Padawan Tano
Excerpt from “Anakin’s Apprentice”
“Oh no,” I whisper, because the number of possible Jedi Masters is getting shorter and shorter.
“Padawan Blahblahblah,” Madame Jocasta says, sorry, I’m — really bad with names. But — also I have trouble not swearing.
“Padawan Tano,” she enunciates, and it feels like her eyes glow. It feels like the whole library goes dark. It feels like, the fuzzy little hairs on my arms don’t just stand up, but, try to leave my body as hard as possible all at once. To the point I’m wondering if my peach fuzz knows something I don’t.
A Jedi, not afraid of their future, must be, padawan, I remember and might have been assisted in remembering, Master Yoda once saying. I don’t know what he — means, half the time when he speaks. Make that, 3 times half… the time. I don’t know, if what I said was mathematically smart or extremely stupid, frankly I had to use the Force to remember how to spell ‘mathematically.’ I… did not ask, to be a Jedi. I’m just —
“General Master Skywalker,” she says, making eye-contact with me. I — have honestly always found this lady creepy and this eye-contact is… not improving that situation in the least bit. I really really really — need someone to help me break out of here.
“Oooooooooo,” some idiot beside me says. I swear to gods — I swear to literal gods —
“I think he’s sexy,” says Poop-head-Von-Shit-steak.
“I think he’s scary,” says her sidekick.
And just like that I’ve lost all patience for life. Just like that.
And then I’m fucking standing in front of the fucker and he swears too so thank gods. Also I’m pretty sure he might be a psychopath. Or else, he has the same look in his eye as all the other soldiers I’ve “met” here who look right through me like… I don’t even know. Can I remind you, that, I did not ASK —
“Slide, SLIDE!” he screams at me. This is how he talks to people. He is not — approachable. Handsome, yes. But not — like not even slightly viable from any perspective whatsoever again the ‘I AM A PSYCHOPATH’ rings true loud and clear in every moment or interaction. The only credit I can give him, is — (aside from sincerely excessively good looks to the point it’s unpleasant or too-pleasant to stare at his face depending on how you’re feeling at that moment) everybody gets some. Like, you just cannot fuck up around — oops sorry. Mess up. Seriously the Force does not like it when someone who takes and ‘oath’ not to, swears. The Force just doesn’t like lying. If you, tell the truth, fuckin’ thumbs up I’M SORRY! I’M SORRY OK! SHIT IT’S SO MAD AT ME LIKE — and then it’s gone. The Force, is like a hornet’s net. I meant ‘nest’ obviously but now I’m just thinking about a hornet’s net and how that would even work. And then —
YOU THINK HE’S — YOU’RE IMAGINING HIS —
OKAY HEY! Let’s — whew.
I just breathe. And then I feel better. It’s like my mouth and soul, were so dry, but then I just breathe and water and — whatever the same thing for souls is — just ‘appears.’
SURE Y —
and there’s that horny voice in my mind again. But I know, it’s just, me. I’m — so fucking horny sometimes. It’s hard to be a Jedi.
MHMM — MHMM
Ew.
EWWWWW! And yet, like, I think there’s something about him that is warning me and every other girl (and every other creature in the galaxy, frankly) DEFINITELY DO NOT.
So why’s there so much temptation? I think I know. It’s because,
Not easy, the path of a Jedi is. But simple and easy, different things are.
You know. I think I’m pretty smart. Not — whatever he is, which is just, annoying and — basically telling the future before it happens without the Force. (GOD I HATE HIM BUT I LOVE HIM.)
YOOOUUUUUU WANNA SEE HIS D — !
I do — do you — wait, I meant not, let me start again.
DING-DONG DONG-DING —
Do you get, why it’s hard to be a Jedi? Because, unlike the ones who, break their oaths, or their vows, or however you want to call it, I already know I never will. My mind can say anything to me, and I will obey, give in, be tempted, or lose faith in what I know I believe just as much as someone who thinks they live on Coruscant is likely to live… some place they don’t want to desperately escape.
DONG-DING PENIS-THING
Why are — like what is the deal? Why do — like we’re supposed to be pious.I’m not allowed to let shit hang out why do dudes get to fucking —
DO NOT CONFUSE A TOLERANCE FOR HUMOUR WITH A LAXITY IN JUDGEMENT, PADAWAN TANO! “Ms. Master Luminara” yells viciously in my mind. But all I hear is, YOU CANNOT HAVE A SINGLE THOUGHT WITHOUT ME WATCHING YOU. YOU ARE UNDER CONSTANT SURVEILLANCE. YOU ARE, BASICALLY ONE FALSE STEP AWAY FROM BECOMING THE WORST MOST EVIL BEING IN EXISTENCE.
And you know what I like about him? This is what he said when I met him. First of all — dead eyes. Talking to the clone troopers like they were fucking —
PADAWAN!
Oh my god, I hate this lady — sorry, Jedi Master, lady.
I can’t even remember my thought now. Oh yeah, how I met him. So I walk up, there’s 67 different colours of clone trooper armour around him which I’ve never seen. I’ve also never seen clone troopers look so focused or so serious. Then Master Kenobi says, ‘here’s your padawan.’ He looks at me and then goes back to talking to the clones. I stand there. Master Kenobi goes,
“You’ll — he’ll warm up to you. Ask Admiral Yularen, he has a soft side.”
“Which one?” I asked.
He didn’t get it. Then ‘General’ Skywalker walked up to me and I almost — lost the — you know.
WELL DONE PADAWAN.
YOU PRAISING ME MAKES ME WANT TO UN-RESTRAIN MYSELF.
I was gonna say pissed my pants.
Ha! bitch doesn’t even show up. Suck —
PADAWAN
You know what, that one was fair. I — it’s HARD TO BE A JEDI. And I don’t —
“If you slow me down, I’ll leave you behind,” is what my Jedi Master told me, the first words he spoke to me in fact, when I met him. Admiral Yularen gave me the best advice, when he found out why I was there, he ‘sent for me’ and a droid rolling by told me what was up so I surprised him in his crew quarter and he just blurted out, “He’s — not so bad as he seems, Padawan Tano. You must — peel back the onion. It’s — not so — will you excuse me I’m actually in the middle — “
And I left and I don’t even want to tell you what he was up to but — everyone who is in ‘command’ of something, is weird. Just ask the people who they are ‘in command’ of. And if there’s something I like about my “master,” Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker, it’s that —
DICK DICK DICK DICK
NNNNNNNNope!
It’s that — I don’t think he has any secrets.
Besides being an obvious — well, you know. I — fucking need to use the Force to remember how to spell ‘psycopath’ ‘spycopath’ ‘spsy’ ‘FUCK’
PADAWAN
Awhhhghghgg! I hate this lady!
“MOVE! MOVE! MOVE!” General Skywalker screams at the clone rookies and sigh actually me.
Like,
“GET UP THERE AHSOKA!” he roars. Like literally, I’ve never seen a being more incapable of volume control. It’s either silent mumbling to his ‘clone brothers’ so quietly I can’t even make out what he’s saying and neither can anyone else but the — whatevers, you know — or,
“GET DOWN! GET YOUR FUCKING ASSES ON THE GROUND! DO YOU UNDERSTAND THAT IF YOU DO NOT FLATTEN YOUR BODIES AGAINST THE GROUND, YOU VERY WELL MIGHT END UP DEAD?!”
And then I see him, do something I’ve never ever seen a — well basically any person who isn’t either a monster or a — something worse, do, he, without even seeming to try, pulls me, and a clone, off the ground, and makes us hover in the air. I can feel, so so many male eyes on me, and I just — fucking HATE that he does shit like this and then does not — like, is so focused on other shit he wouldn’t even understand if I tried to explain it.
LANGUAGE, PADAWAN.
I will try Master, I promise I will try.
“IF YOU ARE HERE, YOU ARE DEAD,” Master Skywalker roared, making me and a clone float in the air, “IF YOU ARE HERE, YOU ARE — DEAD!” And I can hear, his… literally insane grief and sadness, in the Force, “IF YOU ARE HERE,” lowering me one more level but not letting me go until I was basically on the ground, which just goes to show how much — that power is not everwielded carelessly or without intention, it’s just, so so scarily big he hides almost all of it almost all of the time, and breaking into what I can only describe as dry, angry tears he positively TERRORIZED us with the words,
“IF YOU DO NOT GET DOWN, WHEN I TELL YOU TO GET DOWN. YOU WILL DIE. DO YOU UNDERSTAND, TROOPERS?”
And, I don’t know what I was expecting, I assumed they would have been distracted by the fact he raised a literal girl in front of them and they all — whatever, I thought they would have been more distracted so it was, well maybe I’m just, arrogant? But — anyway whatever. You would think that a bunch of — hey maybe there’s something — or unless —
“SIR, YES, SIR!” the clones said.
I have — if there’s one thing that would make you respect him, it’s how the clones act. Or how much, it looks like, he — well. I’ve — I mean I don’t know! I DID NOT PICK HIM. I am here, trying to make the best of an insane —
Ahsoka, he rumbles at me, creepily through the Force. I don’t know why his voice is so faint or cuts in and out or sounds like it’s fucking SHOUTING at me, but, I listen and he says, Come to the — exercise — whatever, bring your lightsaber. HOW IS A BEING SUPPOSED TO DECYPHER THOSE FUCKING DIRECTIONS.
Padawan Tano, the language is becoming a problem.
FOR WHO OR WHOM MASTER LUMINARA? CAUSE MASTER SKYWALKER DOESN’T SEEM TO —
And with that, pzoooom! She disappears. Is that a sound? ‘Pzooom?’ I kinda meant it like if you hear blaster bolts fly past your head, that’s the sound they make. Or if you break a giant block of ice really fast with the Force. Which I cannot confirm or deny doing because —
WE WILL BE SPEAKING WHEN YOU RETURN, PADAWAN TANO.
“Master Skywalker, do you care if I swear?” I asked him once. He turned and looked down at me and I had the thought, ‘are his irises changing colour?’
“WHAT DO YOU WANT PADAWAN?”
“Never mind, Master,” I muttered in reply, realizing I’d just blurted it out in the middle of a huddle with the clones. He’s literally never not huddling with clones. It’s like he doesn’t get — they — whatever.
PADAWAN TANO Master Luminara Unduli positively yammers at me, through the Force… is that a correct use of ‘yammers?’ I like the word, ‘yammers.’ That should be what Jedi call their pyjamas.
“Master Skywalker,” I asked him once, and he turned around so fast I almost bumped into him. It’s either ignoring me entirely or spinning around and staring down at you like fucking breakfast, “WHAT?” he growled at me.
“Do you hate me, Master Skywalker?”
I don’t know what reaction I expected but he just rolled his eyes and walked away.
“If I hated you, padawan, you’d already be dead,” he said.
And the clones chuckled. The fucking clones chuckled.
The point of being a padawan is to learn to become a Jedi, and to become a Jedi, you have to — oh wait, he’s just going to use the Force to show me.
“Like this,” my ‘master’ Anakin Skywalker says. He’s clearly so so angry all of the time it’s like he’s barely restraining himself from killing absolutely and literally anyone.
“NO AHSOKA!” he — so so needs, like medication, or help, or — like I’m trying to be nice, but the way he speaks to me is gentler than he speaks to anyone else and the way he speaks to me is SO NOT OKAY.
He grabs my hands and lightsaber through the Force, and then moves my limbs through the motions. Like a normal Jedi Master would have just moved my heel back. That’s all he had to do. That’s all his “grabbing” me in the Force, accomplished. Also, I’m not even sure if it is The Force. Like it’s aForce, clearly, and there is only one Force, buuuuuuut — doesn’t feel like Theone.
Also, never seen a Jedi one-hand and switch hands with a lightsaber so easily before. Swear, one hand, absolutely crushes, and the other, is so fast I’m just always dead. Would need two blades to even stand a chance. The confusing thing is that all other Jedi and — basically all energy-weapon wielders are broadcasting where they’re about to swing, way before they do, and I can see it. I — fight really well, and always have. I’m the one who humbles people with my gifts, and then I met him and it’s —
“Do not ever stop attacking once you gain an advantage,” he said to me once, and there’s a hairline burn against my neck where the lightsaber barely grazed it, “Your enemy will never give you a second chance at life Ahsoka, I will grant you this one exception.”
I swear, it’s insane the way the clones talk about him. They think he’s —
“DO NOT LET YOUR MIND WANDER OR DRIFT WHILE IN BATTLE AHSOKA!” he says, literally trying to murder me with a blaster and eventually there’s just, like I’m about to die so a clone holds up a shield to cover me. Obviously he worked out some thing with the clones. He’s always got something going with the clones. I — I mean he attends their funerals. They’re CLONES! Does he not get —
But, I’m getting better. I think I was cruising, at the temple. On a pleather plateau, used to not needing to find new gears to use. And he’s terrifying, and would absolutely not give a fuck if I died, but he’d also die protecting me. The weirdest thing about him, is that he’s the padawan to GENERAL KENOBI the nicest most polite Jedi anyone’s ever met. I — like how did those two possibly get along? I can’t even picture them talki —
“HURRY UP AHSOKA!”
“SORRY MASTER!” I reply.
Dude is such a fucking prick.
There are Jedi and then there are Jedi. And I didn’t realize that idiot padawans compare the Jediness of the Jedi they get assigned to as if, being assigned to a great master meant you would become a great — you get it. Feel like — I’m dizzy.
“Use the Force, Ahsoka,” Jedi Master Anakin says to me over comms. The way he speaks through the Force is far creepier however so at least it’s — not that.
I try, and fail, and I hear his disappointment.
“I’m sorry, Master Skywalker.
“We’ll try again next time we have a chance, padawan. At least you didn’t die.”
And with that he’s already spun away with all his fighter pilots in tow. Impossible to keep up with any of them. I swear you’d think clones could wield the —
I mean I don’t even think most Jedi require their padawans to become fighter pilots, bomber pilots, tank drivers, speeder bike racers! He told me, that if I couldn’t beat “Frosty” and “Sundance” or whatever their names were, in a race on speederbikes that he wouldn’t help me train with my lightsaber anymore, which is, frankly the only part I enjoy about —
“Ooooooo, Master Skywalker!” one more goofy dingus who doesn’t understand — stuff about crap — god I can feel that stripy green lady just breathing down my neck every time I swear.
… like just waiting… I know there’s a… blowjob —
PADAWAN!
There it is.
I will remember this Ahsoka, do not grow overconfident because your Master is powerful.
That. That right there. That’s what I fucking hate.
“Which part, are you confused by, exactly?” he said to me, when I said I couldn’t keep up with him and his clones running over barricades and barricades and hurdles and shit is shooting at us and there’s — like, the exercises the other padawans do are, like FOR PADAWANS!
I felt like such a — I’m sorry — non-Jedi — for not being able to catch my breath. It’s as though my whole life has been about ‘measuring up’ to something, and I always did, and now I’m trying to live my life with an impossible bar. And I know I’ll never measure up to that, because, well, I’m not a fucking “prodigy” of the Force. Or whatever the rumours are. The One! Meanwhile, I know that when he smashes his lightsaber down on mine, it’s both, literally about to kill me and… never will. I sometimes wonder if the reason I can’t tell where he’s about to swing it is that, it’s just an illusion that he’s using his hand. I think he might be… holding the lightsaber pinched between two pinkies in the Force while — basically fixing a droid in another room or just doing something else. Yo, loves droids, loves clones, loves — anyone who isn’t someone apparently, and everyone else, might as well not be people.
And then… one, so so annoying day when I was so so, tired or guard-down or whatever, I made the mistake of — well not ‘insulting’ him but just complaining about how difficult he is to deal with, in front of clones. And it’s — it just got so awkward.
I know that the ‘padawans’ from my years think there are ‘cool’ Jedi to apprentice-to, but being a padawan is, almost harder than being a Jedi, at least for some personalities. And I think Jedi Master Skywalker respects me because I don’t like being a padawan.
One day, after asking to join him on a raid, he said, I needed to train more in the Force. I lifted a rock to try and — like train or whatever, kinda the way show-offy losers do but I didn’t think anyone was watching me. And a second later he just, crushed it to the ground. I got so mad, so I tried to lift it against his will and that — did not work.
“You need to pick harder targets,” he snapped.
“Well then — what should I — “
So he lifted… the tank. I could hear the clone troopers inside on comms going, “Woooooaaaaaah!”
And then very gently, so the springs in the footpads barely shook, he put it back down.
“When you can lift that,” he said, “You can join us on a raid,” and then walked out followed by many seriously scarred and frankly vicious-looking clones.
“Why is my Master such an asshole?” I made the mistake of asking a trooper.
He laughed the same way they all do and then said, “You’re training under the greatest Jedi any of us has ever seen, Commander Tano.”
I clicked my tongue and went back to trying to cause a — slightly bigger rock, to hover, so the clone added,
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“But to answer your question, I think war might make us all — a little rough around the edges, Commander.”
I know he wasn’t trying to hurt my feelings, but I just felt like such a small stupid soft kid, in that moment. And, very very foolishly in retrospect, I looked forward to my first real battle.
You see there are battles and then there are battles. And the only way to gain respect or be respected is to have been in one of the real ones. Those who have, or do, are seen differently. And the way they talk and speak to each other is different. The faces they make. My Jedi master’s face when he sees veterans is about the happiest it ever gets aside from seeing Master Kenobi.
“Cody! Rex!” he cries ecstatically, bursting into a sprint towards them so fast I — like how is he doing that without the Force?! I don’t think I’ve ever seen Commander Cody with his helmet off but Commander Rex unseals his and the sincere joy is plain on his features as he salutes.
“General Skywalker, sir!” they both shout.
“At ease, at ease, men. How are you? How’s — “ and then they just chat and chat like old friends. I can feel Commander Cody’s hesitation through the Force though. Unlike Rex, he’s suspicious of all Jedi, perhaps of just — everyone. But he really likes my Jedi master. And he… isn’t sure about me.
“Commander Tano,” Rex says warmly as he passes by.
“Commander,” Cody nods a second later.
I can feel their regret in the Force as they walk away. And my Master’s regret is like 1000x that. What the heck have they been through to make them act like this?
“AHSOKA!”
“Coming Master!”
Swear to gods I hate him.
“Do you like — your assignment — padawan?” Master Luminara asks me when I see her, her eyes glancing at General Skywalker in a way that revealed emotions she did not let leak through the Force but — um, I’m also not an idiot. She looks at him, the way almost all the adult women and even girls my own age do. Like — well, like they can’t smell the insane danger. Or maybe that is what they smell? Whatever, point is they’re crazy but I’ve never seen this lady display a single weakness and she’s been such a bitch to me I kinda want to rub it in so I say,
“He’s — “
“Master Luminara,” my Jedi master says, appearing behind me a literal split-second later.
“Master Skywalker,” she mutters, scurrying away.
“Ahsoka,” he tells me afterward, “Do not try to exploit weakness in others. That is not the way of the Force.”
Of all people to — “You don’t know what I was going to say to her, Master.”
“What were you going to say then, Padawan?”
“That, I’m proud of myself for keeping up with you.”
And this made him look down at me strangely. His scarred face and unfeeling eyes displaying a tiny hint of emotion.
But he said nothing, and soon we were back on ships flying out.
“Anakin! Have you left already!?” Master Obi Wan calls to him over comms.
“Sorry, Master.”
“Oh Anakin…”
The troopers around us laugh, like this is always how it goes. But I can detect, a pain in my Jedi master’s heart, and I knew we didn’t leave because we had to. He got out of there because he couldn’t stand being there, and is feeling relief now that we’re back out in open atmosphere. And that… well makes me like him a teeny bit more. Like maybe we have that in common.
While in hyperspace I thought my Jedi ‘master’ was angry with me but it was just, news, from Christophsis. And then, he — disappeared, in the Force. I couldn’t find him. I was wandering around the ship.
“Where the fuck is he R2?!” I asked, to a thrilled whistle of chirps and beeps. R2 always knows what’s going on. Everyone who you think isn’t paying attention, knows, what is going on. But, you really have to listen, and not through the Force.
When I get to his door, I hear, a terrible sound, inside. It’s — crying. He’s crying. He’s crying in agony and I just ran away from the door a second later because A) positive would get murdered if I didn’t and B) I was ashamed. And walking through the halls beside R2 he warmed my heart saying, it wasn’t my fault.
“Thank you little buddy,” I said, patting him.
And what R2 replied made me laugh and feel better. He’s — so wise and yet so cute. Almost like Master Yoda. I wish I could help my Master though. His wracking sobs fill my heart with grief, even though I don’t understand what the cause is. But I could hear, that that sound, was not the sound of normal tears, or of ‘well, we’ll get through this’ or ‘i’ll get past this’ or ‘the sunrise will rise again whatever blah blah’ tears. It was, ‘there is no fixing this’ tears. It was, deep, horrible, oceanic and overpowering, pain. And I feel, like such an idiot. For disturbing him. Cause I know he knows I was outside the door. He knows everything. I know, he knows, I heard him sob, and I know, some part of him wants to kill me for — well, lots of things. But also, a much bigger part of him wants to protect. Not just me, or the Jedi or the clones or — ‘the citizens of the Republic’ either. Everyone in the galaxy.
But he can’t. None of us can. And it concerns me that — but then again? He’s ‘the greatest Jedi who ever lived’ or whatever. Most touched and blessed by The Force as a person can be, and yet — all the little fuzzy hairs on my body stand up together and I just run to the training room to swing at shit with my lightsaber. I just swing and swing and swing until I’m exhausted, but feel better.
“Good,” Anakin Skywalker says, behind me, terrifying and startling the sh — crap.
“WHERE THE HECK DID YOU COME FROM!?”
“You’re getting stronger, Ahsoka,” he says approvingly, departing almost before the words leave his lips, “Well done, Padawan.”
And I wish it didn’t, but his praise fills me with pride.
I made the mistake of, ‘telling’ a clone to do something. I mean I thought I was ‘asking’ — no, he’s right. My Jedi ‘master’ Anakin, was right. I just ‘told.’ I’m so used to them, and they’re everywhere and they all look alike so I just went, “Here,” and handed the one nearest me something I wanted to not be holding anymore and though Anakin was surrounded by clones and they were all speaking in that inscrutable way they do, barely before my fingers left the thing, he spun around, stared at me with more hatred or — I mean, something beyond it, and then took three steps back, removed the trash from the clone’s hand and put it back in mine.
“Do it yourself,” he spat. And then went back to what he was doing. It really, really hurt my feelings. Like I just thought we were finally starting to understand each other but for the entire rest of the day and the next, I couldn’t find him, either through the Force or on the ship. So I just meditated. I touched the minds of the great Jedi Masters who taught me to meditate and they were, very gentle and kind, but their thoughts didn’t help me understand. So I kept searching. I reached out, through my senses and through the Force, to try to —
I don’t even know. Make the hurt stop? Or make it, comprehensible? I wasn’t even sure what I did wrong, only that, he sincerely hated me in that moment. So I just kept meditating and kept meditating. And then I woke up. Oops. A Jedi who falls asleep meditating is no Jedi, or so I was told. But I’m just a — whateverawan — padawan, I remind myself. Plus, all of those, ‘A blank who does blank is not blank,’ pieces of “wisdom” never made sense to me. I just think of what Master Senube told us about the difference between ‘simple’ and ‘easy’ and though I can’t really understand what he meant, I know — he was right. And that I have to understand it, so I will. So I get back into a comfortable position, and let my mind, become one, with the Force.
And then… it comes to me. I don’t know why, but, I see the face of the clone I passed that trash to. I see, the hurt, in his eyes, and soul. Because I didn’t even look at him. Like he was nothing.
Good, that’s enough, Jedi Master Anakin Skywalker says in my mind, Come see me, Ahsoka, and I try and fail to conceal my frankly ecstatic joy and relief that he’s stopped ignoring or otherwise avoiding me. But I know, I can’t just run at whatever I think I want. I have to wait, I have to breathe I have to have patience.
Good! says a great Jedi Master I’ve never met.
Yes, padawan, says another, with a very confusing mind.
Very well done, padawan Master Luminara says, with a nicer tone in her voice than I’ve ever heard. And then, my eyes flash open because EVEN MASTER YODA HIMSELF, is suddenly with me.
HELLO! I — I mean — Hi, Hey, woah, How are you Master Yoda?!
He chuckles adorably, his tiny hand patting my head through the Force, Soft and strong, weak and not, brave and fearful, never different things they are, padawan, he whispers, before leaving. And then I try to conceal my annoyance, that I can never understand what the f — flip, he’s ever trying to say to me. But I know he heard. Cause he’s laughing even harder, though not at me. Not at anyone. Just, with all of us. And that makes me feel love, for him, for my Jedi ‘master,’ for the Force, and for — the privilege it has granted me, to be so close to so many great and wonderful minds. And then I can’t contain my anticipating anymore so, despite the clucks and tuts I hear without my ears, I find Anakin through the Force and leap off the pillow, summoning my lightsaber to my hand just as the door to my crew quarters opens, right before I was about to crash into it. And I didn’t do that. I didn’t open the door. And I don’t know who did.
Then, Master Skywalker is — well making me hate him again.
“NO! NO! NO!” he screams, smashing his lightsaber down on me like some kind of impossibly gigantic weight. He’s holding it with ONE HAND.
Sssssmash! The blade hums.
Ssssssssmash! Voom voom, my pathetic little parries can barely keep it away. SMASH! SMASH! SMASH!
I can’t — why was I looking forward to this!? SMASH! SMASH! SMASH!
I can’t catch my breath. I can’t — keep up. With the — my windpipe is burning, my lungs ache, the soles of my boots feel harder than metal against my feet. And all the while it’s —
SSSSSMASH! ZOOM! WHACK! ZIP! THWACK! BOOM!
“DO NOT GROW COMPLACENT AHSOKA!” he growls at me.
But it’s just too much. He’s too much. For me for, anyone, for everyone. I’m too tired. I know he’ll hate me for it, but I leap away, sheath my blade, and fall down panting.
I don’t even want to look up at him, but I know he’s there. And I know the clones are watching me. They’re always watching me, to see, if I am worthy of him. I know he won’t praise me, as another Jedi would. He does not give praise for anything that doesn’t sincerely impress him or — deserve, to be praised, as he sees it. And evidently, many of the things that I’ll need to become a Jedi will just have to get praised by my own mind in its own way because, I’ll just never hear it otherwise.
But I can hear, the terrifying thrum of his energy blade, still lit. It’s — not a normal colour. And it feels, somehow, heavier and ‘wider’ than a normal Jedi’s. Like, it’s fuzzy or misty around the sides, unlike mine which my Force crystal sharpens into a tight shape with a distinct boundary and point.
And then — through the Force, I realize, that he’ll never look at me with anything like ‘respect’ or think I have ‘potential’ unless I can get up in this moment, re-ignite my blade, and try again. And then I think, ‘what was I even trying to strike at?’ Like, obviously I’m not trying to kill my Master, but then again, if I’m just swinging it around, not trying to kill the person I’m fighting, then what — what am I even doing.
GOOD, AHSOKA, his creepy-ass broken voice warbles uncertainly through the Force.
I reignite my lightsaber, hold back whatever tears or shivers of exhaustion were about to come, and scream in a way I never have before, swinging my blade again and again, with — what even is this feeling? It’s — hot. It’s — cool. It’s peaceful — it’s chaotic. It’s a side of myself I’ve never seen before, but with every swing it feels more natural. He does not back down even a single step. While I swing and swing, trying to cut him, hurt him, kill him, make him — die, he flicks my sword away with the tiniest motion, never not using one hand. But when I surprise him, by concealing my intentions, pretending to strike at something he thinks I wouldn’t mind hurting, like his hand or foot, I — instead — change hands, using the Force to balance my blade in the air, and when I’ve caught it with the other back-handed, I jab straight for and right at — his face.
He has to switch hands to match me, and does, easily and almost without trying, but I can tell… I impressed him.
“Yes. Yes, Ahsoka,” he says. But I don’t stop, I just keep, doing it, attacking. Ignoring my nerves that are begging me to rest, ignoring my muscles and tendons and ligaments that are all threatening to fall apart or snap, ignoring anything, but this feeling and The Force.
“Good, my padawan,” he says. And, while I hate that word and don’t really know ‘what’ I ‘am,’ I know he’s never called me his anything before. And know, I like it.
“Master Skywalker!”
“DO NOT FALL BEHIND, AHSOKA!” he says, very kindly and politely to me, as any other Jedi would, obviously, because that’s what we both are. I swear I think he’ll never value my life over any single clone’s. It’s like he doesn’t get what they were even made —
KABOOM!
“AHSOKA!” he shrieks. Yes, ‘shriek’ is the right word. I can tell, even without the Force, how angry he is with me. But I’m — like I can’t breathe?! How do they do it? They’re always — and then the Force, like a cool breeze, blows through me, spinning the turbulences of my unsettled mind into one smooth and balanced vortex. For I, am a Jedi.
Oh, was that you, Master Yoda?!
His laughter makes me feel like a kid again. But then an instant later it’s —
BOOM!
KABOOM!
“MEDIC! MEDIC!”
“MEDIC!”
“GET SOME GODS-DAMNED SUPRESSING FIRE ON THAT — “
KABOOM!
It’s like they can read his mind. The clones have taken up defensive positions and the next thing I know, the explosions have died down.
His wrist beeps and the clones report and he says, “WELL DONE MEN. WELL DONE,” then cuts out.
I feel sooooooo out-of-place. I mean —
KABOOM!
“AHHHHHHH!”
“NO! NO!”
“HELP ME!”
“AHHHHHHHHHH!”
I think that I might deserve to go to hell for just, thinking I wanted this. For hearing the clones talking about ‘battles’ and understanding that they wouldn’t ever respect me until I’d been in one of the ‘real’ ones but now it’s — like I am such an idiot. And I throw up.
Anakin pats me — oh wait, it was just one of his clones, patting my back. Why the heck did I think it was — oh, he — reached into the clone trooper’s mind and made him do it? Or, asked him to? The fact that I can’t tell if the trooper was asked to, or forced (no pun intended) to comfort me makes me feel like a fucking child.
I notice that no Jedi masters are chiding me on the swearing now. In fact, I can’t feel any of them at all. I wonder if, they find the feelings of the dying soldiers too painful to bear. But if they ignore their pain is that even —
KABOOM!
“NOOOOOOO!”
“HOLD THE LINE, MEN!” Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker roars. I don’t understand how he isn’t tired. I was exhausted like — hours ago. But he just keeps going. And I don’t know where the strength comes from but it sure as heck isn’t the Force. He’s not — reinforcing him self. Hehe. Wait — what, what am I getting stupider by the second?
“AHSOKA!”
“Yes, M — “
BOOM!
KABOOM!
BOOM!
“Yes, General Skywalker!?” I shriek back. I mean I meant it as a shout but apparently I’m more terrified than I realize.
“I’M GOING TO PULL A FIGHTER DOWN, AND I WANT YOU TO GET ON IT. WHEN YOU GET TOO COLD, JUMP OFF, AND — “
Please tell me he’s joking. Buuuuuut, nope.
Because with absolutely horrifying precision and speed, I am zooming up a hundred, no, two hundred meters above the ground and then he lets me go just as one of the clone pilots battlecraft rips the air beneath. I — just try not to die. I know, he wouldn’t intentionally try to kill me, but I also know, that —
BOOM!
BOOM!
Well at least the explosions are less deafening up here. Actually, as the pilot rises back up into the sky, dodging countless — things — coming from every direction I become so fascinated watching the spacecraft dogfight I —
“AHSOKA!”
“YES! MASTER SKYWALKER!”
“TELL ME WHAT YOU’RE — oh, you know what?”
So he just — enters, my mind. I am embarrassed, that he’ll see any feelings I have and am not supposed to, about him, but it’s like there couldn’t be a single interesting thing in here except for what my eyes are seeing.
“Ah,” he says, like he figured something out by staring from these same eyeballs that just see — like what is there even to see?
“DEFEND THE SALIENT, MEN! DO NOT GIVE UP A CREDIT’S WIDTH! THEY’RE COMING FOR US! WE MUST HOLD! WE WILL HOLD!” he positively booms over comms and through the Force. And somehow even though we’re so high it’s like I can hear all the clones screaming with him a moment later. I — might be starting to get — why he’s so liked, by them and anyone who — would just rather not, come down here. Frankly, I don’t even want to go back down. My hands are, fucking icicles but, I just don’t want to go, back down. I don’t want to hear, the — but —
“AHSOKA! I NEED YOU!” my wrist shouts. Maybe that’s why he screams at everyone all the time. And yet, my hands, just do not let go. I don’t think I’m afraid of the falling, though, um, not like I’VE EVER BEEN DESPERATELY HOLDING ON THROUGH THE FORCE TO THE BACK OF A FIGHTER-PILOTS’ CRAFT BEFORE. WOAH. HOW’S THIS REAL?
“AHSOKA! AHSOKA! …please,” he says.
So I let go. And use the Force to both adjust my descent and then, figure out where he is, catching sight of his lightsaber a few instants later, so blurred it’s like a knot of energy getting painted onto the world. I — he’s truly amazing isn’t he? And not in the — I’m getting why the girls like him now. So so far beyond brave it’s like the word doesn’t apply. And I know he’s scared, he’s terrified. He’s always terrified. It’s just that the fear that stops everyone else, the fear that made my hands not want to let go, doesn’t beat him. He beats it. He beats, his fear. And it makes me respect him, and want to be like him. Because I don’t want to lose to my fear either. And I won’t. I will not fail my Master. I didn’t even think I respected the concept of a ‘Jedi master’ until this moment. Everything that happens when you’re around him is so amazing it just gets normalized but I don’t think anyone could get used to this. I am such an idiot for wanting to see battle. I should have — I wish — I’d known better. I’m such a fool.
And the guns ring out. They’re so FUCKING LOUD! My body and soul fill with terror again as I criss-cross and weave around the debris and laser blasts with my instincts and the Force, and then the ground is so close, and I’m about to hit it. What the — oh my god I’M GOING TO DIE! I’M GOING TO DIE! I CAN’T SLOW MYSELF DOWN! But then,
“Gotch’ya,” he whispers, in his very unsettling and incoherent way in the Force, and literal seconds before I was about to be dead he slows me down with so much gentleness it’s like Master Yoda was the one holding me. I feel cushioned, and protected and then —
BOOM!
“Ahhhh!” I can’t restrain my fear as a huge explosion destroys the troopers right below me. While doing like, ten other things, he uses the Force to swing me around and bring me back to nearly where he’s standing. When my feet touch the ground, I don’t know why, but rather than falling and cowering in the dirt, I run to him, and — just try to hide, in the shadow of his body.
He looks at me with confusion, and then, I expect to be reprimanded, told I am worthless for being unable to control my fear, and I expect him to tell me that I am unworthy of being his padawan. But instead, he — actually hugs me. And I feel the body-armour on his shoulder cutting into my neck but, just enjoy feeling, protected, and valued. By someone, who seems to value almost no one.
Remember to slow your thoughts to feel the Force, my young padawan,Master Senube says, but I just can’t stop crying and I — don’t want to be here. I don’t want to be experiencing any of this.
The troopers’ screams, the endless horrible sounds of the guns and cannons and droid-fighters tearing everything and everyone to pieces. I — feel so foolish and — dark.
“There there, my padawan,” Master Skywalker says, sincerely hugging me, and with more tenderness in his voice than I’ve literally ever heard before in any situation under any circumstances, I feel like he’s not even this nice to himself in his head: “I’m proud of you, Ahsoka. And don’t worry, you’ll get used to it. We all do.”
