Room 316, Early Monday Morning
Apr. 22nd, 2013 12:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nonelikemesinceAnakin felt guilty being back here at all, to tell the truth. (Anakin felt guilty about a lot of things, but that had been the status quo for the past couple of years.) He and Tahiri had managed to escape Yavin 4, though not on the ship they'd stolen. Tahiri had done her best to fly the Yuuzhan Vong craft, but she was 14 and no pilot, and the way it (like all Yuuzhan Vong biotech) interfaced directly with her mind turned out to be too much trauma for her to handle. They'd crash-landed, and despite Anakin's injured leg Tahiri refused to leave him behind.
"I know we used to be in everything together," she'd told him just before they faced the Yuuzhan Vong corvette analog bearing down on them. "I know if this is the end, there's nobody I would rather be standing with. I know that we can still make them sorry they ever tried to mess with the two of us."
When they linked up in the Force, they'd done what Anakin could never have accomplished alone, holding off the corvette with a barrage of trees that they tore right out of the ground and hurled into its hull. It wasn't enough to destroy the ship, but they managed to hold it at bay long enough for -- of all things -- Remis Vehn and Qorl (with Sannah and Valin and even his astromech Fiver still in tow, thankfully) to show up in the transport they'd tried to steal in their original escape attempt.
That battered old ship would only hold up for so long, but it was long enough for Jaina and Jacen to show up in their X-Wings along with Talon Karrde's fleet. Anakin knew he'd never hear the end of the hard time they'd give him for having to bail him out of trouble again, but he wasn't going to complain.
He couldn't stop thinking about what he and Tahiri had done on Yavin 4, and how he'd been able to read from her Force-presence everything the shapers had done to her . . . or the magnitude of pure, raw energy that he'd felt once they both let down all their barriers and let the Force flow unchecked through the bond they'd had since they were children. He'd never felt anything like that in his life.
He had to go back, he knew that. Tahiri had a long, hard recovery ahead of her and he'd promised not to let her go through it alone, but -- bearing in mind how upset she'd been that he'd run off and left the Academy without saying goodbye -- he wanted to at least wrap up a few things in Fandom first. That he hadn't even been gone long enough to miss finals was exasperating, to say the least, but after everything he'd just been through he hardly cared.
"I think she did destroy everything I am," Tahiri had told him. "When I killed her, it was the end of me."
She blamed herself for Ikrit's death, and for the decimation of Talon Karrde's fleet in the ensuing battle, and that . . . Anakin understood. He was an expert at that. Which was why he had to go back; he couldn't stay in Fandom forever, not when Tahiri needed him, not when his newfound understanding of the Yuuzhan Vong might prove pivotal. Besides, he'd promised her that when he went back out to fight them, he wasn't going without her, and it turned out that he didn't even have to try to argue his case with Uncle Luke.
It felt pretty good, in a subdued sort of way, to be able to look forward to doing what he'd been wanting to do in the first place instead of cooling his heels here in Fandom, but it was sad in a way, too; he felt older. Different. He supposed that was a good thing.
[OOC: Some little bits adapted from Edge of Victory 1: Conquest by Greg Keyes again. Mostly establishy, but can be open before he goes off to class, I guess, why not?]
"I know we used to be in everything together," she'd told him just before they faced the Yuuzhan Vong corvette analog bearing down on them. "I know if this is the end, there's nobody I would rather be standing with. I know that we can still make them sorry they ever tried to mess with the two of us."
When they linked up in the Force, they'd done what Anakin could never have accomplished alone, holding off the corvette with a barrage of trees that they tore right out of the ground and hurled into its hull. It wasn't enough to destroy the ship, but they managed to hold it at bay long enough for -- of all things -- Remis Vehn and Qorl (with Sannah and Valin and even his astromech Fiver still in tow, thankfully) to show up in the transport they'd tried to steal in their original escape attempt.
That battered old ship would only hold up for so long, but it was long enough for Jaina and Jacen to show up in their X-Wings along with Talon Karrde's fleet. Anakin knew he'd never hear the end of the hard time they'd give him for having to bail him out of trouble again, but he wasn't going to complain.
He couldn't stop thinking about what he and Tahiri had done on Yavin 4, and how he'd been able to read from her Force-presence everything the shapers had done to her . . . or the magnitude of pure, raw energy that he'd felt once they both let down all their barriers and let the Force flow unchecked through the bond they'd had since they were children. He'd never felt anything like that in his life.
He had to go back, he knew that. Tahiri had a long, hard recovery ahead of her and he'd promised not to let her go through it alone, but -- bearing in mind how upset she'd been that he'd run off and left the Academy without saying goodbye -- he wanted to at least wrap up a few things in Fandom first. That he hadn't even been gone long enough to miss finals was exasperating, to say the least, but after everything he'd just been through he hardly cared.
"I think she did destroy everything I am," Tahiri had told him. "When I killed her, it was the end of me."
She blamed herself for Ikrit's death, and for the decimation of Talon Karrde's fleet in the ensuing battle, and that . . . Anakin understood. He was an expert at that. Which was why he had to go back; he couldn't stay in Fandom forever, not when Tahiri needed him, not when his newfound understanding of the Yuuzhan Vong might prove pivotal. Besides, he'd promised her that when he went back out to fight them, he wasn't going without her, and it turned out that he didn't even have to try to argue his case with Uncle Luke.
It felt pretty good, in a subdued sort of way, to be able to look forward to doing what he'd been wanting to do in the first place instead of cooling his heels here in Fandom, but it was sad in a way, too; he felt older. Different. He supposed that was a good thing.
[OOC: Some little bits adapted from Edge of Victory 1: Conquest by Greg Keyes again. Mostly establishy, but can be open before he goes off to class, I guess, why not?]
