This chapter is a little shorter than usual, sorry.
Chapter Nine
The whole week Arica managed to avoid Luke. Luke knew she was doing it on purpose, but for the life of him did not know why.
Obviously it's about her training, but what about it?
The question bugged Luke day and night, until finally, the busy rebel commander found time to go out of his way to find the stubborn young woman. He headed for the hanger, having a feeling that he would find her there. Sure enough, Luke spotted his friend working on her X-Wing.
Mara was not in any way mechanically gifted, but she knew the basics, and liked to tinker with her X-Wing when she had the spare time. As she crouched down to examine the underside of one of the wings, she tensed up, feeling Luke's presence as he entered the hanger. Knowing that he had already seen her, she knew it was useless to avoid him. Mara stood up, completely forgetting she was still underneath the X-Wing's wing, and with a loud thud bumped her head.
Sithspit,that hurt!
Mara moved out from underneath her the wing and placed her hands on her head ruefully. She knew Luke had saw, and she got a bit annoyed when she sensed the amusement coming from him.
"Its not funny." She told him, trying to maintain a frown.
"Who says I'm laughing?" Luke also tried to maintain a straight face, but failed.
"I can – " Mara almost said 'sense it', but decided not to bring up the Force if she could help it. " – tell."
Luke merely smiled in return, and walked over to Mara's X-Wing, leaning casually against it.
"Well," he began, "I didn't come over her to just watch you bump your head. I was going to ask you how come you don't want to train any more."
Mara sighed, she had known he would ask her this eventually. "I don't know," she replied, staring down at her boots. "I'm so busy already, and this will only complicate things." Mara knew this was a lame excuse, and could tell Luke did, too.
Luke knew there was more to it than her answer, but also knew he wouldn't get anything out of her if she didn't want him to. "I don't see how it would complicate things," he told her, deciding to find the faults in her excuse. "And if you have enough time to tinker with your X-Wing, one would think you'd have enough time to train."
Mara wanted to glared at Luke, not liking how easily it had been for him to throw out her excuse. But his large blue orbs discouraged her from doing so, and instead she replied,
"Fine, you can start teaching me again."
All to enthusiastic for Mara's taste, Luke replied, "Do you want to train some right now?"
"Sure, why not."
---
After some lightsaber training, Luke decided to teach Arica the art of meditation. She didn't seem too keen on the idea, but agreed nonetheless.
"Sit down like so," he told her, sitting down on the ground, crossing his legs. "And close your eyes."
Mara complied, and was slightly surprised at how similar his meditation habits were to hers.
"Now, just breathe slowly and relax yourself."
Again, Mara did just that, and took in a sharp breath when Luke reached out and held her hands. Her entire body tensed up, and said in a warning tone, "Skywalker… What are you –"
"It's fine, Arica, this will help you. Just relax."
Mara slowly let the tension leave her body, and tried not to think of how warm Luke's strong hands felt on hers.
Mara began to go through the very same technique she had a couple of weeks ago, and barely heard Luke tell her to "let the Force flow through you".
Just as Mara began to make some progress, she felt a demanding presence enter her head.
No, no, no! Not now!
Mara knew who it was, and sharply pulled her hands away from Luke's and placed them on her forehead with pressure.
Mara could feel Luke's confusion, and heard him say,
"Arica, what, what are you doing? Are you alright?"
Mara knew her master would start to speak with her any moment, and wanted to rush back to her room as fast as possible.
"I, uh," she hurredly explained to Luke. "I just got this huge headache, I need to go back to my room and take some meds for it."
Mara did feel pain from Palpatine's demanding presence, so in a way, she was telling the truth.
Luke nodded, and told her as she nearly ran out of the hanger, "tell me if you need anything."
After she left, Luke sat on the hanger floor, slightly dumbfounded.
Well that was weird; I hope it wasn't something I did wrong that caused her that headache... Luke thought with a small amount of guilt seeping in. But then he remembered the bump she had gotten on her head not more than two hours ago. Maybe that's where the headache is coming from. But deep inside, Luke knew that wasn't the reason, and felt that Arica wasn't telling him the complete truth about her pain.
Hope you liked it! Review, please!
