Maya-202!

A Star Wars-Inspired Story

Episode I

The Two Prince War

Chapter XXII

A Rapid Flash

Boardroom, Prince Onasius' Mansion, Iryx

"Greetings, all," the large hologrammatic image of Rey that stood tall in the centre of the boardroom welcomed to everyone, who sat in plush chairs coated in comfy blue fabric. "I would like to begin by saying thank you for coming to this debrief – I know it has been a rough couple of days lately, and I'm sure you're all very tired, so I am most grateful that you have taken the time to join and listen to me. Now, I want to talk to you about some important business; and it's business I'm sure you've had on your mind for a while," the Grand Mistress said. "As some of you may know, the Jedi Order have been contacting the Deep Beyond recently to establish where Prince Thomanius is located at this instant. The Baneraax tried to capture him yesterday themselves, although they were unsuccessful, causing a full-blown battle, which they lost drastically, on Kamino, where the Dark Prince's lab is. After the arrival of my close friend, Jedi Master Finn, Prince Thomanius scattered from the planet, taking many of his remaining troops, several Kaminoans in his employment, along with the plans for the world-splitter bomb. We didn't know where he'd gotten to, however, I have received information via R2-D2 here-" Artoo moved into the frame and beeped cheerily, "- who works for the Deep Beyond and hence is able to communicate with the staff there, that they have found out Thomanius is now on the tropical paradise planet of Karanda," Rey revealed.

"The Kotorinah place? What's he doing there?" Leo muttered to Maya, quietly so that he didn't interrupt Rey's speech. Maya shrugged slowly with an inquisitive look on her face, unable to answer his question, then glanced at Prince Onasius, who was sat next to them, to see if he knew why his brother was there. However, he didn't notice Maya looking at him immediately; instead, he also wore an expression of bewilderment. But when he did sense Maya's stare, he turned to face her and said, as if he read her mind, "He must just be finishing constructing the bomb there… for some reason…" It seemed he was almost as in the dark about it as the others.

Rey continued talking, outlining what she thought was the best plan of action. "I'm not going to push anyone into doing this, and I know it may be a controversial suggestion, but I think that our next steps should be to… invade Karanda. Or rather, the part of the planet where Prince Thomanius resides, as of now," she plotted.

"Excuse me for saying this, Grand Mistress, but what if that starts a war with the Karanda locals?" Finn raised.

"There is no need to be excused; it is a valid point, Master Finn. However, luckily for us, the island where the Dark Prince supposedly is is a desolate one, populated only by the Kotorinahs themselves, along with their… servants, and I suspect that he will be far away from their castle lands. Nonetheless, we must not forget that war has already started – and it was started by Prince Thomanius himself," the Grand Mistress responded. It was an ethical dilemma. "The Military of the Eternal Republic have already accepted to undertake this mission, provided you all are there to help back them up. I understand it's not an easy choice, but if you accept this proposition, it may mean we could capture Prince Thomanius and put a stop to his antics permanently," she revealed. There were a few gasps and mumbles in the audience after she said this, even though it was a pretty obvious conclusion to draw, when you thought about it realistically. "So, and I apologise if I am being a bit blunt in the way I'm saying this, but… is the Dreamtrooper Army willing to volunteer themselves for this operation?" Rey wondered, extending her arms out towards the crowd as if to make an 'I need you' type of signal, trying to persuade them. There wasn't anything said for a moment, until Maya sensed Leo get up out of his seat next to her.

"I'm in!" he exclaimed courageously. Maya felt almost… proud of her friend for being as brave as he was, so much that she stood up beside him to show her solidarity.

"So am I!" she stated.

"I will, of course, help my soldiers on the battlefield, and help stop my brother," Prince Onasius added. Suddenly, one by one, every trooper in the room started to voice their agreeance with joining the fight.

"Excellent," Rey applauded, visibly beaming with relief that they'd decided to help in the battle. "OK. So, I say we strike tomorrow; time is running out, and every second wasted is another second Prince Thomanius spends constructing his precious world splitter bomb – the sooner we attack and stop him, the better. What do you think?" she continued.

"I agree," Prince Onasius concurred. "Dreamtroopers, I think we should all get a good night's sleep tonight; it's well-deserved after what we've all been through. Then, tomorrow morning, we must prepare well for battle – although we're planning to catch Thomanius by surprise, and that will be effective to a point, he'll still be well prepared himself, with strong defences and, I'm presuming, many units of hundreds of Nightmare troopers that'll be quick to respond to our offensive," he predicted.

"But don't you forget, we will always have an advantage over droids – we're human; living, conscious beings, that react to situations and think tactically. Remember, computers are not smarter than humans, no matter what some people might say," Master Finn motivated. He was entirely right, and it was something they all needed to remember.

"That is correct, Master Finn," Rey said. "And this is where I will leave you – for now. Tomorrow morning, we should all reconvene here at 9:00 am to outline the final plan. Once we have done that… then we attack," the Grand Mistress stated, before vanishing from the room's sight. When she did and the discussion finished, all the dreamtroopers started murmuring amongst themselves, like children at the end of a class. Well, all but Maya, Leo, and Prince Onasius, who remained deep in their own thoughts whilst many unspoken feelings lingered in the air between them. None of them really knew what to say, if to say anything to each other, as everything had felt like it had gone by in a rapid flash today, so now that all the action had completely slowed down, the trio's minds had almost hit a mental block. All their previous conversations had been focused on the events of the day, so much that they hadn't had a real opportunity to talk about anything else. Leo was tempted to reveal his feelings to Maya, even though he'd only recently learned of them himself – but he didn't. Maya wanted to talk about how excited she was at the possibility of her becoming a Jedi, even if everybody already knew of said excitement – but she didn't. Prince Onasius (sort of) wanted to talk about his brother, and how he was secretly a little scared of meeting him again on the battlefield tomorrow – but he didn't. Instead, the three all sat where they were, staring into blank space as all the other troopers around them got up and started heading for their sleeping quarters to go to bed and recharge for tomorrow. The strange thing was, there was actually so much to talk about; it was just that nobody could find the right words to say. Master Finn, however, broke their silence when he came over to them.

"Hello… are you guys alright…?" he said as he noticed their blank expressions.

"Hm? Oh, yes, Master Finn, thank you. We are quite alright," Prince Onasius replied.

"Yeah…" Maya agreed. Leo remained fully hushed, thinking about what he was going to say to her – he decided that it was only fair to tell Maya, and soon; if she was going to be a Jedi, where attachment was disallowed, and if she returned his feelings, he knew he should let her know so that she could at least make a fully informed choice. Although Leo did have another problem; if his feelings were unrequited, which he hoped to the Force that they weren't, it would mean that he could put their great friendship in danger. However, Leo knew that that was a risk he was going to have to take…

After saying goodbye to Onasius for the night, and a trek though the mansion's halls, Maya and Leo finally arrived at their sleeping quarters. Interestingly, Prince Onasius had mouthed a 'good luck' to Leo during saying goodnight to them, as if he had sensed what he was going to do. It was comforting, but it had also made Leo a little worried that Maya had felt his mood change, too, especially since he knew she was force-sensitive now. On the other hand, it was in a way comforting, because at least it may have meant that it might not shock Maya if she knew something was going on with her trooper friend. The two stood outside the door to their dorm room, whilst a couple of other troopers milled about, passing by them to get to their own sleeping areas. Once Leo saw the prince completely vanish out of his sight, he decided it was time. Maya stood in front of the retinal lock – a scanner that provided the only way into one's bedroom in the house, activated by it locating a retinal map from its database that matched the person who stood in front of it; if the precise match was found for the room's owner, then the door would unlock. Only Leo and Maya could enter their own room via the scans, although Prince Onasius did have an override code as well, just in case of emergencies. It was the same for every trooper's bedroom.

"Retinal Match Found. Accepted. Door Unlocking," the scanner's computerised voice announced, and the bedroom doors slid open. Leo sighed in an attempt to brace himself. Maya heard it and turned around to face him.

"Leo? Something wrong?" she asked with concern in her tone. Yes. Of course, there was something wrong! Leo felt like he was being such a baby, panicking so much about telling Maya this – but there was, to be fair, valid reason for his panic: there were so many potentially negative consequences of revealing his true feelings to Maya. No matter what, though, he knew it was, deep down, the right thing to do, rather than keep his emotions bottled up.

"C… can we go inside, Maya?" he proposed seriously.

Leo loved their shared bedroom. Whenever someone asked him the question, 'If you could go anywhere in the galaxy, where would it be?', he'd always give the answer of his bedroom. It was a strange answer, he knew it was, particularly when he could've chosen the lush jungles of Kashyyyk, or the bustling nightlife of Galactic City, but in all honesty, he felt like he could live in the sleeping quarters forever, if that were possible. They had a certain atmosphere to them, much like the rest of the castle. The walls of his and Maya's dorm were painted a warm shade of creamy white. Two hoverlamps floated in mid-air, one by each trooper's bed, to provide a little bit of light in the dark winter nights on Iryx. The door sealed behind the two soldiers, and all the noise from outside faded into nothing. Every bedroom's walls were 100% soundproof; Prince Onasius believed that his dreamtroopers needed a good night's sleep to wake up fully refreshed and ready for duty the next day, so he thought obscuring as much external noise as possible would be beneficial for that.

"What's up, Leo?" Maya said, once she heard the door click shut. Leo exhaled, and Maya cocked her head at this.

"Um…" he murmured.

"Leo, what's up?" she repeated. "You're behaving very strangely," she then giggled. Force, that laugh was adorable. That smile was a perfect beam of sunshine set amongst her pink-tinted face that was drenched by the waterfall of magnificent auburn hair. "…Leo…?" Maya asked again. Shab. He'd paused in nervousness thinking about her that he'd forgotten the task at hand.

"Sorry. OK, look… I'm gonna be brave, here," he began. Maya watched him curiously. "There is something that needs to be said, and I didn't really wanna say it because of… well, because I was being a wimp. But now you've found out you're force sensitive, and you're thinking about joining the Jedi, and… well… I think you should know all the facts before you make a decision about that," he stated.

"… O…kay," Maya uttered, trying to process what he was saying.

"Alright. One last thing: before I tell you what I want to tell you, I want you to know that I totally understand if you can't have me sleeping in this room with you tonight. I can find somewhere else," Leo said.

"Leo, there's nothing you can say that's gonna make me want that," Maya assured him. At that precise moment, Leo made a quick, impulsive choice - he decided that now was the best time to just spit it out, to rip off the bactapatch, and hope that she didn't want to withdraw that last statement.

"I think I'm in love with you," he said bluntly.