sith_happened | Ye olde shuttle parking [Monday morning]

"No," she deadpanned. "You?"

She worried her lip with her teeth, concentrating on taking off. "What is she doing to people, anyway?"

"She turned Rikku's legs around, but you saw that," Anakin said, racing them through the atmosphere. "And I only know what happened to Luke through what I felt. She sliced him with something, then threw him into something else."

His eyes went flat. "We had a chat, she and I."

He zipped past the moon and headed out towards the outer planets. "And she has a quill that writes with your own blood. I hate that thing."

"She what?" Rory stared, horrified. "She's cutting people?"

"She made Luke bleed," Anakin said through gritted teeth, "but I'm trying this thing where I don't kill people."

"She do anything to you?" she asked softly.

"Do you think I'd let her?" he countered.

Which didn't answer the question.

"No. Did she?"

Anakin was quiet for a long moment. "She didn't do a thing," he said.

Which was true from a certain point of view. He'd been using the quill.

"Don't go near her, Rory," he said quietly. "Please?"

"Only if you tell me what happened between you and her," she said just as quietly. "You're stepping around your words."

"I'm being a father," Anakin said. "She won't use her wand to touch my son or anyone else's child again."

He shrugged. "Everything else doesn't matter."

"Yes it does," she said, shakier than she'd prefer. "If I don't worry about you, who else is going to?"

He gave her a small smile. "You don't need to worry," he said. "She can't touch me."

"Then why are you being cryptic?"

Anakin steered them towards the asteroid belt. Because I'm protecting you, too, he murmured into her head. Just this once, let me?

Rory stared at him a long moment. "...fine," she whispered, crossing her arms around herself.

Anakin let out a soft sigh. "Rory," he said, "I'm not doing this to shut you out."

"Right."

She didn't really care whether he meant to or not.

"If I said she'd done something to me, you'd march right down to her office and she'd hurt you," Anakin said, eyes blazing. "So if you want to feel sorry for yourself because you think I'm not telling you everything, well, go ahead. It's not going to change my mind."

"I'm not feeling sorry for myself," she snapped. "It's not like I'm your girlfriend anymore and deserve to know. It's just that if you think that not telling me isn't sending my imagination into overdrive and making it worse, then you don't even know me."

"I'm walking and talking, unscarred and without pieces of vegetation coming out of my ears," Anakin said as his voice took on a softer tone. "She's not hurting me."

Not permanently, in any case.

"But something bad is happening in there," she said softly. "You wouldn't be like this if it wasn't."

The look in his eyes was a confirmation.

"It's worth the price," he said stubbornly, "if it keeps her pettiness away from the students."

He shrugged. "She's hardly in Palpatine's league, in any case. Writing lines isn't exactly going to break my delicate psyche."

She frowned, then remembered what he'd said about the quill.

"Oh, Anakin."

"My choice," he said softly, "and it keeps her away from people I love."

He held out his hand. "And it doesn't stick around, see?"

Rory gave his hand a cursory glance and went back to staring at his face. "You're taking it so the students don't have to?"

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