Luke's shields were progressing rapidly. Far far faster than Leia had thought was even possible. He had a real hunger to learn, absorbing each task with a fierce determination Leia had not anticipated.
She should have, she realized, he'd make it very clear to her how important learning anything he could about the Force and the Jedi Code was to him.
Luke was, far and away a much better student than Leia had ever been.
If anything, his biggest problem as a student was that he took all of this so seriously that he got disproportionately upset whenever he inevitably messed up.
She didn't know to help him with that.
The worst part was that when he got upset like that, it caused him to focus on himself rather than the Force itself, and created more problems as he tried to learn.
Yet even with those hiccups, he was now creating shields equal to those Leia herself could make. It should have been impossible to learn the technique so fast, there was no way to explain him mastering decades of study in just one day, yet there was no denying the strength of what he was able to create.
Hopefully Luke would now be ready to defend himself from Vader's next attempt to contact either of them.
There was a noise from the doorway, and the twins turned to see what it was in unison.
The military officer from that morning was standing there. "Princess, I've been looking for you. I thought perhaps you were still in the sickbay, but apparently you have recovered. We were going to go over our fleet patterns? Should I reschedule or are you ready for our meeting?"
Luke stood and fell into what Leia recognized was an at attention stance beings in the military used. "General Madine, I'm sorry, I am responsible for Leia being distracted."
Luke gave her an expectant look. She wondered what it is he wanted her to do exactly. She'd never actually been in a military unit before.
After the Clone Wars had ended her mother, and others in the Senate had worked long and hard to ensure a conflict of that nature would not take place again. It had taken years for the structure of the Republic to be suitably altered, and unfortunately, there were still remnants of that dark period of history. Remnants such as the continuing existence of the Grand Army of the Republic, even if the military had been significantly decreased in size since the days of the war.
One of the biggest changes that had happened was the full detachment of the Jedi Order from the Republic's military.
Overall Leia had always been taught that this was a major improvement on the way things had been, that the previous structure of the Order in relation to The Grand Army of the Republic had been a mistake that had caused the Order to go astray. It had even caused the entire Order to drift towards the Dark Side.
Leia agreed with that, even if a part of her felt restless confined to the role of peacekeeper when she heard all the amazing stories her father, Uncle Obi and Aunt 'Soka had from their days fighting in the war.
It also meant that Leia was truly clueless when it came to military discipline and how one was supposed to act within that world.
So she stood and tried to best imitate Luke's pose. The Officer gave her a strange look, clearly surprised and confused by her action. Right. So that wasn't the right thing for her to do. Great.
She sighed. She really was not looking forward to any of this, least of all having to debrief with whoever was in charge here.
Council meetings, whenever she had to go to those, went on forever, and she never felt very comfortable just standing there with everyone staring at her. She imagined that this would go similarly.
She waited for the General to speak, but was surprised to discover he was, in fact, waiting for her. She really did not know what to say. "General, I'm sorry I missed our meeting." She hoped that would be enough to get him to leave and buy her more time to learn about this military she had found herself within before being summoned before the people in charge.
It wasn't.
"Would you like to reschedule it, Princess?"
She nodded, hoping to have it at a far later date.
He watched her expectantly, waiting for her to say when they should next meet.
"Uh, when would work for you?" She hoped he'd be busy until she managed to get home.
"I was going to go grab lunch just now if this time would work for you."
Right. Great. There really would be no putting this off. She sighed. Well, she may as well get the whole reporting to the people in charge thing over with. No point delaying the inevitable.
"General, before we meet you should know that, well, I'm sorry to tell you that something has happened in regards to...in regards to all the responsibilities that… I oversee? I would like to report this in full to whoever is in charge here."
"What do you mean something has happened? Why didn't you say something earlier Princess? Is this an Emergency? Should I notify Alliance High Command?" His tone went up in volume as he spoke.
"Yes. Yes, I suppose this is an emergency. I need to speak to the people in charge of this base and..."
Luke interrupted her, via their bond. Stop. He sent and gave her a pained look. Ok, so clearly she was saying all the wrong things. She didn't get why or what the right thing to say would be, but hey, at least she was no longer actively putting her foot in her mouth. Leia, you are in charge of this base.
She was in charge of this base? She hadn't been expecting to be quite that high up in the command structure. Which meant that the absence of her counterpart actually did qualify as an emergency. She frowned, adjusting to her new understanding of the situation. "Yes General, this is an Emergency," she told him, and General Madine nodded swiftly, hurrying out of the room.
Go, Luke urged her, follow him.
She did, losing track of the twists and turns the two of them took through the base's halls before they arrived at their destination.
The room was near empty save for a handful of display screens and a large circular holotable, all of which was keyed to display all sorts of data related to troop and fleet positions all across the Galaxy. Madine pressed a few buttons on the table's side and then turned to her, worried.
"Is this related to your call to the Alderaanian fleet yesterday? I know it was mostly a formal matter, but if they had something to report..."
She blurted out "Alderaanian fleet?" before she could really stop herself, she was so confused. The people of Alderaan were peaceful, everyone knew that. Why would they have a fleet of their own? Sure they sent ships out all over the place on humanitarian missions and often asked Jedi to accompany their ships for those excursions, but no one had ever described their aid ships as a fleet before.
"Sorry. Fleet, flotilla, it's just semantics to me, but if it is important to you I'll keep it in mind. I take it then that they are indeed having an emergency?"
Madine took her confused look and pursed lips as confirmation of his suspicion. "Whatever it is your people need us to do, Princess, you know we'll try our best given our limited resources."
Holographic figures of several more people dressed in a variety of military-style uniforms appeared. Most of them were in the same uniform as Madine, but there was some variety, and Leia supposed that these may be representative of various branches of military structure.
She recognized some of them from the Grand Army of the Republic, and others from the Republic's government as well. Most of them were total strangers.
The last holo to join them was a person Leia actually knew by name. Senator Mon Mothma, a good friend of Leia's mother.
She didn't really know what to expect from this. All she knew was what Luke had told her when she asked for this emergency meeting. Her counterpart was part of this... Alliance High Command was it? She was in charge of this base. That was all she knew. She didn't even know whothey were at war with!
Why hadn't she asked Luke more questions when she had been teaching him? She'd had plenty of opportunities, she'd just kept putting it off.
She really was not prepared to be given responsibility for an entire base.
All the holos gathered turned towards Leia, and she realized she was the youngest person in the room by far.
How had her counterpart gotten herself this job?
"Princess Leia, what is the emergency?"
She tried to imagine she was in the Council chambers, debriefing after a mission. As much as she hated it, at least that action was familiar. She looked at all of those gathered and then took a breath in and out. She could do this.
"I am not who you think I am," she started, and already she could see various reactions blooming on the faces of those gathered, "something happened, I am not exactly sure of what right now. I traveled here from another dimension."
"Another dimension?" A tired looking dark haired Human asked.
"Yes. That is the only explanation that makes sense. Too many things are fundamentally different for it to be anything else."
"Such as?" A Mon Cal asked, his vocal tone communicating that he did not believe a word she was saying.
"Well, I'm not a Princess for one thing. I am a Jedi."
Everyone gathered started to talk at once, a chaotic cacophony of voices expressing varying states of shock and disbelief. Leia decided to float some of the datapads she saw sitting in a corner over to the table, in full view of the holorecorder, to truly prove her point. Then to really drive it home, she took her lightsaber off her belt and placed it on the table.
"I am a Jedi. I wouldn't joke about something like that."
Mon lifted an eyebrow, and looked Leia over with interest, "You are a Padawan I'm assuming, based on your braid?"
Leia nodded. "Yes, Senator. I know this all sounds very strange, but I am a Jedi Padawan training under Master Ahsoka Tano, a Knight of the Jedi Order."
Everyone gathered reacted to that statement in some way. Most just stared at her with disbelief, a Twi'lek woman seemed to either be holding back tears or covering something up (she didn't know her well enough to say which), and one of those gathered even let out a bark of laughter.
The source of the laughter was a pale and clean-shaven Human, who gave her a suspicious glance. "You claim you are being trained by Fulcrum? As a Jedi? In an alternative universe? Princess, you've proposed some strange and foolish maneuvers in the past, but this really tops it all! Do you really expect anyone to-"
Senator Mothma cut him off. "Thank you, General Draven. Your lack of belief in this development is noted." She turned to Leia. "Does the Republic still exist in your world?"
"Of course it does! Are you suggesting that -"
Now Mon cut her off, exuding an easy air of authority Leia was familiar witnessing her mother command. "The Republic was destroyed 20 years ago, Master Jedi. As was the Jedi Order. We here in the Alliance to Restore the Republic, as our name implies, aim to restore the Republic that once was."
Leia could only gape at her in shock. She'd gathered from the comments everyone she had encountered in this world had made, as well as those horrible visions, that the Order was gone, but the entire Republic too?
She was almost glad her mother was dead in this reality, so she didn't have to see the demise of all that she had worked for. Leia could only hope she had died before the Republic fell, the idea that she had witnessed the end of her life's work was far too horrible to contemplate.
"The Republic is alive and well in my dimension, Ma'am. I am very sad to hear it is not here as well. What sort of government do you have then, if not the Galactic Republic?"
"The Galaxy has been suffering under a Galactic Empire. Singular authoritarian rule by fear led by Emperor Sheev Palpatine."
Sheev Palpatine? Oh. Oh no. She knew all about him, he was all over every history lesson she had ever had, both at the temple and with the tutors her mother had insisted she and Luke suffer through in addition to their regular education.
"He's a Sith!" She looked around the table with desperation. "He's a Sith Lord, you know that, right?"
There was a commotion after that, louder and more raucous than when she had initially told them she was a Jedi. She had never really given thought before to how the Council members managed to never interrupt or talk over each other. Oh sure, they would occasionally cut off the being reporting to them, but fail to listen to other Masters? Never. This group had no such decorum.
Even with everyone talking over each other, it wasn't hard for Leia to figure out that not a single one of the people gathered had actually been aware of Darth Sidious' identity. It was a fact that came up often in history lessons, that the man had managed to escape notice for decades disguised as a kind and grandfatherly politician, a leader of Leia's mother's own political party. He'd even once been her mother's mentor.
Even knowing that she hadn't expected his true identity to be this surprising. Her dad was far from the most perceptive person in the Galaxy, Force abilities aside, and he had managed to figure Sidious' ploy out.
Through all the chaos Mon stood silent, resigned. She looked like she had just been punched. "We were unaware of this. Are you certain that he is indeed a Sith?"
Leia nodded, slowly. "Yes, in my timeline he was found out at the end of the Clone Wars. He was the mastermind behind them, pulling all the strings behind both sides. The entire war was just a ploy for him to justify a decrease in civil liberties and increase in executive authority. My... my father killed him, and brought balance to the Force."
Mon frowned. "You do not mean Bail Organa when you speak of your father, do you?"
Leia shook her head no. "No, my father is Anakin Skywalker."
Mon's expression did not give away any of her feelings on the matter, but in the Force Leia sensed a brief smugness about her, as if she had been suspecting as much for a while and only just had it confirmed. Leia wasn't too surprised, she was a lot like her parents.
Quietly, so much so her voice almost was not picked up by the holorecorder, she asked, "Are you are the daughter of Padmé Amidala?"
"Yes I am, Senator."
Mon smiled. As she spoke, her gaze seemed lost parsecs in the distance, perhaps in recollection of a time long past. "I knew I had won that bet with Bail about who the baby's father was, Padmé never was as good at being secretive about that relationship as she liked to believe," she laughed then, at some old joke it seemed she had once shared with Senator Organa about Leia's parents. "I forgive him for never admitting I won, of course. Where you came from was a secret that needed to be kept." She looked around the room, pointedly. "I expect that this will be treated with the highest level of classification."
There was a lot of nodding after that, as well as "yes ma'am"s and even an "of course, Chancellor."
Her title here was Chancellor?
Mon's sharp gaze focused on Leia. "We welcome you to the Alliance to Restore the Republic, Master Jedi. I will not mince words, we need Princess Organa here and will suffer tremendously in her absence. Our resources are stretched thin as it is, and I do not believe we will be able to allocate the funds and manpower that is going to be needed to bring her home. We will try to find these resources of course," as she said this she turned to the holo of a Human with a bushy white beard, delegating for him to take on this task, "but as of right now I am unsure if we will be able to spare any energy towards that at all. That said, we will appreciate having a Jedi among our ranks once more. Commander Skywalker tries but -"
Mon Mothma paused, in thought.
"He's your brother, isn't he? That's why Bail sent you to get General Kenobi, to be reunited with him," she laughed, "your father is still finding ways to surprise me, even after his death. Padmé too." She looked so terribly bittersweet in that moment, the lone survivor of her closest group of friends.
Senator Organa was dead as well? Wow. This reality really was bleak.
Leia was uncomfortable with how everyone at this meeting was suddenly looking at her.
Like she knew what she was doing.
Like she could save them.
Like she was her father.