solo_sword | Room 313, Thusday evening

Ben didn't want to do this. He'd told John, though (even if he was pretty sure that was what had made him take off for the weekend), and it was only fair he give Jaina at least a little idea of what might be heading her way.

Maybe her Ben could avoid having to wear shirts all summer long.

He rapped softly on her door.

"Come in," she called fully aware of who it was. She might have been ready to confront him about the same thing he came to talk about too.

And now that he was here, he was thinking this was a really bad idea. "I can come back later if you're busy."

She shook her head, waving him in. "I've got some time. What's up?"

Poodoo.

He came in and closed the door behind her. "I know we've both been beaten over the head about messing with the future," he began, staring at his feet, "but there's some stuff you'll probably want to hear anyway."

Jaina raised her eyebrows. "So it's finally my turn, huh?" Because yeah, she wasn't so happy to find out John knew.

"You were happy here, okay?" Ben retorted. "Why would I want to ruin that?"

"Yeah, I'm thrilled to find out people are specifically keeping things from me again," she sighed. "Finding out there are all these secrets and that you can freak out my boyfriend makes me really happy."

The hurt that blazed in his eyes was quickly covered by anger. "Fine," he snapped. "What's the worst possible thing you can imagine happening? Ever?"

"Jacen taking the rest of my family down with him," she said, surprising herself with her calm. She'd had way too much time to think on this.

"He came really kriffing close," Ben said. "Will you settle for the extermination of the Hapan royal family instead?"

Jaina looked at him sharply. "All of them?" She couldn't imagine him doing that to Tenel Ka, under any circumstances.

Then again, she wouldn't have counted on a version of him ever trying to kill her, either.

"Tenel Ka's daughter on down," Ben said. "Tenel Ka's still alive, but Isolder is dead, and so was anyone who was on the flagship with her. It got bad. Dad was reeling for months because Jacen killed Mom and you? You went off to learn how to kill things from Boba Kriffing Fett. If I hadn't lived through it, I wouldn't believe me either. So yes, I kept things from you. Because I've seen one broken-hearted Jaina and I don't want two." His voice cracked on the last sentence and he turned his head away, hunching up his shoulders.

The Jaina that was still very much trying to learn, who wanted to get better to be a better fighter because that was in her unique job description, didn't think that was such a bad idea, in theory. It was the hows that confused her, why he apparently said yes, how Tenel Ka ended up with a kid, and those she wasn't going to ask into.

"You know I'm a big girl, right?" Jaina asked. "You're from a different reality than me. That isn't necessarily my future."

"It doesn't mean it isn't your future, either," Ben told his feet. "You were so happy when Jacen came back, and he turns into everything we've been told to avoid."

"He knows the possibilities. He's not the same Jacen that broke my ribs. He's not the same Jacen that would commit regicide without a damn good reason. And it's not up to anyone else to keep me happy by keeping me ignorant," she told him. "In fact, I completely misunderstood John leaving because of that ignorance and because he couldn't tell me." Not that he hadn't offered to, but she wasn't telling him that. "Stick to honesty, it causes less headaches."

Ben looked kicked in the stomach. "I didn't know telling him anything would make him leave."

Which was pretty much Ben's biggest fear. People had a habit of leaving and not coming back.

"Don't worry about it," she assured him. "He's done that before, and that's between him and me. I don't know what he knows and what he doesn't or how everything went, but if he's hearing things about my future and can't say anything, that hardly seems fair to me." Especially when she didn't discount him being part of her future.

Ben was going to worry about it anyway. "So John can't just be my friend because he's your boyfriend first?"

"That's not what this is about," Jaina sighed. "Say I knew what happened to you in twenty years, and it's really terrible, but would only tell Tahiri and she can't say anything to you. Would you be okay with that? Would you want her knowing and keeping that secret? Because I'm not. And I'm really kriffing sick of being treated like a little kid with everyone else thinking they know best for me, and that's what it sounds like you're doing."

And he was back home with his Jaina scolding him for running off like some seven year old idiot kid when he'd been following procedure. His eyes narrowed.

"Yeah," he said. "You're the one treated like a little kid. The one in a squadron at sixteen, the one who is clearly far too important to be here in high school with the rest of us. I don't want to know anything about twenty years from now because I can barely deal with my present!"

He would regret his words later, but being hurt and angry was a bad combination.

"Yeah, welcome to my world," Jaina snapped back. "You probably don't know the half of what I've been through the last few years, I don't need anyone's protection to save my little feelings, and I really don't need it when you don't seem to get that the secrecy hurts more and makes me madder than the truth could."

"Fine!" Ben yelled. "Some version of you will grow up to kill your twin brother--will ask to, with your parents backing you up--and my father will say yes! And Tahiri will decide to toss it all away and turn into a Sith kriffing apprentice, spend a good week or so interrogating me, and then try to blow up a planet as good Sith do. But don't worry because it's maybe not your future. It's just what I had to live through. Force knows what possessed me to think you might not want to hear about it."

With that he whirled on his heel and tried to leave the room.

"I figured he was dead," said Jaina, not really realizing she said it, even as the rest of the words were still registering.

"There's a galaxy of difference between him being gone and you being the one to end him," Ben said hoarsely, hand on the doorknob and forehead on the cool wood. "I wasn't treating you like a kid. I just didn't want to crush you. The Sword of the Jedi is no gift."

"I'm still standing."

Everything was still processing, of course, so very slowly after the fairly horrifying realization that she was glad it was her.

Ben sighed. "Yeah, you're like beskar," he said softly. "Most of us don't do that."

It was easy, really. She was so used to bad news, and death, and destruction, word of it sort of hit in some empty place till she could deal with it later if she wanted. If not, she just carried it around with her till she didn't notice it anymore. It wasn't even the numbness. This was sort of dreamlike and weird, because to her, it just wasn't real.

Somewhere, Jaina was probably the PTSD queen.

"It doesn't have to happen like that," she said, still slightly on autopilot. "I'm sorry it had to happen for you, but it doesn't haev to be that way across the board."

Ben was suddenly exhausted. His family could make Ender look emotionally well-adjusted.

"It does if you stop to feel things," he mumbled, then shook his head. "I have to go."

The room was starting to close in on him. He needed air.

That first bit earned him a glare, but she wasn't going to stop him. She wouldn't mind some time alone herself.

John pushed the door open and leaned against the frame as usual. "I'll have you know your sandwiches are always needed." Because that needed to be clarified.

Immediately she moved over on the bed to make room. She knew how this went, and she needed it today. "I'll remember that for next week," she promised.

Surprisingly capable of reading her body language he shut the door himself and joined her on the bed. "Good, I'll spend the rest of the week looking forward to that," John said, tone light as ever.

"It'll be worth it," she said, and waited for him to get settled before curling up next to him.

He wrapped his arms around her and kissed the top of her head. "Did I miss something today?"

She went quiet for a moment before answering, "Ben came by. That's all I'm going to say right now." Which wasn't to say she wouldn't talk about it later, but there had to be some time to process.

Knowing how that could possibly have gone, John hugged her a little tighter. "Then I won't even ask."

He would, however, worry about Ben.

"You're a good distraction that way," she said, managing a little smile.

"I might've heard that before," he replied, petting a hand over her hair.

"Have you?" she asked, looking up at him. "Did I say it? I bet it was me."

"Could have been," he smiled a little. "She had those brandy brown type of eyes mortal men can get drunk off of."

She didn't want to laugh, and tried to roll her eyes instead. It didn't quite work. "That was the corniest ting I've ever heard."

He grinned, corny had worked time and time again. "Yeah, couldn't have been you."

"I'm going to have to be really suspicious of other brown-eyed girls now." Ha.

"Because you're so accepting of them in general," he teased. Mostly because that girl who wanted to be his college roommate had brown eyes.

"I am," she nodded. "I know I've got you. That does a lot for jealousy issues concerning girls that come with a two drink minimum."

He liked that and snickered a little. "Two drinks being the shots we have to do to tolerate their version of banter?"

"Something like that," she said, looking up at him. "How do you make thing so normal?" She really thought it was his superpower.

"Years of practice," he told her, "guess that means it's working."

"Mostly," she admitted. "Did he tell you everything?"

"He told me a lot," John said, thinking how he'd put it on Sunday still rang true.

"I killed Jacen there," she said, still very careful on her tenses. She wasn't going to say it was something she would do. It wasn't her reality, even if she was bound to have those particular nightmares again for a while.

"I heard," he nodded, still not keen on any future Jacen at all. "I also heard it was necessary."

"I'm sure it was," she nodded. "I must've gotten good, to take down a Sith." She was still trying to get used to how she felt about it all, but that didn't feel great to say.

"Or just really lucky," he replied, not wanting her to have to get that good. He was really very selfish about this whole thing.

She looked over at him. "I like it much better my way." One version of him had nearly trounced her already.

"I don't like it at all, but you probably knew that."

Jaina nodded, and blurted out, "I'm sorry. I didn't know it was going to be anything like this. I assumed he was dead, but..."

"Hey, there was no way to know," he told her, trying to be calm and soothing if at all possible. "You don't have anything to be sorry about."

"You shouldn't have been put in the middle like that," she said.

"I wasn't in the middle," he said. "It's not like you two are on different sides."

Today it sort of felt like they were, at least on this issue. "I know. I mean... You shouldn't have had to hear that on your own, and I don't want it to be the thing that drives you away."

John frowned down at her. "I'm still here, aren't I?"

"You did leave," she pointed out. She wasn't judging, but she wasn't sure where his head was at now that she knew this much.

"I didn't leave," he corrected. "I took an opportunity to get out of town for a few days. Leaving would entail never coming back and again, I'm right here."

"Semantics," Jaina shrugged. "I just want to now where you are with all this." At the beginning she'd had a very real worry that her life and family would drive him off, but this was bigger. This was about her, and something that hadn't even happened, and may or may not happen at all.

"It's not semantics," John said, a little annoyed. "Where am I with all this? I can't believe you're asking that."

She wanted to hear that he was willing to deal with her being a possible future brother-killer, but those words really weren't coming to her and she wasn't so desperate as to say it anyway. "Forget it," she said, shaking her head.

"No. Am I pissed at you for having a possibly gruesome future? No. Am I going to dump you over it? No. You know this already." Or at least he felt she should.

"That's a big thing," Jaina said simply. "And what you've suggested, me staying here instead of going back there... I can't do that. Now more than ever."

"What I said this weekend was I was working on not making you stay. Because I was trying to get over all this. It was kind of a lot at the time." And his repression was slow-going with people bringing things up.

"It wasn't the first time the subject came up," she said. "That's not even what this is about. I don't even know what it's about right now." It was possible she was having a harder time dealing with this than she knew.

"This has nothing to do with me," he told her, giving her a squeeze. "Other than trying to help."

She gave a small smile she didn't really feel at all. "I've got to try to prevent it."

"I know," he nodded. He'd also had a full week to process this already.

There was a very large part of her that just wanted to just lock herself in here and curl up with him and stay here for as long as humanly possible and just forget everything.

"This may be an argument against specializing in your field," she said, trying for light instead.

At this point he'd be willing to go along with that if he had any clue.

"There's lots of arguments against that," he replied.

"I'm going to go back soon. See him before I end up getting caught up in everything like usual," she mused. "As soon as I figure out what to say that's not condemning him for something he hasn't done."

"You'll think of something," John replied. "Want me to come along?" Not that he knew when she was thinking of going.

"Of course," she replied immediately. "But I don't know that it'll be while you're here." She hated saying that, she really did.

"Oh, right." That might be a problem for going along.

"We'll figure out logistics," she told him, completely assuming theycould.

He considered the possibility that their classes could line up and give him nice, long weekends free.

"Right, we'll have weekends and things anyway."

"We'll manage it. We're good like that." And she was not considering for a second that they wouldn't, especially not right now.

"We are, it's a thing," he agreed, giving her a squeeze.

She slid an arm around him comfortably. "Thanks."

"Love means never having to say thanks," he deadpanned, thinking himself funny.

Good job, John, she actually kind of laughed at hat, and she loved him that much more for managing that.

Room 313, Thusday evening

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