ahsoka knew what she was risking when she told ezra to leave them ; the fear evident on his face so palpable that her heart ached for the boy , simply because he doesn’t understand the extent of this wars history and the relationships to match .
he knows only his anger , and ahsoka only knows the ache in her chest when she confronts her master once again . she knows she will die , but she is not afraid —
and despite their battle , and despite the pain and anger that slithered throughout her yelled words , ahsoka doesn’t fight him when they make haste for his ship , nor when he takes her lightsabers from her . she is too tired to care , but blue eyes follow his movements all the same . this may be her last few precious minutes , yet can she begrudge herself for being okay with them being in HIS presence . it’s like her breath is held , her lungs burning as she awaits the fatal strike , and still it doesn’t appear .
doesn’t when he lies about her survival , or when his fists curl at the underlying suspicion brought forth from sidious’s lips .
anakin doesn’t kill her , and ahsoka doesn’t know what to do with that information .
❛ why , ❜ ahsoka asks in turn , gaze flickering from the cold exterior of his ruined mask to the exposed eye , the human operating the emotionless machine . she could have died in that temple , all he had to do was leave her there . make his last deliberate strike and watch as she was swallowed up with the rest of the antiquities — a reminder of his past , gone just like that .
is it wrong of her to say that she misses her best friend ; that she hates looking upon what he’s become . maybe she shouldn’t have left .
❛ lying to him will only prove fatal to you in return , ana — ❜ she stops herself before the name cuts in , knows that he’ll only bare his teeth at her . ahsoka looks away from him — anywhere but at this GHOST . ❛ what do you hope to gain ? ❜
she whispers , more to herself than anything . yes , she’s concluded : she misses her best friend .
the simplest, most obvious question, and yet the one that he cannot—will not, must not allow himself to answer.
what do you hope to gain.
she would never break if he turned her over to his master. he knows that too well. he knows her too well. she would not turn, would not supplicate herself before the sith as an inquisitor. she would not betray the living jedi or her insurgent allies. she would be strong, stronger than him, and she would die by his hand.
he had seen death spelled out by the force and he had taken another path. for an enemy, yes, a rebel, a rogue jedi, a threat, a target—
he had saved her. he had stopped her from dying.
“because i am a fool,” he says; he can give her no plainer answer than that—other than, perhaps, because i am weak. hearing the strain in his own voice is—unpleasant. for all he had cursed the suit and mask in the years he’d been confined to it, he’s more keenly aware now than ever how much he relies on it, on the metaphorical mask of the vocabulator and affected diction hiding his voice and speech patterns as much as the literal one concealing his expressions.
the thought that his master will kill him if he suspects his insincerity is a dispassionate one by comparison. what secrets he has still managed to keep, those scarce few that were directly against his master’s wishes—all could damn him. all could have already damned him. perhaps his master is aware of everything, simply biding his time, allowing himself to be entertained by events as they unfold before he strikes decisively the moment vader no longer serves a purpose to him. vader has lived every moment of his ill-begotten life since his rebirth in the fire of mustafar awaiting death and does not fear it. not his own.
this is altogether the most reckless thing he has done in a very long time, but certainly she could say the same of her own actions.
i won’t leave you. sentiment that should be sickening. thought she’d still kept up at least a pretense of fighting back until he’d disarmed her, there had been no conviction in it from the moment she’d spoken that name. weak. pathetic. and yet he’d still saved her life.
“perhaps not as foolish as you were in losing your resolve.” he crosses his arms over his chest, prompting an audible whirr of complaint from the servos in his prostheses as he forces them to action despite their suboptimal function. the drained power to them is serving its purpose, at least—according to the readout scrolling across his intact lens, the most critical systems are not in any danger of failure.
“clearly you did not take the jedi’s warnings against attachment to heart.”
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