Chapter Nine

Trouble on my left,

Trouble on my right,

I've been facing trouble almost all my life,

My sweet love, won't you pull me through?

Everywhere I look I catch a glimpse of you.

/

The two lone figures standing on the white plains were motionless as statues. The wind lifted the robes of the taller one, causing a chill to race up his spine.

"Kriff," Ben muttered under his breath.

He chafed his gloved hands together to create enough friction for heat. Korin was already ten minutes late than the latest she should have come back out, and he stared intently at the open mouth of the cave, shivering in the cold as his breath misted in front of him. The barest hint of blood-red sun was beginning to splay across the mountains.

"Patience, Ben." Luke reminded him quietly, his voice startlingly loud and low in the icy quiet.

Hunched over from the cold, the teen turned to look at the Jedi. "Master, what are you sensing? Is anything…did anything go wrong?"

A slight pause, and Ben listened to the eerie whistling of wind through the mountain peaks.

"She's afraid."

He raised an eyebrow. "What, in a normal way?"

"See for yourself."

He allowed his eyes to slide closed, focusing on the Force signatures in the darkness under his eyelids. His uncle's flared a bright blue, wispy tendrils floating off. Ben forced himself to reach further, expanding his detection. And then he saw her, a misty, pale light wavering far away from him. But there was another one beside her. A blanket of darkness, pulling and powerful and strong. He tore his gaze from the strange figure, instead focusing on Korin.

"Who's the other guy with her?" He spoke aloud, eyes still closed. Luke turned to him in confusion.

"What? I don't sense anyone else. Though when the visions are strong enough they tend to give off their own energies."

Ben wisely decided not to tell his uncle that there was nothing but darkness emanating off the fuzzy outline. Nor that he felt a strange, terrible yearning in his chest. He kept watching, and, with a sickening feeling in his stomach, saw Korin's form begin backing up while the ghost advanced. And then Korin suddenly dropped, falling down, down, down.

"Korin!"

He began sprinting, running off towards the direction an underground current was obviously pulling her towards. He nearly stopped when he skidded across clear ice, and swore again as he heard a sharp crack, a fissure appearing on the surface a few feet beside him.

"Ben!" Luke yelled, worry in his tone. With no time to lose, Ben kept running. "I'm fine!"

He traced her over onto a distant edge of the lake, where the ice had thickened after numerous layers of water had frozen over. The eerie green glow of his lightsaber illuminated the glassy surface, and he quickly knelt across a patch of clear ice, cutting a hole into it. Liquid water seeped out from the edges of the rough circle, and once it separated he pushed it down into the water and to the side. His heart pounded as he surveyed the dark, fathomless well of water. Then he took a deep breath and dove in, kicking hard to propel himself towards the bottom of the lake.

The water was freezing, so cold that it seemed to burn his skin. Ben could barely see in the pitch-black of his surroundings, and the light from his saber could only brighten a few meters ahead. He scanned the water around him quickly, feeling the cold already leaching into his bones. Then he saw her: resting on a ledge a few meters down was the huddled, still form of a body. Rather, he saw the faint glowing of the kyber first, cracks of light coming through the tightly closed fist laid across her stomach.

Darting forward, he reached down to grab at her shoulder, hand closing around the waterlogged fur of her jacket. He gave a sharp tug and she lifted a few inches off the ledge, her body swaying in a way that made a shiver of cold run down his spine; she looked lifeless, despite how he could still feel her warmth in his mind.

Struggling to focus as Korin began to float, he pulled her hand towards her, gingerly wriggling the crystal from her and putting it in his pocket for safekeeping. He raised his lightsaber as he began to drag their dead weight through the waters. Black was beginning to edge around his vision, and he coughed, releasing a silvery bubble of air.

Suddenly, when he felt as though his fingers clamped to Korin's shoulder would freeze and fall off, the back of his head bumped painfully against the layer of ice at the surface. He raised his right arm, pushing through the ice with the blade of his saber until he had cut away an opening.

His chest tightened; weak from the lack of air, he couldn't push the ice back up. Panic began to set in, and he trembled, staring at Korin's pale form. He wrapped numb fingers around her wrist, feeling the sleepy thrumming of her pulse.

I love you.

Then there was a rushing sound as the lid of their tomb lifted, air flowing cold onto his cheeks as they breached the surface, Ben gasping for air. His hands found the small of her back and he pushed her up higher, allowing her to slide onto solid surface. His hands scrabbled against the ice as he followed her, hoisting himself up and then collapsing flat on the ground as he took in a heavy breath of the cold air. Luke force-pushed the block of ice to the side, his white-cloaked form stark against the starry black sky.

Ben lurched over her, frantically cupping his face in his hands. Her lips were blue with cold, but as he leaned closer and pressed his ear to her chest, he could still hear the faintest beating.

He pressed a hand to her chest, closed his eyes and focused, feeling for the liquid trapped inside. A tense beat of silence, and then his hand curled into a fist and he pulled upward. At the same time, Korin's body jerked against the ice and water spewed from her mouth. Brown eyes flew open and she coughed loudly, choking and spitting out more water. She hunched over on her side, her hands supporting her against the ice, and retched, vomiting onto the ice. The sour stench caused her to throw up again and a soft whimper escaped her as Ben shakily reached forward to pull the hair up from her face.

"Ben…Ben…" Her hoarse voice called for him, and he wrapped his arms around her, squeezing her tighter than he dared, trying to warm her. Her icy fingers clenched and unclenched as she trembled.

"You're okay now. I've got you. You're okay."

Silhouettes now edged in pale pink sunlight, the three starkly-lined figures struggled back to the transport, and even from a distance anyone could tell they were anything but okay.

"The ship's on autopilot for now." Luke's voice came from the cabin as he began walking back towards them. Ben, arms crossed as he gripped at an insulating blanket, was leaning against a support beam, his face lined with exhaustion. Luke could sense the unease flowing off his nephew; unease that he knew would be later paired with guilt.

His voice cut through the soft beeping of the monitors. "How's Korin holding up?" Both turned to look at her, resting in a side-bed next to the wall.

"Her vitals are steady now. And I already called in to have a bacta tank prepared for her." Ben scanned the carefully-placed bacta strips on her sides, and leaned forward to adjust the heating pads covering her lower abdominals.

"Where's her crystal?"

He reached into his pocket, withdrawing the small clear shard. "I have it."

Luke nodded. Ben gently grasped Korin's wrist, and placed the Kyber crystal in her palm. The ship jolted a little and the Jedi spoke again.

"I'll keep flying. We should get there in another thirty minutes." He turned and walked back into the cockpit.

For the second time that day, Ben's fingers moved to press lightly against Korin's pulse point. He sat down on a crate next to her, closing his eyes and finally relaxing.

Through the tall, scalloped windows, the light shone in clearly to illuminate the bare walls, spilling across the ground carpeted with colored woven mats, setting alight the leaves and petals of the flowers decorating every open surface so that the smallest veins could be seen.

A breeze ran gaily through the courtyard outside, and the swaying trees made sounds of flowing water, the leaves lifting to flash their silvery sides. It had rained while they were gone, and the eves were still leaking a little, the gentle cadence of the dripping giving the room a hushed, clear feeling.

"Ben."

He felt a breath whoosh slowly from him, felt a slight draft slip into the room. His eyes slipped closed, and then he shook himself awake again.

"Ben. You need to rest."

He felt his body tense as Luke laid a hand, his flesh one, on his shoulder, and something calmed in him at the feeling of the warmth of another human being.

"It's not your fault, kid."

"How do you know?" he said, his voice all of a sudden as hard and heavy as stone. "I could have…I could have stopped her from going in. Maybe she wasn't ready. And I should have known she'd see him in there," he muttered, guilt and anger in his voice.

"Who is 'he'?" Luke questioned. Ben ignored him, his hands clenching and unclenching on the armrests.

"I won't leave her again."

Luke let out a sigh, and shifted away. He walked to the adjacent wall, moving jars of flowers off a chair and then pulling the chair up to face Ben. He sat down, clasping his hands in front of him, and Ben suddenly felt a sense of awe at how both authority and kindness seemed to emanate off the older Jedi in an easy, calm manner.

"Ben, I'm talking to you as your uncle, not as your Master." He began firmly. "You need to sleep. She'll be here no matter what. Nothing will hurt her, no harm will happen to her. You have my promise." There truly was something reassuring and solid in Luke's words, and Ben turned to look at her, body, mind and soul exhausted.

The pale blue light of the tank illuminated Korin's small, fragile form from behind. Hooked to wires upon wires, she floated listlessly in the liquid, her hair creating an ethereal circle radiating around her head. The dark, haunting circles around her eyes were prominent against the paleness of her skin. To prevent anything close to choking, her necklace was taken off, placed on a side table. The star gleamed a dull grey-blue from the light.

Sides wrapped in bacta strips and gauze to heal her broken ribs, she looked like a cocooned butterfly. A young, beautiful creature, and he wanted to see her wake up, see her spread her wings once more. As they watched, there was a minute blip on the screen showing brain activity, and her finger twitched.

"I think I'm going to stay." He heard himself say, his mind far away. "Just a little longer."

Luke relented, nodding. He squeezed Ben's hand before he walked away, back down the hall.

Her muscles were weak in the first few days; her nightmares continuous. Ben stayed by her side almost constantly, helping her up from beds or chairs and letting her lean against him as she walked. Eventually the attention became tiresome and she found herself snapping at him irritably as the days wore on. He'd leave her alone after that, with her promise that she'd stay still and not injure herself further.

Night after night she'd wake up to the pale light of the moon stretching across her ceiling, her breath short and her skin cold. Before, the visions she'd had were tangible and vivid, but now they were hazy and wild; the figures unrecognizable; and fast paced. They left her with a sense of trepidation and worry for each coming day.

Almost a month after Ilum, Luke taught her the basics of lightsaber construction. The sun rose bright in that morning that Korin decided to create her saber. As per her request, Ben did not visit her when she woke.

Sitting cross-legged in the center of her room, strips of metal, various powercells, coils, and other materials spread around her, Korin held the kyber crystal in her hand. She closed her eyes, and felt it heat up slightly against her skin before a cylindrical section of durasteel floated upwards, the kyber crystal squeezing out of her fingers to fit into the small cradle in its top. For the next few hours, Korin sat on the hard stone floor until her joints ached, focusing on pulling together the materials.

The sun reached its equinox, shining directly into the room and illuminating her in a patch of golden light as it continued west. The saber, now whole, fell into her waiting hands, and her eyes opened at the touch of warm metal. A large smile appeared on her face, her eyes crinkling a little, as she twisted and turned the lightsaber hilt in her grasp to observe her handiwork.

Her fingertips traced the opening of the exposed crystal chamber when a flash of bright light filled the room. As it faded away, Korin raised her head, an unsettled feeling coming over her. The room had darkened considerably, fat, pointed shadows converging at every corner.

A roll of thunder sounded in the distance, echoing into her bones. Rain began pounding down on the roof above her, the sound louder than the warm summer breeze drifting across the sun-lit fields. It was cold, and then warm and then too cold, so, so cold. Lightning fell jagged in the sky; thunder rumbled loudly in her ears and the light flickered, flashing bright and fading in the same instant. The door slammed shut, startling her enough that she broke meditation, her trembling hands pressing against the rough-woven rug. Cool air seemed to pool like liquid around her bare ankles, seep underneath the linen of her clothing.

A crack of lighting flashed across her line of sight, and suddenly she got the feeling that she wasn't quite alone in the room. Korin opened her mouth to yell for Ben and the rain swept down her face, across her body, into her mouth but it wasn't rain – it was blood and it tasted bitter and coppery on her tongue. A sob shook from her throat and she huddled up in the center of the soaked mat, knees to chest and chin on her knees, her fingers numb. Her lightsaber lay forgotten next to her.

She'd never felt such an absence of strength, she'd never felt so drained. She'd never felt so alone and afraid. Not even at the caves. Something was different about her since she'd returned from Ilum.

She didn't know how long she sat, waiting, until something in her finally snapped. The next thing she knew, she was out of the room, her back to the wall. Everything was awash with golden light, the warmth of the sun soaking into her chilled skin. Her hands twitched restlessly, and she brought one hand to her other arm, pinching half-moons into her skin.

"Korin?" Startled, she jerked away so fast that she bumped up against a side table. Her master was standing a few feet away from her, his eyes narrowed with confusion. It took her a moment to recognize him.

"Luke." Not one of his usual titles, the name sounded hard and fearful coming from her. The man observed Korin – the tense posture, the way her face flashed with something akin to nausea when she glanced back at the room.

Luke gestured to the open hallway out to the courtyard. "Walk with me."

She shook her head quickly, the light nearly blinding her for an instant. It was too bright – too loud, and she wanted it to be quiet, wanted it to be still so she could think. "Not out there. I need to be…I need to be inside."

"Korin. Are you alright, kid?" He reached to grasp her shoulder and his hand tensed when he felt her skin through her tunic. "You're cold."

"Luke, I need to talk to you. Please."

He nodded. "Follow me."

The Jedi led her through the building into a medium-sized room. Korin closed the door behind them, though her voice was still quiet when she spoke, as though afraid that someone would hear.

"I can't do…this, any more. I can't become a Jedi."

"But - kid," her master said, amusement and exasperation in his tone. "Many padawan go through this kind of phase – though I admit you're a little old-"

"Master, I can't." The frightened look in her eyes silenced him. "You don't understand. I see…things that aren't there. I hear things at night. Always have. And I thought that it would get better after Ilum. I really hoped it would. But it's only worse." As she spoke, a tremor suddenly ran through her and her eyes darted up at the ceiling, staring at the shadowed peak in the roof.

"This…whatever this is, the Force, or something…I can't stay here anymore." Korin's eyes drifted towards the carpet beneath her.

"And Ben. I just-I just want him to…I know that he's powerful. Far more than any of us here at the academy. I can't hold him back like this. It's true, the story that you'd told him about his grandfather. He told me. He said that he could be stronger than Anakin, and that…" Her eyes were sad. "That we could be together in the end."

"Korin, listen to me. You have a future here."

"But-but I've been...Having dreams. And I'm afraid – I'm so kriffing afraid." She'd been holding those feelings in for so long, but now, they sounded strange out loud, jumbled and mixed-up.

"Of what?"

"I don't know what to say. Something is happening to us all and I'm not ready for when we find out."

A heavy sigh escaped Luke as he had his worries confirmed. There had been a feeling of this in his heart for quite some time. It was one of the reasons he'd decided to take on the heavy mantle of starting a new Jedi order. They needed to be prepared for the dark before dawn, for the time when the Republic finally chooses to stand against the Empire and its many new faces. And now they were stretched paper-thin, and he couldn't tell whether Korin's leaving would save Ben or destroy him.

"Do you see now, sir?"

"How can you just let her leave?" Ben's shout was loud in the empty sitting chamber, his fists clenched at his sides as he paced. In contrast to his temperamental nephew, Luke stood still, his clear blue eyes focused on the younger man.

"Ben. Do not question your master on this. It is the only way to give her peace."

"You talk of peace…you preach, about the new Jedi order and yet you fail to see the millions that are dying in the galaxy every day! This world needs order-"

"Padawan!"

"I love her, Master! She's hurting; she's afraid and I need to take care of her. No matter if she thinks she's not enough." His voice took on a pleading edge. "Please. I can help her."

"She and I have already discussed this. For both your sake and for hers." Luke took a step forward, and then another and another until he was standing just feet from Ben. He reached an arm out and the young man flinched from him. "Remember what I said to you on Ilum. You are needed for something greater than this."

His gaze was tumultuous but empty; fierce but somehow quiet. "You've lost both of us today."

In the days leading up to her departure, the weather took a downturn; the only light graying and turning cold indoors. Ben stayed silent towards Luke since their argument that night, either glaring at him each time their paths crossed or storming by without a word.

Today had been the third time Ben destroyed a training droid, but Luke didn't have the heart to reprimand him or demand that he fix the tangled messes of metal and wire, not when Ben comforted Korin each night, trying to get her to breathe evenly and sleep after the visions she'd have.

Luke doesn't really try to think all that much about the day Korin left. She had cried all night before, and even though he couldn't hear her sobs he could feel the anguish – the sadness so raw and wounded in his nephew and Korin.

It seemed to be one of those strange cold mornings; a winter sun shining through a thin veil of clouds. Each movement they made seemed laid sharp and starkly lit by the pale sunlight.

It was days like these – where they were stretched paper-thin – that Luke could see their link most strongly. It sang with a strange humming beat when they were silent, and echoed their words of sadness and regret when they spoke.

When the time came he stood at the entrance of the courtyard, solemnly watching as Korin and Ben exchanged their goodbyes. Luke came forward as the shuttle lifted off. And as the shuttle rose higher and higher into the sky, Ben crumpled to his knees, bowing his head forward.

"She's…gone." His voice broke on the last word.

After a moment, Luke's eyes flitted down. "Not forever, Ben," he reminded gently. He had a feeling they'd see each other again, maybe not as who they once were. But that day would come.

Soundlessly, Ben stood, his face strangely smooth and expressionless. His eyes, however, were full and pained and angry.

"She was the one good thing I had. And now she's gone." He blinked, staring at the stone-hemmed edge of the yard. His brow tightened, and, once again, he stormed away back into the buildings.

He'd been gone a week on a mission in the Outer Rim – rumors of a small village of primitive Force-sensitives. It had turned out to be false; only a small host of beings under the influence of heavy toxins from a plant. A few days into his investigation a distress call was sent to his ship computer from his students at the Academy.

The audio clip was barely more than half a minute long but it was enough for him to hear the sounds of rampage and murder. Immediately Luke sprinted towards the shuttle, the ramp lifting behind him as he found the controls. His ship exited the atmosphere and entered lightspeed, headed towards the Academy.

When he arrived it was already too late. The Temple was dead – destroyed, all the living beacons of the Force gone. The wind ripped at his robes as he exited his ship, and as a streak of lightning lit the open courtyard for a moment, he saw the shapeless lumps of bodies littered across the ground. His jaw clenched to keep himself from crying out, yet instead of anger he felt a deep, all-encompassing anguish. He'd failed them, failed his young padawans who had so much to live for, so much to protect. Failed Ben and Korin.

He couldn't bear to look at their faces as he brought their bodies indoors. R2-D2 was silent; the only sound apart from the whirring of his machinery and Luke's footsteps was the sound of the downpour.

In the dark of the temple he lit a single torch, the glow lighting the haggard lines of his face and casting a hellish light on the unseeing eyes of the children.

"I'm so sorry," he whispered, and then his vision blurred and tears streaked down his skin. "I'm…so sorry."

Dry wood had been unimaginably hard to find but he had done it somehow in the dark of night. He had laid their bodies all out, closed their eyes. He had dropped the torch onto the pyre.

The Jedi code taught, above all else, that there would be no attachments, no passion be it love or hate. But they had been his students – his children. What had he done? And now Ben was gone, he'd become someone else entirely, and Korin…

Korin couldn't know what had happened. If she did find out, nothing would stop her from going to find him, and then that would lead to the destruction of both of them. Korin was now the last remaining Jedi – though not fully trained, she was the only hope for the New Republic against the whispers of the rising First Order.

He was the one responsible for this terrible massacre. Guilt seemed to consume him just as the roaring fire before his eyes burned away at the remaining corpses. All he knew was that he had to get away, that he had to let himself find peace again and repent for what he had done wrong.

"R2. Record a message for me and send it to my sister."

The morning was cold and so still, the rough dirt and sand beneath her bare knees warm, barely any breeze drifting across the open lake. After the rain, pollen in the air had turned to dull yellow clay in the cracks on the courtyard tiling, filling dippets in rough stone and scattering on the sand.

The blades of grass on the terrain swayed lazily, flashing with pale purple flowers that smelled of honey. She fingered the velvety rims of lacy vine flowers that decorated the small raft, breathed in the scent of rainwater and the smell of the tides. The petals scattered the planks on the raft, the vines that she'd collected wrought through the woven reeds on the wood, and for a brief moment Korin realized that Ben never would have wanted something this delicate and pristine.

She felt him, a warm hollow beside her heart where he laid, the pulsing, thrumming beat in her veins, a comforting touch on her breast and the whisper of his breath against her shoulder.

"I'll always be here, Korin."

She bowed her head, a ghost of a smile on her lips as her hands gripped onto the raft and then gently pushed it away, out to open sea. The raft wobbled slightly on the coming waves but smoothly slipped past them, floating further and further away from where she knelt on the bank. The sun lay low on the horizon, steadily rising as the shrine became distant.

"I know."

In the entrance outside her new home, the remaining bloodrose petals drifted slowly off the bushes to rest on the ground.

I said it was love, and I did it for love –

Did it for you.

Got so much to lose,

Got so much to prove,

God; don't let me lose my mind.

[Cage the Elephant, Trouble]

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