If you want to get lucky open your eyes.

It had been weeks.

Weeks since everything had gone kriffing sideways. Weeks since she’d nearly died on Mygeeto at the hands of her own clone troopers. Weeks since she’d felt Ki-Adi Mundi die, felt the Force screaming in agony as more and more Jedi were struck down. She’d been on the run since. Her first thought had been to return to the Temple. Not because of the beacon; that was a trap. There was no doubt in her mind, even without the Force warning. But because she couldn’t sit by and do nothing. It was her home.

Then the beacon’s message changed. To a voice she knew all too well. Obi-Wan. Thank the Force. It told her so much. He was alive. And there were others like her, other Jedi that had lived. Their numbers had been decimated, their world razed to the ground, but they hadn’t been destroyed. Not entirely.

She just had to find them.

And survive long enough to do so.

Between the hunt for the remaining Jedi, the state her ship was in, and the state she was in… THAT would be the hard part. It was dangerous for her, now, to reach into the Force to any degree, but she took the risk anyway. Let it guide her as she laid in a new course, away from Coruscant. Away from whatever remained of the Temple. Once that was completed she took the time to try and tend to her injuries. The few bacta patches in the medical kits on her ship would have to do until she was able to land. She didn’t dare rest, though, or chance a healing trance, not with everything that had happened.

It was too dangerous.

She sold her ship for parts in the hopes that it wouldn’t be traced back to her. Then she took her credits and ventured into the less reputable corners of the planet. It took several hands of sabacc, more drinks, and prolonged suffering of inept flirtations from the man seated to her right, but she not only won herself an impressive kriffing pot (in a variety of currency that included credits, peggats, and aurodium ingots), but she won herself a ship, too; a battered YT-1300 light freighter that had been modified. Of course, things never could go smoothly, and shortly after the game and subsequent transaction had been completed, as she attempted to leave, both the planet and the shabby little bar they’d been playing sabacc in, an unrelated fight erupted. It was the hazard of dealing in the shady corners of the galaxy, but they were all that were left to her, now.

By the time she was in the cockpit of her newly acquired ship and blasting off the planet her old injuries were screaming at her, and the new weren’t much happier.

She needed somewhere to rest. Somewhere she could have a chance to heal. Safety. Someone she could trust. Despite her unwillingness to bring danger to another’s doorstep... she didn’t have much choice. She only hoped they would forgive her.

Siri set course for Alderaan.

Her arrival went smoothly enough; she was travelling under the name Vala Dorn for the time being, and she was a thoroughly unremarkable woman with red hair and simple clothing. She was ushered through to a secluded waiting area far away from the important rooms of the royal palace. She waited with a surprising amount of patience, exhausted and hurting, gazing out over the palace gardens. She sensed Bail long before she heard or saw him. “Who are you?” the prince consort demanded.

“I know the hair is different, Bail, but I didn’t think I looked that different,” she retorted, turning to give him a crooked smile. His demeanour changed immediately, and he grinned at her, relief evident on his face. An odd sort of tension, too, but the relief was most prevalent.

“You’re all right!” He crossed the space between them and pulled her into a bone crushing hug. She hugged him back just as tightly, although she had to muffle her cry of pain against his shoulder. Which made him pull back, eyeing her in concern. “I take that back. I’m taking you to the healers.”

When she didn’t argue with him or put up a protest she felt his concern shoot up several more notches, and he wasted no time in leading her to the palace’s medical wing.

Later, after being poked and prodded and scanned and soaking in a prolonged bacta bath (and getting patches slapped on her afterwards to make sure she was completely healed, the sheer LACK of pain was almost... overwhelming.

There was the feeling that she was... missing something, now that she was no longer distracted by her injuries. The Organa’s had set her up in a room in the private wing of the palace, but there was a tension, there. But it wasn’t until the Force led her across Breha sitting by the fountain in one of the palace’s many gardens with an infant, a girl, cradled gently in her arms that she realised what it was.

Oh, FORCE.

She’d never had much of a talent with precognition, but she knew, then, that the little girl, the Force sensitive little girl, was important. Would be important. And she knew whose she was. It raised so many questions, but it made a few pieces of the puzzle begin to fall into place, too. Force, it explained the tension they’d tried to hide.

But there was more to it. And Obi-Wan was involved. She felt it in her bones.

So she held her tongue for the time being, slowly piecing together what had happened. And where Obi-Wan might have gone from Alderaan. If she was going to attempt to find him (and she WAS), she needed somewhere to start.

Once she had clued in enough... it was time for her to bring it up

“How did you come to be caring for Anakin and Padmé’s child?” she asked Bail and Breha quietly, over drinks after dinner one evening. They visibly tensed, and Breha looked at Bail in concern. “You KNOW me, Bail. I’m not going to do anything to jeopardise your family,” she told them, weary and worn. “But I need to hear what happened. From you, not just what I’ve pieced together. And how Obi-Wan’s involved.”

Somehow Bail found a touch of amusement in her words; she suspected he’d figured out her… particular issues regarding her fellow Jedi at some point over the years they’d known each other. That amusement faded as he spoke, answering her question, telling her what she wanted to know, what she’d figured out.

One thing was for certain, however. She couldn’t stay much longer. Her presence was dangerous, to all of them. And she would not put them at risk, any more than they already were.

She offered him a small smile. “I’ll leave as soon as I’m able,” she told them quietly, rising from her chair and crossing towards the door, touching Bail’s shoulder briefly. He covered her hand with his own.

“You don’t have to do that,” he told her, and she knew he meant it. But she still couldn’t stay.

“I need to. I won’t bring any more risk to you than I already have.”

“Then let us help.”

“All right,” she accepted his offer with an exhausted, reluctant sigh. “As long as you don’t put yourself in danger for me. I can’t-” Siri swallowed, hard, anguish and loss welling up in her chest so deeply she couldn’t breathe. “I won’t let you do that.”

He nodded, squeezing her hand once before letting go, and she slipped silently out of the room.

It turned out that the Organas had a considerable number of contacts, which came as absolutely no surprise to her. But it was the identity that they were using their contacts to build for her that was unexpected. They were making her FAMILY. Leda Antilles, one of Breha’s cousins.

And the identity was thorough; built to withstand even the most dedicated of background checks. They’d even set up a “transaction” between Vala Dorn and Leda, for the purchase of one battered YT-1300 light freighter, so it wouldn’t look suspicious for Leda to go off planet in a ship a different woman had arrived in.

Siri was dark-haired now, as was befitting Leda Antilles, and wearing clothing more suitable for a smuggler than a Jedi, all leather trousers and sturdy knee high boots and a dark red sleeveless tunic under a leather waistcoat. It was odd; thanks to the Organas and her skill at sabacc she was now in the possession of more… possessions than she’d ever had… before. She’d tried to decline their gifts, but they’d insisted, and Breha had gotten all… gently stubborn and before she’d known it she had... things. And more medical supplies than she would ever need. She hoped.

It was past time for her to leave; she’d been on Alderaan for too long as it was, and she had a Jedi to find. Both Bail and Breha came to see ‘Leda’ off, hugging her tightly and giving her admonishments to not stay away for so long. She promised she wouldn’t dare to stay away very long at all, of course, and gave them both a fond crooked smile, before heading up the ramp into her ship.

And she left Alderaan behind.