Note: For everyone who thought this story was incomplete as a one-shot. :) You convinced me. I hope you'll enjoy this little offering. And, although this story is truly finished now, there will be a sequel of sorts, "Talmar's Song," as soon as I get some time to write... Thanks to those who have encouraged me to continue with this, and, as always, reviews are greatly appreciated!

Disclaimer: Nope, still not mine. :)

Chapter II: A Piece of the Sky

"Granddad? Is it true that you're the best star-pilot in the galaxy?"

"What?" The surprise in the spirit's voice could not quite manage to disguise the pride shining in his eyes, and his grandson knew he had hit on something vital. "Who told you that?"

"Uncle Luke said that Master Kenobi told him that, a long time ago," he replied, trying but failing to keep a smug grin from showing on his face. He knew that this bit of news could not fail to please his grandfather.

"Did he?" the spirit asked, cocking a brow. Though his face was softened by a fond smile, there was a mischievous glint in his eye that lent him a certain comically dangerous look, like a small child preparing a prank. It was a side of his grandfather the boy had never expected to see, and it left him feeling both warm and a little sad. He wished his grandfather could be with them like this all the time.

"So, is it true?" he asked eagerly, pushing away his melancholy thoughts.

"Well, I don't know. Your Uncle Luke is quite a good pilot himself," his grandfather said, with a definite note of parental pride. "And your father is one of the best." This last was said without the slightest hint of sarcasm or even competitive feeling. For reasons he did not entirely understand, his grandfather seemed to think very highly of his father, and even spoke fondly of him. The spirit had told him once that Han reminded him of all that was right about himself in his younger days. The boy had promised to pass those words on to his father, some day—he could only hope his father would take them as the compliment he thought they were.

"But Uncle Luke said you were the best," he pressed, refusing to let himself be deterred from the matter at hand. He had a plan, if only his grandfather would stop trying to distract him.

The spirit snorted. "While I'm certainly flattered, your Uncle Luke has never even seen me fly. Except…" he paused, and then trailed off entirely, his face darkened with memory and the weight of endless regret. "Well, there was once. But Vader never did fly as well as Anakin…"

His grandson didn't know what to say to that, so, without really thinking about what he was doing, he simply reached out to squeeze his grandfather's arm in reassurance.

To his great surprise, his hand did not pass through the spirit's arm. Instead, he met with something warm and solid and unquestionably alive—more alive than anything else he had ever felt. The feeling was breathtaking and wild and perfectly simple, almost like coming into contact with pure energy, and it sent a tingling sensation all through his body. He realized with a start that it was most like the way the Force felt when he touched it with his mind.

His grandfather was looking at him with blue eyes so full of gratitude, he thought he might weep. But he restrained himself with some effort and focused on his object. He had inherited his mother's knack for knowing the right moment, and was certain that this was the perfect time to make his request.

"Granddad?" he asked, as gently as he could in his excitement, "Will you go flying with me?"

The spirit stared at him for a long time without speaking, but he could see the longing in those sad blue eyes. He knew what he had offered, and it was far more than a simple flight through the traffic lanes of Coruscant in the early hours of the morning. He was offering his grandfather a chance to fly with him as he never had with his own children, to share stories and jokes and all the special tricks of piloting that made Anakin Skywalker the very best. He was offering a chance to teach, and to learn, and to simply be as a family. And he knew that, no matter how much it might cost him, this was something his grandfather could never refuse.

"Well, squirt," the spirit managed at last, "I don't know. I don't think your parents would like you taking off across Coruscant at this hour…"

It was a weak argument at best, made weaker by the hesitant longing evident in his grandfather's voice, and they both knew it. The boy grinned—it was only a matter of time now before the spirit gave in.

"Actually," he said slowly, "they don't have to know."

That was a mistake. His grandfather turned to face him instantly and looked at him very intently, and he noticed something old and deeply sorrowful in the spirit's eyes. "No," his grandfather said, gently but very firmly. "I will not keep secrets from your mother."

He was a little startled by the resolve of the spirit's reply. He had never made a habit of lying to his parents, of course, and he avoided it whenever possible, but like most children, he did not often hesitate to tell a little, innocent lie if it might save him from getting into trouble. And besides, withholding the truth was not exactly lying. Was it?

"You don't like secrets, do you, Granddad?" he asked, very softly.

The spirit sighed deeply and gave him a sad half smile. "It's never a good idea to keep secrets from the ones you love, Ani," he said gently. "And if you keep too many secrets, you may find that you lose yourself in them, and become the lie you've created…"

The boy didn't think the matter of not telling his parents about a late night flight across Coruscant was really a cause for such great concern, but he also understood that his grandfather was now talking about something that vastly transcended his own limited experience. The spirit's words had that tragically beautiful ring to them which he had come to associate with hard-earned truth. It was a note he often heard in Uncle Luke's voice, and sometimes in his mother's or his father's.

"All right," he said quietly. "We won't keep secrets then. But we can still go flying, right? I'll tell Mom and Dad in the morning, I promise." He was coming perilously close to whining now, but he didn't care. This was his dream, and it was his birthday. Surely his grandfather could understand that.

"Well, I…" When the spirit seemed to hesitate, the boy favored him with his most innocently pleading look, the one that never failed to work on his mother, even though she was perfectly aware it was an act. His grandfather never stood a chance. "Oh, blast you," the spirit muttered, but he was grinning like a child himself. "Fine. We'll go flying. But let's at least try not to wake the whole house…"

"Yippee!" the boy shouted and dashed for the door. He was so excited that he never noticed the bittersweet look of mingled joy and regret shining on his grandfather's face.


"Left, left! No, don't, not the—! Center switch, center switch!"

"Relax, Granddad!" he said, sending the spirit a cocky grin. "I'm not that bad!"

They had been out for barely half an hour, and he had been so excited to show his grandfather his skills as a pilot that he'd taken them right into the thickest lanes of Coruscant traffic. True, it was well past midnight, and there was far less traffic now than would have been the case during the "rush hours" of daylight. But Coruscant was never still, and he suspected his grandfather thought it far too crowded for their little outing even now.

He smirked, and pressed the throttle for all it was worth.

"Ani!" His grandfather sounded truly distressed now. "I think you should slow down!"

He eased back on the throttle, just a little, and favored the spirit with a level, somewhat disdainful look. "Don't you like flying, Granddad?" he asked innocently.

A look of absolute, unmitigated horror crossed the spirit's face, and he slapped a hand to his brow in seeming despair. "Blast!" his grandson heard him mutter, quite distinctly. "I'm turning into Obi-Wan!"


"See Granddad? Once you calmed down, it wasn't that bad at all. I'm a good pilot."

His grandfather chuckled and reached over to ruffle his hair. It was a gesture that, over the last two hours, he had quickly become accustomed to, and he quietly reveled in the spirit's seemingly casual shows of grandfatherly affection.

"Yes, you are quite a good pilot," the spirit said warmly. "Probably better than I was at your age. But I'm afraid I haven't been out flying like this in a very long time, and it just took a while to get used to it again."

He turned slightly in the pilot's seat of the speeder and flashed his grandfather a brilliant grin. "It's good to be back, isn't it, Granddad?"

"Yes, it is," said the spirit softly. "You have no idea how good it is…"

"So," he asked casually, purposely not looking at his grandfather's face, "do you want to fly us home?"

"You'd trust a ghost with your family's speeder?" his grandfather joked. But he was not quite able to disguise the eagerness in his voice.

Now his grandson did look at him. "Yes," the boy said softly. "I trust you, Granddad."

"I…" the spirit began, but he could find no words. The pure, unassuming gratitude in his eyes was heart-breaking. "Yes," he said at last, so softly that his grandson almost did not hear him, "I would like to fly us home."

So the boy pulled over for a moment to allow them to switch places. He had been a little uncertain about this, but his grandfather seemed to be able to touch him, and the speeder shouldn't be any different. So he set aside the last whispers of doubt and settled back comfortably in the cushioned seat, trying to contain his excitement.


He had never dreamed that a feeling of such total freedom was possible. The closest he had ever come to such wonder was when he himself was flying. Occasionally, his father would let him pilot the family speeder, and he was left with a sense of warmth, of ability, and of a centered oneness within himself and in the Force which he found in no other way. He took every opportunity he could find to fly, regardless of the craft.

None of that compared to flying with his grandfather. He had decided, after only a few moments as the spirit's passenger, that his Uncle Luke had been right: his grandfather was unquestionably the greatest pilot who had ever lived. It wasn't so much a matter of flashy maneuvers or daring, unusual tricks—although he did convince his grandfather to demonstrate some of those and was suitably awed by them. But the greatness of his grandfather's piloting was in the feeling of him at the controls. He was absolutely in tune with his craft, and under his direction the speeder became not just a vehicle or even a simple extension of his will, but a living manifestation of his desire for freedom and his love of flight. His passenger was swept away into a vibrant, living world untouched by limitation or the corruption of power. He simply was, at one with the Force and with every being in the galaxy, and at the same time able to transcend and thereby join them all.

And then it ended. He was almost surprised to find that they were back home, the speeder parked exactly where it had been before their little outing, and someone was calling his name.

His Uncle Luke came into their little hangar almost at a run, closely followed by his mother and father. They all looked quite worried, and he cringed, knowing that he had frightened them by his selfish actions. Perhaps his grandfather had been more right about secrets than he had at first thought…

His mother was frantic, and she came running towards him, eager to scold and to comfort all at once. But she stopped quite suddenly when she caught sight of her father. The spirit offered her a sad, apologetic grin, but her expression did not change.

His Uncle Luke, however, went from surprised to a cool sort of calm, as close as he ever came to anger. His father, who could not see the spirit, nevertheless seemed to know instinctively from the reactions of his wife and brother-in-law that something here was out of place, and it probably had to do with their "Jedi nonsense," as he called it.

"Father," said his Uncle Luke finally, in a quiet, almost reserved voice, "I think you had better explain this."

Before the spirit could respond, however, his grandson stepped forward, nervous but determined to take the responsibility himself. He wasn't about to let his grandfather take the blame for something that had been his idea. "It's my fault, Uncle Luke," he said in a very small voice that echoed strangely in the too-quiet hangar. "I asked Granddad to go flying with me…"

Beside him, the spirit's hands fiddled nervously with the edges of his sleeves, but his gaze was fixed steadily on his son's. His voice, when he spoke, was profoundly gentle, and he seemed to communicate with his son in a way that none of the others could quite understand.

"I know I probably should have refused him," the spirit said softly, and his voice, though somewhat louder than his grandson's had been, did not echo. "But I…" He trailed off, uncertain, and instead let his eyes speak for him.

His grandson watched his Uncle Luke's face soften and noticed the spirit's sad smile, saw the way a shared memory hung suspended as unshed tears in two pairs of brilliant blue eyes, both marked by wisdom and regret—and he knew that these two understood each other as no one else ever could. Uncle Luke could never truly be angry with his father. They had saved one another, and that bond was too deep for anger.

"You wanted to spend time with your grandson," a soft voice said, interrupting the boy's thoughts. To his great surprise, it was his mother speaking, and she was gazing at her father with compassion and perhaps, he thought, even with tenderness. He glanced at his grandfather, and saw that he seemed to have been struck completely speechless by his daughter's unexpected words. But his eyes betrayed a sharp longing and an almost desperate hope.

His mother looked at him and smiled. "And Ani has always wanted to know his grandfather," she said gently. "I'm glad you gave him that chance."

"Thank you," the spirit whispered, a reply to words unspoken, but no less real. The ageless sorrow in his eyes had not diminished, but there was something else there now, a kind of warmth and a deep, abiding joy that was not lessened by the touch of regret. His grandson thought that he had never seen anything quite so beautiful as those blue eyes, reflected in the warmth of his mother's own brown eyes.

On an impulse, the boy reached for his grandfather's hand with his right, then stepped forward and took his mother's hand in his left. She looked at him in surprise, and his grandfather seemed a bit apprehensive, but neither pulled away.

Without a word, he placed his mother's small hand in his grandfather's much larger one, then stepped back, smiling hopefully. His mother eyed him curiously, and at last seemed to understand. She grasped the spirit's hand a bit more firmly and whispered a soft, "Thank you, Father. For Endor, and for Luke." She swallowed thickly, then added, so softly that almost her son did not hear, "And for Ani."

His grandfather said nothing at all, but his tears were warm, and they left healing in their wake.

The boy smiled brightly up at them both, and he saw that his Uncle Luke and even his father were doing the same. "Granddad," he said with a grin, "I think this has been the best birthday ever."