Revenge of the Jedi (17/17)

[anghraine]

Yay, last chapter! And, as a reminder, the nice sparkly fanmix is over here for anyone who wants to see/hear it.

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Title: Revenge of the Jedi (17/17)

Fanverse: Revenge of the Jedi

Blurb: Luke, Leia, and Co rescue Han, Luke and Leia discuss their further plans, and Han, Luke, and Leia meet up for a Very Special Occasion.

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Chapter Seventeen
Leia launched herself up, snatching Anakin Skywalker’s lightsaber out of the air. She ignited it as she landed, blocking every blaster bolt that came her way.

It wasn’t hard. She’d prepared for this, after all. Spent hours practicing -- practicing with Luke, who made a far worse opponent than Jabba’s minions. She sliced through ten, twelve, she didn’t even know how many, sent others flying through the air, spun at a whisper behind her, flung a chunk of rock at her newest opponent’s head, then brought the saber down as he ducked.

She was vaguely conscious of Luke, not far from her, though she couldn’t make him out even when she happened to look towards him. He seemed a blur of motion, most of his enemies dead before they realized they’d been attacked.

Leia caught a stray thought.

Cannon -- the barge --

“ I’ll take care of it,” Leia shouted in his general direction. She ran, not even bothering to deactivate the lightsaber -- several guards wandered into it for some reason, their movements strangely slow and sluggish. Then she flipped as high as her momentum and the Force could take her, cutting her way through the new set of guards.

She’d have to dispose of Jabba, Leia realized.

She burst into the room he occupied, and grinned. His personal guards had all gone to attack Luke -- right, good luck with that, she thought.

Jabba said something to her. Leia understood Huttish, but she didn’t bother listening.

Instead, she thought of the slave girls she’d seen in the palace. Jabba was a monster, just like the one who had slaughtered and enslaved Luke’s people. His grandmother had been a girl like that, once, lucky even to survive long enough to bear a child. To bear Luke’s father, the Jedi Knight who died with a slave transmitter still embedded in his body.

So what if it hadn’t been this particular slaver? Jabba was just as monstrous. He’d put Han on his wall. He’d thrown that poor girl into the Rancor pit, for entertainment. He deserved to die just as much as any other one did.

Leia looked down at Anakin Skywalker’s lightsaber. She had to kill him some way or another. It’d be appropriate to use this, the weapon of the slave boy who’d gotten out. Efficient, too. Quick.

Jabba didn’t deserve quick. He deserved to suffer, like Oola had; like Han had; like she had, when she’d been at the mercy of his fellow monsters, and watched Alderaan burn. It hadn’t been him on the Death Star, but it didn’t matter. She hated him, she hated them all, and she wanted him to pay for what he was.

Leia remembered her failure in the cave. She’d acted wildly, without thinking. It had to be different this time. It had to be controlled. It had to be about justice, not fear.

Luke, son and grandson of slaves, would understand.

Leia put Anakin’s lightsaber away. She thought of the suffering this creature had caused, that everyone like him had caused. She thought of what he deserved, let the Force spark through her, racing towards her outstretched hand.

It took a moment, and Leia distantly thought this would be too slow and inconvenient for most things. But Jabba could hardly move.

Lightning arced from her fingers. Or something like lightning. She’d never seen anyone struck by actual lightning, but she thought it generally left burns, as it had in the cave, and Jabba’s flesh remained unmarked even as he shrieked and wailed in anguish.

He sounded a little like Oola had, when the Rancor ate her. Leia felt a peculiar blur of satisfaction and regret at the thought. It wasn’t pleasant to do something like this, but somebody had to see justice done. She’d seen too much of the galaxy to think it would happen naturally.

It took him five minutes to die. Leia dropped her hand, staring down at his corpse, his black tongue sticking out of his mouth. Had it always been black? She wasn’t sure.

There’s a battle, Leia told herself. It didn’t seem important. Oh, there was Lando, shooting Boba Fett into the Sarlacc’s maw. How ignominious. And Luke was fighting four or five guards at once, his lightsaber an arc of light, somebody behind him gasping for air. He looked almost as remote as she felt --

For the first time, it didn’t seem right. Not -- he shouldn’t be like that. Not Luke.

Luke. Han. They had to win this, they had -- she had to control the cannon, take out as many as she could from here. Leia felt as if her heart had just started pumping again. She unhooked the lightsaber from her belt, vaulted over Jabba’s corpse, and raced towards the cannon, spinning it around and firing at everything that wasn’t Luke, Chewbacca, or Lando.

The rest of the battle passed in a blur, screams and engines and the humming of the two lightsabers all mingling together. Afterwards, weary from more than fighting, Leia took a deep breath, grabbed a rope, and swung back to Luke’s barge.

He looked pale and strained, but no longer indifferent. Leia thought he was searching her expression for the same thing; her own guilty relief crept over his face.

Luke knew what she’d done. He knew, and he did understand. But not for the reason she’d expected.

Leia glanced down at the body of an enormous guard, sprawled just to her right. She didn’t suppose he’d expected to have trouble restraining a slight man like Luke.  

He was still clutching his throat.

“ I’m not flying all the way back to Han with these,” she said, summoning up enough energy to fling the corpse over the railing. Luke joined her, and Chewie lifted the heavier remains by hand. Lando offered to help, but Leia took one look at his face and ordered him away until they’d finished the grisly task.

They reached the palace without any further inconvenience. Jabba had nearly emptied it for his little jaunt in the desert, so they encountered no serious trouble inside, either.

Luke, Leia, and Chewbacca stood back, and Lando carefully warmed the carbonite. Her eyes burned as she watched, Han’s immobile stone features melting into familiar flesh. For a moment, he seemed asleep, or dead; then he gave a small groan, and half-collapsed. They all leapt forward, but Leia and Luke reached him first, steadying his wavering figure. He flinched back.

“Just relax for a moment!” said Leia. “You’re free of the carbonite.”

Han moaned.

“He has hibernation sickness,” Lando said. “We’d better -- ”

Han reached out, blinking and gazing around wildly. “I can’t see!”

“Your eyesight will return in time,” said Luke, then winced as Han’s flailing hand caught his face, fingers leaving indentations around his eyes and cheekbones. Chewbacca seized his friend in a crushing hug.

Han choked. “Chew -- Chewie?”

Chewie gave a loud, joyful roar, then set him down, letting Luke and Leia support him again. Han laughed dazedly.

“Luke? Leia? Is that you? Where are we?”

“Jabba’s palace,” said Leia, relishing the pressure of his warm, living body, even as she faltered under its weight. “You were brought here a year ago, and we just rescued you --” She glanced over at Luke. “We’ve got to get him taken care of.”

“The base --” Lando began.

“Lando?”

“It’s all right,” Leia said soothingly. “He betrayed the Empire as soon as you went in carbonite, Han. How long does it usually last?”

“Anywhere from a few hours to a few weeks,” said Lando.

Luke shifted his weight a little. “Dagobah’s closer, and there’s nothing the medics can do that Yoda can’t.”

“Look,” Han said, “I don’t know what’s going on, but I know sitting around gabbing isn’t going to help us escape from Jabba. You all got a plan for that, right?”

There was a brief, awkward silence.

“Aw, hell -- ”

“No, we -- it’s not a problem,” Leia assured him. “We took care of Jabba already. We can just walk out.”

Han tried to squint at her. “Walk out? You’re kidding, right? And what do you mean, you took care of him?”

I shot lightning out my fingertips and electrocuted him to death.

“It’s a long story,” said Leia.

“We’ll explain everything later,” Luke added. “For now, we’ve got to get you to the Falcon. Lando, keep your blaster ready. Chewie, can you manage Han? We need to have the lightsabers out.”

“Lightsabers? You got two of them now?”

Han yelped as Chewie picked him up. Luke fell back, keeping an eye on anything that might creep up from behind, while Leia ran ahead with Lando, her weapon glowing a brilliant blue-white.

“Right, later.”

No new misfortunes accosted them, and they managed to leave the palace and fly to the Falcon without delay. Chewie carried a protesting Han up the gangplank, Lando burned the barge, and Luke and Leia stood guard.

Once Han had been nagged and drugged into sleep, Chewie settled into the cockpit with Lando, and Leia dragged Luke off to her quarters.

“What now?” she demanded. “We never planned beyond this.”

He walked to the window, hands clasped behind his back. Something about the gesture tugged at her memory, but she couldn’t say what.

“We should get Han to Dagobah. Let Yoda look over him,” Luke said. “You have your training to finish and refugees to find. The new Alderaanians you’ve found agreed to settle on Carathis, even with that Imperial project in the same system?”

“All but unanimously,” said Leia, sighing. “They’ve already renamed it New Alderaan and started building. The Imperials seem to be trying to avoid notice themselves, but it’s incredibly dangerous. Still, just about every Alderaanian I’ve met is willing to risk it -- they’re flooding in.”

“Good.” Luke fell silent for a few minutes, and Leia could almost hear his mind racing. “I need to meet up with my contact again.”

“The Imp? The Force-sensitive one?”

Luke nodded, stiffly. “I . . . the thing is, they’re -- I still can’t tell you their name, but this person is fairly highly-placed. And they owe me a favour. A big one.”

“When you say big, what exactly do you mean?” Leia frowned at his back. “Is this Imperial Palace-big? Sector-big?”

“Open-ended big,” said Luke. “I haven’t wanted to waste it on something I could do just as easily myself, or -- well, just to waste it. But I could ask them to ensure that the colony gets overlooked.”

Leia caught her breath, and Luke slowly turned around. His expression was very cautious, almost blank.

“You think this person could do that?”

“Yes,” said Luke, “But I’d have to tell them about it in the first place, and -- they hate the Emperor and disapprove of blowing up planets in general, but remember, they’re no friend of the Rebellion either.”

“I’ll call for a vote,” Leia said. She hesitated, then summoned up a smile. “This is it, isn’t it?”

Luke’s brow furrowed. “This is what?”

“Everything’s different now. I thought it’d go back to the way it was, once we rescued Han, but -- it’s not. We’re hardly even in the Rebellion any more. I have to put my people and my training first. You’re going to keep going off and -- contemplating your navel in the desert, or whatever it is you're doing. Han . . . I don’t even know what he’ll do, without that debt hanging over his head.”

“He’ll go wherever you go, I think,” said Luke.

Leia swallowed. “Luke --”

She didn’t know what to say. Why won’t you? Why won’t you stay with me -- with us? We could fight the Empire together, all three of us. Two Jedi and Han Solo -- what could stop us? or What are you hiding? Why aren’t you telling me? Does anyone else know? or You’re my best friend. I do love you, it’s just --

“I wish I could stay with you two,” Luke said, blue eyes steady. “I’ll miss you. What I’m doing, though, it’s too important to give up.”

“More important than the war?”

“For me, yes,” he said. “For me, it’s more important than anything. I don’t imagine anyone else cares much. But it might be able to end the war, if it goes well. I just can’t tell you -- I’m sorry.”

“Have you told Nellith?” she asked, unable to keep her eyes from narrowing a little.

“Nellith!” he said blankly. “What -- how did you hear about that?”

She looked guilty. “I didn’t mean to see. I just glanced at your datapad the other day, when I kept it from falling in the swamp. It said look for Nellith and had a picture of a woman next to it.”

Luke’s expression went from astonished, to bewildered, to grieved, and finally landed in the vicinity of bemused. “It’s my mother’s picture,” he said. “That was her name -- Arissa Nellith. And I just found out that she . . . that I . . . well, that I wasn’t always an only child.”

“What?”

“I had a twin. A sister. I didn’t know, my father didn’t even know -- she was kidnapped right after we were born, before he got back from the wars. Only Yoda knew, and even he has no real idea what happened afterwards. Just that she had our mother’s name, not Father’s.”

“Nellith,” Leia repeated, and winced. “Oh, I didn’t mean -- I’m sorry, I didn’t know. Do you think you can find her?”

“I have to try,” said Luke. “So, um, obviously, I didn’t tell her about . . . well, anything. And definitely not the -- the thing I can’t tell you about. I can’t tell anyone about that. Not even Yoda or Obi-Wan, really.”

“You can’t tell us anything? ”

He considered, chewing on his lip. Leia waited.

“There’s someone,” he began, then stopped, looking frustrated. “You know that there are some people who do . . . things?”

“Well,” said Leia, “as a matter of fact --”

“Great things, I mean,” Luke said. “Or they choose not to do terrible ones. Not like you or I would, though -- not because they think it’s wrong, or right, or anything like that. They don’t care about those. But they love people who do, so they do it for them. ”

That kind of morality is worthless, she wanted to say, but then she thought of Han -- Han two and a half years ago, to all appearances unable to consider anything beyond himself and his own interests, turning back and risking his life to save Luke. Han even last year, determined to get her to safety before abandoning the Rebellion. He didn’t fight for causes and if he had any ideals, she hadn’t seen them. But he was still --

“I might know someone like that,” she admitted. “But what does it have to do with your secret mission?”

“I do, too,” he said, and grinned. “A different one, that is. I can’t tell you their name -- I’m sorry, I can’t. But they’re like that. They have a lot of power, but their only real compass is the person they care about.” He paused. “And, well, that’s me.”

Leia’s lips thinned. “How many immensely powerful, morally ambiguous people-who-cannot-be-named do you know? ”

“Well --”

“It’s the same person, isn’t it?” She put her hands on her hips. “That Imperial contact of yours is in love with you, isn’t she? You’re having an affair with some -- some grand admiral, or something, and --”

Luke looked faintly ill.

“Not exactly,” he replied, in a tone which seemed to suggest that people who kiss smugglers should not throw stones. “I just -- it’s complicated, and I can’t explain. But if I can keep my . . . if just occasionally being around is enough to keep this person from committing crimes against sentience, it’s worth it. And if they can help me find my sister --”

Leia softened. “Oh,” she said. “Well, family’s different.”

“Yes.”

She glanced up at him. “You’re sure she’s out there?”

“I’m sure she was,” said Luke. “I’m -- we’re -- almost twenty-one. Anything could have happened in that much time. She might not care about family or -- but even if she’s dead, I need to find out what happened. And beyond that, I need to master the ways of the Force, to help my . . . friend, to fight the Emperor in whatever ways I can. I’ll be busy. But when you're ready for more training -- ”

Leia smiled. “I’ll let you know.”

They looked at one another. Luke smiled.

“I’ll be back soon enough, anyway,” he said. “There is one more thing we need to do, and all three of us should be there for it.”

---

Five weeks later, Luke stepped out of his ship, and onto the rich, springy soil of the planet formerly known as Carathis. Han, only squinting a little in the bright sunlight, met him.

“Hey, kid.” Despite the careless greeting, Han gave him a tight hug, then dropped his arm over Luke’s shoulder. “You ready for this?”

“I hope so,” said Luke. “You look better, Han.”

“Could hardly look worse. The first time I looked in the mirror -- not that damn swamp, a real mirror -- I just about scared myself witless. At least I can see again. Leia was fussing enough to drive any man out of his mind.” Han paused. Luke kept his eyes resolutely forward. “Speaking of Leia. She says you’ll be leaving as soon as we’re done with this little get-together.”

The arm slung companionably around Luke’s shoulders seemed, without warning, to grow heavier. He swallowed.

“Not right away,” he said. “But I have to get back when I can.”

Han glanced down at him, and grinned. “Have you really seduced Imperial secrets out of Admiral Daala? I wouldn’t have thought you had it in you, but --”

“What?”

Luke couldn’t help but lift incredulous eyes to his friend’s face. Han burst out laughing.

“I’d as soon kiss a Wampa, myself, but hey, we all do what we can for the cause.”

“Daala?”

“All right, I might have made up that part. But Leia says --”

“I haven’t seduced anyone ,” he said, with an exasperated sigh.

Han shook his head. “Figures.”

They picked their way towards the middle of the burgeoning city, Han meandering through back streets and small alleys.

It was -- he’d gotten used to missing Han, almost. But Han alive and well and Han would be quite different from Han frozen in stasis. And he’d be leaving Leia, too. Not for a few weeks, but --

With a sudden sharp clarity, Luke remembered the moment when he and Han had first seen each other after they’d destroyed the Death Star. (Everyone always said it was him, but he’d have been dead at his father’s unwitting hand, without Han.) They’d still been high on adrenaline, running to hug each other, and then there’d been Leia, flying into their arms, the three of them laughing, babbling, ecstatic to be alive and together.

He’d been a little jealous of Han, at first, but after the battle, it seemed -- not stupid, exactly, but irrelevant. He supposed he ought to be jealous now. Leia loved Han. She’d probably marry him. They’d be together, while Luke followed his own path, so distant from theirs that he couldn’t even tell them about it.

Instead, he didn’t mind. Maybe because of the carbonite, maybe because petty rivalries had no place in his life now, but he didn’t envy or resent Han at all. He just dreaded leaving them for -- for wherever blood and destiny took him, dreaded missing them.

Luke forced himself to smile. “I should have known you’d find all the shortcuts before they even finished the streets,” he said.

“We’d never get to the palace otherwise,” said Han. “Everybody’d want to see the Jedi Knight and -- well, it seems I’m a hero, or something. I can’t go anywhere without old ladies pinching my cheek.”

Luke burst out laughing. “I really am sorry I won’t be here to see that. Somebody better catch it on a holovid. You know, for posterity.”

Han cheerfully smacked him, and despite his words, managed to forge a path through the thick crowd at the center of town. Luke had just caught sight Leia standing next the auburn-haired woman he’d seen before -- Mon Mothma -- when she ran up to them.

“There you are -- oh, you’re ready,” she said, and regarded Han’s uniform and Luke’s Jedi regalia with approval. She herself seemed oddly unlike -- well, herself, a beleaguered assistant rushing behind her to unbraid her long hair, another fussing over her stiff, heavy skirts. Yet there was something familiar about it too, the plain hair, the dark red brocade --

The vision. The very first one, when he’d seen himself -- when he thought he’d seen himself as a dark lord, even Leia bowing before him, and instead --

He hadn’t thought of it for months. Not really thought of it, anyway; he’d just gotten used to the horror that lay right in his path. Luke stared at her for a moment, stunned as much by the absence of crushing dread as by Leia herself.

“I’m not sure about my pronunciation,” he finally managed to say. “I don’t actually speak Old Alderaanian, so --”

Leia waved a dismissive hand. “Hardly anybody does. It’s the tradition that’s important. You do remember --”

“Of course he does,” Han said, laughing. “I’d bet you the Falcon that he’s been reciting it in his sleep. Well, maybe not the Falcon, but --”

“I just don’t want to make any mistakes.”

Leia kissed his cheek, then Han’s. “It’ll be fine,” she assured them, the picture of serenity, then sailed off to scold a stone-faced general.

In the end, though, she was right. By Leia’s insistence, the royal palace had yet to be built, or even planned beyond the most basic dimensions, but her architects and engineers had insisted on erecting a dais where the throne room would be. Atop it they’d placed a pedestal and a heavy chair -- simple in its lines, but carved out of priceless Alderaanian ebony, and as Luke had seen months earlier, indubitably a throne.

Tradition was important, Luke thought.

As the crowd fell silent, he ascended the dais and turned to face them, Leia silent and immobile just to his left, on the lowest step. On Alderaan, this task had always fallen to a Jedi -- a Jedi Master, usually, but a lowly knight sometimes performed it when a master couldn’t be spared. And with only four Jedi left in the galaxy -- maybe five -- one of whom would be decidedly unwelcome, it naturally fell to Luke.

Luke took a deep breath, then began to recite the words he had learned. They were wholly unfamiliar to him and meant nothing, but a number of Alderaanians -- mostly elderly -- began to sob, so he assumed he must be doing it right.

Towards the front of the crowd, he saw the familiar figures of the high command -- a few of the pilots closest to Leia -- Han in the front row, uncharacteristically sober-faced. Luke glanced past them, his gaze lingering on the masses of Alderaanians. Even as his voice rang out, he couldn’t imagine what this must mean to them -- what it must be like. Nothing he had suffered could compare to this.

Luke’s eyes fell on a slim, sharp-featured man -- not Alderaanian, but familiar, and not only from the vision. From the Executor. Jir. He looked, as he had there, nondescript and innocuous. His attention, Luke could tell, was focused neither on Luke, Leia, the Rebels, or the Alderaanians, but on any possibility of encountering fellow Imperials.

Vader, it seemed, had every intention of paying his debt, even though so much was different now. It shouldn’t be a surprise, really .

Luke did his best to ignore the Imperial in their midst, and finished the last of the traditional Alderaanian words. He took a deep breath, and gestured at Leia. Her long hair and crimson sleeves fluttered a bit in the breeze, but her face was smooth and controlled -- and very, very pale -- as she stared at her fellow survivors.

“Sons and daughters of Alderaan,” Luke said, the formula reverting -- thankfully -- back to Basic. “Here is Leia Amidala Organa, daughter and only child of Bail Organa, last sovereign of Alderaan. Shall she be queen here?”

Had he not known better, Luke would have expected to hear a roar of assent, or even dissent. Instead, the crowd fell to their knees, just as he had foreseen -- but not to him. To Leia.

Leia drew a deep, shuddering breath. Then she turned, lifting her skirts just high enough to climb the last few standards, and knelt before him.

With a flicker of thought, Luke levitated the crown into the air, just above her head. It would have been heavy, had he held it in his hands -- he didn’t even know how it had been made so quickly, but he had no doubt that it was as priceless as everything else in the immediate vicinity.

Leia’s eyes closed, her lips pressing tightly together. With a final, precise gesture, Luke brought the crown down to rest on her head.

“Behold the Queen!” Luke cried, his voice pitched to carry as far as possible. He helped Leia to her feet, and then stepped quietly aside, leaving her to walk the last few steps to -- to her destiny, he thought.

She did, turning towards her people at the last possible moment, and then settling on her throne, sitting proud and alone.

The crowd finally exploded, screaming with joy, relief, triumph. Daine Jir cheered with the rest of them. Mon Mothma and her generals clapped as loudly as anyone. Han Solo, irrepressible as ever, winked at the queen.

For the last time in what would likely be months, Luke Skywalker opened his mind to her. May the Force be with you, he thought.

Queen Leia’s smile was more than a little bittersweet.