Across the stars
Chapter 1: The Jedi, the Maid and the Princess.
Jakku
"Run."
The word rang through Erina's conscience, echoing through her every orifice.
"Run. Your father will never forgive you."
She shook with fear as she ran across the barren fields of sands. Her slippers hurt, digging into the powdery terrain as bits of rocks accumulated in her soles. They poke at her heels with outmost ferocity, daring her to stop and empty the dirt in her feet, but to rest means to take a risk, one she could never allow herself to test. She looked up at the darkening sky and felt her heart thud, painfully loud against her ribcage while her determination slowly overshadowed her fear. She's escaping that goddamn ship if that's the last thing she can do.
Somewhere along the journey she lost her slippers, tore her midnight-blue dress and lost her precious sapphire earrings. The sand stabbed her bare feet as torrents of gust blew particles into her amethyst eyes, daring her pale eyelashes to bat them away. At long last, miles away from the ship, her legs gave away as she collapsed pitifully into the sand. To her ultimate panic, her instincts told her that there was a presence looming behind her but it wasn't evil like her father's; it felt more like Hisa—
"Princess!" Erina turned her head around to see her handmaiden, Hisako trailing behind. Her fumbling hands managed to help her princess turn around as she fearfully treated the scrapes on her knees and bleeding soles with whatever medicine and cloth she can salvage from the ship. That sherry-pink hair of hers was twisted into a constricting bun and she wore a dress resembling a slave—not that she was one, in fact she denied the silken robes her princess offered, claiming that servants should know their place. The logo of the Nakiri empire was embroidered to the back of her cloak, blaring to the world loudly just who exactly in the whole galaxy does she serve. Erina herself wore the emblem of Nakiri, on her pin which she positioned above her heart.
"Wear it with pride." She heard his voice. No. No. She would not allow him to haunt her right now of all times.
"Hisako, don't call me by that term." She shivered, her sleeveless dress billowing in the cold winds of the desert night.
Why on Earth did she pick today, when a gala dinner is held, to escape? Especially when they were in a foreign planet. But deep inside she remembered all the faux praises, the brilliant coruscating lights and the scintillating reflections of the expensive jewelry and blanched, it wasn't hard to figure out why she broke tonight.
However, her nauseous mood shifted to anger as she held her head high and swore at the sky, "Fuck you." She took a deep breath as tears welling behind her eyes threatened to spill, "Fuck you for leaving me."
"Please Princess, it's not his fault. You know he was old." Hisako ran to her side, face contorted in worry. Erina nearly made a snide comment on how if she kept looking like that it will be permanent if not for a fact that she ignored her direct request not to call her by that term.
"Hisako!" She snapped, angered at the fact that she wouldn't see the truth in her grandfather's death and she regretted it already. Hisako was the very definition of loyalty, even if she was enslaved to her family—not her—she always had put Erina's needs over everyone else. "I'm sorry." Erina apologized, bringing her hand to massage the bridge of her nose, "You know it wasn't of natural causes. He was definitely murdered by that guy." Erina shuddered at the mere thought of him.
"Your father? The King?" Hisako gasped.
"H-he's not my f-father." Erina croaked out, swiping the last of her tears, despite the fact that saying the sentence nearly caused her to succumb to seizures.
The air around them bristled, sparking with animosity at the princess's pain. "Y-you know what h-he did to m-me."
Understanding dawned on Hisako as she edged closer to her, "I know Princess," she said softly, "and I swore that I will never speak of it again. So now do you really want to escape?"
Erina nodded at her words, more of her lemon-blonde hair spilling out of the intricate hairdo Hisako made for her this morning. "Then I'll help you." Hisako finished, materializing a brown leather bag from under her clothes.
The princess immediately recognizes that bag. "But! That bag! H-how did you know?" Erina gasped, for many nights she would pack the bag, bring it, attempt to escape and stopped last minute. She always felt guilty leaving her people. It wasn't right.
"I'm your handmaiden Princess, there's not much I don't know about you." Erina hesitantly took the bag, ignoring the torrents of winds blowing at her dress or at Hisako's cloak, messing up their hairs. She unclasped the leather bag and took out a pair of boots, strapping them unto her recently bandaged feet.
"Oh Hisako…" She trailed off, "Do you think it was right for me to leave my people? Leave them in h-his reign?" Erina stared into her wide brown eyes. Amethyst to hazel.
"Princess," Hisako took a deep breath, "What is moral isn't always correct and what is correct isn't always morally right. Sometimes you have to sacrifice a few things, break a few rules to do the greater good." Hisako smiled at her wisely.
"Have I mentioned that you'd do a better job at being a philosopher than a handmaiden?" Erina smiled at the first time since they fled the battleship.
"Yes. But serving you is always better." Hisako grinned back at her.
"Alright…" Erina got up to her feet, brushing sand from the back of her blue dress before ripping the expensive satin to her waist, leaving her in her knee-length leggings. "Now let's go find Alice, we need allies if we're going to be doing this in the long run." She fastened the bag on her shoulders.
"Wait what for?"
Erina looked back, her back still turned towards Hisako, her countenance illuminated by the light of the constellations in the night.
"To regain the throne and save my people."
Yavin 4
Yukihira Soma looks at the sky in a lonely manner, seated across a rock at the edge of a cliff, his white robes bunched up at his waist. Constellations of all sorts shone, displaying themselves in their ethereal glory for his eyes to see. In a sort of trance, he held his hand up to the sky, wishing that he could reach up and pick it like jewels. Upon the empty air he snapped out of the reverie and looked up at the stars again, now looking like shiny fish roe in his eyes.
Soma closed his aureate eyes and tilted his head back, reveling in the fresh air of his planet. He took a deep breath and reached out. The Force bends to his will, roaming through the constellation, reverberating at life itself. But suddenly it pierces, striking his gut, he can feel it, the palpitating fear. His sight tunneled and his mind blanked out, flood of visions streaming into his mind and all of a sudden, he was in a different place, gales, sand. Barren plains. Miles and miles without water.
Somehow, he knew the name of this place. Cadinth, where the Tootsuki kingdom of the Nakiri bloodline lie, the outskirts of the kingdom, where the dead were buried. Again, he was transported into another place filled with sand, this time, coarser than the one on Cadinth. He felt his heart thud in fear against his ribcage, this place is Jakku, once a scavenger planet but now some hooligans have built a kingdom on it. Flashes of words assault his conscience. Nakiri. Expand. Conquer. He turned around—
Soma nearly toppled over at the weight of the amethyst eyes, stricken and filled with tears. With a jump his mind forced himself back to the presence, snapping him out of this meditation and rendering all peace he had felt beforehand useless as he stood on the rock. His eyes were wide and sweat trickled from the base of his neck as he glanced around him. No gales, no sand, no eyes. A soft breeze rustled his wild red locks, unruly and impertinent.
He tried to get back to the meditation but it was futile, his mind refused to cooperate as her cries echoed in his mind. His head thought back of the connection he accidentally created. Or did he? Perhaps it has always been there, looming but silent and he berated himself for not noticing it sooner.
He needed to find that other person, with the lemon-colored locks and pale visage. Quick. With that he ran towards his people, his master, to inform them of the vision he had seen. A vision of a crying woman with tearful amethyst eyes. And ran he did, trails of his crimson hair disappearing into the night.
A/N: Hi everyone! I'm kind of back with a fanfiction for SnS. This is my tribute to the fandom as it is so obvious that SnS lack cool fics. So I'm back with a Star Wars AU that nobody ever asked for in hopes to somewhat alleviate my own anger towards the lack of fanfics in this fandom. Anywhoo, just wanted to point out that Erina's OOC nature is my attempt on trying to make the meek Erina when she moved to the polar star dorm. You'll soon see that her haughtiness will come back with vengeance in the chapters to come with that..
Look forward to the next chapter!
-Teeturtle Feet