Against All Odds

How can I just let you walk away? Just let you leave without a trace? When I stand here taking every breath with you. You're the only one who really knew me at all.

Admiral Carth Onasi stood on the bridge of the Sojourner, watching the graceful shape of the Ebon Hawk swoop upward and speed off into the vast expanses beyond. Stood rooted in place, frozen like a statue in time. He dare not move, if he allowed himself to, he would run to the comm, tell them to come back. Back so he could join them, leave all this behind and chase off into space with them, searching for the only thing in the galaxy that he wanted for himself.

Was that so wrong? To want something for yourself? He had served others all his life, strove to be the best. To make his father proud, live up to the heritage of the Onasi family. He had fought in the Mandalorian Wars to fulfill that duty, and to protect his wife and son. He had failed in protecting her, and had lost his son. And so he served in the following Sith War to grant them vengence, to lay his wife's spirit to rest. To quell the need inside for revenge against the man who had betrayed him.

And in the midst of that war, that long,cold quest for vengence, he had met her.

He couldn't put his finger on the one exact moment that it happened, the one phrase, or smile, or show of selfless bravery he saw in her. The one moment that she had taken his heart, encased in ice and solitude, and breathed life into it again. She was just there, and before he knew it, his whole life was turned upside down.

How can you just walk away from me? When all I can do is watch you leave? Cause we shared the laughter and the pain, and even shared the tears. You're the only one who really knew me at all...

Turned upside down by her ready smile, her quick wit. The banter they shared that would always end up making him laugh. Her quick,fiery temper and moments of undiminished arrogance in her own abilities. Her gentle, soothing kindness to those in need whom she always sought to aid. She was so stubborn, she kept knocking at the doors of his heart until door by door, room by room, she found her way to it's center.

He found it all so confusing. There were times all he wanted to do was push her as far away as he could so he wouldn't feel those things he had promised himself he would never feel again. And then there were times that all he could think of was to find some way to pull her closer, bask in the sunlight of her love, let it melt away the numbing cold he had been living in.

The little things she would say and do. Her amusing mannerisms, like how she would wrinkle her nose in distaste like some fastidious cat when she found something offensive. The way she would straighten her shoulders, and try to draw herself up imposingly when she was this tiny little woman when someone made her mad. The deadly grace of her movements in battle, that lithe power and agility that would take her opponents by suprise. The way she could set him on fire with a single sultry gaze, a husky whisper in his ear. That cool confident assurance in her own ability to turn a man inside out that he watched her use over and over again on hapless victims and hating how jealous it made him feel if he wasn't on the receiving end of that vicious charm.

And now he lived in the fear that he would never see her again.

Take a look at me now. There's just an empty space. There's nothing left here to remind me, just a memory of your face. Take a look at me now, well there's just an empty space. And you coming back to me is against all odds, and that's what I've got to face.

This was the second time he had watched the Ebon Hawk fly off, leaving him shackled by duty and empty inside. He had watched it fly away the morning she left. Sometimes he wondered if he could have stopped her if he'd tried. He knew she intended to leave, knew she would do so without him. For whatever reason, the reason she kept hidden from him. Part of him hoped that her love for him would keep her from leaving, that he could will her to stay. That she would find herself unable to leave him behind, and allow him to face whatever it was she had to face with him at her side. The only place he ever truly wanted to be, even if it meant death.

He wasn't sure why he didn't try and stop her, even though he knew the moment had come at last. He had felt it rising in her, the way she had buried herself in research, her face distracted and troubled when he would come home to the apartments they shared on Coruscant. Had seen her watching him out of the corner of his eye, a look of sadness clouding those dark green eyes when she thought he wasn't looking. And he had felt it in her the night before, the desperate passion she showed him that night when they made love. The way she clung to him just a bit longer, a bit tighter in the aftermath. It had taken longer then normal for her to fall asleep, but he never did. He didn't want to lose a moment of time holding her that night, touching her skin, her hair, watching her as she slept, feeling her breathing against him.

He was still awake the next morning, when she kissed him softly just before she left. When he felt the moisture of her tears fall on his cheek as she pulled away.Why he pretended to be asleep he didn't know. Why he didn't grab her arms, pull her back and tell her he wouldn't let her leave without him, he couldnt explain. It took everything he had to resist that urge.

Maybe it was because he loved her that much, enough to do what he had to do to make the leaving as easy for her as he could. No matter how much it tore his heart.

I wish I could just make you turn around. Turn around and see me cry. There's so much I need to say to you, so many reasons why. You're the only one who really knew me at all.

He had stood on the balcony of their apartment, watching the Ebon Hawk lift off and soar away into the dawn sky. Just as he watched that same graceful little ship soar away now with all his hopes and dreams. He held back the tears until the ship was out of orbit, refusing to let them fall. Perhaps this pain was his punishment for how he had treated her when he first found out she was Revan, the way he lashed out in his anger. His sense of being betrayed by the woman he had come to love causing him to treat her with such a cold, brutal hatred. The one time she needed him the most, and he had failed her because he was too caught up in his own shock and anger.

Perhaps that was why she chose to leave him behind, because she still wasn't sure he truly loved her. The pain of that moment of revelation still a rift in between them, something forgiven but never truly forgotten. She was his second chance at life, had done everything she could at that point to prove her love for him, and in a moment of rage he had pushed her away. It had never been more obvious what he had done, what he had lost, then after retrieving that final StarMap on Manaan. When she came back from the ocean floor, exhausted, broken inside and wounded, and after handing him the datapad with the final coordinates for the Star Forge, it was to Canderous Ordo that she turned, and collapsed in his arms. At that moment, he realized that she no longer believed he still loved her. Or even that he would at least protect her. He realized then that she no longer even felt safe around him.

It was the pain of losing Morgana, his wife, all over again. Only this time, he could blame no one but himself. As if he had driven a knife into her heart with his own hand.

'I've got you, Sarrin. You're safe now.' Canderous had told the unconcious woman. The glare that Ordo had given him would have melted permacrete ship siding.'Oh sorry Republic. That was YOUR line.'

The reason he didn't shoot that Mandalorian right then, was because he really wanted to turn that blaster on himself.

He couldn't believe how lucky he was when she forgave him, when she took him back. That moment on the beach of the Unknown World when she returned from the temple, and he poured his heart out to her. They held each other so tightly, and he swore he would never again give her any reason to doubt his love for her.

Didn't she know it was crueler to leave him behind..that life without her now was just to return to the emptiness she had filled in him?

He wondered where she was just then, and if she still thought of him. If she felt the same emptiness inside her where he used to be, like he felt without her.

So take a look at me now. Well, there's just an empty space. And there's nothing left here to remind me, just a memory of your face. Now take a look at me now, 'cause there's just an empty space. But to wait for you is all I can do, and that's what I've got to face.

He didn't tell anyone at first that she had left. He had just sort of sat around in a daze, like it was a bad dream he would wake up from. Wake up and find her, warm and willing, snuggled in his arms under those horrible looking sheets she had insisted on buying. He would ignore the comm when it rang, spending his time with a bottle of Corellian whiskey and the datapad she had left for him. Reading her words over and over again so he could hear her voice in his mind. Telling him how hard it was to leave, and that she didn't expect him to understand or to wait for her. That she loved him more then life, but she couldn't go on knowing that there was this threat out there and not do everything she could to stop it. But she couldn't bear to risk his life along with her own. Not again.

Maybe, just maybe, if she righted this wrong, the nightmares would stop. She could look herself in the face again, and the voices of the millions she had killed would give her some rest. Maybe then she could be the woman she wanted to be, give him the kind of mate she felt he deserved, not some guilt ridden, haunted empty shell of a half remembered person. One line she told him he should move on, find someone to be happy with and love without all the complications involved in their relationship since she was the one who brought about the death of his wife, his seperation from his son. The one that had caused him so much pain.

The next she promised him that if she survived, that she would return to him. That knowing he was out there, alive and happy, would give her the strength to face whatever darkness lie in her path. That if he did chose to wait for her, and if fate brought them together again, she would never again leave his side. And if she didn't survive, that nothing, not even the gates of hell would keep her spirit from watching over him.

Did she really think he could ever find someone to replace her? That he would even want to? How could she not know that she was his reason for every breath he drew.

Take a good look at me now, cause I'll still be standing here. And you coming back to me is against all odds. It's the chance I gotta take.

And so he stood here and watched the Ebon Hawk fly away for a second time, carrying his heart with it. In the one simple message he sent out into the darkness that echoed the emptiness she had left him in. 'If you find her, tell her. Tell her that Carth Onasi is still waiting for her.'

Take a look at me now