Revered and Reviled

Patience Keçrye. That was her name, or at least that's what everyone called her. It seemed to fit, and she certainly couldn't think of anything else that she should be called. And yet, somehow, the name didn't seem to belong to her. Nothing did. She didn't seem to belong here.
Battle wounds, the doctors said. They had promised that she would recover in time, that she would remember that she belonged here. In the meantime, work and keeping to her regular schedule would help. So here she was, lying in her bunk, waiting for her shift to start.
The ship rocked. They were under attack. Patience leapt out of bed as someone entered the room. It was Trask, her bunkmate, and he was slightly panicked. Patience could barely follow everything he was saying.
Someone needed saving, she got that much from his panicked words. Sith had boarded the ship. She smiled at his fear. They were just soldiers, like any other. They could be beaten.
Their communicators beeped, and Carth Onasi spoke, warning everyone and commanding them to the bridge. For a moment, Patience couldn't process the words, only hear the sound of his voice. She'd never heard anything like it before. Patience idly wondered if little hearts were floating over her head.
Trask broke in on her reverie, and she realized she still wasn't wearing her armor or her weapons. She ran to the footlocker, and geared up. She pulled out the standard issue blaster with some confusion. Was this really her weapon? There was a sword, but no off-hand weapon. That didn't seem right.
Trask kept talking, going on about meleeing with Sith, and energy shields, and Patience wanted to shake him and tell him to grow a spine. They left the room, and encountered a pair of Sith. Patience used the blaster, and winced at how foolish it felt. There was no elegance, no skill, in such a fight. It was clumsy, slow, stupid. She checked the Sith after they had fallen, and pulled a well-balanced blade from one of the bodies. She tested it, swung it experimentally.
"Uh… you know, it takes a lot of practice to use two swords like that, and those Sith soldiers train in dueling all the time. You might just want to stick to the blaster."
Patience ignored Trask's whining, and set the blaster pistol aside. They turned a corner, and saw three more Sith. Patience smiled, and entered the fight. This she knew, this was familiar to her. The swords in her hands sang, and she whirled, striking quickly and surely, blocking their blows as if the Sith soldiers were moving in slow motion.
Trask stared in surprise as she cut down the Sith soldiers. At the bridge, he made a choice. Clearly, it was more valuable to the Republic that someone with her skills made it off the ship to help find Bastila.
"Go!"
Patience tried to argue, but Trask wouldn't listen and sent her to go find Carth and Bastila.
Carth brought up the camera and watched the last soldier make her way to the escape pods. His jaw dropped when he saw Patience fight. He'd heard stories about her, seen the notes on her service records, but he'd never seen her fight. He'd never seen anyone fight like that. Not brutal, like a Mandalorian or a Sith. Her form flowed, her stance was strangely fluid. It was almost as if she was dancing with the swords in her hands. She was small, too, barely regulation height, slender and lithe. Carth shook his head. Who was this Patience Keçrye, anyway? Where had she learned to fight like that?
Patience took down the last Sith and ran into the pod bay.
"You made it," said Carth.
Patience just stared at him, her head spinning with mad visions of an impossible future. A little farmhold on a distant world, a baby on her hip and a little boy running in the grass. Their father, Carth, standing before her. Her husband, Carth, her friend, her lover.
"Are you all right?" he asked. "We should get out of here as soon as possible."
Patience nodded, sheathed her swords, and entered the escape pod with him.
The pod launched roughly. "They're firing at us," said Carth grimly.
Patience smiled to herself. Well, if her crazy dream wasn't going to come true, dying in a blaze of glory with Carth at her side didn't sound too bad. Carth was watching her curiously, and she couldn't help giggling. This was all too crazy to explain. A woman who could barely remember her own homeworld having visions of a future with a man she had just met. "Sorry," she said, "just thinking crazy thoughts."
"Uh huh."
Patience looked around. There was nothing to see, the pod was completely self-contained, and was rocketing towards the surface of the planet below. The pod had only the most basic evasion routines, and they had no manual controls, or even a viewscreen. She couldn't see anything. And yet, she couldn't stop herself from moving, pulling Carth from his seat, shoving him to the floor. The explosion knocked her from her feet and she slammed into the far wall, slid unconscious to the floor.