1.beginnings
Obi-wan couldn't meet her eyes in the hallway.
Soft. Smooth. The silk of her mouth against his skin.
A moment of weakness, like when he'd killed the Sith apprentice.
Feral. Fierce. He could feel her anger at the bruises he bore; he could feel their forbidden attachment burning beneath his flesh, and for once he did not turn away from it. Siri was trying to take his pain for herself. He let her, and it was selfish.
He couldn't meet her eyes in the hallway, and failed to notice the slight swell of her stomach beneath the Jedi robes.
2.middles
Siri felt like her middle was going to burst.
"It's almost time to push," the tough Corellian woman with whom she'd gone into hiding was standing nearby, dabbing Siri's forehead with a wet cloth. Her young son was watching with wary eyes behind his mother's skirt.
"Han, get back into the commons."
"But…"
"Get, now!"
The boy scampered off to the central common room with a glare, slamming the door behind him. Siri grinned at her makeshift midwife.
"He's a fighter," she said.
"Yours will be, too. Like all children born on Corellia. Are you ready?"
"I'm ready."
Siri pushed.
3.ends
The helmet hid the trooper's face, but it was the same face she'd seen across a hundred worlds on a hundred battlefields.
They had taken everything. Anakin and Padme were both dead, and an unborn child with them. There were rumors to the same effect of Obi-wan, but she didn't believe them.
Now, they wanted to take all she had left of him.
"Mommy, I don't want to go!"
Siri caressed her daughter's bright head and looked into those eyes she had once trusted, searching for mercy.
It was offered in the form of a swift shot, and Mara screamed.
4. first
"This… is a lightsaber."
She didn't tell him that she knew that already; Mommy had one but she wasn't supposed to talk about it. She'd never had one of her own, though, and wondered if he would teach her.
The mask-man dropped to one knee and held out his hand. "Take it."
He was scary, and she didn't want to listen. He'd yelled at her once for stepping on his cape, but she hadn't cried. Maybe if…
And then her head snapped back, and her cheek stung.
"You will pay attention," he thundered. "When I speak, you obey. Take it."
5.last
She was swift and efficient, wasting no movement, expending no unnecessary energy. Undeniably lethal, she was, like the one who'd been her teacher, and unerringly accurate.
Mara Jade never missed her target.
The clone's eyes were bright, but they weren't kind. The mouth was strong, but it didn't smile. The arms were sturdy, but they didn't comfort. It was a mockery of the only thing she had left anymore.
You will kill Luke Skywalker!
You WILL KILL Luke Skywalker!
YOU WILL KILL—
Mara sank Leia's blade into it and felt the Master's voice fade into the far end of forever.