The Young Republic | A Star Wars Story

Chapter 16

Dooku and Friends

"Sometimes, accepting help is harder than offering it."

TW: There is some heavy self-depreciation in this chapter in a later scene.

The trip to Sorenno was surprisingly tame. No tying up, no gag, no collars or cuffs or threats. Just Xena sitting awkwardly in the back of Count Dooku's solar sailer with only silence as her friend. She did try to ask a question, but his tone upon answering made her shut up afterwards.

"How did you find me?"

"Bonteri"

Xena started planning on how to secretly murder the sly little snitch. Silently, of course, she didn't want to disturb the little peace in the solar sailer. The Sith's presence was enough to make Xena complacent; she knew that the carefully constructed presence of calm held back something scary and ruthless.

And maybe Xena was just a tiny bit curious about the man.

While she sat in the endless blue of hyperspace, Xena tried to summon all her knowledge about the Count. He was Qui-Gon's master, which was... interesting. Qui-Gon was a great man, a perfect Jedi in Xena's eye. He had helped and guided Xena in many, many uncomfortable situations. So how the kriffing hell did such a wonderful man come to existence through the teachings of a Sith?

Contrary to belief, Xena wasn't stupid. Not that stupid, at least. Sometimes her peanut-sized brain spun just fast enough to produce a sensible thought or two. She took great pride in her emotional intelligence, her ability to read and pick apart a person like a Jedi would pick apart his opponents. Dooku was a Jedi before he fell to the Dark side, a great one, probably. And Xena could see it then, in the silent ship as the Count started the landing sequence on Sorenno.

The same thing she saw with Luke so many times. A stillness, deadly and untouchable, carefully constructed not to keep things out but to keep something inside. A veil, as Bo-Katan said. Distant, as Solo had said before. Something out of orbit, as Leia had said.

When Xena lets her Force bleed out, lets it spread to the front of the ship, just to feel what she was dealing with, she grazed against the veil of power. Danger. But surprisingly, it never made her nauseous. Not like the half-man-half-mechanical being Grevious, Krell, or when she faced Darth Vader. The vibration of Darkness didn't shake her core dizzy and overwhelmingly. It just... grazed.

It felt like the twins, just when the war had ended. There were nights on Yavin, warm and comfortable, when Xena shared a cot with Luke, too afraid to be away from something like her. And then the windows rattled, the pebbles jumped, and all the warmth got sucked out, and Luke would cry and struggle and cry and-- The Darkness.

There was Leia, struggling to maintain order. She would order, and her words were harsh and brutal and cold and cold and-- The Darkness.

The first times Xena felt it around the twins, she cowered and ran away, hiding behind crates and keeping quiet. She knew, she knew she knew they weren't bad people. They weren't bad, they just grazed her. But still... And when some time passed, a meek Han came looking for her, playing the middleman. He would tell her to see someone, that all the Jedi power things stressed her out. 'Post-traumatic stress,' he called it. Xena denied it. It wasn't their power that stressed her out, but that... darkness.