Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars, as is made obvious by the fact that this ISN'T PUBLISHED!!
A/N: Yeah . . . I have an apology to make . . . I thought this chapter was already up! So, to make it up to you, I'll post the next chapter tomorrow, so you essentially get two for the price of one. I'm sorry! I thought I'd updated it . . .
Chapter XXI: Where Once Was Two
Tahiri paused, biting her lip, frightened beyond the capacity for rational thought. Anakin though he might go mad. "please," he whispered, begging.
Her hand extended, and their fingertips brushed.
There was nothing else. There was Anakin and Tahiri, only they weren't two people, two minds, two hearts and souls anymore - where once was two there was now one. A pair of lifetimes of memories and pain and joy and love cascaded across every smashed, broken boundary, until neither could tell where one ended and the other began. Communication no longer involved such clumsy things as words; they had no need of such a primitive system. They - the one soul that inhabited two bodies, the two whose thoughts were ever finished by the other - they felt what the other felt. Emotion traced and cemented a path that had been growing in their minds and hearts since before they met.
/surprise/stunned/ecstasy/ met /hope/joy/relief/ in a flood of shared emotions. /love/ and /love/ blended till there was no telling who gave and who received.
How long the two basked in each other there was no telling, but when they finally untangled themselves (as much as they were able - or wanted to), Tahiri sent a scolding /loss/pain/fear/despair/ at Anakin, who winced. /reassurance/ flashed across to Tahiri, who gave a mental sigh and just sank deeper into their link. Anakin followed, both reluctant to face the physical world, where they were still two people.
*
Mara Jade Skywalker shook her head. From behind her, on her back, Ben burbled. She wasn't sure how it happened, even though she'd been watching. One moment Tahiri was terrified, on the edge of the bed, the next they were so wrapped up in each other she couldn't tell whose hair was whose.
There had been, however, a much more spectacular reaction in the Force. When they connected, Light poured out. Mara suspected she'd be blind if she could see the Light side of the Force in this room right now.
It suddenly occurred to her that if she'd felt that, despite her close proximity, there was no doubt that Luke and Leia had felt it as well. And Leia was not so untrained in the Force that she wouldn't recognize her own son's Force-signature.
Sithspawn! she thought, quickly closing the door. I get to go play interference again.
Ben felt like he enjoyed the idea. Mara rolled her eyes.