Ewan's girl Thank you. It's kind of difficult to grasp Qui-Gon in that he still has duties to the Jedi, but he's becoming conflicted by them. I hope I'm getting that across alright. Seung Mina6 Thanks! Athena Leigh Thanks for your support, as always.

Nineteen: Last Boundaries

"How much have you been sleeping, on average?"

No. She can't ask me that no one's asked me not even Obi-Wan no one needs to know that…she doesn't understand. After all this and she simply doesn't understand. I press my hand against my forehead.

I don't want to know how long it's been.

Doesn't she know it's so much easier when I don't know?

"I have what energy I need."

My answer ripples throughout the office, echoing again and again the falsity of it, the little lie gnawing with dull, irrepressible teeth inside me.

"If we're going to make anything better, you have to be honest with me." She implores, in that calm voice of hers. "Dodging questions isn't the way.

"How much have you been sleeping?"

My fingers are straining stone against my chin, struggling not to crack, to allow the truth to seep through. "I don't see where this is relevant. I'm mobile, aren't I? I'm functioning as well as I ever have--"

"Maybe this is a more fitting question: When was the last time you actually slept? When you laid down on a pillow and just slept?"

Being reminded of that simple comfort leaves a distant ache in my chest. Sleep. Plain, pure rest. Warm blankets or cool sheets. An uncomplicated release.

But when is it without that horrible intricacy, of securing all the doors and windows, of erasing every shadow and fighting…fighting the thoughts that swarm in and buzz shrill in my ears…

I fix my eyes on Meelon, dry, resigned eyes. And I say nothing.

She doesn't betray her frustration. For all the external world, she's as amiable as she was when we entered the room a few eternities ago.

Yet I catch the subtle drop of her sapphire, gray-flecked gaze before it lifts once more.

Yes. Now you must know you're wrong. Because I know this is the only way.

"I can see you're not too keen on answering that question. I understand. It's fairly personal." She crosses her arms. "So maybe I can approach from another angle.

"When was the last time Obi-Wan slept?"

NO. The last boundary, the one that cannot be crossed, has been obliterated with a few thoughtless words.

And I can't abide it.

"My apprentice is fine, Master Meelon. Perhaps you've had more training into the machinations of the mind, but you've never lived through what I have, what he has. And you certainly don't live within our quarters, or else you would know that Obi-Wan sleeps from half past tenth chime every night to sixth the next morning. And he doesn't have those nightmares anymore." I rise from the couch, wishing I could hurl it out the window…do anything to extinguish the furious conflagration within me. "So it seems that your ammunition has run out and your theories have as well." I rip my eyes from her in disgust, and tramp from the room in a sort of daze, not feeling the pound of my feet on the floor, nor the reverberations going wild in my chest.

That's right I'm right she doesn't understand she doesn't KNOW how can she think she knows?

I stop at the lift, unaware how I came so far so quickly while spinning inside my own mind, in darkness and scarlet anger, while the Temple lights glare like the yellow, focused blaze of interrogation.

"She doesn't understand." I murmur.

And it's a new mantra to repeat as I travel to the level of the sparring arena. A flexible incantation. I can attach any name I wish, because it applies to everyone outside myself.

I hasten down the hall, just barely below a sprint.

Mace doesn't understand.

Only Obi-Wan would understand, I don't need to explain myself to him.

They don't understand.

I enter the opened doors of the training pit…and freeze. For a moment, I'm adhered in place and my heart plummets to the ground.

"Obi-Wan!"