Raiders of Hoth: Cold Case
Posted on Sat Jul 18th, 2026 @ 3:23pm by Loren†& Rusasha Djehuti-Lahan
3,228 words; about a 16 minute read
Chapter:
Additional Stories
Location: Sotah's Woe, en route to the planet Hoth
Timeline: Day One - 1,210 ABY
This post takes place in 1,210 ABY, roughly seven years before the events on Nar Shaddaa involving the Cult of Axion and the death of Jedi Shadow Loren at Jericho. It follows the adventure of Loren and her Padawan Rusasha Djehuti-Lahan on the ice world of Hoth.
The stars of hyperspace streamed endlessly beyond the forward canopy, blue-white rivers of light washing the cockpit in shifting colour.
Rusasha sat in the pilot's chair. Not because she was flying, par se. Sotah's Woe could practically navigate half the galaxy by itself - but because Loren had insisted.
A pilot learned by sitting in the chair and a Jedi learned by doing. If a ship emerged from hyperspace inside an asteroid field because somebody trusted automation more than their own eyes, then the Force was unlikely to be sympathetic - and Loren was keen on these sorts of lessons.
The Woe hummed quietly around them. It was not a large vessel by any measure. Compact, practical and stubbornly utilitarian, the freighter had clearly spent decades surviving conditions it had never been designed for, old even by the time Loren had come into possession of it and the Temple technicians had worked their improvised magic. Even so, panels had been replaced with mismatched alternatives by Loren herself and bulkheads carried old scratches and repairs. One storage locker had been patched with a piece of hull plating from an entirely different manufacturer, and another still bore a faded scorch mark that Loren had once claimed came from a "perfectly avoidable misunderstanding" involving a Hutt with dreams of collecting his own Jedi.
The ship's namesake, however, would probably have described it as a deathtrap.
At the rear of the cockpit, cold-weather equipment sat neatly stacked against the bulkhead. Thick white and grey survival jackets, insulated boots, breather masks, survival packs. Hoth would not care whether one was Jedi; the planet froze heroes and fools with equal enthusiasm.
A metallic clicking sound echoed softly from behind the padawan. Loren sat cross-legged upon a maintenance crate with her yellow-bladed lightsaber disassembled across her lap. A hydrospanner rested between her teeth and several components floated before her under careful guidance from the Force.
Beside her hovered J3-K3. The small astroprobe droid bobbed gently in the air, its single wheel-like lower assembly rotating intermittently as it adjusted position. A thin antenna extended from its chassis, occasionally twitching as it exchanged silent data bursts with the ship's systems.
Developed by GalactaWerks during the latter years of the Second Outer Rim Conflict, the J3-series was effectively a compact survey and communications platform. Its navigation databases were extensive, its sensor suite surprisingly sophisticated, and its ability to establish long-range communications far exceeded what its diminutive size suggested.
Loren mostly valued it because it talked less than most people - and would be essential for traversing, mapping and communicating on a world as changeable and hazardous as Hoth.
A pale blue hologram rotated slowly above the droid's projector. Stars, trade routes and planetary systems - a web of locations stretched across the galaxy.
Loren reached out and rotated the image, and the droid obliged obediently.
A marker pulsed - Vjun. Ancient records indicated repeated visits to the ruins of Bast Castle. Another marker indicated Endor. Not the moon's settlements, of course, but the restricted wilderness surrounding the impact sites of the ancient superweapon of the Old Empire, the 'Second Death Star'.
Another marker indicated Yavin IV - the old Massassi temples of the exiled Sith Lord Naga Sadow, once home toLuke Skywalker's Praxeum of the New (now defunct) Jedi Order
Finally, Coruscant. There had been repeated attempts to access archival material connected to the final years of the Galactic Civil War.
The same name appeared alongside each location.
ACE OF STAVES.
Not their real name, of course. Loren rarely used real names during investigations.
People became playing cards - and the Ace of Staves had been leaving an unusually interesting trail.
They were not stealing artefacts or information, and they did not seem to be building a cult. They were, however, obsessed with one particular era of history - the Skywalkers and their associates. Of particular note, it was Darth Vader, Emperor Palpatine, the fall of the First Republic and the rise of the Old Empire; the role of either Anakin or Luke Skywalker in any of that fabled era of history that now marked the common galactic calendar.
The hologram shifted again as a line connected every known destination. The route eventually terminated in a small flashing icon near the edge of the display: Hoth.
Loren removed the hydrospanner from her mouth.
"Ruhani." The old nickname carried easily through the cockpit as she tapped a component gently back into her lightsaber's housing. "Tell me somefin'." A small smile tugged at one corner of her mouth. "You're an 'istorian. I'm a Shadow. Which means one of us actually understands what we're looking at." She gestured towards the holographic trail. "Why's someone whose clearly richer than the Chairman of GalactaWerks chasin' twelve-'undred year long-dead ghosts of younglings' fairytales?"
Her apprentice found the thought of it intriguing, perhaps a bit classically romantic in a way.
"A Senator told me recently that among the hardest things in life to predict are the whims of a wealthy person with too much time on their hands," Rusasha replied a soft expression of contentment and deep thought. "I think it's good someone is taking interest in the past. I just hope it's for sharing and not profiting."
Loren snorted. Not a particularly elegant response, but one she felt entirely appropriate.
"That's because Senators spend all day surrounded by wealthy people with too much time on their hands." Another component clicked into place. She inspected it critically, frowned, then adjusted it again by a fraction. "An' they're usually right."
The Shadow leaned back slightly on the crate and glanced towards the hologram. The tiny marker over Hoth continued to pulse patiently.
"Maybe you're right. Maybe they're just some academic wiv more credits than sense. There are worse hobbies. Could've bought 'emselves a moon an' spent their days racing airspeeders round it." Her gaze drifted back across the route and the smile faded slightly. "But that's not what bothers me."
She pointed with the hydrospanner.
"Look at where he or she's goin'." A slight movement of her fingers caused the hologram to rotate. "Bast Castle. Home of Darth Vader. Death Star, where he fell, according to the legend. Yavin Four - Skywalker's Praxeum for the New Jedi Order... And Old Empire records. First Galactic Civil War archives."
Loren removed another panel from the lightsaber and peered into its internals.
"If it were one place I'd call it curiosity. Two places I'd call coincidence... But four places? Starts lookin' like intent to me."
J3-K3 emitted a brief electronic chirrup as if agreeing, but Loren ignored it.
"Thing about the past, Ru, is that most people don't actually want the truth." Her voice remained casual, though there was something more serious beneath it. "They want stories. 'Eroes and villains, myths and prophecies... Destiny! 'Specially if it's about them. There are still idiots out there worshippin' Exar Kun, millennia later. Still fools who'll spend their entire lives diggin' through tombs because they reckon some long-dead Sith Lord left 'em a secret meant only for them."
The Jedi Sentinel then gave a dry smile.
"I once arrested a bloke on Ord Mantell who'd convinced himself he was the reincarnation of some ancient Dark Lord. Called himself the Crimson Prophet of Eternal Night." She shook her head. "Turned out he was a shipping clerk." The smile widened slightly. "Maybe this one's buildin' somethin' similar. Maybe wants to be Supreme Arch-Moff of the Sacred Empire, or hopin' to become Grand Vaderite Wizard of the Frozen Sun."
The title sounded ridiculous enough that even Loren looked faintly pleased with herself, but then her expression settled once more.
"Or maybe just chasin' ghosts."
The last component settled into place. With a satisfied nod, Loren reassembled the hilt and clipped it to her belt.
"An' part of a Shadow's job is workin' out whether someone's merely fascinated by history..." She rose to her feet and folded her arms, "...or whether they're tryin' to bring it back."
Before the padawan could answer, Loren then nodded to the controls. They were nearing their destination.
Rusasha nodded and disengaged the hyperdrive. A slight lurch was felt in the Sotah's Woe's hull as the stars returned to their unmoving pinpoint lights appearance across the heavens and the planet Hoth came into clear view ahead.
She switched the thrusters to decoupled mode which would allow for better and tighter manual control under harsh environmental conditions, but it was also risky as it meant less computer-aided navigation and maneuvering. By the time they broke atmo, it became clear that the weather conditions over their intended landing zone weren't going to make it easy to touch down safely.
"Might want to strap in, master," Rusasha advised. "We're in for some chop."
Loren's eyes moved instinctively towards the forward canopy as hyperspace relinquished its hold upon reality. The planet looked lifeless from orbit. White cloud systems spiralled lazily across its surface, concealing vast stretches of glacier, mountain and frozen ocean beneath. Even from here it seemed inhospitable, a world that had spent millennia perfecting the art of killing anything foolish enough to underestimate it.
The Shadow pushed herself up from the crate with a soft grunt, brushing nonexistent dust from her robes before clipping her lightsaber securely to her belt.
J3-K3 emitted a concerned electronic whistle as the first atmospheric telemetry began scrolling across the cockpit displays.
"Yeah, yeah, I can read," Loren muttered at the droid before making her way forward.
She dropped into the co-pilot's seat beside Rusasha, fastening the crash harness with a practiced click.
"Hoth," she said, peering through the canopy. "Lovely holiday destination. Can't imagine why people stopped comin'."
The cockpit lighting dimmed slightly as the ship adjusted for atmospheric entry. Below, swirling white cloud banks rolled across the hemisphere like an angry sea.
Loren folded her arms. "Don't worry too much, Ru," she said. "The Force is our ally." She considered that for a moment. "Mind you, so's gravity. Least we'll make beautiful frozen corpses, huh."
Ru didn't take her eyes off the way ahead, but Loren's grim sarcasm did make the padawan smirk. She deeply cherished every moment she could spend time in the field with her master. Loren made things feel more real with her humorous commentaries and almost sisterly care.
The stars vanished completely as dense clouds swallowed the cockpit and white filled every viewport. The world beyond became an endless shifting maze of storm fronts, snow squalls and towering curtains of ice crystals suspended within the atmosphere. The Woe shuddered as it pushed deeper into the weather system. Atmospheric alarms flickered intermittently across the displays and external temperatures continued to fall.
The freighter shook again - but not dangerously. Not yet, anyway - just enough to command attention. Outside, Hoth was clearly making its opinion of these interlopers known. Even so, Loren remained entirely relaxed. One hand rested lightly against the console and the other sat folded across her lap. She made absolutely no effort to interfere with the controls - this was Rusasha's landing.
The Jedi Shadow merely watched the displays and the occasional glimpse of terrain appearing through breaks in the cloud, as a mountain ridge emerged briefly through the storm, black volcanic stone protruding through the ice shelf before vanishing once more beneath swirling snow. Elsewhere, sunlight caught a field of immense frozen spires rising from the glacier plain below. For a moment they glowed pale blue and green where ancient algae remained trapped within the ice before the clouds swallowed them again.
"Everyone thinks this planet is dead," Loren remarked, studying the readings. "That ain't true."
The scanner painted intermittent contacts across the display. Small moving heat signatures buried amongst the weather.
"Planets like this don't hate people," Rusasha's master continued, although her voice was now a little more strained as her eyes flicked to her apprentice's handiwork flying her ship. "Never understood why everyone talks like they do. It'll freeze a Jedi, a pirate, a Senator or a wampa exactly the same." She looked at the Cathar and grinned. "That's almost refreshin' if you think about it."
"All things being equal," Ru softly replied as she closed her eyes, "we do come with more advantages than most." She attuned herself to the shifting flows and currents of the space around her and switched off her nav computer assists. When her mind shifted from relying on her basic senses and stretched her feelings and faith to the Force, the strong wind resistance on the ship began to gradually ease, the ship taking a trajectory the computer did not recommend.
There was a time Ru would have done such a thing simply out of pride to impress her master, but her Jedi training over the years humbled her enough to where it was no longer a demonstration of evolving skills, but rather a state of mind that she preferred to be in. The Force had become something that was not merely an omnipresent tool to be wielded with care and concentration, but rather that it made her feel closer to her mother, she who gave her life in childbirth so that her daughter may live.
When she opened her eyes, the clarity she gleaned helped her see the true way forward to their planned landing zone. Hoth could not stop their arrival now.
Loren watched in companionable silence, making no effort to interfere with either the controls or the thoughts that now carried her padawan. One elbow rested lazily upon the arm of her seat, fingers supporting her chin as she observed Rusasha guide the Sotah's Woe through the gathering storm with a confidence that had not existed when they had first begun travelling together. There was a steadiness to the young Cathar now, born not of pride nor any desire to prove herself, but of simple trust in the Force. It reminded Loren irresistibly of another Jedi she knew well. The corner of her mouth lifted into the faintest smile as she reflected that Sotah himself might well have offered precisely the same observation about nature's indifference. There had been no attempt by Rusasha to sound profound, nor any expectation of praise. She had simply spoken what she believed to be true, and that quiet sincerity pleased Loren more than she cared to admit. If her apprentice continued along this path, she thought, then in some small ways she might yet become more like the old Selkath than Loren herself had ever managed.
There was, however, another current beneath that serenity. Loren sensed it only briefly, little more than a passing melancholy that brushed against her awareness before slipping quietly away again. She had seen that distant look before whenever conversation drifted towards Rusasha's family or the mother she had never truly known, and she wondered whether the Force had once again carried the young woman towards those memories. Whatever thoughts had found her in that moment, Loren had neither the wish nor the right to disturb them. The Force often revealed such things for reasons of its own, and companionship did not always require words. Sometimes the greatest kindness a master could offer was simply to remain beside her student in comfortable silence, allowing them to walk their own path without feeling alone upon it.
Outside, Hoth continued its timeless war against the living. The freighter banked between colossal walls of ancient ice that rose from the frozen valleys like the weathered buttresses of some forgotten cathedral, their blue-white faces disappearing into curtains of swirling snow. Visibility shrank to little more than fleeting glimpses between squalls, yet each time the storm threatened to close around them entirely another narrow passage revealed itself, almost inviting the little freighter onwards. The navigational computer complained incessantly, its calculations protesting courses that seemed to flirt recklessly with mountain faces and hidden ridgelines, but Rusasha paid the machine little heed. She flew as though following a trail invisible to ordinary senses, and somehow the Sotah's Woe threaded effortlessly through the labyrinth of glacier and stone.
J3-K3 emitted a series of increasingly indignant whistles from behind them as yet another recommended flight path was ignored in favour of one the droid insisted bordered upon suicidal.
"Can it, droid," Loren replied without taking her eyes from the storm beyond the canopy. "Computers've been arguin' with the Force for twenty-five thousand years. Ain't won yet."
The droid answered with a distinctly unconvinced electronic chirrup, though even it seemed to concede the point as the freighter emerged from the worst of the cloud. Visibility improved only slightly, but it was enough for the sensors to begin assembling an uncertain picture of the landscape ahead. Static crackled across the displays as wind-driven ice distorted the returns, causing contact after contact to bloom into existence before vanishing again. One signature, however, refused to disappear. It remained stubbornly fixed beneath layers of accumulated ice, its geometry so precise that nature alone could never have been responsible.
Loren leaned forwards, her relaxed posture giving way to quiet curiosity as the indistinct outline slowly resolved itself. Far beyond a succession of frozen valleys and jagged mountain slopes, something immense protruded from the glacier. At first glance it resembled little more than another ice-covered ridge, but as the ship descended the impossible regularity of its shape became unmistakable. Vast cylindrical forms and sweeping artificial curves lay entombed beneath centuries of snowfall and advancing ice, only fragments of the ancient structure still visible above the frozen landscape before another gust drove curtains of snow across the valley and concealed it once again.
"Scanner's barely keepin' up," Loren murmured, studying the erratic returns with growing interest. "Whole valley's drownin' in ice scatter." She spared Rusasha a brief glance, the smile returning naturally to her face. "Still... looks like our historian's instinct weren't leadin' us astray after all."
The Woe settled gently onto a broad shelf of compacted snow, its landing struts sinking only slightly before locking firmly into place. Repulsorlifts wound down with a hum while the engines gradually fell silent, leaving only the relentless howl of the blizzard battering against the hull. Already fresh snow was collecting around the lower landing gear, Hoth beginning the patient work of reclaiming yet another visitor as though it had all the time in the galaxy.
Loren unclipped her harness and rose with an unhurried stretch, reaching towards the neatly stowed pile of cold-weather equipment. Catching one insulated jacket beneath her arm, she tossed another across to Rusasha before collecting a pair of heavy gloves and a breather mask for herself.
"Right then, Ru," she said, casting one last glance through the cockpit canopy towards the storm that now all but obscured the ancient ruin in the distance. "Gear up. Whatever brought us all this way's been waitin' beneath that ice for a very long time. I don't reckon it'll mind waitin' another five minutes while we make sure we don't freeze solid gettin' to it."
TBC
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