- - - - - Dantooine - - - - -

- - - - - Two Months Later - - - - -

Tess heard the screams of thousands stabbing in her ears, only to realize it was really just her own cry. Lightening shot up through every part of her body—every bone, every muscle, every vein. She was tempted to let death come.

But until it did, all she could do was scream.

"Tess!"

…Leia?

"Tess!"

Tess Naberrie's dark brown eyes bolted open to meet her sister's matching ones. Her vision was blurry and it took her muscles a moment to adjust to consciousness.

As Tess' vision cleared, she realized she couldn't remember where she was supposed to be. She consulted her surroundings for answers. What she saw seemed like something out of a dream.

"We're…"

"In your old collage on Dantooine," Leia finished. Only then did Tess notice the tears in her sister's eyes.

"What's the matter?" asked Tess. Leia sniffed back her emotions and squeezed her sister's hand.

"I'm just happy you're awake," confessed the princess.

Tess once again looked around the room, this time noticing the changes instead of the familiarities. It was without a doubt her old room from when she was nine to eleven years old, and the last place she lived before being ripped from her guardian's arms by Imperials. The bed was the same, but it had different sheets. There were new dark blue curtains on the window that matched them. And to Tess' right, there was some sort of machine that she had seen before in the medical wings of every rebel base.

Had she gotten sick? Tess could only remember Leia being sick. On Teyr. But flying from Teyr to Dantooine—when did that happen? Teyr was west of the Inner Rim and Dantooine was one of the Outer Rim Territories in the Raioballo Sector—practically a galaxy away. Of all places, why were they here?

"We got here about a month ago," Leia explained, seeing the questions in her sister's eyes. But that only gave Tess more questions.

"I…I've been asleep for a month?"

"Two, actually," Leia clarified, smiling slightly as her eyes began to well up again. "You're been in a coma for two months."

Tess half expected the four walls to fall down around her—that this was all just a silly prank. She would be on the Falcon with Han, Luke, Chewie, and the droids, and they would be laughing up a storm for fooling her.

As Tess spoke again, she was so detached that the words hardly felt like they were coming out of her own mouth.

"What happened?"

"Where do I start?" Leia chuckled, tensing noticeably. "What do you remember?"

Tess sighed, closing her eyes in thought.

"You were sick," she began slowly. "We were on Teyr…and Zkab…"

Suddenly, as Tess said Zkab's name, everything came rushing back. Her eyes filled with tears.

"Han…" Tess sobbed. "I…I let them…they killed Han…"

She hardly heard Leia's attempts at reassurance over her sobs. As if Tess' tears were too inconsolable to deal with, the princess left the room. Tess rolled over and buried her face in her pillow. It was no wonder Leia left—she probably didn't forgive Tess for killing the man she loved. It was her fault. All her fault…

Suddenly, a familiar comforting hand touched her shoulder. Tess stifled her cries for a moment, as if listening would prove if this was real or not. She was afraid to say his name. As it turned out, she didn't need to.

"Hey, kid."

Tess practically flipped onto her other side, finding herself face to face with a very much alive Han Solo. She slowly reached forward to touch his shoulder and make sure he wasn't a post-comatose mirage. As soon as her fingertips made contact with the fabric of his shirt, she threw herself into his arms.

"We didn't know if you would wake up or not," Han told Tess after a few moments, squeezing her back just as tightly.

"But if you didn't get shot…?" she pondered aloud. Suddenly, the color drained from Tess' face. She broke the hug. "…Chewie…?"

"No, no," Han reassured her quickly. "Zkab's com was enough to distract his man and for me to grab his blaster. No, Chewie's visiting his family on Kashyyyk. The shot you heard was me nailing one into the guy guarding us."

Tess collapsed back on her pillow with relief. Leia joined the two of them, sitting opposite of Han on Tess' bed and reminding her of the questions that remained.

"The last thing I remember…" she recalled slowly. "Is hearing the blaster fire. I thought one of Zkab's men had just killed Han. I screamed." Tess thought hard for several more moments, but her memory ended there. "That's it."

Han and Leia exchanged brief glances. The princess leaned forward to take Tess' hand.

"We got you out of there," she said in a soft voice.

Something about her tone told Tess that she wasn't going to get any more than that.

Leia stepped out of the small cottage, inhaling the fresh Dantooine air. Han followed her out.

"I don't feel right about this," he confessed. The princess spun around to face him.

"Then what do you suggest?" Leia snapped. "The last decision you made flipped our entire world upside-down. My family…my job…" She kept herself turned away from the Corellian, refusing to let him see her cry.

"We had to land on Teyr," Han assured her softly. "You would have died. The medic said so."

"Luke told you not to."

"I know," Han shot back, still maintaining a calmer tone. He sighed. "If you think one of these sixty-four days has gone by that I don't regret landing on the next-closest planet—anywhere but Teyr—then you really are insane, Princess."

Leia was silent. If Han hadn't known the woman like he did, he would think she was done. But she always had to have the last word.

"She can never know what happened to her on Teyr," Leia reminded Han gravely. She turned to face him, meeting his eyes with stern resolve. "She can never know what she did."