?" Kyr asked. "What's happened? Is she okay?" Kyr asked, already turning to dash from the sickbay.

"Kyr!" Kait said. "I do not think that is her." She stated.

"What?" Kyr asked, confused and coming to a stop.

"They were just telling us about what happened," Viran explained to Kyr as he stood from his seat.

"We went down to talk to her, and 'Cien' was ignoring me like last time, like she didn't know who I was or thought I was a functionary or something," Kait started. "The Admiral called me Kaity when we were talking about Sasha and I doing her hair. And Cien said she couldn't remember it, which could have been understandable. But she said 'I'm sorry Kaity', as if she was taking a stab in the dark at using my name." Kait looked confused for a second. "I think that was the first time anyone used my name since we've been talking to her. Then to see what she'd say I remarked that it was like when she and I had talked in the bar, and she had dragged Op over to meet me and set us up. That I hadn't remembered that I met Cien a decade earlier. And she agreed." Kait shook her head as if to clear it. "That's not at all how it happened, Op and Sasha were missing on Myrkr, and she and I never met before. Op was the one I met a decade before." Kait said, explaining to the Admiral. "If she couldn't have remembered that all, fine. If she couldn't remember me, that's understandable. But she lied about it, she tried to pretend like she remembered when she didn't. She might have some of Cien's memories, but she isn't Cien." Kait finished.

Kyr furrowed his brow and looked downward. "Maybe it's a misunderstanding?" Kyr suggested with no hint of hope. "She remembers so much, so many details that wouldn't make sense for Selina to have been able to get." He said dejectedly.

Viran looked between Kait and Kyr before exchanging a look with Admiral Sulam. "Then why don't we go down and see for ourselves? I understand that her memory is fuzzy, but this does seem a bit odd. Let's check and we will know for sure," he suggested.

"Yeah." Kyr said absently, his features turning towards a scowl. "Lets go see what this is about." He stated as he turned to leave.

Viran watched his best friend go with a furrowed brow before glancing to Oppie, Kait, and the Admiral. He then followed after Kyr with the others at his side after shooting a brief glance to Sasha's sleeping form as if to almost say they would be back soon.

"Colonel." The Marine said. Then they glanced behind him to see the crowd coming into the brig. "Admiral. Commander."

"At ease." The Admiral said as she followed the Xiv's down the small corridor to the prisoner's cell. Scamp was at her side, and they were following Kait and Oppie. Scamp had met them down there after Sulam had called him to inform him of their plan.

Viran followed just behind Kyr to the cell. A sense of unease washing over him as their large party reached the door. He glanced at Kyr as they all came to a stop. "Shall we?" He asked, gesturing towards what lay beyond in the cell.

Kyr took a brief moment to collect himself before he sighed quietly inside his helmet. He took his buy'ce off and hit the door release stepping inside. Selina, or Cien, or whoever was pretending to be Cien, he wasn't sure who he might encounter, was sitting on the edge of the bed looking into the far distance in the small room.

Her eyes turned up to look at them as she seemed to come out of her daze. "Cyar'riduur?" She asked, using Cien's inflections.

"Yeah." Kyr said, not sure what to say.

She stood up, looking at the crowd that was walking in. "Is everything okay?" She asked with concern.

"Yeah." Kyr said once again. He took another step forward, seeing his wife's mannerisms in everything Selina was doing. The way she held her hands, the way she stood, the way she looked at them from under her brow with a look of tentative defensiveness. He didn't know if it was wishful thinking or… He cleared his throat. "Do you remember Kait?" He asked, gesturing tentatively over his shoulder at her, where she stood next to Op.

Cien furrowed her brow. "Yes, but… what is this about?" She asked, confused and almost annoyed. "Haven't I proven myself, who I am?"

"Yes." Kyr said placatingly. This wasn't a side of Cien he had seen, really, since he had seen to her wounds in the sickbay after she first arrived at Haven. Or that one time he had messed up her armor stand.

"We just all wanted to come back and check in again," Viran added casually. "To see how you are doing."

"I'm trapped in this prison," Cien responded flatley as she gestured to Selina's body. "In this cell, how do you think I feel?" She bit back annoyedly.

"Cien." Oppie said, stepping forward. "We understand, it's just -"

"Why did you lie?" Kait asked, stepping forward.

"When did I lie?" Cien asked, seething at Kait, then looking between Kyr, Viran and Op. "My memory is spotty. After I transferred into a whole other body." She stated, as if explaining annoyedly for the millionth time. "Does that seem unreasonable?" She growled.

"If your memory is spotty, then why pretend we had met a decade ago?" Kait pressed, "why 'go along' with the idea that you introduced me to Op in a bar?" She asked.

"Everything is a jumble." Cien stated, almost glaring at them, her jaw set in annoyance. "I can't remember what are Selina's memories, what are my own. What memories that did transfer with me, they feel disjointed."

"That doesn't explain why you went along with something completely false." Kait countered.

"Kait." Kyr said warningly under his breath.

"Maybe it's because I'm trapped in this cell." Cien said, her voice raised, loosing her temper. "While all the people that are supposed to be my family keep coming in here to make me prove for the thousandth time that I'm me." She said in frustration as she turned her back to them, seething, and hid her face in her hands.

"Cyar'ika, we believe you." Kyr said placatingly, stepping forward to the forcefield, to be as close as he could be to his wife.

"It really doesn't feel like it." Cien growled from behind her hands. She let them drop as she turned back to them, her annoyance as strong as ever. "What do I need to do to finally prove myself? That this isn't some trick?" She said seething. "You," she pointed at Op. "I met you in the forests on Vestora, I was trying to retrieve a holocron fragment for Dracul." She spat out. She pointed at Viran. "And we met on Polis Massa, and you made a stupid pun about lighting when you sent a light panel into my head." She growled at them.

Viran blinked then smirked as he remembered the pun. "I did, didn't I?" He chuckled under his breath then dropped the smirk, becoming serious again. "Look, I believe it's you. It's just this whole thing is confusing."

"Yes." Oppie agreed. "But you m-"

"No." Cien said, seething. "No more of this, I've proven myself. If you need to keep Selina locked up, fine." She spat out. "But I'm trapped in here just the same as her. Stop coming in here making me prove who I am." She said, looking between them.

Kyr looked at his wife, trapped in Selina's body, and had no idea what to do. It felt like such a paltry thing next to what she must be going through, but he hated this, more than anything he had ever encountered. He missed his wife, and he worried, deeply, about their children and whatever had happened to them. Hoping that whatever happened they were somehow okay with wherever her body was. He really, desperately, wished that Sasha was here, since she was the only one among them who could actually know, and put the question about the person that stood before them to rest. Even aside from her ability to delve into Selina's mind and confirm that Cien really resided within, Sasha knew Cien better in some ways than even he did as her husband. She would know. And she would have been able to confirm it. But she would have known better than anyone, even Kyr, since they were so close.

Kyr furrowed his brow, slightly at that thought. And instantly hid it behind his sabacc face. "You're absolutely right." Kyr said quietly, dejectedly, for his wife. "You have proven who you are." He said, looking at her in the cell while she seethed at them, still from behind the ray shield while everyone else was trying to figure out what to say. Kyr glanced at all the others. "Let's go talk outside." He said, his voice an order as he gestured with his thumb towards the door. He shot Op a look when it looked like his brother was about to speak, and a flash of confusion shot across his brothers face as he moved to follow Kyr.

Scamp and Admiral Sulam stepped back from the hatchway to allow them to exit. Viran exchanged a confused glance with Oppie before following after Kyr.

Kait spoke, after everyone had gotten into the other room and the door closed behind him. "Kyr, I'm sorry, but there's something wrong about this." She said firmly, though she understood she had crossed a line.

"No, Kait…" Kyr said, shaking his head. He closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose tiredly. "Sport," he started quietly and dejectedly. "Did anything about this, all of this, seem wrong to you?" He asked.

"Uh…" Viran looked at everyone as their gazes all shifted to him then down to the decking. He thought for a moment for anything that felt out of the ordinary or wrong as Kyr put it. "No. Not that I saw." He said, furrowing his brow, but he wasn't sure if that was right either. Something definitely felt wrong, but he couldn't pinpoint what exactly it was. And there was still that strange feeling, but he was more sure it was Cien being trapped in Selina's head now… maybe.

Kyr snorted with dark humor, almost a laugh. "I…" He started. "Cien always says I was the first person to treat her kindly, but that's not really true." He started. "There was someone else in her life that reached out to her before I ever knew her. And you and I always joke about how jealous we are of the two of them."

Viran smirked at that as he knew exactly who Kyr was referring to. "Sasha." He then blinked. "Wait… she never brought up Sasha. And the last time we were in there, she didn't really seem to care as much as I would expect when talking about Sasha," he said, gesturing to Oppie and Kait. "She dismissed the fact that Sasha isn't well. I thought that was really strange, but said nothing because I wasn't sure."

"She hasn't said anything about Sasha with me." Kyr said. "And if that was Cien it would be the first thing she'd ask about. She'd be worried sick about her, even under these circumstances." He wiped his face. "She doesn't seem to care about Sasha, she's having trouble remembering Kait." He said, almost under his breath as he tried to put the pieces together of a puzzle he didn't even know existed. "She knows so much, but this all feels wrong. Her memory seems spotty, but not that spotty. There's some pattern to it that seems so unlike my wife." He said quietly.

"If we're starting to see a pattern then we need to go try to work it out." Oppie suggested. "She knows too much for it not to be Cien, but… I agree with you guys, something feels off about this."

"And you're right. The fact she didn't react or ask about Sasha is worrying," Viran added.

"But what do we do?" Scamp asked, speaking up for the first time since they got down there.

"I don't know." Kyr said quietly. "If that is Cien in some way." He said, glancing between them. "I don't know if her not mentioning Sasha and having a spotty memory is enough to condemn her, especially under these circumstances."

"Then how do we prove that it is not really Cien?" Viran asked carefully. "Because the more I think about it, that's not her and that Kait was right. That something was wrong."

"If that is Cien, can we sense if it's truly her or not?" Oppie asked.

"We could try," Viran said with a shrug. "Sasha was able to sense Cien on the Taipan and I've been sensing something off about Selina since she got here. Maybe we can get a clear answer to that. Plus she is the only one who knows what actually happened to Sasha. It doesn't hurt to try."

"That might be the only way any of us can tell." Oppie suggested with a shrug. "We've spent the last couple of years with Cien. If she doesn't 'feel' like Cien, then that's something we should be able to discern?"

Viran opened his mouth as if to respond then closed it. "No, you've got a point. We should have been able to sense if that was Cien. This doesn't feel like Cien." He concentrated for a moment. "This feels… darker almost."

Oppie closed his eyes and concentrated as well, immersing himself in the Force, trying to sense the world around them. He felt the whisps of presence of everyone else. The familiar feeling of Kait shining a little brighter as she quietly looked on curiously. And on the other side of the door, in the cell, a sense of… coldness. Darkness. Like a spill of ink that felt wrong. Cien, whenever he had tried to sense her these last few years, had always been like a hard stone edifice. Like she was a rough hewn rock face making her way through the house. This didn't feel like Cien at all, it felt like something darker, more amorphous. "No." Oppie said shaking his head. "That doesn't feel like Cien at all." He said, opening his eyes and glancing towards the closed door that separated them from… her. "It feels darker, more oily. Cien always seems like a rough stone in the middle of a turbulent river."

Kyr furrowed his brow curiously at his brother for that description.

"Then who the hell is that?" Scamp asked, gesturing towards the door as he tensed up as if the person on the other side of the cell door was a dangerous prisoner, not a friend. Which was the case from what the two Jedi in the hall were suggesting.

"She knows everything from Cien though." Kyr said, still wrestling with all of this in his mind. "What…" He swallowed as he remembered something, "what could she be?" He asked, deflating. Something nagged at him, something Cien had told him what felt like so long ago. After Abbiados, when she had described disposing of some dark part of herself with Selina.

"I don't think she's your wife, Kyr." The Admiral stated. "It's someone who has her memories, but it's not just memories that make the person."

"Yeah." Kyr looked back towards the door and squared his shoulders and stepped back into the anteroom before the forcefield.

"Is everything okay?" Cien asked archly as they walked back in.

"Yeah." Kyr said while the others followed him back in. He tried to figure out what to say as he looked at Selina's face, looking at them with Cien's mannerisms. The quirk of her eyebrow, the slight pursing of her lips. Everything about it seemed like his wife. But it wasn't. Her eyes were harder. She was looking at them with annoyance instead of concern. She was chewing her lip slightly, like she always did when she was trying to keep her temper under control. It was his wife, all the little mannerisms he had memorized and loved about her. But in a dark mirror. And not just because it was Selina's face trying to reflect Cien's mannerisms. "Do you have any idea what happened to Sasha?" Kyr asked.

"No." Cien stated. Too quickly.

Kyr looked at her for a split second, trying to hide a sense of confusion and concern. His 'wife' didn't follow up, she didn't care. And she answered too quickly, as if she knew perfectly well what was going on rather than needing a moment to form a well considered answer.

She spoke again after a moment, as if realizing the gaff she had made. "Sasha is strong, I'm sure she will be able to break free."

Kyr quirked his head to the side. "Break free of what?" He asked, perhaps a little sharply.

"Whatever is happening to her." Cien said, the slightest hint of surprise and concern. Not for Sasha, but for herself. "I don't know what's happening to her but I'm sure she will come out of it soon." She stated.

Kyr studied her for a moment. "Who are you?" He asked a hint of darkness edging into his tone.

Cien looked at him confused for a second. "I'm your wife." She said, annoyance and anger creeping into her tone. "I've proven myself."

Kyr looked at her for a tense while, as the room seemed to go completely quiet. As if the others weren't there, and it was just him and the woman behind the forcefield. "You've proven you have her memories." Kyr said as he took a step forward, almost stalking towards her. "But you're not my wife. You are not Sasha's sister, or the mother of our children. You don't care one bit about Sasha."

Her face fell into something like mortified shock. "Kyr, I-" She started.

"Whatever you are." He said, interrupting her, "you-"

"Kyr." Cien interrupted him, desperately trying to get a word in edgewise as her face belied a bevy of emotions. Anger. Annoyance. Pain. Shock. Hurt. Fear. "I am your wife, I'm trapped in this body. Please believe me." She said, her voice taking on a pleading tone. She didn't seem to care that the others were in the room. "Please." She said quietly. "I need you to believe me. I need you."

Kyr deflated once more at that. That sounded like his wife, whoever this was, it was still someone that had enough of her spark for her pain to break his heart.

"Hun." The Admiral said, taking a step forward as the silence subsumed the room. "I know my girl well enough to know who she is. How she feels about her family. How she feels about her husband." She paused. "And I don't think you're her."

Cien slowly turned Selina's eyes and face to glare at the Admiral. Not just a glare, a look of absolute venomous, seething hatred that if they hadn't been separated by the forcefield she would have lunged forward and ripped the Admiral's throat out, if not something far, far worse.

Kyr saw the look. For all that she was someone who had the memories of his wife. Whose mannerisms, her voice carried everything of her that he loved so much, this was not her. Cien would not have reacted that way. She would never have looked at the admiral with such hatred. She would never have looked at someone she considered her erstwhile mother, and fully the grandmother of their children with such a look of death.

He set his jaw and turned without a word, heading for the door.

"Kyr!" Cien called after him desperately. "Come back!" She called. "Stop!" She ordered, annoyance turning it into a forceful yell. "Stop!" She yelled after him. "You're supposed to be mine!" She yelled as he walked out the door into the room beyond and turned the corner, stopping out of her sight. Cien looked desperately at the others in the room. "He's supposed to be my husband!" She said, looking between Op and Viran. "He's supposed to be mine!" She yelled furiously, slamming her fist into the ray shield.

Viran narrowed his gaze at her. "He is not yours," he said sternly. "Whoever you are, stop this charade now. If you know what's good for you," he added disgustedly as he turned to go, following after his best friend.

Cien snarled at him and slammed her fist against the forcefield. "No!" She yelled. "No! NO! NO!" She said, each time slamming against the forcefield. "He's mine, not hers!" She yelled, losing all control as Kait, Op, The Admiral and Scamp backed away and left the room.

The door slid shut behind them, Cien's furious yelling being cut off as she devolved into a incoherent yelling through tears.

The room was dead quiet for a moment as the din of the exchange hung in the air.

"So where the hell is Cien?" Kyr asked numbly.

End of Part 1

OH SNAP! THEN WHERE IS CIEN? REVIEW!