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Revenge of the Jedi (11/17)
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Title: Revenge of the Jedi (11/17)
Fanverse: Revenge of the Jedi
Blurb: Luke returns from the crystal cave, and receives his final trial; Leia leaves Carathis for Dagobah.
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Chapter Eleven
Luke meditated for the rest of the morning. Then he walked up and down the cave, gliding his fingers along the crystals, focusing his senses as narrowly as he could. Two or three of them seemed to resonate with even greater intensity than the others.
Luke considered them. He didn’t know how normal apprentices had acquired them. Of course, he wasn’t a normal apprentice by any stretch of the imagination. It didn’t much matter how they’d done it, when he’d had to be mindful of the crushing strength in his new hand since his surgery. Now, for once, it would be a blessing rather than a curse.
He gripped each of the chosen crystals, and with a jerk of his fingers, they snapped off, falling into his hands. Luke broke them into smaller pieces and stuffed them into his bag.
He made his way back to Yoda’s hut, surviving with rather greater ease than when he’d been heading in the opposite direction. This time, he knew what to expect -- and of course, now he had the crystals. It wasn’t like the cave, of course, but they still heightened his connection to the Force.
As he walked, Luke no longer even felt as if he had one foot in the mundane world, and the other in some mystical alternate reality. It seemed quite natural for glowing presences, ever-shifting connections, and glimpses of the future to exist alongside plants and rocks and water. He didn’t think he could go back to the way he’d seen things before. Maybe it was the crystals, but if so, he didn’t care; soon enough, he’d be carrying one with him all the time, anyway.
He emerged near the swamp by dusk, and found Yoda and Obi-Wan waiting for him. They were smiling. The former looked very nearly smug.
Luke, no longer in danger of being killed by wild animals or predatory plants, put up his shields and put down his guard.
“I’ve got my crystals,” he announced. He couldn’t help but grin back. “And I didn’t turn to the Dark Side or anything.”
“Well done,” Obi-Wan said.
“Mm, yes,” said Yoda, his ears straightening. “Only the greatest trial is now left to you. More difficult and dangerous than this. Much more.”
Luke gulped.
“But now we eat.”
He gave a small cackle at the expression on Luke’s face, then turned and hobbled back into the hut. Luke and Obi-Wan exchanged an amused look and followed him in=, where the former gratefully accepted his soup and the latter perched on a chair. While Yoda and Luke ate, the two Jedi Masters interrogated Luke about his journey and retrieval of the crystals.
Within half an hour, however, Yoda’s ears were drooping, and he looked as if he were on the point of planting his face in his bowl. Luke gazed at him, frowning.
“You should sleep, Master Yoda. You need your rest,” he said. “Obi-Wan can tell me about the last trial.”
He couldn’t quite keep the alarm out of his expression. Of course, Yoda had been ancient for as long as he’d known him, but before now, Luke hadn’t noticed how much more so he had become. He never took a step without leaning heavily on his cane and spent more and more hours asleep, yet seemed worn and tired when he was awake. Even his face was more weathered than it had been.
“Hm, that face you make,” he said. “Look I so old to young eyes?”
“No -- no, of course not,” said Luke hastily. He glanced at Obi-Wan, half for reassurance, half to avoid Yoda’s still-sharp eyes, but the ghostly Jedi only shook his head.
“I do. Yes, I do! Sick have I become. Old and weak.” He chuckled, more to himself than Luke, and pointed one gnarled finger at him. “When nine hundred years old you reach, look as good you will not, hm?”
Luke managed a weak smile.
“But yes. Rest need I now.” He got to his feet, Luke jumping up to help him, and laughed again. “Rest! Soon will I rest, forever sleep. But not yet.”
Yoda tottered off to his bed, the rough door closing behind him. Luke whirled to glare at Obi-Wan.
“He can’t die!”
Obi-Wan’s expression turned grave, and then resigned. “He is very, very old.”
“But he’s so powerful,” Luke protested.
“He is strong in the Force,” Obi-Wan told him, “but not that strong. Nobody is. He has earned his rest, Luke.” He gave him a small smile. “And you needn’t despair just yet. He has some time left.”
Luke just managed a nod. He made his way over to a window and knelt in front of it, his fingers tight on the sill. Staring into the Dagobah night, he let the countless sparks of life wash over him, from the great Jedi master, asleep in the next room, to the tiny pebbles below the window. The Force, he told himself, would be with Yoda always, too. Even once he died, he’d still be bound to it. He’d remain in the world Luke now lived in, just as Obi-Wan had.
But it wasn’t the same. Obi-Wan and Shmi . . . of course it was better than losing them altogether. But it wasn’t like walking alongside Ben had been, like a living grandparent would have been. They weren’t what they had been, any more than -- than his hand. The dead, even when they continued on, were still dead.
He closed his eyes, bowing his head. “What is my final trial?” he asked evenly.
“You must pass on what you have learned,” said Obi-Wan.
Luke twisted around to stare at him. “Pass on -- but I’ve only had a few months’ training myself! Besides, I’m the last one left. Aren’t I? You told me, yourself, that the Empire, that Father turned every Force-sensitive he found over to the Emperor.”
“Yes,” Obi-Wan acknowledged, “every one he found. But he did not find them all.” He gazed down at Luke, his eyes intense even through the shimmer of his ghostly form. “You are not alone.”
Luke could only stare at him, dizzy. Then he remembered to breathe, and gulped in great, painful gasps of air.
He turned fully around. “How many?” he managed to say.
“I don’t know,” said Obi-Wan. “One rather . . . wayward Jedi was cast out of the Order some time before Vader took charge of the Purge. He had a Force-sensitive child with him. In all probability, they were found and killed. We never found out. But another lived with her parents in the very heart of the Empire, and . . . somehow, escaped Vader’s notice.”
The half-reluctant somehow caught Luke’s attention. Obi-Wan had a very good idea of how it had happened. Perhaps he even knew for certain, and just couldn’t bring himself to acknowledge it. It was difficult to know with Obi-Wan, sometimes.
Something to do with his father, Luke thought. Like most things that Obi-Wan took his . . . unusual points of view towards. Well, Vader had been in charge of the final Purges. This girl hadn’t slipped past a flimsi-fiddling bureaucrat, but Vader himself.
Impossible! Or at least, improbable. More likely, Vader hadn’t simply missed the Force-sensitive living on his doorstep, but . . . yes, that felt right. She hadn’t flown under the radar. The radar had flown over her. But he couldn’t imagine Darth Vader, even a younger, less callous Vader, sparing this girl in a fit of impersonal altruism. It’d have to be --
Luke gasped. “Leia. It’s Leia!”
Why didn’t you tell me? Did her parents know? Is that why --
“The Force is with her,” Obi-Wan said.
“Senator Amidala was a Jedi?”
Obi-Wan laughed at that. “No. She had enough of the Force to hit anything she aimed at, but she was never anything other than a politician.” He flickered. “Luke, listen to me. You must teach your friend the ways of the Force.”
“But I’m still only half-trained myself! I can’t -- ”
“You must. Untrained, she is at her most vulnerable. If Leia were to fall -- ”
“Leia would never join the Emperor. She hates the Empire!”
“So did Anakin,” said Obi-Wan grimly. “Moreover, the Emperor is not the Dark Side -- much though he would like to think so. Hatred, anger, aggression -- they lead to it more quickly and more surely than anything else, and she has them all in abundance. Her path will be longer and harder than yours or Anakin's ever were. Help her, Luke. Do for your friend what I should have done for mine.”
Luke flinched, turning away to stare at his abandoned soup. “I can't speak for her,” he said finally. “It's Leia's choice, not mine. But if she agrees to be trained, I'll do my best.”
“May the Force be with you both,” said Obi-Wan.
Four days later, Leia’s ship blasted off the surface of Carathis.
She stood at the viewscreen and watched the planet recede, greenery and ruins fading into blues and whites, fading into a distant light, fading into nothing. The Imperials didn’t seem to have changed position; their ships still appeared on Chewbacca’s modified equipment, and Leia’s own ship easily slipped past without notice.
Nevertheless, everyone breathed a sigh of relief when they headed into deep space.
Carathis was nearly perfect. Smaller than Alderaan, yes -- but then, they hardly needed the space provided by their home planet, when only a fraction of a percent of them had survived. Otherwise, the atmosphere and climate were exactly suited to humanoid physiology, and they’d found a number of spots suitable for a settlement. Since the planet was, indeed, bare of all sapient life, colonization wouldn’t displace any other peoples.
It would have been perfect, if not for that damn Imperial project. Leia’s fingernails dug into her palms. Every flight into the Alcar IV system was a risk. Too great a risk, in all probability. Her actions had devastated her people already; Tarkin might have been determined to destroy a highly visible, highly populated planet anyway, but it had been Alderaan because of her.
She drew a deep, shuddering breath. No, she would gladly risk it for herself, but she couldn’t endanger them. Not again. She’d take it to them -- the ones she’d found, anyway. They could choose for themselves. And no matter what happened, she’d keep looking for the others.
Leia’s mind drifted to Luke’s information. Another Death Star, a possible spy. A high-placed spy, even. But an enemy to the Rebellion. Using this person’s intelligence would be falling in with their plans. Not using it would be --
A beam of green light blasted towards Alderaan. It was impossible -- not Alderaan -- they hadn’t even done anything -- no weapons -- just her --
With a shudder of the planetary shields, her home exploded in a burst of light, splintering into lifeless rocks. Every single person was dead, everything burning, and somehow, Leia managed to jerk out of Vader’s painfully tight grip and bolt towards Tarkin.
Five minutes ago, she had felt as if she’d rather die than let him touch her again, but now she didn’t care about anything except scratching his eyes out, didn’t care if she did die doing it, and then Vader’s gloved hands were digging into her shoulders again and yanking her away from Tarkin and she wanted to kill him, too --
Leia squeezed her eyes shut. She’d thought of this as a difficult choice. But it wasn’t a choice at all. She couldn’t let that happen again, not if she could do something to stop it. They couldn’t. She’d take the news to Mothma and the generals, of course, but she knew what they would decide.
She opened her eyes, pulling out her datapad and handing it to a bemused Chewbacca.
“Set our destination for these coordinates,” she said.
Kurek, the pilot, glanced at her in surprise.
“I need to meet with someone there,” said Leia, certain that Luke didn’t want his location known. She trusted everyone here, but critical information had a way of getting out. She, Chewie and -- most dangerously -- Threepio would go down alone.
They reached the sector without any Imperial entanglements -- an unremarkable if fortunate happenstance, in this remote corner of the galaxy. A day from their arrival, however, Chewbacca’s comlink gave a sharp buzz.
Threepio, peering around the Wookiee’s shoulder, gave a small, robotic gasp. “Why, it’s Lando Calrissian!”
“Lando,” breathed Leia, her stomach tightening. “He must have news. Let him through, Chewie.”
Chewbacca switched it on, growling a short greeting.
“Chew . . . that you?” said Lando, his voice distant and crackling. “I . . . can’t talk much, but . . . apped the place, sending . . . lowered security for . . . six weeks . . . hear that?”
“Jabba’s going to lower the security in six weeks?” Leia asked swiftly.
“That’s ri --”
“That’s when we’ll be coming, then. You’ll need to be ready.”
“I’ll be wait . . . one’s coming,” Lando said, and disconnected.
Chewbacca gave a joyous roar. Leia grinned at him.
“Six weeks, and we’ll have Han back, Chewie.”
Months of nothing, she thought, and now she had refugees, rescues, a vote, and a spy on her hands. Well, she’d manage, somehow. Better this than being reduced to the tragic little princess, day in and day out.
And in a few hours, she’d see Luke again. Leia bit her lip. He’d already seemed so different when she last saw him, and it had been almost five months since then. She hoped . . . she didn’t even know. That after all this time, perhaps he’d learned enough to come back to the Rebellion. Perhaps, with Jabba taken care of, he’d be able to convince Han to stay -- at the least, perhaps they’d spare the time to help with her mission.
After all, smugglers and seers were hardly less useful than engineers or scientists -- and the three of them had always achieved their greatest successes in concert -- and, well, she wanted them with her. She wanted everything to be like it had been before.
Except now, she and Han were . . . something. She’d admitted that she loved him, at any rate, and he (probably) loved her too. Somehow, that didn’t make it feel wrong to kiss Luke afterwards.
He was her best friend -- her only friend, she thought sometimes, but that only made her love him more, not less. Not in quite the same way she loved Han, but not quite different, either. Besides, he’d been suffering, broken; after everything that had happened to them both, it was only natural to try and comfort them both. It always was about comfort, with Luke. It was --
It was complicated.
No, they couldn’t go back to being three friends running around the galaxy, with only a touch of low, safe tension running between them. But she still felt they should be together -- at least in some way -- every once in awhile -- if they could. And for now, she wanted to see Luke.
Title: Revenge of the Jedi (11/17)
Fanverse: Revenge of the Jedi
Blurb: Luke returns from the crystal cave, and receives his final trial; Leia leaves Carathis for Dagobah.
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Chapter Eleven
Luke meditated for the rest of the morning. Then he walked up and down the cave, gliding his fingers along the crystals, focusing his senses as narrowly as he could. Two or three of them seemed to resonate with even greater intensity than the others.
Luke considered them. He didn’t know how normal apprentices had acquired them. Of course, he wasn’t a normal apprentice by any stretch of the imagination. It didn’t much matter how they’d done it, when he’d had to be mindful of the crushing strength in his new hand since his surgery. Now, for once, it would be a blessing rather than a curse.
He gripped each of the chosen crystals, and with a jerk of his fingers, they snapped off, falling into his hands. Luke broke them into smaller pieces and stuffed them into his bag.
He made his way back to Yoda’s hut, surviving with rather greater ease than when he’d been heading in the opposite direction. This time, he knew what to expect -- and of course, now he had the crystals. It wasn’t like the cave, of course, but they still heightened his connection to the Force.
As he walked, Luke no longer even felt as if he had one foot in the mundane world, and the other in some mystical alternate reality. It seemed quite natural for glowing presences, ever-shifting connections, and glimpses of the future to exist alongside plants and rocks and water. He didn’t think he could go back to the way he’d seen things before. Maybe it was the crystals, but if so, he didn’t care; soon enough, he’d be carrying one with him all the time, anyway.
He emerged near the swamp by dusk, and found Yoda and Obi-Wan waiting for him. They were smiling. The former looked very nearly smug.
Luke, no longer in danger of being killed by wild animals or predatory plants, put up his shields and put down his guard.
“I’ve got my crystals,” he announced. He couldn’t help but grin back. “And I didn’t turn to the Dark Side or anything.”
“Well done,” Obi-Wan said.
“Mm, yes,” said Yoda, his ears straightening. “Only the greatest trial is now left to you. More difficult and dangerous than this. Much more.”
Luke gulped.
“But now we eat.”
He gave a small cackle at the expression on Luke’s face, then turned and hobbled back into the hut. Luke and Obi-Wan exchanged an amused look and followed him in=, where the former gratefully accepted his soup and the latter perched on a chair. While Yoda and Luke ate, the two Jedi Masters interrogated Luke about his journey and retrieval of the crystals.
Within half an hour, however, Yoda’s ears were drooping, and he looked as if he were on the point of planting his face in his bowl. Luke gazed at him, frowning.
“You should sleep, Master Yoda. You need your rest,” he said. “Obi-Wan can tell me about the last trial.”
He couldn’t quite keep the alarm out of his expression. Of course, Yoda had been ancient for as long as he’d known him, but before now, Luke hadn’t noticed how much more so he had become. He never took a step without leaning heavily on his cane and spent more and more hours asleep, yet seemed worn and tired when he was awake. Even his face was more weathered than it had been.
“Hm, that face you make,” he said. “Look I so old to young eyes?”
“No -- no, of course not,” said Luke hastily. He glanced at Obi-Wan, half for reassurance, half to avoid Yoda’s still-sharp eyes, but the ghostly Jedi only shook his head.
“I do. Yes, I do! Sick have I become. Old and weak.” He chuckled, more to himself than Luke, and pointed one gnarled finger at him. “When nine hundred years old you reach, look as good you will not, hm?”
Luke managed a weak smile.
“But yes. Rest need I now.” He got to his feet, Luke jumping up to help him, and laughed again. “Rest! Soon will I rest, forever sleep. But not yet.”
Yoda tottered off to his bed, the rough door closing behind him. Luke whirled to glare at Obi-Wan.
“He can’t die!”
Obi-Wan’s expression turned grave, and then resigned. “He is very, very old.”
“But he’s so powerful,” Luke protested.
“He is strong in the Force,” Obi-Wan told him, “but not that strong. Nobody is. He has earned his rest, Luke.” He gave him a small smile. “And you needn’t despair just yet. He has some time left.”
Luke just managed a nod. He made his way over to a window and knelt in front of it, his fingers tight on the sill. Staring into the Dagobah night, he let the countless sparks of life wash over him, from the great Jedi master, asleep in the next room, to the tiny pebbles below the window. The Force, he told himself, would be with Yoda always, too. Even once he died, he’d still be bound to it. He’d remain in the world Luke now lived in, just as Obi-Wan had.
But it wasn’t the same. Obi-Wan and Shmi . . . of course it was better than losing them altogether. But it wasn’t like walking alongside Ben had been, like a living grandparent would have been. They weren’t what they had been, any more than -- than his hand. The dead, even when they continued on, were still dead.
He closed his eyes, bowing his head. “What is my final trial?” he asked evenly.
“You must pass on what you have learned,” said Obi-Wan.
Luke twisted around to stare at him. “Pass on -- but I’ve only had a few months’ training myself! Besides, I’m the last one left. Aren’t I? You told me, yourself, that the Empire, that Father turned every Force-sensitive he found over to the Emperor.”
“Yes,” Obi-Wan acknowledged, “every one he found. But he did not find them all.” He gazed down at Luke, his eyes intense even through the shimmer of his ghostly form. “You are not alone.”
Luke could only stare at him, dizzy. Then he remembered to breathe, and gulped in great, painful gasps of air.
He turned fully around. “How many?” he managed to say.
“I don’t know,” said Obi-Wan. “One rather . . . wayward Jedi was cast out of the Order some time before Vader took charge of the Purge. He had a Force-sensitive child with him. In all probability, they were found and killed. We never found out. But another lived with her parents in the very heart of the Empire, and . . . somehow, escaped Vader’s notice.”
The half-reluctant somehow caught Luke’s attention. Obi-Wan had a very good idea of how it had happened. Perhaps he even knew for certain, and just couldn’t bring himself to acknowledge it. It was difficult to know with Obi-Wan, sometimes.
Something to do with his father, Luke thought. Like most things that Obi-Wan took his . . . unusual points of view towards. Well, Vader had been in charge of the final Purges. This girl hadn’t slipped past a flimsi-fiddling bureaucrat, but Vader himself.
Impossible! Or at least, improbable. More likely, Vader hadn’t simply missed the Force-sensitive living on his doorstep, but . . . yes, that felt right. She hadn’t flown under the radar. The radar had flown over her. But he couldn’t imagine Darth Vader, even a younger, less callous Vader, sparing this girl in a fit of impersonal altruism. It’d have to be --
Luke gasped. “Leia. It’s Leia!”
Why didn’t you tell me? Did her parents know? Is that why --
“The Force is with her,” Obi-Wan said.
“Senator Amidala was a Jedi?”
Obi-Wan laughed at that. “No. She had enough of the Force to hit anything she aimed at, but she was never anything other than a politician.” He flickered. “Luke, listen to me. You must teach your friend the ways of the Force.”
“But I’m still only half-trained myself! I can’t -- ”
“You must. Untrained, she is at her most vulnerable. If Leia were to fall -- ”
“Leia would never join the Emperor. She hates the Empire!”
“So did Anakin,” said Obi-Wan grimly. “Moreover, the Emperor is not the Dark Side -- much though he would like to think so. Hatred, anger, aggression -- they lead to it more quickly and more surely than anything else, and she has them all in abundance. Her path will be longer and harder than yours or Anakin's ever were. Help her, Luke. Do for your friend what I should have done for mine.”
Luke flinched, turning away to stare at his abandoned soup. “I can't speak for her,” he said finally. “It's Leia's choice, not mine. But if she agrees to be trained, I'll do my best.”
“May the Force be with you both,” said Obi-Wan.
Four days later, Leia’s ship blasted off the surface of Carathis.
She stood at the viewscreen and watched the planet recede, greenery and ruins fading into blues and whites, fading into a distant light, fading into nothing. The Imperials didn’t seem to have changed position; their ships still appeared on Chewbacca’s modified equipment, and Leia’s own ship easily slipped past without notice.
Nevertheless, everyone breathed a sigh of relief when they headed into deep space.
Carathis was nearly perfect. Smaller than Alderaan, yes -- but then, they hardly needed the space provided by their home planet, when only a fraction of a percent of them had survived. Otherwise, the atmosphere and climate were exactly suited to humanoid physiology, and they’d found a number of spots suitable for a settlement. Since the planet was, indeed, bare of all sapient life, colonization wouldn’t displace any other peoples.
It would have been perfect, if not for that damn Imperial project. Leia’s fingernails dug into her palms. Every flight into the Alcar IV system was a risk. Too great a risk, in all probability. Her actions had devastated her people already; Tarkin might have been determined to destroy a highly visible, highly populated planet anyway, but it had been Alderaan because of her.
She drew a deep, shuddering breath. No, she would gladly risk it for herself, but she couldn’t endanger them. Not again. She’d take it to them -- the ones she’d found, anyway. They could choose for themselves. And no matter what happened, she’d keep looking for the others.
Leia’s mind drifted to Luke’s information. Another Death Star, a possible spy. A high-placed spy, even. But an enemy to the Rebellion. Using this person’s intelligence would be falling in with their plans. Not using it would be --
A beam of green light blasted towards Alderaan. It was impossible -- not Alderaan -- they hadn’t even done anything -- no weapons -- just her --
With a shudder of the planetary shields, her home exploded in a burst of light, splintering into lifeless rocks. Every single person was dead, everything burning, and somehow, Leia managed to jerk out of Vader’s painfully tight grip and bolt towards Tarkin.
Five minutes ago, she had felt as if she’d rather die than let him touch her again, but now she didn’t care about anything except scratching his eyes out, didn’t care if she did die doing it, and then Vader’s gloved hands were digging into her shoulders again and yanking her away from Tarkin and she wanted to kill him, too --
Leia squeezed her eyes shut. She’d thought of this as a difficult choice. But it wasn’t a choice at all. She couldn’t let that happen again, not if she could do something to stop it. They couldn’t. She’d take the news to Mothma and the generals, of course, but she knew what they would decide.
She opened her eyes, pulling out her datapad and handing it to a bemused Chewbacca.
“Set our destination for these coordinates,” she said.
Kurek, the pilot, glanced at her in surprise.
“I need to meet with someone there,” said Leia, certain that Luke didn’t want his location known. She trusted everyone here, but critical information had a way of getting out. She, Chewie and -- most dangerously -- Threepio would go down alone.
They reached the sector without any Imperial entanglements -- an unremarkable if fortunate happenstance, in this remote corner of the galaxy. A day from their arrival, however, Chewbacca’s comlink gave a sharp buzz.
Threepio, peering around the Wookiee’s shoulder, gave a small, robotic gasp. “Why, it’s Lando Calrissian!”
“Lando,” breathed Leia, her stomach tightening. “He must have news. Let him through, Chewie.”
Chewbacca switched it on, growling a short greeting.
“Chew . . . that you?” said Lando, his voice distant and crackling. “I . . . can’t talk much, but . . . apped the place, sending . . . lowered security for . . . six weeks . . . hear that?”
“Jabba’s going to lower the security in six weeks?” Leia asked swiftly.
“That’s ri --”
“That’s when we’ll be coming, then. You’ll need to be ready.”
“I’ll be wait . . . one’s coming,” Lando said, and disconnected.
Chewbacca gave a joyous roar. Leia grinned at him.
“Six weeks, and we’ll have Han back, Chewie.”
Months of nothing, she thought, and now she had refugees, rescues, a vote, and a spy on her hands. Well, she’d manage, somehow. Better this than being reduced to the tragic little princess, day in and day out.
And in a few hours, she’d see Luke again. Leia bit her lip. He’d already seemed so different when she last saw him, and it had been almost five months since then. She hoped . . . she didn’t even know. That after all this time, perhaps he’d learned enough to come back to the Rebellion. Perhaps, with Jabba taken care of, he’d be able to convince Han to stay -- at the least, perhaps they’d spare the time to help with her mission.
After all, smugglers and seers were hardly less useful than engineers or scientists -- and the three of them had always achieved their greatest successes in concert -- and, well, she wanted them with her. She wanted everything to be like it had been before.
Except now, she and Han were . . . something. She’d admitted that she loved him, at any rate, and he (probably) loved her too. Somehow, that didn’t make it feel wrong to kiss Luke afterwards.
He was her best friend -- her only friend, she thought sometimes, but that only made her love him more, not less. Not in quite the same way she loved Han, but not quite different, either. Besides, he’d been suffering, broken; after everything that had happened to them both, it was only natural to try and comfort them both. It always was about comfort, with Luke. It was --
It was complicated.
No, they couldn’t go back to being three friends running around the galaxy, with only a touch of low, safe tension running between them. But she still felt they should be together -- at least in some way -- every once in awhile -- if they could. And for now, she wanted to see Luke.