Erm, well ... yes. This took some time, didn't it? Thanks for not giving up on me -- that is, if you haven't given up on me. :)

-L.

C6: Amendments

"Halfway 'round the world lies the one thing that you want; Buried in the ground; Hundreds of miles down; The first thing that arises in your mind when you awake; Is bending you 'til you break; Let me hold you now; Baby, close your eyes; Don't open 'til the morning light; Baby, don't forget; We haven't lost it all, yet ... "
The Fray, "Syndicate"

As she stared at the datapad clutched in her trembling hands, she was hardly aware of the bile rising in her throat until she collapsed against the sandy floor of her tiny kitchen, heaving. The words on the screen raced through her mind. They tore at her soul and heart, at her sanity. Her eyes stung with tears of anguish, of crushing grief.

Dead.

She screamed. It was primal, desperate, otherworldly, like the sound of a dying bantha. It ripped from her body and echoed off the walls, off the dunes, and off the stars.

"No!"

Dead. How could she be dead? Where was the justice?

Dead. Accident. Body mangled, unable to ship back for burial.

Aada Tambara swiped roughly at her mouth with the back of her blue hand and scowled at the mocking note on her datapad, forgetting to be surprised that she even received any notification. Accident. Ha. There was no accident, of that much she was sure. There were no accidents in the crime lord's palace, only murders. Enslaved dancers on the verge of purchased freedom did not get caught in the crossfire of a blaster fight in the main audience chamber. They were probably chained too close to Jabba the Hutt's throne to ever be put at such risk.

Accident. The lie jumped off the screen as though it were scrawled in crimson blood. Oola was murdered, probably fed to the rancor rumored to be kept in that slimy son of a bantha's palace. Aada shuddered to think that her sister's last moments of life were spent in fear and pain, at the mercy of that hideous beast and its vile owner.

"Oh, Oola," Aada whispered, her words strangled by her tears. The blue-skinned Twi'lek looked with blurred vision out the small viewport in her kitchen. The dry shore of Tatooine's evil Dune Sea was shadowed black in the red light of the two setting suns. She narrowed her eyes, scanning the dunes for the tiny, tiny spec that she knew to be Jabba's palace, the only connection that she'd had with her sister for the past two years. Aada used to look out her window at sunset, used to find the palace and swear silently to Oola that her enslavement was coming to an end. Aada was going to be her sister's savior.

But now Oola was no more.

The thought slashed at her mind again and Aada slammed her fist into the adobe cabinet in front of her, breaking the door into a hundred crumbling pieces. Oola was dead, killed by the vile gangster who kept her chained to his dais and raped her night after night. Aada had been so close to rescuing her sister from that hell. The asking price for a used slave girl was ten thousand credits, and she had almost scrimped together enough money...

It was inconsequential now. Oola could never be rescued.

A new sob escaped Aada's chest as the first sun dipped below the horizon and the desert planet suddenly cooled by staggering degrees. The encroaching dark reminded her how truly alone she was in this wretched place, living in a tiny hut carved from hardened sand, devoted solely to the thought of saving her sister. She had no friends here, no family. No one to mourn with her. Oola had been the only family she had left.

"Oola," Aada said again, crumbling a clump of sand between her fingers, imagining that she was pinching the overgrown head of Jabba off his grotesque form. The monster had destroyed everything Aada ever held dear. He deserved to pay.

The trembling in her hands stopped as that thought seeped into her mind. Revenge. The gangster deserved to pay for what he did to Oola, and pay he would. Oola would have her vindication.

As the second sun set and Tatooine fell into blackness, Aada made her silent promise to the stars. She would kill Jabba the Hutt, even if it took until her dying breath.

He could hardly blame the Rebels for forgetting to remember on the anniversary of their day of triumph, but he was frustrated nonetheless. After all, Leia's all-too-conspicuous absence in the Mess, the Hangar Bay, the Command Center, should have been reminder enough. She spent every other day of the year flitting from station to station, determined to do everything in her power to win the war for justice. Shouldn't it have been obvious, then, that the one day she was nowhere to be found was the same day as the first anniversary of the victory at Yavin?

The first anniversary of the destruction of Alderaan.

He had thought at one time in his life that war stopped for nothing, but that was when he was fighting for the side that had no need to celebrate. When all the battles were handed to him as an Imperial lieutenant, celebration would have been unnecessary and indeed obnoxious.

But the Alliance had cause to celebrate, and what's more, the Alliance needed to celebrate. The anniversary of their biggest victory yet served as a necessary boost in troop morale at a time when all battles since didn't seem to be going their way. So the morning drills were abandoned and the tables in the Mess were shoved aside and even he donated what liquor he had on the Falcon to the revelry.

He'd noticed she wasn't around, of course, because he spent more time than he cared to admit scanning the base for that pair of brown eyes. But it wasn't until someone -- a Rogue, no doubt -- snuck into the Communications Center and music began filtering over the com system that he came to the heavy conclusion that no one else realized the dark significance of the day. No one else had watched Leia Organa shrink into herself over the past year, watched her cheeks hollow and her shoulders narrow; no one else wanted to remember what she would never be able to forget.

And she shouldn't have been forced to grieve alone.

He found her, then, in her quarters. The door was locked of course, but a detail like that had never been one to stop him in the past. A quick hotwire of the panel revealed her, on the floor in the corner of her room, hugging her knees to her chest and staring at the wall opposite. Just staring. She had no tears because she had not yet learned how to mourn the loss of an entire world. It was a burden too big, and she was small, so, so small.

They were dearest friends on their best days and mortal enemies on their worst, their relationship strained by shared feelings that neither of them were ready to admit. But she did not object to his intrusion, didn't even look at him as he sat down beside her and wrapped a strong arm around her shoulders, just half-nodded once and continued with her staring.

He'd never been good at the business of grief, and if Leia had been male he would have already poured her a tall glass of black whiskey, stuff so strong it was illegal even on Corellia. Hell, as they continued to sit there in silence, he considered it anyway. She was far from a delicate flower, and he'd seen her handle more liquor than half of Rogue Squadron and still be up and looking perfect an hour before first shift.

But, though he'd never been good with grief, he'd always been good at recognizing exactly what others needed, and she didn't need a drinking buddy and mind-erasing shots burning down her throat. He glanced down at her. The muscles in her neck were taut, rigid against her pale skin, and the dark circles under her eyes were like bruises. She was pale, not her usual smooth alabaster, but waxen, anemic, like she was being held pallid prisoner to her own demons. Her hair was twisted into a chignon at the base of her neck, but it was messy and chocolate strands fell over her face. The white dress she wore hung loosely over her, making her seem ethereal, ghostly.

She looked sick. And she looked exhausted.

He sighed and brought his other arm up to hug her, then pulled her gently until she was sitting across his lap and her bony cheek rested against his chest. She didn't resist, just let him position her, her body limp, like a ragdoll. She was so frail and small and he was careful not to hold her too tightly, lest he break her in half.

Leia simply stared ahead for a long while, her expression blank, and Han was ready to draw her in closer when she finally spoke, voice scratchy and oddly devoid of emotion, brown eyes still fixed on some invisible point beyond the wall.

"I realized yesterday that I've been fighting all this time for something I've never known."

He didn't know what exactly he'd been expecting her to say, but it certainly wasn't that. And then she turned towards him and caught his eyes in hers, far too old for her nineteen years and tired, so tired.

"Freedom?"

"Democracy," she amended. "It's something I've only ever studied, but I believe in it because my father knew it, because he believed in it."

"You're noble."

Leia laughed humorlessly and shook her head.

"No I'm not. I don't even really believe that it's worth it."

"Yeah, you do," Han countered, squeezing her shoulders slightly as though the motion would jostle a little sense into her. "C'mon, Princess. You know it's worth it."

"How? Was the galaxy so much better off before the Emperor?" She searched his face for answers for a short moment and then sighed, defeated. "You don't know. You would have been too young to remember."

He opened his mouth to respond and then closed it again. She had a point. He was barely seven when Palpatine rose to power, and what little he remembered of his life before then was his mother, struggling daily in a system that failed her. They had argued, Han and Leia, more times than he really cared to count, about his belief in democracy because his own impressions of it were so tainted. But, as much as wanted to think her cause was foolish, he couldn't, not when he could see her passion, the bright gold flecks that shone in her eyes when she talked about victory and the end of the war.

"Hey," Han said at last, cupping Leia's cheek so she was looking up at him. "I know that it's not been easy for you recently, and that it probably won't be easy for a while, but what you're doing ... it's the right thing. The good thing." He moved forward and brushed his lips against her forehead, then leaned them back together so she was resting her head on his chest, tucked neatly beneath his chin. "Don't let them take that from you, too, Leia."

She sighed again, her shoulders shaking with the exhale, and pressed her cheek further against him.

"You should get some rest," he murmured into her hair when she didn't say anything, but she only shook her head.

"Can't sleep. Every time I close my eyes ... I see ... it. And I just ... "

She trailed off, unable to find the right words, but then again there were no words appropriate to describe the destruction of an entire planet, and anyway, Han understood. He began rubbing her back slowly, flat palm making small circles, and humming the lullaby his mother used to sing to him. It was in Old Corelli, and he hadn't heard the gentle song since he was six years old, since his mother died, but he remembered every word perfectly and still, twenty-one years after her death, found comfort in the tune.

"That's beautiful," Leia whispered.

"It's the song my mother would sing when I didn't want to go to bed. She would lie down beside me and rub my back and sing until I fell asleep."

Against his chest, he felt Leia smile.

"Are there words?"

"Yes, in Old Corelli, but sometimes she would sing it in Basic, too."

She was silent for a moment, then took a deep, steadying breath.

"Will you -- " A pause. "Will you sing it to me?"

Han felt his heart constrict at her vulnerable plea, both saddened by the heartbreak that she bore alone and overcome with the realization of how desperately she needed someone to care. He pressed his lips into her hair once, then rested his cheek against the crown of her head and began to sing.

"L'nauti nea e'lune silvé, rellé òrs l'celes.
Rellé òrs l'seu a'vas, ehil il'blancs ehlly.
Nea apisca l'revé, apisca ols y'sah.
L'rine e'lunelus slivé, l'sahte e'stell slivé.
Nauta, nea, nauta lau, lau ecro l'seu.
Nauta, nea, nauta lau ...
E'nos leges a'nauta ces a'mi."

As he finished, he noticed that Leia's breathing had slowed to that deep, rhythmic pace that always accompanied the edges of sleep. Quietly, he reached one arm up and grabbed the blankets off her bed, wrapping them both up in the thin fleece. Then Han whispered the song to her again, this time in Basic, rocking her gently until he was certain she was asleep.

"Baby's boat's a silver moon, sailing over the sky.
Sailing over the sea of dew, while the clouds float by.
Baby's fishing for a dream, fishing near and far.
Her line, a silver moonbeam is, her bait, a silver star.
Sail, baby, sail out, out across the sea.
Sail, baby, sail out ...
But always sail back home to me."

There were very few things in the galaxy that frightened Leia Organa Solo. She had faced down legions of Imperial Stormtroopers and survived; had seen war, carnage, death, had held soldiers' ribs together with her own hands in vain attempts to save their lives. She had taken on Palpatine himself in debate on the Senate floor and beaten an increasingly angry Wookiee at dejarik -- twice. She had seen her entire planet destroyed before her very eyes and learned that the man who let it happen was her own father. She had watched as her husband was lead to an almost certain death and lived everyday with the very real possibility that she might never see him again...

She had seen some of the greatest terrors the galaxy had to offer, but none of them, not one, prepared her for the terror of a five week-old infant with colic.

Haddon Solo's incessant crying began when he was four days old, not long after he had finished a nap and been fed and freshly diapered. He was lying on a blanket on the floor next to his mother, looking up at the portable mobile Wicket had made for him, brightly-colored carved wooden pieces shaped like various Alliance fighter ships. As far as Leia could tell, there was nothing wrong with him, but when Haddon began screaming, his face deep crimson, his back arching, she half-panicked and ran him the short distance from the Falcon to the medcenter.

Tuck checked the wailing infant over thoroughly, but in the end, gave Leia the too-common diagnosis and told her sympathetically that she would just have to cope. And so she did, the best she could, enduring long days and sleepless nights up with her son, as well as advice from well-meaning friends and strangers alike that was becoming increasingly annoying. Luke had used a soothing technique that had helped the first few days, but then Haddon grew accustomed to the brush of his mind in the Force and his crying returned with a renewed intensity. The same thing happened when Chewie's long arms served as temporary comfort, when one of the female Ewoks named Pika told her to rub Haddon's back in circles while gliding in the rocking chair, when Pax Antilles suggested she rub Ryquin lavendarplant oil on the back of her neck, and when Rieekan had suggested warm baths.

Even the short reprieve granted by these remedies was not enough to let Leia rest, and now, having slept no more than three hours a day since the birth of her son, she was nearing her wit's end. What little weight she'd gained in her pregnancy had already come off with the stress, plus some, so her cheeks were hollowed and gaunt and she was beginning to have trouble nursing. Her attempts to continue with her role in establishing the new government were counterproductive at best, as she was constantly having to be caught up with the Alliance's progress whenever she could make it to meetings. She'd cut her hair off to just below her shoulders one morning in a fit of desperation, because braiding it took too much time in the mornings and it was just an additional stress that she couldn't handle. It now hung in loose waves, hastily parted on the left and shoved behind her ears, probably messy, but she was too exhausted to care.

"Haddon, Sweetheart," she said softly. "Please. Please rest."

Leia looked down helplessly at the screaming infant in her arms and wanted to cry, too. She couldn't help her own child, she who had helped bring down an Empire, and she felt as though she was failing as a mother. It was 0223, and she was pacing her cabin on the Falcon in dim light, really now just hoping that she could get Haddon to bed. The walls on the ship were not soundproof, and though both of them were far too kind to ever say anything, she was sure that Chewie and Luke both were suffering from lack of sleep, too.

It was fairly dark in the cabin and she was exhausted and not really paying attention when she accidentally collided -- hard -- with the desk at the back of the room. Cursing silently, Leia bent down to rub her stinging knee and saw that she had managed to activate one of the holodiscs on the desktop, which was now projecting a soft glow over the dark cabin and an image she recognized as one taken at her twentieth birthday party with Luke, back when their shared birthdays were just a funny coincidence.

The image was of Han and Leia, pausing in their dance long enough to smile for the photographer, whom she remembered vaguely to be Wes Janson. The distance between the two of them was less than respectable even then, nearly a year before either of them had admitted their love out loud. She was wearing a long white dress and her hair was down, and Han was wearing his standard uniform, yellow bloodstripes this time, and they both looked so incredibly happy. His arm was wrapped securely around her waist and she remembered that the fingers of their other hands were intertwined, and that this picture had come not long after an argument between the two of them, though she couldn't remember over what even if she'd wanted.

Leia picked up the holodisc with a small smile, and then realized, belatedly, that Haddon had ceased his crying and was looking with great interest at the image in her other hand. Overjoyed, she brought the image closer to her son's face so she could see it better and sat down with him in the gliding chair. Haddon's hazel eyes reflected almost golden in the soft light, and he reached his chubby hand forward towards Han's face.

She was unprepared for the wave of emotion that crashed into her then. Her son, Han's son, missed his father. He was comforted by the image of his father, could recognize Han without ever seeing him before. Leia was all at once thrilled and heartbroken, awed by Haddon's ability and saddened that Han wasn't there to share it.

The room was silent as Haddon focused on the image of his parents, and Leia suddenly and unexpectedly found herself missing the noise. With the baby finally quiet, her mind was free to run away with the memories of her husband, and she desperately needed a distraction. Cradling Haddon in her left hand, she positioned the holodisc somewhat awkwardly in her left fingers so it rested on his chest. Then, careful not to jostle him too much, she stretched her free arm towards the desk and managed to brush the controls for the cabin's sound system. Smooth Corellian jazz began to filter quietly throughout the room, and Haddon looked up for the source of the sound for a moment before settling his gaze back on the image.

Leia grabbed the patterned quilt resting on the arm of the chair and swaddled it around Haddon, kissing his forehead gently and settling them back together in the rocker. Slowly, she placed the still-active holodisc on the corner of the desk, then brought her hand back to caress Haddon's cheek. He was studying his mother's face now with heavy eyelids, cocooned in the warmth of his blanket and the safety of Leia's arms.

"I know you miss Daddy, my Little Cub, and I'm so sorry," she whispered, smoothing the baby's blonde curls. "I miss him, too. But I promise you that we will get him back. He loves you so much, Haddon, we both love you so much and he's going to come home to us."

Haddon gave a great yawn in response, soothed by Leia's voice, and she smiled broadly.

"Your Daddy saved my life, Haddon," she continued. "Did you know that? He was always there when I got scared or sad or lonely."

Leia kissed her son again, remembering the lullaby that Han had sung to her the night of the first anniversary of Alderaan's destruction. He had been so careful with her, had held her there through the night, his presence allowing her sleep and peaceful dreams on a night when she was sure she'd find neither. When she had awoken in his arms the next morning, overwhelmed by the realization that she was irrevocably falling for him, she'd started a fight to compensate for her faltering resolve. Still, she knew even then that she wasn't fooling anyone, least of all Han.

Face still close to Haddon's, Leia quietly began to sing the lullaby, first in Old Corelli, then in Basic, just as Han had done all those years ago. The infant's eyes grew heavier and heavier, and before she reached the end of the song, he was fast asleep. Rocking their sleeping son gently, Leia focused on the image of her husband on the desk across from her whispering the last line of the lullaby so it was lost in the dulcet woodwinds of the jazz music.

"But always sail back home to me..."

Luke Skywalker's early morning runs had allowed him to explore Endor for kilometers beyond the perimeter of the Alliance's base and the Ewok village in every direction, but this morning, his feet took him on a familiar, yet mostly untraveled route deep within the forest. He ran, pushing himself faster and faster through the dense green brush, until the overhead tree canopy grew sparse and he came to a small clearing nearly five kilometers from base.

He had counted at least four thundershowers in the past few months, one with rain so severe that eight of the ground-level buildings the Alliance had hastily erected had flooded with several centims of water. But despite the rain, the hallowed ground was still charred black and no flora had yet to reclaim the earth where he had watched his father's body burn.

Luke stopped running at the edge of the clearing and walked slowly to the scored ground. Slowly, he bent to pick up the melted remains of his father's mask, a formless blob of black plastisteel, one misshapen viewsocket barely discernible, and even then, that was only if you knew exactly what you held in your hand. It was all that was left of his father; or, and perhaps more appropriate, it was all that was left of Darth Vader.

Sighing, he dropped heavily to the ground, running his prosthetic right hand over the mask. The hand was perfect. It looked real and felt real and yet it wasn't. It did not boast skin, but synthflesh; durasteel, not bones; electrical circuits and wires, not blood. And it served as a constant reminder that, even though he had forgiven Anakin Skywalker, and even though his father had turned to good at the end, Luke was just as much Anakin's son as he was Vader's.

And that reminder scared him.

"Yoda would say that's the Dark Side talking."

Not at all startled a voice in the seemingly empty clearing, Luke looked to his right and smiled at the ethereal form of Anakin Skywalker as he appeared, sitting cross-legged next to his son. Anakin smiled in return, an upturn of the corners of his mouth that was identical to Leia's, and Luke had to remind himself that he was looking at his father, not his older brother.

"Twin brother," Anakin corrected, grinning wider now. "I look twenty-three, and you are twenty-three, so it works out."

Luke chuckled and tossed the mask back into the extinguished pyre.

"I feel a lot older than that," the younger Skywalker returned, bright blue eyes focusing somewhere beyond the tree line. "Tatooine ... seems like ages ago."

"Hm," Anakin agreed, following Luke's gaze. They settled into silence for a long moment, then he spoke again. "How are you, Luke?"

"I'm tired," Luke said with a sigh, turning back to his father. "Haddon. Leia's been doing everything she can, but the walls on that ship are thin."

A shadow seemed to cross Anakin's face at the mention of his daughter and grandson, and Luke couldn't decide if it was because of guilt or sadness, or perhaps something else.

"How is she? Leia? And Haddon? Is he sick?"

Luke shook his head.

"No. Well, I don't think so. He has colic, but Leia's medic said it's just something that babies get and there's nothing anyone can really do about it. He cries and cries and cries and I think it's starting to wear on her. She acts strong and she's trying to keep up with all the politics, but it's hard. She's gotten really thin, thinner than after -- well -- " Luke broke off awkwardly and Anakin grimaced. After Alderaan, he meant to say. After her torture. "She misses Han more than she lets on."

The last words were delivered with a pointed look and Anakin grimaced again.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly.

"You shouldn't tell me," Luke returned, feeling slightly guilty for bringing up what he did. "Tell Leia."

"I don't think she'll want to hear it."

"Probably not," Luke agreed. "But try."

Anakin sighed and nodded, and again they fell into silence. This time, it was Luke that spoke first.

"We've captured ten of the twelve Grand Admirals and named prosecuting attorneys for three of them," he said brightly, sensing that the conversation desperately needed to change directions. "Lando Calrissian has been leading the search. And Wedge Antilles is close to retaking Coruscant. Isard is pesky, but she's not good enough."

Anakin raised an eyebrow, clearly grateful for the change in conversation.

"Who's your intelligence chief?"

"Airen Cracken," Luke answered. "He's had the position for a little over a year. After Hoth."

"There are thirteen."

"What?"

"Thirteen Grand Admirals. Who are you missing?"

"Batch and Syn."

"Do you have Thrawn?"

Luke furrowed his brow.

"Who?"

"Thrawn," Anakin said again. "Mitth'raw'nuruodo. He's the thirteenth. He's a Chiss."

Luke whistled.

"A non-human Grand Admiral?"

Anakin nodded.

"He was promoted about two years ago, but it was done in secret so not many know. Have your Intel Chief look into it. Last I heard, Palpatine had sent him to the Unknown Regions."

"I'll tell him."

There was another moment of silence as Anakin looked as though he was mulling something over.

"You know, Luke," he began thoughtfully, "you could save yourselves a lot of trouble if you took control of the Stormtroopers."

Luke studied his father for a moment, floored.

"You can do that?"

"They're clones," he affirmed. "They've been programmed. Alter their programming ... " Anakin snapped his fingers, but the gesture proved slightly comical as it made no sound. "You end the war for good. Kuat, Fondor, Sluis Van, Duro ... the shipyards are yours. Coruscant is yours. Isard will have no one to fight her battles. Thrawn, Syn, Batch. They won't have anyone protecting them. You'd still have the officers, of course, but without the clone firepower to back them up, they can't do anything."

"How -- " Luke began, but Anakin was already there.

"Kamino. It's in Wild Space, south of the Rishi Maze. I've only ever been there twice, but that's where you go. All the technology is there. You can reprogram the clones." He paused, as if considering his next statement, a significant look crossing his face. "There is a Kill Switch."

"Shav," Luke breathed. "There's go to be at least two hundred million."

"Closer to three. But, they have a short lifespan. Ten, twelve years."

"If that's the case, we could reprogram them and end the cloning ... phase them out gradually."

"That's what I would suggest."

Luke exhaled deeply and glanced the sky. The pinks and oranges of early morning had long since burned away, replaced by a brilliant blue, the forest alive with the sounds of the morning avians. He needed to get back. Leia and Haddon would be up soon if they weren't already, and he and his twin had taken up the morning ritual of sharing drinks -- kaffe for him, tea for her -- and talking before the day really got started. Standing up, he turned to his father, who followed suit.

"So. Kamino. Do you have the coordinates?"

The Untraveled Region of Tatooine's Dune Sea was cruel to most during the majority of the year, but in the stormy season, it was completely uninhabitable. Fierce sandstorms blew up daily, 500-plus kilometer per hour winds whipping across the terrain, destroying millennia-old land formations, reducing them to pebbles. A thick-skinned Sand Person, evolved to withstand the harshest desert conditions, would survive perhaps a minute; a human, no more than a few seconds, most likely dying of blood loss as the lethal sand sheared flesh from bone.

If Tatooine employed cartographers, they would have been forced to redraw the area after every storm season. The landscape was left completely transformed after every storm, and following weeks of deadly tempests, it was left virtually unrecognizable -- provided one could distinguish sand dune from sand dune in the first place. It was all-too-simple to get lost, even easier to die, victim to the baking desert heat.

And it was in the middle of the altered landscape of the Untraveled Region that Curio Sar found himself cursing his dilapidated R-Series freighter, and, more importantly, the slimy little Rodian who'd sold him that malfunctioning navicomputer. Really, he should have known better than to trust anyone on Hypori, but the stolen shipment of ketterspice was too much money for him to pass up, and these things were truly time sensitive ...

"Kreth!" Sar shouted, kicking the landing claw with one booted foot, which only resulted in a throbbing toe. It had taken him three weeks to get here after he stole the ketterspice on Druckenwell, a hyperspace jump that should have been four hours -- tops. His first navicomputer shorted out and forced him to make an emergency on Hypori, resulting in the purchase of the second computer that rapidly calculated no fewer than ten microjumps before Sar could get the ship on course to Tatooine. Ketterspice was a powerful stimulant and it sold for copious credits when one could find it, but it was volatile and broke down quickly. Take it any more than two weeks after it was blended and you would not be in for a very comfortable last few minutes of life.

"Kreth," Sar swore again. If he'd gotten the spice to Jabba on time, he could have netted close to half the profits. Sure, he would have made more if he sold it on his own, but the Hutt knew how to move illegal stimulants. With Jabba's help, Sar was looking at nearly 60,000 credits. As it stood, he was in the hole a good seven thousand. He could risk selling the drugs at the palace once he got the navicomputer working again, but that would no doubt prove to be a very poor life decision. So instead, he was stuck in the middle of the Dune Sea with three days left of rations, a bum computer, no money, and twenty kilos of sour drugs.

Frustrated, Sar whipped out his blaster and shot blindly in the ground, then jumped back, startled, when the blast he expected to be absorbed by the sand ricocheted backwards and sparked against his rundown ship. Intrigued, he brushed the sand beneath him around with his foot, revealing a small edge of some sort of carbon-scored metal. He bent down and began digging with his hands, furiously moving sand away to reveal what he desperately hoped was worth something.

Sar dug for a good three minutes in the hot suns before his hand hit a bump in the flat metal. Excited, he brushed the sand off the bump, dirty fingers removing sand from crevices, exposing more and more of the metal to reveal --

He stumbled backwards on to his rear as he realized he'd uncovered a face. There was a body beneath him. Horrified and disgusted, Sar's first instinct was to get far, far away, and he was clumsily scrambling to his feet when it finally dawned on him that he could be looking at a lost piece of art from a shipwreck, something that very well might be worth serious credits. It was the more rational thought, of course. After all, who puts bodies in metal?

Sar continued digging for the next hour, forced to return to the cool safety of his ship for water four times, but finally, he was able to uncover the entire sculpture and began to dig around the perimeter. The whole block was about a third of a meter thick, and he was relieved to see a glowing panel when he exposed the upper left edge. There was a hover mechanism on this art, then, and it was working, so he wouldn't have to rig some device to drag it onto his ship.

As Sar moved in to inspect the controls, he noticed five green indicator lights, beneath which was text in Aurebesh that he couldn't quite make out. He brushed what sand he could from beneath the lights, hopeful that he would be given the name of the artist, and perhaps, an estimate for how much the piece was worth.

"Kreth," he breathed, falling backwards on his rear for the second time. He studied the body in the metal, slack-jawed, utterly flabbergasted by the realization that there was a living person encased in this metal slab.

"Whoah, pal," Sar said, leaning in to getter look at the man's face. "You'a ain't havin' th' best'a days, is ya?"

He studied the man's features for a long time. He'd seen this man before, somewhere, though he couldn't quite place him. The guy could have been a smuggler, like Sar. In their line of work, it was impossible to know everyone, but you learned after a while who you needed to look out for; who you couldn't trust, who you'd try to kill at the first chance because they were better than you. Sar wracked his brain, struggling to place the frozen man's familiar features. There was something about that face, that slightly crooked nose and that barely-discernible scar on the man's chin, something that Sar knew was important.

"Oh, kreth."

The realization hit Sar like a ton of durasteel. Slowly, a wide, maniacal grin spread across his weather-beaten face and he began to laugh, a low chuckle that grew louder and louder until he was kneeling in the middle of the Dune Sea, head thrown backwards, cackling up at the hot, red sky.

Maybe this trip wasn't a total wash after all.

Leia was sitting at the dejarik table by the time Luke made it back to the ship, a chipped blue mug of steaming tea in already front of her. She was freshly showered, hair pulled back in hidden pins at both temples, and no doubt looked and felt more rested than she had in months. Haddon had slept until 0830, meaning that Leia, too, had nearly tripled the amount of sleep she'd gotten the night before. Now he was nursing, wrapped loosely in a pale green blanket and playing with the deep v-neck of his mother's white dress as she quietly hummed along with the Alderaani symphony playing throughout the Falcon.

She glanced up from the datapad she was reading as Luke entered the galley and gave her a funny look.

"What?" Leia asked.

"Nothing," he insisted, crossing to the counter and pouring some kaffe into an equally chipped black mug. "It's just that ... you look ... good."

She made a face as he sat down across from her.

"Thanks, Luke."

"No," he fumbled, realizing his mistake. "I didn't mean -- "

Leia chucked and shook her head.

"Oh, hush. I know what you meant." She leaned slightly towards Luke with a wide grin stretching across her face. "I got him to sleep last night. Six whole hours. By the way, Chewie made that."

The last words were thrown in hastily as Luke moved to take a sip of his kaffe. He heard her warning too late, probably still awed by the fact she had gotten Haddon to sleep at all, and he sputtered as he took a large gulp of too-strong kaffe. Leia had acquired a taste for the bitter concoction on their jaunt to Bespin, but she knew that her brother had never quite gotten used to Chewie's particular brand of kaffe. Coughing, Luke got up and walked over to the cool storage unit, in search of some sort of creamer to cut the flavor. He returned with a carton of nerf milk and a plate of breadcakes and soft cheese, as well as a small pot of honey.

"Eat, Leia," Luke demanded, sliding the plate in front of her. He took a cake and poured a little milk in his kaffe, then sat down again. "Six hours, huh?"

She smiled and nodded as she scooped up a little cheese with the bread, then dipped it into the honey.

"It's Han. And music. Maybe both. I accidentally activated that holo of us dancing on our birthday, and Haddon stopped crying and reached for Han's face. I turned the music on, too. He was a little fussy when he woke up this morning, but that's been all. I can't believe it."

"Wow," Luke replied, genuinely impressed. "Do you think it'll last?"

Leia shrugged, having just taken a bite of her breakfast.

"If you have any old holos?" she asked after she swallowed. "I want to make sure he gets to look at different ones."

"Sure."

Leia refocused her attentions on Haddon and they ate in silence for a few moments. She quickly adjusted her dress and the blanket over her shoulder when the baby finished his morning meal, noticing finally that Luke was watching her carefully as she began patting Haddon on the back.

"What, Luke?" she asked again.

Luke opened his mouth to say something, then seemed to reconsider his words. Instead, he shrugged.

"Nothing, Leia, really. Are you going to the Command meeting this afternoon?"

"Yes," she said slowly, lifting a suspicious eyebrow. "Chewie's going to watch Cub."

"Okay." He stood up and poured his nearly-full mug of kaffe into the basin. "Okay, good. I'm going to shower, and then I've got to do a little research. I'll see you a little later?"

Leia frowned.

"Luke?"

"I promise," Luke said, anticipating her question. "It's nothing. See you at the meeting."

He retreated hastily, leaving his sister staring after him, visibly perplexed by his odd behavior. Sighing when Luke was out of earshot, Leia lifted Haddon from her shoulder and lifted him so she could kiss his belly. The baby responded with a toothless, crooked smile and reached towards his mother.

"You're right, Haddon," Leia cooed, nuzzling Haddon's cheek. "Uncle Luke is a little weird. But we love him anyway, don't we?"

By midmorning, Leia was beginning to feel that, after five weeks, she was finally starting to get the hang of this mothering thing. She had again succeeded in putting a tearless Haddon down for a nap and was reclining in Han's seat in the cockpit, enjoying soft acoustic music that she recognized as Brentaali and studying the latest Intel reports, when she heard soft cooing filtering over the babycom. Surprised, she glanced at her chrono. Haddon had been sleeping for less than an hour, and anyway, he hadn't quite reached the stage where he could do more vocalizing beyond crying. She held her breath for a moment, listening intensely, and then gasped silently as she heard whispered words coming from inside her cabin.

"Hello there, Haddon."

Leia snatched her blaster from its resting place on the instrument panel in front of her and darted silently out of the cockpit, scanning the corridors as she made her way towards her son, trying desperately to control her thundering heartbeat. The hatch to the ship was open and the boarding ramp down, but that was standard for her makeshift home during the daylight. The Falcon was berthed near the center of the base, and soldiers and civilians alike were constantly walking by. Surely, someone would have noticed an attempt to kidnap her son?

Her cabin door was open when she reached it, but that was how it had been left. Aiming her blaster, arms ramrod straight, Leia crept into the cabin after the intruder ...

And the blaster slipped from her stunned fingers and fell with a quiet thud on a blanket she'd left on the floor that morning. She stood there, mouth agape, eyes locked on the man who had invaded her cabin.

"Leia -- "

"Get. Out." she hissed, crossing swiftly to the bassinet in the corner, behind which the intruder stood. Haddon was still sleeping, and though he appeared unharmed, she lifted the swaddled baby carefully from the crib and cradled him protectively against her chest.

"Leia, please," he pleaded. "I just wanted to see him. And you."

"No. You have no right." Her voice was barely whisper, and it was trembling, but she still brokered no room for argument.

Anakin Skywalker gazed upon his daughter sadly, hands splayed before him in a gesture of peace.

"I came to apologize to you, Leia. And to my grandson. For what I've done."

He stepped forward and Leia retreated, her vision suddenly blurry with angry, terrified tears.

"You came to apologize?" The word fell from her mouth as though it were poison.

"Yes." He touched his fingers to her shoulder and she jerked away as though burned, horrified with the realization that she could feel him, a ghost, a specter.

"No," she whispered, shaking her head from side to side, her resolve faltering.

"I don't want to hurt you, Leia," Anakin insisted quietly, moving away from her as though to prove his intentions. He dropped his gaze. "I've done enough of that."

"You came to apologize?" she repeated again, incredulous.

"For Alderaan. For -- for the Death Star. For Cloud City. All of it."

"You came to apologize." This time, it was a statement. She had fully wrapped her mind around the reason for this visit, and yet she was still in shock that her father would actually have the audacity. "Do you really think -- "

"No," he interrupted, anticipating her question. "I don't. But I have to start somewhere."

"You don't," she retorted. "You don't have to start anywhere. You can leave."

"Leia, if you'll just -- "

"Stop," Leia demanded, loudly enough that Haddon stirred a little and she rocked him gently to keep him sleeping. "Just -- just stop. You ... Do you know ... " she faltered, taking a deep, calming breath before she continued. "Do you know that I live every day terrified of what I have brought into this galaxy because of you? Look at my son. He is perfect. He is beautiful, he is so, so good, and it isn't fair. I shouldn't have to be afraid of what he could become."

"Let me explain."

"What could you possibly say to me that could make anything you've done better?"

"Leia," Anakin insisted, taking a step towards his daughter again. "You have to hear me. You have to understand. I fell to the Dark Side because I was angry, because I was terrified of the fate that could have befallen my wife and children. Don't you see? I was afraid of your suffering, and yet I became the cause of it. Everything I've done to you, everything that could have been prevented, it all started because of my fear."

Leia furrowed her brow, feeling somewhere between bewildered and frustrated, and placed one delicate hand over the back of Haddon's head, shielding him.

"You can't ... you can't really have come here expecting my forgiveness."

Anakin frowned slightly, a rather serious, paternal expression she'd seen on Bail Organa in his less tolerant moments. She didn't appreciate it.

"I'm asking, Leia. As your father -- "

"You are not my father," she snapped, the volume of her voice rising a few decibels. "Bail Organa was my father."

"As someone who cares, deeply, about you, then," he amended. "I'm asking. If you care at all about your son's soul, if you care about yours. Don't end up like I did."

"I am nothing like you."

"You are exactly like me, Leia. Until you let go, you will be exactly like me, like who I was."

A hot tear slipped down Leia's cheek and she was trembling in earnest now, but still her eyes remained fiery, defiant. Dark brown and accusatory.

"Luke said," she whispered dangerously, "that Kenobi felt it when Alderaan was destroyed. Did you feel it, too? Did it hurt you the way it hurt him?"

Sighing sadly, Anakin shook his head.

"And when you injected me on the Death Star, when you watched as your men beat me, when you shoved your mind into mine and made every nerve ending in my body burn, when you heard me scream until my throat bled and beg you to kill me, did it bother you?"

He merely held her gaze this time, unmoving, but his silence was answer enough. Setting her jaw, she nodded once, crisply, even as another tear fell.

"What about all the soldiers you killed at Hoth? At Yavin? Good men with families? Did you feel that?" She didn't wait for an answer. "Because I did. I still do. Every day, I ache for those who have lost someone they love to this stupid war and so many of them are grieving because of you. I fight because I want things to be better for them, because I care about them, and that means I am not like you, I will never be like you. Haddon will be nothing like you."

She watched him angrily for several tense moments, a sudden, horrible thought forming in her mind and spreading cold throughout her body.

"Did you know?" she hissed, careful not to wake the sleeping infant in her arms. "At Bespin? Did you know that I was pregnant?" Her voice broke, but she continued. "Did you know that -- that Han was my husb -- that we were ... that you were killing my son's father?"

Anakin ducked his head for a moment and shifted uncomfortably, silently, before meeting his daughter's penetrating glare.

"Yes."

Leia closed her eyes. It was too much. She, perhaps, could have handled his lack of remorse at her torture four years ago, and his ambivalence towards Alderaan, because they had been fighting and were on different sides. She had been a prisoner and her home had been an enemy, and the old adage really justified it all with the fairness in love and war, didn't it?

But to know that her father was aware of her pregnancy, that he did what he did to Han in spite of the child growing inside of her ... Leia couldn't take it. How could she be expected to forgive Anakin for that? How was it fair?

"Leia," Anakin began, but she shook her head once and sank into the gliding chair behind her, eyes on her son because she couldn't stand to look at her father any longer. She was crying in earnest now, silent tears spilling down her cheeks.

"I think you should go now," she whispered, her words soft, defeated. "Please. I can't ... please just go."

Leia watched her sleeping infant for a long time, studying his cherubic face and finding solace from her anger in the beautiful life she and Han had created together, and when she at last looked up again, Anakin Skywalker was gone.