Thanks to all the reviewers and readers!

(The five people are Obi-Wan, Anakin, Han, Leia, and on the return trip hopefully Luke, to answer that question.)

Smiles!

Lou

"Chewie's with him."

"I don't care if the kriffing Emperor's with him. You gave Lando my ship?"

"It wasn't exactly my idea, Han!"

Anakin entered the hangar bay in the midst of an argument. Leia- his daughter- glanced up at him.

"Aren't you supposed to be in medbay?"

"No," came an ethereal voice. "Anakin is fine. Now, if we could please decide on a ship?"

"Look, ghost-guy, how about you choose the ship?"

"And how about we get to rescuing my son now?" inquired Anakin angrily.

The three people next to the line of shuttles stared at the irate Jedi.

"Your what?" inquired Leia.

Anakin just glared some more. "I pick this one." His practiced ship-judging eye had spotted the shuttle immediately. He may not have known much about the engines of these future ships, but anything someone had gone to the trouble of painting hotrod flames on had to be much loved and for a good reason.

"That ship was recently captured- and painted- by Rogue Squadron. It belongs to Wedge Antilles," said Leia imperiously in a manner reminiscent of Padmé in a mood. "It's not available."

"Jedi privilege," muttered Anakin. He Force-slammed the loading door of the shuttle down to the hangar's metal floor, probably damaging the locking mechanism. "Now have fun being Rebellion-y, I'm out of here."

"We're coming after Luke," said Leia.

Sith. This so figured. Was everyone in the future engaged in a conspiracy to slow him down whenever possible? Even his own children?

Anakin decided to ignore her comment in the hopes that it would go away, but Leia, Han, and Obi-Wan followed him into the shuttle anyway.

"Can we really trust this guy?" The smuggler's voice was skeptical.

"I told you, he's General Kenobi. Don't you remember him?" His daughter, this time.

"The one I knew wasn't transparent."

"No," agreed Obi-Wan's voice. "Rather inconvenient side effect of dying." The voice became louder. "Anakin, set the autopilot and get down to the main bay. We have things to discuss with our guests."

Guests. Right. This was his mission, his fault. Two people leaving, three returning. Not dragging along some huge crowd.

Grumbling to himself, Anakin guided the shuttle out of the hangar, set the autopilot towards where he felt his son was, and slammed the ship into hyperspace. He did all these things as quickly as possible, but once the essential, son-rescuing portions of his tasks were complete, the Jedi slowed down. He walked, very, very slowly down a short corridor. He pretended to get lost. He missed the correct entryway at least twice, whistling to himself.

"Anakin! Get in here!"

Technically he's dead. I don't have to obey him. I'm a Knight now.

Except that I'm why he's dead, so I owe it to him.

Anakin grumbled something dark under his breath, then straightened his shoulders and slid open the entrance to the main bay of the small ship. "Obi-Wan," he said, deliberately ignoring the Uninvited Passengers. Sure, the woman was apparently his daughter (his daughter!), but that didn't give her the right to barge in on important rescue missions. And just because the two of them had actually met Luke did not mean they were qualified for this rescue mission.

It wasn't their stupid evil future selves they would have to fight.

"Well, Anakin," said Obi-Wan in a mildly annoyed tone, "I was going to have us all do introductions, but as you are late, it'll just be you."

Anakin was now looking away from every single occupant of the room, including himself. "You've gone over the basics?"

"Nope."

Curse you, Obi-Wan Kenobi.

-

Anakin had told his story without looking at anyone, and while it was not the hardest thing he'd ever done, it was tough.

When he stopped speaking, there was a very awkward silence. Finally, the time traveler glanced up, his face expressionless. He couldn't decide which emotion to use.

The woman- it was still difficult to connect an adult standing in front of him with the whole "daughter" concept- had her hand clenched on Solo's arm. Both of their faces were drawn, with something grim their eyes that Anakin could only perceive as hatred.

It mad him mad.

"Be that way, then," he hissed. "Blame me for what I haven't done yet. What I won't do, if I ever get home, which I'm beginning to doubt. I'm not the person we're trying to fight. He killed everything that was ever important to me, in case you didn't get the details of that from what I said. And I'm going to kill him."

"Anakin," said Obi-Wan.

"What?"

"No one said anything about you being-"

"I was going to," said Leia suddenly. "I'm… sorry."

Her voice was not completely sincere, but she meant well.

"All right," said Anakin, also not completely sincere. These people didn't feel like family at all. His family was Padmé and possibly Obi-Wan, not a bunch of future-relatives who hated him for no reason.

"The system over there says it's about fifteen minutes 'til we're out of hyperspace," commented Han. "Do we actually have any plans for this, or is it going to be another one of those 'run in with guns blazing' things the Rebellion is so fond of?"

Leia muttered something at him under her breath. "You're one to talk."

They held each other's eyes for longer than Anakin felt was strictly necessary, but he kept quiet.

"Actually," said Obi-Wan, "I have been making a plan. Of course, I expect Anakin to ruin it within minutes, but at least it's a starting point."

Apparently Han and Leia were not ready for "Anakin ruining things" jokes. Or possibly it just hadn't been funny. Obi-Wan wasn't completely sure, but at least Ani had showed his normal "eye-rolling" reaction.

"And, Anakin," the force-ghost said rather more sternly, "we are hoping not to engage anyone in combat at all."

Anakin snorted, and was pleased to see that Captain Solo apparently had a similar reaction. Maybe the man wasn't so bad after all. Even if he had come along on a mission uninvited. Or at least only invited by Obi-Wan, who should not have had the right to invite anyone at all.

"Look, um, Kenobi," said Han. "We're rescuing a high security prisoner from a giant Imperial battleship. Now, I have some experience in this area, and I can tell you that typically, it's gonna involve fighting." The man's tone was more than slightly condescending, a point which did not evade or fail to annoy Anakin. Still, Solo was also right.

"Look, Obi-Wan," said Anakin. "How about we just… improvise? Sneak aboard the ship somehow and run to the cells? Any of you know anything about the ventilation systems on the ship?"

Obi-Wan smiled to himself. As ashamed as he was to admit it, "leave it to Anakin" had been, for perhaps the first time, his Plan A.

-

There was something going on in the edges of Darth Vader's mind that the Sith could not completely figure out. At first he had assumed it was some trick of his helmet's brain-linked hearing circuits. Probably crewmen having a conversation.

"I want complete silence, radio and otherwise, on this entire ship!" he had snapped to one of the guards nearby, who had relayed the order, much to the displeasure and confusion of the crew.

It had been in effect for at least fifteen minutes now, and the whispering noises in his mind continued. After much ineffective pacing through the halls, he had retreated once again to his meditation pod, removing his helmet and verifying that, no, it was not a malfunction.

Luke, he demanded silently.

Go away.

It was not his son, then. He tried focusing on the murmurings alone, to decipher what exactly was being said, if anything at all.

New portion of the plan, Obi-Wan. I want this ship.

What?

Ha ha, Anakin, very funny. Are we going to let the tractor beam catch us?

I thought you were planning this. And I wasn't kidding about the ship.

We'll call that plan B, Anakin.

-

"Is there a ship approaching?"

Ream had been quite alarmed when Darth Vader had strode onto the bridge. He'd felt the same momentary flush of fear- please don't let it be something I've done- that everyone else had, and then the same relief when the menacing figure had passed him by.

He'd felt some concern for Admiral Piett when whatever had happened turned out to be his duty. While not overly inspiring, the Admiral was a competent officer and would be missed more than most of his predecessors.

But apparently Vader wasn't angry. Or at least not all that much more angry than usual.

Ream couldn't hear what Piett had to say about ships, but it was apparently unsatisfactory.

Someone elbowed Ream in the side. "Ream. Your computer."

Oh. A small patch of light, representing an unfamiliar shuttlecraft, was entering the screen in front of him.

"Admiral!" called out the man, hoping his voice wasn't shaking too much. "A shuttlecraft is approaching, port stern!" It wasn't technically his job to spot approaching crafts- there was an entire room down a few decks full of the people whose job it was- but if Vader wanted to know about them, it was best that someone found the information.

He just would've preferred it to be someone other than himself.

Up near the front viewport, Vader turned his masked face towards Piett in what Ream supposed was an inquisitive manner.

"A shuttlecraft is approaching, milord," said the Admiral, rather redundantly. Ream had to strain to hear him.

"Good," said Vader. Ream did not have to strain to hear him. "Contact them. Believe whatever they say, and allow them to land. Have a boarding party ready, and bring the passengers to me- alive."

This was the sort of behavior the men had learned to expect while chasing Skywalker- but hadn't they just caught Skywalker?

"Yes, milord," said Piett nervously, and Vader strode back along the row of computers and off of the bridge.