Belief

What are you going to make yourself believe?

You world, everything you thought you knew, has turned upside down. As you pace in this room that used to be the summation of everything you believed and hoped for, you must decide.

What are you going to make yourself believe?

The truth: you have been lied to by the man you considered to be your best friend.

What you want to believe: you knew all along, it's for the best, this is the way it's supposed the be. The only way it can be.

He is your friend. Nothing can convince you otherwise. But that light of reality must compete with the knowledge that he is the heir to what you thought was the most evil dynasty in the galaxy.

What are you going to make yourself believe?

The truth: your wife has committed herself to the cause of bringing down a tyrant bent on ruling the galaxy.

What you want to believe: your wife has inadvertently committed treason because she was mistaken when she believed that he was evil.

You know he desires to rule the galaxy. You know this, but you want to believe he will give it up. You have to believe this or what little sanity you have left will shatter.

What are you going to make yourself believe?

The truth: your family and friends are even now trying desperately to keep their lives.

What you want to believe: that there is no danger for them, they have never been your friends, they deserve what is coming to them, that this is the way it must be.

Even now, you can feel your hatred and fear for them duelling within you. They are Obi-Wan's family, not yours, yet you feel you must do something for them. But then you remember the cool glances of the Council, and hatred gains the upper hand.

What are you going to make yourself believe?

The truth: the thing you feared most, what drove you to the dark side to prevent, you will do.

What you want to believe: you will not kill your wife. You will not kill Padmé Amidala.

You don't want to believe it. This is the vision that stares back at you, your fear conquering your hatred and then morphing into it, the dragon reborn. You know what you have to do, and what you will do, but you do not want to believe it.

But you know the truth. And there is no believing anything else.

It Doesn't Even Matter


A/N::: It's very short. Sorry, but you can only milk these things so far before you're wondering just when they're going to lose their grip...

He wished he hadn't even begun to fight. That he had never attempted to rescue the princess. That he'd never agreed to come with Ben, or buy those droids, or even gotten out of bed the day they were to go into Mos Eisley to purchase them.

What did it matter to him if a doomed rebellion failed just a few days earlier? How had the Empire hurt him, before those 'droids had come? Hadn't he, just three years before, being dying to go to Carida and become a pilot in the service of the Empire?

And could he even blame the Empire for what they had done to regain those plans? They were to-secret military plans, after all, and how were those troopers supposed to know that Owen and Beru weren't members of the organization that had stolen them and were not bent on its destruction? Wasn't it best to shoot first and ask questions later?

He'd been aching to join the Academy three years ago, before. Why couldn't he still? Did he have to remember all that a crazy green frog and an insane old desert-dweller and a silly Alderaanian princess had told him about the Empire and what they deemed to be evil? Was the Empire really so evil? Was this dark side that called to sweetly to him really so horrible? Could the thing that could save him then, in that moment, really be so bad?

The pain was still raw in his wrist as he looked up at the helmet that masked the man who claimed to be his father. Would it really be so wrong to join him, to join something that he could change for the betterment of all the beings in the galaxy? Couldn't he join him and save his friends from the horrors of life in Jabba's court?

But then he lost his grip and it didn't matter anymore.

Have You Ever

A/N:: Very short, very dark. I like it. It's about Kyp, in case you couldn't tell.

And remember, the best way to get more is to review!


Have you ever sat with your lightsaber pressed to your temple, contemplating switching it on?

Have you ever goaded an enemy, wishing they would whip out their blaster and shoot you?

Have you ever stood on a tower in a lightning-storm, willing nature to strike you down from your perch?

Have you ever watched a friend's funeral pyre, wondering what it would feel like if you threw yourself onto it?

Have you ever been in a fire-fight, hand hovering over the button to take down your shields?

Have you ever taken a boat out to the centre of a sea, leaned over the side, and considered letting yourself fall into the water?

Have you ever stood atop a building on Coruscant, fingers clutched to the railing, about to launch yourself over across and down?

Have you ever eschewed the lightsaber in favour of a blaster, pressed it to your chest, and nearly pulled the trigger?

Have you ever gone out and drunk more ale than even a Corellian space pirate could survive?

Have you ever taken a razor and slashed it across your own skin, waiting, waiting, waiting to die?

Have you?

I have.

It Never Stops Raining


It never stops raining

It always rained on Korriban. A day did not pass when the heavens did not pour acid rain upon the stones of this, his temple, his palace. As he climbed the long steps he stared out over the dreary landscape, pondering this place, his chosen homeland.

Since you've been gone

It never rained on Tatooine. Perhaps that was why he had chosen this planet as his refuge. He had dreamed of rain as a child, hoped for it like normal children dreamt of sweets.

I've been all alone

Maybe it was because in the place of her birth it rained. He remembered the storms that had flooded their honeymoon, remembered his awe at so much water in one place. He remembered her laughing at his childish wonder.

It never stops raining

Maybe it was because every time a drop hit his worn helmet, he remembered her tears. The sobs when she told him he was breaking her heart, the quiet weeping her sorrow had punished him with. He preferred the wracking sobs to her silent despair, when she had finally turned away from him, convinced that there was no turning him back.

The sun doesn't shine

Maybe it was because now, so much of his body replaced with cybernetic parts, he was unable to cry. He remembered the last time he had, so many long years ago, after the death of his mother. He hadn't been able to shed tears since then. He wished he could weep now.

And I can't see the sky

His daughter would have been able to weep. He knew it, cherished the thought like he cherished his few happy days with his long-dead wife. She would have been able to cry, water streaming down her face, clear as the Nubian seas.

'Cause it never stops raining

If it had been a son-- It was no use thinking, what was done was done, but he still held the thought and finished it. If it had been a son, he would have had eyes as blue as crystal teardrops. Eyes like he himself had once had, long before the rage had consumed him and left him no place for sorrow.

Since you've been gone

Maybe those were the reasons. He didn't know, and as he climbed the last few steps, spoke the words that would allow him access to his palace of lamentation, he didn't care. All he knew was that it had never stopped raining, and she had never stopped weeping for him.

Duty

J/J/K (No, I haven't lost my mind, folks. Just read it.)

He's going back to Chiss space.

The war is over. It's been over a while now, and he's decided that it's time to go home. He wants you to go with him. And of course, having been with him for years, you should.

Not only that, but it will solidify the alliance between the Republic and the Empire. A Jedi and the son of an important Imperial. It will be good for the galaxy.

So when he asks you, you smile and say yes. He is leaving in a month, he tells you, and says that it should give you plenty of time to say goodbye. You agree, and smile some more.

A month. Here, in your room, with your family close by, you know that hasn't been long enough. This is your life. Surely you can't be expected to leave that behind...

You sigh and sink onto your bed, so very tired. The war is over, you remind yourself. But your own personal war is still raging. To go, to stay, and a million other things you won't even acknowledge the existence of.

Your things go into a small box; you've never lost the pilot's habit of only a few things and are packed in moments. Moments that fly by as fluidly as the past four weeks, you muse, and suddenly you wish that the war wasn't over, that you had a reason to feel like this.

But the war's been over nearly a year, and you have no excuse. You can't say you have to finish your training; your uncle knighted you before the end of the war. You aren't even a pilot anymore.

Can you do this? Can you really leave everything forever? You tell yourself you can, but as you consider the last object you put into the box--your lightsaber--you know differently.

You don't want to go to the Unknown Regions, don't want to be an Imperial, don't want to settle down. And, as the first tear falls from your eye, you know you don't want him, you've never wanted him, and just how thoroughly you've destroyed your own life.

It only takes a few moments before you're curled into a ball, sobbing so hard you can barely breathe. Your shields are so high, so solid, though, that even your old master, in the room beside yours, can't feel your pain.

Slowly, so achingly slowly, you manage to stand and wipe away your tears. You reach for the door, wanting to prolong this moment before you tell everyone a final goodbye.

Because even though you don't want to leave tomorrow, you will.

Genuflection

Far too many capitalisations. Post-HBP. Religious abuse of a young child, possibly not completely true to Catholic tradition, but I point out that Peturnia is a Protestant. Oh, and I'm Catholic, so don't come bitching to me about how horrible the portrayal of this is. Religious squick is one of the few I write, and I am intimately aware of all the ramifications of religious abuse, tyvm. So fuck off.

It was enough for him to enter the church, kneel quickly beside the pew, and slide into his seat five minutes before the Antiphon. Enough to lower himself slowly onto the kneeler, salute the Crucifix suspended from the ceiling, and forget.

He liked to lose himself in the service, to let the words slide over and through him, lyrics and verses long memorised and so recently forgotten. He did not know how he had gone so long without it, only the summers between his first and sixth years had been spent in mass and the company of the parish. ...the peace of the Holy Spirit...and also with you... The hand motions were familiar, the cant, the priest and the Eucharist.

He remembered his aunt, dragging him here every Sunday for the first eleven years of his life, and Tuesdays after school, entrusting him to the nuns and begging the priests to spare a prayer for him. He did not know why she did it. She always sat stonily on the bench during prayers and hymns, but if he failed to kneel or stand or sing, it would be a sharp pinch then and a beating later.

She would have him read his Catechism aloud, everyday, ten pages from the time he learned to recognise letters. Who made the world? she would ask him from the kitchen table as he washed the dishes, and he would answer, lips tucked tightly between his teeth in concentration, God made the world.

She bought him a Rosary, hung it around his neck and told him that if he ever took it off it was to pray to Mary, and at no other time. He bent his head obediently and let the beads slide click-click-click through his fingers.

What are the Commandments? she would ask, and he would list them. Thou shalt not steal, thou shalt not kill...love they neighbour as thyself... He occasionally would wonder why she never made his cousin recite the Commandments, as he certainly didn't obey any of them. Dudley didn't love anybody, and he swore and stole and never went to Confession, ever. Harry had to go once a week.

When Petunia brought him home from his first Communion, all dressed up in starched white trousers and shirt, the only new clothes he'd ever owned, she took him to a religious supply store and bought him his first Icon, a small statue of Saint Jerome Emiliani, patron of orphans and abandoned children. That evening he cleared a spot for it in the corner of his cupboard and reverently placed it in the dirt. He thumbed through his little dog-eared index of the saints until he came to him. February 8, he noted, and taking out a stub of a pencil he inscribed that date above his door so as not to forget it.

He was precocious and helpful, and all the nuns at the school would pinch his cheeks and offer him sweets or pray the rosary for him. Because Dudley went to a public school, there was no one to bother the small boy or push him down or take his candy. If Petunia would forget to pick him up in time he would sweep and dust. When the Father asked him if he would become an altar boy, he confided his dream of becoming a priest. The Father smiled and tousled his hair, saying what a fine priest he would undoubtedly make some day.

Eventually, he had to go to the public school with Dudley as the nuns could teach him no more, but he would always be waiting for the Sundays when Petunia would don her best hat and dress and take him to church. He always chose a seat near the front, nearly pulling Petunia along in his excitement, the better to see the priest prepare the Eucharist. He would quickly drop to his knee, cross himself, and slide into the pew before Petunia would sidle in after him, no more comfortable for years of attendance.