A Blossoming Flame
Leia Organa couldn't help but reflect on how funny life could be. As a child, her parents had always impressed upon her the importance of being, or at the very least appearing like, a mature young woman and a respectable member of the Royal Family and focusing on the prospects of her own political career. She would get a proper scolding if she were rude to a cousin or snuck out of some important family function. But ever since she and Amilyn Holdo had helped with the evacuation of Praucis Major two years ago, she was constantly getting involved in aiding the Rebel Alliance's war effort, an act of outright treason that carried the penalty of death if any of them were caught, and her parents were proud of her for it. It would be pretty ridiculous if they weren't, of course, seeing as how they had helped found the Rebellion, but still. Life was funny, wasn't it?
Another one of life's odd little touches of humor made itself known when a servant called Leia away from her studies and told her that her parents needed to meet with her in the hangar of all places. But not the main hangar where they docked their ships and received guests, but the freight hangar, where delivery ships arrived and where the palace staff kept their transports. As she walked, Leia tried to puzzle out the meaning of all of this. Yet despite considering herself pretty sharp, she was still caught completely by surprise.
Her mother and father were standing off in a corner of the hangar near an HWK-290 Light Freighter, looking horribly out of place in this part of the palace even in their most "casual" clothes. "So, what's the matter?" Leia asked when she reached them. "What was so important and secret that you needed to speak to me here?"
Bail Organa's expression had been more than a bit grave when he'd been speaking to Queen Breah but he turned and gave his daughter a wry smile. "There's an old friend here to see you," he explained, "Who's here on very important business." Leia arched one eyebrow before a very old-looking man walked out of the freighter's shadow. His hair and beard were a stark white, his face was haggard with lines of worry and exhaustion, and he wore a rather beat-up-looking set of tan clothes and an even more beat-up brown robe over his shoulders. Strung over one of those shoulders was a single canvas bag that looked to be in the best condition of the three. But the man's face lit up with a smile when he saw the Princess and there was a twinkle in his eye.
"Hello there," he greeted her. Leia's confusion only deepened. She had absolutely no idea who this man was. "Come now, little Luma," he playfully admonished her. "Don't you recognize your own father?" Now Leia was hopelessly confused. Was this man senile? But once she gave the words a moment to sink in, the memories came flooding back to her and a broad smile broke across Leia's face as she rushed to the old man.
"Obi-Wan!" she cried out as she wrapped him up in a hug. The old hermit laughed as he returned the embrace and hugged her tightly. It was the first time Obi-Wan had hugged anyone in nearly a decade. The last person he'd hugged had been Leia, too. "My goodness, I barely recognized you," Leia admitted as she pulled away from the hug. She kept her hands on Obi-Wan's shoulders as she looked him over. "It can't possibly have been that long, can it?"
"Leia!" Breah admonished her. Obi-Wan just laughed again and shook his head.
"No, no, it's quite alright. I understand," he conceded as he squeezed Leia's shoulders affectionately. "Sometimes, I can hardly believe it myself. But twin suns and a desert climate hardly do wonders for one's complexion." He and the Princess shared a laugh, which made Bail chuckle and even Breah smiled a bit, relaxing once it was clear Obi-Wan took no offense.
"What are you doing here?" Leia asked curiously. "Is there some kind of danger?" Which was certainly a fair question to ask. The last time she and Obi-Wan had met, she had been kidnapped by agents of the Empire and had been pursued by a Dark Lord of the Sith.
Leia still wasn't entirely sure what that last thing was, if she was being honest. She understood enough what the Jedi were– or rather had been– so she had always figured that a Sith was… the opposite of that.
"You might say that," Obi-Wan admitted. "But we really should speak somewhere more private. These are… delicate matters." Leia nodded and the four of them walked out of the hangar. Leia offered Obi-Wan her arm for him to lean on and for a moment he seemed hesitant, perhaps out of some vestigial amount of pride, before he took her arm and walked with her. After taking a turbolift to the floor that the Royal family's chambers were on, they walked down a hall toward Leia's room. Walking toward them down that same hall was a golden Protocol Droid. For a moment, Obi-Wan wanted to chalk it up to nothing more than an obscene coincidence.
But then the droid spoke.
"Good afternoon, your Majesties," the unmistakable alto of C-3PO greeted them. "Princess. And you are?" he asked while looking directly at Obi-Wan's face.
For his part, Obi-Wan did his best to remain calm. This was terrible. He could accept it was more than likely that a thirty-year-old Protocol Droid might not have advanced enough facial recognition software to recognize him as an old man but if he recognized his voice or were able to notice him in some other way, Obi-Wan would be doomed. If there was one thing Obi-Wan remembered about Anakin's Protocol Droid, it was impossible for him to be silent or even withhold information.
"Oh, I'm–" Obi-Wan began to say before Breah interrupted him.
"This is Ben Kenobi, Threepio," she explained. "He's a friend of Bail's. He'll be staying with us for a time so I expect you to treat him as a guest." It was all Obi-Wan could do to clench his jaw to keep from screaming. Why? Why, of all the names in the galaxy, did she have to give the blasted droid his actual, real surname?
"Kenobi?" C-3PO echoed as he pivoted his head curiously back and forth from looking at the Queen to looking at Obi-Wan as the former Jedi Master held his breath. "A pleasure to meet you," C-3PO finally said cheerfully. "My name is C-3PO, human-cyborg relations."
"You as well," Obi-Wan said back as he put on a smile that barely managed to mask his confusion. After thinking about it, though, the answer became clear. Bail must have had C-3PO's memory wiped when he took ownership of the droid. So he had no memory of Obi-Wan, Anakin, Padmé, or anything of the Republic. It made sense and yet… it also made him oddly sad in a way he could not properly explain. Obi-Wan had never held much sentimentality with droids but… still.
"Threepio, I need to speak with Ben privately," Leia informed the droid. "Make sure that we're not disturbed unless it's an emergency."
"As you say, Princess," C-3PO agreed with as much of a nod as he could manage before he shuffled past them down the hallway. The four of them entered the Princess's bedroom and Obi-Wan looked around the room for somewhere to sit down. Like everything else in the palace, Leia's room was immaculately clean and Obi-Wan was painfully aware that he was… not. He was certain that he'd left a trail of sand and dust behind him ever since he'd left the hangar.
Leia just smiled and got up from her seat at the edge of the bed to push a chair over from her desk for Obi-Wan to sit in. "Really, don't worry about it," she assured him. "You flew halfway across the galaxy, I'm not going to have you thrown out because of some dust." Besides, she thought to herself, that's what cleaning droids were for, wasn't it?
Obi-Wan sat down and rested his hands on his lap with a sigh. "Leia… there's something important that I need to tell you. Perhaps we all should have told you sooner," he admitted as he looked at Bail and Breah. They gave slight nods in agreement. "It's about your birth parents." Leia immediately sat forward on the edge of the bed and gave Obi-Wan her full attention. "Your mother was Padmé Amidala, the Queen of Naboo and a member of the Senate in the Republic." Obi-Wan looked to Leia's parents and gave a sad smile. "We all knew her well. She was a dear friend. As I told you once before, you two are very much alike." Leia nodded and smiled back at him. "Your father…" Obi-Wan swallowed thickly as he reached a hand into his robes. "Was Anakin Skywalker. He was… a Jedi Knight," he added after a moment. Obi-Wan had been thinking about this for the entire trip from Tatooine to Alderaan. What to tell Leia, how much to tell her. In the end, he decided it was best to tell her the truth… from a certain point of view. "Your father was one of the finest men I've ever known," he told her. "He was… my brother." He swallowed again and blinked rapidly before producing something from his robes. The silvery metal glinted in the light as he handed it to Leia. "This was your father's lightsaber," he told her. "It seems only right that you should have it."
Leia took the weapon carefully from Obi–Wan's hand, holding it reverently and looking at it in awe. For so long, she had wanted to know more about her birth parents. More than just the snippets she had learned from Obi-Wan the last time they'd met or what little she could pry out of her parents. Now she knew the truth. Now she had part of her family's legacy, something her father had held, had built with his own hands. She could feel… a connection to this lightsaber. Something deep within her soul. Was this the Force?
"My father… was he killed in Order 66?" Leia asked softly as her gaze moved slowly from the lightsaber back to Obi-Wan. "Was he killed by the Clone Troopers?" For several seconds, Obi-Wan didn't speak. Bail waited for a moment longer as he, himself, wondered how to delicately explain the truth to Leia before Obi-Wan spoke up again.
"That being we met years before," he told her, "Darth Vader. He… was a fellow Jedi," he explained. "A close friend of ours before he was seduced by the Dark Side of the Force. He betrayed and murdered your father," he said gently, trying to soften the blow as much as he could while trying to simultaneously make himself believe the lie. "He helped carry out Order 66 and drove the Jedi near to extinction." If there were more than a dozen Jedi still living, Obi-Wan would be shocked.
Bail and Breah remained silent but they exchanged concerned looks. Breah didn't know exactly what was wrong but she could tell from Bail's expression that something didn't quite add up.
Leia let out a shuddering breath and looked back to the lightsaber in her hands. She had been that close to her father's murderer. Had he sensed her presence? Had he known she was Anakin's daughter? "Why tell me all of this?" she asked him. "Why now?"
Obi-Wan looked thoughtfully at the Princess, his expression carrying a small tinge of regret for the war he now needed to involve her in. "Anakin Skywalker was exceptionally powerful in the Force," he said. "We were certain any child of Anakin's would be powerful as well. That's why your father and I took measures to protect you. To keep you hidden. You… and your brother," he added after a moment's consideration.
"I have a brother?" Leia asked as her eyes widened at the news. She'd had close friends like Winter and Amilyn whom she'd known nearly all her life but she had always wanted a sibling. "Where is he?"
"Luke is… lost," Obi-Wan lied, though the pain he felt was truly sincere. Bail looked stunned at this particular revelation. "An incident with his Landspeeder. It was my fault," he said, and there was not an ounce of him that needed to lie to believe this. "I should have watched him more carefully, should have…" he trailed off and Bail walked over to lay a hand on Obi-Wan's arm and give him a consoling look.
"I'm sure you did all you could, old friend," he assured him. It was the same thing Obi-Wan had said to Beru and Owen only a short time ago. Obi-Wan wondered distantly if the Larses had believed it as little as he believed it now.
"This means," he said as he returned his focus to Leia, "That you are our best hope against the Empire and the Sith. That is why I am here. To train you to be a Jedi." Now Bail and Breah were the ones with shocked expressions while Leia's face turned serious and contemplative as she looked at the lightsaber again. "I am old," he told them, "And no longer the Jedi I once was. I will help the Rebel Alliance as much as I can but I am no longer the one who can face Vader and the Emperor directly."
"Then what about Master Yoda?" Breah asked. "He survived as well, didn't he?" Obi-Wan shook his head.
"I admit I have no idea what condition Yoda is in," he said, "Or even what he's been doing in the Dagobah system. I would have to seek him out directly and that is time that we do not have. I must begin training Leia as soon as possible."
While Obi-Wan and her parents argued, Leia ran her hands up and down the surface of the lightsaber. It felt alive in her hands. She had read the old files, had seen the old holotapes her father had saved from before the Empire's information purge. Anakin Skywalker. "The Hero Without Fear." The greatest hero of the Republic in The Clone Wars. What would he do in this situation, she wondered. Her thumb unconsciously landed on the weapon's activation switch and the "Snap-hiss!" silenced the arguing as the room filled with bright blue light. Leia gazed into the sky blue blade and listened to the song of its hum. In that light, in that song, she found her answer. She rose from the bed as her grip tightened around the weapon's hilt and turned to look at Obi-Wan and her parents.
"I'll do it."
Obi-Wan beamed proudly and her parents, while still reasonably concerned, looked at their daughter with approval. "I'm very glad to hear that," Obi-Wan said. "We will begin your proper training tomorrow." At that, Leia gave the old Jedi a perplexed look and deactivated her lightsaber. "It has been a long journey and, as you have readily pointed out, I am not as young as I once was," he reminded her with a wry smirk. "For now," Obi-Wan said as he stood up, "I would consider familiarizing yourself with these," he took the bag off his shoulder and handed it off to Leia. "These were the stories and teachings of the Jedi that I was able to save. Read them, understand them, and gain a better knowledge of the Force. And Leia," he added as his expression became serious once more, "This must all be secret. The lightsaber, the texts, even our lessons. We must keep them all hidden. Being a Jedi is illegal," he reminded her, "And we do not know where the Empire's eyes are."
Leia nodded seriously, looking at her lightsaber in one hand and the bag of books in the other. "I will, Obi-Wan. You can count on me."
"I know I can," he assured her with another smile. Breah and Bail nodded as they followed Obi-Wan out of the room and Leia waited for them to leave before activating her lightsaber again. She looked at the blade and smiled, swaying her arm slowly from side to side and listening to its hum with each movement. She now held her very destiny in her hands.
"Well, I suppose that concludes things," Breah remarked. She still had her reservations about Leia becoming a Jedi or being involved in direct military conflict with the Empire but a part of her knew that with the sort of woman her daughter was becoming, it was almost inevitable that she might wind up in the fight one way or another. If not with a lightsaber, it probably would have been a blaster. "I have business to attend to."
"And I'll show Ben where he'll be staying during his time here," Bail added, "Then I'll join you." He turned to Obi-Wan and gave him a playful smile. "We'll see what we can do about getting you something proper to wear." He and Obi-Wan shared a chuckle as they walked one way and Breah walked another. Once they had walked for a bit, Bail looked around quickly to confirm that there was no staff within earshot before turning to Obi-Wan. "I'm sure you have your reasons," he acknowledged in a hushed tone, "But why–"
"Did I only tell Leia the partial truth about her father?" Obi-Wan finished. Bail nodded silently and Obi-Wan stroked his chin thoughtfully. "We have to face the eventuality that Leia may, at some point, be forced to encounter Darth Vader directly." A shiver went down Bail's spine at the thought. "In fact, it is almost a certainty," Obi-Wan admitted. "When that time comes, Leia cannot have her judgment clouded. She must be able to see clearly what needs to be done." It was for that same reason that Obi-Wan had withheld the truth from her about Luke's fate as well. He had made peace, such as he could, with the fact that Vader or Sidious would almost certainly discover the boy and train him in the ways of the Dark Side.
"To be able to kill Darth Vader, you mean," Bail pointed out bluntly. "To fight her birth father to the death."
"Anakin Skywalker is her birth father. He died long ago," Obi-Wan remarked grimly. "Only Vader remains."