~

            This fic was originally posted on theforce.net, where I go by the screenname of SaberBlade.  If you recognize this, don't worry, it isn't plagiarized; I'm simply reposting it here also.

            ~

            General Disclaimer:  Star Wars belongs to George Lucas and the characters belong to their respective authors.  Anything you don't recognize is mine; please respect my muse.  I don't intend any infringement with this fic; it was created because I have an abiding love for Star Wars and a wish to share my interpretation of it with the world.

            ~

            ~

            Details:

            Name: Whole

            Time Frame: Post-NJO

            Pairing: Kyp Durron and Jaina Solo

            Rating: PG to PG-13

            Post: Chapter 6 of ?

            Story Status: Work in Progress

            Notes: There is a prequel, Broken, which can be found both on this site and on theforce.net.  I recommend reading it before this fic, though it isn't technically needed.  This story starts a few hours after Broken ends.:

            ~

            As always, reviews are appreciated.

            ~

            ~

Keshli sat stiffly in the plush chair, doing her level best to become invisible.  It wasn't working; the three Solos sharing the room with her were doing their level best to draw her out.

            She recognized all of them, of course.  Leia Organa Solo: Princess of Alderaan, Jedi Knight, former Chief of State, diplomat and advisor.  She seemed genuinely concerned with Keshli's silence, and gently addressed her with questions that would be impolite to not answer.  Keshli had seen her on the holonet more times than she could count; she had even had a glimpse of her on Yavin 4, when she was younger and still training at the undestroyed Academy.  Leia was as beautiful as the history holos had shown her, and her presence through the Force was warm and reassuring, like the embers of a fire on a cold, dark night.

            Han Solo looked like a smuggler.  She had seen enough of them in her childhood to recognize one easily.  He reminded her of her master, in some ways.  Keshli couldn't quite figure out why he did, but that was who she was reminded of.  He lounged on the couch with lazy indolence, injecting comments and sarcastic observations into the conversation whenever he saw fit.  All in all, Keshli decided, he was like his wife: just as the history holos had shown him.  He looked rough, but she wasn't worried about him.  He was safe; she could recognize safe people easily.  Han Solo was one of them; so was his wife.

            Jaina Solo, though- Jaina Solo worried her.  Keshli had recognized her easily- if she hadn't remembered the Trickster-Goddess stuff from the war, she would have recognized her anyways from the holo of her Master Durron had.  Jaina was a few years older now, but she hadn't changed all that much physically.  She had welcomed Keshli, and seemed to be perfectly friendly towards her friend's apprentice.  But where Keshli couldn't pinpoint just why Han Solo reminded her of Master Durron, it was all to easy for Keshli to figure out why Jaina Solo made her think of Master Durron.  All she had to do was reach out with the Force and feel.  They were both surrounded by a faint echo of the Dark Side.

            "How is Kyp as a master?" Leia Organa asked, voice still soft and pleasant.

            Keshli swallowed back the urge to curl up into a little ball and ignore them all.  "He's very patient," she said.  And he was: she knew he didn't necessarily want to be teaching her; he knew she didn't want him to be her instructor.

            But Jaina bit back a laugh.  "Kyp? Patient? Are we talking about the same Kyp Durron?"

            Leia glanced at her daughter, but Han was the one to speak next.  "Hey, he can afford to be patient with her.  He doesn't have to pull her back from the Dark Side."

            A faint flicker of some emotion appeared on Jaina's face, and then her stricken look vanished.  "True enough."  She glanced at Keshli and grinned; Keshli couldn't keep her lekku from twitching nervously.  "I guess you're not quite the problem student I was."

            "No," she agreed.  She offered no more information; the room was blessedly silent for a few minutes.

            Then Jaina looked straight at Keshli and said plainly, "You don't have to be afraid of him."

            Keshli recoiled from the blunt statement.  "What?"

            "You're afraid of Kyp.  You don't have to be."

            Keshli shrank back against the chair.  "I'm not afraid of him," she protested weakly, knowing she was lying.

            "You are," Jaina said, and she stood.

            "Jaina-" her mother began, and Han straightened, but Jaina ignored them.

            "You're afraid of him," she continued.  "Because of what he's done."

            "I'm not," Keshli whispered.  She wasn't sure who she was trying to convince: Jaina or herself.

            Leia put a hand on Jaina's arm.  "Jaina, sweetie, most people are a little afraid of Kyp.  It's all right to be a little scared of what he did."  Her voice was soothing and calm; Keshli could feel her projecting reassurance.

            Jaina's smile was brittle.  "She's not just afraid of that, Mom."  Her even gaze returned to Keshli.  "You're afraid of him, and you're afraid of me."  She took a step forward, and Keshli desperately searched for a way out.  "But most of all, you're afraid of yourself."

            "I'm not," she whimpered.

            Leia hung behind her daughter, concern etched into her features.  Han had gained his feet and put a hand on his wife's shoulder.  Keshli felt trapped by them, backed into a corner.  Jaina's smile stretched wider, taunting.  "You are.  You're so afraid of what we've done you can't stop thinking about it."

            Keshli's fear finally lent her voice strength.  "I'm not!"

            "You're sitting there, absolutely terrified, because I'm standing not a meter from you, looking straight at you, and all you can think of is what I've done."  Her voice was cold as Hoth; her words were all too true.

            Keshli shut her eyes tightly, trying to block out of the sound of Jaina's voice. 

            "I fell to the Dark Side.  I knew I was slipping, and I still fell.  I killed using the Force.  I wiped memories from good people.  I murdered, I tortured, I hurt others deliberately."  Her voice was low and taunting.  "I abandoned everything I had been taught and took the easy way to power so I could take my revenge.  I turned.  And I terrify you."  Her voice changed.  "Open your eyes, Keshli," she ordered.

            "No," she whispered, trying to block everything out.

            "Keshli!  Open your eyes!"  The words were snapped out with parade-ground precision; before Keshli had a chance to think about it, her eyes were opened.

            Han and Leia stood behind Jaina, eyes horrified, holding each other for support.  But Jaina dominated everything Keshli could see.

            "Nothing I could ever do can change what I've done," she said flatly.  "Nothing Kyp can do can ever erase the fact that he's killed billions.  But most people can look at us and see past that.  You . . . you're too afraid to."

            "I'm not afraid!" Keshli cried.

            "You . . . are . . . afraid," Jaina said, emphasizing every word.  "You look at us and see Dark Jedi.  You look at us and see something evil.  Something that could taint you, make you fall yourself."

            "I don't," Keshli denied, though Jaina spoke the truth.

            "You don't see Jedi," Jaina continued ruthlessly.  "You don't see us as people.  You don't see someone who feels and bleeds.  You just see someone who is a danger to you, someone just waiting for you to slip so they can pull you into the dark."

            "I don't," she said, eyes flickering around the room, searching for an escape.  "I don't!"  Her voice was shrill.

            "You do," Jaina said, and the human woman leaned closer, smile still tight and feral.  "That's what you're afraid of.  It doesn't matter that we've come back to the light and worked hard to redeem ourselves.  It doesn't matter how much we've suffered trying to earn respect again.  It doesn't matter because you're afraid."

            All the anger, all the fear that Keshli had desperately been trying to ignore finally broke loose.  "I'm not afraid!" she shrieked, and saw Han pull Leia back.

            "You're afraid," Jaina contradicted cooly.  She still stood her ground.  "You haven't met my eyes yet.  I don't think you would be able to shake my hand if I offered it to you.  I'm not here to turn you to the Dark Side.  Neither's Kyp.  But you're too afraid of what we were to see beyond that.  You're too afraid of what we were to see what we are now.  You're too afraid that you might fall to actually recognize that we're living, breathing people trying to help you.  We deserve a chance, but you're too afraid to give it to us."  She surveyed the younger Jedi, and Keshli heard her contempt.  "You're a coward."

            She was on her feet before she could think.  Crack!  Keshli's hand lashed out and connected with Jaina's cheek.  The older woman stumbled a step back from the force put into the blow.  Keshli looked down at her hand in horror.  What had she done?  She had given in to her anger, her hate, her fear . . .  Anger was of the Dark Side!  Had she just taken her first step down the wrong path?  She sank into the chair once again, trying not to cry.

            Keshli raised her eyes up to Jaina's face.  The left half of Jaina's face was red, and there were four cuts across her cheek where Keshli's long fingernails had scored deep.  But now there was grudging respect in Jaina's eyes. 

            "See?" Jaina said, gently touching her face, fingers coming away bloody.  "I bleed."  She held out her smeared fingers as proof.  "I'm only human.  So's Kyp.  Give us a chance."  She reached out and took Keshli's hand in both of hers.  "The code says that there is no emotion, there is only the Force.  But there's plenty of emotion in the Force, Keshli."

            "Anger is of the Dark Side," Keshli choked out, tears streaming down her face.  "I gave into my anger."

            "I goaded you into it," Jaina said.  "But your anger wasn't of the Dark Side.  It was perfectly justified."  She let Keshli's hand fall, and Keshli wiped away her tears.  "Did hitting me make you feel better?"

            "No.  Yes," she corrected.  "For just that one second.  But then I was afraid again."

            Jaina crouched down in front of her, brown eyes serious.  "That's what the Dark Side is like.  For that instant you're striking out, you feel better.  But after you're done, you're ashamed and afraid of what you did.  You might have had a reason in the beginning- you might have been goaded into falling- but once you slap the reason down–" she smiled faintly "– you finally recognize what you've done."  Her voice changed again.  She asked briskly, "Are you glad you hit me?"

            "No," Keshli's voice was soft, but she was no longer crying. 

            "But you made me stop taunting you.  Isn't that an accomplishment?"

            "It wasn't worth it."

            "So now that you know that, if I was to start all over again, would you hit me again?"

            "No."  She curled her hand into a fist.

            "And if you knew I was going to go up to someone else and try to make them furious, would you tell that person to hit me to feel better and make me shut up?"

            Keshli's voice was almost a whisper.  "No."

            Jaina stood.  "It's all right to be afraid of the Dark Side.  It's all right to be afraid of those who are under its influence.  But I'm not.  Neither is Kyp."  One hand went up to her still-bleeding face.  "We've both struck out before with the Dark Side.  Neither of us would recommend it as a way to feel better and make the problems shut up."  She paused.  "Do you understand now?"

            Keshli looked up at her and met her eyes squarely.  There was still the vestigial fear, still the shivering along her lekku that she couldn't quite control.  But this time she looked at Jaina, really looked.  Deep within her eyes there was a well of pain, of fresh guilt.  Shocked, Keshli realized that it must have hurt Jaina to be deliberately cruel to her.

            Keshli stared at her for a long moment, mind whirling with the lesson learned.  Then she finally stood, not flinching when it put her directly in front of the older Jedi.  She reached out and deliberately took Jaina's hand.  She spoke firmly, putting her conviction into her words.

            "I'm not afraid of you."

            From somewhere behind them came Leia's sigh of relief; Han's whoosh of a held breath released.

            "Are you afraid of Kyp?"

            Kyp Durron, destroyer of worlds, perhaps the galaxy's greatest living expert on the Dark Side through personal experience.  The man chosen to train her.

            "A little," she said honestly.  "But then I'm still a little afraid of you."

            There was a flicker of sadness in Jaina's eyes, but it vanished so quickly Keshli wasn't sure if it had ever existed.  "That's probably safest," Jaina said at last.  "But can you train under him?"

            Keshli never thought she would be able to.  Now, though, the prospect didn't seem quite so daunting.  He was just like them: he could feel, he could bleed.  "Yes."  She hesitated, then ventured, "Can we not tell him about this?"

            A faint smile spread across Jaina's face.  "I think that would be best.  It would only get both of us in trouble."  Then she turned back to her parents, and the smile vanished.  Keshli felt a sudden stirring of sympathy for the woman as she faced them after recounting all her evil deeds, after goading a terrified apprentice into striking out.  "I'm sorry," Jaina said simply.  "I had to do it."

            Leia opened her arms, and Jaina tumbled into them, dress uniform and all.  Han's hand came down and squeezed her shoulder.  Jaina was shaking; it took Keshli a moment to realize that the woman was crying.

            She sank back into the plush chair.  She could bleed, she could feel, she could cry.  She was only human.  She made mistakes.

            Master Durron was only human.  He could bleed, he could feel, he could cry.  He had made mistakes.

            Was it right to punish them for their mistakes when they tried so hard to redeem themselves?  Was it fair of her to expect either one of them to suddenly urge her over to the Dark Side?

            No, she decided as Leia released her daughter and firmly sat her down, asking her husband to find her something to clean Jaina's face with.  No, it wasn't.

            The fear was still there, an echo of what it had been.  But it no longer made Master Durron or Jaina Solo- or even Master Skywalker or Master Solusar- loom up like invincible, impersonal monsters.

            They could bleed; they could feel.

            The Twi'lek girl slipped off the chair and moved to Jaina's side just as Han returned to the room with bacta patches.  "May I?" she asked formally.

            Leia looked at her, confused; Jaina nodded.

            She placed her hand lightly against Jaina's cheek, careful to keep her sharp nails from inflicting further damage.  Part of her mind was terrified- she was touching a former Dark Jedi!- but she squashed it down.  Keshli took a deep breath, reached for the Force, and concentrated.  Beneath her fingers, the torn skin mended, stitching itself together, until all that was left were four thin white scars- scars that would fade in a few days.

            It was a start.

~~

Reviews make my day!  Tell me what you think I did well or horribly.  I appreciate constructive criticism and honest appraisals…

Thanks!

-Keth

~