#isval

Have some twi’leks cause their species is pretty fascinating imo, and while they are used a lot in SW media, there are very few twi’lek main or supporting characters.

Yes. I excluded Orn Freeta on purpose.

Bonus:

Finished my read of Lords of the Sith this weekend when I couldn’t get into my writing headspace on Saturday, and it’s definitely given me an increased respect for the shared cultural and familial trauma that Hera has inherited, even though she isn’t present for the events of the story. This book is definitely the darkest and heaviest of the new canon novels I’ve read. Afterwards, I also went back and reread the Hera-centered short story “Mercy Mission,” which was definitely more interesting understanding the events that took place in the months before it.

This is a little long, so read on below the cut.

Near the end of the book, we finally get one more scene in Lords of the Sith which refers to Hera. Interestingly, and quite telling, it isn’t Cham thinking of her, it’s Isval, his fellow rebel/semi love interest, who takes Hera into account when deciding to sacrifice herself to allow Cham to escape Vader.

Ultimately, Isval stays to fight, while Goll quite literally throws Cham over his shoulder and drags him away to their ship to escape, succeeding in part only because Cham is knocked out by a rock kicked up into the air when the area is pelted with V-wing fire. The whole scene and its aftermath has more than a few eerie parallels to Kanan’s sacrifice to save Hera in Jedi Night, not the least of which is the utter lack of choice Cham is given in the matter. He is saved for his own good and the good of his family despite himself by the woman he loves, and forced to carry on with his life and leadership in her absence.

But where it gets especially interesting, and truly testifies to the depth of Cham’s obsessions, is his response to the situation afterwards. Isval told him to think of Hera. He doesn’t. Not once. (Wookiepedia lies about this, by the way; don’t believe it.) His mind turns entirely to the fight against the Empire and rebuilding his movement, which is utterly expended after the assassination attempts against Vader and the Emperor.

My poor, traumatized heart, this man is the father to a fourteen-year-old girl who might as well not exist when it really matters. It’s no wonder their relationship was in shambles and she chose not to come back to fight with him for Ryloth when she was old enough. While it’s clear that he was already pretty distant after the loss of her mother, I can only imagine how much this renewed obsession further drove a wedge between them.

A few conclusions I’ve come to/important facts (from these parts and other things in the book and short story):

Cham is a master of compartmentalization. Hera has definitely inherited some of this dysfunctional trait, but it is far less extreme, leading to some emotional conflict with Kanan, but not complete separation or denial of what they have together in the present. She really does try to love him as best as she knows how, despite the deep-seated fears which hold her back from contemplating their future together.

Hera has not lived on Ryloth since she was quite young. “Mercy Mission” tells us: “She hadn’t seen Ryloth in so long that the rust-brown disk was as much a symbol as a remembered home.” My personal guess is that Cham sent her away very soon after losing her mother, to somewhere else he considered safe and that would allow him to work and move between his various bases unhindered.

The disconnection between Cham and Hera runs deep and is longstanding. Cham pushes Hera away to focus on his rebellion. Hera pushes back against this like the rebellious adolescent kid she is, testing the bars of her cage, as Cham says here. She volunteers for the mission to Ryloth knowing he would be against it. Goll, amusingly enough, lets her do it, despite knowing Cham would be angry if he found out. But he still won’t tell her where her father is at.

I’d guess that Hera’s mother died within about a year of the end of the the Clone Wars. Four years has elapsed between the end of the war and this book, so this makes the most sense to me, math-wise. Hera says in Homecoming that her mother was killed early in the Resistance, and in Lords of the Sith, Cham acknowledges that he has been in love with Isval for “years.” While we don’t know the exact state of the relationship between Hera’s parents at that point, from the way Hera talks about it it seems clear that they were still together when she died. Of note: Hera’s mother is never once mentioned in the book, even as motivation for fighting—another point illustrating Cham’s intense emotional compartmentalization. (Gotta love those emotionally stunted men, amirite?)

think about lords of the sith