The Princess, The Pea And The Bounty Hunter

Chapter Ten: Freedom Will Come...

"Close your eyes..." he said and the world stopped for Litha...the whole galaxy in a pause for bating breath with her as she looked up at him for just a few moments through her eyelashes...

Eyelashes which were soon bid to flutter closed as Mando turned his body toward hers. Never leaving her arms as she heard him remove his helmet. Then, there once again she found herself holding her breath...

A breath that felt tighter by the moment in her lungs as she felt him brush her braids back behind her shoulder...before she realized that his gloves had gone with his helmet and she could feel his calloused hand come to caress and cup her cheek...

She could feel his skin on hers and this pressurized breath clamped in her lungs was allowed to leave at an agonizingly slow pace for she feared missing a single thing...

"What the hell does good man even mean...?" he asked her then, but her eyes remained shut even as she realized he'd heard.

Litha dared to reach out then, to reach up and take his face in her hands, to feel him...to feel his forehead brush against hers as he bowed with a sigh of what could only be interpreted as grief...

To show someone your face in the Mandalorian culture is to give yourself to them entirely...it was no easy thing to contemplate...

But then again, the good things are never easy...

"I'll let you see me if we both survive," he proposed, thought not expecting the serene sort of laugh that left her...she was so at peace touching him.

"I'm a Jedi, remember...?" she reminded him, "I can always feel you, even if I can't see you...and I'll always be-" Litha's new assurance would be interrupted as he gave into an impulse. Tilting her chin up as he bent down just a bit further to meet her lips with his.

It wasn't a rough kiss, nor was it overly gentle...

It seemed...a stern kiss, as if a sort of demand before he pulled back to speak, "Be.careful," and there it was before her teeth found his lower lip to drag him back to her for another sort of contact...a promise and for them it was enough to know...

I won't die if you don't...

A reasonable arrangement...

***

Standing on the barricade, Litha would wait with the villagers...

"Master Jedi?" one of them would ask, "We'll be alright, won't we?" he asked and Litha smiled wryly.

"Your people have never seen war. It's not a part of you...so, no. Alright won't come right away, but freedom will," she assured him as her eyes closed, "Ready yourselves!" she ordered before they heard an explosion in the forest beyond their spawning pools, "When Cara and Mando clear the treeline, you await my signal! There will be many and they will hit hard, but when the dust settles and we stand above, you will look back on this night as free men and women!" she announced and as the lot of the people cheered, Mando and Cara would come running out of the brush with the AT-ST in tow and a hoard of maybe fifty raiders coming into view as soon as they made it through the barricade.

"NOW!" Litha shouted and held her fist above her head and the villagers opened fire on the raiders.

The Lady then looked to those behind her, "When I charge, those with spears follow me!" she ordered as she climbed down and headed for the gate of the barricade.

"Litha, no!" Mando shouted, but there was no time to argue. The raiders were upon them and Litha took off running through the gates. Removing limbs, heads and severing torsos as she went, headed straight for the Walker.

The villagers followed, running out to take on the rest as the Jedi leapt into the air, maybe thirty feet high, landing on top of the AT-ST, "Hello in there!" she called as she worked to carve a hole in the top, then dropping inside to kill the drivers...

Though...she didn't expect the Walker to trip in the skirmish and fall face first into the nearest krill pond with her still inside...

Watching this while the barbarians fled in horror, Mando sprinted for the sinking walker, "Litha-" he panted as he reached it, kicking at the glass windshields to break them, "Damn it! I told you to wait, you-" he froze as the blade of her lightsaber shot from the top of the wreckage, cutting a new hole through which she climbed once the ring was forced out.

Coming to stand on top, Litha brushed herself off, "...That was interesting," she panted lightly before seeing Mando standing in the pond below, "Hello, handsome," she chuckled out before hopping over to the dry ground nearby.

Mando moved swiftly to get himself out of the pond, "You're okay," he huffed in obvious surprise, disbelief even as she stood by to wait for him.

"You sound surprised?" she questioned, embracing him as he came to her, "You've got a flamethrower and those...dart things. I can jump thirty feet in the air and cleave people in half," she listed some of their skills as she pulled back, her hands coming to rest on his shoulders.

Mando chuckled then, "We make quite the pair," he mused as she giggled.

"That we do..."