Author's Notes: This continues right from the last chapter.
Updated 7/4/21
Happy 4th of July, fellow Americans.
Barriss asks, "Can you tell Master Unduli about me surviving.?"
Leia replies, "Sure. If you need something, like food, ask the med droid. Feel free to use the holonet, although I blocked a few episodes of shows that you really don't want to see."
Barriss replies, "Okay. I understand." Sensing that Barriss is satisfied for now, she walks off to go grab the books.
She walks down the hallway, stopping at the nurse's station to grab the last sip of caf from her pastel mug.
When she has finished the caf, the med droid says, "Patient: Luminara Unduli, is awake."
Leia checks the records and sees that Master Unduli is in Room 4. She walks down the hallway and enters Room 4, seeing another thin Mirialan, with some more tubes attached to her green skin.
"You're Master Unduli, right?", she asks.
"Yes. Who are you?", Luminara replies.
"I'm Leia. I'm from Alderaan. How are you doing?"
"I've been worse." Leia remembers to grab the medscanner but must use the Force to grab it from the high shelf.
"Are you a Jedi? You sure don't look like one."
Leia takes a deep breath to calm herself, then replies, "Yes, I'm training to use the Force. I'm also a diplomat for the New Republic. The Force is a very useful tool to keep people from trying to kill me."
"Agreed. Sorry about the comment."
"I get worse comments all the time in politics. Do you want an update on the fate of your former Padawan?" Luminaria pauses for a minute with her eyes closed. Finally, she speaks.
"Yes, I do."
"I got an update that's been confirmed as true. Barriss was mind-controlled into the bombing. She's still alive. I just spoke to her, and she's trying to catch up on her studies, in the medbay."
"Can you give her a message for me?" Leia pulls a spare comlink out of her pocket, and hands it to Luminaria.
"Here you go. The first number is my number, the second is my brother's number, and third is the number for my other spare comlink, which I'm gonna give to Barriss."
"Thanks so much, Leia" Leia walks out of the room, as Master Unduli starts recording a message.
"My Padawan, I'm sorry for everything. I understand if you want someone else to finish your training, though I will finish your training if you want me to. I always cared about you. I heard from Leia you are thinking you have to impress me by trying to study. You can take a break and wait until you recover, you know."
Luminaria presses send just seconds after Leia has given Barriss the comlink. Barriss opens the holo message. Many thoughts come to mind...
Master Unduli cared for me...
She wasn't lying that one time she said that and gave me a hug after I broke my arm!
Of all people she, wants me to take a break... I never should have tried to study, as Leia tells my master that I'm going to be trying to study.
Barriss calls Master Unduli back, "Master, it's me." What will Master think? Will she really be happy?
"I'm glad you survived, Padawan." Padawan. She hadn't been called that in a long time.
"I'm glad about you still being alive, Master. While I'm still upset at the Council, I'd be willing to have you finish my training, assuming you're willing to care about me. To be honest, I felt privately hurt when I heard from Ahsoka that you told her former master that you thought I was dead, when we took out the factory..."
"I'm sorry, Padawan. I was trying to teach Skywalker a lesson about letting go. I didn't mean for it to get back to you." That lesson failed, as Skywalker became a Sith.
"That's so not reassuring, when you hear that, in the medbay after the brain worm 'incident', Master. And, of all people, why are you complaining on my attempt to impress you?"
"You need your rest. Just because you know how to use the Force to heal yourself, doesn't mean you can work forever. Plus, I'm already impressed with you surviving and not falling."
"Really? You mean I should take a break and not beat Leia's record?"
"What's Leia's record?"
"Back at work same day, and not going to the medbay until the next day, after collapsing out of who knows what. She also happens to have PTSD from her mission that caused that. I sensed that she was glossing over the graphic details, as well." Barriss thinks that Leia probably was more traumatized then she let on, and could use some help from a mind healer.
"I will try to quietly see what happened and talk to her."
"Thanks, Padawan."
Meanwhile...
Leia gets a message to her personal comlink. She opens the message and looks at the holostills and the note.
Dear Leia,
I got some good holostills of you and your father dancing. I'm not going to post these on the HoloNet, but I thought you might want these.
The holostills were very nice. Leia forwarded them on to her image server, sent a quick thankful reply to Mon, then heard her com beep again. The message was from the Jedi Temple account, making it impossible to know who of the Jedi at the Temple had sent it.
To: Leia
From: Anakin
Shaak Ti also survived, my daughter, and is in statis in my castle on Mustafar. I have a plan to get her out after Fete, by secretly infiltrating into the Empire, and stabilizing it. Also, my plan would allow for retrieval of other captured Jedi and Alliance personnel. I think some other Jedi also survive, but I'm not sure. Luke knows about her, and I'm messaging Ahsoka. This is a heads-up so you can move your stuff out.
Leia messages back, Thanks for the heads-up. Once I grab some books for Barriss, I kinda need to fill you in on where we, as a Senate, are going for Fete. It's traditional to have this trip be a diplomatic aid and partying trip, and I had the Senate vote from a list of options this morning. The vote came back, but is still classified to non Senate people. I will fill you guys in on it.
Leia presses send, then checks the vote. The Senate had basically unanimously voted for Alderaan. This is amazing! I never thought I'd see Alderaan again, after... everything...
Leia walks to the Archives, seeing the busts of the Lost 20 masters along the tall shelves, which are filed with knowledge. She finds the healing section and asks an archive droid to find the titles for her. A few minutes later, the droid returns, and hands her the holo textbooks. Leia brings them back to Barriss, warning her to not study too hard.
Leia then senses that her brother, Luke, her father, Anakin, and Ahsoka, her most loyal agent for Alderaanian Intel, are all in the main Council chambers. She walks over to the chambers and finds R2-D2, who starts beeping at her.
[Primary: Leia Organa (Skywalker) (Solo) present.]
"Yes, I'm here, Artoo. Thanks for being my loyal droid, and not disclosing anything classified..." Anakin looks at Artoo. Did Leia hide the Death star plans there? He knew better then to ask.
Leia rubs Artoo's shinny metal dome, and begins explaining, "So the Senate has a tradition of going to a world for Fete. We drop off diplomatic aid, and we celebrate Fete with the locals. Before I tell you, any guesses? Also, don't mention it to people who don't work for the New Republic until tomorrow morning, for security reasons."
Ahsoka guesses, "Shili. We can free it and then do the traditional Senate stuff." Leia shakes her head. Oh, well.
Luke says, "Naboo."
Anakin thinks for a second, then guesses, "Naboo." Leia shakes her head.
Leia nods at Artoo, who pulls up the result. Planet X is at the top and Toprawa, Naboo, and a few other worlds had a few votes each.
"Artoo, reveal Planet X.", says Leia. Artoo's holoprojector shows a holo of none other then Alderaan. Everyone but Leia is surprised. Then, Leia's holovideo, quickly assembled by her video editing staff, starts playing.
"Whoa. I didn't preview the video, so let's see how it is.", says an only slightly surprised Leia. She knew a video would likely show up, but didn't think it would be so soon.
The video plays. Everyone is impressed.
"Damage levels are surprisingly low, given the data from Jedha and Scarif. That's a great sign.", says Leia.
Author's Note:
Toprawa was heavily damaged in legends, as before Disney bought canon (and created Rouge One), it was involved in stealing the Death Star plans. I'm posting part one of the video as well, so check my profile for it on. I wrote a script for the video. Check my profile for the story.
1. Where's the time travel?
Anakin dies and comes back 6 months later, in RoTS body.
2. Why is there no Anakin/Padme yet?
In Chapter 7 , Padme isn't real comfortable with Anakin. Leia tries to make things less awkward by getting people helping with setup. I'm not great at writing Anidala, but I'll try my best to write some, but I don't write sex (remember this is a T story, not an M story).
3. How did Alderaan survive?
The Force. Force illusions made it be protected.
This story will be on pause for a while, as it will eventually crossover with Hiding Behind the Mask, but HbtM needs to update quite a bit to get to that point. I also need to rewrite some parts and remove one subplot.