DISCLAIMER: Star Wars and all publicly recognisable characters, names and references, etc are the sole property of George Lucas, Lucasfilm Ltd, Lucasarts Inc, 20th Century Fox, Timothy Zahn, Barbara Hambly, YKW and the other writers of the expanded Star Wars Universe. This fan fiction was created solely for entertainment and no money was made from it. Also, no copyright or trademark infringement was intended. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author. Any other characters, the storyline and the actual story are the property of the author.
"I don't like this," Mara said that evening as she and Luke walked back from the landing port to their home. "I don't like not telling her. She's old enough to know. She'd probably even find it exciting. It might make her respect us more, and take more pride in herself."
Luke put his arm around Mara's waist. "Only four months to go, Mara. We decided to wait until she's 16. It's far too complicated for her to understand now."
"Understand," Mara practically sneered. "Hell, Luke, she probably already knows on some level."
"But it's not as traumatizing as it could be if she found out that you once wanted to kill me, that you killed for a living, and that I was at one time a dark Jedi Knight. She's so strong in the Force. We have to wait until she's mature enough to understand the way things work."
"I don't understand the way things work, Skywalker!" Mara railed at him, her voice enchoing off the cool night-covered jungle. "And of all people, I still don't understand how you could have agreed to this! I mean, you didn't find out about Vader until you were---"
"Old enough to deal with it," Luke pointed out. "Any time before, and I might have fallen to the dark side--completely." He nodded. "Trust me, Mara. It's not even a year. She'll learn her heritage. She'll learn how much she needs the power of the light."
Then there was Han Solo to tell them that they were both full of bantha fooder.
He and Leia came to visit the twins and celebrate the completion of their training. If they actually completed it. Han had some colorful opinions about that, too.
"You know," he said one evening as Mara dealt out a "friendly" game of sabbacc, "you're just going to make things worse for her if you keep this up. I don't understand what the big deal is. I mean, what's four months? The poor kid is ready to burst! Besides, isn't all this anxiety she feels over it bad for her psyche or something? Isn't that all part of the dark side?"
Luke grinned at his old friend. "Come on, Han, you know how messed up I was when I was 19. I could never have handled knowing that Vader was my father. I would have run off to find him and wound up becoming a darksider before I even knew it."
"But Vaiya has you and Mara for parents, not some mysterious Dark Jedi out there somewhere. What are you afraid of?"
"That she won't understand about Callista and her son, for one thing," Leia offered. "That sort of thing can be really hard on a child."
Mara ran her thumb over her cards, letting then snap loudly. "Call it Jedi intuition if you want, Solo," she said dryly, and then added thoughtfully, "and she's so rebellious. If she finds out too much of our colorful family history before she's ready, she could do more damage to us than I'd like to think about."
Han let out a little laugh. "You're worried about your own daughter? Now that is really paranoid."
"Mara had several disturbing visions when she was carrying Vaiya," Luke defended his wife. "I trust her to take the right course of action."
This time, it was Leia who shook her head. "But Luke, if you hadn't made it sound like a big secret---"
"That's just it, we didn't," Mara said. "We always talked about things so casually, even told her the little story about when we defeated CyBoth, and how Luke 'rescued' me and we fell in love. But she knew there was more to it than that. And I'm not telling a 9 year old information that could get distorted in her mind, or she could wind up distorting herself and getting us all into trouble. She knew, though. She knew there were secrets, insisted in hearing them until we told her flat out that we would tell her when she was old enough to understand. When she turned 13, I thought she was going to just burst." Mara did not add that it was at that point that Vaiya's pubervescent hormones had strengthened her Jedi abilities and made her aware that memories that were not her own lurked in her head. Han and Leia didn't really know about that and that was just fine with her.
Han snorted. "Jedi nonsense. You're going to turn her into a basketcase, mark my words. Just like your old Uncle Ben." Luke smiled. "If I should be half as lucky," he said.
Father had gone off with Derrin on some sort of hike through the jungle. Vaiya had watched them disappear into the thick green foliage, wishing she could tag along but knowing better. Father taught his students alone. Mother was a bit more flexible, and besides, she owed her mother something for letting her hang around Derrin the other day.
Her stomach still fluttered when she remembered the attention he'd lavished on her. Just as her daydreams filled with his face, she felt a strange disturbance in the Force.
"Someone's here, Mother!" Vaiya called as she gazed toward the landing port. A sleek craft that she didn't know the technical name for had just set itself down in an empty slot, and within a few minutes she could see the movement of the hatch door opening.
She felt Mara come out behind her. "Who is it?" Vaiya asked her, not looking at her but keeping her eyes fixed on the craft.
"Wait here," Mara said softly. "I'll go see."
"NO!" Vaiya objected, stamping her foot on the ground. Mara whirled on her daughter, a look of surprise on her face from the Force echo of Vaiya's anger.
"You're always doing that to me!" Vaiya ranted. "You and Daddy just want to shove me away, lock me up in my room, and forget about me!"
"You know that isn't true," Mara said, her voice calm and level. "We just want to protect you--"
"Then why don't you just lock me in a box and shove me in the ground! I can't get any safer than that!" With that, she whirled around and ran back into the house.
Watching her go, Mara was shaken. First, because she had felt something coming from her daughter's mind that felt too familiar, and second, she had a very bad feeling about strange ships landing in their port, unannounced. After all, this scene had happened before, and no good had ever come out of it.