Chapter 4: Letters from Home
Meditation was a sacred Jedi discipline, meant to center the soul, still the mind, and banish distraction.
I was currently hiding behind a statue of an ancient Jedi Master with half her nose chipped off, typing as fast as possible on a datapad I had most definitely not borrowed permanently from the Temple Archives.
So yes. I was technically meditating. On the consequences of being raised in a political lie.
And maybe also on regional unrest.
With a side of passive aggression.
Encrypted Message: Outbound / Level-2 Disguise Layer: Academic Inquiry
TO: Duchess Satine Kryze, Mandalore (allegedly my aunt)
CC: Korkie "Technically My Twin, Even Though We're Not Identical" Kryze, Age 7, Aspiring Political Martyr
FROM: Temple Student "Ben" (Codename: Definitely Not the Child of a Jedi and a Duchess, That Would Be Ridiculous)
SUBJECT: Regional Ethics and Mandalorian Domestic Law, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Start Hacking the Archives
Dear Aunt Satine,
Meditation is going great. I'm very centered. Enlightened, even.
Today's lesson was about surrendering emotional attachments to achieve true peace, and nothing says inner serenity like pretending your own family doesn't exist.
We also studied the concept of legal non-involvement in planetary conflict. I raised my hand and asked if that extended to family civil wars. Master Windu blinked slowly and told me to reflect on my silence. I found that very meaningful.
Also, unrelated question: If someone hypothetically trained me in diplomacy and gave me an heirloom vibroblade, what kind of message would that send?
Asking for a me.
The screen blinked at me, waiting for more.
I shifted, knees folded beneath me on the cold marble floor, one hand tucked in my sleeve so I could hide the datapad if someone walked by. My cloak was bunched up behind me like a nest. I called it strategic camouflage. The archivists called it "a tripping hazard."
From beyond the statue alcove, I heard footsteps and a distant lecture voice droning about "unified balance in posture." The other initiates were doing their actual afternoon meditation. I was doing emotional recon and encrypted intergalactic communications.
Everyone has their role.
"You know you're the worst at hiding," Ahsoka's voice whispered.
I didn't jump. I almost jumped, but I didn't.
She crouched down beside me, montrals twitching slightly under her hood.
"You weren't followed, right?" I whispered dramatically.
"Obviously," she said. "I used the baby Rodian decoy plan. She lives to cause distractions."
"Nice."
"Also, Master Tyyyvak thinks you're in solo meditation. I may have implied you were working through inner shame."
"Even better."
"Did you at least write something poetic and angsty?"
I showed her the datapad.
She squinted. "'How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Start Hacking the Archives.' Seriously?"
"What? It's catchy."
"You are so lucky Jedi can't get grounded."
...
She leaned her head against the statue, watching me edit.
"You miss her?" she asked.
I didn't answer right away.
Instead, I kept typing:
Korkie,
If Bo-Katan actually blew up a mining cruiser this time, you are legally required to describe it in detail and include the splash radius.
Also, if she says she's not your mom again, she's right. Stop arguing with her. She legally couldn't have twins at fifteen, and this whole plan to blame everything on her is falling apart.
I know "aunt" Satine says we're her nephews, that's because she probably doesn't want to admit she's our mom, but still wanted us to live with her. It's not that complicated. I really don't know what you want me to say. Maybe you should be more likable if you want that parental recognition?
It's fine. I'm fine. Enlightenment, et cetera.
"I miss all of them." I admitted. "But my place is with the Jedi."
For now.
Ahsoka sighed. "You really think they'll read between the lines?"
"Oh, definitely." I smirked. "Satine loves subtext. It's how she communicates. That and pretending everything is diplomatic procedure."
"Sound familiar."
I ignored her.
From the hall, a soft set of boots approached.
Ahsoka's posture straightened instantly. "Someone's coming."
I flipped the datapad under my cloak and crossed my legs like I had always been meditating and wasn't hiding behind a statue illegally texting a Duchess.
The approaching figure turned the corner.
A Knight. Human. Tall, tired, not too observant.
He raised an eyebrow.
"Everything alright here?"
"Yes, Master," Ahsoka said smoothly. "Ben's in personal reflection."
The Knight looked at me. I made my most serene face.
"I'm meditating on the consequences of regional unrest," I said.
Ahsoka kicked me.
The Knight gave us a look that screamed I don't get paid enough for this, nodded, and left.
We exhaled.
"I can't believe that worked," I whispered.
"I can't believe you said that," Ahsoka muttered.
We huddled back down. I resumed typing.
P.S. Please tell Bo-Katan that if she wants to join a violent insurgency, fine. But I want royalties on the family scandal if it ever gets turned into a holodrama.
P.P.S. Master Tyyyvak says to be mindful of one's breathing. I would like to add: easier said than done when your lungs are full of unresolved childhood questions.
Ahsoka peeked over my shoulder again. "You're going to get caught eventually."
"Probably."
"And then what?"
I shrugged. "I'm seven. What are they going to do? Arrest me?"
"You'd probably talk your way into juvenile Sith detention and like it."
"I'd unionize it."
"Ugh. Just finish your secret manifesto, idiot."
I grinned.
Final lines:
Mandalore may be neutral, but my feelings aren't.
I hope the revolution is interesting.
Please don't let Korkie touch any explosives. He means well, but he's also Korkie.
With restrained affection,
—Ben
P.S. (Last one) Tell the guard who reads this that she has nice hair. But also, this message self-erases in 30 seconds. Just so everyone knows I'm serious.
I hit send.
The datapad blinked twice, encrypted transmission dispersing across six offworld relays.
Gone.
Ahsoka leaned back, arms behind her head. "You're lucky I like you," she said.
"Don't lie," I said. "You like the drama."
She smirked. "I am the drama."
We stayed there behind the statue for a few extra minutes.
Meditating, maybe.
Just a little.
...
The datapad screen flickered to life under Korkie's pillow. He squinted at it, then pulled it out with the air of a spy receiving urgent orders. The encryption cracked itself open with a satisfying chirp, and there it was.
Ben's message.
Korkie sat up straight in bed, ignoring the muffled sounds of arguing adults from the palace hall and the faint crump of something exploding somewhere on the lower levels. (Hopefully not the laundry room again.)
He tapped open the message, read it twice—snorted—and immediately opened a reply window. The dim light cast dramatic shadows across his face, which he did not notice but would have appreciated.
His fingers flew across the screen:
TO: Jedi Temple Student "Ben" (Codename: Still Probably My Brother)
FROM: Korkie Kryze, Official Heir to Satine's Passive-Aggressive Legacy
SUBJECT: RE: Your Pathologically Calm Correspondence
Dear Ben,
Bo-Katan did not blow up a mining cruiser. She blew up a mining shuttle. It was only mildly explosive. She says it was "a precision strike" and not "a mood." I said maybe her mood should involve fewer concussions. She threatened to enroll me in a live-fire exercise.
Anyway, she's been wearing this black and red armor lately, which she says is "the aesthetic of serious intent." I think it looks like she lost a bet. But don't tell her I said that or I'll have to write my next message from the ceiling ductwork.
Korkie paused and added a crayon-sketched map—messily scanned and digitally attached. It had HERE THERE BE TRAITORS written across one corner and a stick figure labeled "Bo?" holding a lightsaber and a mug.
Included Map: "Where I Think the Revolution Is Probably Happening"
(Note: May not be to scale. Or geographically accurate.)
So. Updates. Satine's been doing the whole "I'm too dignified for emotions" thing lately, which means she's either going to cry or declare a planetary summit. Possibly both.
Also, I saw what you said last time, and no, Satine is definitely our aunt. She told me, and she never lies, except about snacks. And bedtime. And her actual feelings. But not about this.
So if we're twins, which we are, and Satine is our aunt, which she is, that means Bo-Katan is our mom. It's basic math, Ben. I don't know why you keep making it weird.
Outside his bedroom, something thunked against the wall. Korkie didn't flinch.
He added a new paragraph:
Bo says I should focus less on "conspiracy theories" and more on "survival training." I said knowledge is survival. She muttered something about training you both to be Mandalorians anyway, if the Jedi don't "muck it up." Then she threw a vibroknife into a table leg. It was very cool. I clapped.
I tried asking her if she's ever stolen a baby. She said I was being "unhelpful" and then grounded me. Not that grounding works when you have a datapad, and a network, and a deeply encrypted comms relay installed in your wall sconce. Which she still doesn't know about.
From the doorway, a faint voice called, "Korkie! Lights out!"
"Already did!" he shouted, and then dramatically hit dim mode. The screen lowered its brightness like a conspirator.
He finished with flourish:
Anyway, tell your Jedi friends that if they give you a buzzcut I will personally write a speech about hair freedom and read it on the Senate floor. I think we're still technically royalty, so I'm allowed to do that. I have a sash.
Stay safe, don't join the Sith, unless it's for infiltration purposes, and remember: if you go dark side, I call dibs on being your dramatic foil.
With definitely platonic brotherly affection,
—Korkie
...
In a quieter corner of the palace, lit only by moonlight through a tall pane of crystalglass, Satine Kryze sat reading the letter on her own tablet.
How her son—nephews thought he could get away with encrypting anything under her roof, was a mystery beyond her, and most parents.
She didn't laugh. But the corner of her mouth twitched.
When she reached the line about being a war criminal, she closed her eyes for a long, deep breath—and then gently tucked the tablet away inside the folds of her robe.
She didn't answer aloud.
But later that night, her personal aide noticed that the Duchess requested a diplomatic communique "with embedded cultural queries" to be drafted for Coruscant.
One that included a footnote on the Jedi Order's stance on attachment. And a second on whether Jedi children were allowed to correspond with "extended family."
...
Obi-Wan Kenobi was not one to check flagged Temple communications. That was the work of droids, archivists, and the occasional overzealous Knight with too much time on their hands.
But the alert had come through a discretionary filter—anonymous tip, high-priority keyword match, "external correspondence." It wouldn't have drawn his attention, if not for the name embedded in the encryption header:
Kryze, Satine.
His hand hovered above the terminal. The message hadn't been fully decrypted yet. He didn't know who had sent it. Not officially.
But he knew.
He exhaled quietly and slid his access card through the reader.
The Temple hallway behind him was quiet, dim in the late evening. Most initiates were in their dormitories. Most Masters in meditation or review.
He tapped the screen.
A message began to unfold.
Encrypted Outgoing Transmission
Origin: Temple Crèche Subnet / User Alias: "Ben"
Disguise Layer: Academic Inquiry – Mandalorian Domestic Law
Attached Metadata: Timestamp, relay trace, emotion tag (masked poorly)
Primary Recipient: Duchess Satine Kryze
Secondary Recipient: Civilian – Kryze, Korkie
Content Preview:
"…if Bo-Katan wants to join a violent insurgency, fine, but I want royalties if this ever gets adapted into a holodrama…"
"…tell the guard who reads this she has nice hair. But this message self-erases in 30 seconds…"
Obi-Wan closed his eyes.
Of course it was Ben.
He hadn't seen the boy for several days—not closely, not outside his regular updates from Master Tyyyvak and the crèche instructors. Ben had been… stable. Energetic. Argumentative. Brilliant. Troublesome in that very specific way that left instructors shaking their heads and muttering, "He's got so much potential."
And now he was writing letters to Mandalore's ex-leader. To Satine.
No. Not "to." He was writing to her. Not as a political figure.
As something closer.
Obi-Wan closed the access log. He didn't read the entire message.
He didn't have to.
The metadata said enough.
Ben had been communicating with her for a while. Carefully. Encrypted. Slipping through Temple systems just cleverly enough to avoid daily detection—until now.
The system only caught it by coincidence: an anonymous report from a cranky protocol droid who flagged the term "violent insurgency" during a random scan. Lucky. Or not.
Obi-Wan rubbed at the bridge of his nose.
The hallway was too bright.
His chamber was simple. Clean. Empty in the way that Jedi quarters always were: uncluttered, unassuming. A meditation mat. A shelf of texts. One plant he forgot to water. A lightsaber hilt on the table.
He keyed the door shut behind him and sat.
He let the silence settle.
Then pulled up the message again.
Not the text this time. Just the header. The encryption trail. The metadata.
A youngling had no business knowing how to route through offworld relays.
He leaned back in his chair, staring at the ceiling.
"You're too clever for your own good," he muttered.
It wasn't just the message.
It was the intent.
Ben knew the Code. He'd been raised in it, lectured in it, recited it—badly, rebelliously, but often. And yet he was still doing this. Still reaching back toward home. Still writing.
Still attached.
The Jedi taught that attachment led to suffering. That clinging invited fear. That even love—particularly love—was a path to chaos.
But what about the ones born from it?
What about the ones left behind?
Obi-Wan remembered Satine's voice as they watched the children, playing in the courtyard.
"You said the Jedi take them young," she whispered, after her sister left earshot. "You didn't say how young."
"I never wanted to worry you." He whispered back. "We don't have to take him. He can still be raised here. With you."
"It's not about me." Satine's hands had shaken. "It's about what's best for Ben. He needs help. The kind that I can't give him. But you can. He needs you. Be there for him. Please."
She hadn't cried.
Not then.
But Obi-Wan remembered thinking she might.
He looked back at the terminal.
The message sat waiting. Flagged. Archived. Labeled for report.
He hovered his fingers above the alert window.
Then closed it.
He deleted the security flag. The message itself? He left untouched. Just… archived.
For now.
He would not report it. Not yet. But he would keep an eye on Ben. More than before. More than the usual careful Jedi watchfulness.
This was not detachment. It wasn't indulgence, either. It was something else.
Responsibility. Maybe even… guilt.
A chime echoed faintly in the corridor outside—lights dimming for night cycle.
Obi-Wan sat motionless.
Then, slowly, he turned off the terminal.
The chamber smelled like dust and clean steel. The ventilation hummed softly overhead. Somewhere in the distance, someone was arguing over shipping permits. Satine barely registered it.
She sat at her desk, posture regal, datapad in hand—held at just the right angle that a passing guard might think she was reviewing a diplomatic report. That was what she'd told them, after all.
"Routine foreign update. Communications from Coruscant. Standard trade brief."
Not technically a lie. There was a trade brief embedded in the footer.
But her eyes were on the message above it.
For the fifth time.
TO: Duchess Satine (Aunt Extraordinaire, Ruler of Reasonable People)
FROM: Definitely-Not-Your-Son (Codename: Jedi Hopeful, Chaos Edition)
SUBJECT: Political Memo (Definitely Not Personal)
Dear Duchess Satine,
Please note that your recent remarks on Republic infrastructure were not well-received by the eight-year-old Senator I'm being forced to study. He called you "intense." I called him "unqualified to comment on Mandalorian policy." Master Tyyyvak made me mop the hallway.
The Jedi say attachment leads to suffering, but I think they've never read one of your speeches. I reread your comments on regional unrest while pretending to meditate. If Master Forehead asks, I was contemplating the Force. Or maybe agriculture. Something boring.
Temple life remains strange. The robes itch. Ahsoka beat me at Force tag. Again. The archivist droid hates me. (Not because of what I did. Because of who I am.)
If Bo-Katan tries to blow up another ship, please remind her I want royalties.
Yours in absolute legal compliance,
—Ben
The words were pure Ben.
Sharp-edged, clever, full of half-jokes and exaggerated deflections. Reading it hurt. It reminded so much of his father… and herself.
Satine blinked once, slowly, then reached for a stylus and began composing a reply—aloud.
For the benefit of the guard still standing near the entrance.
She didn't look at him, of course.
Merely kept her voice even.
TO: Initiate Ben (Jedi Temple)
FROM: Duchess Satine Kryze (Officially Your Aunt)
SUBJECT: Re: Political Memo / Diplomatic Clarifications
Ben,
Your insights into senatorial literacy are—as always—provocative. I recommend caution when critiquing Republic representatives, especially those who cry easily. Diplomacy demands both restraint and tact. Though, I concede, mopping does build character.
Your meditations on the Force (and/or agriculture) are noted with interest. In future communications, feel free to expand upon your theories on regional stability, or at least include footnotes. I'm told the archivist droid appreciates proper citation.
Bo-Katan has been informed of your concerns. She laughed. Then muttered something about napalm. I'll… keep you posted.
Strength is not silence. You are not alone.
Yours, in accordance with all Republic protocol,
—Satine
She tapped the send key, and the encryption folded the message into its layered mask of political formality.
When the datapad blinked its green confirmation light, she finally exhaled.
Her fingers remained pressed to the screen.
"You're still pretending," she murmured, almost too quiet to hear. "Still pretending to be someone else, my child."
The words slipped from her like breath—half-smile tugging at her mouth.
Four years wasn't long. Not in galactic terms. Not in war. Not in policy. But for a mother…
…For a mother, it was a lifetime.
Even if no one called her that.
If only she told Obi-Wan how much she wanted him to stay. Both of them. Would they be able to raise their boys together? Would Satine have had the family she so desperately craved, and needed. Especially after the tragedies hers has endured already.
But one could spend a lifetime looking back. It was a curse to imagine "if only". Obi-Wan has his duties. She has hers. And Ben will have his, too. Though, perhaps, if she truly believed that, she would not be responding to his messages.
… everyone can be a little hypocritical sometimes.
...
The blanket over my head made it hard to breathe, but at least it muffled the glow of the datapad. The Force teaches patience, serenity, inner peace.
I had none of those right now.
I tapped the screen again. Just once more.
TO: Initiate Ben (Jedi Temple)
FROM: Duchess Satine Kryze (Officially Your Aunt)
SUBJECT: Re: Political Memo / Diplomatic Clarifications
Ben,
Your insights into senatorial literacy are—as always—provocative. I recommend caution when critiquing Republic representatives, especially those who cry easily. Diplomacy demands both restraint and tact. Though, I concede, mopping does build character.
Your meditations on the Force (and/or agriculture) are noted with interest. In future communications, feel free to expand upon your theories on regional stability, or at least include footnotes. I'm told the archivist droid appreciates proper citation.
Bo-Katan has been informed of your concerns. She laughed. Then muttered something about napalm. I'll… keep you posted.
Strength is not silence. You are not alone.
Yours, in accordance with all Republic protocol,
—Satine
I stared at that last line.
Strength is not silence. You are not alone.
That wasn't a diplomatic line.
That was her.
That was mine.
"Still up?" A voice mumbled near my elbow.
Ahsoka shifted next to me, half-asleep and warm. She always curled like a loth-cat in winter, fists tucked near her face, head buried under her pillow. And with the terrifying habit of sneaking into my bed. Seriously, I have the Force. How can I not sense her? Was I really that distracted?
On the bright side, now I knew she was there. But on the downside, I had to deal with her eyes blinking open under the blanket, catching the blue screen's reflection, as she stared at me, unrelentingly.
"Just… checking for regional instability," I whispered.
She squinted at me. "Is that what you call homesickness?"
I rolled onto my back and sighed. "Don't Jedi not get homesick?"
"We're not Jedi yet," she muttered. "So I think we're okay… probably. Maybe don't tell anyone."
I didn't answer. Just passed her the datapad.
She read it quietly, her mouth twitching a little at the bit about Bo-Katan. By the end, she didn't smile. She just nodded and whispered, "If she's not your mom, she's the best fake one I've ever seen."
I didn't say anything for a moment.
"Yeah. She's… trying."