A/N: This has lived on my computer for a good two years, I do believe. I suppose it deserves some fresh air. Inspired partly by the Sarah McLachlan song of the same title. Enjoy!
DISCLAIMER: I do not own the following characters...I would like to...but I do not.
Ventress had finally done it. She had broken the one rule that she had set for herself when she had undertaken this mission.
"Ventress?"
Taken off guard, the assassin jumped, whirled, and promptly dropped the gauntlet she was polishing. "Kenobi!"
Her heart promptly skipped five beats in her chest. No. Remember the mission.
Obi-Wan swooped for the glove before she could even stoop to retrieve it. "My apologies, my dear. I didn't mean to frighten you."
Only seduction! She had promised this to herself. No touch! Nothing! Only words.
Well, she thought sarcastically, good job on that, dearie.
"You? Frighten me?" Ventress chuckled, took the proffered armor, and placed it on the rack next to its brothers. "In all the three months I've been in the service of the Republic, Kenobi, it is you who frightens me least."
Remember the mission. Remember the mission.
Obi-Wan smirked. "Oh? Perhaps I inspire other feelings in you, then, my darling?"
Praying her patented eye-roll disguised her true emotions, Ventress snorted. "You refer to those of utter loathing, I presume?"
"Harsh!" The Jedi pressed a hand to his chest, wearing a playfully indignant look. "I mean in all the three months you've been my apprentice, of sorts, you've been acting…strange around me. Don't think I was born yesterday, Ventress. You like me."
Deny it. Deny it because it is unbearably true.
NO! Remember, the mission! The mission! Your master is counting on you.
Half-willingly, half-involuntarily, Ventress allowed a smile to flicker across her lips. "Is that so, Obi-Wan? I'm afraid I must tell you, what you perceive is nothing more than your own wishful thinking."
She touched her lips. They still tingled in the places that Obi-Wan had touched with his own, caressed, mangled.
"Wishful thinking, eh?" Obi-Wan's smile was like sunlight, outshining the artificial light in the armory by a mile. He put his hands on his hips and moved closer. "You know Jedi aren't allowed any attachments."
"I know," Ventress heaved a dramatic sigh, idly polishing a plastoid chestplate. "Such a shame for you, Kenobi. My deepest apologies for being so irresistibly attractive."
She knew she looked like a fool. She knew that he must think her a fool. If it wasn't for Dooku…
If it wasn't for her bothersome feelings…
NO! You. Must. Remember. The. Mission.
"Indeed…" Obi-Wan's voice was soft, breathed, a whisper. Trouble.
The remembered feel of his mouth on hers, his insistent yet gentle touch, all the emotion she felt that tumbled from his essence into hers…
Ventress' head snapped up. Somewhere in the span of their bantering, he had moved from one side of the suddenly incredibly small armory to the other. He was right in front of her. All around her.
Staring down at her with those sparkling blue eyes that played tricks with her heart, her soul, her mind.
This was getting too close.
Forcing the blush from her cheeks, Ventress spared him a tremulous smile. "I-It…i-it is a s-shame, truly, um…the n-no attachments rule…"
"Mmm."
"Y-You know, the S-Separatists don't have a-any silly rules l-like that…" Her voice trailed off. Why did she tell him that? Why did he care about attachments? More importantly, why did she…?
It felt like he had poured his soul into that silent communication of touched lips.
He was growing closer. She could count his eyelashes as they brushed against his cheek, his eyes half-lidded and molten. The warmth of his face caressed hers.
No…
Could Dooku's crazy idea…actually be working?
The backwards corner of her most sinister mind danced gleefully. This Jedi was hers for the taking, to do with as she pleased. The Republic forces under Kenobi would be on its knees. Dooku would be incomprehensibly proud!
But the overwhelming majority of her brain was silent.
This is wrong.
"Ventress…"
The last word out of his mouth before he kissed her. For the first time. There, in the armory, lights flickering, the smell of plastic and rubber hissing from the vents overhead, Kenobi kissed her.
She responded, instinctively, automatically, in a trance. She had no choice. Since she had seen him, she had been wanting this, craving this. The setting was less than romantic, but as she dropped the chestplate, letting it clatter to the floor as her arms wrapped around his neck, she couldn't care less.
Emotion rolled from his kiss into hers, all the restrained emotion that a Jedi was never able to express. So selfless. So disciplined. So utterly convinced that he was doing the right thing, the thing that the galaxy needed. So sure that she was his, securely in the light, no longer a Sith in training…
That's when she realized what she was doing to him.
That's when she had been scared out of her wits. She had run out. So much trust, so much energy, so much…so much feeling had been in the air that she hadn't been able to stand it.
She ripped from his lips like he burned. The sudden disconnection left him in shock. He stumbled a bit, before staring at her, vulnerable, stunned, surprised and scared. "Ventress…?"
She shook her head, eyes wide, mouth gasping for air. He trusted her. He trained her. He helped her in her fake time of need when no other Jedi could have. No place to go when the Separatists expelled her. Nowhere except to him.
And she used him.
"I'm so sorry, Obi-Wan."
Before he could ask what she meant, she stumbled past him, lurched through the door, and sprinted down the hall. Away from him. Away from the goodness. Away from the light.
The mission was a failure.
She couldn't give him away.
Not now.
Not ever.
She never could have, not even before this whole mess had begun.
She jammed her hand down on the nearest emergency alarm button. Instantly, sirens wailed to life, letting everyone know that something was amiss in that wing of the building.
Then she marched down the hallway and hung a right towards the suite Obi-Wan had given her upon her arrival. Someone should come looking soon enough. She would knock them out, and run back to Dooku. She would tell the story about how they had figured her out, and that the plan did not work. She just managed to escape with her life.
Ventress went to the window as the noises of chaos rang around her. Troopers scrambled towards her wing aimlessly searching for what had set off the alarm. No one had broken in, no fire, no nothing. What was making it happen?
She heard the door hiss open. And she heard the sound of footsteps coming inside.
Footsteps she recognized.
Her heart leapt inside her chest before she quickly stopped it. No, those thoughts were not even possible.
She felt nothing for the Jedi Master who just walked in.
Nothing but hate.
And loathing.
That kiss meant nothing to her.
She listened to him ignite his lightsaber. He knew. Or had a kind of inkling of what was going on.
"Don't come any closer," she commanded softly, staring out across the plains outside her balcony.
He said nothing.
"Ventress?"
Except that.
She choked. He wanted an explanation. Well…after everything…she owed him that much.
"I didn't come here of my own accord…" she said. Whispered. She said it so softly that it sounded like she hadn't said anything at all. "I was on orders."
She looked up at him. Or tried to look up at him. He was hidden in the shadows
so the only thing that she could see were his eyes, glowing electric blue, deep bottomless eyes that swallowed her up into nothingness.
"You are too dangerous to us, Kenobi," she frowned pensive. "I was under orders to…to either persuade you to our cause…or…or…destroy you."
He showed no signs of a reaction to this statement. But his blue eyes turned more gray than usual, stormy gray.
"And tell me…" he said in a flat, emotionless voice, so unlike the one he had used just moments ago in the uniform bay. "How were you to persuade me?"
Ventress couldn't help the blush that crossed her pale cheeks, and her lips curled up into a wry smirk.
"Dooku said I was to seduce you." She barked out a laugh. "Honestly, seduce a Jedi Master? Such a task can be accomplished by none."
She glanced up at Obi-Wan, and was shocked to see his lightsaber shaking. Shaking? With rage? Mirth? Embarrassment?
It didn't matter.
She took small steps towards the balcony, her long skirt ruffling in the light breeze, exposing her pale thigh, chilling it with the coolness of the wind.
"Are you going to kill me, then?"
His voice was definitely angry. And for some reason it cut her, it cut her behind the left section of her ribs like a sharp knife.
She took a step forward. "Never!"
Then she felt self conscious. He stared at her with a strange expression on his face. Storm clouds rumbled over Ventress' head and she made her way back inside the room to keep from being rained upon.
"I could…could never…" she muttered, disjointed, shivers of words.
And she was telling the truth. Before this whole mess…she had never been able…would never have lifted a finger to even…
His voice brought her out of her flustered thoughts. "So…what happens now?"
He had put his lightsaber away. The moment she had been waiting for.
"This happens," she muttered, and then lunged.
He was not quick as she was, and was taken off guard. She pinned him to the pillar, and deftly secured a rope around his wrists, attaching him to the building.
The breath left his lungs with a whoosh that blew his intoxicating scent across Ventress' face. She steeled herself.
"When they come looking," she hissed, tightening the knot that bound him, "I took you off guard, tied you to this pillar, and left, alright? That's what happened, nothing more, nothing less! Right?"
Her silver eyes glared up at his warm ice ones. He merely stared at her with an unreadable expression, and something with a smile across his lips.
"Don't take this the wrong way," he muttered, grinning like he had won a wager, "But who said it was impossible to seduce a Jedi Master?"
She just had time to give him a questioning look before he leapt forward as far as his ropes would allow him, and pressed a searing kiss to her stunned lips.
Blood boiled under her skin as his mouth took utter possession of hers, aggressive, angry possession. He kissed her so hard the breath left her lungs and migrated into his. He kissed her like the world was ending under their feet, a throbbing, pounding kiss that tore her heart open and flooded it with hot, sticky, sweet warmth.
She couldn't move, except closer. She couldn't breathe, except his scent. His arms being occupied by being fastened around the pillar, she clung to him like a lifeline, wrapping her arms around his shoulders, clutching his head and burrowing her hands in his russet hair.
He parted her lips and breathed hot moist air into her lungs. CPR, she smiled ruefully before her mind was wiped blank by his tongue.
His heart beat rocked her like a shattering earthquake with each throb.
"Force almighty," she gasped, leaning back for what felt like her first breath of air in a century.
"If you only knew," Obi-Wan growled huskily, low, in the back of his throat before crushing his lips into the side of her neck, pressing them to her jugular vein. She could hardly choke in enough air for her greedy lungs, and this air tasted stale compared to the utter spice of his breath.
Cheeks flushed with blood added warmth to the already moist air of the Coruscant summer. Sweat coated their bodies, salt to balance the sweet. The siren was drowned out by a roaring in Ventress' ears.
"You're much more seductive than you give yourself credit for," Obi-Wan moaned into her skin, his chest vibrating with the hum of his voice.
"I'm just standing here!" she laughed breathlessly. At her laugh, his heart sounded like it exploded.
"Exactly," he snarled, nipping the soft flesh behind her ear. "You're innocent act is…is so…so…"
He didn't finish because at that moment, Ventress had taken it upon herself to pin him to the pillar and he was now staring in her eyes with a rather shocked and frightened expression.
She grinned like a snake who had caught a bird. "Innocent, hmm?"
Obi-Wan was just able to give the tiniest squeak before she crushed her body
against him, crushed her lips against his, and crushed her soul against his.
They were melded. One. Nothing short of a nuclear explosion could separate them.
Ventress hummed into his chest with satisfaction when his heart beat so fast that it sounded like it was humming. His Force signature intensified with the hot lather of desire, mirroring hers.
"Damn these ropes," he swore, yanking at the cords. "You tie a good knot."
Ropes…
Restraints…
That's when everything came crashing back.
She yanked away so quickly she probably got whiplash.
She stood away from him, curled up tight, arms folded against her chest, her lips
parted and swollen, eyes wide.
"Oh, no…" she whispered.
The sirens suddenly seemed to increase in volume tenfold. The troopers' boots pounded on the floor outside the door. They seemed to be getting closer.
Obi-Wan stared at her, his eyes still sparkling with remnants of excitement, and then his face reformed. His mouth turned down violently at the corners, and his shoulders stiffened.
"Kenobi, I…" What could she say?
He said what she was thinking for her. "Damn these ropes," he heaved, panting. "Damn the Jedi, damn the Separatists, damn the war, damn the planets…"
He then turned his eyes to her, eyes that searched hers, eyes that slowly curved up at the corners as his lips took on a wry smile. "And damn me. For being so easily seduced by you."
She frowned at him. "You forgot to damn me."
He smirked. "I don't think you'll have to worry about damnation, Ventress."
Whatever that meant, she opened her mouth to ask. But then pounding came at the doors that Obi-Wan had locked behind himself. And troopers' voices.
"You had better run, darling," Obi-Wan resumed his teasing, cavalier attitude. "I don't think they'd take nicely to this…ahem, little scene."
Ventress smirked. "No, I very much doubt they would."
Then, so quickly he didn't have time to brace himself, Ventress slammed him against the pillar, stole a violent, breathtaking, heart-pounding, heart-stopping kiss, and then flashed to the balcony.
"That's not fair!" Obi-Wan swore after her, his eyes glinting playfully.
"I know how you are about fairness, Kenobi," she grinned, standing on the railing of the balcony. "And so I ensure that you'll see me again to even the score."
He grinned like a predator. Something the Jedi Kenobi would never do. "Count on it, my dear."
She smirked, saluted, and leapt off the balcony, just as the clones charged through the door, blasters ready.
"You alright, sir?" Commander Cody barked, slicing through Obi-Wan's ropes with a knife.
"Fine, thank you, Cody," he replied, rubbing his wrists. "Our friend isn't though. She just jumped off the balcony."
A group of clones raced to the edge, and peered over. "She's nowhere in sight, General!"
Kenobi sighed. Well, she wasn't going to make it easy, was she? But then again, he thought with a smirk, that's what made it worth the chase.
"Let her go," he commanded. The clones obediently withdrew. "She'll turn up sooner or later."
The clones marched out the door, and went to finally turn off those infernal alarms.
Obi-Wan gave the tiniest of smirks, and bit his lower lip thoughtfully. He could still taste her.
"Hopefully sooner than later," he smiled.
FIN.
A/N: One of the first fics I ever wrote. Ever. But I actually think this one is alright. But, what do you think? Click the little link below to tell me, please!