What Could Have Been Part III: The Destined Warriors

The Duel

       Leia

       This wasn't how things were supposed to be. Master Windu wasn't supposed to be right about this. Midas wasn't supposed to win. Luke wasn't supposed to join the Sith. Leia wasn't supposed to fight her brother. This wasn't how things were supposed to be.

       The battle started with Luke leading and Leia stuck in defense. The clash of their blue and green blades echoed throughout the gigantic palace while the rainstorm outside was split by cracks of violent thunder. Midas was careful not to get in the way; only watching from the side with a satisfied expression. The impact of Luke's blade every time he landed it into Leia's own sword sent jarring pain into her wrists. Her brother had always been an aggressive swordsman and she had admired him for that, but in that moment, Leia was terrified at the realization that Luke's viciousness in this fight wasn't just his competitive edge. He wanted to kill her.

       He's still my brother. I can still save him... I just need him to hear me. Leia tried to rationalize with herself why she was allowing Luke such control over the fight. He was too strong for her, she decided. She was just tired from the journey there and couldn't keep up her stamina. They were nice excuses but in the end, it all came down to the truth and the truth was, she couldn't bring herself to fight back. She couldn't hate her brother the way he now hated her.

      "Come on, Leia. It won't be any fun if you down put some effort into it!" Luke teased with a grin as he parried off one of her weak attacks with ease. Leia put some distance between herself and her wayward sibling by Force jumping to the top of a stair case leading up to the balconies which overlooked the rest of the ballroom. "You've let Midas poison you with hatred. This isn't like you!" She told him as he paced back and forth at the base of the steps. Copying her move action, Luke leapt up with a great arc and prepared to swing his saber down on Leia's head. She dodged just in time and his blade instead came down on the balustrade of the staircase and cut through the stone railing like it was thin air.

      Leia told herself that what she was doing was cowardly but she wasn't interested in being brave anymore. She couldn't stay here any longer so while her brother was drawing back his sword from the masonry work he had sown on the flight of stairs, she ran for the door. She had only made it a two or three yards when her feet suddenly left the ground and her body was pulled backwards as if she were tied at the waste to some imaginary elastic band that had gained to much tension and was recoiling back to its original state of slack. She hit the floor and heard something in her chest snap like a twig. It was excruciatingly painful to stand back up and when she did, it was nearly impossible to breath. Luke descended down the stairs with a skip in his step that told Leia how much he was enjoying this. "Leaving so soon? I don't blame you. I'd run too, if I was fighting like a girl..." he jeered.

       Leia almost laughed at the ridiculousness of the comment had she not been in so much pain, or so shocked at the sheer brutality of her brother's action. He found it funny trying to kill her? She couldn't believe it. The fair-haired, lean muscled young man with the scar over his eye like his father may have looked like Luke Skywalker, may have even sounded like him, but he was not her brother.

       "Don't worry," she said with a shallow breath. She drew up her emerald lightsaber with strength she didn't know she had. "I'm just getting warmed up."

      Luke

      Leia was favoring Form VI. Typical.

      Now that Leia was finally fighting back, things had begun to get more interesting. It was obvious that she had come here to destroy him, he accepted. But it was her who would be destroyed. When it came down to it, he was stronger. He had always been stronger.

      She blocked his moves more diligently now without the sloppy moves she had been using before. Her stance widened the way it always did when she was about to make an attack against the upper body and Luke deflected in suite. Leia's injuries were taking a toll on her ability to keep up with his powerful moves. She switched forms quickly, jumping from Form VI, to the more basic Shii-Cho form; knowing that it was a style of fighting Luke never bothered to practice defending much due to his interest in the more powerful forms.

        After nineteen years together, they knew the other's moves before they themselves did.

       The change forced Luke to fall back into defensive and Leia gained momentum with each and every attack. When Leia's lower body was open to attack, Luke made a fierce lunge at her legs. To his surprise, she matched him and their blades locked against each other. It was a battle of strength now as the blades of the siblings pushed back and forth. Luke won and forced Leia off her footing but what he didn't expect was for her to return to Form VI's narrow stance and take back the lead in the fight with a series of delicate swings that Luke wasn't prepared to defend against. Maybe he didn't know all of her moves after all.

      Weak! You are weak! You have allowed her to overtake you! She will not stop until you are dead! You are a Sith! Use your anger to fight. Use it to kill her.

       Luke tried to shake the voices from his mind but they wouldn't leave him. Although Leia had the physical disadvantage, she was not being tormented internally by the voices in Luke's restless mind. The darkness overwhelmed his entire body so that his veins pulsed heatedly in his wrists as he clutched his lightsaber until his knuckles turned white. Where Midas had taken his blood to complete his Ritual of Powers, there was now a steady flow of red running down his forearm. The deep cut's perpetual stinging was starting to overwhelm him and that only fueled his rage. This was all because of Leia. She would die. He would make sure of it.

        Sorry about the gore! Man I wish I could finish writing this. Probably like five chapters left if that. Another update soon maybe? We'll see.