The Unchronicled Adventures of Ahsoka Tano, Book Eight

Chapter Eleven: Curiosity And Anakin

ANAKIN SKYWALKER

Anakin was lying down on his bed in the darkness of his room in the New Jedi Temple, his legs tucked to his chest. He was wearing his undermost shirt and his loose Jedi pants, the clothes he usually slept in. Wearing his undergarments to sleep in was a tactic he had picked up during the Clone Wars, because if he ever needed to wake up quickly to fight, he could just put his other clothes on top of it.

He was thinking about Padme. He wanted her to come back to Cialone, where he could see her again. But he knew that she was busy on Alderaan, talking with Senator Organa and seeing Leia again.

He smiled, remembering how she had promised she would take pictures of his daughter and send them to him.

But Anakin still missed her. He, Lux, Ahsoka and Rex were in actuality the only people other than she who knew what the true purpose of her mission was: finding the necessary funds to recreate the Clone Army of the Republic. And visiting the home planets of her old political allies was the first step.

He had no idea how she planned to do it, but knowing her, it could be anything. She had her ways of getting what she wanted by the best means possible. Because, as he always said, ‘You can take the Senator away from the Senate, but you can’t take the Senate away from the Senator.’

He had fulfilled his part of the deal. He had gone back to Kamino, and successfully convinced the new Prime Minister to recreate the Clone Army with the Jango Fett DNA type, an old sample of which they still happened to have.

They would need to at least double their army to make a significant threat against the Empire. The Kaminoan cloners had named their price, and he had reported back to Padme with their answer. And it was going to be costly.

Suddenly the door opened. He glanced up, catching sight of Ahsoka, clad in her Jedi cloak, which completely hid her figure. It was strange that she had started wearing looser clothes that she would have absolutely despised a few months ago.

 “Ahsoka, I just want to be alone,” he mumbled, but she wasn’t deterred.

“Anakin, you need someone right now,” she said, sitting down beside him. She pushed one of her striped lekku off her shoulder. “Padme’s away, Amni’s busy, and Obi-Wan is still on Tatooine. Which leaves me.”

He managed a slight smile. “It’s like our roles are switched, now. You used to be the one who needed guidance, who needed someone to be there for you. Now it’s me, and you’re the one offering comfort.”

“We all have our ups and downs. Everyone in this galaxy is either having a good time in their life or a bad one. It’s just that I can usually hide it. You can, too.”

He sat up. “What kind of time are you in?”

Ahsoka scrunched the white lines that were her eyebrows, which, along with the other ornate markings on her face, stood out against her orangey-brown skin tone. She was an colorful combination of teal-and-white, and tan-and-white.

“You know, I’m not entirely sure,” she said. “Sometimes I feel like I’m on top of the world, and sometimes I feel like I’m underneath it, supporting all its weight.”

“Why? Why aren’t you sure?”

She tensed for a split-second, then reverted back to normal. “Let’s just say that there are some things that should stay buried, Master. For everyone’s sake,” she said in a strange tone of voice. It was sort of like she knew things that he didn’t.

She got up and walked to the door. “I hope you feel better. We’re going soon, and we need you, Anakin.”

As Ahsoka walked out of the room, one sleeve of her cloak slipped off her shoulder. As she stopped to right it, the light from outside his darkened room did something curious to her silhouette. It almost made it look like there was just the slightest bulge in her clothing where her stomach was.

Then with a last look at him, she left, leaving Anakin to think. And, as he thought about what he had just seen, suspicions blossomed in his mind.

*Curiosity killed the cat...But will it get the Jedi too? And what could he suspect? Is there something that Ahsoka's hiding that the others don't know? And will it be too late when they find out? And what has Maul been up to in the few months following the last confrontation of the Jedi and Sith exiles? You'll find out in the next action-packed chapter of The Unchronicled Adventures Of Ahsoka Tano!

Man... To quote the words of Obi-Wan Kenobi in all his awesomeness, (except wtihout the sarcasm) *le British accent* That was good!

I loved that last sentence, with the imagery of suspicions blooming in his mind... But I have to go, I want to get the next chapter up and keep working on the one after that.

Become the Jedi you should be and may the Force be with you,

Sharron