"Runaway" musings...
So ... there’s this ‘verse in my head that’s bugging me. It may never get written. I mean, there’s a lot of other stuff that needs to come first. But if it gets written, it’s called Runaway, and it goes something like this:
Anakin Skywalker is seventeen when he gets married. It’s a good idea, in some ways - the only way, maybe, to heal the schism between the Lorethan heretics and the Jedi Council, and it does save his friend Ryn from her own expendability. But in other ways, it’s a really bad idea. The Jedi are hiding things, the Lorethans are so wrapped in tradition it’s practically choking them, and Ryn has agreed to stipulations in the contract Anakin knows nothing about. Among them is an interdiction against making sexual demands of her new husband, a restriction whose presence in the contract had a dual genesis: the Jedi fear of attachment, reluctant to foster anything like a mutually satisfying relationship, and Lorethan superstitions regarding women’s sexual power. Not exactly a recipe for domestic harmony, especially with events in the galaxy at large spiraling down into darkness.
Somebody really ought to say something.
But what happens is that Ryn keeps her mouth shut, soldiering on with the determination of self-sacrifice that has defined her life to date, and since she doesn’t know that Anakin doesn’t know about the chains with which their contract binds her, she doesn’t see any reason to speak.
They have two kids together, and design the space station that finally makes Loreth a viable trading presence beyond the Outer Rim as well as providing a reliable center of defense against the Chiss, and against all the odds they actually make it work ... for a little while.
But the thing about living a life based on secrets is that eventually, somebody is sure to talk. And it happens one night in bed: Ryn can’t quite help herself, can’t resist reaching for a little more than she knows she should. And Anakin, quite innocently, calls her on it - “let me do that,” is what he wants to say, but it comes out wrong, and all she hears is “no,” and the regret cuts deep enough that he finally feels the schism. So he asks, and gradually his would-be wife realizes that there are some critical gaps in his understanding.
It dawns on her that something is out of place. So she breaks her vow, and her silence, and tells him the whole damn story. And what it amounts to is that no contract is valid if the parties involved don’t know - because they aren’t told - what they’re agreeing to. So together they confront her brother, Kit, the man at the heart of the plan ... and he rips Ryn a new one for defying the contract in the first place, and kicks her out of his house.
On the way home, Ryn grabs Anakin by the arm and says, “I can’t let my kids grow up here.”
So they go on the run.
Anakin knows at least one member of the Senate who won’t flinch from throwing a conspiracy like this one wide open in the name of justice, so he is determined that they have to reach Padmé. But with half the Lorethan Militia on their trail ... it might be a bumpy ride.
They go to ground to save their kids, and along the way, they might even save each other ...
Anakin Skywalker is seventeen when he gets married. It’s a good idea, in some ways - the only way, maybe, to heal the schism between the Lorethan heretics and the Jedi Council, and it does save his friend Ryn from her own expendability. But in other ways, it’s a really bad idea. The Jedi are hiding things, the Lorethans are so wrapped in tradition it’s practically choking them, and Ryn has agreed to stipulations in the contract Anakin knows nothing about. Among them is an interdiction against making sexual demands of her new husband, a restriction whose presence in the contract had a dual genesis: the Jedi fear of attachment, reluctant to foster anything like a mutually satisfying relationship, and Lorethan superstitions regarding women’s sexual power. Not exactly a recipe for domestic harmony, especially with events in the galaxy at large spiraling down into darkness.
Somebody really ought to say something.
But what happens is that Ryn keeps her mouth shut, soldiering on with the determination of self-sacrifice that has defined her life to date, and since she doesn’t know that Anakin doesn’t know about the chains with which their contract binds her, she doesn’t see any reason to speak.
They have two kids together, and design the space station that finally makes Loreth a viable trading presence beyond the Outer Rim as well as providing a reliable center of defense against the Chiss, and against all the odds they actually make it work ... for a little while.
But the thing about living a life based on secrets is that eventually, somebody is sure to talk. And it happens one night in bed: Ryn can’t quite help herself, can’t resist reaching for a little more than she knows she should. And Anakin, quite innocently, calls her on it - “let me do that,” is what he wants to say, but it comes out wrong, and all she hears is “no,” and the regret cuts deep enough that he finally feels the schism. So he asks, and gradually his would-be wife realizes that there are some critical gaps in his understanding.
It dawns on her that something is out of place. So she breaks her vow, and her silence, and tells him the whole damn story. And what it amounts to is that no contract is valid if the parties involved don’t know - because they aren’t told - what they’re agreeing to. So together they confront her brother, Kit, the man at the heart of the plan ... and he rips Ryn a new one for defying the contract in the first place, and kicks her out of his house.
On the way home, Ryn grabs Anakin by the arm and says, “I can’t let my kids grow up here.”
So they go on the run.
Anakin knows at least one member of the Senate who won’t flinch from throwing a conspiracy like this one wide open in the name of justice, so he is determined that they have to reach Padmé. But with half the Lorethan Militia on their trail ... it might be a bumpy ride.
They go to ground to save their kids, and along the way, they might even save each other ...