You did it again, didn't you? [Vani/Sandrow]

[Jak Sandrow]

"N...nothing, nothing," he said. "Just... thinking... about stuff..."

And her...

He pushed his plate away. "Eh, I'm not really hungry anymore. I'll clean up."

@[member="Emily Vani"]

 

[Emily Vani]

Emily sat awkwardly. "Jak..." she says.

She gets up to stop him. It can't be helped but to worry about this man who's helped her for the past two days.

She grabs his hands and looks into his eyes.

@[member="Jak Sandrow"]

 

[Jak Sandrow]

As she took his hand, he stopped, inwardly groaned, and closed his eyes.

Whyyyyy....

He turned to her and opened them again.

And her eyes pierced right through his heart.

Gently but firmly, he removed her hand from his wrist and turned away, having not made a sound.

As he knew the ship far better than her, it was an easy matter to lose her if she followed.

@[member="Emily Vani"]

 

[Emily Vani]

"Jak!" she was getting uncontrollable feelings of anguish at this point.

He was walking away.

"DAMMIT! Answer me!"

@[member="Jak Sandrow"]

 

[Jak Sandrow]

But he kept walking, and didn't answer.

He couldn't trust himself.

---

Some time later, when pursuit was negligible, he was found by Re, idly turning a hydrospanner in his hands.

"Hey, Re," he said, patting the seat next to him, sliding over. "I know you can't talk. I just... need to get this off my chest..."

@[member="Emily Vani"]

 

[Emily Vani]

Emily, wandering aimlessly through the ship finally her Jak's voice.

She stopped short, the Force quieted her breath, slowed her heart rate, and increased her ability to hear.

"I know you can't talk. I just... need to get this off my chest..."

@[member="Jak Sandrow"]

 

[Jak Sandrow]

He sighed and rubbed the nexu's head.

"Thing is... if I want to be honest with myself... I find that... well, I like her. She's really quite beautiful. And I don't measure beauty just by outward appearance.
"However, if I'm really honest with myself... I'm scared. Scared that this will lead to something that I can't control. I mean, look at Circe. The only reason she's a plant right now is because I made her one. And she's affected me in so many ways since then. She's popped in and out of my life, Re. And every time she's popped out, she stabs me one more time in the back. And I finally said, 'Not anymore.' But... I think that broke me.
"I've tried to steer clear of Force users ever since. It's been difficult, what with how prevalent they are, but I've managed. Till now."
He absent-mindedly petted the nexu as he rambled.
"But I got hit with a double whammy. Not only is she a Force User, but she's Circe's goddamn apprentice! And.... and I guess it's a triple whammy... I'm not exactly the brightest core in the fusion reactor, but... I think I know subtle flirting when I see it. And it pains me. Because... I think I like it. And that scares me, and we're right back to square one."
He sighed, and flipped the hydrospanner over in his hands.
"Truth is," he admitted, "I might have been scarred. Maybe not intentionally, but... I hurt nevertheless. Because... well, I thought that there was something between me and Circe. And she promised there was!"
He clenched the hydrospanner in his fist. "And like a goddamn idiot - " here he threw it at the bulkhead - "I believed her."
Holding his head in his hands, he sighed.

Not moving for a few minutes, he straightened up in his seat.
"Explain something to me, Re. How can a plant feel affection for a human? Especially one like her? I think Circe scarred me in more ways than one. I hold a nagging suspicion she affected how I love. Like I have no choice but to love. That would explain Steph," he mused.

He sighed. "But... if I try to find the last bit of Circe... I find love. Yet..... there's something... off... about it.
"When I compare what I felt for Circe, with what I think I feel for Emily... I don't know.. I feel... I think.... I think that... huhh... I think that, whatever I feel for her.... is far more potent, far more enduring, and far, far more permanent than anything I felt for Circe."

He noticed the nexu still beside him. Giving a half-smile, he gave the nexu a playful nudge. "Go on. Emily's probably looking for you."

@[member="Emily Vani"]

 

[Emily Vani]

Emily quickly ran off, the Force silencing her feet. Tears streamed down her face in waterfalls of intense passion. 'When. When has someone ever said something like that about me?' she asks herself. 'Never.' That was when. This was a feeling she hadn't felt before. Sure she had been with guys all the time, men with big muscles. Men with big ships. Men with big hearts. But no one ever. EVER. Had ever said anything like that.

It hurt in a joyous way. Almost as if her heart didn't know how to process it.

Arriving back in the bedroom, Emily flung herself onto the bed. Absorbing Jak's smell and just hoping - wishing - that this would all make sense. Curled into a ball, Emily's eyes flowed with hot tears of pent up emotion that she never knew she had. She heard Re pad into the room and jump lightly up onto the bed. Wrapping her fingers around in his soft white fur, she hopped to get some consolation, some sort of reprieve for this inexplicable emotional mess that was running through her. But Re wouldn't help.

@[member="Jak Sandrow"]

 

[Jak Sandrow]

As he was walking by the bedroom, he thought he heard... sobbing?

He stopped just a little ways outside the door, and listened in, trying to not even breathe.

@[member="Emily Vani"]

 

[Emily Vani]

"Re," she says, her voice a near whisper, "is this right? Should I feel this way?"

She takes a deep breath in, collecting her thoughts, "I have been in more guys' beds than I can count. Honestly, I thought this would be just another guy who I would give myself up to for a ride to wherever. But now. Now I feel like he's not going to just give me a ride, I feel like he's giving me life, breathing it into me. It feel so good, but I don't want him to feel uncomfortable. This is his life I have to think about to. In the end, what matters the most is the optimal outcome for him. I don't deserve anything good. But he does. He deserves someone who has something to live for. Not just some girl he met in a bar, wasting her time until her death day arrives."

"Re. Is it time that we leave? Maybe if we go now, he can forget about me..."

"I hate to do it. He's so damn good looking. He makes me food, he gives me a bed...he gives me happiness..." Emily pauses, shifting herself to look at Re's four different eyes. They wander around the room. Not paying attention to anything. "Oh what do you care. You follow me around no matter what. I think we'll leave when he's asleep..."

@[member="Jak Sandrow"]

@[member="Jak Sandrow"]

 

[Jak Sandrow]

Jak looked down at his feet, feeling horrible for eavesdropping. Yet.. he was glad he did.

Faking coming from the other end of the corridor, he asked, "Hey Emily, tomorrow I'm going to be working on the computers; want to help out?"

He... he... he needed her...

@[member="Emily Vani"]

 

[Emily Vani]

Quickly before Jak could see anything she wipes her eyes and perks up as if she were sleeping. "Humm...? Oh, sure."

Inwardly she sighs. One more night. She said she would help. So she would.

"But, I'm sorta tired. Is it okay if I sleep in your bed again? I can sleep on the couch too."

One more night.

@[member="Jak Sandrow"]

 

[Jak Sandrow]

"No, no, it's fine, take the bed."

Inwardly he was like

Outwardly?

"So... Um... see you tomorrow then?"

@[member="Emily Vani"]

 

[Emily Vani]

The night was just as the last to begin with. Simple sleep. Quiet sleep. Peaceful sleep.

But it was still like the last, all too much.

The terror returned.

She was thrashing around in the bed, fear consuming her unconscious mind, enveloping her in helplessness.

She couldn't wake.

@[member="Jak Sandrow"]

 

[Jak Sandrow]

Hearing the screams start up again, he sighed, and this time took a light with him.

He needed to tell her.

He went to her room - he was already starting to think of it as hers.... - and gently shook her till she woke.

Setting the light down between them, he nervously clasped his hands. "Emily... I need to tell you something. I guess I should have told you earlier... but... I didn't have the guts for it."

@[member="Emily Vani"]

 

[Emily Vani]

Her eyes adjusting to the light after finally having opened them from clenching in pain, she looks at Jak.

"Oh...what is it?"

Shivering, she leans into Jak for warmth.

@[member="Jak Sandrow"]

 

[Jak Sandrow]

He held her sideways, unsure how to phrase it.

"Emily... I need to get this off my chest," he said. "If I want to be honest with myself - "

@[member="Emily Vani"]

 

[Emily Vani]

"Shh." silently she maneuvers around Jak, straddling herself over his legs.

She pushes him down to the bed and kisses him. Not on the cheek. On the lips.

"I know Jak." she says, "I know."

Emily moves back into the covers again, this time on a farther side of the bed, she pulls back the covers and looks at Jak with a calm, questioning look.

@[member="Jak Sandrow"]

 

[Jak Sandrow]

He let her sit on him, somewhat dazed. Then his world exploded.

His heart - or whatever plants had for a heart - was going a mile a minute.

"You kno - you know," he said. That was what he had felt around the corner...

He looked over at her, making herself comfortable, and realized what she was inferring. "D... do you have room for a plant in your heart?" he asked, with the barest glimmer of hope.

@[member="Emily Vani"]

 

[Emily Vani]

She giggled at his question. But she didn't say anything, just moved the covers back some more to allow him to slip in beside her.

Softly she kissed him.

"Yes." she whispers in his ear.

@[member="Jak Sandrow"]