Please enjoy and reviews are always welcome and as usual I don't own anything.
At the Edge of the World
The wind whipped her back urging her to cling tighter to the large fighter jacket she had found aboard the ship. Roaring louder the wind came in one sweeping movement from the left causing Juno to skew from her nice neat desired straight line. Juno tried to duck her head inside the jacket. She was hopeful to find some shelter from the wind, but was unsuccessful. Her hair was playing in the wind, coming out of her standard bun. The wind seemed to catch her hair, pulling out every strain and tossing it as high as it could go into the sky.
With her obvious difficulties Juno stared ahead at the silhouette of the other passenger who lived aboard the ship with her. She was envious. He sat his arms behind him, supporting his weight, sitting precariously at the edge of the cliff apparently unfazed by the wind.
Juno stopped fighting the wind to just watch him. She couldn't put her finger on it but there was something between them, something different.
Was it trust? Juno's mind flashed with dozens of faces, there was no one she knew that she could trust, but with him… She felt like she could trust in him even as foolish as that sounded to her.
When she had seen him running towards her upon Vader's ship she had been downright startled. Not only was he supposed to be dead but he had come back for her. There was not one single person, that came to mind, that would have risked so much just to come back for her and no one had ever come back for her before.
It was also apparent that he wasn't supposed to have come for her, PROXY reminded her of that daily.
Juno was a body length from him, his hands digging into the soft earth beneath his fingers. She could tell he was frustrated. Their efforts to locate a blind man were counterproductive with every planet, space station, city they were seemingly taking steps further into the dark. Who in the galaxy would have thought that a blind man would be so hard to find. Since so much time had passed from his initial search she guessed that he started to doubt his own venture.
"Are you going to sit down?" Juno's lip formed into a half smile. She was amazed that he had even noticed her presence. The wind picked up and carried most sound away in its fluid dance, so the idea of him hearing her shuffling footsteps was ludicrous. Then again, she had to remind herself that he did have powers she could never hope to obtain.
Juno leaned forward, putting pressure on the tips of her feet, to see that Starkiller had picked the one part of the ledge to sit on that with one wrong move would result in a gut wrenching fall into absolute destruction.
"No thank you. I'd prefer to stand." The wind begged to differ urging her towards him. He didn't even look at her, he sounded a little exacerbated,
"Don't worry. I'm not going to let you fall anytime soon." Juno believed him, but she didn't have that much faith in herself so she slowly sat down on the earth scooting little by little, pushing small pebbles over the edge. Finally, her feet felt nothingness and she let her legs swing over the edge of the cliff. The upper half of her body was not as brave. Her right hand gripped to a root that sat between them believing it to be her anchor to safety while her left hand remained dedicated to holding the jacket to her.
Starkiller's movement was so quick Juno barely had time to register what was happening.
"What are you doing?" She half screeched, her voice two pitches higher than normal, at Starkiller. He had removed her fingers easily despite her viselike grip from the root. He preceded to rip it out of the ground throwing it into the ditch below.
Juno's heart was beating fast, that root had been her one safety net to not falling below. Starkiller rolled his eyes at her he could sense both her uneasiness and tenseness of her body.
"I told you, I'm not going to let you fall." She trusted him and nodded nervously in agreement. Juno tried to look at him face to face but his eyes were distracted watching her hair fly into the wind. He turned his face to overlook the canyons before them.
"You look terrible."
Juno's face turned into a scowl. She usually did not get comments like that from most men; then again he wasn't like most men.
Juno thought about just how differently he truly was. Experience had shown her that men were unreliable; dim witted and only watched Juno's chest when she talked completely ignoring what she had to say.
Her soft sky eyes sought the horizon taking in the beautiful curvatures of the mountains, winding trees, gentle valleys and the unique coloration on the stones of the landscape below them. Memories were haunting and because of that she let her free hand slide itself onto her stomach and pressed tightly against it. She thought that if she could suppress the pain she could erase her mistakes.
"Are you hurt?" Starkiller had pushed himself forward his arms now resting across his lap, his tone held a tint of concern.
"It's nothing," Juno said, trying to wave away her problems into the air trying to have faith in her own words.
"It's always nothing, huh?" She could hear in his voice that he wasn't buying her excuse either. She tried to smile at him but it faltered.
"It seems that way doesn't it?"
Starkiller's eyes went blank, unfocused, he was lost in his own mind.
The wind had died down; the suns began to set, casting long shadows behind the two.
Juno broke Starkiller from his reverie,
"Thank you." Juno was surprised she hadn't said it earlier. Starkiller shifted his head away from hers merely grunting in response. She supposed he didn't hear too many thank yous, or give any for that matter.
Juno looked at the space between the two of them; their hands were so close separated by only a few pebbles. His hand dragged back to his leg leaving finger trails in the dirt. Juno bit her lip, she should have…
She forced her head up only to find him staring intently at her, his eyes were hard, Juno opened her mouth to speak but his tongue was quicker than hers.
"Juno, you don't have to thank me. It wasn't personal," He sounded conflicted, but then again sometimes Juno only heard what she wanted to.
"Oh," Juno broke his gaze, staring straightforward intent to not let him see the hurt and confusion in her eyes. She thought that maybe just maybe there had been something personal about his rescue. She was hesitant to even admit to to herself but it had a felt personal to her. Once again here was another example that Juno wasn't sure she knew Starkiller as well as she thought she knew him.
"Well," she added before he could say anything more to deter her, "Even if it wasn't personal, thank you". There was a secret hiding behind Starkiller's eyes.
With quickness that Juno could not measure he was already on his feet, he kicked one particularly large rock over the side. It bounced and chipped away while it fell below, plunging deeper until it was lost.
"Here, "Starkiller said, extending one hand out to her. Juno extended her own to his. He closed his fingers around hers and pulled her up to him.
Hands were connected between the two of them; their bodies were so close, the force of his pull had done this. Juno could feel Starkiller's warm breath on her head even with the chilled wind whirling around them. She looked up, his eyes were playing back and forth with hers; there was something in them Juno had not seen before and could not identify.
As if he could sense her feelings his movements were quick. Starkiller pushed Juno back, careful not to push her over the edge, letting her hand fall from his. Turning his back on her he let out an angry shout, hands clenched, punching the air in front of him, walking back to his ship.
Juno was left twisting in the wind.
