When Paths Collide

Chapter 6 - Crisis at the Heart

Aniya Skywalker

Every day, every day I go back to my apartment alone, and remember my failure, that my child is gone because I wasn't strong enough to protect her. Sometimes I can try to convince myself she's coming back, but inside I know the truth: she's never coming back. She left me, walked away as if I meant nothing to her, and sometimes I have to ask myself. Did she care? Did she?! Inside I know the truth. I know she did, but it makes me wonder. Did I fail her? Did I do something wrong to deserve this, other than not being strong enough? Was I not the master she wanted, that she needed?

I don't understand!

Temper finally snapping altogether, I throw the nearest unbreakable thing across the room – my lightsaber – more frustrated when I feel no relief from it when it hits the wall and the floor with a dull thud. It changes nothing, absolutely nothing, but sometimes I want to throw myself into battle so I can focus on something else, because it's the only thing that stops the pain. I feel somewhat high with the rush of adrenaline coursing through me, seeing droid after droid cut down by my blade lying scattered at my feet. It's what I want, what I crave for now: destruction, the only respite from the reality of my life. Maybe if I push a little harder, do a little more, I'll be enough for someone.

Enough so that I won't have the entire Council scowling at me every time I enter the room, have my child leave me, have my master – my father, the man who raised me disappear because – because I haven't been fast enough to do what he wanted me to, what I was supposed to do. It doesn't... I don't know how he could have done that. It doesn't make sense, because he's always been there, and I foolishly thought he always would be. This is the man who turned down the possibility of a seat on the Council so he could keep training his padawan a generation back, so why? I know ending the war is far more important than my own feelings, but still, it hurts knowing even my own master would be willing to leave me behind for it. He did the same to Obi-Wan once, too, though. I shouldn't be so surprised.

But my padawan, my child, and Ahsoka... they're both gone. I want to scream out my pain and rage and frustration, because slashing down droids and sometimes – sometimes lifting them and crushing them to a ball of scrap metal isn't enough. It's never enough, if only for fleeting moments.

My brothers don't let me do this for long, rage alone to myself, and while I'm grateful, it feels like it's what I deserve. I was with Ahsoka when it happened, and I still was incapable of thinking clearly and stopping it from happening. How stupid could I be to not have seen it?

I find myself thinking about Alema again, wondering what I could have done differently, where in the galaxy I went so wrong. I tell myself she needed the space, needed to leave, but if I had used my head instead of panicking, she'd still be here. So would Ahsoka. Now that my master isn't here to guide me, I need someone to lean on, someone to follow, and that obviously can't be the Council. It's... well, it's the Chancellor. There's not anyone else we can trust, and even if the Council doesn't trust him, throughout the war my faith in him has only grown. He's trying to end the war, even if the Senate is too stupid to let it. There are too many people benefiting from it, and it disgusts me.

"I love you" my padawan had said, before she left, but... I feel bad for questioning it. I shouldn't, but sometimes... Does she want me back? Does she? Or have I been too much a failure to her for her to look back? I don't know. Maybe I never will.

But I could have sworn she asked us to come for her. She wanted it. Ahsoka wanted space though. I don't know – I don't know anything anymore. It had been Alema who interjected in the end and... She wanted to be away from the Council which I understand, but I don't know how she could have thought that was worth more than staying near us. I don't blame her. I don't. I just... don't understand, and it hurts. It hurts so much.