Disclaimer: I am NOT George Lucas. nuff said
A/N: I hope to get these out faster again, so I churned this little thing out so that people who actually REVIEW to encourage me to update. y'know, tell me what they thought. I like knowing how people react to what I write. It makes me write faster. Just ask the reviewers of my XME fic, "Lovely Pointed Ears"! (and don't ask them about the sequel…) Also, shameless plug: there's this colorful little name up here somewhere that says 'Jimaine'. wouldja click it and check out the other stuff I've written (yes, I've written more than one Star Wars)? Anything you like? Pleeeeeease? (no, I wouldn't beg…)
Chapter XIV: Lost Without You
"NOOOOOO!"
Tionne tried to shield herself against the anguish, tried with everything she had learned in all her years of Jedi training, but she couldn't. Nothing, no one, could block that, not when it was that strong. Not when it was that deep.
Hidden in the Core were most of the Jedi not out fighting the Vong. When Tahiri's mind exploded in agony each and every Jedi within the Core doubled up, trying desperately to keep a hold on consciousness. Most managed it, though some didn't, and those who did did so only because Tionne and Kam had warned them that they were going to snap Tahiri back to the present. If they didn't, they ran the risk of losing her forever.
Little did they guess that without Anakin in the past, present, or future, Tahiri was lost to them anyway.
"no," she whimpered, curled up on her bed. Short blond hair ringed her head, and sea-green eyes were closed tight against a world gone suddenly and decidedly mad. "no . . ."
Eyes that saw the Errant Venture, eyes that saw the empty spaces where Jedi and trainees should be, eyes that were blank and lost and drowning in a sea that had nothing to do with water. Eyes that opened on Tionne and Kam, who thought for a moment that something else had replaced the Tahiri they'd raised and taught for six years.
In truth, something had.
The tattoos and alterations the Yuuzhan Vong made were all the more obvious now, for an inexplicable reason. Her blond hair reinforced the idea that she wasn't entirely of this galaxy, that she was somehow half and half. When she had known she wasn't Vong, when she had someone there to tell everything to, when she . . . when she had Anakin she was, for the most part, the same person she had always been. When she knew she was human, and innocent, and a victim, she looked human in other's eyes. Older, wiser, changed a bit, but in her heart she'd known that no matter what happened, no matter how strange a creature the Vong made her, no matter what others or even she thought of herself, there was someone who would share what she went through, never care how she looked and would always think the best of her.
Who wouldn't let her die without kissing her.
When nothing Tionne or Kam could say would bring Tahiri from her tears they left, hoping she could find peace in her own time.
Peace . . . totally unshielded, Tahiri was open to the thoughts of every Jedi who was too close. Tionne, who'd been the Jedi who found her, who had been one of her closest friends, couldn't hope to shield her thoughts from Tahiri. Although the Jedi was no longer picking up Tahiri's misery, Tahiri was picking up thoughts from her.
And there was one only place that a Jedi could gain peace, in all the lore Tionne had ever taught her. She just had to be sure, first, had to know. Then –
Jedi find their peace in death.