DISCLAIMER: Star Wars and all publicly recognisable characters, names and references, etc are the sole property of George Lucas, Lucasfilm Ltd, Lucasarts Inc, 20th Century Fox, Timothy Zahn, Barbara Hambly, YKW and the other writers of the expanded Star Wars Universe. This fan fiction was created solely for entertainment and no money was made from it. Also, no copyright or trademark infringement was intended. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author. Any other characters, the storyline and the actual story are the property of the author.
The scream came from their main chambers. Luke turned around, the hairs on the back of his neck rising not just with the chilling pitch of it, but with the familiarity of the voice. He'd been dreading when Mara would discover what the young twelve year old pre-Jedi students had accidentally made with their Force tinkering. Perhaps he should have done more to prevent it, but watching out for Vaiya was all her could have handled that day.
Besides, these kids needed a real lesson in invoking the wrath of a Jedi Knight. And Mara needed a lesson in patience, which she still needed, in spite of how she had mellowed in the last years.
Not that Mara Jade would ever mellow. Never completely. There would always be a spark in her, ready to ignite. These poor youngsters had unfortunately found it.
"SKYWALKER!" she raged as she stormed out of the building, her green robe blowing about her in the late morning breeze on Yavin IV. Her hair looked like she'd been catching a quick nap, and as she got nearer Luke could see the sleep marks on her face, where she'd been leaning against her hand. *Wonderful,* he thought. *She's angry and tired.*
"You guys had better scram," he said to the three adolescent boys before him. They nodded, their eyes wide in awe at the caliber of Mara's scream. The air was still ringing. Even the trees had shakens lightly with the Force impact. "I'll handle this."
They scampered off as Luke turned completely around and caught Mara in his arms.
"Good morning, my love. You look beautiful," he tried, his smile coy.
"Don't you dare, Skywalker," she growled. "Do you know what those three prize students of yours did in our kitchen?"
"Make you breakfast in bed?" he tried, all innocence.
"HA! You should see their idea of cooking. Is that some stupid Force trick you picked up during your bachelor days that you never told me about? Cooking eggs in mid air? Didn't you bother to tell them to be careful not to let them explode all over the ceiling? Or what about the flour and milk? If you put them together, you get glue, not pancakes, and it's glued the cooler door shut! Not to mention the bacon! Here I thought you couldn't kill pork twice!"
Luke just continued to smile at her, risking enraging her more, but put as much affection as he could into it in the hopes that it would distract her. "You're so beautiful when you're creating a dark side disturbance in the Force, Mara," he said.
It was like taking a chisel to a diamond in just the right spot. Instantly, she was trying not to laugh. "I'm serious, Luke. I don't want you bringing them into my kitchen ever again."
"Yes, mistress," he said with a flourish.
"That's more like it," she said. "Now who is going to clean it up? Not me."
"You just said they can't come into the kitchen anymore. Who does that leave?"
"You."
"Oh, no. I didn't do it. I didn't have anything to do with it. They were just trying to surprise you and they got carried away."
"Their hormones got carried away is more like it," she snapped, angry again. He was going to have to curb this temper of hers or one day it was going to get the better of her. But before he could stop himself, he found himself sighing and saying;
"You're on your period, aren't you?"
Instantly, he regretted it. She slapped him across the chest with the heavy, wide sleeve of her robe and spun away from him. Three-year-old Vaiya, who was sitting on a thick blanket not ten feet away, giggled.
"Daddy whap whap!"
Mara scooped her up into her arms. "Daddy can go whap himself tonight, he's not sleeping in my bed," she muttered as she carried Vaiya back toward the quad building. "Come on, sweetie, we're going to practice our levitation skills in the kitchen."
"I love you!" Luke called lamely.
"Eat my lightsaber!" she snarled back, and then turned her head again to look at him over her shoulder. Her hair flew about her head like a flame. "At about eleven o'clock tonight."
"It's a date," he said with a smirk as she disappeared through the door.
Ah, Mara, Mara, Mara. Thank the Force she would never really change.