Title: Momentary Pause
Author: AsianScaper
Disclaimer: Star Wars belongs to George Lucas.
Rating: G
Category: Drama
Spoilers: None
Feedback: Friends, enemies: Send your comments or constructive criticism to asianscaper@edsamail.com.ph. Advice is highly sought after!
Summary: Courage in the flight of one, hope in the path of another.
Archiving: Just email me the URL to allow me a peek.
Dedication: To the highschool gals. MUAH!
Author's Note: Another vile experiment on my writing style. Tell me what you think!
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Part XI.
Bleak. Eternal. Utterly immense that as he looked, he felt his heart, his mood, his gentle disposition fade away into insignificance. So he began to talk in hurried tones that his companion, watchful yet never content, eyed him suspiciously.
"Are you afraid Obi-wan?"
He cowered beneath that gaze, so dark and beautiful and so very young! It shimmered with wisdom squeezed from grief. Then, within the soft serenity of her eyes, he was silenced.
Nonetheless, he asked, "Why do you ask?"
"I am, Master Kenobi, very much afraid."
He perused the sincerity on her face and he admired her all the more when she showed the first flickering of courage. So he said, "Well then, I am too."
He lifted a hand and his sleeve fell away to reveal the elongated silver handle of his lightsaber. It glinted against the twin suns and his senses converged into heat. Hearing the weapon click safely at his side, his other hand sheltered his face as he peered past the dancing lines of a landscape drawn by warmth.
"This is…rather discouraging, my lady," he said, his boots sinking into sand as they climbed up the side of a dune.
"Wasn't it you who always said to see beyond the senses? Don't prove me wrong now, Master Jedi." But he could see she was jesting for her smile tugged about the gentle slopes of her lips, capering about the shadows of her cowl.
"I'd love to, if that's any consolation," he returned, not at all uneasy at the familiar tone of voice. His complaint was lost to the howl of the desert when he sank deeper into the ground. "Grathus could have chosen a more beguiling spot."
"He's a good old man, Obi-wan."
"And a little rough at the edges, too, my lady."
"You're insufferable!"
The crunch of granular silica mended their boots into waking and soon, a steady rhythm beat itself mercilessly into their soles. Obi-wan dared not stop for if he did, he would have grappled with thoughts of thirst.
Padmé tapped his boot from below him as the slope became steeper. A breeze cast the brief flare of their cloaks, turning to banners shouting in the wind. "Sometimes, I could almost believe that you're not as old as you look, Obi-wan. You really could snivel."
"Oh, what a compliment, my lady." By then, they had topped the mound of sand and they gazed about like lost mariners in the middle of an extensive sea of gold. But the treasure in it was lost in the dread filling both their hearts. "And what a dreary garden we've walked into."
"Think of it as a plain of honey," she said, encouraging him to think similarly when she clambered to his side, a pleasant flicker of hope in her eye. Then she also added, as a clear confession of her plight without malice or heart, "It was, once, when the few lived here as they did."
He turned to her and found the cloth of her hood hiding a face, which would have crumpled briefly yet regained all composure in an instant.
"The few," he muttered half to himself. He was still looking at her when she moved her head a bit, as if in contemplation of the scene. All there was for him to see was a tanned cheek and there atop it sat a drop of moisture, reveling at exposure.
Obi-wan endeavored to look ahead. "I hope that old devil finds us before the Imperium does."
"Oh, he will."
Her voice did not tremble, nor did it crack, nor did it show a hint of sadness. Wonder marked Obi-wan's expression as he said, "I'll take your word for it, my lady, and hope on your hope."
***
They hardly recognized him then, covered in soot, his beard sprinkled with large splashes of white, his eyes frightful yet intense. His face scrambled behind a ragged hood, while his feet sprang from one position to another, afraid that if he were to stand still, the ground would open up beneath him.
Padmé felt increasing pity for Grathus; he seemed less than he was, his face sporting an angry scar that looked far from mended. But when he grabbed them into a dark, stinking corner in Mos Eisley, she could see the brave warrior staring at her in disbelief. Had he expected them to be dead?
"Yes!" Grathus hissed, pulling them closer.
Padmé could tell that the old man was seething with barely hidden terror. She could smell it even as he led them. His eyes darted behind them and then, behind him, as if half expecting a mob of soldiers to grab him by the neck. He had good reason to feel that way, Padmé thought later on.
"Are there any survivors?" Padmé asked, softly, so that she would not agitate him to silence.
"Last I've heard, they killed thirteen Jedi before I could escape." Grathus swallowed and the act seemed difficult for him. His scar writhed, angry and red. "I was injured when one of them tried to save me. Oh, bless his soul!"
Obi-wan stole a glance at Padmé, shrugging. "Why did you bring us here, Grathus?"
"I have a message, that's all. I'd beg you to take me with you, but I'd rather die this time around. So many lives for our sake…" His gaze fell on the woman senator and there was accusation there, pity, and incredible faith. "For your sake, woman. Yours! Use those lives wisely!"
From beneath his cloak, he produced a small data cube. "What's left of the Jedi would have you read this, Obi-wan. For you m'lady, we've given quite enough." He shook his head, regretting his words, as if they had left his tongue in a hurry. "Our hope lies in you. All our hope! Remember the solarium!"
Then he broke free and ran. They let him go, of course. Let them walk their own paths, Padmé told herself. So many things left undone, by her and by so many more. She could not lay the blame solely on herself or on the commands that destiny left her.
Obi-wan looked at the cube in earnest, turning it in his palm as it shimmered silver, then black, then silver again. "Well, this is something. Orders? Battle plans? I hope it's something we can do."
Nodding her sympathy, Padmé disconsolately held her handgun. "We better get out of here soon. It'll be flooding with Imperials by the time we leave the city."
"Agreed. Come along, my lady, this way." He smiled at her, the bend of it encouraging. Then, pulling his hood over his head and taking her hand, they strolled along the thoroughfare of sand with barely a backward glance.
***
Part XII.
Pain's apparition.
Blue eyes reached for the distant expanse of reality, his vigilance grabbed by the sounds of his bridge, by the mantle of anxiety and adrenaline as shouts pierced through the metal bulkheads in intermittent bursts.
"Commander, report."
"My lord!" The man turned from his station, eager though grim, a sign of maturity and dangerous health. "The ground troops have been deployed. Fifteen Jedi slain." His uniform was newly pressed and his pips glinted with polish. But it was the news Darth Vader was interested in.
Fifteen stars plucked from the heavens. Fifteen rays of light ready to shine on his cloak.
"Good. Captives?"
For reasons even he could not begin to contemplate, his heart tightened for the words, limited in its cage as it waited.
"Roughly nine transports escaped through hyperspace even before we reached the planet, my lord. We were able to track five though the rest are untraceable. We have captives, sire, many of which were executed for resisting."
If hearts thrashed, it did in his. Vader frowned beneath his helmet, thankful, almost, for the concealment and hypocrisy of kindness found below. It did not sit well with him that the world chose such cruel words. Perhaps he would never know…
Autumns in Naboo…
…her face…
The officer paused and Darth Vader could see that this man was weighing one fact within the scales of right and wrong. "What else is there?" he demanded quietly. An edge of impatience chose the trembling of his tongue yet he surpassed it, with a gaze that made his servant rigid.
Vader admired this man's aplomb when he merely blinked, staring for a moment before saying, "And there was a transmission, my lord, from a Master Yoda, encoded for you."
Vader remained impassive, his mind mirrored by the black swirl of ambiguous material, his helmet's composition. His silence extended considerably until he noticed the twitch of the other's hand.
Ah, not as cool as was perceived? He would not bother to know this one's name.
"I shall take it from my console, Commander. Finish off the rest of this Rebellion." It was a bitter word, webbed in outlines of sweet ideas from a sweet mind.
Melancholy grabbed him then, and he did not hear the officer's zealous, "Yes, my lord Vader." The klaxons screamed above Vader's helmet, knocking on metal, insistent..
Standing, he chose his way through the many corridors of his ship, resting only when he came to his quarters. Then, in an act that frightened even him, his gloved hand pushed commands into the console. The view screen came to life.
"A message encoded this is, for a young Skywalker…"
***
In another corner in the galaxy...
Perhaps he should wait. In silence. And remember the days finer than this when he survived the onslaught of races, the grave dismemberment of parts that had ensued. It was so much easier to forget and so very painful to remember. To throw away the misguided letter rather than read it; to release it to memory's forgetting. Too easy.
His diminutive hands clutched the lightsaber. Tighter and tighter until his skin turned the lighter shade of green, when suns shone through the canopy of trees. But the gentle hum of birds brought his thoughts to pause. For the first time in three days, the Jedi Master smiled softly, welcoming the sounds. As though they held the secrets of life's enduring cycle.
Sighing, he allowed his small feet to pierce the muddied ground. Realizing the significance of this, he opened his senses and felt, rather than saw, the ancient goodness of this place despite its crude exterior. For that was how the wisest overcame vanity, by masking their path with simplicity. The mud sought refuge between his toes and soon, the Jedi was laughing at the top of his lungs, tickled to ease.
How wonderful it was, to release the airs of joy for a place that seemed to abandon all attempts at order. But in every overhanging canopy of sad, drooping lichen, order made do with the frail walk of breezes that touched the marshes. And caressed, and drove fear, and made him peaceful.
"Hmmm," he said to himself, tapping his chin and squinting to see the idea forming within. "For my sake, build I shall. Then wait." He chuckled. "Yes, wait I shall, too."
He disappeared behind an elderly tree, his cane splashing through the marsh, sometimes quietly, sometimes loudly. But it was a cheerful sound and peaceful besides.
The lightsaber's last hurrah sparkled as it disappeared beneath his cloak.
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-The End-