Chapter Fourteen: Knight and Her Lightsaber

Her ship docked smoothly to the medical frigate. Luke was still not fully recovered yet, and they wanted to make sure that he was feeling in top shape before he went out again. Of course, he still had quite a bit of physiological healing left to do, and that was no secret. Anna could see it in the way he carried himself, and she could feel it. There was no way that it would be an easy fix for him; this was something that was far deeper than anything that she could've ever imaged.

She went to her room first, managing to sneak past the rebels that had been waiting outside of her ship. She smiled as she walked swiftly down the familiar corridor, and turned into her room, to which the door was open. She walked over to her bed to see that her usual black leather jacket was sitting on top of the blankets. There was nothing that she wanted more than to get out of the clothes that had the smell and memories of the swamp embedded within their fibres.

Within a few minutes, she was dressed in her black leather jacket, with dark, skinny-legged flexible pants. Her hair hung in loose curls around her face, and she brushed them aside slightly as she looked at her reflection in the mirror.

Things had definitely changed about her, and that was no secret. She looked to have gained some muscle tone to her, and she didn't look near as frail as before. She was still thin, but she didn't seem like someone who would completely collapse in a fight. Anna knew that her training had strengthened her in some aspects, but she knew that the inevitable meeting with Luke would be the hardest. Though they hadn't directly admitted their feelings for each other, it would feel just as bad. They had barely even touched each other's hands, or really even got to know each other. She knew that Luke would be able to pick up on her sudden hesitance that she knew would happen, but she had to do her best to not expose it. She glanced down at her prized weapon and lightly lay her hand over it. She had not yet gotten used to the pearl-white colour of her blade that she had never seen before. Luke's was, or at least had been, blue, but that lightsaber was gone. Anna felt her eyes drop as she remembered the brief time that she had spent on Cloud City. Even though it hadn't happened too long ago, it felt like months, even years had passed, not weeks. She sighed and took one more look at herself in the mirror before she walked out of the room.

Leia was the first person that Anna ran into, and they both smiled at each other as they neared.

"Good to see you back," Leia commented as she slowed her pace.

"It's nice to see you too," Anna said. "Feels like a long time since I was last here. Any more news on Han?"

Leia's gaze fell. "Not that I've heard," she said. "Lando and Chewie are still out there working on their part in the mission, but enough about that. How was training? I see you've got yourself a new weapon."

Anna smiled and took her double-bladed hilt out from her belt and held it out for Leia to see. "It's been modified," Anna said.

"It's really nice," Leia said. "By the way, Luke has been waiting for you in the dining hall."

Anna's heart twitched, and she nodded. "I'll go meet him there. Nice seeing you."

Leia nodded in return and started up again. She smiled once more at Anna before she turned back to look ahead of her, down the corridor, walking at her usual clipped pace.

Anna walked slowly to the dining hall. It wasn't that she didn't want to see Luke, it was just that Yoda's words had stuck in her head. She had rarely talked to Luke through the com-link, and she knew that he wasn't too pleased about that, but she knew that he mostly felt sorrow. It was no secret that not talking to him at the end of everyday like she had told him had taken its toll on him. He had always sounded slightly saddened whenever she had finally come on to talk to him, and it killed her inside. She had been careful to only talk to him while Yoda was resting, and not paying much attention to her. Sometimes, the way his voice sounded scared her enough to think of the Dark side of the Force.

She walked into the dining hall, which was empty for the most part. A section of the lights had been turned off, and she saw the other Jedi member of the rebels sitting at one of the smaller tables, his head down as he looked at the food in front of him. Anna took a deep breath and picked up her pace as she neared his table.

"Luke," she called softly, and his head shot up at her voice. She forced a smile at him, and he too seemed to be pushing his facial expression, ad not letting it come naturally.

"When did you arrive?" he asked, gesturing to the chair in front of him across the table. Anna pulled it back and settled into it.

"Not too long ago," she answered. "I wanted to change out of the clothes that I wore on Dagobah before I made my arrival public. Leia already caught me up with everything that has happened so far."

Luke looked down at his food again. "It's starting to seem hopeless, but maybe it's just because I'm stuck in here, and they're out there," he said, and sighed. "I don't have a lot of time left here, so that's good. But enough about me; how was your training?"

Anna didn't say anything, but instead looked down at her weapon that was clipped onto her belt. "I guess that the highlight was that I got my prized weapon," she said, and pulled it off of her belt before setting it on the table. Luke looked at it once before he paused.

"Double blade?" he asked, picking it up.

"Yep," she said. "With a Krayt dragon pearl as the crystal."

Luke ignited one of the blades and stood up before igniting the other one. He stared at the brilliant glow of the uncommon colour emanating from the blade. Anna loved to see the look of awestruck on his face.

"A Krayt dragon pearl?" he asked, and Anna nodded, though she was certain that he was too preoccupied with examining her lightsaber to notice her movements. "Those are really rare."

"Yoda said that he trusted me to use it to the best of my abilities," Anna explained.

"I trust that you will too," Luke said, and Anna smiled.

Slowly advancing this story toward ROTJ…sloooowlyy.

It should be picking up again in the next few chapters.