asdfghjkl The last chapter of Crash Landing! I wanted to post this on the 9th of June but I was watching the hockey game (go Pens! even tho you lost) and I was fighting with a bad bout of anxiety. There is an essay of an author's note at the bottom, you have been warned.

Anna stood quietly in the elevator, still trying to wrap her mind around the fact that she had left so easily. She had expected some sort of resistance, if not from Major Shay, from the Emperor or Vader. Most of her was relieved that she had been able to escape so easily, but there was another part of her that wondered why it had been so easy to get up and leave. Surely the Emperor had a plan, as he always did with each move, but she didn't want to stay around and find out what it was.

She was still trying to come to terms with seeing Shay for the first time since she had fled from him. He looked just the same, the pale skin, dark hair kept neat under his cap, light brown eyes full of nothing but a hunger for power. She had wanted to kill him right then for everything he had done to her, and now, knowing that he was still alive and well did nothing to soothe her aching heart.

Luke. He was still there, whether or not he was still alive was up in the air. There had been no signs of life from him, but she still had hope that his heart was beating. She had to. After everything that had happened between them, it seemed as though that single moment where they had been frozen in each other's gaze had forgiven it all. Right before the intense bolts had torn through his body. Her fingers tightened around her saberstaff as a flash of the pain returned, and she clutched at her chest as the phantom pain wound its way through her.

Her goal was to get to the hangar, and to live long enough to tell the Alliance what had happened. It wasn't going to be easy by any means, especially with Leia, but there had to be some hope. The destruction of this battle station would mean that the Empire would be severely weakened once more, and its powerful grip on the galaxy would loosen. Whether or not they would make it back to greatness, she didn't know, nor did she care. All she was concerned about now was running.

The elevator doors opened, and she slipped out into the chaos of the hallway. Stormtroopers and officers were running in every direction, trying to get off of the Death Star before it blew. Time was running out, and she knew that she needed to find the hangar quickly. It wasn't far from where the elevators were, and in all of the chaos she didn't worry about being spotted. At this moment, everyone was running for their lives. Still, she kept her saberstaff in her hand, just in case she needed it.

Towers and support beams fell all around her, and she narrowly missed a few of them as they fell from above. Some were not so lucky, but she didn't stop to dwell on it. Death was inevitable when close to two million crew members were evacuating, and she did not intend to be one of them. However, all she could do was run.

Anna reached the executive docking bay first, seeing that the shuttle that had been used to bring her and Luke to the Death Star was still there. She wasted no time, calling upon the Force to spring the door free, and quickly sweeping under the door. The shuttle was unlike anything she had ever flown before, but she was confident in her abilities as a pilot, even if they were starting to get rusty with the long amount of time between flights.
She pulled the ramp down, climbing up into the ship and heading right into the cockpit. As she sat down and her hands brushed the controls, she remembered the last time she had been in a shuttle such as this one. Luke had been doubting whether or not his presence, and hers as well, was healthy for the mission to the forest moon. She remembered the tension between the two of them as they had faced off in the storage locker, and how they had been very touchy for the remainder of the flight, not speaking much to each other. Now, there was nothing Anna wanted more than to tell him that he was right, than they should have stayed on the Home One and that it would have had a better result for everyone. The attack would still have gone as planned, and Luke would be at her side, watching as the Empire fell, celebrating when it finally collapsed into nothingness. But he was not here anymore, and all she could do was get off the Death Star.

A metal support fell in front of the shuttle narrowly missing the view screen, and it jolted her out of her thoughts. She gripped the controls, flicking switches and the shuttle powered up. However, the image of Luke's fallen body refused to leave her, no matter how hard she tried to stay in the moment. It seemed as though it took forever for the shuttle to warm up, and she took off slowly as the Death Star fell to pieces behind her.
As soon as she was away from the superstructure and heading back toward Endor, Anna sat back in the pilot's seat. Instead of Luke, her mind travelled once more to what the Emperor had told her about her family. If it were true, she would not rest until she found them, her sister, whoever was still alive. It would have to wait for a little while, as she needed to grieve and eventually celebrate the near-fatal wound that had been dealt to the Empire. She would scour the galaxy if she had to, and all she could hope was that the Emperor had not lied. If there truly was someone out there that she could call family, it would put her at peace, if just for a time.

Then, she raised her head. She had one more idea in order to see if Luke truly was alive. He had used it once before, according to Leia, and she knew that if he heard someone calling for him, he would respond.

"Luke," she called weakly, watching as the green moon began to take shape in front of her. "Luke, come back to me. I still need you. Your sister still needs you."

In a shuttle, sailing in the opposite direction of the forest moon, Luke's body lay on the floor in the passenger area, being looked over by Major Shay. The Emperor sat just a little further back, watching.

"So the rumours are true then," the Major said. "About Anna? She's a Jedi?"

The Emperor nodded, seeing that silent question in the Major's eyes. "I let her go because she is no threat to us," he said. "The Empire has suffered a significant setback, but she will be much easier to contain than someone such as young Skywalker. She too is weakened by this, the fact that her dearly beloved is with us."

"Why didn't you tell me?" Shay asked. "You know I've been looking for her for years."

"You history with her is not my concern, nor should it cloud your judgement," the Emperor stated, and raised his head as he heard a faint calling through the Force. He couldn't help but let a smile break out on his face.

They both looked at the young Jedi's face, where colour had started to seep back into his skin.

His eyes slowly opened, revealing the newly yellow-glowing irises.

Before anyone flips because of that ending, don't worry, there is a sequel planned! I was never going to just end this story on this note. I love these characters too much to just write one story about them. I plan on releasing chapters of the sequel in August.

As for this story, I'm going to revisit it, and probably write a new draft with a bunch of new chapters that follow the chronology of the actual story better. Not to mention that I started writing this before I had truly found my writing voice, and now that I've participated in NaNoWriMo for four years, done Camp NaNo four times to the fullest (the other three I was usually burned out or didn't do enough planning), I've figured out what it takes to get everything done. I don't have any timeframe on the edited version, but it will take time (sorry, I just need some time with my other creative projects before I get back into this one).

As for the sequel, which I've named "After the Crash" for now, I've started planning, outlining, and world building. I plan on writing it for the July Camp NaNo session, and then editing it throughout the course of the year. I don't know when I'll get around to it, but both of the stories should be relatively polished before the start of the school year in September, where I'll be going to a different city to start my Batchelor's degree in Communications.

I'd also like to thank all of my reviewers! I love all of you, and I'd like to give a special mention to CarminaxBuranax, who has been around since 2014 when I started this story. Thank you for all of your kind words, it means so much to know that you stuck around through all of my hiatuses!

Lastly, I just want to thank everyone for the support over the last two years. I published the first chapter in February of 2014, and now here we are, over two years later, in 2016. During that time, this story has been on four hiatuses, and I apologize for that. I know how frustrating it is when an author doesn't update a story that you're invested in, and when they do, you've already forgotten what's happened and need to refresh yourself. I've been there (in fact, I still am) and I can say that as an author, it's difficult to get back into a story that you don't really want to write anymore. You go thorough phases of being super excited about a story, and then, after about a week of collective writing, you don't care for it anymore. Since I started writing this story, I turned from what NaNo calls a "pantser", which is essentially winging it with little or no direction as to how to get to the end, to a planner, and it has made writing this story so much easier. I still have some sorting out to do for getting my notes in order, which I'll use for editing, but I'm sure that I can easily go through this story and weed out what I need.

So for now, I will be working on planning After the Crash. I hope you all enjoyed this story as much as I did writing it, and thank you again for sticking with me for over two years!