Rating: PG

Summary: Most can't hear her—but you can.

"Most can't hear me..."

Hi.

Whoa—you heard that? You can hear me?

…That's strange. Most can't hear me…

I'm dead, you see.

That's right. Dead. D-E-D.

Are you laughing at me? Why? Is it so funny that I've died? I haven't even told you how, yet.

I was strangled.

You aren't laughing, anymore. That'll stop, soon.

Everyone thinks it funny, how I died… Everybody but my family, at least. Especially Sis… It was sorta her fault, you see, so—

Yes, it was "sorta" her fault. She didn't mean it to end up how it did. She tried to avoid it, actually. She underestimated.

No, she didn't squeeze my throat. She didn't Force-choke me, either.

How did she do it, then? …Well, you see…

This gets sorta complicated. I suppose the best way to tell it is by explaining… Why I don't mind being dead, I guess…

Living hurt too much.

I know, sickness and all that is supposed to be normal. I had another problem, you see. One so different that—

Well, I kinda freaked people out. I mean, it's not every day you see a little kid being attacked by every animal in her vicinity. And not just the normally aggressive ones, either. I mean everything —somehow, my Force-presence told them all to attack me. Me—never Sola or Padmé.

Sola was lucky. She didn't have to worry about all the Force-stuff. Padmé and I… We had to spend a lot of time with Grandmother. She tried to teach me how to keep the animals from attacking me, while Padmé learned how to protect me from them. She was good with animals, like our other grandmother, Grandma.

Daddy's mother had passed on about the same time as Momma's father. They had been distant cousins, you see. Grandma had been a Jedi; Grandfather, a Corellian Jedi, whatever the difference was.

I was really clumsy, too—Grandmother wasn't Human, though she pretended to be. We were the last generation it could show up in. Sola didn't get any—lucky, again. I got a bunch of mismatched muscles and organs. Padmé got all Grandmother's stuff. She was really strong… She couldn't use it much, though. Her midichlorians didn't like working. Had she turned them all on, they would've burned her up. They almost did, once, when she saved me from a zoo. Grandmother had to actively use the Force to bring her out of it. Momma was jumpy for awhile, after that. She wasn't as good at hiding her feelings as Grandmother was. No one could tell if something bothered Grandmother.

Except Padmé. Her midichlorians let a little Force-energy through. Enough to tell what people were thinking. Made her a good politician, even though she wasn't aware of it until the end. She named her daughter after me, after all. I know 'cause I watched her a lot. Until she died, at least. Now I… Watch people in general, I guess…

Especially fires. I like fire. I used to make them all the time. They were so relaxing…

Yeah… We grew up on a farm, you see, and—

What? Daddy could protect me from animals, too.

Anyway, Padmé was four years older than me, and Sola another two. One day when I was two…

Well, I sorta got on Padmé's nerves. She sent a garden snake after me—a harmless little garden snake.

Er… Let's just say it didn't turn out so harmless as she expected.

When she realized that, she ran off. By the time everybody found her, she'd blocked off all bits of her memory relating to Force-use. They moved to Theed; to make it easier for her, you know. I didn't mind so much that the garden snake had strangled me. Still don't. I think I'm even glad for it, as I watch the universe go by in my bodyless state.

I haven't hurt since.