Lie to Myself: I Walk the Line
Nadae has been on Alderaan for several days now, and is making final preparations for her Trial.

"Shadows fall and hope has fled

Steal your heart, the Dawn Will Come

The night is long and the path is dark

Look to the sky, for one day soon

The Dawn Will Come"

For so long Nadae had found her structure in these words. They were the hand that pulled her back down to the ground, the bones that kept her straight. These words had drifted her body to slumber, kept her mind focused on her duties, kept her strong enough to make it through to the end of the day.

"The Shepherds lost and his home is far

Keep to the stars, the Dawn Will Come

The night is long and the path is dark

Look to the sky, for one day soon

The Dawn Will Come"

These words were the very core of who she was. A Jedi bound to a Code, a woman to give hope for those who needed it most. Singing for the ones who needed a song.

"Bare your blade and raise it high

Stand your ground, the Dawn Will Come

The night is long and the path is dark

Look to the sky, for one day soon

The Dawn Will Come"

They no longer did so. They would not settle the ground that shook beneath her feet. A tremor that would eventually become an earthquake. But Nadae continued to sing, as that was all she knew she could do.

"Sing with desperation, you do."

He master startled her making her heart jump up her throat. She could sneak up on others, but she would never get used to Yoda always doing it.

Alderaan was a beautiful sight; the guest quarters of the palace had incredible views of Aldera and the mountains beyond. Appenza Peak loomed in the background of the sight, a place of which many Alderaanian fairy tales originated from and where the Jedi could commune with the Force. The Juran Mountains lay further beyond the Peak, covering hundreds of clicks of area.

Nadae had felt through the Force that she was going beyond Appenza Peak, into the Juran Mountains. The Barsen'thor called out from there.

"Master?"

"That hymn, sung with solidness and strength it is meant to," Yoda slowly made his way onto the balcony Nadae had found herself drawn to over the past three days they had resided here. "Singing it wrong, you are."

She couldn't help herself, one side of her mouth quirked up. "Well, Master, I'm not sure you're really the right one to be giving singing advice."

He 'humphed' has he always did. "You are troubled."

"I am as I always have been, Master."

"Troubled."

"No," she asserted. "I am functional."

She never knew what Yoda was thinking exactly and never could. She could like most Jedi however feel his emotion. Concern was in his mind but after Nadae had asserted that she was no less than normal, he did not press further into the issue. She would not burden Master Yoda with her burdens and knew that he could never know of them. The questions and concerns that buzzed around Nadae's head were not to be thought of as they countered the Code that she had sworn herself to. There was to be no more of this Obi-Wan Kenobi nonsense.

Which was hard when he was the one overseeing her Trials.

But Yoda knew. Master Yoda always knew.

"Any dreams?" he inquired.

"They're not as bad, Master." She answered. "She knows I'm coming now."

All the preparations had been made. Nadae was setting out in the morning to the Juran Mountains alone with just a few supplies and a lightsaber. Queen Organa had warned her of dangerous snowstorms emerging in the mountains but Nadae took no concern of it. The Queen had not been experiencing her visions and therefor did not feel the need to get to the Outlander.

"I don't understand how it is possible." Nadae spoke low, close to a whisper. A curiosity slipped from her lips. "How does she do it…? Is it possible for someone to manipulate the Force like that… even beyond death? I thought our conscience dissipated into the Force once we died."

Her Master frowned and groaned; a signature sign that he was about to begin a deep thought process. "The Force, vastly unknown to us it is," he tapped his walking stick on the ground as if trying to distract himself. "Never before have the dead spoken to us. A Force vision it all is, perhaps. However, know what the Barsen'thor's was capable of, we do not. Understand her we do not. But," there was always a 'but' at the end of one of Yoda's teachings, Nadae was used to this. "return with knowledge beyond my understanding and most Jedi, you will."

He reopened his eyes and laid them upon her face. There was a softness in him that Nadae hadn't felt from him before; quiet proudness and compassion and yet he poured his words out with grief. This was his last piece of advice, his last teachings, and his last words of wisdom that he would give to her. He was a parent waving goodbye to their child as they stepped onto the loading ramp of a starship, embarking on a journey to the unexplored areas of the Galaxy.

"Thank you." Nadae chose her words carefully. She did not thank him for just his advice that he spoke to her on a balcony of the Palace. She thanked him for comforting her over her brother's departure, bruising her skin and breaking her bones during training, taking her to Wild Space to find her lightsaber, giving her the knowledge of the Force that she knew now.

A sudden memory came to her; her and her Master were on a diplomatic mission to Agora in her early Jedi Ambassador days. The ship's hyperdrive had leaked and rendered itself useless after the first hyperspace jump and the power surge caused the shield generator and commlinks to be knocked out, so her and her Master were floating towards their destination for a month alone, aside from each other's company. Yoda had taken to attempting to repair the commlink and began searching through the spare parts shelf of the engineering bay. She had found him some while later inside said parts shelf throwing various technical bits and bobs out with numerous mutterings of 'no!' and 'bah!' and 'useless!'. Such a pity neither of them were very good at fixing things.

Most people knew Yoda as Grandmaster of the Jedi Order, a little green man whose words were considered the wisest of all, containing vast amounts of knowledge in his little head. Nadae knew him mostly as the little green old man who made a mess of spare parts and was a very bad singer. He was kind but strict and harsh when it came to training but Nadae was thankful for that; pain was an excellent teacher.

It wasn't a very meaningful memory in retrospect, but it was Nadae's memory that glimpsed at Yoda in a way no one else could. It was her memory to cherish and hers only.

"Rest, you need." He said. "A big day for you tomorrow, it is, hmm?"

She left her Master to meditate on the balcony. Nadae left the lounge feeling a heavy ambivalence rest upon her shoulders.

No more little green man's terrible singing.

But something else was to come. She didn't know what, and she didn't like not knowing what, but it was coming nonetheless.

She took the stairs to one of the lower levels to the preparation room they had set up. A final inspection of her hiking gear couldn't go unharmed – but from experience she knew not to fiddle with things too much.

"I don't believe the transistor belongs in that part, Seefor." Came a familiar voice from behind the door.

Several chatterish beeps followed.

"No, I do not have a degree in physics."

Nadae opened the door to find the man she had hoped to avoid deep in an argument with the most non-cooperative astromech in existence. More beeps.

"You… you have lecture slides?" Obi-Wan was sitting on a chair with his feet on the table, covered in hiking gear, as he held a device in his hand and waved a screwdriver in the air. "Oh, Padawan Dravvaadas. How in the living daylight does your droid have university lecture slides? That aren't from the Temple? In his memory banks?"

Nadae found herself rocking on her heels and twiddling her thumbs behind her back.

"Nadae?"

The view of the pine trees out the window suddenly became interesting. "I wonder what size the life rings are in the trees here are…"

"Oh, that would be an interesting study…" Obi-Wan got to his feet and stood next to Nadae to study the trees. After a brief moment he shook his head and that endearing frown made it back onto his face. "Don't distract me! What did Seefor do?"

It was an uncomfortably long time before Nadae decided to speak. "The history texts at the Temple became tiresome to read and…"

"Oh no," Obi-Wan's hand went to his forehead.

"And physics is something entirely new! I haven't studied physics before!" she defended.

"So you sent Seefor in to download lecture slides on electronics."

"I am terrible with wires!"

Obi-Wan's expression from one raised eyebrow to soft and sympathetic. "I have missed this."

This was what she was trying to avoid, and yet she walked right into it.

A strand of her hair came loose and she tucked it behind her ear. She didn't wear her usual Jedi robes; today she was in her training gear again and the maids had braided her hair into a ring around the crown of her hair, a traditional Alderaanian style. She felt vulnerable.

"Seefor, leave." She spoke through the lump in her throat. The droid probably read her physiology signs and decided it was better to simply obey his owner and left the room, pressing the controls behind him and the door slid shut.

Three years' worth of tension had suddenly risen from the ground. "Why are you doing this now?"

"We had to talk at some point."

"Why?"

Obi-Wan's frown came back to his face. "Did you just ask 'why'?"

"Yes. Now tell me why."

Now he was in disbelief. "Because I haven't been able to stop thinking about it." she could feel through the Force the frustration suddenly rising in him. This was new to see as Obi-Wan was always good at remaining calm. He, too, suddenly found himself wanting to be distracted by something else and picked up an electronic board which belonged to Nadae's electronic wrist piece which was to read her vital signs. Both of them had frowns on their foreheads as Nadae observed Obi-Wan and Obi-Wan fiddled with the board. "You know I care about you." He stated, clear and simple.

"You know we can't do this." She felt a pain when she said those words, as if she were convincing herself that she knew she cared also.

Well, she cared… but it wasn't… she didn't know!

"I knew you'd say that- ow!" he'd cut himself on a small sharp spike of the electronic board, immediately dropping it to the table and bringing his finger to his mouth.

"Here," Nadae strode over to Obi-Wan and grabbed his hand to inspect the small bleeding cut on his left ring finger. She knew exactly what to do, she'd done this many times before alone in her chambers with broken bones.

She grabbed his hand tightly with one hand and hovered the other over the small cut. She focused her thoughts onto the bleeding, focusing on the flow of his blood to slow so she could mend the broken cells of his skin back together. Once she was done, she immediately dropped his hand and put her own behind her back. She didn't need to think about holding his hand.

He looked at his now mended finger and wiggled it in front of his face, making sure it was working properly. "I didn't know you could Force Heal."

"Self-taught. Needed it."

And then he was glaring at her, crossed arms and everything, like she was a little youngling who had been caught using a broomstick as a lightsaber. "You never went to the medbay, did you? Like Yoda thought?"

And it was her turn to cross her arms and appear stern. Most of the times she had done this Obi-Wan in the past, it hadn't worked because she was 'so small she looked terrifyingly adorable'.

"Don't give me that look." He didn't falter, which was just as well because Nadae wanted him to take her seriously this time. "You never once went to the medbay after training."

"I learnt a new skill." She defied. "It worked out in the end."

"You can learn to Force Heal without experimenting on yourself! You could've gotten proper training and proper medical care both at once." He sighed and brought a hand to his beard. "Going to get your body healed isn't a sign of weakness."

She had been brutal on herself in her teenage years. Yoda was a brutal but soft teacher, always making sure once she was hurt she could be mended by a doctor. Then one day she'd broken her radius in a training exercise and Yoda had instructed she visit the medbay. And then the thought came across her head 'Jedi survive in even the harshest of conditions', and she knew she'd have to harden herself and teach herself how to heal her own wounds rather than see a doctor. And yes they were poor first attempts, hence a few scars and permanent nerve issues, but she got better over time. She hadn't seen a doctor since she was eleven.

"But I survived," she pointed out. "which means I can survive worse." She couldn't understand why Obi-Wan would be upset about this, she was a perfectly functional human being. Aside from the whole Barsen'thor thing.

"I care about you. I care about whether you're hurt or not and whether you're doing the right thing about it." She noticed that he was looking anywhere else in the room that wasn't her. "I care about how you feel."

Her heartbeat spiked. She hadn't intended for it to do so. "You don't know how I feel."

"I know you don't want to feel." But then he looked right into her eyes, begging for something that he so desperately needed to hear. "I want to know how you feel about me." He spoke quietly and taking a few steps closer to her. At this distance he was towering over her. "How you really feel."

She felt as though she were on her Senate podium again; in the centre of the room with all eyes on her with no escape. Vulnerable. She didn't care for feeling vulnerable.

She didn't say anything.

"Nadae, I can't know for sure unless you tell me."

She didn't say a word. A hand came to her cheek and held it, desperate eyes waiting for an answer. She clenched her fists and her throat tightened. Her eyes slammed shut.

"Little Bird,"

And how the name brought her home. How she had unknowingly longed for his voice to say that name. How human she felt.

It reminded her they shouldn't be in this situation. It wasn't the way of the Jedi.

The hand dropped from her cheek and she felt the presence of his body slowly move away. "I understand." He began walking for the door. "If you say so." Nadae presumed that was a joke for himself, helping him lighten his mood. He was failing miserably. She heard him attempt to key the door open.

Obi-Wan should leave. He should. This wasn't what they were meant to be doing. It's for the best she thought to herself.

"Why isn't the door working?" she heard him mutter softly to himself.

Obi-Wan should be going. Nadae and Obi-Wan were not meant to be doing this. Obi-Wan should go. He should go. He should go.

"Nads, why won't the door open?"

She clenched her fists so tightly she knew her body was shaking. Her eyes were squeezed shut. Tears threatened to drop and if she opened them she knew she would do so.

"Nadae?" She felt his presence return to her front. He would be able to see her shaking in front of him. "You don't want me to go, do you?"

He spoke her thoughts for her. The thoughts that she dare not think. He had simply reached down into her core and pulled them up and read them. She didn't understand how he could do that, nor was he supposed to.

She didn't intentionally keep the door shut with the Force, but she knew she had.

The same hand traced the side of her face down from her forehead to hold her chin again. She opened her eyes bright and glittering with water and wide as she stared at Obi-Wan, so tremendously scared that her lips quivered.

He should leave, but she didn't want him to, and it frightened her.

"No," she whispered so softly that if someone were across the room they wouldn't have heard her. Just Obi-Wan.

Both of his hands found their way to her jawline and he stared down at her, and his face was full tenderness. "I want to do it right this time."

Nadae couldn't say anymore. She didn't want to say anymore.

Obi-Wan lowered his head further and pulled hers up. He caressed his lips over hers and Nadae had never felt anything as soft and warm. One of his hands went to the back of her neck and the other found its way to rest on her hip. His beard was exquisitely rough against her skin as he continued the kiss, and her own hands found their way to his shoulders.

She couldn't describe why, but she knew she wanted more, and so her own lips responded to Obi-Wan's movements. At her response, the hand on her waist moved to her back and pulled her closer.

It was a forbidden dream that was filled with soft clouds and the moonlight.

It wasn't long before Obi-Wan parted they lips, but he kept holding onto her and resting his forehead on hers. "You don't regret this, do you?"

Nadae was looking into his questioning eyes again, full of questions herself. "What is this?"

He considered his answer for a moment, knowing if he said something too bluntly or the wrong thing she would scamper away back into the shadows of the Jedi Code.

"Whatever you want it to be."

so, hi.

Sorry for the long wait (again), I have a back injury so sitting down at my computer has proven to be quite a difficult task. I wrote this little pieces at a time.

SOOOO whatever the hell is going on between these two idiots is finally starting to blossom :) would be a pity :) if the author :) were to ruin :) obi-wan's feelings :) much later :) in the series :) again :)

Also, fun side note, I was doing the Internets and I stumbled across a screenshot of messages between two people and it perfectly described Luke and Kat's relationship to me;
Kat: "I'll see you in hell!"
Luke: "are you asking me on a date? i accept"

That's... that's all I had to say, really.

- yoda-is-cool.