#phoenix files

“Uh… he’s slurring a bit, I’m not sure. I’m trying to focus on the road to actually get to you, and, uh, my coworker’s name is Harry, and—shit!”

The injured man groans, and the young person says, “sorry, the potholes, man—and there are so many drunk people, jeez. Um, wait, here’s Harry—”

The phone carries a bunch of static, but reaches a man. He does sound familiar. Also oddly southern, though Dana hasn’t got a clue where in that region. “Hi, I’m Harry Wilson. My cousin’s name is Mike—oh boy—”

There are at least five Mikes here that Dana can name off the top of her head, and not all of them are on shift. She thinks this Harry Wilson is about to vomit, at least by the sound of it.

“We can figure that part out when you get here,” she tells them. “Fifteen minutes?”

“Maybe ten with how she’s driving—”

The call cuts out. Dana sighs and announces they’ve got an MVA coming in.

--

“You know, I was gonna ask more about whose cousin this is, but I think I can guess.”

Breanna looks up from where she’s walking next to the gurney, and spots the older blonde lady that she thinks said that. “Uh, hi?”

“Hey, you must be the kid from the phone,” the woman says. She addresses Harry next. “Sir, are you related to Doctor Robby? Think you’d look identical if he shaved and got a good night’s sleep.”

Harry laughs, wheezing a touch. “Aw, he’s still going by that? Mom’s gonna be disappointed.”

“I’ll let Robby know,” the woman says. She pats the bed, rattles off some instructions to the nearest nurse about vitals and drugs, and then turns to Breanna. “So, you hit him with your car. How’d it happen, and do you know if he’s been drinking or anything? Emergency contacts?”

Breanna cannot tell this lady about the ‘getting shot at’ parts. “I borrowed my older brother’s food truck, and the sightlines take some getting used to? He kinda just… walked out from between two other cars and I was distracted by so me firecrackers while I was checking over my shoulder, so between all that, it kind of just… yeah.”

“Okay,” the lady says. Her name tag says Dana Evans. “Miss…?”

“Uh, Breanna, Breanna Casey.” Since this is going around Harry’s actual family, they probably shouldn’t lie too much.

“I’m not a cop,” Nurse Evans says. “I’m not asking about why you hit him, I’m asking about how. Mechanism of injury. Did you clip him passing, hit him straight on, how fast were you going?”

Right, yeah. Breanna’s a bit concerned by all the physical papers and the downed monitors she’s seeing. “Uh, clipped him, not very fast, but it knocked him over and I think he hit his head on the cement.”

“Concussion protocol,” Nurse Evans says. “Do you have anyone we can call?”

“Um, yeah, I have his daughter’s phone number,” Breanna says, pulling out her phone, “probably faster to ask me than… whoever the cousin is? You said Robby, but he said Mikey, are those—”

“Michael Robinavitch, yeah,” Nurse Evans interrupts. She seems in a hurry. “Here, Princess can help you get started on the forms with what you do know, and hopefully we’ll have Robby here or the daughter on the phone by the time we get to anything that needs HIPAA.”

“Okay,” Breanna says, “I can do that.”

--

“What do you mean Dana says my cousin’s here?”

Santos shrugs, eyes wide and eyebrows up in the exaggerated way that says ‘I don’t know what you want from me here.’ “That is what she said, and that is what I’m telling you. Guy kinda looked like you if you shaved. I heard Huckleberry asking him concussion questions.”

Like you if you shaved. “Well… I’ve only got one cousin,” Robby says. He signs off on the latest paper shoved his way, and heads for the door. “Which room?”

He makes his way down to the right room, which is actually just one of the beds with a curtain, and finds Harry laying down. He is still in most of a tan suit, the jacket thrown over a nearby chair, which is also occupied by a young black woman who has a laptop out.

“You have enough signal for a video call?” Whitaker asks her as he pauses in filling out the paper forms. It’s impressive, given they don’t have any wi-fi right now.

“I’ve got some crazy satellite connections,” the girl says. She doesn’t look away from the screen. “Becky, did you find the right files or should I try to go through employee records for it instead? Harry’s right here, he can give consent for it or whatever. It’s not like his social’s a huge secret anyway.”

“Okay!” Robby interrupts, with a clap to gather attention, “let’s not announce social security numbers by video chat. Harry, what the hell?”

“Hey Mikey,” Harry says, smiling like he hasn’t got a care in the world. There is a bandage on his head. Concerning. “I’m Pittsburgh for work. I thought you were going to be out of town! I would have called to get dinner or something.”

(Is Bo-Katan alright? She’s far away, hidden in the core with their mother’s sister, but perhaps that’s not safe enough.)

(Satine worries.)

Jinn sits her down with an odd look on his face after they eat. He holds the notebook in front of him. He says, I want to check something. Can you try to guess what object I’m looking at in this notebook?

It’s odd, but whatever. She figures he’s trying to test how well she can pay attention, pick up on things when she’s otherwise engaged, that sort of thing. So she watches his face, tries to remember what was on the page, but nothing. She doesn’t remember a single thing that was on that page. She wasn’t trying to get a look, so she’s not sure she ever got more than a glance.

She throws out a few wild, random guesses. Qui-Gon nods along, and Obi-Wan gets a weird expression, and when they’re done…

Qui-Gon says, “hm.”

“What?” she asks.

“I want to check something the next time we encounter medical treatment,” Qui-Gon says. “Did you know you might be Force Sensitive?”

What.

--

Children from Mandalore rarely, if ever, go to the Jedi. They don’t even really get tested for that, aside from a handful of clans. Maybe it came up when Satine was a baby and too young to remember, but she did not know.

(There are children from Mandalorian space that go, sometimes, but not Mandalorians themselves. It’s a complicated subject.)

She lets the meddroid test her for it when they next see one.

“Mildly so,” Jinn tells her, looking over the results. “Bottom quartile of what we find among Jedi, but still enough that you would have been accepted had your family decided to give you to us. I don’t suppose you ever received any training?”

“I didn’t even know I had this,” she protests. Did Bo? Is it a family trait? Is it more common among siblings?

Her answer comes from Obi-Wan. He shrugs, and says, “that doesn’t mean you weren’t trained. Your parents could have kept it secret from you. It happens.”

Satine wants to protest that they wouldn’t, but she’s honestly not that sure. She understands operational security now, but she wouldn’t have when she was a child. She knows better than to do secret things without scanning each and every corner of a room for hidden cameras… but wouldn’t have been good enough to find everything just a few years earlier.

Most of Mandalore wouldn’t care. But there are pockets, often violent ones, that would have opinions.

Her mother died before she was old enough to be safely told. Her father…

Perhaps he thought she would need his full attention and several days to know. A vacation.

They haven’t had one of those since Jango died.

Well. ‘Died.’

“I don’t know,” she finally says. “I want to say they would have told me. But… I don’t know.”

Master Jinn nods. “Alright then. We can work on a few things when we have time that could help to keep you safe. Your instincts are already quite well-trained for short-term prescience, as with dodging the blaster bolts. We’ll see what else you show a talent for.”

“Okay,” Satine says, because she doesn’t know what else she could say. “That will likely be useful.”

She rolls her eyes, as if they are all making this very hard for her on purpose. Fox meets Wolffe’s eyes, and does his best to project natborns. Wolffe grimaces like he gets it.

Fox watches the hope leave from the Jedi, as they ‘realize’ how bad of a plan this was, and then Uzumaki turns and starts moving people.

Koon, Billaba, and Commander Dume to one side. Yoda and Fisto to another. Windu off on his own.

“Type,” Uzumaki tells them.

Fox wonders what the hell she’s doing, but then Koon says, “ah. The lightsabers.”

He draws his own, lights it, and gestures to the blade. “Mine, Master Billaba’s, and Padawan Dume’s are all blue. Masters Yoda and Fisto have green blades, and Master Windu has purple.”

Uzumaki’s eyes narrow. She tilts her head, gestures as if demanding proof, and they all light their sabers to prove it.

She drifts closer. Fox rests a hand on his blaster, though he has an odd feeling that it won’t help much if she does do something. After all, there are multiple Jedi Masters in the room.

“There is… something small,” she says, looking at Koon’s lightsaber, but not touching it. “Like… stars.”

“The kyber crystal,” Koon says, and then hurries to explain at the unimpressed look he gets, “a rock, clear but with color. They help power the saber.”

Uzumaki nods slowly. “The mark?”

Mark? Like for a con? Girl, this is a target.

“Red,” Windu says. “It’s not a natural color. She bled her crystals.”

Uzumaki does not look any more impressed with him than she did with Koon.

“She gave her kyber her pain and anger, until they also hurt,” Windu tries instead.

With a nose-wrinkle of distaste, Uzumaki asks, “the rock thinks?”

Fox is also curious as to this question. The hedging hand-wiggle is almost a disappointment.

“Red stone,” Uzumaki says, “do you have a sample?”

They do. They get it, from wherever it’s hidden away. The Jedi are uncomfortable with it, though only Dume is young enough to really shy away. Uzumaki makes a face, picks up the saber it’s housed in, and closes her eyes.

Considers.

“I can use this,” she says, though she immediately hands it back.

She does a weird motion with her hands. Closes her eyes again. Says something, kagura shingan, that means nothing to Fox.

And then she opens her eyes and says, “more than one. Closest is… that way. Fifty? Kiromētoru, a little more?”

“In miles,” Boba pipes up.

She shoots him a look, as if he should know better. “I do not know.”

Boba frowns and thinks very hard. “Um… I think... the ratio was something like three miles is five of those things. About that?”

So thirty miles? Well. At least Boba’s being helpful, if only to enjoy the dawning horror of the Jedi.

“That direction,” Fox says pleasantly, “is the Senate.”

And suddenly, everyone gets very urgent about things.

Fox doesn’t bother to take charge, because it’s kind of nice to let the Jedi manage the tracker like this. Fox does take charge of Boba, pulling him over to that Dume kid and saying, “hold hands.”

Boba tries to kick Fox instead, which is stupid of him. Kind of endearing, but stupid.

“Caleb isn’t coming,” Billaba informs him. “We have a mission of our own to prepare for.”

“I don’t need a babysitter!” Boba spits.

“You need to be watched,” Fox says, as drily as he can. He gestures to a few of his men. “Keep an eye on him.”

“Are you going with the Jedi?” Porkchop asks; as a medic, he’s definitely going with the field team.

…which has already left.

“Yes,” Fox says, hurrying after them and ignoring the squabbling children behind him. “Come on.”

So, Obi-Wan must marry. He must, in fact, marry a man, because the odds of finding a woman born as a man are as slim as the odds of Obi-Wan himself. And there are few men among the gentry that are willing to sacrifice their reputations to marry Obi-Wan.

The dowry is good, but with grandfather’s political scandals, father’s multiple bastards, and Obi-Wan’s own rejection of his birth sex, there aren’t a whole lot of suitors. Those who are, with noble parentage and an attraction to at least some men and a disregard for the gossip such a marriage would bring, are by and large already married, and to the most gorgeous women to boot.

Bail would have been nice. It’s a pity that Breha caught his eye so early, though they make a beautiful couple.

Quinlan, darling Quinlan, actually had proposed, early on, in private, but then he’d learned of the all the money his estate had lost to his aunt’s greedy hands, and suddenly, hundreds of livelihoods depended on a large dowry coming in.

Obi-Wan’s dowry is good, but not that good.

Had Obi-Wan been born a man, he would have tried his hand at marrying Lady Satine Kryze, daughter of the Duke of Mandalore. He would likely not have succeeded, given his own lack of title, since Serenno will continue with Rael’s line, but he would have tried.

He’d been eighteen when he and Satine had spent some whirlwind weeks together, unchaperoned as he’d still been in dresses and dainty dance shoes, kissing in the gardens and then fumbling in the dark of her bedroom. It had never gone further, and his heart still yearns for her.

Quinlan had been when Obi-Wan was seventeen, twenty-one, twenty-three. On and off. The proposal had been when Obi-Wan was twenty-three; by that point, he’d already started presenting himself to society as a man, and the prospects had become rather grim.

Obi-Wan could never have married Satine, and he could not condemn the people of Quinlan’s duchy for the sake of his heart.

So Obi-Wan did the best thing he could do, and introduced them to each other.