A/N: Here's Chapter 4! I apologize about the slow updates, but I'm having my finals in school right now. Thanks so much for all the reviews. They're appreciated. (A couple of you PM'd me, and I feel terrible for not replying, but I have no idea how to find the inbox on my control panel. Boy, do I feel stupid. But thank you very much. 3)
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The sand all around them was cast in a soft, blue-morning glow which Siri usually found to be beautiful. Today, it gave her an eerie feeling she couldn't shake.
Both Jedi were too emotionally and physically exhausted from the night before to talk. She knew that Obi-Wan had slept for perhaps two hours; he had never functioned well with little rest. Still, it was two hours more of sleep than she had.
He was getting old. They both were, but she noticed it in him more than herself. At only forty-two, years from worrying had given him premature wrinkles along his forehead, and in the corners of his eyes. She had nagged him to look for any kind of vision-enhancer in Mos Eisley. His glasses had long been destroyed.
(Not that anyone knew that the glasses had even existed. Except for her.)
"Did you eat anything this morning?"
The question caught her off-guard. His sad, soft blue eyes were soul-searching, as if a missed breakfast had been Siri's greatest tragedy.
She scoffed. "What do you think? Don't worry. I've gone longer." After a beat, Siri drew her hood up. Tears reluctantly gathered. Hormones, she sniffled to herself. But that's no excuse for being a bitch.
Obi-Wan continued to march beside her. There was no wind this morning to hide their footprints, but he was too frazzled to notice. Siri's old, beaten knapsack bounced against her hip. Her blonde hair was getting long and scraggly. It threatened to hide her face. The brown robe Siri wore was, as always, too large for her.
The clothes made her look even more tiny. Of course, it was much too early in her pregnancy for Siri to be showing. There was an incredibly brief moment when Obi-Wan imagined what she would look like with a round stomach, but the thought painfully pierced him. He knew that if any human woman in the galaxy could handle being a single mother, it was Siri. But she wasn't a pregnant, one-night stand who he felt responsible for. He wasn't an anonymous donor she picked out. She was his best friend, carrying his own child. And he was making her leave.
Right now, am I any better than Anakin?
He wanted to grab her. He wanted to push her hood back, kiss her within an inch of their lives, and take her back home. If she wanted to have this baby, then he would want to be there, be a parent, be a protector -- but he knew too much was at stake.
Two hours from Mos Eisley, Obi-Wan's hands went into his pockets.
"Do you have any ideas yet?"
Siri's head lifted up. "Of where to go? I've got contacts. Three years of being on the run will do that to a person."
Obi-Wan didn't think it was possible. But his heart sank even further when he realized that it was probably best to not know where she was going.
------
As they walked along a narrow, rocky canyon, Siri took Obi-Wan by the arm.
"If I get off-planet by tonight, I want you to get a room before you head back tomorrow."
Obi-Wan was taken aback. "What? No. It's much too expensive. It's entirely wasteful."
Her full lips parted. "You're almost falling over enough as it is. You won't make it. Pay for a bed. Please."
"Oh, of all the pointless--"
His complaint was cut off by a low, vibrating bantha howl. Both of them froze, Siri's fingernails digging into Obi-Wan's upper arm. Her eyes narrowed as she reached out into the Force. There was definitely a bantha herd moving this way. A herd, being ridden by Tusken Raiders. They were quickly approaching, managing to hide behind a series of large boulders.
"Ten of them, maybe fifteen," Obi-Wan murmered. "A scavaging party."
"Yes," Siri agreed. "And they're scavaging this way."
Both Jedi unhooked their lightsabers, not yet activating the blades. Just over the rocks, the tops of three banthas came appeared. Siri felt her heart race and her blood accelerate. The serene warrior next to her calculated how many Raiders had weapons-- and then, they were spotted.
Siri's entire body seemed to pulse. "Fight or flight, Obi-Wan?"
The tallest robed figure, appearing to be the leader, let out a war cry and pointed to Obi-Wan.
Fight.
Both blades activated as the scavening party charged forward. In a matter of seconds, Obi-Wan's lightsaber had sliced through three of their gaffi sticks. They stepped back, but hollered for reinforcements.
Siri's attackers were more stubborn; she ran one through with her blade, but the others surrounding her still looked for an oppurtunity of weakness. Quickly, she reached out and levitated a good-sized rock a few feet above her head. Parlor tricks. The Tuskens froze, giving her a false sense of dominance.
She steadied the rock as the hunters in front of her slowly backed away in fright. Obi-Wan's saber cut through a hunter, but his spin came short as he saw the chief make a running leap for Siri. He had no time to warn her as the chief's gaffi-stick made a sickening crack, striking the back of her skull.
Siri jerked violently, falling backwards onto the sand. Just as the chief completed another devastating blow, he cried out and dropped his weapon. Right before being yanked into unconciousness, Siri saw a blue blade jut through the Raider's stomach.
-----
"Siri? Siri, oh, Force..."
The pulse against her temple was erratic and extremely weak. Her breath was too shallow. The remaining Raiders had disappeared, terrified after seeing their leader struck down by the bizarre attacker.
Obi-Wan firmly put his hand at the back of her head. He reached out to sense her other injuries. Feeling no broken vertebrae, he scooped her up into his arms.
Shock. She's in shock. I have to get her stable.
He shrugged his robe off, and wrapped it around her. She needed a healing trance, and fast. He knew he couldn't get her all the way home in time. The limpness of her body in his embrace scared him to the point of retching, but he had to concentrate on what to do. Shelter? Yes, he had to get both of them hidden.
Early arthritis made Obi-Wan's knees stiff as he shakily climbed a crevice along the canyon wall. Sweat beaded his face. At the top of a ledge, there was an opening large enough for him to fit inside.
Gently, he laid Siri on the cool surface, her features hidden in shadow. If Obi-Wan blinked, he could pretend she was just sleeping -- but he hadn't seen her look so distressed while unconcious since the war had began. From experience, he knew that a female of her size couldn't survive to lose as much blood as was spilling onto his robe.
She goes, I go with her. He choked back a sob as he felt her presence growing even weaker. To enter a healing trance at this point would put him at danger as well. Fusing their senses together meant that she could drag him along, the same way that his soul screamed to pull her back.
Obi-Wan sat behind her, gripping her hands is his. He had seen this done before; knew the technicalities; but had never taken part. She was still on the same plane as the living. Delving into the Force, Obi-Wan focused his energy on Siri's head trauma. He meditated on the bruising at the back of her brain, along with the torn vessels. He protectively wrapped his essense around hers, encouraging her body to allow the Force to enter and help repair--
Stay.
His eyes shot open as he felt the whisper touch his mind. He sent a wave of comfort back to Siri. Her injury wasn't getting any better yet, and the trauma still gripped her. Only in a trance with a connection as deep as theirs could Obi-Wan reach any sort of contact at all. After a while, he began to feel her familiarity weaving into him once more. He softly called out to her. Immediately, he was hit by a desparate wall of despair.
"Siri? I'm here. It's only us. I'm going to make it better."
------
I'm here.
She had been floating in a void, maybe in the Force itself. She had not felt herself die, but knew her feet were on either side of the boundary. All she had sensed was Obi-Wan, or maybe just his echo, bouncing from every direction. It felt as if she were at the bottom of a deep, warm pool, drowning, all his calls distorted by the waves.
It was peaceful here.
Siri could feel her own bizarre self-awareness. While floating, she couldn't remember her name, or her age, or what planet she had been on when she had tumbled. And then there were the things she knew, memories truer than any galactic history textbook she had read as a Padawan. Memories, telling her that the vaporator needed to be cleaned, and it was Obi-Wan's turn to dry-wash the sand out of their clothes, and an embryo couldn't possibly survive so long without any oxygen--
It's only us. But it was peaceful here. Obi-Wan was calling her, wanting her to come back to him. Siri tried to ignore him; tried to concentrate on her new-found nirvana. She was awake enough to decide where she wanted to go at this crossroads. There was nothing wrong or terrible in this place. She felt herself walking back toward the door, back toward the safety of nothingness, and then her path was blocked.
Stay.
So, she had heard it again. Of course, it wasn't a word. It wasn't even a coherent thought. But the sentiment, the desire, hadn't come from Obi-Wan or any of Siri's fallen friends.
Stay.
Neither would remember this. Even if Siri had been concious, the miniscule energy would have felt like the wind on her neck, or a breath on her forehead.
If we go back together, you will never have an easy life.
There was no joy, no sadness, no emotion, no love between a mother and child. All of that could come later. Siri felt an acceptance from the tiny flicker; a pure, tiny flame, knowing every detail of her life, to be forgotten when she was born.
The connection left as quickly as it came, but the imprint remained. Obi-Wan called out again. Siri ran back.
