Chapter Text
Space was cold. Not always and not everywhere as the temperature rose with every click you neared a sun.
But out here, in the vast nothingness of the Outer Rim on the night-side of a planet, space was cold. Pulling the blanket closer around her bare shoulders, Ahsoka ignored the I-Told-You-So glance Master Obi-Wan sent her way. The ease with which her Togruta body usually adapted to the outside temperature was glaringly lacking in the nihility surrounding them.
Unlike her, her grandmaster had opted wear a thicker tunic than he usually did in the field and was currently being swallowed up by a winter coat likely two numbers too big for him. She would bet money on the fact that it was Anakin’s old one. The grin slipping onto her lips at the thought let Obi-Wan raise an eyebrow.
“What?” He asked and Ahsoka shrugged her shoulders, sinking a little deeper into her blanket to hide how much the grin was growing.
“I just think red isn’t really you colour. Skyguy’s coat?” At first, all she got as a reply was the low chuckle she had learned to associate with comfort and Obi-Wan turned to check their location once more, before picking almost self-consciously at the fur interior of his coat.
“Is it that obvious?” He asked. “According to Anakin, my own coat isn’t functioning any longer as there are too many holes in it from blasters. I’d say it is perfectly fine, but you know how Anakin gets.”
Overprotective, worried in a way that bordered onto obsession? Yes she had been on the receiving end of his unique kind of love for almost two years now. Originally she had assumed it was due to her age and that he might see her as incapable, but if anything, his intensity to love and care got much much worse when focused on his old Master. Something Ahsoka never quite understood, as Master Obi-Wan represented an ideal of capability she never even imagined to achieve.
“Well, I guess then I’m lucky that I didn’t see him before leaving,” She laughed and Obi-Wan sent her a warm smile with a shake of his head.
“Or unlucky, considering you are the one shivering right now. Here,” He stood up from the pilot seat and began working his way out of Anakin’s coat. Ahsoka tried to protest, but before she could even formulate a full sentence, she was already covered in warm fur.
“I’ll be fine once we reach the surface, Master! I don’t get cold as quickly as humans do.”
This time, Obi-Wan was the one to laugh as he abandoned his former seat to move across the cockpit and towards the food storage.
“You forget, dear. I’m Stewjoni. I don’t get as cold as quickly as Anakin does. Your Master is especially sensitive to the cold. I think that’s why he keeps insisting we dress warmer than necessary.” Glancing out the window, Obi-Wan gestured towards the large, dark moon they were narrowly passing right now, its planet blocking almost every last bit of sunlight.
“And besides, we are only just passing Sichi 77145. It will be a few more hours until we reach our destination.”
Nodding, Ahsoka curled deeper below the blanket and her Master’s coat, finally feeling the warmth creep back into her finger tips. Her eyes drifted towards the darkness surrounding them. Or rather, the dark sky punctuated by millions upon millions of little stars. She had grown up with the knowledge of how the universe was endless, and yet, every single time she looked up at the sky, she almost lost herself in the feeling of how incredibly tiny she was. How incredibly unimportant she had been and would always be in the face of the universe’s vastness. No matter if she was trained by the Chosen one. No matter if her line was the direct lineage of Master Yoda. No matter if her grandmaster had killed a Sith. She herself was tiny in comparison to all that grace.
“A tea, my dear?” Obi-Wan asked and broke through her spiralling thoughts. Ahsoka almost startled, only saved by the weight of the blankets above her, so instead, she forced a smile on her lips and nodded.
“I’m guessing you won’t let me have caf?”
The laugh she got as reply eased some of her sadness.
“Trust me, the tea is stronger. But if you want caf instead, I won’t stop you. You’re not my Padawan,” He grinned and Ahsoka echoed his earlier laughter, leaning back into her seat a little more comfortable.
“No, I think I’ll try your tea.”
Obi-Wan hummed and turned to begin rummaging through the limited shelf storage for the various packages of tea he seemingly always brought along. Either he packed it or it was packed for him. Ahsoka was 100% sure Cody had a stack of his own, just in case his general ever ended up running out of tea. But then again, she was also fairly sure that those two frequently took their tea breaks together.
“Are you alright, Ahsoka?”
“What?” She asked, her head whipping around to stare at her grandmaster, her eyes widening in slight surprise.
“You seem…” He hesitated, searching for the right word. “Sad. Is it because you’re away without Anakin?”
Oh. She had projected. Immediately slamming her mental shields shut, she curled a little deeper into the fabrics covering her body and her eyes focused on a spot above his shoulder.
“No, I… Well… I’ve been away from Anakin for missions before. And I have you with me. I’m just… Anakin and I had a fight. Kind of. Before I left.”
Obi-Wan pulled two cups out of the storage, diving the tea leaves between them, while giving her an encouraging nod to continue.
“He’s been distant recently. Angry, I’d say. Or maybe moody. Anything I do, I do wrong and everything I say annoys him. I just want him to say that he is proud of me? At least once! But all he does is telling me what I could do better and ignoring me if he doesn’t have any criticism,” She went on, almost feeling self-conscious about the words slipping out her mouth. Her grandmaster opposite of her had frozen in his movements, his eyes staring at the cups between his fingers, before he cleared his throat and turned to face her.
“You should tell him that. He’ll be upset, of course, he always gets upset. But he is very proud of you. As am I. Ahsoka you-“
He didn’t finish his sentence, instead, his eyes widened as he stared past her out the window of their ship, before the cups dropped to the ground and shattered.
“AHSOKA WATCH OUT!”
She felt it more than she saw it. A field of energy passing through her, a field of heat boiling her from the inside, burning her skin. Orange filled her vision as a solar storm burned its way through the ship, slamming her back into her seat and knocking Master Obi-Wan off his feet. Before she could open her mouth to scream, to fill her burning lungs with air and fire, the ship around her went dark. And then it lost gravity. Or rather… it gained gravity.
Ahsoka was ripped to the side, only held in place by the belt across her chest. The ship tilted sideways, shards of burned glass floated past her as the gravitational pull of Sichi 77145’s moon drew them towards the surface, leaving the ship in a state of free falling.
There was no up, there was no down. There was just falling. Ahsoka couldn’t tell how many times she was thrown from side to side as the ship spiralled down to earth like a Samara fruit falling in autumn. She couldn’t see Obi-Wan. She couldn’t see anything except for the stars rotating around her at dizzying speed and her throat felt raw from screaming even though she couldn’t hear her own words. The moon’s surface came closer with every passing rotation and heat hit Ahsoka’s burned face as the ship’s nose caught fire and began tearing itself apart.
“Stop!” She screamed, her voice lost in the roaring wind around her.
“Stop!” Her eyes stayed closed while her hands were digging into the fur of Anakin’s coat, trying and failing to find any kind of gravity to ground herself.
“Stop!”
A jolt went through the ship, Ahsoka was thrown forward in her seat as the fall was abruptly stopped. Her head slammed against the ship’s control board and the world around her went black.