I sat at the checkered-patterned table in the Millennium Falcon, rubbing the silver empty spot at its center, thinking about Ben. I didn't understand. Why did he let Darth Vader kill him?

In the Death Star, I saw Ben with his blue lightsaber, fighting against Darth Vader, a man clad in black with a red lightsaber. He had a black helmet, cape, and some buttons on his chest. I saw their fight from afar, while the Stormtroopers watched them up close. Han, Leia, C3-PO, and R2-D2 went to the Millennium Falcon.

Ben saw me with a quick glance. He looked back at Vader. Then, he pulled his lightsaber away from Vader, giving him an opening to cut him down.

"NO!" I yelled. The Stormtroopers heard me and started to fire at my friends and me. I fired back. I wanted to kill them all. Han and Leia were yelling at me to get into the ship because there were too many of them.

I heard Han yell, "Blast the doors, kid!" I saw Darth Vader about to leave the room where he fought Obi Wan. I shot at the panel next to the doors, closing them. I still kept shooting at the Stormtroopers, trying my best to kill them all.

But then, I heard Ben's voice in my head, saying, "Run, Luke, run!" I didn't know why his voice was in my head at the time, but I obeyed his command and ran into the ship.

We were under a lot of fire at the time, but thankfully, Han flew us out of the Death Star before the Stormtroopers could inflict major damage on his ship. We were now in the dark expanse of space.

I walked through the hallways of the ship, feeling empty and confused. I went into the lounge. C3-PO and R2-D2 were already there at the round-checkered table. They saw me, but they didn't say anything or made any sounds. I didn't feel like saying anything to them. I slumped on the chair at the other side of the table and placed my arms upon it.

I kept rubbing the silver empty spot, thinking about why he let Vader kill him. Could anyone really beat Vader?

I then felt a blanket on my back. I shifted my head to the right and saw Leia, who placed the blanket on me. She placed her hand around my shoulders and sat down beside me. Her hand felt warm, comforting me.

But I still felt confused as I continued to rub the center of the table, mourning for my master. I shook my head and said, "I can't believe he's gone."

She replied, "There wasn't anything you could have done."

Then we heard Han running past the lounge as he said, "Come on, buddy. We're not out of this yet."

The Empire was still after us. Leia and I ran into the hallway. I followed Han to the laser turrets, while Leia went into the pilot's cockpit. Han went up the ladder to the turret on top of the ship, while I went down to the bottom turret.

I entered a small compartment that had a black seat with handles for the turret and a window, outside of which the turret was placed above my field of vision. I sat down and saw headphones to my left. I wore them on my head. I grasped the handles. As I moved them, the turret moved in synch with the handles. My chair as well shifted according to where I shifted my body.

"You in, kid?" Han said over the headphones. "Stay sharp."

I then pressed the button to the top left, turning on the radar, which informed me of the approximate location of the Empire's ships around the Millennium Falcon.

"Here they come." Leia said over the radio.

I heard wailing noises as the Empire ships flew by the Millennium Falcon. They were spherical bodies that had two black planes parallel to each other on the left and right sides of them.

I fired at them, but I kept missing though. "They're coming in too fast!" I turned left and right, squeezing the trigger every time they flew by, but to no avail.

BOOM! Something blew up in the ship.

"We've lost the lateral controls!" Leia said.

"Don't worry. She'll hold together." Han said.

But he sounded worried as he whispered, "Hear me baby, hold it together."

All I could do was just keep firing, but I kept missing them every single time.

Then, I heard an explosion outside of the ship. Han laughed joyfully over the headphones. He shot one down.

I squeezed the handles tighter now. An Empire ship flew by. I pushed the trigger with everything I got. The turret shot green lasers in rapid fire, blowing up the ship.

"Got it! I got it!" I yelled as I turned my head back towards Han's turret, hoping that he saw that.

Han replied, "Great, kid! Don't get cocky."

Hearing his praise made me double my efforts as I held the handles in anticipation for more Empire ships to come after us.

Leia said, "There's still two more of them out there!"

We fired from left to right. These ships were fast, but not impossible to hit. I kept firing and firing until I blew another ship. I hoped Han saw that or at least heard that explosion. There was one more ship left. I squeezed the trigger whenever it passed by, but Han got to it first, causing a huge explosion in the dark expanse of space.

"That's it! We did it!" I yelled.

"We did it!" Leia said.

Han took a deep breath of relief.

I took off my headphones and got out of my seat. I climbed up the ladder. I felt great destroying those ships. Now, I wanted talk to Han about the fight just now.

When I came to the top of the ladder and walked through the hallway, I saw C3-PO tangled in wires, while R2-D2 was beeping at him.

"Master Luke! May you please free me from these wires?! I feel like I'm melting." C3-PO said.

I tried to untangle the wires on C3-PO. R2-D2 made beeping noises.

"No, R2. I am not paranoid. I really think that the metal on my body is coming off of me."

I said, "How did you get tangled in this mess?"

C3-PO replied, "There was an explosion from before, blowing the covers off of the wires. And well, with all of this flying around and all, I fell down and got tangled in these wires."

After some time, I managed to untangle the wires without ripping any of them. I helped C3-PO back up on his feet.

"Thank you, Master Luke!" C3-PO said.

"No problem," I said.

I then went back to the ladder to see if Han was still up there. He wasn't. I overheard Han telling Leia something about money in the pilot's cockpit. I quickly walked over there, when Leia was just leaving.

She had a disgruntled countenance as she told me, "You friend is quite the mercenary. I wonder if he really cares about anything. Or anybody."

She left. I said, "I care." She didn't hear me as she kept walking trough the hallway.

I glanced at Han for a moment. Was money the only thing he ever thought about? When we saved Leia, he only helped me because she had a lot of money since she was a princess (at least, that was what I told him). I then looked back at the hallway again. Leia was gone. She must have gone into the lounge.

I then sat down in the revolving chair next to Han, who had a meditative, yet frustrated facial expression as he squinted his eyes, not focused on the controls in front of him.

Curious, I asked him, "So… what do you think of her, Han?"

He replied, "I'm trying not to, kid."

Relieved, I said, "Good." I turned to the piloting controls in front of me, pressing some buttons. At least he wasn't interested in her.

"Still…" Han said in a reflective tone. "She's got a lot of spirit." I stopped what I was doing and slowly shifted my head at him. "I don't know. What do you think?" He asked in hopeful speculation. "Do you think a princess and a guy like me—"

"No."

Han stared at me in bewilderment. I stared into his brown stern eyes. I wondered what he was thinking about? Did he see me as competition for Leia? Well, tough luck, Han. I was not going to give up Leia to him.

I went back to the controls. Han made a small chuckle. Was he covering up his disappointment? Or was he amused at my affections for Leia? Whatever his reason, his chuckle comforted me for some reason.

Oddly enough, I wanted to talk to him about our fight with the ships before. I was able to forget, just for a single moment, about Ben's death as we fought against them together. Now, I just saw him as competition for Leia and I didn't want to talk about her in front of him. Still though, we made a pretty good team. Without him and Chewbacca, I never would have been able to save her.

It was way too close. So many Stormtroopers were coming after us in the Detention Center, where Leia was being held, that we had to go through a trash compactor to get out of the firefight. We almost got crushed. I almost got drowned by some weird monster with tentacles in there! Han and Leia were trying to save me. I remembered Han held my arm at one point so that the monster wouldn't drag me down. He let go once to shoot at it a couple of times. It dragged me down again, but eventually, it let go.

I smiled at the memory of Han holding my arms as he tried to save me.

"What are you smiling about?" Han asked me.

"I just can't wait to get to the Rebel's base," I said, smiling.

Han nodded and said, "Yeah… well, I can't wait to get my money. I hope the Rebels can pay me after all the stuff I've been through."

"Don't worry. You'll get your money."

"I hope so, kid." Han then looked ahead.

When we get to the Rebel base, would he just leave like that? We had been through a lot since then. We escaped Tatooine, saved Leia, almost got crushed by a trash compactor, and fought off the Empire's ships. I mean, despite what Leia said, I think he did care about others. He did try to save my life in the trash compactor. I thought about what he would do for the whole flight until we reached the Rebel base.