Sorry for the long wait.I hope everyone survived.

And here's some more story!............. (

***************************

The darkness broiled in thick clouds of oily smoke, reaching for him with cold, snaking fingers. Voices cackled and laughed at his vain attempt to get away, and familiar faces swam up before his vision, pleading, laughing, and cruelly mocking.

He saw Leia's face, twisted with grief; her bitter cries calling for him, pulling at his heart. He saw Han, his expression angry, hateful. He glimpsed Mara; the caustic twist of her mouth, her fiery green eyes, her mocking laughter. His father stood somewhere in the distance, stoic and silent. He saw Palpatine, his silhouette surrounded by a blue corona of fire as Luke shrunk before him, crying out in pain. His punishments, the torture droids, Palpatine and his minions as they crowed maliciously over him-the memory screamed and fought in his brain, mixing with the scorching smoke and unbearable heat. Their voices churned together in a sickening maelstrom, crying out to him, reaching for him.

*Help us, Luke!*

*They're dead and it's all your fault.*

*We will find you.hunt you down. There is no escape.*

He cried out, begging for an end this hideous nightmare--for he could only cling to the hope that that was what it was--and hung on, trying not to plummet to the eternal depths of his dark fears.

Suddenly, he was awake, his eyes opened to cool darkness, his face pressed into a crumpled fistful of dampened bed sheets. His body was drenched in icy perspiration. His heart pounded like a warrior's drum, and his breathing was ragged and hoarse like he had been screaming.

Cautiously, swallowing lungfuls of cool oxygen to quell the overwhelming sensation of suffocation, and forcibly unclenching his fists from their death-grip on the sheets, Luke slapped a trembling hand out into the darkness, groping for the lamp on the nightstand next to his bed. His fingers brushed cool metal and clumsily found the switch, the light suddenly bathing the small, comfortably furnished room--the one upstairs from the Kelson's droid-repair shop--in a warm, yellow glow.

It had only been a dream.

Feeling dizzy and nauseated, Luke slid his feet over the side of the bed and checked his wrist chrono. It was barely two o'clock in the morning, local time.

It had been five days since he had arrived in Kruall and started working for Aram Kelson. Every night, after a hectic day of work--he seriously questioned how his employer had managed to run everything by himself, given all the business he received--Luke would return tiredly to his room only to lie on his bed for hours, unable to sleep. Visions skittered across his mind--visions of his father and the Emperor conducting a feverish, inexhaustible search for him, the images leaving him tense and on the edge. Fear for his friends' safety left him feeling worried and guilty. They were busy fighting a war and he was hiding out. They needed his help and he was turning a blind eye to their plight. Every night, when he finally drifted off into an uneasy sleep, the same pleading, accusing nightmare invaded his dreams, leaving him gasping, sobbing to wakefulness in the infant hours of the morning--shaken enough that he would not be able to sleep for the rest of the night. As dawn would turn the dark sky to gray, he would only be able to gaze listlessly out the small window, his shoulders taut, his mind reeling with indecision, fists clenched so tightly the knuckles were white, his body and mind utterly exhausted.

He shivered slightly in the cool, damp air, pressing a clammy palm to his forehead and shakily rose to his feet, limping to the refresher.

His left leg was mostly healed by now, its vague, persistent pain was something he could now shut out and ignore. However, with the lack of proper medical attention, and using the only basic healing skills that he knew, the broken bone had healed somewhat grotesquely, making his left leg about a half an inch shorter than his right.

Luke leaned against the polished sink and turned on the cold water, splashing it over his face and neck and cupping a handful to drink, the clear liquid cooling his parched throat.

He leaned over the sink for several moments, eyeing the disheveled, red- eyed stranger that stared back at him in the mirror. Dampened hair stuck to his forehead, and dark circles outlined his eyes. He needed to rest. But his mind was still racing from the fresh horror of his nightmare and he knew that for the remainder of the night, sleep would again perform a tantalizing and elusive dance just out of reach of his weary grasp.

****

Han found her in the cockpit of the Falcon, seated in the pilot's chair, the faint lights of monitors and consoles and the odd chalky glow of hyperspace giving her face an angelic glow as she gazed listlessly out the viewport, oblivious to his presence.

Chewie was asleep, the droids powered down, and most of the glowpanels throughout the ship had been dimmed. It was the equivalent of night in space. But, Solo had awoken a few minutes before to pitch-blackness and found that his wife was no longer lying beside him.

He came forward to massage her shoulders. "You're sitting in my seat," he murmured.

Leia's hand reached for his and she turned, offering him a tired smile. There was a gentle sadness in her eyes that was familiar, but he could not quite place it.

"You should be sleeping," he said mock-sternly. "Because when you're not there, I can't sleep either."

"Heaven forbid," she whispered, the faint smile reaching her eyes. He leaned forward to kiss her and she accepted.

When they parted, Han said gruffly, "now you'd better have a good excuse for sitting there."

"Of course I do," she agreed. "I'm married to you."

"Funny, princess. And I'm touched that you want to keep watch, but we won't be coming out of hyperspace for five more hours."

She smiled thinly. "Well, since I couldn't sleep, I decided it was the least I could do." Her face was deadpan, her sarcasm subtle, and the sadness in her eyes deepened.

"What's wrong, Leia?"

She shook her head, her smile faltering. "Nothing. I just had a bad dream."

"Hmm. Strange kind of nothing." He sat down in Chewie's oversized chair. He now recognized the look in her eyes. It was the expression she wore when quietly mourning for Luke. He guessed that she did not really want to talk about it. "Nightmares about the new Rebel base we're going to?" He asked.

She rolled her head to face him and looked at him from the corners of her eyes. "That must be it."

"Well I guess we have Lando to thank for finding a base in an old mining facility on an asteroid." He shuddered.

Leia smiled. "I knew there was something I never trusted about him."

"Well, at least we can almost be sure not to be found by Palpatine's cronies."

Leia's expression suddenly darkened. "Don't speak too loudly," she murmured. "Nothing's ever certain."

She fell silent, her eyes staring blankly into hyperspace again.

Han opened his mouth to speak, to ask her why she had just spoken those words with such dark certainty. Had she had some sort of premonition, or was it just weary cynicism that made her words sound like a pronunciation of doom?

He shut his mouth and decided not to ask. The quiet cockpit was comfortable and he was tired.

The mottled tunnel of hyperspace barreled past in tranquil silence.

************ ****************