A Long Time Ago, In a Galaxy Far Away

Chapter 120

You are such an idiot, Anakin thought to himself, angrily picking up a nearby wrench and chucking it across the room. It banged into the wall and fell to the floor with a clang. She's right. Luna is messing with Sidious's plans. He would have taken notice by now.

And then you leave her in the Senate Building, alone, when you are supposed to protect her! If you had just asked Yoda or Obi-Wan, they may have helped you find a way out of the meeting! It was an assignment from the Council for Force's sake, and she was going to meet with Palpatine, there may have been some leniency!

And Luna knows what's at stake more than anyone else, she wouldn't do anything that risky in such close proximity to Sidious unless she thought it was for the best.

And what did you do Anakin?

You lost it and yelled at her, as if she's not under enough stress. You know she would protect the future and everything else before she would protect herself. Luna proved that when she tried to fight Vader.

And that's exactly what she did. You weren't there to keep her safe, so she had to give up one of her own secrets to protect everyone.

And how much do you think that's going to hurt her in the long run?

What do you think Sidious is going to do with that secret?

***

What are you doing, Luna? she thought to herself as she curled into a tighter ball. Luna had found her way onto the ziggurat of the Temple and was sitting in a shadow against one of the enormous pillars that lead to one of the five council chambers away from the activity of the landing pad as she overlooked the city. Tears were streaming down her face for the third time that day.

You aren't made to fight against a Sith. You're a nobody from Earth,

What did you think you can do? You might as well give up now. Anakin hates you.

He doesn't hate me, another thought said, trying to push back against the previous one. It didn't sound too sure.

You don't know that. It was a know it all high pitched voice, probably how Luna would sound if she pretended to be a popular girl who thought she knew everything. It was how her thoughts worked when there were clashing ideas, they would all be in her own voice, the only difference was usually tone and/or attitude. Why wouldn't he? He thinks you endangered Luke and Leia, the Jedi, himself, everyone. This plan of yours is hopeless. We should give up and leave. Find a way back to Earth.

All that waits for us there is eventual capture from our father, another thought replied. It was stronger in it's conviction then the other that pushed back before it. Besides, we would be leaving this galaxy to it's fate.

Better to have a certain fate than an uncertain one.

The only reason Earth has ever been certain was because of routine. We have that here too. So what? Sidious is after us, we've been on the run and hiding our whole lives. Don't you think it's time to fight a little?

We have been doing that, and now he's onto us.

If we don't fight for the future of this place, for the Jedi, for the Rebellion, the Empire will come to be! What is the point of having a certain future? We don't even know if we'll be sent back or not!

We have never had a certain future, nor have we ever deserved one. It was the weak melancholy voice again. It sounded almost exactly like Luna's own. We can't give up now. We aren't fighting for our survival, we are fighting for theirs. That is far more important.

We agree, the almost braver thought said.

We can't do this. It was a different thought than the other three so far, the voice was hard and certain.

We won't know until we try.

And what if we fail. What if the Force wants the creation of the Empire?

That isn't true.

How can you be so certain?

We aren't, the weak voice replied.

I just can't afford to think that way.

And with that last thought, Luna ended the mental debate that had been going on in her mind.

All of her thoughts had good point though. Sidious knew, and Luna wasn't near strong enough to fight him. She had been living on borrowed time and hopefully all this did was give her a marker of how long she had left.

For all she knew, the Force may want the Empire to happen.

But Luna knew one other thing:

As long as she was there, she was going to do her best to save them, no matter how outmatched she was, because that was just the kind of person she was.

Luna was one of those people that would do anything to protect those she cared about, no matter how much it would hurt her personally. She may have not known Anakin, Obi-Wan, Padmé, and everyone else existed a few months ago, but she had always been devoted to her fandom. She had always, in a way, been devoted to protecting Anakin and Vader. It was why the argument she had with Leia blew up so quickly.

On Earth, there had only ever been two people that had managed to get that amount of faithfulness from her: Sophie and....

And someone she never allowed herself to think about anymore.

But now.... Now there were far more people that Luna wanted to protect. Would do anything to protect. She hadn't even known Sophie at the same time as the other.

It wasn't a feeling she was used to. While focusing on Anakin, she still needed to, and had actually forgotten as of late, to worry about what Padmé was going through. And then there was Obi-Wan who was mainly safe, but she needed his help to get through to Anakin as well, not to mention the older Jedi was far more worried than he had been in the original timeline.

It was a balancing act. Luna needed to focus on Anakin, but at the same time, not put her full focus on him. She needed to tread lightly but still powerfully enough to move him away from Sidious's manipulations.

Luna wasn't ready for this. She hadn't been trained for it. She had never done anything like it before. Sophie had been the closest, but all Luna had to do back then was just focus on the younger girl and build her own world around the child, not balance out several and monitor her own actions obsessively.

She was terrified of the possibility of failure.

But right then, it was time to stop hiding in the darkness. It was time to look at her inner darkness and fears face to face. Luna was good at avoiding her fears, but sometimes she had to face them.

And she had no hope to face Sidious if she couldn't face her own darkness, even if only for a short period of time.

Because Luna knew that Sidious would use her past against her.

And Luna knew that she wasn't strong enough to fight against it unless she started working on facing it, or at least the small part she had showed him.

She had never faced this part of herself head on before, not even the fraction she had revealed.

But if it was what she had to make herself do to protect Anakin, Padmé, and everyone else?

So be it.

Luna just prayed Sidious would overlook the rest of her past the next time he wiggled his way into her mind.