Notes: Next up is Prime Time Coverage (500+ words of action, adventure, or excitement with your chosen couple as the star). I took the title from the song "Stay Alive" by Hidden Citizens (feat. Remmi). For this event, we're going back to the fight on Reialem (section III of What If This Storm Ends?), only this time we get to see it from Allana's POV.

Many thanks to Gabri Jade for her input on a couple of spots that were giving me trouble.

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V. "Closer Than a Friend, I Can Be Your Enemy" | 56 ABY | Prime Time Coverage

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There are a lot of things Allana Djo thought she might find in the jungles of Reialem. A Sith Lord is not one of them.

Darth Festus stands halfway up a gently sloping incline, blocking her path back to civilization. Breathing a little harder than normal – how does she even know what's normal with him? – as if he's just finished running. He huffs out a heavy breath and grins. "You following me, Princess?"

Oh, the nerve. She holds the hilt of her lightsaber at her side, gripping it hard enough to leave indents in her fingers. "Absolutely not," she answers, lifting her chin. "In fact, why don't you move out of the way, so I can definitely not follow you out of here."

He tilts his head and quirks one eyebrow. "You know that's not how this works."

She wonders what would happen if she tried to run for it. He'd probably catch her without much trouble. She breathes in and activates her lightsaber, its resounding snap-hiss startling a flock of avian creatures in the canopy above. "Guess I'll have to move you myself, then."

He draws his own weapon and ignites it, and his grin takes on a darker quality. "Be careful, Princess. Your boyfriend isn't here to save you this time."

"Please," she says, with way more confidence than she feels. Stifling the urge to tell him that Geridan isn't her boyfriend anymore, because that's definitely not something she needs to tell her would-be-murderer. "I put you on your back the last two times we fought, and I'll do it again."

He inhales deep, catching his bottom lip between his teeth, and her stomach does a weird little flip at the sight of it.

"Is that a promise?" he asks, low and eager.

She raises her lightsaber in front of her. "You'd better believe it."

She isn't sure who moves first, but there's an air of inevitability in the way they collide, sabers clashing in a violent display of crimson and cerulean light. As if they were always meant to orbit each other like this, binary stars drawn together by a single point of mass, eternally bound in a celestial dance.

She slices a horizontal path through the air and nearly catches him in the chin – is he not paying attention? – and as he brings his blade up to defend, she reverses course and crashes against it. He actually looks startled, as if he's having trouble keeping up; and she has to admit, that feels pretty good.

Still riding high off of that realization, she allows herself a small smirk. "As much as I'd love to stick around and get murdered," she says between blows, "I have somewhere to be."

He laughs at that, their sabers sparking against one another as they clash again. "You think I'm going to let you go that easy?"

Before she can respond, he flips his wrists over and up, nearly ripping the lightsaber from her hand. She holds on, but just barely, and is forced on the defensive as he renews his assault. He pushes her backward, overwhelming her, preventing her from gaining a solid footing. It's all she can do to fend off his attacks as she steps blindly through the dense undergrowth. Low-hanging branches drape around them, adding a strange intimacy to their surroundings, as if they're the only two people in this whole jungle – on this whole planet, even. Leaves rain down on her shoulders, scorched and sheared off with each swing of their sabers.

She senses the tree the instant before she slams into it, his weight and her own momentum pressing her hard against the wide trunk, driving the air from her lungs. She gasps for breath; hears him do the same. Their crossed blades inch closer to her, then hold. She strains against his attack, her muscles burning, screaming in defiance of the effort, and she tries not to think of how much stronger he's gotten. The wiry boy from Vjun is well and truly gone; the man in his place is nearly a match for Ben in terms of physicality, and even with the Force as her ally, she's not sure how long she can keep this up.

The mingled light of their sabers reflects in his eyes as he stares right at her. Right into her. And then his cocky grin falls away, replaced by something she doesn't understand, something that sends a shock of heat through her center, something terrifying for how it pulls at her, all but demanding to be answered.

Don't look at me, a small voice whispers from deep inside her, don't look at me, don't look at me, don't, don't, don't—

"Come on, Princess," he says in that same low tone, the one that rumbles through her. "Is that really all you've got?"

And there's the insufferably smug smirk she's come to expect. Force, she wants to wipe it right off his face. She calls on every ounce of strength to shove him backward, hitting him with a kinetic blast the instant their blades break contact. He nearly loses his balance as he stumbles back down the hill, and a thrill races through her to see him so unsteady.

"Not even close," she answers, brushing her bangs from her eyes with one hand and flourishing her lightsaber with the other. She drives forward, trying to press her advantage before he can recover. He raises his saber to block, and she can feel the durasteel behind that move. He's definitely not making this easy.

He parries her next swing, then pushes her back with a series of quick, tight blows she can barely keep up with. Each one beats her back, beats her down, making her feel every bit of the disparity in their sizes. How in the worlds is she going to get out of this?

His next strike is the hardest of all, and he holds his saber against hers, looming over her, staring at her through the light of their weapons. That strange feeling in her stomach again, but only for a second, because as she feels his weight bearing down on her, she suddenly remembers the perfect trick for this situation.

She smirks up at him, anticipation making her feel lighter already. "Now pay attention, because I'm only going to do this once."

She deactivates her lightsaber and sidesteps as he pitches forward, unable to correct his balance in time to stop his fall. Before he can use the Force to slow his descent, she darts behind him and brings both fists – still curled tight around the hilt of her lightsaber – down between his shoulders as hard as she can. He slams to the ground, and she hits him with a wave of energy to keep him there while she escapes. She hears his head smack the ground with a muffled thud, but she runs anyway.

Her heart is pounding all the way in her throat as she scales the hill. She didn't mean to hit his head like that. What happens if he doesn't get up?

What happens if he does?

She knows she shouldn't slow down, not even for a moment; but as she reaches the trees at the top of the hill, she turns back to look at him. He's standing there, fingers stained scarlet from the gash on his forehead, and he looks slightly dazed as he stares up at her. There it is again, that heat from earlier – not that it ever really left. Force, she has to get away from him.

She runs, back to civilization, back to Ben and the Jedi, safety and sanity. She's not thinking of how he looked at her as he held her against the tree, because even if she saw what she thought she saw or felt what she thought she felt, it still doesn't mean anything, and it's definitely not real. She runs because she has to, because no matter how closely they orbit one another, they'll never be anything more than enemies.