The Jedi And The Warrior

The First Brother

A stampede of fleeing people was trying to cut her off.

Flyra shoved against the panicking crowd, forcing her way through countless bodies that seemed intent on keeping her away from Obi-Wan. She had lost him in the Temple, her moment of hesitation costing her, but he must have raised the alarm if the torrent of fleeing civilians was any indication.

A mixture of senators and traders and mechanics pushed past her, but Flyra ducked between two cloaked men and struggled onwards, trying desperately to peer above the crowd. She was battling against the tides of circumstance, intent upon turning her the other way.

She would not. Not now. Not today.

"Obi-Wan!" she called over the panic, but she could not see him amongst the Padawans lining the hallway, doing their best to control the stampede.

A few paces ahead of her, Flyra could glimpse a doorway leading off onto another hallway. One or two people trickled from it, joining the flow of panic, but for the most part it was empty. She battled the few steps it took her to reach the entrance, and ducked away from the crowd.

Quiet hit her, and stillness, and she paused to draw in deep breaths. She pressed herself against the wall, leaning her head against the cool surface. Turning, she could see the people still hurrying past in a burst of colours and faces, but the tide was slowing to a trickle as the majority evacuated the Temple. Flyra turned away, pushing herself from the wall and heading down her hallway. She wished fervently for the Force, if only so that she could find Obi-Wan.

She broke into a run, turning corners and weaving through corridors, tearing through the endless labyrinth of a Temple she had never bothered to explore, until she became completely disorientated. Until she had no idea if she was heading for safety or danger. The halls around her were so silent it was as though she burst into a new tomb with every corner she turned. She panted, slowing to a stop in yet another quiet, empty hallway that looked just the same as the last.

"Obi-Wan," she muttered under her breath, real fear clogging her throat suddenly until she could barely breathe.

Alone. She was alone, and she was no one's priority, and it wouldn't matter if she remained lost here in this perpetual peace, in this stale silence, because she did not matter.

She could almost see it, then. The city and the Temple forgotten, the people that lived in it swept onwards by the tides of time, while she remained here, wandering the unshifting, endless halls because the world had no need of her. Vines would grow over the structures of man, reclaiming it, and trees would shoulder their way above the buildings, and still she would be here, until all the world was changed, until the years of her life were spent and wasted.

And the Warriors of Fate... they would never stop hunting her. Perhaps she didn't want them to.

But footsteps echoed down the hallway ahead of her, and Flyra went rigid. Enemy or friend. She could not tell.

And then he was there, Obi-Wan, turning the corner into her hallway. Something like hope leaped in her heart, and she went to meet him. His arm was bleeding again, staining his tunic crimson, and a young Padawan whose name she did not know ran beside him — he had pale hair like Obi-Wan's, but a dark tan kissed his cheeks.

Obi-Wan reached her side, placing a hand on her arm, just below her elbow. "Are you all right?" he asked, and his eyes were frightened. "I was afraid... afraid you had gone."

She stared at him, her fear suddenly hitting her once again, fear and despair and hopelessness. She was tired. So, so tired. She gripped onto Obi-Wan's arm, so hard she thought her nails might be digging in, and he frowned down at her.