Title: Remembered
Author: Figlia Della Musica
Summary: At the funeral of his bondmate, Wedge reflects back
on a lifetime.
Warnings: non-explicit slash, hanky
Archive: SWA-L, anywhere else sure but just ask me first
Author's comments: The quote that starts this off I found in
a magazine, on one of those stones you can have set in your garden. This fic immediately hopped into my
mind. I normally don't write death
fics, but I couldn't help it.
"If tears could build a stairway,
And memories a lane,
I'd walk right up to heaven,
And bring you home again."
Wedge stood
alone at the funeral. It wasn't that
there weren't other people there—there were many. The funeral of one of the Rebellion's greatest heroes meant that
there were scores of people there. But
everyone was giving that hero's bondmate a clear space. They shot him covert glances, when they
thought he wasn't looking. They tried,
mentally, to gauge how well he was doing, without his mate.
Luke lay in
the casket, arms folded, looking serene.
Death gave him youth again, wiped away lines of care, worry, and
time. It gave lie to his silver
hair. Luke, lying dead in the casket,
looked beautiful. His face held
dignity, befitting the greatest Jedi Master, and the black clothes he'd always
worn gave him an air of solemnity.
The black
clothes that Wedge now wore, too, echoing the loss of his bondmate. He ran his fingers through hair that was
nearly as silver as Luke's, and remembered the past.
Remembered
the first time Luke had said, "I love you."
It had been after Endor, right after, with the Death Star's grave
glowing in the sky, when Luke had walked out of the darkness grinning but
looking like he was about to collapse.
Remembered
too, when they'd been bonded, the glow of love in Luke's eyes, the joy in his
voice as he spoke. "I, Luke Skywalker,
take you, Wedge Antilles, as bondmate, in my heart and in my soul, forever."
Remembered
the times Leia's kids would come to visit, shouting, "Uncle Luke! Uncle Wedge!" Luke had always loved children, but the two of them had never
gotten around to adopting a child, though they'd talked about it.
Remembered
when Luke started teaching Jedi. Wedge,
not having any Force abilities, had felt like a fifth wheel for a while, until
the Academy had started bringing in younger students, children of the first
ones, students who needed to learn skills other than Jedi ones. Wedge had
started teaching then, too, teaching young students to fly. It was a way to stay in the air, and get out
of the military. He'd been glad to
tender his resignation. It gave him
more time with Luke.
And now
Luke was dead. They were both old—well
over one hundred years, in fact—and they'd led long, full, happy lives, but
Luke's loss was a sharp pain.
The Jedi
performing the service—one of Luke's earliest students, and now a Jedi Master
in his own right—finished speaking. The
coffin was closed and lowered into the ground, next to Leia's.
Wedge
stared at the grave marker as though it was his personal enemy.
Luke Skywalker
Jedi Master
b. 10 Jurek, BY
18 d. 18 Juils, AY 104
A hero, a Jedi, a
loving bondmate and a good man.
May he find a home in
the heart of the Force.
Wedge stood by the grave a long
time, as one by one the other mourners straggled out. Finally, with darkness falling, he began the long walk out of the
cemetery, back to the lonely little house by the waterfall, the house he and
Luke had built, the one with the beautiful view of the Academy buildings. Entering the house, he smiled at a picture,
an old-fashioned oil painting one of the students had done. In it, he and Luke, both much younger, stood
in front of their newly-completed house.
Luke's smile was open, sunny, and beautiful. Wedge smiled at the painting-Luke.
"Wait for me, love," he
whispered. "I'll not be long."
He settled down to wait his time
out. Several of his great-nephews and
great-nieces—Leia's grandchildren, themselves well into middle age—came every
now and then, to look in on him and make sure he was okay. They were patient, sitting around and
letting him talk about Luke endlessly, but he felt like a burden on their
hands.
So it was with relief that, two
weeks after the funeral, he awoke to see Luke standing before him, outlined
with a blue light.
"Wedge," Luke said softly, "it's
time, love. Come with me." He held out a hand.
"I've been waiting," Wedge
replied. He reached out to take Luke's
hand, and Luke pulled him out of the chair.
For a moment, Wedge turned around to see himself, still asleep in his
chair facing the oil painting. Then he
looked down at the hand Luke had grasped.
It was outlined in the same blue light as Luke.
"Yes," Luke said to him. "To their eyes, you're dead now. They'll come in, the next time they visit,
and find you there."
Wedge smiled, and touched Luke's
cheek, gently, the expression in their old language of touch and caress that
meant love. "I hope they'll
understand," he said softly, "and not cry.
I wasn't happy, without you."
"I was a bit lonely, myself," Luke
replied, returning the gesture. "Come
on."
Together, hand in hand, they walked
towards the heart of the Force.
***
It's said, at the Jedi Academy,
that a student will know if he is destined for greatness. When he is being knighted, two men will
appear at the end of the Great Hall, outlined in blue. Their faces will match the portraits above
the dais, the portraits of the Academy's founder and his bondmate. The two men won't say anything, but they'll
smile. And, with their arms still
linked, they'll disappear.
