Disclaimers: See part 1
Eloria’s story
by AJ Marks
Part 2
Luke rushed the one of the droids knowing he would have to finish it off quickly before it could harm anyone. He had no idea what setting it was on, or how tough of a fight he was in for. His green blade engaged the blue blade.
After a few counters he knew what the setting was, and his fight would not be over before the other droid could reach the others. He quickly doubled his efforts before powering through the defenses of the droid. Turning to engage the other droid he stopped in shock at what he saw.
Facing off against the other droid he saw Eloria dueling with a yellow lightsaber. She had taken off her cloak showing comfortable clothing which allowed for maximum movement in a fight. Even as he watched she powered through the droid’s defenses, slicing it in half before standing there taken in the rest of the room.
The stance was burned into his memories, taking him back to a time before he ever joined the Rebellion. He stood in a bar in Mos Eisley and Ben Kenobi had taken on two criminals. The stance was exactly the same. He shook his head clearing the memory and came back to reality.
“Anyone hurt?’ Luke asked, looking around seeing Kyle run into the room, stopping at the sight before heading out with Luke to the training area. Four Jedi lay wounded, having been training with the droids.
“Sorry Master Luke, we were practicing teamwork, didn’t work,” one stated as medical staff ran in to attend to their wounds.
“I sent them flying away, didn’t know they would crash through the wall?’ another Jedi said.
“It’s all right, no harm was done this time, need to rebuild that wall anyways,” Luke finally said.
“I’ll take care of this,” Kyle said, seeing Luke look back over at Marlene and Eloria, who had put her cloak back on, despite others looking at her with confusion.
Luke made his way back over to where everyone stood before making his way over to Eloria. “Where did you learn that?”
“Would you believe basic bounty hunter training?” Eloria replied, with a raised eyebrow. Luke slowly shook his head as they both knew it was a lie.
“Not really, but it reminded me of my mentor, Ben Kenobi,” Luke said, wondering if he would get an answer which made sense.
“You mean Obi-Wan,” Eloria said, surprising Luke she knew his name and used it so familiarity. “You could say we had the same teacher, as did you.”
“What?” Luke replied, now confused at the course of the conversation.
“Perhaps we should take this conversation more, private,” Eloria said, looking around at the others. Whatever the woman had to say she did not wish to talk about it in front of others.
“Of course, this way,” Luke said, leading the three women to his office. He hoped he could gain some information about what happened back there. Something made no sense to him, the only logical explanation was she was some sort of Jedi. If that was the case, how did she survive? He knew they never knew how many other Jedi managed to survive the Purge.
He would get his answers back at his office.
Eloria walked beside Marlene and a now shocked Karen, who kept looking up at her with wide eyes. She had never seen that side of her mother. Eloria hid it well to prevent any entanglement by the Empire and their Jedi eliminators.
“Mother?’ Karen asked, as they walked.
Eloria gave her daughter’s shoulder a squeeze and a reassuring smile. “We were going to tell you when you were older, like after you graduated and made padawan,” Eloria told her.
“Tell me what? You’re a Jedi?” Karen asked as they reached the office.
Eloria looked around, seeing that a few others joined them, including Kyle Katarn. She knew they were looking at her for an answer, sitting down Marlene joined her holding her hand.
“I trained under Master Yoda as a youngling,” Eloria said, seeing everyone’s eyes except for Marlene’s widen. “I joined the Jedi Order when I was three. We learned under many Jedi Masters, including Master Yoda and Master Ki-Tann, who took me as his pawadan several years before the Clone Wars began. I was promoted to Jedi Knight after the battle of Coruscant.”
“A survivor of the Jedi Purge,” Luke said.
“That’s what historians call it, I call it a massacre of good friends and comrades,” Eloria said, the bitterness of the event still very real to her. Marlene squeezed her hand slightly which she returned.
“Sorry, we’re not used to dealing with people who survived, I’m curious, how did you survive?” Luke asked, the question Eloria expected the moment she told them the truth. She looked over seeing Karen looking on, waiting to hear what happened.
“That is a story in and of itself, and how I met your mom,” Eloria said, looking at Karen.
“You never told me because you were a Jedi?” Karen asked.
“It was better for you not to know,” Marlene said. “We hide it from you for your protection, if the Empire learned they would have hunted all three of us.”
“She’s right,” Luke said. “We have records of their pursuit of Jedi all over the universe.”
Eloria took a breath and began her story, starting with the Jedi Council meeting.
Eloria stood beside Master Ki-Tann in the middle of the Jedi Council looking at the Jedi Masters. Several were on missions off world, still participating in the meeting, their image the blue holo that everyone could see. She saw Master Windu, Yoda and Kenobi were there after the battle at Coruscant. Master Yoda would be leaving off world after the meeting to help the Wookies in their battle against the Separatists.
“Pawadan Eloria, your bravery in the battle has brought you before the Council,” Master Windu said, talking to her and the others. “It was your quick actions which alerted us to the fact the Chancellor had been kidnapped, by alerting others we were able to take action to rescue him before General Grievous could get away.”
“I only did what I was trained for,” Eloria replied. She noticed a few other masters were listening in, obviously having already talked about the situation before she entered the room. They appeared in agreement over something.
“In addition to helping rescue the Chancellor it led to the defeat of Count Dooku leaving only Grievous as a leader of the Separatists,” Master Windu said. “For your actions it is the will of the Council to grant you the title of Jedi Knight.”
Eloria felt a bit stunned at the news. She was overwhelmed by the decision, but would not let anyone down. Master Ki-Tann looked over at Eloria with pride.
“Thank you masters,” Eloria replied.
“I could use some help, Ki-Adi-Mindu said addressing the council. “We are encountering heavier resistance than anticipated. I believe reinforcements will be required to eliminate this threat.”
“Then Master Eloria we will send. Take the 106 to reinforce Master Mindu’s forces you will,” Yoda said. “Until General Grievous is eliminated, a threat he remains.”
“I’ll head over and inform the 106th and take over command,” Eloria said. “We should be able to move out before the day is over.”
She bowed to the assembled Jedi Masters and made her way out. She felt the weight of leadership on her shoulders now that she was in command. She no longer had Master Ki-Tann to lean on in making decisions.
Shaking her head of such thoughts she took a shuttle to waiting Republic warships and the 106th, her new command.
“You were a general in the Clone Wars mother,” Karen asked, her voice filled with confusion about the situation. Eloria gave a small chuckle knowing her daughter did not know that. Ancient history to her.
“Like many Jedi, yes,” Eloria replied back to Karen. She noticed that Karen seemed deep in thought about the idea. Would she be proud or fearful, or did she even understand the war at all. Looking over at Luke she saw understanding in his eyes.
“I knew Ben all my life, but my aunt and uncle didn’t like him,” Luke said. “They knew who he was, they always shared a look whenever his name came up. I think they were hoping the universe remained quiet, but I think they knew it was a losing battle.”
“I knew Anakin had children after I visited Obi-Wan a several years after the Purge. By then I had moved on to other things, I found something important in my life,” Eloria said, looking down at Marlene. “I always meant to go back and visit, but then I heard he was killed by Vader.”
“On the first Death Star,” Luke replied. “Allowed us to escape.”
“Ironic, he always said Anakin would be the death of him,” Eloria said, recalling the many times he said to his padawan. “I don’t think any of us thought it would be so literal. Though he did mention it the last time I talked with him. He said Yoda was still out there, but the trip to Dagobah was too risky.”
“How did you avoid the Order 66?” Luke asked, mentioning the code the Emperor gave his clones to attack the Jedi.
“It happened while I was on Mygeeto,” Eloria said.
The wind whipped Eloria hair causing her to shake her head to clear her vision once more. The ribbon holding it had come undone a short time ago and she could not spare a hand to retie it. Climbing on the side of a building in the middle of a city held by Separatist forces was not the time to worry about such things.
Off in the distance she heard the beginning of the assault by the combined forces of Master Mundi’s forces and hers. She had gone into the heart of the city to scout around, one of her specialties, spying.
Reaching the bottom of the building she dropped down, looking around for any enemy forces. Not seeing any she made her way towards to the headquarters to see how the assault was going. She paused seeing in the moving troops as they assaulted the city.
She watched as Master Mundi led the charge. However, she noticed something strange happen as he ran out in front of the troopers. They had stopped and shifted targets.
Time slowed down as she watched as Mundi stopped as well and looked back. Horrified she watched the troopers open fire upon him. The sheer number overwhelmed his defenses as he fell. Shock entered her body at the sight of what she saw. The clone troopers had betrayed him, why?
Run
She heard the voice, and knew it was Master Mundi. Taking his advice she quickly went back into hiding. The troopers were not to be trusted for some reason. She needed to know why, had the Separatists managed to control them? For now she would avoid them, but she needed a plan on how to get off Mygeeto and report back to the Council. They would need to know what happened.
Even as she moved to get off the planet the Force rippled in pain. Somewhere, something terrible was happening. Moving towards the headquarters she remained hidden, not too hard considering she knew the layout and how the troopers acted.
She looked inside the communications center, seeing two guards. Stealthily she approached and knocked them out. Moving quickly she activated the communicator hoping to get in touch with someone back at the Temple.
“This is Jedi Knight Eloria to Jedi Temple, come in,” Eloria said, waiting a few seconds no one replied back, which meant something bad was going on.
Moving back out she quietly made her way back out, and noticed a few of the commanders standing nearby.
“Any word on General Eloria?” one asked.
“No sir, she never returned from her mission,” a second one said.
“Inform all commands, shoot on sight, highly dangerous,” the commander said.
Eloria had her answers, they were targeting Jedi, and she was to be shot on sight. Now she knew she had to get off the planet. She quickly devised of a plan she hoped would work.
“Can’t imagine what that must have been like,” Luke said. “Closest I came was when Alderran was destroyed. However I wasn’t strong enough in the Force at the time, but Ben felt it.”
“I did as well, thought I didn’t understand what happened until later,” Eloria stated, recalling the tremor.
“How did you get off the planet?” Karen asked.
“A bit of luck and a lot of forceful persuasion. Clones are very good at obeying orders, but they have a weak mind,” Eloria replied.
“Sounds familiar,” Luke said. “Ben said something similar when we ran into a couple of stormtroopers looking for R2-D2 and C-3PO. At the time I didn’t understand, I do now.”
“From Mygeeto I went away from Coruscant, and from any traps waiting there. I knew something happened to the clones, and that the Temple was not answering. When it finally did I had a couple of troopers on me real quick. I knew they were tracking any incoming calls,” Eloria said. She had to fight several times running into troopers.
“Is that when you met mom?” Karen asked.
“Remember, I’m from Naboo,” Marlene said.
“I went around to a few planets when I got word about what happened on Naboo,” Eloria said. “The Queen was taking a stand with some Jedi, I quickly went there hoping for a rally point. That’s when I met your mother.”
Marlene spoke up taking the next part of the story.
End part 2
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