Jeff10: Thank you! I'm so glad you enjoyed it :)

Jedi from Rohan: Yeah…this villain is semi-inspired by Gollum, so you might notice a few similarities.  Sorry if the beginning was more difficult to understand – I first posted it on JC, where I could respond to my readers' questions immediately. Also, this was is/was the first fanfic I posted, so… Thank you! :D

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Part Three:
Strength Over Weakness; Love Over Hate


"If I am the last then I shall be a flame to the end."
~ "Mother Ocean, Daughter Sea"


"Life eventually breaks everybody. Sometimes, it breaks people and they are stronger at their seams when they come back together. However, those that life can't break, it kills."
~Hemingway



One day later

"She'll be alright, then?"

The med-droid nodded once in answer to Wedge's inquiry. "It would appear Mistress Solo is exhausted emotionally and physically." The droid paused and levelled its gaze on Wedge, its emotionless mask making it appear almost that he was glaring at the Rebel hero, as if it blamed Wedge entirely for Jaina's collapse. "She has not yet woken, but she should soon. Mistress Solo will be able to lead her squadron again in two weeks time; however, I advise you to keep a close eye on her health, unless you want this to happen again."

Wedge thanked the droid and watched it trundle off to its next patient. "If that girl is declared flight-capable before she's twenty-seven, the Force really is with her," he remarked grimly to his wife. It had been thirty-six hours since Jaina had fainted and in that period of time Wedge had yet to leave her side. Every time he closed his eyes, he could see Jaina's pale face and her wide, dark eyes when she came out of the trance.

Iella glanced at him tiredly. "Can the Galactic Alliance afford to have her off-duty?"

"Until she's out of dangerous mental territory, it'll have to."

She shook her head and laughed ruefully. "She's twenty, Wedge, and the 'Trickster Goddess.' Do you really think she'll listen to you?"

Before he could answer, their attention was caught by the sound of a man arguing loudly with one of the med-droids around the corridor.

* * *

She was awake as soon as the door swished open, but she didn't move, except to tighten her grip on her lightsaber. Light footsteps made their way across the room and stopped next to her bed. The intruder started to lean over her and she sprang up, knocking the being to the ground. Rolling automatically onto the being to keep them from moving, she ignited her lightsaber with a snap-hiss at the intruder's neck, only then fully opening her eyes.

Horrifyingly enough, her gaze did not encounter the snarl of a 'Vong warrior, but her new and almost comically wide-eyed master, Kyp Durron. "Time to wake up?" he tried, giving her a look that was part amused and part angry, but mostly confused.

Jaina's cheeks flushed in embarrassment and she averted her eyes. "Sorry," she muttered as she moved off him. "This whole Goddess must be making me a little jumpy."

He seemed to find his bearings. "I've been attacked by worse. Besides," he cast her a grin, his eyes twinkling mischievously, "there are worse things than having a beautiful woman on top of you."

She stared at him, wide-eyed, for a moment, then shook her head slowly. "And I thought being a master would make you grow up."

"I was your baby-sitter for years and you still thought that?" He shook his head mock-disapprovingly. "Poor, naïve Goddess."

He looked tired and drained, she noticed, even as he teased her. For the first time she realized how lasting a scar Sanar's death had left on him. How much suffering, she wondered, will he have to go through before he's 'justly punished' for his actions at Carida?

She began to stand, then sank back to the floor. "Why did I need a special wake-up this morning, anyway?"

He appeared to consciously push aside any thoughts of Sanar – which had to be difficult, she thought, as she was nearly Sanar's twin – and quirked one corner of his mouth slightly. "Perhaps there was no special reason; maybe I just wanted to see your beautiful face."

She raised a sceptic eyebrow. "Right; next you'll be telling me that Wedge and you are forming an alliance for the betterment of Endor's environment for the sake of the Ewoks."

A grin blossomed on his lips and his eyes danced. "You won't tell anyone, will you? It's Wedge's surprise birthday present for Janson."

"Kyp, you're my partner, but if you continue to be this mischievous and cheerful in the morning, I'll be forced to hurt you."

"Don't tell me you became serious sometime when I wasn't looking?" When she didn't answer he reached over and tickled her stomach, startling a laugh out of her. She rolled away and he followed her, his status as her ex-babysitter giving him the advantage of knowing where she was most ticklish.

"You are so – dead, Durron," she gasped through giggles.

His eyes held an ironic light as he said, "I don't think you can affect me anymore, Goddess."

She sat up abruptly, moving out of his reach, her eyes widening as reality crashed over her, filling her with its dull, throbbing emptiness. Her eyes skittered around the room; how had she thought this was real? The very air was illusionary, as if out of a faded dream. She was not even wearing her nightclothes, but a loose pair of training pants and tunic. "This…this isn't my memory," she whispered, her gaze flying to Kyp's, looking for an explanation. "This didn't happen."

Kyp straightened and stood, giving her his hand. She accepted it and he pulled her up and over to her bed, where they both sat. "No; if this was your memory we would have been fighting over some tiny, stupid detail." His voice was bitter. "I was able to access your mind through it, though, to talk to you. This," he gestured about him, "is a dream, so you might not remember anything I tell you, but I'll take that chance."

"To talk to…but you're dead, aren't you?" Her voice cracked a little on "dead" but it remained unnoticed.

He hesitated for a few, suspicious moments. "In a manner of speaking," he finally replied, evasively. Before she could ask just what that meant, he changed the subject. "You need to be careful, Jaina."

She frowned in annoyance. Her earlier revelation no longer made sense and Kyp was once again her irritating – if very handsome – partner and an arrogant monkey lizard of a Jedi Master, rather than the man she loved. "Obviously – did it take dying for you to figure that out? I'm not blind, you know."

"Jaina, you can't begin to imagine what he – "

She set her jaw against a sudden flash of pain – or perhaps it was merely from the exasperation he seemed to love making her feel. "We were partners unto death, Kyp, but if you want to repeat things I already know over and over again, I'll find a way to bring you back to life and kill you.

"Garik's helping me with the Senate – even you have to admit I'm safer with him than anyone else." She paused, the truth of her words hitting her with more surprise than they should have. How had she managed to be blind to Garik's always-there presence, forever ready to catch her if she should slip? Was she really that ignorant?

The discovery came and was pushed aside for later – the pile of things that would need to be meditated on seemed to growing rather steadily –and she continued without more than a few moments' pause. "…And what kind of 'Sword of the Jedi' would I be if I couldn't protect myself from the 'Vong?"

He moved closer to her, his voice dropping to a whisper, as if in secrecy. "Jaina, the 'Vong and some petty senators will be the least of your problems." He paused, as if trying to figure out how he could best say what he needed to. "There is a…being that will do anything to bring you to it. It believes you are its 'Master'; it is the thing that tried to pull you to it while you were meditating," he clarified, seeing her dubious look. "That was only the beginning though; it will only become more desperate. Garik might not be able to save you next time."

She straightened, his words making her defensive. "'Rik's more powerful than he seems."

" 'Rik'?" His brow furrowed and his face became drawn. It took her a moment to recognize his expression as one of pain. "Funny," he commented quietly, looking off to the side for a moment.

"What's funny?"

He continued to avert his gaze. "The two of you always made the oddest pair. He was so quiet and careful as a kid but when it came to you…he would always spring up and attack anyone who got in your way. I think your parents let you have even as much freedom as they did because they knew Garik would keep you out of trouble as much as he could. As for you…well," his laugh held little humour, "I seem to recall accidentally walking into 'imaginary games' that made him your most loyal knight, ready to die for his young, beautiful queen, should it come to that."

Her forehead crinkled as she tried to feel out what he was thinking. She was unsuccessful. She studied him, but the longer she looked at him, the more she seemed to be soaking in the chance to see him again, rather than figuring out what was going on in his head. This close he looked so real, so alive, it made her throat tighten. His eyes were the same forest green with flecks of brown that she remembered being caught in before he left for that fatal meeting on the Eclipse. His hair was wild, making him look as if he had just woken up. His Jedi training pants and Tathi cotton shirt were worn, as if they had needed to be replaced even before the war had started. Even his scent (how she could smell in a dream, she wasn't quite sure) was the same: a faint waft of soap, sweat, machinery and spice.

Realizing he had noticed her stare, she blushed. "You look exactly the way I remember," she said softly. Her hand rose of its own accord but dropped before it reached his face, her eyes catching sight of something that wasn't familiar. "Where did you get that scar?" The spidery white line slashed along the left side of his face, just barely missing his eye. The longer she looked at it, the more apparent it became.

His hand went to his face, his expression unreadable. "I didn't want you to see that."

Even as he spoke the scar became slightly pink, then red and new. "Kyp?" Her voice wavered a little.

His lips twitched humourlessly. "My current holding place doesn't exactly promote physical welfare."

It took a moment for his words to sink in – the room was morphing slowly, oddly, and distractingly – but when they did she grabbed his left forearm with an iron grip. " 'Your current holding place'?! Durron, if – does that mean – where are you?"

It was immediately obvious he hadn't meant to let slip what he had. "I'm gone, Jaina; let's leave it at that."

" 'Leave it at that'?" she repeated incredulously. "How can I? If you're alive that means – "

His hands rested on her shoulders and he lowered his head a little so that they were eye-to-eye. "Whether I am physically alive or not, your position won't change. There's nothing you can do for me anymore. I – "

She stood, shoving his hands off her shoulders angrily. "I could at least try! How do you know…Force, Durron, why did you come here if you knew this would happen? Did you come to wave the fact that I let us slip through my fingers in my face? I don't have anyone because I pushed everyone away – I get it. But if there's even a chance I could save you…" her voice trailed off, but the thought continued. If I could save you, I might be able to save myself.

His eyes dropped to the ground. "Jaina, what we have – had – wouldn't have worked; we both know it. It was just a nice, forbidden dream we made up to avoid fully realizing what was going on around us."

She blinked, her hand going to her throat. "I can't believe you just said that," she whispered. "How…Force!"

He sighed. "Don't act like it's a surprise, Goddess – you knew it even before I did."

She bit her lip, tears beginning to slide down her cheeks. "I do love you, you know." She raised her eyes to his. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you before…I just…"

He stood and reached across the distance between them to finger the necklace that hung from her neck. His gaze rested steadily on the pendant, his demeanour almost angry, injured. "You couldn't let it go; I know." He sighed and his shoulders drooped, his eyes almost haunted. "I couldn't let go Sanar go either, so I guess we're even." His hand dropped and he shook his head, seeming to push the sentimental moment to the side.

"I came here," he said deliberately, shifting from the mind-set of a lover to that of a Jedi Master, "to warn you." Seeing her open her mouth to speak, he held up a hand, forestalling her words. "There may be no Dark side, Jaina, but that doesn't relieve you of the Sith." He paused for a moment, then continued carefully. "This war has destroyed many lives. Good, honest people have become assassins, murderers. Some of them are not strong enough to face up to consequences and so will find someone to blame. You, as the last of the Jedi, are a rather…easy target."

She groaned and drew her fingers through her hair. "Fine, fine; I'll be careful – are you happy now?"

He pretended to ponder her question for a moment, clearly enjoying her frustration. "Am I happy?" he repeated slowly. His smile unexpectedly took an impish quality. "No; but I can't think of something that would make me happy…"

She blushed, remembering how they had parted. "Durron," she muttered with an amused and mock-exasperated twist to her words.

"Goddess," he returned playfully.

The walls began to morph from clay to a grey substance she could not recognize, and the objects around them, even the bed, disappeared into shadows that began to take their own form as…

He saw her gaze drifting and pulled her close, hoping to distract her from what was happening. His control was slipping; she could not see… "You owe me a kiss," he whispered.

Her eyes lifted to his, a delicate rose staining her face. "Do I? Since when?" Instinctively, her arms wrapped around his neck, something she could not define urging her closer.

His clothes were becoming ragged, she noticed with a frown as her hands moved over the suddenly tattered tunic. They were torn, as if by… But fog crept within her mind as he leaned in to her. They're lips touched and suddenly, even though she knew there was something wrong, even though she knew that if she could keep her head for just a few more moments his concentration would falter and she would see his holding place – what else would the room be morphing into? – she lost herself in his embrace.

The months since the massacre had been hard, as the years of war had been, and she had not realized until she lost him just how much warmth and comfort Kyp had brought her in the short time they had really known each other. Other than Garik, whom she had seen a very few times since she had thrown his friendship in his face in her guilt and sorrow, Kyp had been her only haven, the one person she could run to when she had been about to break. And then, just like that, he had been gone, leaving her with no anchor.

She moaned softly as he pulled her still closer. Why had she fought against this? Why, when it was so right, so safe, had she turned and run?

//"Jaina, what we have – had – wouldn't have worked; we both know it. It was just a nice, forbidden dream we made up to avoid fully realizing what was going on around us."//

The memory of his words whispered in her ear, as if he had repeated them aloud. She pulled back in time to see what looked like a cross between a laboratory and a torture room, complete with a twisted figure hunched over a jelled rectangle and bodies scattered about in contraptions she never before seen.

"I'm sorry, my love," Kyp whispered painfully in her ear and then…

Oh, Force, then…

Oh, stars, the blood…

So much blood…

"Solo?"

Even as she knew it was not real…

Even as she knew, somewhere deep within herself, that it was not truly happening…

Pain, so much pain…

The last time she had felt this ripping agony…

"Jaina! Wake up!"

Her very soul shrieking…

She opened her mouth to scream…

…and woke up.

* * * *

"What's going on here?"

The human man looked up irritably as Wedge's voice cut into the argument. His annoyance faded as he recognized Jaina's hold-father. "General Antilles," he tipped his head in respect, "I must see Mistress Solo immediately; it is a matter of utmost importance."

Wedge's eyebrows hiked up in surprise. Was his imagination running loose, or was there an underlying current of urgency and fear in the diplomat's voice? This was most certainly not the unflappable, laid-back diplomat he had met a few days ago. "I'm sorry, but only family is permitted to see her at the moment."

Garik's blasé expression remained carefully maintained, but for a moment Wedge thought he saw the beginnings of a scowl form on the young man's face. "I'm the closest thing she has to family," he argued, and for a moment, Wedge could picture just how cocky the diplomat had been as a child. "Kriff, I'm closer to her than I am to my own sister!"

The med-droid made impatient shooing motions. "Only the Antilles may see Mistress Solo, sir." There was a weariness in the droid's voice that implied this phrase had been repeated more than once. "Now if you would please just – "

"No offence, sir," Garik tipped his head respectfully to Wedge but his voice was chilly, "but I believe I have more right to see her than her commanding officer's family."

Wedge felt his own ire rise. "I have been Jaina's hold-father since she was an infant, Diplomat Klamath."

"One of many," the diplomat retorted, his frustration getting the better of him. "She is an adult, sir; she can make her own choices." His voice was hard and pointed.

Wedge ignored Garik's first comment. "Not while she's in a coma, she can't."

Garik froze. "I was told," he started very quietly and in a low voice that would hide his emotions, "that she was only sleeping."

"Then you were told too much," the general snapped. He could feel Iella's disapproval at lying to the man but he ignored her. He wasn't sure he trusted the politician; his kind was always twisting things to their advantage. Why, he could count on one hand how many times he had seen Jaina and Garik together and he had known Jaina all her life! He would have noticed if the two were close friends. "If she comes to – "

" 'If'?!" The russet-haired man looked genuinely alarmed.

Unable to watch her husband torture the poor boy further, Iella cut in. "The medics believed her to be in a coma at first, but now they believe it is merely exhaustion. She'll be fine in a day or two." She watched as Garik struggled to keep his relief from being too visible. How could he be here for false reasons? He was far too genuinely concerned about Jaina's welfare to be anything other than a close friend. Vaguely, she wondered why she had never seen the two together before.

"Her room is this way," she added gently, gesturing for Garik to follow her.

Wedge sighed in weary exasperation and watched as the diplomat's shoulders relaxed in relief. His lips twisted unhappily.

He didn't trust politicians.

* * *

Iella left the room after he thanked her and for that he was grateful. He didn't enjoy people watching him when he knew his emotions would burst through and past his shields. It made him nervous to feel their eyes, as if they were preparing to judge him, figure out if he was feeling too much or too little. Seeing Solo in a hospital bed with the word "coma" jumping around in his mind was definitely one of those times.

He crossed the room with more hesitation than was normal for him and, though he berated himself for it, he was unable to quicken his pace. Nevertheless, he reached her side and his eyes found her and his stomach twisted in an uncomfortable knot.

//…she's in a coma…//

Kriff it! Why had General Antilles put that thought in his head? As if his imagination and wasn't coming up with its own morbid ideas! A coma – kriff, she looked like she was in one too, with all those machines surrounding her and her skin nearly translucent. He brushed a lock of hair out of her face and sat in the chair next to her bed, watching her intently. In the large hospital bed she looked tiny and vulnerable – two words he rarely connected with his vivacious and reckless childhood playmate. Her eyes were a little puffy, as if she had been crying. His fingers followed imaginary tear-trails almost reverently. Fleetingly, he wished he had thought to bring his sketch pad, but he doubted how he would forget how she looked now for some time – this crystal, shattered princess would haunt his dreams and nightmares alike, no doubt.

Quite suddenly, she jerked under his touch. "You awake?" he queried, reflexively retracting his stroking fingers from her face and drawing up his shields. She whimpered pitifully and he frowned, becoming more concerned. "Solo?" When she did not wake, he shook her shoulder gently but urgently. "Jaina, wake up!"

She made a strangled sound, as if the shriek she was trying to emit had fallen back in her throat, then, suddenly, sat up, her hands flailing protectively in front of her. He caught her wrists (unfortunately, she managed to hit him once before he did so) and held them tightly. "Jaina!"

She froze and he found himself wonder if it was because he had never used his 'senator voce' with her. " 'Rik?" Her voice was unusually small and frightened from behind the curtain of hair that hid her face from view.

His hand moved across her shoulders and he pulled her into a hug. "You certainly know how to scare a guy," he noted in a low voice.

She clung to him as if the years of their separation had never been. "Sorry," she muttered into his shirt. Even as muffled as her voice was, he could hear how tired she was.

"I thought I told you to stay out of trouble," he teased when she pulled back, trying to lighten the mood.

Her eyes widened. "I did!"

"You're in a hospital bed; that suggests you did something that wasn't good for you, which implies you got into trouble."

"It wasn't my fault," she protested moodily, her mouth forming a pout that belonged to a reprimanded child.

He gave her a disbelieving look, something in his eyes suggesting that he had expected this response. "Right."

"I was just meditating."

He sighed, feeling very much like an older brother that had been roped into baby-sitting. "Since when does meditation ever make you nearly comatose? Be honest, Solo."

"Okay, so I was only meditating because some thing nearly cut my head in half until I agreed," she amended.

"Something – the same thing that tried to kill you – ordered you into meditation and you did what it said?" he repeated, aghast at her stupidity. "Have you any sense at all?"

"Hey! I wasn't done telling you what happened," she chided him, her pout becoming more prominent.

He gave a mocking half bow. "My apologies – do continue, oh Supremely Idiotic One."

She scowled at him but carried on. "I thought I was being smart by submerging myself into the Force." Her tone abruptly became soft and pensive. "Supposedly, I'm the strongest trained Jedi in the galaxy; kriff, I'm the only Jedi in the galaxy. In meditation, I should have had the upper hand." She shook her head ruefully. "It would figure that the one time I tried to use logic in my decisions, the situation would become illogical."

Kriff, he agreed, leaning back in his chair. Had it worked for her she might have seen the good in continuing the practice of common sense and his job might have been a lot easier.

"But when I did…" she trailed off, her voice almost childish in its confused hurt. "It attacked me – but it wasn't that it assaulted me so much as it tried to…to try to control me. It – it tore at my mind, pried in my memories…nothing of me was hidden, nothing was – sacred, mine," she stumbled over the words, trying to express something with the small words Basic offered. "It was the most – terrifying thing that ever happened to me – but I couldn't do anything. I couldn't move, couldn't fight or erect barriers…all I could do was watch." She quieted, her eyes stricken and haunted.

He waited a moment, wishing he knew if their friendship was still intact enough that he wouldn't be pushed away if he comforted her. Swallowing, he leaned closer to her and took her hand in his, squeezing gently. "What happened?" he prompted.

She stared at their clasped hands as if they held all the answers to all the secrets of the galaxy. "What do you mean? I told you what happened."

"Considering how you appear to be alive and well, albeit in a hospital bed, something must have happened."

"He saved me," she stated, as if it were the most simple and obvious idea in the galaxy.

Garik's mouth twisted a little from an anonymous emotion. "Who did?"

She merely raised her eyes to his, her gaze steadier than he had seen it in years. Her silence was frustrating, but Garik knew he wouldn't be able to get to the root of what had happened anytime soon. She was withdrawing into her own world again, shutting everything and everyone else out.

"Do I need to beat someone up for you?" he teased in an attempt to receive a few more minutes of precious companionship with her.

She blinked and suddenly laughed out loud. "You already did," she assured him, an affectionate, delighted and real smile lighting her features. "Your performance was a bit more glorified than a few punches, but your opponent won't be coming back for more anytime soon."

The sudden brilliance of her smile had made him catch his breath and it took a moment for her words to sink in. When they did, however, a medic entered, saying she needed to check the patient and why hadn't he notified anyone that Jaina was awake, anyway?

He was shooed out of the room before he could even say good-bye. When the door swished closed behind him he shook his head and chuckled. The medics never did change – and neither did his ritual of sneaking back in through the window to spend some more time with his childhood 'Queen'.

While he was waiting, though, perhaps he would be brave – and hungry – enough to try some of the base's rations…

~TJF