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.
Vaiya Jade Skywalker was fighting off despair. She couldn't give up, not in her heart. Mara was her mother, whether she liked it or not. The fact that she didn't like it was what hurt so much. That woman in her medical quarters, with the firey red hair and emerald green eyes, that was not a woman that Vaiya would want as a mother. She was hateful and spiteful and deadly in her every breath. She was a slave to her anger but denied it like a yowling hellcat.
Not too far away, her father, Jedi Master Luke Skywalker, paced the room slowly. Every once in a while, he would check his comlink. Vaiya's own self-pity was overshadowed only by pity for him. He had stoutly refused to accept Vaiya's retelling of Mara's words---
I don't want to remember.
Now he spent his time making sure that Cal Saphringer wasn't going to show up unexpectedly. "That would be just the sort of thing for the man to do," Luke had said when their vigil had just begun. "Come in here and try to convince her that she had married me only to destroy me, maybe even have her kill you, too."
"He can't get past security," Vaiya said in a shallow echo of a voice. She was hunched up against the transparisteel windows in the medlounge, her cloak pulled around her tightly, her forehead resting against the window. She meant to be reassuring, but it was really pointless. No matter how true it was, he would still worry.
If he didn't worry, the poor man might go insane.
At her words, Luke whirled on her. "You might be doing something more constructive than sitting there," he barked. "I told you what you needed to do. Why haven't you done it?"
Running through a technique intended to give her patience (along with a quick prayer) Vaiya rehearsed her answer. "I can do nothing for her until she accepts me, Father." She sighed, then said what she should never have dared. "You realize that this might be impossible, don't you? That she may remain like this forever? That you may have to accept it and carry it for the rest of your life?"
"Don't tell me what I'm supposed to accept," Luke snarled at her, causing Vaiya to jump to her feet, matching him in the infamous Skywalker anger. "Why do you think you are!?" he railed.
"I know who you are, Master Skywalker! You are the first of a generation of Jedi Knights, savior of the galaxy and hope of the Jedi to come! No one bestowed the honor of Master upon you. You had to claim it for yourself! With that came the responsibility! You had many happy years with your wife, and you have a child to carry your work on after you're done! But you're forgetting the Jedi creed, Father....not our will, but the will of the Force."
She stopped, remembering what Valeris had told her. Not the Force, but what Created the Force....she couldn't bring that up now. Her father was already slipping in his faith in the Force. No sense springing that stuff onto him now.
Luke pulled back, looking very old in the dim light. His shoulders slumped slightly, and he said, very softly, "Then perhaps I need to step down."
Vaiya practically ran to him. "Don't say that, Father. You're strong---"
"Even strength has limits." He shut his eyes, and Vaiya could sense his effort to keep himself together. "I lost my father and my mother before I even knew them. I lost my aunt and uncle, I lost Ben. I'm tired of losing people. If I lose Mara....it will break me."
"And then what, the dark side? Oh, yeah, that's a good solution."
Luke practically laughed, but it came out more like a pathetic sputter. "The dark side isn't all hatred and anger. It's despair, also."
"Don't despair, Father. You still have me."
Luke looked up, as if seeing her for the first time. "You....you're a grown woman now, even though you're still barely 16. I don't know what you saw, or where you went, but it changed you. I can see it. You're a Jedi Knight, and you have your own destiny to fulfill. You will leave us as surely as anything. Perhaps you'll find your friend again...I know your feelings for him are strong. But my path was with your mother. Without her....."
"I am no Jedi Knight, Father," Vaiya said, her own voice threatening to crack. "I lack courage. I run from problems rather than face them."
"You do better than I did. I ran head-first into my own sorrows." He clenched his mechanical hand. "But I guess extremes of any sort is bad."
"We just have to keep praying," Vaiya whispered, as if to assure herself. She shut her eyes and tried to think of Valeris, of what he would tell her. There had to be a purpose for this...her newfound faith could not be so tested without some sign that she was---
Just then the doors to the lounge opened, and Mara's doctor stepped through. He walked over to Vaiya. "She is requesting to speak to you," he said.
Luke straightened. "She wants to see you, Vaiya," he said. "That can only be a good thing."
"I hope so," Vaiya whispered. "Did she say why, Doctor?"
"You're her daughter. She didn't have to." He turned and Vaiya followed him from the lounge into Mara's room. Before the doors slid closed behind her, Vaiya turned and looked at her father.
All of the hope of the universe rested in that gaze. Her parents had given her life and breath, and no child in all of history had ever been able to pay back such a debt.
Vaiya knew she would be the first.