They huddled together under a tarp Lando had the foresight to pack. Luke didn't know if it was the hypnotic motion of the skiff, or its two shadows, racing ahead and slightly to port, but he felt strange, like he was caught in a time of in-between.

Tiredly, Luke kept an eye on the horizon, where distance became time. He saw himself, the many ways, the many parts of him.

A Princess, delivering a plea, swathed in yards of white.

A young man, embracing a woman in blue.

A skeleton breaking apart under a smuggler's hands.

Ben, turning away from the baby in the woman's arms, lonely and broken.

An adolescent, moving sullenly among condensers of a moisture farm.

A young man in black, taking leave.

It was like being the little yellow sun, promising to watch over her planet, creating the second sun which would ultimately destroy it. And she loved them both.

Luke felt a profound gratitude for Tatooine. To show him that life was fleeting, temporary, even that which lasted millennia.

He squinted toward the foreground, and sat a little straighter.

It had to be because of the heat. And the exhaustion. And the lack of drinking water.

Luke saw a mirage: off in the distance, a young Anakin Skywalker was disembarking from a speeder, the woman in blue already standing on the sand and shielding her eyes with her hand.

It wasn't clear- what he saw danced and shimmered, broken by heat waves, and he got up and moved to the bow.

It was interesting, because mirages, in his lifetime of desert experience, usually didn't move. Anakin crossed in front of the speeder and joined the woman at her side.

Luke's gaze moved between the mirage and his fellow passengers gathered under the shade of tarp. R2, at the helm with C-3PO, didn't beep to alert Luke there was anything to see, or that they were near their destination, and he would. He was such a reliable droid. C-3PO, less efficient, was also silent.

Anakin hadn't pulled up to anything. The mirage didn't feature the Lars farm of thirty years ago, or whenever Luke's grandmother had died. The speeder was just out in the open, empty desert.

Chewie and Lando were sitting back to back, supporting each other, chins nodding on their chests, dozing.

Anakin and the woman were embracing.

That's my mother, Luke thought. He'd suspected it before, the first time he saw the Force vision, but now he was certain. He watched her with interest. She left his father's embrace and started walking, in the direction of the skiff. Anakin's arms dropped to his side and he merely watched.

Luke's eyes flitted to R2 again, and then to Leia. She was leaning back on her palms, legs extended and crossed at the ankles. Her eyes were closed and her head tilted upward, at the tarp, soaking up some shade. Han's head rested on her thigh.

Luke thought about contacting her through the Force. Leia, wake up. Do you see- To try and see if he could get her to add to what she'd accomplished, unknowingly, in the Force so far.

But if it was a mirage, then it was only his to see...

His mirage kept moving, growing closer. He could see the variable tones in his mother's blue robes, as if water had been used to wash the color away. His father remained far away, blurry and small.

What was this? Luke thought back. Earlier in his experiences with the Force, he'd been with non-Force users. Owen and Beru at the table, Han in the cantina. But he'd been brought then by the Force, in the guise of Ben usually, to interact with them. This was different; this wasn't possible. Well, neither was drinking blue milk with a Force-infused aunt when he was really on a tauntaun's back, he argued with himself, but somehow it was possible. He' been guided.

Those locations, the circumstances, the time- they were all familiar, known to him. His mother wasn't. The other time he'd seen her, just the once, he was being told something, given a lesson he had to work out.

This felt different. Nothing whispered to him, pay attention.

Was he just more powerful? Experiencing the Force in new ways? He didn't need lessons anymore, he just needed to understand?

She had brown eyes. Even, white teeth, which she showed in a gentle smile. What do you want, he thought at her.

He warned himself to be careful. Already once he'd been enraptured by the vision of a princess in a holomessage, and here he was again entranced by an image of someone who awakened something in him, something vague yet filled with longing.

She boarded the skiff. Moments ago she was a shimmering vision, unfocused, unclear, and she had crossed the desert on foot like a breeze.

She looked first at him, then Leia, her expression tentative, and knelt by Han's side.

"Leave him alone," Luke said. Then, because she might be his mother, he added, "Please."

"I will take care of him," his mother said.

"We just got him back," Luke told her. "Leia will."

"Look at her," his mother said.

Luke did. What did she want him to see? Right now she reminded him of the holo that greeted Wedge every time he opened his locker. An image of a scantily clad woman, beautiful and objectified.

The length of broken chain that had tethered her to Jabba curved around her breast and dangled over the deck, swaying slightly with the skiff's motion.

There was nothing wrong with what Luke saw. He saw Leia, through and through, always. "You look," he told her. "You're not being fair. Do you know what we've been through-"

"This is a dangerous time for you," she said.

Luke's head jolted forward. "Ben?" he exclaimed and shook his head to clear it of the voice. "That's not fair!" he said again angrily. He'd been successful at thwarting all of Ben's attempts at contact this long. He didn't want to hear from him; he knew whatever explanation was offered couldn't be trusted, that it was just Ben trying to get him to do Ben's will. And Yoda's, what they said the Force desired. To use his mother... It was a cheap shot.

"I don't care what hindsight you have," he told- whoever it was. "We chose," he deliberately emphasized the words. "And nothing you can say will make us change our mind. You can't tell us what-"

He broke off, and he felt Ben disappear, though his mother still knelt by Han. His mother, he realized. Tending to Han. The Force had never held much for Han nor he for it, and yet- there's no mystical energy field controls my destiny-

Han had sounded like such a defiant, belligerent jerk when he'd said that, observing Luke's first lessons with the lightsaber. The Force created life and it owed its existence to his mother and Han as much as it owed Luke, yet both remained outside of the Force.

It was funny now- Luke could see himself judge Han for his denial of the Force- he'd felt a pity for him, actually. Such had been his desires. But in essence, it took Luke three years to reach the same conclusion. Maybe that's why it was Force Han at the cantina with the brochures for Luke to decide on.

Two things were going on right now. Ben was here, jumping on a moment to get to Luke, and the Force was asking for help.

"What happened to you?" Luke said. It was one question, directed at two: his mother and the Force.

The only being who knew anything about his mother was Darth Vader, and Luke didn't foresee that conversation was ever likely to happen.

Son, learn the power of the dark side and rule the galaxy by my side.

I'll think about it, Father. First what can you tell me about Mother?

He imagined Vader chopping off his other hand. Anakin was dead to Vader and that meant his mother was dead too, more than dead. She couldn't be spoken of without sparking his rage and blame.

Vader wouldn't allow himself to think of her, and the Force sort of… glossed over her. Like it did Han. She needn't be mentioned. She was… not an oversight… Luke fought to grasp what he sensed. Not a mistake. A misdirection. One of the many possible paths a being could venture down and the Force hadn't considered it.

She chose death? Luke felt his brows raise. A young woman, heavy with child, his name ready on her lips, longing for family, and she decided to die.

She'd seen Anakin die, and she saw Vader rise. That's why, Luke inhaled sharply. For some reason, his father had already embraced the dark side. Luke had assumed her death was another push toward it, as Anakin's mother's had been.

She wouldn't allow her love, grown dark and terrible, to have her, so she took herself away from him, so that he might never destroy her, and she was willing to take her son away, too.

She was going to let me die, Luke thought.

But he refused to let it weigh him down at the moment. Later, maybe. Right now, this was about her, and Han, and the Force. You have a power, too, he realized. And so does Han. You have the ability, as much as I have really, to influence-

Typically, words failed him. Not the future, though that certainly was the outcome. Not the Force- well, yes, because everything contained the Force but also no, because they didn't have it- They had the power to influence- direction, the way a life could go. Anyone's life. A Wookiee, or a Princess. A Jedi. It wasn't the Force that made these stories. It was the beings who lived them. The Force was merely the narrator.

Ben was gone but his mother was still here, and far away Anakin waited for her by the speeder. So he knew, too.

"You don't have to worry," he told her. "I already know." He moved his eyes from her back to his father. "You can go back. I wish you could stay. But I know you can't." He wanted to know so much about her- not just her name, or how she met his father. Who she was, how Anakin came to love her. But it would have to wait until the Force was repaired.

He made his way over to Leia and sat beside her, squeezing between her and Chewie. She turned her head toward him to let him know she sensed him next to her, but didn't open her eyes.

"I'm going to comm Mrs. Darklighter," he told her. "None of us have eaten, had anything to drink, slept in a day. You don't mess with the desert."

"Mm?" Han stirred drowsily.

Leia supported herself on one hand and used the other to brush hair off his brow. "Ssh," she said.

"Mm," he said.

"Wait, maybe," Leia told Luke sleepily, eyes still closed, as if she could nap and talk at the same time. "'Til you change, and I get out of this," she grabbed at the chain dangling from her neck collar and missed, and Luke felt if it wasn't heat exhaustion than it was a kind of shock.

"I don't really need to change. I'm in regular clothes," Luke told her.

"She's going to freak," Leia continued dreamily. "A big wooden skiff. You look like Vader."

Luke blinked at her in surprise. "What?"

Han said, "Wassat? Vader?"

"Luke's all in black," Leia said a little more clearly. "He's dressed like Vader."

"No I'm not," Luke protested.

"Lemme see." Han made no move except to lift his forearm. He patted at the air, eyes closed, trying to find Luke.

"You can't see," Luke reminded him, but he smiled, and lowered his head. He felt Han pat him all over his hair.

"No," Han told Leia. "Not Vader."

"Thanks, Han," Luke said.

"What were you going for, anyway, Luke?" Leia said. "Did you think Jabba would associate you with Vader?"

"No," Luke answered defensively. "I was in a used surplus store. There wasn't a lot of choice. I was going for self-assured, and serene." And power, he realized. I was trying to show power, like Vader does.

Look at me, Mother. Do I remind you of him? He withdrew into himself, a little disturbed Leia saw him that transparently while he had been oblivious to the connection. And should he be disturbed still, that he saw nothing wrong in it?

"I need to get out of this," Leia said again, and she lifted a bare thigh. Han's head rolled with her motion but he seemed to have fallen asleep. Leia gazed into his face. "I want to protect her from it, somehow," she told Luke.

He nodded. The Darklighters had been good neighbors. Helpful and friendly. They had to know there was more to Luke's return than he told them, which was nothing, but he was grateful they had never pressed Luke or Leia for information. They seemed happy to treat Luke and Leia as a married couple, and neither did anything to dissuade them of the notion.

They each carried memories of loss for each other. Luke of Biggs, their son, and they of his aunt and uncle. Luke and Leia had enjoyed a simple friendship with them. There was no mention of Alderaan, of Vader, of Jabba.

He liked being their neighbor, and he suspected they enjoyed the relationship as well. He enjoyed their attention, their care and interest.

It went both ways. The opportunity to be with someone they'd known as a child, returned as a young adult; to help them set up a home, teach them; it must have provided some closure they didn't know they needed. And for Luke, who felt his life so crazy: yeah, she's a Princess without a planet. We plan on rescuing a smuggler who was tortured by my father. He's how I lost my hand, by the way. When he farmed, side by side with the Darklighters, life was simple. Sane, and calm. Real.

Luke offered Leia a forgiving smile. "What are they going to think when Han becomes part of our household?" he teased. "They're going to think something's up with our marriage."

She managed a smile with hooded eyes and said, "Hmm. Guess we'll have some kinks."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Storm season was coming. Tatooine's wobbly ellipse passed too close to the red sun this time of year, and it wreaked havoc on the desert. It was a busy time for moisture farmers, who needed to bottle the harvest and cover the condensers. The season was predictable, but not the storms. No one could say where they would originate or how long they would last.

Right now, the air made a human's eyes feel swollen and their temples throbbed. The breeze was constant, and brisk; sand needled at one's face and hands constantly.

Luke was restless. A pressure was building up in him. He'd sent Lando on errands, but stayed close to the farm with Leia, Chewie and Han. Lando had brought the two droids to the ships in the canyon for sentry duty, and traveled to Mos Eisley to get Leia's speeder out of long term docking. They told him to do whatever he wished with the skiff, and he'd sold it to some jawas.

How timeless the desert was, Luke thought. He was here for the story of the Skywalkers- and the Lars, Force, he remonstrated, don't forget the Lars- but for the Force too, the lives that created it, the lives it bound itself to.

Moving from one condenser to the next on the Darklighter farm, Luke happened to glance up and saw Adolescent Luke, moving through the fields of the Lars farm, a few condensers away from Uncle Owen. Be careful now, Luke wanted to warn his past self, for he knew exactly what would happen.

There was a moment in the harvest, if you weren't careful, and the water sloshed, and then it was gone- just gone. There was no feeling of wetness as the drops slid past your fingers. The sand never dimpled because the water never had the chance to touch it. The suns sucked it away.

Luke appreciated the Force for this, the way history filled him. There was no emotion associated with what he saw, just knowledge of what used to be and what would. How I've grown, he thought of himself, for he barely caused the water to ripple now; familiar with that sinking horror, Adolescent Luke looking over his shoulder- did Owen see me spill- it never mattered though. Owen knew every drop.

"Carelessness costs credits," Owen would yell, and Luke, who knew he deserved the scolding, would mutter sullenly under his breath, "say that three times fast."

After they stowed the last of the harvest in the shed, Luke accepted a glass of blue milk in the Darklighter kitchen, knowing it might be the last time he saw them. If there was a break in the storms, Mr. D would have no time to socialize; he'd have to inspect and repair and make ready.

"I'm sorry for all the alarm we must have caused," Luke apologized.

"Oh, Luke," Mr. Darklighter sighed and raised his glass. "Alarm," he repeated, testing whether it was the right word.

"You and Mrs. D probably wished I'd been a more normal neighbor," Luke continued. "Not dashing off into the canyons all the time."

Mr. D threw Luke a sharp glance. "You think I didn't know you and Biggs were in the canyons?" Luke laughed, and Mr. D sobered. "Ever since that day those troopers came to your homestead, Luke... There's been no such thing as normal. Ever again."

Luke lowered the glass from his lips. "I know, sir. Or it's a normal you didn't want."

Mr. Darklighter opened his mouth, then closed it to regard Luke a moment. He seemed to have decided on something, for he opened his mouth again and spoke. "Do you know what I think, every time a visitor comes, Luke? We don't get visitors often, so maybe that's why, but every time the bell rings and I see a visitor, I think 'someone's going to die.' That's my first thought. Not 'I wonder who it is'. 'Someone's going to die'. And I hate it. I hate feeling nervous when I see the shadows approach. I hate having to think where my gun is, just in case."

Luke nodded. He understood exactly what Mr. Darklighter meant. His first thought, when the skiff pulled up to the Lars farm was there's no smoke today. "Did you think that about me and Leia?"

Mr. Darklighter's eyes swept over the desert. He nodded. "I did about your friend." He grunted in memory. "Definitely made sure I had my gun."

Luke smiled.

"Still might be your friend that dies."

"He's pretty sick," Luke agreed. "But at least we have a chance to take care of him, right? Instead of outright being killed."

"Right." Both men fell silent for a time. Luke had something to say, but he couldn't find a way to broach it.

"I'm also thinking," Mr. Darklighter said, "that I hate this conversation." Luke smiled faintly. "About death. Friends dying. Our families, Luke," Mr. Darklighter made sure to hold Luke's eyes, "we've had our share of loss. And I'm awfully sorry for it, and I don't want you to have any more. You're young, Luke. You should be starting out, thinking bright."

"Biggs, too," Luke said, for that's who Mr. Darklighter meant. "I know it's not enough, but- I think of Biggs a lot. I tell stories all the time. Just ask my wing man," he joked gently. "I know you won't see him have the life you wanted for him. But," Luke took a big breath, finding it difficult to express himself, "but he was a friend. He gave me..." Luke shrugged. "Friendship. It's stayed with me. So, in a way, he lives on." He shook his head, hating how pathetic and patronizing he sounded. "I'm sorry. I know that's nothing like-"

"No, it's fine," Mr. Darklighter said. He looked moved. Not comforted, which was what Luke was trying to do, but affected, and Luke thought maybe that was good enough. "It's good to know. Nice to hear. Thank you."

"I may not have said it well in the letter I wrote you. Even when I'm away," Luke persisted, finding an opening, "Biggs is still along." Mr. Darklighter nodded. "Sir," Luke waited a few heart beats, "Leia and I will be leaving again." He swallowed, finding it difficult to say. "I'm not sure we'll be back."

The desert didn't care, Luke thought, as he looked down at the sand. The desert would continue, while life came and went, until the red sun swallowed the desert and Tatooine became just a moment in history.

Mr. Darklighter wasn't surprised either. "I expected that," he said. "The letter you sent- you both were pilots. What you always wanted to be. So when you came back, and farmed only one condenser..."

Luke laughed. "I guess that is kind of ridiculous."

Mr. Darklighter chuckled.

"I'm not sure what to do about the farm," Luke said.

"Well, that's up to you. It's good land."

"Would you like it?" Luke asked, thinking 'good land' was a very relative phrase.

"No, no," Mr. Darklighter was startled. "Don't give it away. Sell it. Or keep it. Mine's big enough, I think." He looked at the adobe walls of his kitchen. "Don't give it away."

"I guess not. It'd piss Uncle Owen off."

Mr. Darklighter's laughed genuinely, the first time Luke heard it since he returned. It contained affection, and memory, and the bittersweet recognition that life used to be different.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

They watched him in shifts, everyone in their own way. Luke liked Lando's method best. Lando dealt Han a hand of sabacc and played it for him against himself, talking Han through it. "You have a minus thirteen. I'm going to discard the knave and take three. You good with that?" and Han would answer "yeah" even though the effort might cause him to vomit.

Luke pulled aside the Cut Lace curtain and peered inside. Leia had made it. It was the constellation of the Three Goddesses looking over the lake at Aldera. At the bottom corner was a tower, and Leia had pointed out a cut in the fabric. She had told Luke it was a window, and that little Leilei was behind it, looking out.

"Mind if I join you?" he asked Lando.

"Not at all," Lando replied smoothly. "I'll deal you in, if you like." He jerked his head toward the figure on the pallet. "He's not too much fun right now."

Han was mostly on his stomach, one arm trapped between his belly and the mattress. The other arm was bent at the elbow, fingers dangling lightly off the edge of the pallet. His hair was very rumpled, mouth open a little. His back rose and fell evenly. It was the first in three days Luke saw he was truly resting.

Luke smiled fondly. "He's actually sleeping?" he said in a hushed voice.

"The patient is sedated," the med droid intoned, and Luke started. He hadn't noticed it in the corner of the room.

"I take it there's not much sickness on Tatooine," Lando said, dealing cards. "This one's not good for much."

Luke picked up his hand. "Heat stroke and exhaustion, mainly. Injuries. It's not its fault. Viruses and bacteria don't flourish here. There's outbreaks in the ports sometimes, but it dies off really fast. Too hot."

"True." Lando tapped the deck for Luke to draw. "I figured as much."

Luke added, "Cut it some slack. No sentient's been through carbon freeze, right?"

Lando's chin jerked towards Han. "He's exhausted. Body wouldn't quit. Not going to heal like that."

"Yeah." Luke had never seen sick like this. He was familiar with injuries- wounds, and blood. There was the bacta tank, or bandages. Weakness, sure. Pain was a given, but so were painkillers. He'd gone that route himself a few times. You either died, or you recovered. And it was decided quickly- you knew within a day or two which way it would go. And in between you were out of it.

But he'd never known anything to be this unceasing, this relentless. Something had Han and it would not let go. He complained of his skin crawling, and they couldn't touch him. Still so cold, even with his temperature so high. The med droid was convinced the disorientation and dizziness was due to dehydration and heat stroke, but after a few days had to send out for fever reducer and anticonvulsants. He didn't sleep, but lapsed in and out of awareness, and he always asked, "how long?", coming to in a panic, thinking he was still in the carbonite.

Lando was arranging his cards. "Where's Leia?"

"She's sleeping, too. Finally."

"Yeah. 'Bout time. She's taking this hard. Personally."

Luke pursed his lips, considering his cards and Lando's words. "Not really. She's frightened is all." She lost so much, he wanted to say. She's afraid she'll break if she loses one more thing. He didn't think it was really Lando's business.

"Leia should know he's a tough bastard."

"You know she's a princess, don't you?" Luke had heard Lando use her title only once, in the IMF, when he'd left with Chewie to return to Bespin. "You keep calling her Leia."

"Shouldn't I? You do."

"But I'm Luke," he said with a small smile. "It took Han ages before he called her Leia."

"He called her Princess?"

"Well, not-" Luke stopped himself. "Sometimes."

"Anyway, it's how she introduced herself. I guess Han needed to see what he was flying her into, so they held back on some important details."

"Well, they were right, weren't they?" Luke added up his hand. If he discarded the nine and the two, he stood at eleven.

Lando snorted. "He was on his last ounce of fuel. I didn't know until Lord Vader said it. I didn't know if Han did, until he said it."

"Why wouldn't Han know?"

"How would I know?" Lando threw up his hand in exasperation and Luke caught a glimpse of an eight and ten. Lando was going for a straight. Luke kept the nine. "He was playing things pretty close. Hells, I didn't know she loved him 'til she said it."

Luke nodded.

"Did you?"

Luke smiled. "I wasn't with them for a while. Before that, I'd have said... I knew what she didn't."

"Huh. Interesting. You talk in a haze, you know that?"

Luke laughed, and over on the pallet, Han rolled over. The two men froze, waiting to see if he would wake. When he resumed sleep with a snore, they went back to playing cards.

"Vader got there first," Lando spoke with regret. "He got there first. He asked me for the beings aboard a ship he expected to call for port, and he didn't mention a princess, or rebels, though that's what I assumed, and he didn't name the ship. He didn't say it was for the security of the Empire. Instead he threatened the city."

Luke nodded, just listening.

"He expected just Han and Chewbacca," Lando continued. "He was- pleased, I'd say, to get the Princess."

Luke nodded again. There was nothing to say. "Let's shift the deck," he suggested. They didn't have a reshuffler, so it involved being dealt a brand new hand.

"It didn't sit right, giving up a ship sight unseen to Vader, you know," Lando shuffled the deck. "But it was one ship or the whole city. What's your move?"

"I liked my old hand better."

"That's sabacc. Can I ask you a question?"

"Sure."

"What's your status with the Rebellion?"

"Oh." Luke took a large inhale. "Probably not good," he joked lamely. "I was a flight squadron commander. They know I left to rendezvous, but I never showed up. I could be missing. Or absent." He laughed ironically. "Depends who debriefs me."

"You're going back?"

Luke nodded, and took a card. "Yeah. Still got a war to fight."

"Leia says she's missing in action, presumed dead," Lando provided.

"It's likely," Luke allowed. "We all were at the Battle of Hoth. She was in the command center. The Empire managed to pierce through our defenses. She missed the transport and got off in the Falcon. So she's not accounted for."

"She ranks high?"

Luke nodded. "High Council. Been involved with the Rebellion..." Luke thought about her father, "for years. Inherited it, almost."

Lando fell to looking at his cards, his face revealing nothing, and Luke suddenly got suspicious. "Why," he said with narrowed eyes. "You're not cooking up something, are you?"

Lando's eyes got wide and innocent. "Me? No, no. Not at all."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"3PO, I want to run something by you," Luke leaned against the courtyard wall, speaking quietly into a comm unit held close to his mouth.

"Of course, Master Luke. I am happy to be of assistance." The droid wasn't too happy to be left on the Falcon with just R2, but it was certainly much more peaceful in the home without him. Before exiling him to the canyons, Luke had to bar him from discussing Han's recovery with anyone. 3PO told Chewie that Captain Solo was unlikely to recover from the trauma of being buried alive, and had subsequently been run out the room, being chased by an angry, limping Wookiee who should be lying in bed with his hurt leg propped up.

Then, after discussion with the Visiting Med Droid, who wasn't as effective as Luke or Leia had hoped, he thoughtlessly mentioned to Leia that humans suffering such a high fever for a prolonged time would be left brain damaged. Leia responded by squirting bacta gel into his photoreceptors and yelling at him to shut up, which a distressed 3PO found out of character.

Luke began, "Someone once said, 'this is a dangerous time for you.' I'm not going to tell you who said it, or who heard it, but I want your take on it."

"Certainly, sir. Language is my specialty, after all." C-3PO was silent a moment as he processed information. "Well, sir. The term 'danger' of course indicates to whomever the phrase was directed was not safe. That is fairly self-explanatory, I should think." Luke pictured him cocking his head to the side. "Perhaps exposed, or vulnerable. My interpretation is that the danger is probably not physical. It might only be a perceived threat, or a condition that may eventually cause physical harm. And the use of 'time' suggests that the situation could be temporary."

3PO stopped a moment. "It seems to me, if the listener, or listeners, took action or even if they did not, the situation of danger might pass on its own. Then," he continued, "is the use of 'you'. In Basic, which I find a terribly flawed language-"

"Tell me your opinion of Basic later."

"It has a fascinating history, Master Luke. One of the rare manufactured languages-"

"-The use of 'you'?" Luke reminded the droid.

"Yes, sir. The use of 'you' in Basic is unclear. It is both singular and plural. I am afraid I am unable to tell you if there was only one listener, or several. It is pointless to interpret it."

"So it could mean, you as in one person, or many: all of you."

"Quite correct, sir."

Luke nodded thoughtfully to himself. "Thanks."

"Might I venture a guess, sir, as to who said it and to whom?"

"Sure, go ahead." Luke prepared himself to be entertained, and the droid did not disappoint.

"It falls completely in line with what I knew of the droid master at Jabba's palace. That unit routinely ordered the disassembling of machines!"

"That would be a dangerous time, alright," Luke smiled. "How's the Falcon? Got any visitors?"

"No, sir. Nothing to report. May I inquire about Captain Solo?"

"He's doing okay."

"That is good news, sir. Though I must say, based on his-"

"The VMD got it figured out finally. Once Lando explained about the freezing process. It's because the carbonite is kept under pressure. Some kind of embolism. He needs a decompress, but that'll have to be elsewhere."

"I could have told you this, Master Luke. I was at Cloud City and saw it happen. If I were to be with-"

"Need someone at the Falcon, 3PO, but thanks. I gotta go. Skywalker out."

Luke was grimly satisfied with C-3PO's interpretation. It fell in line with everything he'd been feeling and learning.

There was no way 3PO could guess- the only witness other than Luke was Yoda. It was Ben's warning, uttered to Luke on Dagobah before he departed.

"But I feel the Force," Luke had said pleadingly.

"But you cannot control it," Obi Wan rejoined.

Well, Luke could now, better than Ben even, because he had a different relationship with the Force. He could even tell Master Yoda why the Jedi had to fall.

Ben hadn't known that while he spoke his warning, the Force spoke too. Ben hadn't even felt it. Not the part that beings tapped into; the free part, the larger part. Again, it wasn't something Luke felt a word could adequately express. The collective Force, uttered to the all of Luke. What he was, who he had. His time.

Adolescent Luke had been unable to avoid it. His mother couldn't either. But you. The little family that he was: Luke, Han and Leia. It is a dangerous time for you. Their future, the three of them.

The Jedi in black, who straddled the point between good and evil.

The Princess who shed perceptions, shifting from a world of duty and intellect to love and instinct. Look at her, his mother had said, but wasn't it obvious? Little by little she peeled off the layers of white that were pressed so thickly on her, until she stood in the beauty of her own flesh.

No, Leia was no victim. She was not exposed, all creamy skin in strips of metal. She was revealed.

The only danger to her was Han. If somehow she lost him, and she didn't keep what he had given her that slow trip to Bespin. She had relearned to accept love and to give it, after it was so cruelly taken from her.

And lastly, a smuggler stuck in time, who made things possible. He gives the rides. Isn't that what he told Leia?

Luke was ready. He felt prepared. He could talk to Ben again, and it wouldn't sting. He knew who he was, and what he had to do. It was very much open to question whether he could indeed achieve it, but that part didn't bother him.

He had considered the desert, while riding on the skiff. Should it look different, feel different, now that Jabba was removed from it?

And he's smiled, because just as the Force was the problem it gave him the solution. The answer was yes, but of course it was also no.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

The three sat in a similar pose, their backs against the walls, knees drawn up to their chests.

Han was sleepy, rumpled. His lower lip pouted as he blinked to try and bring focus to the world.

Across from him, next to Luke, Leia finished her explanation.

She'd spoken too fast, Luke thought. She was excited, forecasting ahead. She was so glad to move from deathly ill Han that she went all the way to well Han, forgetting recovery in between.

He was still sick. Not frighteningly so, but he wasn't over it. He still needed treatment. But he was stronger. Still pale. He'd gone from moaning about his skin crawling to making the med droid remove the drip so he didn't have to piss every twenty minutes to insisting its service be dismissed, period.

Han drew the sheet over his knees and chest and gathered his shoulders. "I don't get it," he said, his confusion obvious. "...you're leaving?"

Strange, Luke thought, how things tended to come full circle. It used to be Leia who fretted about Han's leaving. But it was understandable; it was the only control Han felt he had over his life. Drift here, go there. He didn't let anything - mystical energy field or being- influence where he went and he didn't stay long enough to see what impact he made.

Being put into carbonite- everyone else moving, living, waking day after day and he was left behind- must have been a living nightmare for him. And like the cold, he couldn't quite shake it.

"Yes," Leia answered, cheerfully- and bluntly, to Han- frank. "I've managed to reestablish contact with General Rieekan. I had to go through my history of contacts through C-3PO but I finally got him. It's taken them almost as long as us, but the fleet will be assembling outside of Sullust."

"Ssh," Luke whispered. "Lando."

Leia shook her head. "It's no matter. It's public knowledge."

"Really?" Han said.

"So anyone can join?" Luke asked.

"And they are, I hear," Leia said. "From whole systems to individuals. It's a great opportunity for those who've seen little prospect of – anything. A chance to become something. Make a living."

"Is that smart?" Luke said, and Leia looked at him, surprised. "I mean about the assembling."

"Does seem like a good chance for the Empire to end it all," Han said.

"They're waiting. The second Death Star is still under construction. That's how they plan on ending the civil war, when it's completed. Of course our aim is to not let either of those happen. It's going to be a real battle. They've staked out their corner of space, and we're on the march to attack."

"Well." Luke looked at Han, brows raised expressively.

Leia looked a little worriedly at Luke. "Rieekan offered to send a ship and pick us up."

"When are you going?" Han said.

Leia swallowed, and Luke broke in. "Leia," he said quietly to her. "He's sick. Don't spell it out for him so slow and don't make him add two and two."

"What the hells are you two talking about?" Han demanded.

"I checked with Rieekan," Leia said. "They've got a decompress chamber. They have a lot of Mon Calamari in service now, and they need it for times they leave the water too soon. So I'll leave as soon as you can walk from here to the speeder."

"You mean-" Han was still confused. "What about-"

"I told him the Falcon is here."

"Shit," Han said, bringing his hands to his hairline and rubbing hard.

"What?" Luke asked.

"Volunteers can't use the equipment," Han's voice was muffled from behind his hands. "Looks like I'm going to have to join." He lifted his hands and the first glimpse of the old Han returned, just a tiny crooked grin but a playful gleam in his eye.

Leia laughed and got up to sit next to Han, linking her arm around his elbow and laying her head on his shoulder.

Lando's head poked into the room. "Princess?" He said, and Luke noted how he used her title. "May I have a word with you?"