"Do you believe in love, Revan?" Anka Rand asked idly, the question both forming in her mind and being spoken nearly simultaneously, one finger tracing the curve of the whiskey bottle she was drinking from.
Revan moved from his position by the door of the Room of a Thousand Fountains , no longer leaning against the frame. Anka was sitting on the floor in the middle, an empty bottle of Corellian whiskey beside her, and another in her hand, only half-full. Her hair was messy and lank, pulled back from her face with a simple tie. Revan eyes rested on her for long moments, something sad stirring in the blue depths as they took in her beauty. The beauty of her sophisticated face, her long slender legs. She looked a lot like her Brother; Atton.
Anka grabbed the bottle again, and took a good-sized swig, as she had mindlessly been doing for the past hour. Revan watched silently, as he had been doing for the past few minutes.
After a seconds hesitation, Revan quietly walked to her and sat down in front of her. He took the bottle from her hand and placed it out of her reach.
"Well?" Anka said, raising an eyebrow.
"If you mean do I believe it exists, the answer is yes." He remained calm, gaze steady on hers.
Anka waved a hand, fingers twitching as if she wanted the bottle. "I know it exists," she said dismissively. "But do you think it does any good? You can still hurt someone if you love them. They can still hurt you. What the hell is love, really? People act like it's so special, but it's really just an emotion, like any other."
"Love is more than an emotion," Revan gently disagreed. "Even if it can manifest itself in them. Can an emotion change a person's life? What they are?"
"Well, it's not like you enough memoryto know if it was just a passing emotion," Anka said nastily.
Revan raised an eyebrow, though she saw a flash of regretful hurt. "Do people die for passing emotions, Anka?"
Anka stared at the empty bottle, which Revan hadn't bothered to move. "Maybe." People died in the heat of the moment, of emotion, for stupid things. She'd seen it before. Of course, she had also seen people act wildly out of character for something she simply didn't understand. Hell, who knew if even they understood it.
"What's the matter, Anka?" Revan asked softly, concern tingeing his tone. "I've never seen you like this; I didn't know you could be like this."
"It's a passing phase, Rev," Anka replied offhandedly. "I do this every once in a while. Kinda like a good cry - you just need one occasionally." Every other year or so . . . it had only been one since she had first truly met Revan.
Revan didn't say anything for a moment as Anka blearily closed her eyes. "You don't believe in love, Anka?"
"I'd think that fairly obvious," Anka snapped, opening her eyes in irritation. Revan said nothing, and the silence crawled into her, muffling and deafening. Break, she thought, speaking just to speak. "It's all so pointless," she continued. "People love, but they still hate, and sometimes they hate the person they love." Like you, she thought, as her words veered off in another direction. "Everything is a blur of who thinks what right and wrong is. I killed people, and it seemed right at the time. I wanted to live, and that was all that mattered. I liked my position. Wasn't that right?"
Revan hesitated visibly. "Anka . . . we all possess some knowledge of right and wrong. Call it instinct, call it a gift of the Force, but we all have it. Ethical codes change little from world to world, species to species and culture to culture. How do you explain that? There's always some defining point."
"Which is always changing to suit your views at the time," Anka pointed out cynically.
"Only when you base everything on yourself," Revan replied. His hands were loosely on his knees. He looked obscenely relaxed.
"And what should it be based on? Love?" Anka sneered. She reached forward, off-balance and teetering on her knees, reaching for the whiskey bottle that had some drink left in it.
Revan moved it farther away, and Anka overcompensated in trying to reach for it. He instantly grabbed her arm, steadying her, and she lurched back into a sitting position with a glare, yanking herself away. Revan's mouth twitched, but he didn't comment on her clearly drunken state despite the fresh opportunity.
"Don't you feel it?" Revan asked softly, leaning forward slightly and not reacting to her anger.
She felt the Force touch her, bringing with it waves of guilt and grief mixed with memories. It was not the Force that was showing her the wrongness in her past. It wasn't. "Stop it, Revan" she said tiredly. "Stop that Force crap."
"I'm not doing anything to you," Revan said, unruffled.
"So I was wrong, was I?" Anka said, gesturing with one hand to encompass everything - her whole life.
"Why don't you tell me?" Revan returned easily.
Anka pursed her lips. "You can be a real piece of Hutt slime. So certain of yourself."
"I'm certain of very little, Anka, but the Force."
"And love? Certain of love, too?"
Revan looked thoughtful. "Love is . . . supernatural, I've always thought. Not a force of nature, but more than that. Even you can't deny its power, its effect. Can you?"
Anka laughed bitterly. Bitter dreams. "And when love is twisted? Used to use and abuse another? When it's nothing more than a tool to shape you, to manipulate you?"
"That's not love, Anka, that's an exercise of power."
Anka snorted.
Revan paused. "You are guilty of your crimes, Anka, as am I," he said softly. Anka flinched, but he continued inexorably. "Though there is also forgiveness. I've little doubt you've been loved, and used the power of that love, while never knowing the love itself. One of your targets, perhaps . . . you speak of it as one with experience."
"I hate you," Anka hissed, rising to her feet. Revan's words were cutting, making her bleed. Oh yes, she knew how to use love. She had used it against one of her first targets. Revan rather reminded her of him, because although they looked nothing alike, they both had that same earnestness that made Anka want to scream.
Revan didn't stop speaking, just rose with her. "And yes, your Brother did have power over you, and he did use it. And on your part, there was love; but there was none on his. You loved out of ignorance or willful blindness, but the love itself wasn't tainted. I imagine you even liked serving your Brother, and love is never selfish."
Anka choked out a sob. "I hate love," she wept, turning away. Her movements were sloppy, wide and awkward. She crashed into the bulkhead more than leaned against it. Her sight swerved, and her emotions spun ever more out of control. She was undeniably drunk to let them go so far.
Revan stepped forward, close enough to touch but not touching. "Don't," he requested softly.
"It's nothing but pain!"
"The pain isn't from the love, Anka, it's from the lack," Revan said quietly.
Anka turned to face him, face streaked with tears. "Then make it stop!
Revan gathered her into his arms. She was little more than a bundle of awkward movements, arms and legs, and she collapsed against him, unable to hold herself together. She never was when she did this, but never before had there been anyone but herself to bring her back together.
"I will," Revan said into her hair, stroking it back tenderly. "But you have to let everything else go."
It felt hard for Anka to breathe, she was so constricted in her pain. Let everything that wasn't love go? It wasn't possible. It wasn't. "Where the hell did you get so wise?" she said with a sarcastic edge.
She felt his shrug.
"Life," he replied. "Masters and Enemys. Your Brother; Atton and his lies. Betrayal." He hesitated. "Loss."
He lowered them both to the hard deck. It felt easier to Anka, and she relaxed completely in Revan's arms, sure he would hold her. It made it easier to trust when she was easier to hold, and the trust made her easier to hold.
She felt him kiss the top of her head, and she closed her eyes. "If I let everything else go, will you catch me?" she whispered.
"Yes," he said simply. It was not a confession torn from the soul, because he knew it so well, and accepted it so completely. But there was a fear there, nevertheless. "I already love you, and that . . . that's all. Everything." His words were awkward in manner, but beautiful in everything else.
Let it be pure, she thought.
"Catch me," she breathed, looking into Revan's shining eyes and warm smile, and let it go.