Sorry for the delay in updates. It's been a long time, but I've been busy as well as distracted for the past month. Hopefully I will be more persistent in updating this for the future though. As always, thank you for reading this, and I hope you enjoy.
Chapter 2
Anakin piloted his ship through the fertile valley, hovering directly above the trees and the river below. Although he had taken this route many times in the last seven years, its scenery never ceased to amaze him. The entire planet was beautiful, full of magnificent snow-capped mountains and lush valleys similar to the one he was currently passing through. Their life here was relatively uneventful, giving the couple all the time in the world to explore this mostly uninhabited and wild paradise that was their home. The planet had no real name. For all of the few residents that dwelled on it, none save Anakin and Padme had ever lived anywhere else. For them, and for the planet's two newest residents, it was Home, and nothing else.
As the river below his speeder meandered out of the forest and into a comfortable grassy plain, Anakin slowed his vehicle down. Minutes later he was in the village. The houses that dotted the landscape were simple ones, all composed of the natural resources found on the planet, with none of the artificial, droid made durasteel that monopolized the construction of the Galactic Republic.
The few inhabitants of the planet were not ignorant about the rest of the Galaxy. They had fled the Republic a thousand years ago to escape the chaos and suffering of the Great Sith War. Though most of the refugees were human, they all originated from many different planets. It was a yearning for peace and solitude from the troubled tidings of the Republic that had brought them together, and they, like Anakin and Padme had seven years ago, looked to escape to the farthest corner of the unknown regions in the hopes that whatever forces, groups, or clans that sought power over the Galaxy would never find them.
The refugees had been successful in that aspect. No off-worlders had ever found their safe haven for an entire millennium, up until the day two humans fleeing Naboo had stumbled their way to the planet. They were viewed with open suspicion at first, but Padme's political ways served the two well. After engrossing herself into learning their ways, customs, and history, Padme assured them that they were of the same mind. Her and Anakin, like the ancestors of the planet's current native residents, were refugees running away from the shattered remains of their past and looking for a place to start over; a place where they would not be found or disturbed.
Anakin paced purposefully down the cobblestone street, greeting many of the other pedestrians with courtesy as he passed them by. The people were very friendly, but they were also very private, family oriented folk. Most, like Anakin and Padme had learned to do in their time there, farmed their own food. Those who were in need of any material thing went to one of the markets in the villages, where they bartered amongst each other for the supplies that they needed.
The local government was very informal. A rotating set of councilors appointed from each village served mainly as arbitrators whose primary purpose was to resolve disputes. Not that they were common at all. Though a thousand years had passed since the original inhabitants arrived, population growth rates had been minimal, and most of the planet still remained undeveloped. It was open range for everyone, and there was no need to claim a neighbor's possessions when one could easily find it unclaimed elsewhere on the planet.
Out of the original refugees of the planet, one had been a Jedi. He had engaged along with his fellow colleagues in the war against the Sith, though he never distinguished himself as a superb warrior. In the end, the Jedi decided that he valued his own family's safety over the state of the Galaxy, and discretely walked away from the Order and the known worlds.
Though it tended to skip several generations at a time, many of his descendants had been Force-sensitive. Some of them served for periods on the Central Council. Most of them were simply content to live with their families and serve as seers and village wise-men. It was one of these old Masters that Anakin sought to visit now. He finished his trot up a small slope and knocked on the door of the humble house that sat atop the hill. A wizened old man with a stubby white beard greeted him.
"Master Jollee," he said respectfully, "it has been too long."
The old man ushered him into the homestead invitingly and clasped his shoulder.
"Young Anakin. I am extremely grateful that you have chosen to visit me. But how many times do I have to tell you, drop the Master stuff."
"All right, Sven. Not a problem."
They found their way to Sven's meditation chamber, a small, unadorned room with plenty of seating if one chose to sat on the floor. Anakin waited for Sven to sit down before he followed him into his accustomed positions.
"So what brings you here, young Skywalker? I sense that something is amiss with you."
"It is the past that brings me here."
"A person," Master Jollee asked inquisitively.
"Yes."
"Someone who was close to you."
"Was," Anakin emphasized.
"Your old master then."
"You are too wise, Master Sven."
The old man laughed.
"Anakin, you hide your emotions like an open book. One does not need to be knowledged in the Force to know what's troubling you."
Both men shut their eyes as each entered a deep trance.
"Your Master is coming from a very dark place. I fear that he would taint our homeland with this darkness."
"What do you mean," Anakin asked.
"You are strong in the Force, young Skywalker, and your perceptions are second to none. Surely you have sensed the darkness that is suffocating the outside world, the entire Galaxy it seems, save for our own little refuge."
Anakin opened his eyes, his mind troubled by Sven's words because, as always, they were true.
"Yes. I too sense the darkness. It feels omnipotent, like it surrounds the entire Republic."
"It is troubling. Such a darkness has not been evident for a millennium now."
The old man got up and wandered slowly to the window, squinting his eyes at the mid-afternoon sun.
"Such is the nature of the Force. We enjoy the day, but must live through the night. These fluctuations of balance cannot be averted. But then, that is why we choose to hide here. So that we are sheltered when darkness overcomes the balance."
Sven looked back at Anakin, who shuddered as he observe for the first time what appeared to be fear emanating from the old man's eyes.
"Your old master's arrival could jeopardize everything that we have worked for in the last one thousand years."
Anakin sighed acceptingly.
"He has come for me, I am sure. I will go with him."
He stood up and warmly embraced Sven in a hug, shaking his hand afterward.
"I am extremely grateful to you and your brethren for the hospitality you have shown me for the last seven years. I will not allow the darker forces of the Galaxy to take away the peace of heart that you enjoy here, and that you have allowed me and my wife to enjoy. Padme and I will find another place to settle in."
They walked wordlessly together as the old man accompanied Anakin back to his speeder. Before Anakin departed the villa for the last time, Sven decided to offer his last piece of advice to the young man.
"Anakin, most of us hide because we can. We remain hidden because we are insignificant. I'm afraid that is not true in your case."
"What do you mean?"
"I know you would hesitate to agree with me, Anakin, but you cannot hide from the world forever. You are special, and you are destined to make a difference in this Galaxy. I know you love your wife very much, that you seek to keep her safe. Perhaps one day you will realize that the only way you can protect her is to take initiative and destroy the darkness that threatens us all."
Anakin listened the man's lecture silently. Part of him wanted to argue vehemently against it, as he would have against Obi-Wan all those years ago. But another part of him argued patience. He sensed that Sven had wanted to tell him this for a long time now, but had held back his words because he did not wish to upset him.
"We will see," Anakin replied after Sven had finished. He then ignited his speeder to race home back to his wife.
The beautiful blond-haired Jedi eyed her quarters anxiously. She wanted to run away, to break down the walls that confined her and fly to some faraway place where no one would bother or question her. But then, at this moment, as she patted her swollen belly, she wanted, no craved, food, preferably the sugary, creamy kind.
Almost as if on cue, the doors to her room opened up, and Master Yoda made his way in carrying a bowl of his detestable bitterroot soup. Forgetting all pretenses of politeness and protocol, Siri Tachi grabbed it from the Jedi Master and drank it all in one gulp. Then, without any premeditated warning, she angrily hurled the empty bowl at the wall, shattering it into thousands of pieces.
Yoda watched this display with composed agony, and he did not raise his voice as he chided the Siri.
"Dangerously unbalanced, your heart is. Such is why the Order does not encourage its female Knights to become pregnant."
Siri avoided eye contact with the tiny Master; instead she chose to stare unflinchingly at the shards of what used to be a soup bowl.
"I am finished with my meal, Master Yoda. You may leave now."
Yoda sighed dejectedly, though he was used to this sequence of events by now. Though he knew the answer, or rather, the lack of one he would receive, he still asked the question.
"Who is the father, Master Tachi?"
"I told you," Siri recited, "a rogue smuggler I met after the Battle of Kuat."
"Fool the Council, your words do not. Know, we do, that the father of your child is a fellow Jedi. Sense, we can, your unborn child's connectivity with the Force."
As it was everyday with their interrogations, Siri kept her mouth shut once the allegations were out in the open. More rigorous though, was restraining the temptation to physically strike out at the diminutive Master.
"Leave, I will for now," Yoda relented after several minutes of silence had passed. "Hide the truth forever from us, you cannot."
