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Tweak says, "Mind if I borrow your date?"

Mara Jade Skywalker is always surprising you (lifeyoulive) wrote in wariscoming,
@ 2012-08-23 01:05:00

Entry tags:

luke skywalker, mara jade skywalker, river tam

Who: Mara, Luke and River Tam (this is also posting order to avoid confusion!)
What: After a run in with Darth Caedus and needing to relax, clearly that translates to family time!
When: Slightly BACKDATED to late afternoon/early evening of the 22nd
Where: Their apartment
Warning: Uh...TBA

That dose of Darth Caedus was certainly something Mara could have done without. Of course, since she'd showed up here she knew Caedus was always inside Jacen, lurking somewhere under the surface. The kind of darkness he had would always be there in some form or another. So truthfully, the events of the other night had been something she'd always known could be a possibility. But that didn't mean she was prepared to feel that presence in the Force. That didn't mean she was even mentally capable of holding herself back. And oh, she had wanted to deliver a death blow to Caedus. The only reason she hadn't tried to was because Luke had managed to talk her out of it. And it was difficult to let go of that, despite seeing that Jacen seemed to be getting a grip on himself again. Mara wasn't going to even try to talk to Jacen just yet, not until she was calm and not fighting with herself about killing her nephew.

That was a promise she would always keep to Jacen, that she would kill him if he Fell again and couldn't be saved. But as the lowered inhibitions seemed to prove to her, she seemed quick to bypass the waiting to determine if Jacen could be saved. Then again when Caedus sat there and pressed her buttons, when she felt that same presence she'd felt on Kavan, she was quick to attack. Mara refused to let Caedus hurt anyone else. She was just glad her and Luke had arrived when they did so Tenel Ka was not hurt more than she could have been.

So in trying to unwind herself from the sudden presence of her murderer, Mara was trying to keep the darker thoughts at bay. She had been meditating in the bedroom, trying to find her inner calm. Mara had let herself linger in the meditation a bit longer than she usually did simply to try and get ahold of that inner calm and try to keep her thoughts at bay. Finally, she came out of it and took a deep breath, running a hand through her long red hair. After some moments, she stood up and headed to the living room deciding to see what was on television. Perhaps she would find an interesting movie or some program on the Discovery channel or History channel. She didn't care for what passed for entertainment shows, she was more into the documentaries that taught her something about this planet or this universe. Planting herself on the couch, she settled into it, drawing a leg underneath her as she grabbed the remote and started to flip through the channels, just wanting something to take her mind off of subjects she didn't want to think about.

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theskywalker
2012-08-23 06:22 am UTC (link)

Luke was sitting, delving deep into the Force, searching his feelings and the Force for the answer as to whether he had done the right thing the other day in saving Jacen, in not killing Caedus, exactly. He sat, and his mind searched for answers he was not sure he would find. All he knew was how much Tenel Ka loved Jacen, and Allana did, and he wanted... he did not want Allana to grow up without Jacen, or Tenel Ka to feel the pain of losing Jacen forever.

Luke sighed as he floated in the Force, a soundless exhalation, and then he heard the sound of his wife moving around, and he chuckled, and looked down. he was sitting, after all, on the ceiling of the living room, and his eyes were warm and loving as he looked to her. Love cascaded across their link, and the ever present small tinge of lust, but also comfort, and an almost touch.

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notmymemory
2012-08-23 03:49 pm UTC (link)

River was oddly lucid in the days following the lowered inhibitions. Well, lucid for her. Once Dark had left, it had been easier to focus. The nightmares were still there. The need to run. To fight. Needs she didn't understand and the ever presence of having memories which were not her own. The feelings that were not her own. They said she could shield herself but she wasn't trying. But she did try. But forced energy around her made her panic and the Academy had made sure that she would feel everything. In the Black in had been different. She had known everyone there. Had latched onto them and their familiarity. And Simon. Simon had been there.

Here she had Luke and Mara. And they were nice. They were calm. She had the string from Luke, but sometimes it didn't work. Not when she'd been at the carnival. But they didn't know that. Because she hadn't been taken. And she didn't know what the price was for staring into the mirror. For seeing herself sane. It was impossible to grant.

Caedus had tried to throw her. No. He had just said what he always held back. Jacen. That she was weak. But she wasn't weak. There were days when she was a terrified hiding in the closet fort she had made with Simon's blanket. But there was always something more. A memory just below the surface. The threat of being put to sleep again. Just as she had been back home, before showing up. The Fruity Oaty Bar commercial and blackness. But the injuries of a fight.

Luke amused her. He was on the ceiling. Just floating. It should seem odd, but River found the oddest of things normal and the most normal of things odd. She saw too much, felt too much, knew too much. There were fallacies in even the most innocent of books. It was annoying. Still, at least it was calm. Even if the lust was annoying. It made her scrunch up her nose. She had learned what that feeling meant, it had confused her before, just feeling it, but now, well, it was something she didn't really want to think about. But it was always lurking just not overwhelming most of the time.

Silently, as the only time she ever really made a noise was when she was in her boots, River left the dining room where she'd been working on a theoretical physics equation. There was no reason to. She'd just been bored. But Luke was on the the ceiling and Mara was avoiding. They all avoided. And she knew maybe people wouldn't understand her comments to Jacen. But that was okay. Because they had been straight forward, at least for her, and she meant them because to fight darkness was a constant battle and the spell made it not happen but it was a reminder on why he had to fight. Without a word, River sat on the couch next to Mara, pulling her legs into herself.

"They're wrong."

It could be about anything. People who were quick to judge. Or about the documentary that had just shown up on the screen. With River, no one could ever really know what she meant at first comment.

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lifeyoulive
2012-08-23 08:38 pm UTC (link)

The Jedi Master knew she was avoiding, but she felt justified in doing so. After all, dwelling on the issue too much would only work her up and remember her own death. She didn't want to think about that. She was alive here, and she was holding onto that. And having Luke here now, it made everything easier. She was always one who could easily adapt to changes around her, so she hadn't taken much time to adjust to this place. It had also helped to have Jaina there. Of course, Mara still didn't exactly like that Jaina was from the Trickster Goddess point in time, but she hoped that things could change as time went on now that more of the family was here. Really, only Leia, Han and Ben were missing. Oh how she missed Ben and worried about him. She was always worried. Mara was a mother through and through, and she tended to be overprotective more often than not.

So really, when River had needed help, needed someone, that tapped right into Mara's maternal side. Of course it had been somewhat difficult at first, learning River's pattern of speech and so forth, but now she'd come to at least understand the girl better. So really, she wasn't exactly surprised any longer by things River said or did.

When she felt Luke's love across their link, she smiled, letting the feeling settle into her. She glanced up at him and sent her love to him through the their link. It was an interesting sight to see her husband floating on the ceiling, but she didn't comment on it. She had the ability to levitate as well, but she hadn't planned to join him on the ceiling. Perhaps later if he didn't come down, she'd go up after him, but time would tell if she'd have to take that course of action or not.

As River came and sat next to her, Mara turned her emerald gaze to her, tilting her head slightly at her words. It was difficult to tell what she was commenting on. The girl was psychic, so she could be commenting about anyone. Or she could be commenting about the documentary on the television. Either way, Mara was curious.

"Many people are wrong." She gave her own vague answer, wondering where that would turn the conversation.

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theskywalker
2012-08-24 08:30 am UTC (link)

Luke canted his head at the entrance of River. She was an interesting girl, and one whose presence had led to him sharpening up his mental walls quite thoroughly. She was a reader, something rare even in a world of Jedi. She made him curious, and he wished he knew enough to help her.

Her entrance and her statement, the way she moved and held herself as she sat, made him move to flip and land sooner than he might have otherwise. He landed with his normal ease, eyes on the pair, and a small smile creeping over his face. It had been a long time since he had enjoyed a scene of family, and yet this was growing into one, sort of, slowly. The re-meeting with his wife, the slowly growing of familiarity with River, and the settling into this newer home, all of it made for a warmth and a joy that made the days better.

Most of them, anyway. He took a seat opposite the women and settled in, calm eyes and warm thoughts present as he watched them.

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notmymemory
2012-08-25 12:57 am UTC (link)

It was not just the world of the Jedi where readers were rare. She knew it was rare back home as well. Wash had thought it out of science fiction even though they lived on a space ship. But it wasn't by choice. She was intuitive before, right? Or had she always been a reader? She didn't know. Everything from the Academy blurred together and so what was from that and she had always been born with, it was left unknown. Beyond her intellect. She'd been correcting Simon's homework long before the Academy. Still, the other things, the feeling of everything, the ability to fight... those were created. Stuck in her. With the memories that kept her awake because she didn't know what they were of. Because they weren't hers.

Still, there was familiarity here. It wasn't home, they weren't her family, but they had a family unit all the same. Perhaps it was what all three of them needed. Why they bonded together. No. Luke and Mara were connected, married, in love. She was the stray. The one without a family once the Seal stole Simon from her. The one who's family before had been a bunch of other strays all together on Serenity. They had found one another and they had become family. Like here.

At the comment, the brunette looked to Mara, tilting her head to the side. Really, there were a lot of things. Hypocrisy, judgment... but Mara needed to relax and River was lucid. Which meant she knew what was needed and wasn't so lost in all the emotions that she could keep up. And they calmed her. So she should calm them.

"The mechanics of the ship."

And so River went into a very animated and detailed explanation on just why the documentary on the Hindenburg was wrong. Why they had failed. Why they were wrong in what history said was the truth. Because they didn't understand. It was all so very obvious. To someone like River. No one else, but she knew why she was right. She could easily draw up the comparisons if necessary.

Documentaries were often wrong, though. She was used to it.

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lifeyoulive
2012-08-27 09:08 am UTC (link)

In truth, Mara liked having this family unit. River may not be hers and Luke's biologically, but it didn't take blood to make a family. All one needed was the capacity to love and be connected with others. And the fact that this little family unit came without having Jedi family drama tacked onto it and beyond refreshing. Luke might take offense if he knew that, but Mara would stand by it. Of course, it was worse here than it had been in their own universe because of everyone being from different points in time. There was so much tension between them all, and it seemed that when they tried to come together as an actual family, something would happen to break them apart again.

So she was incredibly grateful that Luke was here, that River was here. It gave her relief from her mixed feelings on Jacen, which were now tilted far more in the direction of being hate currently. Mara did need that balance to keep her from killing Jacen, which is what she currently wanted to do. But that wouldn't solve anything, save to quench the thirst for vengeance that Mara had. And oh, it was there, she just kept it to herself. She had managed to keep it hidden, especially after Jacen had saved her life after Pestilence had been disposed of. But now it was trying to come to the surface, and so she tried to do what she could to keep it from getting to that point.

As Mara listened to the explanation of why the documentary was wrong, she surprisingly followed along. After all, Mara was a pilot, among about a thousand other things, but she'd flown many different kinds of ships in her time. So really, she could see River's explanation. Of course, without the girl pointing it out, Mara wouldn't have seen it.

"It sounds like they could've used a mechanic from Coruscant that knew how to properly build aircraft." And that was Mara's simple response. "Now that you mentioned it, it's a wonder that the Hindenburg ever got airborne to begin with."

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theskywalker
2012-08-27 11:20 pm UTC (link)

Luke liked this. Listening to them, to their words and how they talked, and the feel of it. He was no natural reader, but being in the same room with them, he kept an 'ear' out, so to speak, and when they were like this, it felt good. These two women, one who was his wife, his other half, and his soul mate, for want of a better word, and one who was starting to feel almost like she could be a daughter, a person he cared about.

One of his few regrets from his previous life was that he and his wife had never found time to have a daughter as well as Ben, their son. It was not a fault of either, but simply the way of their times and that it had never been a priority. River felt much like he had thought a daughter could, and he wondered truly, at the way life worked, and the universes wandered. The Force always sent him where he was needed most, and this was his place now. He was glad of it too, as he listened, remembering his own mechanical works, and the ship he had built. That had been long ago, though, before Mara even. And he had been a very foolish young man then.

For now, he relished the sound of their voices, and that quiet happiness radiated from him, calm and peacefully. His smile, likely also gave away his joy.

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notmymemory
2012-09-01 02:24 am UTC (link)

"People on Earth that Was had limited understanding. It's not their fault." And it wasn't. After all, things were being learned every day. New discoveries. There was so much advancement even now from the time when the Hindenburg had been built. Add in the time she was from in which things were even more advanced in regards to ships, and what was an obvious mistake to her would seem accurate, even in the year 2012. It was why the documentaries had it wrong.

Untangling her legs from her curled up position, the dancer moved to the dining room table where she had her notes she'd been writing, picking up a pen and some paper before kneeling at the coffee table and started sketching. As she sketched, the teen pointed out the mechanics of the Hidenburg, the structure and means of transportation. It was information she had gathered from watching the documentary as the Hidenburg was so historic and inconsequential in her time that she had never read of it.

She knew, though. Knew of the vengeance lurking within Mara. The darkness. The pain. The control she kept on herself. She knew that pain between them. People were quieter right now. It was a calm, but it was something she would take. They were all lost in the wood, some just preferred to be lost. Like the captain. She missed her family. Her crew. But they were better off without her. Safer. She knew that she'd go back to being asleep in her world. But she couldn't change that.

"If they had just rewired this.. it would have been better."

She'd been rewired. And while the Alliance thought it was for the better, it wasn't. And so the ticking would continue, the danger lurking. She knew she was dangerous and while running would save the two, she knew they wouldn't let her so she was content to talk ship mechanics for as long as she could focus and hold onto the lucidity as long as possible.

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lifeyoulive
2012-09-08 02:41 am UTC (link)

Well yes, River had a point. Sometimes people had to make mistakes in order to further progress. Mistakes really were the way people learned what needed to be corrected in order to move technology forward. It had been true in her universe, and it was true here. People could only use what they had at their fingertips, so clearly nothing was perfect. Sometimes disaster was needed to happen in order for the next step in technological advancement to be better and safer.

When River got up to grab some paper and a pen, Mara glanced over at Luke for a moment. It was difficult to keep herself from going after Jacen right now, but she was trying. Her need for vengeance was subsiding little by little at least. Meditation helped, but also keeping her focus on Luke and River helped. As long as she could focus on her love and allow herself to exert her maternal side, she wouldn't suddenly disappear and find Jacen. The last thing anyone needed was her confronting and fighting Jacen right now. Even Mara herself didn't exactly want to fight him. It would only make the situation all the worse, and that wasn't something she wanted. She wanted to make it better, so keeping her focus on things that wouldn't nurture the vengeance within her had to do.

Looking back at River as she began to sketch, Mara slid off the couch and moved to kneel beside her, looking at the sketch. Running a hand through her hair, she pulled her red locks over one shoulder to keep it from obstructing her view. Now she was able to follow River's drawing and explanation. She wasn't exactly a mechanic, but she had done enough odds-and-ends jobs in her life to know these kinds of things. So she nodded in understanding when River pointed out what needed to be rewired.

"It would seem that they discovered that afterwards and were able to engineer a new one that would not suffer the same fate." She smiled at River, thinking, not for the first time, that the girl was incredibly intelligent. Mara respected that, and it made her a bit sad to know that someone had tortured her. People really could be so cruel sometimes. But she was glad that River was able to have periods of lucidity. "Sometimes it does take a tragedy to highlight the short comings of things so that they can be made better."

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theskywalker
2012-09-11 03:26 am UTC (link)

Luke reached out to Mara, letting his mind touch hers through the link, sharing his own knowledge of mechanics with her, and allowing him to see the drawings without moving. His mind was floating peacefully ri9ght now, emitting only warmth and peace, and love, a thing he held greatly for Mara, and was starting to feel in a kind for River.

"Only through great struggle can things be improved without conflict. It takes... a lot of work most people are not willing to put out. But some do and those push forward innovation where most do not." His addition to the conversation was spoken softly.

It was nice, watching them, seeing their interaction and his connection to the Force seemed to strengthen in the peace of it, the sheer pleasantness of it, filling him with a warmth and a strength that he rarely felt outside of meditation.

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