STORMY WEATHER

Jaina Solo was not happy.

She was supposed to have gone for the weekend to visit her Uncle Luke and Aunt Mara, something she'd really been looking forward to. Her aunt and uncle always made her laugh. But Luke had taken ill. Nothing serious, but Uncle Luke wasn't one to slow down, and Aunt Mara had to all but sit on top of him to keep him in bed. Jaina had suspected all day that it was going to come to that, but actually hearing it brought on part irritation and part depression.

Visiting Mom and Dad was out; they were on Bespin. Dad was in a sabacc tournament, of all things. He'd eschewed playing professionally for years, but Uncle Lando had conned him into rejoining the fold, just this once. With Uncle Lando, nearly everything was a con. She liked him; she just didn't trust him. Dad had told her that that was the only sensible way to view Uncle Lando.

Jacen was busy with his studies, both in veterinary sciences and in the Living Force. Tenel Ka was dealing with problems on Hapes and caring for baby Allana. The couple hadn't even had time to plan a wedding, let alone go through with one. Anakin was in his first year at engineering college, probably partying and playing sabacc, taking away his classmates' credits with a smile. Jarik was with Chewie at Chewie's place on Corellia. She had friends-fellow cadets-but most of them had taken off for the weekend. They only got one of them each standard month, and the base was deserted.

Jaina sat alone in the mess hall, sipping a bad kaf (Dad had said that it was always bad, but at least there was plenty of it, and that was still true), wondering how she was going to pass the weekend. She had a novel, but that was hardly going to cover forty-eight standard hours.

She could take one of the X-wings and barge in on Anakin, but she knew it would just depress her, as well as make her broke; sabacc was one of his passions, and he played it nearly every weekend.

Brendahl, their nanny, would likely welcome her, but Brendahl was growing old and sick and needed her weekends to recover from chasing after Jarik, who was, to put it mildly, a handful. She hoped that Chewie would survive Jarik. who was not exactly easy to handle.

She'd become distant from the friends she'd hung out with before attending the Jedi Praxeum. They had different lives, different priorities. Most had not supported her decision to join the military. They were long ago and far away.

I'm nineteen years old, she mused sadly, and I feel so old. And lonely.

She'd tried to connect romantically with a couple of the guys in her class, but it never seemed to

click. They'd ended up staying friendly, but they, too, had moved on, entering new relationships. Most of all, they'd all headed out for the weekend.

Jaina hated it when she was alone like this. She did enjoy being alone at times, but this wasn't being alone, this was being lonely. It took her back to another time...to when she was younger and a lot more foolish, but so much happier.

To the time when she fell, no pun intended, with Jagged Fel.

She'd gone to work with her father one day, when he was starting with a new class of cadets. It was school break, a few weeks before she was headed for the Praxeum, and she and Dad were going to do a quick delivery on the Core Worlds, with her at the helm. She'd become a good pilot and Dad was becoming more trusting about letting her sit in the left-hand seat (although, being her father and the ship being the Falcon, he'd never totally be at ease).

She had just turned fifteen.

And she saw him. He was absolutely gorgeous. She'd listened to her girlfriends giggle over their crushes and the boys they were 'in love' with. These particular members of the opposite sex were, to Jaina's mind, lame. She had trouble fathoming the allure.

But then, there he was.

Dark hair, dark eyes, with an intensity that she could almost reach out and grab. He had a serious expression and his eyes were fixed on Dad as he went through the introduction to the new class. Dad joked around and made the other cadets laugh, but not Jag. He was all business. Despite his intensity, however, Jaina could sense a deep calmness.

She had to force herself not to stare at him. The reaction she was having was one she'd never felt before. It was as if she'd been shot full of a substance that was making her feel deliriously ecstatic, and she craved more and more of it. She also felt terribly self-conscious; she knew she couldn't pull her gaze away.

Jaina wasn't sure if she was imagining it, but she thought he might be looking at her. She felt her cheeks grew hot and she lowered her eyes, not daring to gaze up again. She was afraid

he would look at her and afraid he wouldn't.

She kept her head down, but glanced out the corner of one eye. No, he was looking at Dad, taking in what was being said. Dad, she observed, was a hardass instructor. Yes, he made the cadets laugh, but it was pretty clear that he wasn't going to put up with less than outstanding performance. Well, he'd been that way with her, so she wasn't surprised.

She furtively stole another glance, and she could have sworn that Jagged Fel was looking in her

direction. He was subtle about it, but she knew he was watching her. She gave him a shy smile. He, of course, did not smile in return, but she had yet to see the corners of his mouth turn up.

He has such a gorgeous smile, she sighed to herself, not able to keep one from her own lips.

"We're just about to break for lunch," Dad announced, "but I want to introduce my daughter, Jaina. I also want to let you know that if any of you of the male persuasion come near her, you will not like the results." This resulted in some nervous tittering. "You'll be with Captain Wedge Antilles after lunch, and you'd better pretend to be paying attention to him at least as well as you did with me." The cadets broke out in laughter again.

Jaina, for her part, was utterly humiliated. Dad could be such a jerk sometimes, she groaned to herself, feeling herself blushing from her face to her chest. That she'd inherited from Mom. It was not a trait she appreciated; it tended to pop up at the worst moments.

Once she'd gotten the Falcon to lightspeed, she was going to ream Dad out…

Her thoughts were interrupted as she accidentally tipped her mug over. "Kriff!" she shouted, trying to run for the serviettes to clean herself up. She was out of uniform, and it was annoying because her collection of civilian clothes was small-there wasn't much space on a training base.

"Jaina," a voice called, seemingly disembodied. There'd been no one else in the mess hall that she'd seen. It was a voice that seemed out of place.

She snapped her head about. Standing before her was none other than Lieutenant Commander Jagged Fel. She gasped.

How long had he been there?

Was she pleased to see him or not?

"Are you all right?" he asked her, noticing the kaf stain on her pale blue shirt.

"I'm fine!"

"You didn't get burnt, did you?" Jag asked solicitiously.

"What're you doing here?" she demanded, in a tone that she instantly regretted. A rush of emotions, longing, desire, betrayal, anger, and a few she couldn't sort out all came out in the terse question.

"I'm on duty this weekend," he answered simply. Jag had graduated and was active duty; unlike the cadets, they got their off-duty days on rotation. "Well, I'm off duty for next twenty-four

standard, then on. Why didn't you take the weekend off?" he asked her.

"Why would you care?" Jaina spat out. He'd broken up with her when he'd gone to attend the Naval Academy, feeling it would be better for both of them. Jaina realized that her heart was still too fragile.

"If you want me to go away and not bother you, I will," Jag said softly to her.

Did she want that? Did she want him to just walk away? Did she want him to stay? What did she want?

"I did have plans, but they were cancelled," she said simply. "I was going to visit my aunt and uncle, but my uncle took sick and my aunt's having to tie him to the bed."

"Your Uncle Luke?"

"He's the only uncle I've got. Well, that's a blood relation, anyway," she said.

Jag shifted from one foot to another. It was not lost on Jaina that he was looking less like the confident officer he was and more like a nervous schoolboy, which was not at all like him. "Mind if I sit down?" he asked her.

"Be my guest," Jaina told him with a wave of her hand, a gesture that was very much Leia's when she really wasn't sure she wanted company.

Jag studied her for several seconds.

Jaina shot back at him, "What?"

"I...I'm glad you're here," Jag told her.

"Why?" Jaina demanded, doing her best to keep her tone neutral and not completely succeeding.

"Because…"

"C'mon, Fel, you can do better than that!" Jaina snapped. "You sweep me off my feet when I'm too young to know any better, you make me think you're in love with me-"

"I was in love with you," Jag said, not raising his voice. "But I knew we couldn't stay together then."

"And why was that?" she snapped.

"Because I knew you were planning to go to the Naval Academy, and I was two years ahead of

you, and you had to go through your Jedi training. I didn't think we should...distract each other."

"So why are you telling me this now?"

"I told you this when we broke up."

"You broke up with me. It wasn't mutual, just in case you've forgotten!" Jaina snapped at him. "Go on. I'd rather be alone right now."

Jag studied her carefully. "No," he said at last.

"You heard me!" Jaina hissed.

"I'm not going anywhere, Jaina."