Title: Meditation

Author: Aria Penrod     arianrhod74@hotmail.com

Rating: R

Characters: Anakin & you

Category: ABH, seduction

Status: 1/1

Disclaimer: The character of Anakin Skywalker and the universe of Star Wars 
belongs to George Lucas. I have no plans to make money off of this story 
and have made no money from it to date as far as I am aware. No Jedi were 
harmed in the writing of this fic.

Summary: A female Jedi padawan tries to resolve her feelings for another 
padawan in her daily meditation.

Author’s Notes: Thanks to my beta, Tam Chronin, for the positive feedback 
and for helping me be a little bit more clear in what I was trying to say. 
:)

I have used ::....:: to indicate thought speech/telepathy.

-----

You try to comfort yourself with the daily ritual of preparation. You have 
the lights dimmed just so, the incense burning in another room so the 
fragrance reaches you but doesn't overpower. You light a candle and sit 
before it, looking into the flame as it wavers in the nearly still air.

The light is the Force.

The flame is Life.

The candle is the path to the Light...

The litany of familiar words fails to bring its usual calm. For some reason 
you just can't shake the feeling of nervousness in the pit of your stomach. 
It's because of Him, the boy who finally noticed that you exist. Well, 
maybe not a boy, but not yet a man either, and you aren't quite a woman no 
matter what Coruscant law states. As long as you're a padawan you will be a 
girl, and he will be a boy. It just feels that way to you.

I am one with the Flame.

I am one with the Force.

Nothing is too far for aim.

Nothing will pull me off course.

Those were the words you made up yourself years ago when you first had 
problems stilling your mind. Your Master didn't exactly approve, but as 
long as it worked no one could take it from you. Now the words come back to 
you, haunting you with childish memories.

The first time you saw him you teased him along with the others. He was a 
stranger. He was so far behind. He was powerful, but out of control. He 
was so *old* to just be starting his training! And you and your friends 
made sure he knew just how out of place he was. You didn't want to, but you 
didn't want to be singled out alongside this stranger. Soon enough the 
Knights and Masters put an abrupt end to it, and you tried to put it out of 
your mind, but his clear blue eyes always pierced your soul with accusation.

You feel the whispers of the Force guide your thoughts. It is different 
from a normal meditation, but you willingly follow where the Force takes 
you.

Anakin's eyes. Ah yes, you could gaze into them for eternity if it weren't 
so painful to merely glance into them. What was it about them? The answer 
comes unbidden to your open mind. Pain. He has seen pain, has known more 
pain than just losing someone like Master Qui-Gon. And who was Qui-Gon Jinn 
to you or any of your peers? He was just another old man who was grumpy 
with the kids, that's who. Anakin was the only one who missed him.

There was so much more though. He had come with secrets, things that no 
other padawan knew, or would ever know. He arrived with a mother's love. 
He arrived with lost friendships none of the rest of you shared. He arrived 
with a cultural background that included a harsh reality and the knowledge 
that he was property and his life meant less than the credit slips his 
master had paid. Oh, he was valuable, but his life wasn't. At least, 
that's how you finally understood it.

His eyes knew something else that you didn't. They knew darkness. Maybe 
just a sliver, but a darkness that you had been protected from all your life 
lived behind those eyes. Your knees feel loose and your intestines are 
electrified at that thought. He knew what darkness looked like, and you 
recognized that even though no one else wanted to see it.

You felt drawn to that darkness from the time you noticed that guys weren't 
just icky. And you noticed it first in the strange, silent boy who had 
those haunted blue eyes.

The Force tugs you to what happened earlier today. You had become the shy 
one, withdrawn into your own thoughts that tortured you when you let them. 
(It was a delicious torture, to be sure.) He walked, bold as can be, right 
up to you.

"If you don't break out of that shell they'll never make you a Knight."

His words stopped you cold. Maybe that was where the ice in your voice came 
from. "Oh really? What about you, Mister Outgoing?"

That's when he leaned in close and whispered, "I know why you pretend you 
don't stare at me. I also know that you *do* stare at me. If you're not 
careful your secrets will pull you under."

You recoiled as if you had been slapped. It took you a moment to fish for a 
retort, but he gave you the time you needed and all the while he gave you a 
smug half-smile. At least, you thought at the time it had been smug. In 
retrospect it strikes you as knowing, and you realize that it is the biggest 
smile you have ever seen on his face.

"I don't think you, of all people here, should be lecturing me about keeping 
secrets."

Why did you have to be so cruel to him? For years you have entertained 
fantasies about him talking to you, and you blow it like this. Your cheeks 
had grown warm under his stare, and your own eyes hovered on the "V" of his 
tunic, afraid to wander up toward those eyes again. Tears welled up in your 
eyes, and you nearly flew away from him.

The Force is neither merciful nor cruel. Just as you were brought there to 
face what had happened you are brought somewhere else that feels more 
comfortable. There is warmth and welcome there. It feels strangely like 
home, a "presence" so familiar in your mind that you relax fully into your 
meditation and lose all sense of your physical self.

::You don't need to feel so bad, you don't need to push me away. I'm right 
here.::

It feels like a cuddle, warm and soft and comforting, just without the 
bodies. You don't question it, you just accept it as something happening. 
::I live for this, I wish I could have this always.::

::I know. You have been like this for years. I just wish I had known, I 
wish I had paid attention.::

::All that matters is now,:: you reply in thought.

The "other" doesn't agree, but sends just a feeling of it, no words. You 
feel the "other" make a slight effort, and then the veil is lifted. Of 
course. It is Anakin.

You struggle on some level, but for the most part you aren't surprised. He 
is so powerful, and you have known him for years. Of course his mental 
presence would be familiar to you.

::I want to touch you.::

::I want to feel you.::

His mental eyes are just as piercing and intense, but now you can't avoid 
them. You are being undressed, but this is much more intimate than anything 
he would do with your body and your clothes. You want him as much as he 
wants you, and there is no hiding it.

If you could feel your body you would feel your heart rate escalate, and the 
juices of your "private parts" begin to moisten to welcome him. Your 
breathing would be uneven.

Here, where your mind is bare to his, it is worse. You don't have your 
bodies to bump together; you don't have your bodies to keep you apart. The 
thought of his hand upon your breast is both more and less than the real 
act. You feel yourself blending with him, your identity wrapped up in his. 
You want to feel your bodies do the same thing, but you also know that you 
could never feel this while trapped in your skull.

There is no orgasm. It builds and builds until there is nothing but the joy 
of being together.

And then suddenly there is the thought that breaks you two apart.

Her.

She is an angel to him. Unattainable, but his. You will never be his. You 
are just there.

Then there is the anger that Jedi training couldn't entirely wipe out. A 
burning resentment for everything you seemed to represent to him. He didn't 
want you. He wanted to be you.

::No.:: At first it is a whisper. Then it is a scream. Primal, pent-up 
rage flares within you. You are slammed back into your own skull, and you 
happily accept the sentence of solitary confinement. It is better than 
knowing the truth.

After you rip a few pillows with your hands, telekinesis, and a few sharp 
objects you found lying around, you feel like you might be able to handle 
the world. Not him, never him again. Just the rest of the galaxy maybe.

You pack your things, hesitating long moments over your lightsaber. You 
decide finally to take it, but never to use it again. All you leave behind 
for your Master is a note.

"I just don't have what it takes to be a Jedi. I will not fall to the Dark 
Side, but to ensure that I must leave. Now. I'm sorry."

You won't know for years to come that Anakin saved your life by killing all 
hope. Will you wonder if the price was worth it?

~end~