Star Wars: Lost and loging

'I care!'

She didn't even quite comprehend yet what about that statement caused him to change his mind. Was it her vocally and angrily expressing her opinion? Was it her declaring that she cared, and had an attachment to the beings who also served in the Order? She truly was no closer to understanding his logic now than when she had started to ponder his actions and words.

All she knew was that she would stay with them.

With the final revelation that she would stay aboard the Gryffindor, her legs collapsed out from underneath her.

All at once the past few days caught up with her. From the near-escapes on Nar Shaddaa, to seeing Force abilities that she'd never dreamed of, to seeing the heartbreaking scene of Harry speaking with the slaves, to meeting with the Council, and now securing her spot on the ship after being provoked.

She felt tears fall down her face as she realized she wouldn't be kicked or ordered off the ship that promised to potentially open a path to a future that didn't involve the death of everyone she knew… including herself.

She struggled to pull herself together, trying to calm herself but it all hit her at once. The first sob finally broke through.

She put her hand to her head as the tears fell while she tried to calm the storm of emotions. The vision had impacted her so viscerally, the deaths of so many dying in pain, agony, and betrayal. She had felt them all. Not the least of which was her own death. The fear, the hurt, the broken hope and dreams that came with each death. The sensation of sinking into darkness and then… nothing. Horrifying.

She had barely any time to ponder that vision before she'd been pushed to try and stay on the ship, and then talk to the Jedi Council, and then argued with Harry. She hadn't had any time to process everything. She had sectioned off her reaction to the vision, focusing on the issues at hand. But now, absolutely alone in essentially a storage closet of a strange ship, it overwhelmed her all at once.

"Here," a soft voice said.

She jerked in surprise at the sudden presence of someone else in the room, someone she hadn't even sensed. Aayla further flinched that anyone could see her like this, rubbing her eyes rapidly, even knowing it was futile. Many of the hardline Masters of the Order would harshly berate her for such a loss of composure.

She looked up and started slightly. Not a few inches from her was Harry. He was kneeling down and holding out a clean piece of finely tailored cloth for her to take. The action was so unexpected that Aayla looked at him blankly, not comprehending.

Harry smiled a kind smile and reached forward and wiped the cloth over her cheek in a surprisingly gentle touch.

She held still though a brief frown crossed her face as even the touch didn't seem to generate any sort of reading on his emotions. For an empath, that confused her further. She was so used to feeling a rush of emotions when there was a touch. It told her about people, their thoughts and intentions.

She'd often felt the gamut of emotions, happiness, gratefulness, anger, deceit, though it was usually always tinged with attraction or lust. Except Harry. He was still a complete blank to her.

He continued to wipe gently at the stray tears that still were on her face and had collected at her chin. She took the piece of cloth from him in order to begin wiping her own face as she took another steadying breath, cursing herself for the shudder in it. "I'm sorry. I'm a Jedi… I shouldn't just… break down like this."

Harry snorted a little bit, as he turned and easily sat down beside her on the ground. Though instead of scorn or irritation that had been there earlier, his face now reflected a bit of sadness. "Like I said. You're a living being. I know this may come as a shock but emotions are okay." At her lack of response, and the way she turned her head to look away in shame, Harry reached over and turned her head gently but insistently back toward him to look into her eyes. "You're not going to fall to the Dark Side and take over the galaxy because your emotions finally got the best of you in a stressful time while all alone in the back of a ship after what could charitably be called a long day."

Aayla smiled a little bit at the weak joke, but the result was still only temporary. She felt like a failure. No other Jedi behaved like this, at least as far as she knew. She had always been called emotional, and her empathic abilities hadn't helped, but to lose her composure like this was definitely not the Jedi way.

Harry settled down quietly, leaning back against the bulkhead as he watched Aayla studiously avoid his gaze. He hadn't meant to push her to a point where she broke like that. He had simply been pushing her buttons to try and get her to see the hypocrisy of her statements and the Order's tenets as a whole.

He had no problem reducing someone to tears if the situation called for it. But… the brief explosion of emotion was what he expected, not a complete collapse like he was seeing.

"Do you want to talk about it?" he asked softly.

Aayla looked at him and frowned, instead of pondering why she should open up and spill her deepest secrets and hidden shame to a total stranger, she instead blurted out, "Why are you acting so different?" Harry tilted his head with a little bit of an amused smile on his face, inviting her to continue.

Aayla gestured obliquely, clarifying her question "Just a minute ago you were… cold and… uncaring."

Harry raised an eyebrow a hint of a smile on his face, "You mean emotionless."

Aayla flinched slightly at that statement and deflated immediately. Emotionless was truly not a state that Jedi coveted. Serenity was the goal, but in the end, they weren't all that different. Either way, it was rare she achieved a sense of serenity, doubly so because of the emotions she constantly sensed from others with her empathy. It was just as difficult for her not to succumb to her baser instincts and emotions when confronted with a stressful situation. Normally she managed to control herself so that she didn't end up in this state, but Harry had hit several soft points for her.

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