Luke woke from another nightmare. He pressed a hand to his face and felt the sweat that had gathered there. The closer they came, the more the nightmares came to him.
"Luke?"
"Go back to sleep, Mara," he murmured, hooking his arms around his knees. No sense for her to have to be awake along with him.
"Forget it, Skywalker," Mara responded, her tone hardening. "I may be your wife now, but I don't have to obey you in everything." She sat up. "Was it another dream from Brakiss?"
Luke sighed and nodded. "I'll be glad when we land today. It's time to face him and get this over with."
Mara hugged her husband. "He won't be happy with anything less than your death, and you know it. What do you hope to gain by going?"
He turned haunted eyes to her. "My father had good in him still and he was the one who actually managed to kill the Emperor at the end—I was too much in pain to do much of anything. Brakiss is the same—I know there is good in him. I have to try to draw that out of him again."
"But he rejected you the last time you saw him and tried," Mara reminded him. "I think this time he's too far gone, Luke. The only thing you'll accomplish is to leave me a widow before I got to enjoy my chance of being a wife."
He shook damp hair out of his eyes. "I don't want that, but I can't be selfish, Mara. Hundreds are dying and more will as well if I don't go. Maybe I can get him to duel with me; at least that way there will be a fairer chance of one of us being killed, and perhaps not me. I don't know what he's been doing to train himself, but his ability to shield all those deaths from everyone worries me. He…may be too powerful in the dark side for even me to kill."
Mara hit him hard on the back side of his head.
"Ow! What was that for?"
Her green eyes blazed at him. "No more defeatist talk like that, do you hear me?" She demanded. "If I have to physically knock some sense into your stubborn head then I will." She glared at him.
Luke blinked, and then started to laugh. He laughed so hard that he thought he might cry. Soon, Mara was laughing with him and they rolled around on the bed like children.
"Luke!"
"Mara? What's going on?"
Luke and Mara glanced up to see Han, Leia and Chewie standing at their doorway. All three of their faces were surprised, their eyes wide.
Luke snorted at the comical sight, caught up in a fit of laughter. "I'm stubborn," he choked out.
Mara nodded and glanced at him. "Painfully so."
They caught each other's eye and started laughing again.
Leia tapped Han on the shoulder to gain his attention. A grin threatened to break out on her face as well at the sight of her brother finally laughing again. "Come on. Let's give them some time alone."
Han started to chuckle. "But I don't want to have to discuss this with a committee."
She caught on to their running joke and punched him in the arm. "I am not a committee."
The three of them laughed and returned to their rooms for the night.
"I need you up here, Luke. We're about to land and I need to know where Brakiss is," Han called into the comm unit.
"Be right there," was the reply.
In just a few seconds, Luke was there behind him, wearing an all black outfit and a somber expression. His eyes flicked over the landscape of Helska and after a moment, he pointed to the left.
"He's over there. Try to land in the clearing in the trees right before that hilltop," he instructed.
Han nodded, and he and Chewie expertly piloted the Falcon to the designated place while Leia and Mara joined them in the cockpit.
Luke frowned at Mara's camouflage outfit. "Where do you think you're going?"
Mara sent him a venomous look. "With you. You don't seriously think I'm letting you go by yourself, do you?"
"Neither am I," chimed in Leia.
"Now, look here…" He started, but Mara cut him off.
"No, you look. We are your family, Luke. Families protect each other. I was too young to help my own family but I'm sure as a frozen night on Hoth not going to let you go into this alone. And don't try any Jedi stuff on me, either. I know ways to get around the techniques you are trained in, and you know it." She stood with her hands on her hips, her eyes and sense reading nothing but determination to go.
He sighed and gave up. Kissing her on the forehead, he whispered, "I love you so much, Mara." He gave her a tight smile.
Her eyes twinkled. "I know."
Han cleared his throat. "If this sappy little episode has passed, then we better get going…Brakiss is waiting up there on that hill."
Luke rounded to face him. "'We'?" He questioned.
Han raised an eyebrow. "Yes, 'we'. Mara's words apply to us, too. Though Chewie'll stay here to keep the Falcon ready to fly for a quick get away."
Luke frowned. "You're not going."
"What?! What do you mean, I'm not going? You can't order me around!" Han replied, indignant.
Luke half-closed his eyes and focused on his friend. He began to put Han through a healing trance to have him stay in one place. It was much harder to do so on someone who was not gifted in the Force and it took him longer than he liked, but the result was the same. Han's knees buckled as he slipped into the trance, and Luke neatly caught him.
"Luke! There was no call for that!" He heard his sister protest from behind him.
Chewie let out a roar.
Luke arranged Han comfortably in his pilot's seat and did not turn around as he explained, "Han is not Force-sensitive. This battle will be hard enough for those of us who are strong in the Force. Han's life would be too much in danger for him to come with Mara and I. I couldn't let him do it."
"I'm going too!" Leia declared.
Luke finally turned to look at her. His blue eyes were sad. "No, Leia. I'm afraid you are not." Quickly, he put her in a healing trance as well.
"Luke…this is treading on dangerous ground of the dark side," Mara warned him as he took Leia to her and Han's room on the Falcon.
He nodded as he laid his sister out on the bed. "I know, but I had to do it. I would never be able to live if I did defeat Brakiss but he had killed them. This way, they will be safe."
"They'll be madder than wounded banthas when they wake up, though," Mara observed, a slight tinge of humor in her tone.
"At least they'll be alive," Luke returned. He walked briskly back to the cockpit. "Be ready for anything, Chewie."
Chewbacca nodded, though he did not seem comfortable with what Luke had done.
Neither was Luke himself, for that matter. But he did what he thought he must. Now it was time to finally end things between himself and Brakiss, for better or worse.