Author's note: So, hi, it's been a while (like, seven years). I couldn't get this exchange out of my head and it just had to be put into writing. And I'm sure this doesn't follow any sort of canonical planet history, but what even is canon these days, anyway? Enjoy. And, oh, happy 100 days until The Force Awakens.
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
So it was like this: she was ecstatic to see Luke alive, devastated to see Han gone, confused by Luke's injury and whatever happened to alert her to go back to grab Luke, and unsure about what their next move was.
Threepio and Artoo stood by she and Luke's side as they watched the fleet jump to hyperspace. It was only then, when Luke had his arms around her—how it felt so comforting, so warm, like home, but not romantic, no, definitely not—that she asked, "So, what next?"
She and Luke turned around together, heading back to the medical droid where Luke sat down on the chair. Testing out his new hand, he continued to control each finger individually: up, down, up, down. "Well," he started, "I need a lightsaber."
Leia nodded, noticing in this harsh artificial lighting how Luke looked like he aged years in the past few weeks they had been apart. They had always been close, ever since they had met, and he had burst into her prison cell and rescued her. Their bond existed right from the beginning: being together just felt right, like two of the last puzzle pieces fitting together. She felt his struggle, release, and triumph during the Battle of Yavin, their adventures navigating the ever-changing landscape of Rebellion versus Empire, and when Luke had arrived just yesterday to Cloud City and found himself in a carefully orchestrated trap. She was confident that he, too, felt their bond; she knew it was different than how she felt towards Han. She loved Luke—she did, she really did—but it just wasn't the same.
Right now, as they existed in this moment on the medical frigate, both Luke and Leia stood in turmoil together: everything was turned on its head. Han was gone, alive but gone. Luke had barely gotten away alive from Vader. Their mutual understanding of each other's situations hung in the air, especially when Leia nodded and said, "When do we leave?"
Luke had disclosed that Yoda—the Jedi master he had been training from the past few weeks—told him of a planet called Ilum, where Jedi masters and learners had gone for over a thousand generations in order to built their lightsabers. "Crystals," Luke told her, cupping the air, "about this big."
Leia had traded her previous outfit for the clothes she had gotten accustomed to wearing on Hoth: layers and layers of warmth. She and Luke both discovered upon stepping into what seemed like an inhabitable condition of constant blizzard that they had not been missing the weather on the Echo Base.
She noticed Luke give an audible shiver and she laughed. "Once a desert farm boy, always a desert farm boy."
"Ugh, I guess go," he shrugged, glancing at his compass. "Come on, this way."
Trudging directly into the hollowing blizzard, the pair eventually climbed up the white, icy cliffs to reach the caverns. "It's in here."
How do you know!? Leia wanted to scream after Luke, who was headstrong leading them into this barren wasteland.
"I just do!" He answered. Had she said that out loud?
He led her into a tall, blue hued cavern. Leia stared at the three pathways within the cave right in front of her, all leading different directions. "This way," he directed her to the left, grabbing her hand to lead her.
Something within her made her feet stop. "Wait, no," she dropped her hand from his and pointed to the cave to the right. "I think it's this way."
"Really? Interesting," he said, looking puzzled, peering over and following Leia's finger with his piercing blue eyes. "Yoda says one gathers their crystal by letting their instinct guide them." Leia swallowed. "Well, actually, he said, 'The Will of the Force, a Jedi follows, to find their crystal.'"
"Oh, kriff, doesn't actually talk like that, does he?" she laughed. "Fine then. You go that way, I'll go this way. We'll meet back here."
"Are you sure? We don't want to get separated—" But Leia had already turned around. "Okay, fine! I have my comm link!"
Leia waved Luke off as they both disappeared down their chosen caverns.
She was first enveloped by the darkness of the light-less ice, but then, eventually, she reached a clearing of bright clear-as-day blue ice. Curiously, she saw no signs of saber crystals in the extremely bright place. Instead, the cavern was almost a clear cube with no way out besides the way she came.
"Maybe Luke was right," she said, looking down at the creaky ice below her feet. She turned her heal to leave but something caught her eye in her peripheral vision: a blue light. A little spark, just to the right of her right boot. It flew around her feet and eventually in front of her. It was guiding her.
The blue light traced the clear ice into a line in front of her and her feet followed until she reached the solid wall of ice that bordered the room. It lingered there, pulsing from a dark blue shade back to the same shade as Luke's eyes, and back to dark again. Instinctively—is this the Will of the Force?—she took off her white gloves and placed her hand on it.
Initially, she thought the ice would feel cold, but why would it? She knew this pulsing light was warm: it reminded her of what she felt like when she was right next to Luke, when she thought of Alderaan and her parents, when she thought about her relationship with Han.
Then, she felt gaps forming between the ice and her fingertips. The ice was melting. Her eyes widened and she moved her hands over her ears as a voice, as loud as a roar but paradoxically comforting, not unlike the voices she had heard in her dreams as a child (or were they nightmares?). "There's good in him." She removed her hands from her ears tentatively, letting the voice, over and over again, wash over her.
As she watched the ice melt away from where her hand had laid, she discovered that the pulsing light revealed a crystal, a light blue that tinted the entire ice-clad room. She reached out quickly and snatched it between her fingers, rolling along her fingertips like she used to during the summer months with flowers on Alderaan. She felt pride in discovering the crystal, on not giving up on it, on going her own path even though Luke followed a different one.
She wondered if Luke had been successful in finding a crystal, or if this one was actually meant for him. She pocketed in and turned to leave, hearing Luke's voice shout her name.
"I'm here!" She called when she emerged at the fork. "Any luck?"
"Yeah," he said quietly, "Weird place, though." Grinning, he pulled out a green crystal, holding it out to Leia, then placed his in his breast pocket.
He didn't ask Leia if she had found anything. She felt relieved, an emotion she didn't expect to feel. Deep down, she knew the crystal was for her. "Yeah, weird," she said. "Let's get out of here."