All the thanks ever goes to my beta, Sethnakht.
The first thing Leia noticed when she reached the clearing with the hut was Luke doing a handstand.
The second thing she noticed was Yoda balancing on top of one of Luke's feet.
She was glad she got to see both things as she entered the space, because as soon as he noticed her, Luke lost his balance and went toppling to the ground. She managed to use the Force to catch Yoda before he fell, setting the elderly Master on the ground gently.
He nodded his appreciation at her, and gestured towards the domed structure they would be staying in. "The hut, set the roots next to, yes."
She had somehow forgotten about the roots, still hovering behind her at her eye level. How had she not dropped them?
Not only had she not been thinking about them, she had been distracted by trying to find her way through the strange terrain . . . and by her fath - by Darth Vader. Somehow she had still successfully transported them to the new location on her own.
"Master," she said to get Yoda's attention as she returned to where Luke was still lying on his back, "How did you know I would be able to levitate so many small items all at once?"
Yoda chuckled. "Earlier, trouble concentrating you had. Push you, show you more is possible, I hoped to do. Complacent, comfortable with your limits, you had become."
"How did you know I was capable of more?"
As they spoke Luke lifted himself back into a handstand, the movement reminding Leia of his presence. He was glancing between them as they spoke, eyes darting this way and that, but he didn't say anything, his face slowly turned red.
"Always capable of more, we are," Yoda nodded, looking up to meet her eye. "A good conversation you had, I hope?"
"Master?" She heard herself say. How did he know she had been talking to Vader?
"Think old Master Yoda noticed not, hmm?" He narrowed his eyes at her. She could tell that he had more to say, the unspoken words hovering in the space between them.
Leia frowned. Vader hadn't threatened to harm her, outside of his desire to make her fall of course. He'd mostly been equal parts curious about the life he could have had, had he stayed in the light, and in denial that such a timeline was even possible. So, to answer Master Yoda's question… "I do think it was a good conversation Master… he seemed almost calm this time. More willing to hear what I had to say."
"Good. Good! If through to him, you got, excellent news, that is. Yet careful you must be. Good, hope is, but not, too much misplaced hope is. Hmmmmmm. Listening, understanding what others meant, never a strong point for that one. Possible it is, that what he heard was not what you said."
Leia could sense Luke's unasked questions. His desire to know what they were talking about. Part of her knew they should hold off on continuing this conversation until later, have it somewhere where he would not hear them. She didn't care though if he heard or not, so she pressed on with her own question. "Is there anything we can do to make sure he'll listen?"
Yoda sighed, ears drooping and posture folding in, "Up to him, that choice is." He hummed, watching Luke struggle to maintain his pose. "Glad you transported all the roots I am. Unexpected that was." It seemed he felt they had said enough here with Luke, and wanted them to shift topics.
"Unexpected?"
"Yes. Think you would be able to bring them here I did not. To the tree line, or few paces into the woods. Not all the way here. Easy to carry things over a distance it is not."
It wasn't easy, no. Or at least, it shouldn't be.
Every lesson Leia had ever had reinforced that she should be feeling strain, that getting things to interact with the world in a way that was not natural for them for an extended period of time should have sapped her energy away, left her with a headache or some other sign of exhaustion.
She could recall countless lessons where her classmates would complain about pressure behind the eyes, or nausea or any one of hundreds of other ailments. But now that she thought about it, really thought about it, she couldn't actually remember ever experiencing those things herself. Pain in her muscles after training with her lightsaber for too long, sure. Eye strain and headaches after days spent combing over texts in the Archives, of course. But never after her lessons in the Force itself.
Huh.
She felt fine now too. Not even winded. She had been doing so many things all at once, and yet… she felt good. Like she'd taken a quick jog, nothing more than that.
Yet still, as successful as her attempt had been, that didn't change the fact that Master Yoda had apparently assigned her a task he never expected her to complete.
"Why did you ask me to do it if you didn't expect me to succeed?"
"How you react to failure, I wished to observe."
"Master, why are you telling me you set me up to fail?"
"Surprised me already you have. Shown yourself capable of tasks I did not expect. True of other matters as well, perhaps."
Leia grinned. "It's the masters who learn and the students who teach." She had never really understood that phrase, had heard it cited time and time again as key Jedi wisdom, but thought she was starting to see what it might have meant.
"Yes. Challenged, it has been too long since I was."
"When did you last have a student?"
"Twenty years ago, when the order fell. My students all were…" He sighed, shaking his head. "No, dwelling on the past will help us not."
"But isn't that exactly what we are doing here? Going over past events so we can better understand the future?"
"Lived with this pain for a long time, have I, alone. Used to talking about it I am not, but right, you are. Yes. Talking, processing, valuable actions, these are. Needed to let go, to move on, they are."
"You're not alone Master. You can lean on others for help." She gathered her thoughts, remembering how alone Vader had felt, how his loneliness had almost felt like a gaping wound in and of itself. No being was ever supposed to be isolated like that, ever. "We are all connected in the Force, the emotions of one of us influences all others. The burdens one Jedi carries should be shared by all."
"Hmmmm. Thank you. Needed to hear this I did. Yes."
"Leia's right," Luke said, from where he had seemingly fallen flat on the ground from his second failed handstand. "If you need people to talk to, we're here for you. It's the least I can do, what with you agreeing to train me and all."
"Seeing what is before you, you both are, not just the distant horizon. Much progress we have all made today, yes? Yes!" Yoda nodded, glancing between them both and grinning. "Time to eat it is, and then rest."
Luke's face twitched, a passing quick expression Leia would have missed without a lifetime of pushing her brother's every boundary. What was bothering him?
Yoda picked up some of the roots, showing Leia and Luke how to cut them properly as he set up a pot to stew them in.
Occasionally as she worked Leia would imagine describing the scene to people back home, once they solved this problem.
"What did you do when you were trapped in that alternate dimension?" someone would ask, possibly Master Yoda himself! (Of course if it was Master Yoda asking the question the syntax would be all different, but Leia ignored that in her fantasy of one day looking back on this all from the comfort and safety of home).
Leia would say: "deep in a swamp, Master Yoda showed Luke and I how to cook him his dinner. He's kind of a fussy old man about these things, you know. Needs the veggies cubed down to a certain size, otherwise they just ruin his meal. It reminded me a lot of working with the culinary droid back home, actually. So obsessed with proper knife cuts! He did have a lot of nice things to say about Luke's gardening skills though. Kept thanking Luke for some boring thing he had told him about pruning even as he complained about how I was chopping the roots all wrong."
It was a nice story, and while it in no way made up for everything else Leia had experienced since entering this dimension, she knew she'd always look back on this particular night, and smile.
"So who are they then?" Leia asked, eyebrow arched. "The people in the illustration?"
"They are called the Father, the Son, and the Daughter," Barriss explained, "images of them show up all over the galaxy, some older than space travel itself."
The book Leia had seen their images in had certainly been ancient, but nowhere near that old.
"Perhaps who was the wrong question then. What are they? Or rather, what do they represent? They certainly never showed up in any of my art history classes, and I can assure you that as a member of Alderaan's royal family my education in such matters was quite extensive."
"No, they wouldn't have. Almost all depictions of them appear at sites where the Force is strong, places where Force-sensitives have gathered for as long as anyone can remember to live and study."
"Which is to say sites that belong to the Order?"
"Yes," Barriss confirmed. "More often than not, where there is a depiction of the Mortis motif, there is also a Jedi temple."
"Which means there could have been one on Horox!" Anakin sounded excited, obviously this had a level of significance that went over Leia's head.
"What?" It wasn't a well articulated request for more information, no, but she was far too stressed to really vocalize her questions properly. She consciously relaxed her forehead, worried that the way it was scrunched was contributing to her faint and building headache.
"The reason Ahsoka and Leia were on Horox was to try and find an ancient Jedi site," Anakin grinned, triumphant, "so it's entirely possible that there was a mural related to Mortis there! Barriss, that connection's brilliant!"
Leia suppressed a groan, would these people ever actually explain things rather than assume she had access to the same information they did?
"So there are paintings all over the galaxy. What does art have to do with my situation?"
"Mortis murals have a very distinct presence in the Force," Barriss said. "Even with how long we've been studying them, researchers still haven't worked out what that presence means or does. All we can say with certainty is that they aren't just paintings."
"Maybe we should back up a bit and explain what we know about Mortis?" Anakin asked Barriss.
"Yes, maybe you should," Leia sighed, wondering when the things they were telling her would finally make sense. "Context could only help."
Anakin shook his head. "When it comes to Mortis, that does anything but help." He gave her a strange look. "It's a place. Kind of. I went there once? Maybe. It's all… jumbled up in my mind. I can recall flashes of things, but when I try to focus on them too hard they slip away." Anakin frowned. "Obi-Wan thinks it was just a dream, that the three of us were connected in the Force and just shared a dream, but Ahsoka swears it felt real and honestly I agree with her. It was…" Anakin paused gathering his thoughts, seemingly looking everywhere in the small room but actually at her.
He told her then about the… vision he had shared with Obi-Wan and Ahsoka. It was full of gaps and missing pieces, but it did involve the three figures from the book. The Father, the Son, and the Daughter. The three of them had wanted to know if Anakin was truly this "Chosen One" figure, and had demanded he submit to a test.
Anakin did not remember what the test was, or if he had passed it.
Leia still did not understand what any of this had to do her situation.
Neither did Anakin, it seemed, which was why he had been surprised to see the book out when they had first arrived to speak with Barriss.
Barriss for her part was reticent to share information, couching everything in countless disclaimers that she had only just started down this avenue of research, and was not sure it would go anywhere.
The main reason she had brought the topic up at all was because she had found a mention of people occasionally vanishing around Mortis related murals, and then reappearing in other locations, sometimes years later.
That mention, combined with the possible sighting of Morai on Horox III was all they had to link Mortis to Leia's situation. It was also, with two different factors possibly connecting Mortis to what was going on, currently their best lead. The other two passages Leia had looked over when they had entered the room were the next best guesses at an explanation.
The first was from a group of Force-users known as Lew'elans.
They were not, as Leia had first assumed, an ancient sect that had died out. Rather they were a group of Humans that had split from the Jedi thousands of years ago, and went on to settle a planet all their own and live apart from the rest of the galaxy. They were still alive and thriving in this dimension, and Leia wondered if they still existed in her universe as well. She made a mental note to learn as much about them as she could while she was here. After all, if they were still out there… well Luke would really love to meet them. A whole planet of Force-users out there with generations of knowledge to share!
She didn't let her hopes get up too high, of course. Palpatine had made a point of exterminating as many Force-worshiping cultures as he could.
Still, there was a chance that some of the Lew'elans were still around. Unlike non-Human cultures like the Lasat, who had faced genocide and near total extinction due to the simple fact of their faith, Human-centric Force-worshiping groups tended to simply be made destitute, their members arrested on trumped up charges and unable to display any symbols of their worship. That was where the popular fad of wearing red cloth had come from - with all symbols of faith destroyed and made illegal, people found new ways to communicate that they believed. Until of course the very act of wearing red dyed clothes became a dangerous activity in and of itself. She took heart in the Lew'elans' isolationist tendencies, and hope that had been enough to keep them safe, protecting them from the horrors of the Empire's enforced atheism.
The sect of Force-users responsible for the second text Leia had looked at was extinct. Had been for quite a long time. Their religion predated the Jedi Order, and was known as the Mist-weavers. Not much was actually known about them.
Barriss, Leia, and Anakin lost track of time, looking through books and discussing theories about how and why Leia and her counterpart swapped places. They didn't come anywhere near close to solving the mystery of what had brought Leia to this strange new dimension, but it was one of the most enjoyable afternoons Leia had experienced since the exchange had occurred, second only to her trip home to see her mother a few days prior.
She knew most other people her age would find it boring, but combing through ancient texts in the hopes of finding the key to an almost unsolvable puzzle was thrilling.
Sometime after Barriss and Anakin's sixth time rehashing the same gibberish in their attempt to explain Mortis to her (it really just didn't make any sense), Leia's skipped lunch caught up with her. Her stomach let out a horribly loud gurgle, the noise impossibly loud in the small room.
After that both Barriss and Anakin no longer seemed interested in continuing their conversation. All they wanted to talk about was getting Leia some food
Leia was set on dropping the topic so they could keep working - it wouldn't be the first time she had fewer than three meals in a day, nor would it be the last - until Luke's voice rang in her head.
Leia? Dad? I'm really hungry all of a sudden. Do either of you want to get dinner? Also, Leia where are you? Aunt 'Soka says you just ditched on her training? What's going on?
Several things happened in quick succession. Leia startled at the sudden mental intrusion, knocking into the table. One of the ancient texts on the table toppled off it, and Leia dove to try and catch it. Barriss let out a yelp of surprise, moving towards where the book was falling with one hand outstretched. Leia and Barriss knocked into each other, and the book hit the ground. Its spine bent on impact, and the book splayed open on a random page.
There was something... something about that page… but before Leia could even so much as make a noise, Barriss had scooped the book up and began fussing over it, lamenting at the damage the fall had caused.
Leia wasn't sure what had caught her attention so she let the matter go. Instead her cheeks flushed and she filled with shame. Shame that she had damaged such a valuable text.
"I'm sorry," she said, "It is no excuse, but Luke just started speaking in my head out of nowhere."
Barriss's features smoothed out, and she nodded. "Is there an emergency?" she asked. "Is that why he decided to forgo using a comm?"
"No, no emergency," Leia responded. "Not unless an empty stomach counts."
Anakin grinned. "If the two of you are experiencing rumbling bellies in sync and all, that's probably a sign that we should be getting ourselves to some food as soon as possible." He began to move to the door, the matter seemingly decided.
"Wait," Leia said, hoping to regain some control of the situation. At the sound of her voice Anakin stopped and turned to face her. "Please tell me we aren't returning to the Cantina you took me to the other day."
Anakin looked hurt, but just passingly. "I uh, don't exactly have too many other places to suggest. Unless you want to have dinner here in the Temple's cafeteria?"
"Is there anywhere you would recommend, Barriss?" Leia asked.
Barriss was surprised by the question, and when she answered her words were quiet and hesitant. "I don't eat outside of the Temple very often. Jedi don't typically carry credits unless we are on assignment."
Anakin laughed, palming the controls to open the door. "Don't worry Leia, I have plenty of credits on me, your mom always insists our family carries chips linked to her accounts."
Leia nodded. "Good to know. Still doesn't settle the question of where we should eat, but it is helpful to know what sort of price range is available to us. I'd imagine given whose bank account we're taking from, our options are near unlimited?"
Luke's voice drifted into her mind again. Hello? Did either of you even hear me? Food. We should go get some.
Yeah, we heard you Luke. Not seeing Anakin's lips move as she heard his voice was a surreal experience. We're just trying to figure out where would be the best place to eat.
We can figure that out on the way out! Somehow, Leia did not understand how, she could feel Luke's eyes roll.
Slowly, carefully, she reached out and touched Luke's mind. Felt his exhaustion and hunger. It mirrored her own, almost exactly. There was a roll of amusement from him as she had that revelation, and with a start she realised he must have heard her thoughts. The shock of that revelation was enough to snap her fully back to herself.
Anakin was watching her, warmth and pride radiating from his being. Barriss was still fussing over the book, the air around her swirling wildly with worries and concerns that seemed to keep increasing and multiplying, spurting into the Force around her like wet calligraphy ink.
Leia felt faintly sick. What was happening to her? Her senses kept reeling. One moment things were as they always had been, made sense and worked the way they were supposed to, and the next - like a filter was dropping in front of her eyes, or perhaps falling away - everything would shift.
Even as she watched Barriss' emotions twirl about, she could faintly detect generations of readers pouring over the texts around her, the echoes of their questions and findings still there in the room with them.
It was all too much.
She turned to Anakin again to ask what was happening to her, but the words died in her mouth. He was so strange to look at, she didn't have any of the vocabulary needed to understand what she was seeing at all. She faltered, blinked and rubbed at her eyes. When her hands fell back to her sides she was so grateful to discover the world had been put right. The colors had muted back to their familiar hues, she no longer saw things she knew were not really there, and the intensifying vibrating sense of connection had died away.
Anakin was standing in the open doorway; she hadn't even noticed the door opening.
"Come'on Leia, let's not leave Luke waiting. He sounded half ready to gnaw his own arm off."
Leia nodded distractedly, smiling at Barriss in parting as she stepped through the doorway and back into the library. She was quiet as as they left the archives, barely even noticing the endless stairs as she ascended them.
Occasionally her vision would shift, like it had in the room with Anakin and Barriss.
The empty stacks around her would humm with the activity of readers long past, and even more alarmingly readers who had not yet been born. How she knew that impossibility was beyond her.
It was all so loud. Too much happening all at once around her. An entire timeline condensed so that rather than occurring over the course of years, generations, centuries, it was all taking place in that single instant.
She blinked hard hoping to dispel what she saw, and when she opened her eyes she saw the library ransacked and empty.
Dust swirled in the dark cavernous space, between the broken shelves and deactivated datacrons. The security droids lay in broken rusted pieces on the floor, cobwebs gathered around discarded computer terminals.
She shook her head, rejecting the forsaken impossible fantasy.
What was happening?
How was she seeing these things?
The library returned.
It was full of too much (too little?) time, but it was a functioning library. Well maintained. Unbroken.
Was Anakin aware there was something wrong?
He didn't say anything about what was happening, but neither did she...
Maybe he was cognizant of it all. A strange knowing air was radiating out from him as he watched her.
Even when he wasn't looking at her, when he'd face forward or glance to the sides, she somehow still knew his attention was unfailingly trained on her.
He shone. Vast, tremendous. It wasn't overwhelming. Unlike everything else...
There was something about his presence that calmed her, that moored her to the here and now, made sure she did not get lost in the endless thens and eventualities.
More and more as they climbed his presence engulfed her, like basking in the heat of a fireplace during a blizzard, warm and comfortable and reassuring.
As more people, real currently present in the here and now people, began to appear, things started to stabilize.
The confusing visions receded, the world acting more like it always had before.
It was a relief, stepping back onto the main floor, with its bustling activity.
Leia felt the present moment solidly. Before standing in that room, or climbing those stairs, she had always taken the linear progression of time for granted. Now… she was was grateful therewas a discernible now.
Anakin slipped one of his arms around her shoulder, pulling her close to him. She did not fight it, his touch made her feel that much more securely anchored and here.
"I forgot to ask if you want to see Luke," he said. "Sorry about that. I know you said you wanted a bit of distance from everything. You want me to come up with an excuse for you?"
She craned her neck to watch his face, the angle was awkward since she was pressed to his side. He was smiling down at her, no hint of falsehood anywhere in his expression. He was committed to making sure she was comfortable with what they did next, she couldn't think of any ulterior motivations he might have.
Leia smiled back at him. "No, it's ok. I don't mind eating with Luke."
His grin widened, he didn't seem relaxed exactly, there was a tension hanging about him that kept his body language from fully easing into that state, but he did seem more comfortable. "Ok. So let's track him down then. You, uh, want me to show you how?"
Leia nodded, more because she could tell Anakin needed to occupy a set role, to be needed and in control, than out any real desire to learn. She was exhausted and had experienced enough new things for one day. The world had only just righted itself, and part of her was terrified that if she tried to do anything with the Force she'd be adrift in that swirling infinite timelessness again.
His eyes sparkled, and she wondered if he knew she was indulging him, or if he was just that happy to teach her.
Idly it occurred to her that she could find out which it was, that she was capable of slipping into his thoughts and knowing for sure what it was he was reacting to. The impulse scared and repulsed her. She pressed closer to Anakin's side, needing the comfort and reassurance of something real and tangible like human contact.
"Can you focus on your connection to Luke? Just picture it in your mind, that way you feel when you are with him, the unique emotions he and he alone can inspire when you are together," Anakin said.
Leia frowned. "I don't know your son that well. I've only met him a handful of times."
The arm around her twitched, and she heard Anakin let out a puff of breath. "Fair point. But from what I understand, you had no trouble connecting with him as soon as you met him."
She nodded, recalling how right it had felt to let him in, how easy it had been to slip into his mind when he had been the one reaching out to her earlier. Was that what Anakin was asking her to do? Enter Luke's mind? She wasn't sure she wanted to do that.
As if sensing her ambivalence, Anakin continued speaking. "Open yourself to him, like you did when we were with Barriss, but this time don't go to him. Just try and locate him. Figure out where he is, nothing more than that."
"I feel like whenever I try to do anything I either overshoot or fail outright," Leia confessed. "Not to mention that…." she trailed off, not sure how comfortable she was sharing what she had experienced when they were on the stairs.
They were outside the library now, strolling down one of the Temple's massive halls. A group of small children, around ten or eleven years of age, each in small robes with braids dangling at the sides of their head, ran past them, shouting and laughing.
Anakin stopped walking, his arm dropped away from her shoulder, and he stepped back half a step watching the younglings cavort until they turned a corner and disappeared out of sight.
"I…. I understand how frustrating that is Leia. It used to happen to me all the time." He made eye contact with her, looking particularly serious. "As for the… the other stuff…" he was talking about the strange way reality was twisting around her, she just knew it. She hadn't even said anything and somehow he knew what it was she was experiencing. "Obi-Wan always said I was overstimulated when things got all… distorted and weird. Would you let me help you? If you let me guide you, maybe then..." he trailed off.
Leia let him gather his thoughts.
"I don't want to overstep your boundaries Leia. You've made it very clear that you… well that we're not exactly there yet. And I know that Ahsoka and Ventress are supposed to be the ones teaching you, but well-"
"Yes," Leia interrupted. "Please, if you can help me make sense of what is happening to me, then I give you permission to do that."
Anakin's smile was stunning, his joy was almost a tangible thing Leia could reach out and touch. "Why don't we do that after you've had a chance to eat and rest up? You've had a long and hectic day, and sometimes that can… well I wouldn't be surprised if things are particularly strange for you right now. Back when I first arrived at the Temple and my senses started waking up to everything around me, the Force seemed to push back and refuse to let me ignore it on the days when I had pushed myself to my limits."
Was that what this was? Exhaustion? It was both a comfort and aggravation all on its own. While it was encouraging to know she could avoid things ... getting fuzzy… just by getting a good night's sleep, she was far too pragmatic to delude herself into thinking adequate sleep was something she could work into her schedule. She was in the middle of a war. Sleep was a resource in short supply.
"Bet you're grateful for all those meditation techniques Snips undoubtedly has tried to teach you now, huh?" Anakin quipped, and Leia's brow furrowed.
Huh? What did that have to do with-
"When I say you need to rest up, I don't necessarily mean you need to sleep. I mean obviously you do need to sleep, all organics do. You should be getting sleep. Still, meditating, it can help you find your focus and ease the pressure. When things start to feel all sideways and uncontrollable, that's generally a good sign that some meditation is in order."
"You know, Anakin, you really don't strike me as the meditation type."
"Yeah, I know. I've found some methods that work for me though. Leia - my Leia - she always liked them too, ever since she was little. If you want I can show them to you as well."
Leia nodded, and they started walking again, strolling down the massive hallway side by side.
"Oh and Leia? If it is too much for you right now, then there is no need for you to try and find Luke. If you're really disoriented and all that, you shouldn't be pushing yourself to try new things. I can care of it, ok?"
She was tired and she was hungry, but when wasn't that the case? She had entered into battles in far worse states than she was in now. Still there was no denying how off things had gotten for her earlier, and she wanted to avoid experiencing that again as much as she could.
She indicated that she would rather Anakin find Luke for them. What an impossible day this was. All of them since she had come to this universe were, really.
Still, as she slipped her hands into the pockets of the robes that belonged to a different her, and strolled through the Jedi Temple's impossibly pristine halls side by side with her long dead birth father, she found she wasn't upset by it. She looked forward to eating a good meal, and to getting to know both Anakin and the Luke who had grown up by her side better.
Maybe, she thought as she glanced at Anakin and studied his smile, not everything about this situation was terrible.
