sith_happened | Office hours [all day]

"Come in and shut the door," he said, looking very serious.

Oh, boy. Tahiri swallowed and did as she was told, but as soon as the latch clicked shut she moved up and stood in front of his desk, hands clasped behind her back.

"Is there something we need to talk about?"

His eyes locked on her face. "What has my grandson told you to explain why he's locked up like a Colo claw fish with a meal in its mouth?"

So that was what this was about. Tahiri didn't flinch or back down, as much as she wanted to. "I know he told you what happened to him a few months ago when he was home. So he's probably told you about me." Her palms were starting to sweat, but she met his gaze and kept her chin up. "You might know more than I do -- I know she hurt him. I've seen the scars. I know she went horribly wrong, but Master Skywalker, that's not me."

Ben hadn't mentioned scars.

Anakin's expression went even stonier. "It better not be," he said, voice deceptively quiet. "No one gets to hurt my family. I'd say the same thing to Jaina's version of Jacen. You know the mantra, but if I get even a hint from the Force you're heading down the same path that this woman followed..."

"No matter what she did, I would never hurt Ben," Tahiri said, voice shaking but resolute. But all of a sudden everything about Riina, what Karla had said about not being able to get rid of her, was beginning to worry her a lot more. And yet there was a lot of Riina's conviction added to her own when she spoke up again; family was important, worthy of fierce loyalty. "I'd never do that to your family. And if I ever looked like I would, I'd want you to stop me," she added in a rush.

He nodded. "This is the only warning you'll get from me," he said, and he lifted the careful veneer of civility he worked so hard to project, allowing her to see the fierce eyes and controlled rage of a man who had terrorized a galaxy for decades. "Some version of you decided to make that choice. She better be the only one."

That was the face of the man who'd haunted his namesake grandson's nightmares for years, and Tahiri understood a little more of her Anakin's fears now. Her face paled visibly, the scars on her forehead almost disappearing, and she took a deep breath.

"I can't speak for any other versions of myself, but I promise I'm going to do everyting I can to keep that from happening. And if I'm going to do that, I need your help."

Ben's version of Tahiri should be counting herself lucky that she'd probably never run into his grandfather's righteous fury. Anakin wasn't nearly as forgiving as the later generations.

"What do you need from me?" he asked, slipping back into his semi-civilized Jedi Master role.

Ben's version of Tahiri might be lucky to never run into this one, either, at that.

Briefly (for her), she filled him in on Karla's theory about not being able to get rid of Riina, concluding with, "And if I really don't have any choice but being stuck with her, I'm going to need to figure a lot of things out."

Anakin nodded. "If she's truly a part of you, you need to come to terms with it," he said quietly. "I spent twenty years running from a dark, terrifying part of myself I didn't want to acknowledge. It became the weakness Palpatine used to manipulate me. A Jedi must know all facets of themselves--we called it facing the mirror and it was part of becoming a knight--because willful blindness causes disaster."

"She scares me," Tahiri said simply, and looked at him. "And we know where that goes."

"Very probably to Ben's version of the future," Anakin said. "Is that why she scares you?"

"That part doesn't help." There was no point in trying to lie to him. "She scares me because she's Yuuzhan Vong. She's everything I'm not, everything I'm not supposed to be."

"A humorless, technology-hating killing machine?" Anakin replied dryly.

"For starters." Tahiri almost cracked a smile.

"And Karla believes she can fix this?" Anakin sounded a little dubious.

"Fix? I'm not sure. I don't want to get my hopes up." Tahiri frowned, biting her lip. "I'll never be the person I was again, not any more. But she thinks we can make me less . . . fractured."

He nodded. "All of us have demons," he said. "Most of them just don't have other names."

"And memories." Riina bristled at the description, and Tahiri's jaw tensed slightly. In a quiet voice she asked, "Is this going to make you treat me differently?"

"Some version of you hurt Ben badly enough that he won't talk about it," Anakin said, eyes hard.

So...yes.

Tahiri flinched, her Force-sense spiking with hurt. "That version of me doesn't --" She cut herself off and shook her head. "Fine. That's fine. I should be used to people looking at me like I'll turn on them any second by now anyway."

That hit close enough to how he had felt as a teenager that his Force-sense turned guilty.

"He's my son's son, named for my best friend," he said. "I don't do rational" at all, "well...when he's involved."

Tahiri stared down at her feet, not wanting to see that look on his face or let on that she was fighting back tears. "I know. And I don't blame you for that . . . he's Ben. Look, Master Skywalker, don't you see? I saw what Anakin went through all those years, worrying if he'd fall to the dark side. It was hard enough for him, and he had people there to support him. Now I'm the one worrying about that."

"Every Jedi fights the dark side," Anakin said. "Most of them just won't mention it."

He bit back his rant about Luke's Jedi and their apparent need to visit the dark side like it was some kind of vacation destination.

"He was worried because we shared a name, right?"

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