Last Part! (i think) I finally had the time to type it up. yay!

Disclaimer: I don't own this - at all

He made his way slowly back to his “home”. Opening the door he paused, struggling to force his face into a smile – but he couldn’t quite manage it.

She looked up from the book she was reading – some medical textbook from a planet ten million miles away from her home. He wasn’t sure if she was actually interested in it, or if she was just reading it for the sake of reading it.

“You OK?” she asked him softly, her eyes searching his face for some sign of what was wrong.

He said nothing – his voice would give his emotions away. He merely nodded one, hoping that because she was just a novice, she wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between this forced half smile and the real thing. Unfortunately, she was better than he gave her credit for. She stood up, walked around behind him, and gave him a gentle hug. Her hugs were different from her hugs. Not worse, or bad, but different. He let his arms automatically wrap around her and hug her back.

“She would know. If she were here, she’d know just what to say,” she whispered softly, “I’m just a novice – can’t be helped. But I want to know the right thing to say. I want to make it better.” She sounded so sad, so desperate to help him.

His arms pulled her tighter, holding her to him as if trying to protect her from the horrors he had seen. Maybe, he thought, if he just held her tighter, she wouldn’t slip away. Maybe, if he held her closer, he could protect her better. True, she wasn’t the same – but no one could be the same. Yet here she was, easing his hurt and making him realize that there were other companions out there – ones who were ready to prove that they could hold their own too. He couldn’t hold on to the past forever – isn’t that what he wanted for her? He wanted her to live a fantastic life. She would want the same for him. So he put her away, in a special spot meant just for the people he loved, and moved on. Because he had her, the one wrapping her arms around a man who wanted someone else, the one who knew she wasn’t who he wanted but she stuck around anyway. The one who wanted nothing better than to be someone else, just to make him happy. And he didn’t want her to change for him. She was different, but he could grow to love her. Love her like he loved all his companions.

He buried his face in her hair, closing his eyes. He couldn’t protect her forever – but damn if he wasn’t going to try.

Review! I'm sorry if it's confusing with the "she" and "her" referring to two different people. But I didn't want to use actual names. I tried to make it clear - let me know!