~@~ Steer the Shore

   Laus sat in his private study, deep in consideration.  Of course he had planned for either eventuality, but he had to admit that he had really expected the decision to go against Dare. His cause would have been helped if she could have been turned against the New Republic.... But it hadn't happened that way. Dare had remained on Coruscant as a free woman.  He would have to take things extra slowly now; this could complicate matters if he did not give it its full consideration. Not only was he as far away from gaining the services of Lara Dare as he ever had been, but he also had to worry about what she might be able to tell the New Republic about him. Still, as with all of life's little complications, the difficulties could also be made to fit his needs, and to help progress his plans. Laus would make sure of that. 

   The new bargaining chip he had gathered was already shaping up to be even more valuable a tool than he had first anticipated, and something that his esteemed associate would be sure to value – if Laus decided to share it with him, that was.  In the meantime he was inclined to keep that information to himself. He already had several uses of his own in mind, and there was always a certain value in knowing just a little more than your associates knew.

~

   Mara met with Leia early the next day so that they could go over the highlights of the latest Coalition reports. To both women's grave disappointment, there was no more information to be found on the "mystery ships," as the Rogues' popular description of the things had caught on.

   "It looks like they've gone underground,"  Leia admitted, and she couldn't help but note that Mara was starting to look a little more impatient than usual. "I know you've been here longer than you planned to be," Leia said with finality.  Mara's extra impatience likely stemmed from wanting to get off planet so that she could return to her other responsibilities.  "Thanks for checking in with me," Leia smiled as she offered Mara the dismissal, "maybe we'll have more to show for it in the next round."

   "I hope so," Mara acknowledged, "but it looks like things on my end have dried out.  We may not see anything else from them until they want us to," she added as she started to gather her things. "But then, maybe NRI will fare better in tracking them," she growled the afterthought, and snorted. "They didn't waste any time, offering Dare a position working with the old Imperial records."

   "I didn't realize," Leia said, collecting herself from a speechless silence.

   Mara was visibly surprised but continued packing notes and data cards into her bag.  "I figured with Luke being so much in her defense–" she trailed off. "Well, at least that you knew," she finished her thought more carefully.

   Leia's expression was questioning as she continued to study Mara.  "Mara, do you really believe that this woman is what she claims?" 

   Mara was silent for a moment; Leia's question sounded more like a challenge and Mara Jade couldn't help herself from responding in kind.  "I haven't heard her claim anything," she said wryly, then gave the matter a moment's silent consideration as she sealed her bag and threw it over her shoulder. "All I can say is that she has my respect, for whatever that's worth," Mara added from behind a tight grin. "Frankly, I'd thought that your brother's say would mean a lot more than mine," she observed, and her remaining grin tightened out when Organa Solo didn't notice the humor Mara had intended to create with the comment.

~

   Leia started walking during her midday break.  Before she realized that she was going anywhere in particular, she found herself at the records archives. "I can't believe this, even when I've seen it for myself," Leia stated loudly.

   Lara looked toward her voice.  "Intelligence approved it," she offered evenly. "I already know the files, probably better than they do. They thought that I may be able to find something here to backtrack the source of that shielding design."  The silence remained heavy, and Lara turned back to her work. "If nothing else, I can organize the records so that at least Intelligence will have a better idea of what's here," she finished, assessing her new role with a heavy tone of voice.

   "The Council may not think that you're a danger, and Intelligence may have decided that you can help them, but I don't hold with either of those views," Leia spoke firmly. "I don't trust you," she said without apology. The two women locked eyes for a long moment. "Maybe you thought you could use Luke to secure your freedom," Leia continued, her voice lowering a notch.  "Obviously you weren't so indebted to him that you didn't mind lifting out of here as fast as you could.  Or was all of that some kind of guise to draw him out after you, a test of his loyalty to you?" Leia took a step toward Lara.  "Whatever you've got in mind, be warned, I won't see you hurt him."  

   "I don't have anything in mind," Lara answered her evenly. "I don't expect to have anyone's good graces here; I realize that I'm lucky just to have my freedom. I do owe a great deal of that to Luke, and he is why I stayed.  He's been a friend to me. I don't have many friends left, and I've got no intentions to take advantage of his friendship."

   Leia's expression was obviously disbelieving.

   Something about that struck a cord in Lara, and Lara softened her own expression just a shade when she spoke again. "I know you're just looking out for your brother; I've got no intention to take advantage of that either."

   Leia snorted softly. "You had better not."  She paused, and her tone went even colder.  "It seems that people who are attached to you have a way of getting mysteriously dead.  I won't see my brother added to that list."

   With that said, Leia Organa Solo turned and left the record archives.  Lara stood frozen, watching her go, waiting for the blood she had felt drain from her system to return to circulation.

~

   "Listen, Leia, he knows what he's doing."  Han's reassurance echoed Mara's comments from earlier in the day. Why was it that everybody seemed to think she was off-base with this?

   "Even my brother is entitled to a blind spot, Han," she argued. 

   "True enough, especially if you're thinking what I think you're thinking."

   "What's that?" she asked, suspicious of that certain tone of voice from her husband.

   "That he might be getting, attached, to her," Han explained with an evasive shrug.

   "That definitely was not what I was thinking." Leia grimaced.

   "Ok, I was thinking it then," he added lightly.  "They did spend a lot of time together during the hearing."     

   "Han," she warned.

   "Don't be surprised, Sweetheart! Even a scoundrel can turn to mush if the right woman looks at him, in just the right way," he said, taking her hand affectionately.  Then he grinned that lopsided grin, and she failed miserably at staying frustrated with him.

~~ ~ () ~ ~~

   "Hi, Artoo," Lara greeted the little droid as he rolled up to her and began beeping excitedly.

   Luke had reminded her that Artoo tended to be a little eccentric when he had first offered the droid's assistance in her work with the records, but so far she was beginning to think that he had exaggerated.  The little droid had been a great help over the first two months when she was trying to sort the impossible numbers of files into something that she could work with, and he still continued the thankless task of sorting an incredible amount of information while she combed a much more limited collection of what she hoped would be the most relevant areas.  Through all that, this was the first she'd heard out of him aside from an almost peaceful low-pitched twittering to himself. The occasional visits from his counterpart were another story all together! 

   Lara smiled at the thought.  "Did you find something?" she asked, leaning down to read the translation consol that Artoo was plugging himself into. "Okay, give me a minute to pull it up," she directed patiently as the droid became more excited. 

   Lara bent closer to the console, reading, and the little droid's excited fluttering fell into an occasional, softly worried beeping.  Soon the room fell completely silent around her, but Lara had already tuned out the room, intently focused on what she was reading.

   She stayed in the archives a while longer, trying to scrape together anything else related to Artoo's finding. It was starting to get late when she came across an illusive final piece, and something else that was surprising.  She had thought that she knew her way around most of the Imperial files, and certainly all of the remaining undamaged areas.  But that last file carried a strange encrypt, and seemed to stick out curiously from the dregs of the d files. She saved a copy of it to work up the encrypt later and hurriedly gathered up the rest of the day's findings.

~

   Luke headed her off just as she reached the Grand Corridor.  He was cheerful, but a little quiet.  "You here to see Leia?" she guessed.

   "I went by.  It didn't go so well, but that's been the norm lately," he admitted. 

   They walked a little further in silence.

   "Luke," she said softly, drawing his attention.  "I don't blame her for not trusting me – just the opposite. I expect that. I know where it's coming from; she's worried for you." Her voice softened noticeably. "I understand that," she confided.  "Luke, I won't come between the two of you," she said uncomfortably.  "I couldn't do that."

   He smiled. "I know, and I wouldn't let that happen either.  Leia means too much to me." He took a deep breath. "But it hasn't come to that. Let's give her some time to come around, to see that you really are harmless," he grinned.

   She laughed. "I don't know if I've ever been called that before," Lara decided, holding on to just a hint of mock indignation. He had a way of totally taking her off her guard, and it was a liberating feeling. Luke knew her well enough that he was able to cross those lines at will, usually making her laugh, and sharing his... usually leaving her awed with him.  He gave so much of himself, and offered everything freely.  His friendship was a truly amazing gift. 

   "I think I've made some progress on backtracking those ships," she told him as they walked.  "Nothing definite yet, but a lead that might pan out."

   He watched her for a moment. He was getting the curious feeling that there was more to it than that, but he put the feeling aside.  She would tell him when she was ready, when she had all the information she wanted. 

   "There haven't been any more sightings, have there?" she asked, picking up on his hesitation.

   "No," he answered.

   "Well, I guess that's a good thing," she mused.  "It's more the Empire's style to ram a new super-weapon right down on top of an enemy." She stopped unexpectedly, and the sudden change in her emotions prompted Luke to look at her questioningly. "Maybe I am spending too much time in those archive files," she mumbled, rubbing a hand across her tired eyes; "I have to keep reminding myself that all of those records are at least a decade old, and we're not dealing with the Empire anymore." 

   "Well, at least not straight-forwardly," Luke amended. "It's only the Remnants now." 

   "And the warlords who are steadily picking them clean," she added. "That means all bets are off," Lara surmised more darkly.

   He was silent for a moment.  "I'd agree with the general idea though.  A powerful, well-organized enemy would be more prone to take a hard-line stand, and to use its strongest weapons to the fullest.  The fact that they've broken off implies a hit-and-fade type of attack strategy. That could mean that they don't have the numbers to launch a full-on assault, or that they're waiting," he added the second possibility.

   "But what could they be waiting for?" she posed the rhetorical question that they had no answer to yet.

   "Even if we're not dealing with the Remnants, those plans definitely came out of the Imperial records," Luke stated. Her face was thoughtful, following his reasoning.  "Who could have provided that?" he asked the next logical question.

   She sighed.  "Normally, the list would be small."

   "But."

   "But," she conceded, "I was doing some reading while I had time on my hands, and one of the things I was curious about was the transition period after Endor."

   Now Luke nodded, and his mind went back to those days. They were the culmination of government collapse and military squabbling within the ranks of the fallen Empire.  They were long, uncertain, and chaotic times. Then had come the moment of truth when the next step had to be taken and all that they had fought for had to be pulled out of that chaos.

   He remembered vividly the view from aboard the Rebellion cruiser as he had stood with the others, core leadership and hardened warriors of the Rebel Alliance. He remembered that first overwhelming sight of Coruscant and the electric feeling in the air as Mon Mothma had hailed the planet and asked for its surrender – to the New Republic.

   The silence had become deafening, and it seemed like an eternity before a civilian voice returned their hail.  Luke could still hear it against the silence of the bridge: "New Republic cruiser, this is Coruscant.  You have our full surrender."  And then the cheers that erupted on both sides of the comm linkage had become deafening. 

   He smiled at the memory, recalling the vivid emotions of joy and hope. But the official changing of the guard had been only that; it had still taken over a year for New Republic Intelligence to comb the city throughly enough even for local leadership to be comfortable in the Emperor's former home. During that time Coruscant had become the unofficial headquarters for criminal trial of top-ranking Imperials, starting with those trapped on world. Overnight, it seemed to have become a twisted refugee camp. 

   "There was a great deal of chaos then," Lara stated.

   "And for a long time afterwards, as well," Luke agreed absently. It had still been a shock to many when the Provisional Council suggested only a short time later that the seat of government for the New Republic be brought here.  But regardless, when the first session of the New Republic Senate had been called to order, it was done from the old Imperial Palace.  

   "Almost anyone could have gotten access during that," he noted, but his voice was still far away.  Luke was remembering the feel of his own emotions during those difficult days, how he had spent as much time as he could salvage trying to find information on his Father, on the Jedi... but Luke had only found, over and over again, that the Emperor had destroyed the legacy of the Jedi in record and history as throughly as he had destroyed them physically.

   Luke had realized then that he was the last of the Jedi, and that there would be no one to help guide his way. He had seldom felt so uncertain and so utterly alone as he had at that dark moment. 

   "Hey."

   The reassuring quiet of her voice broke into his stark memory. He shook it off, physically trying to put that difficult emotion aside.  She stood there holding the rooftop door open, waiting for him to join her. Her expression gently reminded him that she already knew; she was patiently waiting for him to come back to the present, and she knew that it was more than just the memory of difficult times that had left him feeling distracted and tormented. 

   "Just one of those things," he shrugged sadly, struggling to explain it. "Reminds me again, of all that I don't know." He tried a smile despite the heavy emotions that weighed on him. Looking to her, he could see that she wasn't fooled by it either. She stood beside him in the Palace doorway for another heartbeat before she took a careful step forward, slowly walking ahead of him again.

   "What things?" she asked, looking back with gentle curiosity. 

   They sat down on the stone bench midway across the Palace roof.  His eyes flashed over hers before he spoke, and a touch of amazement mixed with the sadness and loss that he was feeling.  "Over a thousand generations," he said, shaking his head in dismay.  "Gone, without so much as a trace of what it all meant. One man destroyed all that, almost single-handedly."

   He shook his head again. "All I know is the little bit that Ben and Yoda had time to pass on to me. What the Jedi believed or how they lived, I only know in pieces, seen through my teachers' eyes. Which parts were personal and which were solid, uncompromising code of fact, I can't say.  I was taught through their expectations of what I would need to know in the face of desperate circumstances, and so much remains a mystery to me.  The simplest of questions, and the most complex philosophies...." He trailed off, and fell silent for a long moment. 

   "Now, if the Jedi are going to survive past me, I have to be the one who passes it on.  How do I do that?  How can I teach what I don't fully understand?  How do I pass on what I don't know how to live in my own life?" 

   Lara sighed beside him and Luke looked to her, realizing anew what it meant that she was there with him. She was feeling the same turmoil that he felt, wanting for the same answers... and through all that, her eyes were an anchor for him.

   She gave him a small smile.  "I don't know," she admitted gently.  "But I believe," she continued more firmly.  "I believe that it's in you, that you can find the way. Start with what you do know, with what you already have," she offered gently.

   He smiled, begrudgingly. "I've been working with Leia for some time now, but she has so much on her already. I don't know if she'll ever be able to dedicate enough time and effort to make herself a full Jedi.... And that's all right," he acknowledged, "her talents lie elsewhere. 

   "But her children are another matter.  They're very strong, even now, and I know that she wants more for them.... I hope that I can do right by them."

   She watched him, understanding a little more.  "But you don't know," she emphasized softly. 

   He closed his eyes, looking down.  She could see it cross his face again: memories of Ben and thoughts of his own father.  The enormous weight of responsibility and the terrible cost of failure.

   "Ben told me that he thought he could train my father, that he was amazed at how strongly the Force was with him, and he took that responsibility upon himself.  But he was wrong," Luke finished, his voice strained.  He shook his head slowly. "He was wrong. What does that say about my chances?" 

   Lara watched him wrestling with the strength of his own doubts, fighting the pain and uncertainty inside himself, and she wished that she had the answers he needed – the very faith that he needed.  She wished she could offer something to ease the painful emotions that tore at him.

   She moved closer to him, reaching an arm around his back and placing her hand on his shoulder. Luke glanced at her, a trace of surprise showing in his eyes before they quietly flickered away.  Lara let her gaze fall away from him as well, as they both accepted the gesture.  She could still sense the strain that his own great uncertainty placed upon him, and Lara moved a little closer, resting her head against the back of his shoulder. She simply shared the emotion with him, giving it its weight, and letting its burden lighten between them.

   "I know how hard it is," she finally spoke softly, "that you feel like so much is missing – and you're entitled to that.  But the biggest thing you can do is to pass on what you know. All that you've seen, all that you've lived, and all that it's taught you. There's more there than you think, more than you give yourself credit for." 

   She felt him smile in response.  It was a strange sensation: light joy, disbelievingly pushing at the much heavier weights of worry and doubt.

   "You're right," Luke said quietly, feeling a little stunned that the truth in her perspective was so easy to see. "I need to focus on what I can do, and not all the other uncertainties."

   Lara gently pushed back from him until only her hand remained resting on his shoulder. She smiled at Luke as she met his eyes, and he watched her, wondering at how she could see him so much more clearly than he saw himself, and how he had grown to trust that so completely. This connection between them kept growing stronger, and he had never felt anything like it, anything so true.

   His eyes lingered on hers, and her hand lingered on his shoulder for a long moment before they both smiled again, easily.  There was ease and comfort in this deep bond of friendship that had unexpectedly formed between them, but they each knew that the friendship was slowly growing into something more.... Luke took a deep breath as his thoughts shifted, deliberately moving away from places that he didn't want them to go.

   "Tell me some more about what you've come up with from the files," Luke prompted finally.

   "Two things," Lara picked up his train of thought and started in easily. "What if they aren't waiting for something? What if they've already got what they were looking for?  Most obviously, they got off a few test runs for their new toys.  That could be one objective, but they also chose to give the New Republic a good look at what they were doing. That, along with the big show of massing their assets, implies ambition.  They want to be known, or feared, or just to throw the New Republic off guard.  Something. 

   Now, why Aci?  There's its Imperial background.  Maybe they were trying to destroy something a little more specific than the planet's defense capabilities."

   "Evidence of how they got those plans," he put together her deduction.

   "And their own identity therein the process," she finished. 

   "Covering their tracks," he added. "So how do we get proof?"

   "That's the good part," she said.  "When I was in the archives today, Artoo was running files, including the original copies of all the battle data that NRI has on those ships.  He uncovered a nice little file, an undermessage, in the transmission your team overheard during the Rhaci skirmish."

~

   "Ghent broke that undermessage on the Rhaci transmission file," Mara reported from across the transmission divide. "Undermessages are so rare, he couldn't remember when he'd last seen one."

   Luke nodded. "NRI said the same thing, that, and they'll be sure to add a first copy search into their procedures in case it pops up again," he added. 

   "He thanks you," Mara continued. "Says it was a particularly fun break, if a little anti-climatic."

   Luke smiled. "Reality has a way of sounding dull to Ghent," he explained to Lara.

   "In this case, it's not really untrue," Mara admitted. It was a pretty bland message for such trouble.  It does end strangely though, with a course setting that doesn't seem to match up with anything on map. I put it through every oscillation I could think of, even asked Ghent to try shaking out a few.  Still no match. But I'll send the whole mess along.  You can see if it means anything to NRI."

   "Will do," Luke said, keying in the download.  "Thanks, Mara."

   "No problem. Take care," she signed off.

   Lara stood and walked over to the intelligence deck's main computer while Luke was getting the download copied into NRI records.  A strange memory occurred to her, something that she hadn't thought of in years. Farfetched, but she couldn't shake the feeling that it was important, related.

   Luke glanced after her, watching for a few moments before he went back to the information that Mara had just transmitted.  Then he felt a change in her sense.

   Luke stood and walked over to the place were she was standing. "What are we looking at?" he asked after looking over her shoulder for a couple of moments.

   "The nav specs from the Myrtle system to the Aci system," she answered without looking back at him.  "I remember the Executioner making a stop early on in that trip," she thought out loud. "I remember it because that stop ended up creating a very sticky delay for Vader; almost got Piett strangled on the spot, as a matter of fact....  That could have put us in Aci space according to the nav charts, and I happen to know that there was a development-type shipboard for that trip."

   She was silent for a moment, and Luke sensed a discomfort in her that went beyond the expected for either of the circumstances she was considering. "I'd bet on it," she decided finally, "a small base world, not on the maps, used as a supply station for whatever the Empire was running through Aci space."

   "It would be close enough to the Aci trade routes, and conveniently out of the way so as not to draw attention," Luke noted. 

   "Probably abandoned in a hurry after Endor, and very few people would know it ever existed."

   "But for the former Imperial who knows the location, it's just the place for keeping top secret plans and prototypes under wraps," Luke concluded.

~

   "You know, I think you could be right," Mara agreed the next day when they ran it past her for a second opinion.  "Not at all unusual for the Emperor to leave worlds uncharted for secrecy sake.  I don't remember this one specifically, but the location fits the purpose."  The silence held for a moment. 

   "You want me to find somebody to check it out?"  Mara offered tentatively.

   Luke glanced to Lara to see if she shared his opinion.

   "No," he responded slowly, "I think we'd better handle this one ourselves."

~

   Leia objected to the idea, rather adamantly. The strength of that objection caused Luke to have to do the one thing he had most hoped to avoid, and he stepped between the two women for the first time.

   "I'm asking you to reconsider this, Luke," she managed, getting a grip on her emotions.

   Luke shook his head. "I've already made my decision," he said with quiet certainty. "This is the best lead we've had since we started investigating this.  You've got to see that, Leia."

   "I see a lot of things," she intoned with an icy stare that looked past him in Lara's direction.

   "If I can get permission, we'll leave as soon as possible," he finished quietly.

   The tense moment held between them, and Luke glanced back to Lara. She quietly stepped outside.

   He looked back to Leia.  "I hate this," he said quietly. "I don't want to fight with you."

   She sighed, feeling guilty.  It seemed they had been doing a lot of this lately.

   "Neither do I, Luke. But I'll fight to the death if I think it'll save you from harm."

   He smiled, seeing the tough, strong sister he loved. And he bent to kiss her cheek. "Thank you for that." Then he leaned back to look her in the eye.  "But you've also got to give me a little credit.  Look at the bright side," he joked easily, "if I'm making a mistake, you get to say you told me so."

   She smiled begrudgingly. "Only if you promise I'll get that chance," she said, pulling him into a hug.  "Please be careful, Luke."

   "I will," he answered. "I promise."

~~ ~ () ~ ~~

   Luke and Lara filed into the cockpit, ready to bring the ship out of lightspeed. Luke sat in the pilot's seat preparing to take the controls, and Lara took the copilot's seat beside him, making the final checks before they came out of hyperspace.  It felt like the start of a mission, like a team ready to jump into coordinated effort, but there was something missing.

   "Are you all right?" He felt a break in her focus.  Lara was weighed down by something that was more tangible that the stress of this mission.  Luke had tried to draw her out before, several times over the last few days, but each time he was left feeling as though he was back on the outside, trying to see in. 

   Lara nodded, pushing away the distraction. With an effort, she put her regrets aside and concentrated once more on the task ahead of them. Everything she knew thus far pointed to danger in the mission ahead; she was acutely aware that both of them might not get out.  She had decided that there would be something she could do; it was a last ditch contingency plan that didn't include Luke's prior knowledge. She was realizing that she regretted that part of the plan far more than she had first anticipated, but if worse came to worse this could be their best chance at survival. It would be the surest chance one of them would get for escape, for saving the mission... and if it came down to it, she knew she would take that chance.

   "Just a little nervous," she assured him.

   It all felt too familiar   The distance in her emotions reminded Luke of the trip to Coruscant... but it hadn't been that way the whole time. Until a couple of days ago the air between them had been warm and alive. There had been nothing to do but pass the time; they spent long hours talking about nothing of weight, enjoying the quiet solitude and the close company, seeing each other in a different light. They were growing closer, each tending to developing feelings.  It was something that they felt out cautiously, giving a greater sense of mischief to a smile or a longer pause for a casual touch.

   A light infatuation played against the deeper friendship, hinting at deeper feelings.  It had been happy, purely happy, more than anything Luke had felt in a very long time.  The hope he had felt within him when she had agreed to stay – this was it and more. The possibility had come to life, that she would allow him to care for her, and that the closeness created in that could make her happy... he could make her happy.

   It was on the second leg of the trip that things had shifted noticeably. They started to gear toward the coming mission, preparing themselves for the intangibles of a largely unknown future, and stress levels increased as the time started to click down toward their arrival.  That much was expected, but this was something more.  This distance was something that Luke couldn't explain and it worried him, not just because of his feelings for her, but also for the mission. They were going into something that could be very dangerous, and if she was not ready or able to share the full weight of the task with him, it could land them in a lot of trouble.

   The nav counted down ten seconds to their arrival and Luke placed his hand over the lever, reaching out to the Force.

   Five seconds, three, two....

   "Here we go," Luke said.

   The mottled lines of hyperspace straightened, and finally returned to the pinpoints of the outer Aci system. 

   "And there it is," Lara said slowly. She hadn't been completely sure that it would be there, but just ahead of them, and at the precise coordinates indicated in the undermessage, there was a small planet shrouded in thick cloud cover.

   "Looks like they've got a natural camouflage," Luke mumbled. "Can you get any readings?"

   "I'm not picking up any technology on this side. Let's hope that means they won't see us coming."

   "Then we can hope the trek won't be too bad once we get down there," he pointed out.

   "Right," she noted, watching as he brought the ship in.  This was not going to be easy; but then, when was it ever? The side of the planet they put down on was mostly rock formation, almost uninhabitable. Luke put them down on the daylight divide and hunkered the ship into an outcropping that would provide cover and keep it hidden from sight.

   "Okay," he said with an upbeat sigh, and cut the power back as the ship settled. "Now let's see what we've got out there." 

   They made quick work of getting underway.  The combined experience between them at this sort of action made it feel almost routine.  They ran the standard battery of tests to make sure the environment was safe for human beings and started to break out the gear. For transport, they settled on an all-purpose speeder with a partial cloaking mechanism. Then they packed a week's worth of survival gear into the speeder and set off into the night side of the planet.

~

   After about a day's travel they had passed out of the rocky terrain and into forest. They had also started to pick up technology readings. 

   "There's something ahead," Luke noted grimly, glancing at the readings. 

   "Something big," Lara warned.  "With those kinds of numbers, this is no small-time fringe outpost. We're looking at heavy defense fields and long range comm capabilities, at the very least." 

   Luke only nodded.  "I agree. What ever they've got out here, they mean business."

   "And I'll bet they don't want company."

   Luke nodded again. He had already activated a number of features on the speeder's control panel, putting it into stealth mode; they pressed on for about another hour before stopping for local night.  By full nightfall they had set up camp under stealth conditions, and as an added precaution they would take shifts sleeping.  Lara volunteered for the first shift.

   When Luke awoke it was almost midnight; his first thought was that Lara should have woken him for the start of his shift at least a half hour ago. He quickly shook the grogginess from his mind and reached out to the Force.  He could feel her nearby; she was all right.  Luke sat up and rolled off of his pallet, his relief quickly evaporating.  The light from one of the planet's four half moons was shining through the trees, casting a glossy glow around the camp.  Lara was sitting in the shadows, staring into the night.

   "Lara," he whispered, placing a hand on her shoulder. 

   She jumped.  "What's wrong?" Luke asked, his voice troubled.

   "You startled me," she said, laughing as she tried to calm her rattled nerves.

   Luke wasn't satisfied with the obvious answer. "That's not what I mean."  He sat down beside her and put his hand over hers.  "You don't have to hide what you're feeling from me."

   He sensed something... then her emotions went quiet, covering.

   "Lara, things were so simple between us on the trip here." Luke smiled at that memory.  "Just having that time together, being near each other. That felt good, and I know it made you happy too.  I felt that."

   She shifted her weight uncomfortably, and he let her pull her hand away from his.

   "Now I'm fighting again, just to get a glimpse of what you're really feeling." He touched her, his fingertips tracing along the line of her cheek as he looked into her face. "Who are you trying to protect now?" he asked curiously.  "Me, or yourself – because I can take it, Lara, and I think that I can help you, if you'll let me."

   "I just don't know what I feel, Luke," she whispered, dropping her head. That was a lie, but why was she lying to him?  She must know that he could tell. "Please don't ask me any more."  The request that followed was completely sincere.

   He reached out to her again, gently lifting her chin with the curve of his forefinger. "I care for you. No matter what you feel for me, that won't change.  All I ask from you in return is honesty."

   She nodded, looking away from him. Then she stood and slowly walked back toward the camp, troubled.

   Luke sighed, feeling his hope evaporate. She did trust him on a lot of levels, but she might never trust him completely.  It had nothing to do with him or even her feelings for him; she had proven that by lying to him tonight, and he suspected that her worried distraction and the distance between them were just further expressions of the same problem. Telling him what she truly felt would mean allowing another person the ability to hurt her, and Lara might not be willing to cross that line.  She might never be able to accept that kind of weakness in herself. He had to accept that.

   Even so, Luke realized that there was no turning back now; he had come to depend on her. She had not once faltered in the three months since he had gone to her on the platforms. Her loyalty had been complete, and his faith in her was great.  He reminded himself that the underlying friendship between them was solid, and Lara was nothing if not professional. Tomorrow it would be the mission at hand, and all her focus would be on getting the job done... but would that be enough?

   Had he misread her determination to undertake this, or at least her determination to undertake this with him at her side? Lara was used to going it alone, especially when it was her life on the line; if she was going into harm's way, she would rather be alone.  But this time that could be dangerous.  If she couldn't put her old ways aside and learn to work with him in the days ahead, that same stubbornness recklessness that had managed to keep her alive could easily get both of them killed.

~

   The next day they packed up their essential lightweight equipment, covered the speeder, and continued on foot. By mid-day they had found the sizable encampment they'd been expecting.  Hunched on a slight outcropping with a set of macros, they could make out two sets of four bunkers aligned in a V formation. Half of the bunkers looked deserted; perhaps they had been converted to storage space. The rest of the facilities were very much in use.  There was a lot of activity, a lot of equipment under cover, and a great deal of energy being pumped into defense shielding and transmission cloaking. 

   Whatever was going on here, they wanted it kept secret.

   "Let's get a look around the other side of the bunkers," Lara suggested, spotting a high-domed building just beyond the others.

   "I see it," Luke echoed. "That could be a sizable hanger."

   "Exactly," she breathed, already on her way out.

~

   Luke made a low whistling sound under his breath when the hanger turned out to be more sizable than he had expected. And fuller. 

   "I second that," Lara mumbled as she dug into her pack for the macros and their built-in recorder.

   Luke was already making his own survey.  "I can count at least thirty of our mystery ships, plus about twenty more of unknown design, and a few Republic and Imperial types scattered in, just for variety."

   "How indiscriminate of them," Lara echoed Luke's observation as she brought the macros around for another sweep. The hanger was protected by a high-domed ceiling that extended a third of the way down its sides; it reminded Lara of a child's fort with a blanket thrown over the top for a ceiling. The actual structure was pillared, with its partial walls gathering to the ground at intervals to support the ceiling's weight.  The entrance was located at the side furthest away from them, appearing to arch up into the dome's structure.  It was an impressive architectural design, from what they could see of it.  "Okay," Lara said, shutting the macros down. "Now what?"

   "Wait a minute," Luke breathed, his attention still glued on the hanger. She followed his line of sight.  There was movement on the far side, beyond the hanger's entrance.

   "They're clearing a landing pad," she realized.

   "A very large pad." 

   They waited, watching until a large freight ship, reminiscent of the mid-size crewers that Luke had seen at Rhaci, slowly cleared the atmosphere. Then they waited again.

   "Blast." Lara cursed under her breath, but the word held no venom.  "I know it wouldn't be much better, but I was really hoping that they would be on-loading," she said.  The macros were now trained on the lines of fighters that were steadily pulling off the transport, ships being brought into the hanger for storage.

   Luke looked to her, his expression dark. "This means that those ships are being produced somewhere else."

   "And all these are all bound for somewhere else," she added as darkly.

   He grimaced. "Right.  Now what?" he returned.

   She absently held a hand to her mouth, thinking, keeping her eyes on the hanger. "I'd hate to leave these ships at our back, but it really does no good to destroy them if they can just send another batch at us from somewhere else."

   He was silent for a moment.  "Agreed," he said.  "Let's circle back the way we came. One of those bunkers we saw may have housed the command structure."

   She nodded.  "It's a good place to start."

~

   They paused to regroup when they reached the outcropping that overlooked the base.

   "If we circle around, I think we can edge through right over there," Lara said, motioning to a clearing in the forest below them. It was very near to what looked like a side entrance into the bunker.  Then her thoughts came to an abrupt pause.  Luke was looking ahead, his gaze unfocused.

   She waited, reaching out to the Force, following his sense.  A moment later she felt it too. A small group of guards stepped out of the bunker with purpose in their minds.

   "Uh oh," she mumbled, resting a hand on her blaster.

   "No, it's not us," he said just a little distantly. 

   Lara froze, calming her emotions and reaching out again with her feelings. He was right.  The guards weren't expecting anything; they were just cautiously alert. They stood together talking among themselves for a few moments and then spread out along the bunker's perimeter, leaving the entrance Lara had sighted clear again.

   Luke glanced toward her only to find that she was watching him, waiting for his cue. "Ready?" he asked.

   She nodded.  "Let's go."

   They made their cautious way down from the outcropping and through the forest until they could see the bunker across a small clearing.  From there they paused to scope out the entrance at closer range.

   "I don't see signs of any surveillance or traps," Lara reported.

   Luke agreed. "It looks clear."  They exchanged a ready nod and moved the rest of the way in. 

   They reached the building quickly, then managed to rig the entrance's locking mechanism and avoid being spotted for long enough to get inside. The layout of the building was something neither Old Republic nor Imperial standard, leaving Luke wishing that he knew more about the Acii culture than what the talkative Senator from this system had offered to him on more than one occasion. They started moving toward what they thought should be the command area, the area most adjacent to the hanger and landing platforms, but it was hard to maintain a sense of direction through all the hallways that converged on one another.

   They quickly ducked out of the way of another small security team.

   Lara turned to look at Luke, her expression serious. That had been the third one they had narrowly avoided, and only thanks to the maze-like hallways.

   "Not a quiet day," Luke murmured. 

   "Think it's anything more than the off-loading we saw?"

   He reached out to the Force, and after a moment shook his head.  "No.  I don't think they suspect anything unusual.  They're just nervous over receiving this shipment."  

   She nodded, but the feeling that something was off didn't go away.

   Luke paused in his thought.  "Something about this shipment, is unusual for them," he finished cautiously.

   "Let's see if we can't get to the control area and see where those shipments are coming from before they have a chance to notice us," Lara suggested, and the two of them started back out, carefully hugging the walls as they crept through the winding halls.

   Judging by the steadily increasing traffic, they were getting closer.  With his senses still extended, Luke picked up a noise. He motioned for Lara to go ahead while Luke watched behind them. Lara ducked around the next corner as Luke turned his attention to the hall behind them, but his investigation was cut short. Luke immediately felt surprise in Lara's sense.  Splitting his attention between the two sides, he heard her addressing someone, authority in her voice. 

   A younger man's voice came back, prompt with respect and measured familiarity. "Agent Dare. I didn't know you were working out here." 

   "I just came in," Lara responded, motioning in the direction of hanger.

   Luke felt a twinge of guilt as he listened, thinking that she did that just a little too easily.

   "What's the latest progress here?" she asked tightly. 

   The guilt vanished as Luke smiled to himself.  Not only had she faked this person into thinking that she belonged here, now she was pumping him for information.

   "Dangin's elated, though he won't show it. We've never had a shipment this big here.  Of course he says he's just anxious to unload it before it becomes an eyesore."

   Lara snorted lightly.

   "Still, you can see he's glad to be in the thick of things again," he continued. "Speaking of, I've got to get out there myself," the young man finished, excusing himself.

   Luke ducked back against the wall, just catching a glimpse of the man as he continued through another of the bunker's passages; he wore the rank of ensign.  "That was quick thinking," Luke said, stepping around behind Lara. 

   "That made my skin crawl," she returned, all business. "Are we clear?"

   Luke nodded. "The team that was behind us broke off down another passage toward the hanger."

   "If this place had any more hallways it would be a maze instead of a bunker," she grumbled.  "Let's keep moving."

   Luke nodded. That encounter with the ensign had bothered her. "You know that 'Dangin' he mentioned?"  Luke asked from behind her.

   "A middle tier Imperial officer."  She cast a look back at him.  "Not a big fish."

   Luke looked at her curiously for a moment before Lara grinned and turned ahead. 

   She had hardly taken another step before he reached for her shoulder, stopping her in mid stride.  Lara froze and looked back to him.  Luke cautiously motioned ahead of them and Lara made an effort to reach out with her own senses. It was a slight ripple in the Force but she could feel the disturbance as well, now that she knew where to look for it.

   They waited a little longer, until the activity ahead of them had died down again. Lara felt the Force settle into a quiet buzz, no longer warning her of danger, only confirming that she was not alone here.  She looked toward Luke; he nodded, and she moved forward again while he stayed in cover. They kept on that way as they moved into the hub of the building. A few turns later they had reached the building's control room. 

   Now the roles reversed.  Without question, she nodded for him to go in and Lara stayed outside as his backup.  Reduced staffing due to the off-loading and the busy atmosphere it had created in the base made it relatively easy for Luke to distract the two men manning the small control room. They hardly even looked at him as he paged through the work orders for today's delivery and pulled up the information so that he could copy it onto a data card.

   He held the contact for a few extra moments while he slipped out of the room and nodded the all-clear to Lara. She took the lead position again and they started carefully backtracking their way out of the base.

~

   Lara made it as far as the next turn before an imposing figure blocked her way.  She halted abruptly, maintaining a distance between the two of them.  She could feel Luke's surprise at her sudden halt; then there was belated understanding, followed by worry. 

   "Dangin," she identified the man of average build and temperament, who was oddly weighted under his strange burden.  "What's with the lizard?"

   Ysalameri. Luke put the pieces together just as Lara gave him the hint. They were small, tree dwelling, lizard-like creatures whose distinctive trait was their ability to push the Force away from themselves; that trait was a defense mechanism which, on their native planet, protected them from their primary predators, vornskrs. But any Force sensitive standing within that bubble would be effectively blinded to the Force.  Thus far Lara was keeping herself far enough away so that the creature 's influence didn't affect her, but the Ysalameri's influence had already prevented them from sensing the approach of Dangin and his guards.

   "A little inconvenient, but they do have their advantages," the middle-aged officer acknowledged.  "It's become standard procedure to keep one or two around since the late Grand Admiral was astute enough to realize their unique benefits."

   Lara watched Dangin carefully, not giving anything away. Only a handful of people within the Empire had known that Lara Dare had the ability to use the Force.

   "When I heard we had visitors I assumed that Skywalker or perhaps Jade may see the benefits of this little animal."  He smiled, creating what Lara thought was a particularly oily image.  "Your presence here is a surprise indeed, though not an entirely unwelcome one." 

   "I'm glad to hear that," Lara intoned calmly.  "When I came across your name attached to the shielding development reports in the d Files, I thought it might be worth checking out."

   Luke frowned; that was what she had been keeping under wraps. 

   The officer made a cautious sound in response. "I think there could be beneficial arrangements to be made, but let's not forget the small matter that you didn't come here alone." 

   "The New Republic doesn't trust me; that's why they sent their watchdog along." 

   "I think your companion would react a little differently to being here with you if he knew that you were bargaining with a former officer of the great Empire.  Of course, I think there's a lot that the New Republic would react a little differently to, if they knew those things about you."

   "But they're in a difficult situation. They know that I can help them... just like you do."

   "Where is he?"

   Luke pushed back the discomfort that was pressing at him.  This was an obvious attempt to undermine them.  Convince the former Imperial to turn on the New Republic and hand over Luke Skywalker.

   "You'll deal with me first," Lara challenged him cooly.  "Once an agreement is reached, then we'll discuss Skywalker."

   Luke tensed. For a few seconds there was only silence.

   "Let's call it a show of good faith," Lara prompted icily.

   "Very well.  We'll deal with you.  You were able to find your way here.... How much of what you know does Coruscant also know?"

   Lara didn't answer right away.

   "Not that I'd underestimate their Intelligence capabilities," he amended, "only that I have great respect for your considerable abilities, Collque Dare."

   The sensation of crawling skin returned to her as he called her by the more obscure working title, something that he should not have known. "The question you should be asking is, how can what I know help you?  You're wondering what I can provide for your benefit," she continued without letting her new caution show through.

   "Please," he groaned, exasperated with the pace of their conversation. "Enough circling around the matter; even with Skywalker in tow, I know exactly what you're up to by coming here." 

   Lara suppressed a smile. Middle tier all the way through: possessing no patience or foresight, only able to deal with what's placed directly in front of him.  Push him just the right way, and he can't contain his own narrow sights.

   "Admit it. You've seen inside Coruscant, and now you have information.  You want to use it to come back."

   "I have more than information, what do you have to offer?" Lara asked, taking the bait and twisting the hook in.

   Luke swore to himself as he felt that same discomforting emotion pressing at him again; he didn't like the way this was going.  It felt wrong.  Then it hit him.  He felt something, or a lack of something to be more accurate. He sent a thought to Lara. They were being boxed in. 

   "Not here," she demanded almost instantly, deathly calm. "I want to see those ships I've read so much about, close up, before this negotiation goes any further."

   "Very well," Dangin answered into the silence.

   Luke's sense broke off from Lara as she stepped closer to Dangin, following him toward the hanger. She hoped that Luke would understand what she was about to do....

   Luke cut into a nearby access panel with his lightsaber, allowing him to get out of the maze-like corridors. Then he cut down through the floor and managed to stay one step ahead of the guards as he began following Lara's route toward the hanger.  He hoped that Lara knew what she was doing. More to the point, he hoped that she had an escape plan in mind. 

~

   Dangin's party had already reached the hanger by the time Luke caught up with them.  Luke hadn't been able to sneak unnoticed onto the hanger floor; every entrance and exit had been too heavily guarded. He had finally left the building and circled around the hanger perimeter from the outside, but he eventually found the position he wanted. From under brush cover at the hanger's edge, Luke was able to make eye contact with Lara.

   She tilted her head, motioning casually toward the heavy pillars which marked the entrance to the hanger.  He followed her gaze and nodded his understanding.  She was using her position to scout the area, planning the best places to set their charges. Luke frowned; what she was proposing would destroy the hanger and all the ships in it, but the necessary explosives were back in the speeder; she knew that he didn't have anything of that magnitude on him.

   She looked to him again, discretely holding his gaze, and Luke wondered what she had in mind.  Then he saw the guards that were moving to circle off the perimeter behind her, followed shortly by the handful that moved directly in toward her.

   With a cold chill, he realized what she had in mind. He wouldn't let her do it.

~

   She watched Luke with half of her attention. The other half was fully aware of the troops moving in at her back.  She had taken that chance when she had come out here, exchanging sure capture for both of them for the possibilities that open air offered.  That also meant the possibility of shear, overpowering numbers, which appeared to be where this was going, and Luke would know that.  They had the information they needed. He could get it away and come back to set charges that would take out the hanger.  It would be worth it.

   He wouldn't like it, but it would be worth it.

   She cast a relevant glance at the guards closing in on her before she turned to Dangin and bowed slightly, conceding the advantage that he held.  Even as she spoke the words she hoped that Luke was already on his way out. 

   "I surrender."

~

   Her escort of six guards left the influence of Dangin's yalsarmi a few paces before they reached the building's entrance. Dangin was sending her to confinement; likely she would be given a lengthy stay in solitude to think about how much she wanted to tell them in exchange for her freedom.

   A split second later, a blast exploded to her back.  Her guards scattered into defensive positions.  Instinctively Lara ducked down, taking a step toward the forest that hugged the edge of the hanger.  Then Luke grabbed her arm.  She swore under her breath. Looking back, she could see the guards starting to regroup. They had realized what was going on and were moving, with weapons drawn, to break up her escape. 

   She turned and followed Luke's retreat into the forest.  They headed into the thickest of the underbrush, putting as much difficult terrain between them and the coming trackers as they could.  Then they cut across a stream bed to reach easier ground and pushed ahead again, this time for distance. 

   "You know that wasn't what I had in mind," Lara gritted under her breath as they pulled up for a moment, catching their breaths and calculating their next move.  They had almost reached the outcropping where they had first sighted the base, and where they had stashed their gear.

   He looked down at her from the slight embankment he stood upon.  "Yeah.  That's what I was afraid of," Luke mumbled and pulled his pack out from under a brush pile to swing it on over his shoulders, watching as Lara did the same. "Let's head east a little further, then we can start to circle back toward the speeder."

   "It'll be a long hike, with them at our backs the whole way –  and we won't be able to get close enough to do any damage to that hanger if we pull out now," she argued.

   He whirled back to her, but his eyes quickly moved away from her face, looking past her. They both heard the sounds of a search party behind them. 

   "We've got no other choice," he said tightly.  "Every troop in that base is in these woods now, searching for us; if we stay here too long, they capture us. Mission over."

   She nodded.  Luke was right; they would have to find another way.

~

   Lara felt the warning sensation tickle at the back of her mind, and she dove for cover.  She was half a step behind Luke when she tucked herself under, diving into a roll.  But in midair, halfway through the motion, there was a flash of pain and she felt herself go down hard, landing wrong. 

   Luke called her name, not knowing for a moment how bad it was. Lara hit the ground hard and rolled onto her side, curling her hip under her, instinctively tucking in to cover her injuries.  Luke dropped down beside her, a gentle hand at her shoulder.

   "Let me see," he said, softly but insistently.

   With an effort and a groan of restrained agony, Lara turned onto her back, gripping her side for support as she tried not to move her right leg.  After a moment she shifted up to her elbows; again, the effort was greeted by shooting pain, and her breathing came heavily as she tried to control the pain.  Lara looked to Luke, who was a light touch at her knee and ankle.

   "It's broken, just above the ankle," he said without looking to her.

   She nodded, already suspecting, and braced herself as best she could.  He was already cutting through the leg of her boot, to remove it before swelling could become a problem.

   "I'll make it as quick as I can," Luke said, glancing to her. 

   She nodded again.  "Go ahead."

   In one movement, Luke pulled against the leg and pushed the bone back into place, and he tried to ease the pain, all at the same time. She fell back to the ground, her breathing labored through clinched teeth and her eyes squeezed tight against the pain.  Luke watched her worriedly while he worked, moving quickly and keeping a part of his mind open to the forest around them. He had added a slit in her pant leg when he had cut off her boot, and he used part of the extra material to loosely wrap the break site, hoping that it would be enough to help hold the bone into place until there was time for something more permanent.

   He glanced up to her again, suddenly more worried. "Lara. You've got to stay conscious." For a moment she had relaxed, a little too much. "Focus on me," he instructed, leaning toward her. 

   Her eyes snapped open and she struggled to sit back up.  He reached around her shoulders to help her. She was a little wobbly and shook her head against the fogginess, taking deep breaths. Then she leaned forward slightly, testing her balance.

   Luke shifted his weight back onto the balls of his feet; he had felt something, and he stretched out with his senses as he moved into a crouch.  A hand still on her back, he could sense that Lara was waiting too, pushing herself to ignore the pain.

   The danger passed, but their trackers were close. 

   "Luke, we've got to get moving," she spoke his thought.

   "Yeah," he breathed knowingly, and moved closer to her side. "Try not to put any weight on it," he instructed tightly. 

   She put an arm around his shoulders and with his help she pushed herself to standing. 

~

   They moved at a brisk pace for about twenty minutes. For the last five, he was keenly aware that the pain was growing steadily worse for her, though Lara stubbornly refused to let it show through. 

   When she finally spoke it was through clinched teeth, and Luke knew she couldn't go much further.  She was already starting to shake with fatigue. 

   "I know," he said urgently, realizing that he was breathing hard as well.  "Not much further."

   A few minutes later they found a makeshift shelter.  It was a partially collapsed cave that could be further camouflaged to be totally hidden from the eye, especially with nightfall quickly approaching.  Once the entrance had been disguised to Luke's liking they made their way into a larger room away from the cave's mouth.  Lara leaned heavily on his shoulder and he helped her to make a precarious limping turn so that she could sit down against the wall – but her good leg gave way beneath her as she tried to lower herself, dropping her hard into the wall at her back. 

   Luke was caught off balance trying to break the unexpected fall; he caught her in a partial Force grip and his hand automatically moved to her waist as she slid down to the cave floor.  It was then that he saw the black tear in her clothing, as she hit, before she could grip her left side again.

   "Lara," he hissed, dropping to one knee and reaching across her. He opened the rip further to see the burn. 

   "It's not bad," she breathed, "the leg's what worries me."

   "You should've shown me," he mumbled, unconvinced, as he dug through the small med pack at his belt for a burn kit.

   She was watching him as he leaned back across her, and she grinned suddenly. "I was a little busy."

   Luke stared, trying to keep a straight face as he felt his tension abruptly melt away. He only shook his head at her as he reached to clean the wound, but she could see him smiling too; there was relief in him, in spite of his exasperation with her.  The combination made her own grin widen as she lifted her eyes up toward the ceiling, looking away from the pain as Luke started cleaning the burn. 

   He cleaned the wound and applied a bandage, then he sat back, studying her.  Again, Luke was worried. She leaned against the wall, her eyes shut, exhausted, and still in a lot of pain. But her breathing was steady and regular.  She was containing it.  Luke sighed at the heavy realization – he should have expected as much from her.

   "I'll see if I can find something to wrap that leg with," he said a little absently. Luke removed his survival pack and started searching for the emergency med kit inside.  When he turned back she was watching him again, tiredly. Now was not the time, he cautioned himself.  He needed to get her injuries taken care of. Gently, he picked up her ankle and started to wrap it, trying to concentrate on the task... but he stopped a few seconds later, sighing at the space between them. The air felt painfully heavy where there hadn't been a space before. 

   Lara felt it too, and she sat watching him, waiting for him to look at her, to talk to her.  Another moment passed before he lifted his eyes to hers; she could see the hurt there, knew that she'd hurt him somehow. In the smallest of movements, she flinched, stung by that.

   "You could have told me, you know," he said quietly. It bothered him more than he was comfortable with, that even with so much on the line, something still had prevented her from being honest with him.  It didn't help that her actions and decisions had ended up getting her shot.

   "I know," she answered. 

   That wasn't the answer he had expected, and it only added to his lack of understanding. 

   "I should have told you back at the camp, what I was expecting and what I was planning," she admitted.

   He shook his head, disappointed. "You think I would have just stood by and let you surrender, so that I could escape."

   "I would have done it, if it had come to that," she answered evenly, unflinching. 

   Luke shivered.

   "Well, I wasn't going to give you a vote," she added, acknowledging his discomfort.  "You were going to escape," she stated certainly, "even if I had to send them after you to make it happen."

   Luke shook his head again, but he laughed. "Thanks," he managed, and returned to wrapping her ankle.

   "I'm sorry, Luke," she offered.  "You asked me to be honest with you and I should have been. I'm just more comfortable taking the risk myself; I guess it's what I'm used to," she finished.

   "I understand that, Lara, but if we're gonna accomplish this mission and keep ourselves from getting killed in the process, we have to work together. See if you can put any weight on it," he prompted, gesturing to the ankle he had just finished wrapping.

   He stood and took her hands for support as she tried it.

   Lara stood on her left leg and put the other foot down, testing it carefully.  Soft shell wrapping was usually supportive enough for a bad sprain but it wasn't going to take enough pressure off the break to allow her to put any weight on that leg, much less travel on it. She shook her head without looking back to Luke.

   He could already tell the lack of success by her elevated breathing. "I'll have to try to make a splint for it," Luke noted, and he helped her keep her balance to sit again.  "I'll be right back."

   She nodded as he excused himself, and Lara sat looking up through a crack in the stone ceiling, listening to the quiet night outside.  Trying to clear her head.

   He returned in a few minutes with some wood pieces and set to wrapping the break above her ankle again. It was a much more painful process this time, despite his attempts to ease it. "Sorry," Luke apologized, wincing.

   She found the stars through the gap again, trying to distract herself this time. "I'm not gonna be any use tomorrow at this rate," she gritted. "We need something to take the swelling down, numb it a bit."

   "That would help," he conceded.  "Unfortunately the emergency packs are pretty limited on that sort of thing."

     With only a small amount of available space to provide for a wide range of injury and illness treatments, the packs tended to provide for the extremes.  Splints and swelling were not among them. The pain represents were also of the extreme variety, far from ideal. 

   Carefully, he pulled the set a little tighter as he tied off the wrapping. "I looked around for some roots or herbs–"

   "All right, farm boy," she cut him off, suppressing a grin, "what about cold water?" she asked, motioning further into the cave with a tilt of her head.

   "Yeah," he answered, giving her his best annoyed stare as he listened. "That could be running water.  I'll go have a look."

   A few minutes later he carried her back to the small stream and carefully placed her ankle in at the edge as he set her down.

   She squinted.  "That's cold all right."

   "Good," he quipped. 

   Smiling, he sat down beside her. And protectively, he took his lightsaber from concealment at his belt and attached it to his side nearest the entrance. 

   When he looked back to her, her eyes were closed.  He could tell she was concentrating on the leg. "Any better?"

   "Yeah. Already feeling a bit numb, which is good," she grinned at him.  Then she shifted her weight a bit and looked at him thoughtfully.  "I really don't know why I didn't tell you," she said softly, suddenly remembering how she had felt back on the ship. During their approach, that feeling of regret that she had felt through her determination... she had missed his input while contemplating the planned sacrifice to save the mission, to save him, with her last ditch contingency plan.  "None of the reasons stand up now," she thought out loud.  "What's worse, I realize now that if I had told you what I was thinking, expecting, we probably could have come up with a stronger, tighter plan. Maybe avoided all of this."

   He nodded. "I think so too. And you know," he added with quiet confidence, "I've got a feeling that if we could just work together, the two of us could be unstoppable."

   "Okay," she acknowledged easily, stifling a smile. "New game plan, all teamwork."

   "That includes being honest with me about that leg," he was quick to admonish her.

   She smiled and agreed. "Okay."

   He slowly sat back against the stone wall, surprised to find that almost as soon as he did, he felt deeply tired. A peaceful silence surrounded them for a few minutes, but it was broken when Lara sighed heavily, shifting her weight against the stone wall at her back.  She was utterly exhausted but it was impossible for her to rest comfortably. Finally she gave up on comfort and just leaned her head back against the cold stone, stubbornly closing her eyes against her pains and discomforts.

   Luke glanced in her direction. He could see the fatigue showing on her features as she let her head rest against the wall at their backs. He tried not to let himself think about it, but his mind returned again to seeing her fall, and not knowing....

   She opened heavy eyes to look at him.  "I'm all right, Luke," she said softly.

   Her eyes were alive and bright, despite the pain and fatigue she was fighting. If that blast bolt had been just a foot over, if she had waited just a half second longer to dive out of its path....

   She reached a hand to him, resting it palm up on the stone floor. 

   He took the hand she offered and smiled at her cautiously. "I'm sorry; I know I'm just being overprotective," he said sheepishly, but he felt his heart tighten at the thought of losing someone else dear to him.  "That was too close," he added softly, looking down.   

   She squeezed his hand. "I'm not so easy to get rid of, you know – if you don't believe me, ask Mara," she challenged him lightly.  The reassurance in her calm voice and the humor behind her smile managed to break through his anxiety. Luke smiled, and when he looked back to her, her smile had softened. "It's understandable," she said very softly.

   He felt the strength of that familiar connection between them, and he shook his head.  "Only because you know where it comes from," he said softly. Then, looking down again, he squeezed her hand in return.

   Lara's smile flowed into a quiet laugh.  She was shaking her head at herself as her own thoughts shifted back.  "It was stupid of me," she scoffed at her own behavior, "thinking I'd rather tough out a blast burn than look for help.  Even from you.  I'm sorry I worried you, Luke.  I'm afraid I haven't handled the changes between us well, not on the platforms, not on the trip here, and especially not now. I don't do helpless well," she conceded begrudgingly.

   A slow smile spread across Luke's face, and his eyebrows raised in response. "I can't imagine you ever being helpless."

   Her eyes flashed across his face before she shared a tight smile with him. "Thanks. I needed to hear that," she admitted. Then she leaned her head back against the stone wall, closing her eyes for a moment.

   He sensed a change in her emotions, something more coming through the worry and fatigue... something that she was trying to mask. He had felt that once before, the other night at the camp.

   She looked back to him cautiously. "On the trip here, I realized that I needed to protect you. I couldn't watch another person I care about die, not when I had the power to prevent it.  That's why I did what I did, and it's why I lied to you.  I was trying to protect you," she said softly, "and myself. I thought that I could go through with this plan, save you and the mission, no matter how hard it was on either of us. But if I was going to do that, I couldn't tell you the truth.  You would never have left me behind if you knew what I really felt, and I didn't want to be the reason you sacrificed yourself."

   "I don't understand," Luke admitted.

   "I know," she whispered, guarding a smile. "You see, there's something else," she said softly, "that I don't want to keep from you any longer."

   Something in the sound of her voice made him lean toward her, his eyes at once questioning and supporting.  Her gaze briefly dropped to his hand, still holding hers, and a cautious smile pulled at her mouth when her eyes flickered back to his. He waited for her to continue. Then, to his surprise, Lara closed her eyes and she pressed her lips to his; for a long moment, giving, softly and surely.

   Her breath held as she pulled back, and her eyes quietly flickered up to his.  This time her gaze stayed steadily on him, reading him.

   Some of that farm boy came through in his smile for her. The budding anxiousness within her lessened when she saw his smile, but she still felt her heart skip a beat in the silence.

   "I love you, Luke," she whispered, the words just as soft and certain as her kiss had been.

   He looked at her, frozen, for just a moment. Then that smile slowly crossed him again, and he leaned toward her once more.  This time he carefully cupped her face in his hands, and Luke kissed her, slowly and gently.

   When he opened his eyes a moment later, cautiously leaning back, he noticed that his heart was racing. It was only a moment later – but where time had held still a moment ago, now everything wanted to rush in at once.  Then her eyes opened to his again, and what he saw there made the racing of his heart fall easily back into calm. Luke felt himself smile.

   "I love you too," he breathed.

   She smiled back at him, a sparkle gleaming in her beautiful eyes

   Impulsively, joyfully, he kissed her for a second time, and felt her laughter break into his own emotions. This was a feeling of pure, electric joy in the shared emotional high. Those emotions ran strong as Luke wrapped his arms around Lara and gently held her to him, but they gradually became matched with a deeper, quieter feeling as she leaned into his embrace and they held on to one another. 

   The quiet settled around them, and in the face of all their other troubles there was an extraordinary new sense of peace and comfort.  An unexpected source of strength was found in each other, and that feeling kept them focused in the moment for a long time before fully coming back to the rest of the reality around them.

   "You should try to get some sleep," Luke realized, feeling her fatigue anew. "Here," he said, easing from the embrace and shrugging out of his camouflaged smock. He folded it into a makeshift pillow.  "Don't argue," he cut her off easily, "you'll sleep better lying down." 

   Lara smiled, putting her argument aside.

   He set the pillow down and moved closer to her.  "Okay?" he asked gently.  She nodded to him, and Luke supported her injured leg as Lara braced herself and pulled away from the edge of the stream. The cold water had done its part, and Luke's splint was stabilizing the break. Fatigue was stronger than the pain now, and Lara gratefully eased herself to the floor. 

   Luke smiled as she lifted her head and he slid the pillow behind her.  Lara smiled too, opening her eyes to look at him once more.  He pushed her hair from her face and let his hand linger on her forehead as Lara closed her eyes again... accepting his efforts to help her, looking for sleep through the pain and fatigue. He stroked her hair and leaned down to kiss her forehead. 

   "Goodnight, Lara," he whispered, moving back. 

   "Night, Luke," came the soft, weary reply.

   He felt his heart tighten again. This time it made him smile.

~

   Luke slept off and on, sitting a few feet closer to the entrance.  Staying aware.  Just in case, his lightsaber was ready at his side.  When he was awake, he listened to the sound of her breathing and wondered what they would do tomorrow.  Traveling this terrain on foot, with Lara injured, would be harsh even under the best of circumstances.  But Luke didn't expect the best of circumstances; their enemies would be looking for them, especially if they knew that Lara had been hit.

   The other thoughts were worse.

   He wasn't sure that he could protect her if they were captured.  And he knew that if they were caught, their captors would use her injuries against them both.  Lara would tough it out, if it meant fighting to the death. He knew that.  But he also knew that he wouldn't be able to withstand it if they tortured her.

   He shivered at the thought, and the unpleasant knowledge that accompanied it.  They would know it would be the easiest way to get what they wanted out of him. He pushed the troubling thoughts aside and looked to her, watching her sleep.

   Some time later he jolted awake. Instantly awake, Luke's hand rested at his lightsaber, his senses extended.  There was a search party nearby.  He eased into his combat crouch and moved out toward the center of the cave.  Keeping his lightsaber gripped between them and the only entrance, he remained fully alert, his finger ready on the switch that would activate the deadly blade. 

   Behind him, he felt Lara stir. 'All right' he sent the thought to her, and felt her relax in response.  They both waited. And the group eventually passed them by.

   "Luke," she prompted softly, a few minutes later. 

   He turned back to her, lowering his lightsaber.  He had to smile.  She knew that the danger was well past but she sat up behind him, propped on one arm with her blaster resting propped on her knee. Only now did she tilt the weapon back, following his lead, keeping him covered.

   He came back to her side.  "Guess I'm just being overprotective again," he grinned, trying to cover the sharp new edge of urgency that he felt for her protection.

   She only smiled, returning the blaster to the ground beside her; she grimaced a bit as the movement strained her side. Carefully, Luke leaned over her, taking her arms to help her lie back without pulling the wound again. Then his hand gently brushed against her side in an effort to ease the lingering pain.

   "Thank you," she said, her eyes still shut. 

   "I wish I could do more," he whispered, lightly brushing her forehead, trying to find something that would help. 

   She took a deep breath and nodded slightly.  "That's better," she said softly and opened her eyes. His closeness startled her a little.

   Her eyes stayed on him, and Luke grinned at the awkwardness of the moment. Lara smiled up at him, and he brushed his hand over her hair again before he leaned away. She closed her eyes, taking another deep breath. "I'll let you in on something."  She smiled, and looked back to him. "I don't mind the overprotectiveness.  From anyone else, it would seem patronizing, but not you," she trailed off. "You know me too well."

   He looked at her, slowly taking that in and thinking about it. "We stand equal, Lara," he stated softly, and he smiled, remembering.  "Fighting back to back, or the hours we spent on the roof, or now.  That doesn't change."

   She stayed quiet for a moment. "Respect is something that means a lot to me.  I've mostly had to fight to earn it," she added softly, honestly, "and mostly from people who knew nothing of honor, weren't worthy of respect," she trailed off warily, looking away.  Then she lifted her eyes back to his, speaking softly.  "I feel a lot of things for you, Luke, but it's an honor for me – in more ways than I can say – simply that I have your respect."

   He watched her for a moment, feeling all the things that were left unsaid beneath her words, and not quite able to find the words to tell her how much he did feel. She had his respect, and his admiration... along with deep affection... friendship.. trust... and now, love.  There was no way to express how much all that meant to him, no way to pick from all the things he felt for her in that one moment.

   Lara smiled. Her face and her eyes were soft, forgetting everything else. He knew that look well; it told him he didn't need the words. She already knew what he was feeling. 

   Luke bent down to her and softly kissed her lips.  Looking into her eyes, he knew that his heart belonged to her. She reached a hand to his cheek, and he closed his eyes at her touch.  He could feel her smile. Luke lowered himself to the ground beside her and gently stretched an arm around the makeshift pillow under her head. It seemed the most natural thing in the world to do.

   She eased toward him gingerly, accepting his protection and his comfort as he lay down at her side.  Lara gratefully rested her head against his shoulder, and Luke closed his eyes.  Feeling her nearness, something inside him filled to overflowing with an indescribable sense of peace. It told him undeniably that this was where he belonged, close by her side.  He took a deep breath, feeling that peaceful knowledge take him over.

   Lara smiled sleepily.  It was a curious sensation, and one that she had only felt once before. She couldn't tell where what she was feeling ended and where what he was feeling began... but this time it was a feeling of peace, like none she had ever known.  That feeling sank deep into her heart, shared between them both as they fell asleep.

~

   They awoke together the next morning.  Lara opened her eyes to see the sky outside just beginning to lighten as it shone through the cracks in the cave's ceiling.  She felt Luke begin to stir beside her, then he seemed to remember her there by his side and he paused in the motion.  She could sense him holding his breath, not wanting to wake her, not wanting the shift of his weight to hurt her.  Lara closed her eyes and turned her head to his shoulder; suddenly all she wanted was to have one more quiet moment here before the day would rush in on them.

   He felt her stir, and his heart skipped a beat as he wondered if she was awake yet.  Luke held his breath, feeling her move against him, drawing closer to him. She was awake; he felt the wishful emotion fill her, along with the deep breath that she drew.  Carefully, he bent to brush his lips against the top of her head.  He knew that they didn't have much time, but he could give her this. 

   For just a few minutes longer they lay still in the early morning light, denying the coming day one more moment at a time... until finally, they could afford to wait no longer.  Then he gave her shoulder an affectionate squeeze, and with a regretting sigh Luke eased from her side. Lara took a deep, focusing breath, preparing herself. There were lots of protests from tired muscles when Luke slipped his arm around her back, helping her to sit, but she was relieved that the protests were no worse so far. 

   He smiled to her cautiously, and she nodded in reassurance to him. Satisfied that she was all right, Luke moved away to start hunting through the packs for breakfast.  He would have to reload them so that he carried most of the weight, but she knew that couldn't be helped.  With her injuries working against her, she'd be doing her share if she could keep moving long enough for them to clear out of here... then there were the search parties that would be looking for them, and the hanger full of ships that still waited at their backs.    

   She started moving, testing herself slowly. 

   "How's the ankle?" Luke asked over the packs. 

   "Pretty good so far. Swelling's down a good bit."

   "Think you can travel on it?" he asked.

   "I think I can manage it, with the splint," Lara answered, picking her right leg up carefully and shifting her weight to get her good foot under her. "Not like we've got so many better options," she added dryly. 

   He grimaced, and moved to her side to help as she stood.

   She took a few cautious steps, putting weight on the injured leg as briefly as possible. "No problem," she said lightly, a little surprised that the pain wasn't worse – but she knew that it would be, as the day wore on and travel further aggravated the injury. 

   She sat down again beside the packs. "Your thoughts on what we do today?" Lara asked with a touch of sarcastic lightness as she watched him continue to dig through their packs; he was also reorganizing the loads as he deliberately searched.

   "From what I can tell, we're still a good way from the speeder.  Even if we get to it, it's another day's travel back to the ship." 

   "And that still leaves the hanger and all those ships at our backs, no thanks. What're our other options?" 

   He looked up at her. "We go back to the base. The search parties are less likely to be looking for us that way.  Security there, will be a challenge," he weighed out the understatement, "but hopefully we can relieve them of a ship and leave our mark on the base before we blast out."   

   He handed her a ration bar and took one for himself. Then he started digging again, going through the med bag this time. Lara nodded slowly.  "A tall order."

   He glanced up at her, reading her expression. 

   She nodded again, with determination.  "But a good plan."

   "Here. You'd better keep these on you," he said, handing her a couple of emergency med patches.

   He could see her caution as she took the patches from him, and he understood it. The things were well-named.  They could save your life in an emergency with a wicked combination of reducing the blood flow and killing the pain at the site of an injury.  But they were not intended for light use.

   She took the patches warily, not crazy about the idea of having to use them. These things would mess you up in quick order if you weren't real careful about how you used them. She'd seen it happen often enough, which was why she preferred the age old way of toughing it out – but in this case, an exception was warranted. She didn't have to remind herself that if they couldn't get out of here a detention stint would do a lot more harm a lot faster... assuming that they wouldn't just shoot first and ask questions later.

   She tucked the patches into her pocket and ate the ration bar.

   Luke headed over to the stream to fill their packs' water coolers. Lara was standing and in her pack when he returned.  "Right, then," he answered her gamely.  "Let's get moving."

~

   They circled around toward the side of the hanger opposite the command bunker, mixing the need for caution with the need to cut their travel time and avoid the harder terrain. The going went smoothly until they had to make a quick break to avoid a search team. Then Lara took a bad step, and her leg twisted under her when the footing gave away. 

   She didn't feel anything for a few moments after the leg twisted out from under her; the space between that step and the ground was a blinding blur.  Once she hit the ground the blood seemed to rush to her ears, and it was a matter of great concentration simply to stay conscious and not cry out. Luke would have to carry the rest. 

   He dropped down to cover her, trying to mask the noise of the underbrush and keep them out of sight. For several long moments all he could hear was the pounding of his own heartbeat as he reached out with all of his awareness, waiting. And he could feel Lara's tortured breathing, ragged against him, as she strained to keep herself together. He stayed frozen until he was sure the party had gone by them, then he pushed back from her carefully.  Her face was fixed into a grimace, eyes shut tight against the pain.  He eased back again, and his leg brushed her knee; Luke winced and cursed himself, hearing the small, painful noise that escaped her. 

   The flash of pain faded quickly, leaving a cold feeling in its wake, like a challenge laid down. She needed to get back to her feet.  The desperate need was more from reflex and instinct than the conscious thought that accompanied it: that every moment she stayed down would make it that much harder to get back up. She struggled to sit and the pain slammed into her, immediately dropping her back to the ground, knocking the wind out of her.  This time she had to bite down on her sleeve to keep herself from crying out, and she felt Luke bend down over her once more. 

   Panicked, Lara struggled again to quiet her breathing, to quiet the pain.  Her first thought was to hope that they hadn't been discovered.  She could feel the worry in him; she expected it, but she slowly realized that his focus wasn't defensive. As her head started to clear she could feel his arms around her shoulders, feel his concern.  His worry was for her.

   Luke held on to her tightly as Lara shook violently with the ragged breaths against his shoulder.  It was taking an enormous effort for her to control the pain, and he kept holding her tightly, hoping that he could offer her some kind of support as she battled it.  He could sense her having to fight for control in each breath, and in each passing second; but gradually, with each passing second, she was also gaining strength and getting her focus back.

   He gave her another few moments to collect herself, and then she nodded against him. "I'm okay. C'mon," she urged him. With one arm around him and the other to the ground behind her, she pushed herself off and he pulled her up to sitting. Her eyes were still shut tightly, but she was composed again, just for shear determination.  She reached for the emergency patches in her pocket, pressed one to her leg, and leaned against it heavily. 

   It took a few moments to kick in, and her breathing was still heavy and strained.  Luke put a hand on her shoulder and she glanced to him cautiously.  He was really worried. 

   Lara smiled begrudgingly, a mixture of stubborn pride and fierce determination showing in her face.  "Don't look at me like that," she said between deep breaths. "We're gonna do this," she told him softly. 

   He nodded, support and relief mixing in his face, pushing back the worry.

   She gingerly slid her hands down toward her ankle until she felt the place where it went wrong.  "Blast it," she cursed under her breath.  "It dislocated again when I twisted it." 

   "I can put it back," Luke said, "but the fragments are going to do damage with you walking around on it."

   She grinned. "Less damage grinding against each other than against the insides of my leg."

   Luke cringed at her bluntness.

   "Sorry," she apologized. "What I meant to say was, don't worry about it; it's nothing a decent med droid can't fix."

   "I like the sound of that a lot better," Luke admitted as he set to work, this time wrapping the leg as tightly as he could once he got the bone back into place.  The emergency med patch would kill the pain and eliminate the swelling.  Hopefully the pressure of walking would aid circulation in the foot until she could get to a med droid to have the effects of the patch reversed and the break repaired.

   "Done," Luke reported.

   "Good. Now help me up," Lara prompted. 

~

   After a few minutes Lara had found new balance on the leg she couldn't feel any longer and Luke went back to scouting a few steps ahead of her. Cautiously, they edged up to the underbrush surrounding the hanger. 

   "Not too bad," he noted. There were only a few guards standing at intervals inside the hanger's perimeter.

   "You were right," she added. "They aren't expecting us from out here."

   "Most of them are still searching the woods," he finished. "And look at that... just in case they did cut us off from our ship and we had to double back...."

   "That's not too obvious," she said sarcastically.

   "Bait," Luke conceded under his breath.  A New Republic fighter stood practically unguarded among the mystery fighters, with a utility bunker not thirty paces away.

   "Kind of sad, actually," Lara noted, making him smile at her honest assessment.  "But I don't see any sign of a double-cross," she finished.

   "I think they actually expect me to fall for that," he echoed her sentiment.

   She smiled back. "I like the look of that one," she said, motioning to a ship of general Imperial design that had been the obvious recipient of a recent overhaul.  More importantly, it's position cater-cornered the entrance and it was relatively unguarded.

   "Okay," he said. "I'll leave you to it. I'm going to see if I can't give them a little extra excitement before I spring the distraction."

   Lara nodded and they started to move out; then they both paused to look back, and each was caught staring into the same cautious and hopeful smile. 

   "Steer the shore," Luke said softly.

   Lara grinned at him. "You too," she advised him gently before she backed out.

   Luke moved into position opposite the ship that had been planted for him and called to Lara mentally. 

   'Ready' he felt her answer. 

   He set a charge and cleared out of the area.

   While half of the guards were rushing over to investigate the ship that had just suffered a well-placed electrical malfunction, Luke was using the Force to loosen the restraints on the planted New Republic fighter, and Lara was boarding a different ship halfway across the field. 

   Luke gave the fighter a push, directing it with the Force.

   The guards who were checking out the first disturbance scattered out of the ship's path while the extra battalion emerged from their position within the utility bunker, leaving the trap that was meant for Luke sprung.  By the time they had emerged to surround the planted New Republic fighter, Luke was already boarding the real escape ship.

   Lara was bringing up the ship's systems as he entered the cockpit.

   "I knew that trap was too obvious," she gritted as she turned the engines over and activated the repulsor lifts.  Now they wouldn't go unnoticed for long. 

   Luke dropped into the copilot's seat.  "No matter. They're too late," he observed.  Two manned fighters had been positioned at the hanger's entrance, presumably as defense for the base in case Luke and Lara had been able to launch an aerial assault; now the ships were charging up their weapons systems to meet the internal attack and prevent Luke and Lara from escaping.

   But Lara was ready for them. The first of their blast bolts ricocheted harmlessly off the shields that she had already raised, and she wasted no time bringing the fighter into the air.  Lara fired on the two opposing ships, disabling them before they were able to activate their own shields, then she started blasting away at the hanger.  

   The ground crew frantically ordered the scattering troops to their ships, desperate to save the unprotected vessels from the barrage, but the green troops fell apart under attack and more of them rushed to escape the confines of the hanger than rushed to follow their commanders' orders.   

   "Okay," Luke advised as the hanger started to show some significant damage.  "Let's finish up and make our exit." 

   Lara swung the ship under the arching hanger entrance into the open air beyond and then fired a few shots back to finish the job.  With that, the hanger lurched unsteadily on its pillared foundation and fell in on itself with a mighty crash.

~

     "Not bad," Lara concluded as the stars flared to hyperspace around them.  Luke nodded in agreement as he emerged from the outer defense quad, having made short work of the few ships that had tried to follow up the attack. 

   "Apparently they didn't get all of those holes plugged," he reported, sitting heavily into the copilot's seat again. "Coruscant will happy to hear that those fighters have a chink to their armor after all." 

   Hyperspace mottling filled the cockpit with a shimmering wave of reflected light.  It lent a calming atmosphere to tense nerves and emotions, and the two passengers both took deep breaths, feeling the rush of adrenaline recede.

   "Luke?" Lara asked after a moment. "You remember when I told you 'steer the shore', what it meant?"

   He nodded. "Good luck," he answered. 

   She nodded back. "And 'be careful', partly," she added. "At least that's the most simple way to explain it.  But it has a lot of other connotations," she added more quietly, "of long voyages, and the feeling of sending friends and loved ones off into danger and wishing for their safe return... hoping that they don't get lost, and that they can find their way home again when the trip is done.. I always thought of it as sending a piece of yourself along with the one you love, to keep him close to you, and safe, until he could return to you." 

   "I like that," he said softly.

   "Me too, since I was a little kid. It's something incredibly simple, that manages to capture everything." She smiled again.  "When you said it earlier, it felt like you got all that – like you meant all that. I just wanted to tell you – so that you really did know," she added, squinting as she said the words, wondering if the sudden fatigue she was feeling hadn't totally muddled what she wanted to say.

   But Luke only nodded, and she got the unmistakable feeling that he would understand her no matter how tired and muddled she got.

~

   A short time later Lara sat in the ship's small med station waiting on the med droid to return from ship's storage with... something. The droid had already begun reversing the effects of the emergency med patch and she hoped, rather urgently, that it would hurry back.  Her leg was already starting to throb. 

   She had been glad that the ship was equipped with enough of a med station that they hadn't had to make a side trip, but she had been too tired to really absorb it when the droid had explained exactly what would be involved in this process. It was in a med droid's programming to explain itself when it worked alone, but she had often wondered what the point was when they were only programed with the vocabulary to communicate with medics.

   "Did you get a look at that data card?" Luke asked as he appeared in the doorway across from her.

   "Yeah," she answered him, remembering the data pad that was resting by her side.

   "After this it's a good bet they'll pull up stakes anyway, but I've already notified Mara of what we found. She's going to put some of her nearby sources on the system to watch for movement. That should at least start a trace on this outfit when they do move out; and NRI will check out the shipping locations that were listed in their work orders." 

   Lara nodded at his words but her thoughts were elsewhere.  "Remember, I called Dangin's bluff with the Coruscant records?" she asked him.

   Luke nodded.

   "The fact is, there were three names attached to the shielding project.  Dangin was one. The Imperial I remembered from the Aci trip was another.  The third is the one who worries me.  If he's still involved in this, it will mean trouble – the kind of trouble that we need to put a stop to before it gets beyond our control to stop it."

~

   It was a very bad day back in the back room of the small cantina in the Myrtle system.  

   "It's bad enough that two entire shipments were destroyed. Now I find out that your man had Dare right in front of him and failed to capture her," Laus railed.

   "Not so fast," Imago stopped him.  "Skywalker played a role in this too; and don't forget," he said, drawing himself up to his full height, "that you're not the only one with losses.  Now I've got to relocate an entire base. This whole setup was your ill-fated and ill-timed idea."

   "Bases and shipments are small worlds," Laus said, choosing to let the questionable choice of words from his associate pass in favor of getting the larger point across. "Dare should have been delivered to me this time; my patience runs thin on this matter."

   "You've profited greatly from our deal, as have I," Imago backtracked to the familiar argument, the one that favored him.  "Don't be so quick to throw it away for the sake of Vader's watchdog." 

   Laus cut him off.  Almost before Imago could get out the last word, Laus had stalked toward the smaller man so suddenly that his guards stepped forward in alarm.  "Lara Dare was the second in command to Darth Vader," he spoke intensely, "the last surviving Sith Lord, the man second only to the Emperor himself in the New Order.  With such a person to lead my forces, no one would be able to oppose me." 

   He brought himself back under control. "I will have that," he grated before he turned away. "And I'll ask you again, not to overestimate your importance to me, Imago. If you cannot provide me with what I require, then I will no longer require you!"

   Imago swallowed his objection as Laus spoke over him.  "I'll await your decision."

   With that dismissal, Laus turned his back and motioned for his men to escort Imago and his bodyguards out. 

~~ ~ () ~ ~~

   Lara lay back in the small ship's bunk.  Better than halfway through the trip back, her side was healed and the break in her leg was well on its way.  The med droid had set her ankle in a bacta cast and she was keeping off of it, which was more than enough treatment for her. As she'd told Luke, the bacta tank was extremely overrated as a medical miracle (not to mention terribly uncomfortable stuff), and she was uncomfortable enough just having to stay off of her feet for a while longer.

   He ducked in.  She was getting used to his ducking in.

   "Hi. How much longer?"  She smiled up at him, pursuing the running joke that had been made of own impatience. 

   He knelt down by her side. "Should I be offended? You don't like my bedside manner."

   She grinned, closing her eyes and feeling herself blush a little at the thought of him waiting over her. "I don't like having to take it easy," she murmured the correction impatiently. He reached to touch her face, brushing a finger along her cheekbone, and Lara worked at hiding a sly smile as she looked up at him affectionately.  "Though your bedside manner is the high point of the experience."

   "I feel better then," he grinned lightly, despite his reddening ears.

   "Thank you," she said quietly.

   He looked confused.  "For my bedside manner?" he persisted in kidding her.

   She shook her head at him. "For taking care of me," she explained with a reluctant smile. "I was serious when I said that I don't do helpless well," she added, her smile coming more easily. "It's bad enough that I'm terribly stir crazy," she admitted, motioning impatiently around the small bunk room, "but I can't stand the feeling that I can't take care of myself, or defend myself, if I need to." She paused.  "You got me through that, and you kept me together when I was really struggling."

   He shook his head slightly.  "We kept each other together," he corrected her, then he grinned. "We do that well." 

   "I know. I feel it too. We see each other," she tried to put it into words as she reached for his hand, "and we fit together.  Just this, is the most amazing thing, the most amazing feeling," she marveled.

   "For me too," he said softly.  Luke smiled, looking down for a moment. "When we get back to Coruscant, things will be more, complex." 

   She nodded, smiling back at him. "Then maybe we had better enjoy the quiet, while we have it," she suggested. Lara made room for him to sit by her, and pulled him toward her with a soft smile. His fingers closed gently around hers, and Luke bowed down to kiss her forehead as he sat at her side.

   An amazed smile crossed him as he stayed, watching her, recognizing again the strength of his feelings for her. He wanted to be close to her, to be there to love her and protect her. When he looked into her eyes, when she smiled at him, he could see those same emotions in her too. It was a little overwhelming.  He had never felt love like that... and suddenly he couldn't imagine himself wanting anything more. 

   He knew that once they returned to Coruscant, questions would have to be faced, and answered.  She knew it too. They both trusted that those answers would come, in time, but right now it was just the two of them. Just like that coming day in the cave, they could let this moment be... and all the rest could wait; one moment at a time, it could wait.

   With a sigh, Luke let go her hand and moved to lie down by her side.

   He felt her pull nearer to him and Luke lifted his eyes to meet hers as he draped his arm around her; Lara was watching him with another soft smile, settling herself close beside him.  Her fingertips pushed softly at his hair and Luke dipped his eyes. He felt her arm curl around his shoulder as he lowered his head against her pillow, and her lips brushed gently against the peak of his forehead just before he rested his head against her temple. He settled himself at her side and closed his eyes.  Content.  This moment was all that he had to share with her, and all that he needed....  There was peace in the quiet space between them, and they were content simply to stay in each other's arms.

~~ ~ () ~ ~~

   Luke and Lara retreated to the Imperial Palace roof after a long first day back on Coruscant.  It had been a day spent in briefings, and pouring over the information that Mara had begun to send in.  The movement they expected had come. It had been both swift and complete; the base was already deserted and everyone was scrambling to trace the new location, so far with no luck.  The same could be said for the location that had been listed in the data Luke had obtained. A New Republic team had just arrived there to find it deserted as well, though they estimated that it had been so for some time.... A suspicious fact, which implied that this had been, at least in part, a trap. 

   Lara sighed heavily. "Why would they want us to find that base? They risk its being destroyed, and at the very least, they've sacrificed a perfectly obscure location." 

   "We saw the obvious trap.  Maybe they were after me," Luke noted.

   "But you wouldn't have known to look for that base at the exact location in the undermessage when all the nav readings said that there was nothing there; that means they were counting on either me or Mara being involved."

   "This mystery gets stranger and stranger," Luke admitted. 

   "What about the Senate?" Lara asked, seemingly changing the subject. "Has the talk of my involvement started already?" 

   He sighed. "Almost immediately."

   "Maybe this is more about me than you," she decided thoughtfully.

   "How so?" he asked.

   "It all started with the mystery ships being spotted during my trial, and all the clues that we've uncovered, except for the actual undermessage, have related to my knowledge of the Imperial files. If they think I could know something–"

   "Then they might try to sabotage your credibility to the Senate by sending us on this chase," Luke finished.

   "And by getting you captured," she added.

   "It's logical, but all of this is suspicion and theory; we don't even know for sure who we're dealing with here.  How are we supposed to figure out what someone with a connection to the Imperial files has to fear from a former Imperial intelligence agent working with the New Republic?

   "I don't know," Lara admitted; then she allowed herself a smile. "That's the real mystery, isn't it?  She left that question hanging as she and Luke walked across the roof and sat down together. They were both tired from wrestling over the facts and questions behind this mystery and coming away with no answers.

   Luke took her hand, his mood changing as he did so.  They were alone now, for the first time since the ship had sat down early this morning, and both of them knew that the time had come to answer those lingering questions between the two of them.

   He looked at her briefly before his gaze returned to her hand in his.  "Lara," Luke started cautiously, "we've both been careful in this.  I don't even know for how long I've loved you; it was just always more urgent that I be your friend... so I made that come first."

   She nodded quietly.  "It was that way for me too.  I saw the trust, and respect, and I was amazed every time I thought about this friendship we had found....  I don't know when it began to pass into those deeper emotions. It happened so quietly for me.

   "We were right to be cautious," he whispered.  "But all that changed when you told me you love me, and I don't know what happens – what should happen next."

   "Luke," she spoke quietly, "you need to know that I didn't say those words impulsively.  Just because the emotions behind them are strong, that didn't make the words careless – if anything, it made me more determined to be careful with them because I knew I didn't want to play with your emotions – and when I spoke, it was because it had become something that I didn't want to go any further without your knowing."   

   Luke nodded, a slight smile betraying his unexpected feeling of gratitude. He was grateful that he had chosen to protect her, chosen to put her needs and feelings before his own.  But he was touched to find that she had protected his heart in the very way that he had been trying to protect hers.

   "I didn't take the words lightly then," she continued, "and I don't take them lightly now. I know that they change everything," Lara whispered, "and I never would have told you if that wasn't something that I was willing to answer to – not just with my heart and the strength of my feelings, but with my whole life."

   He nodded. "I know that about you, Lara," Luke whispered, and he smiled.  "I think I just needed to hear you say it," he amended more quietly. And she felt the change in him as he gathered himself to speak again.

   "Lara, I know that neither of our lives are anything typical.  But mine is especially..." he trailed off, unable to find the right word. "You know how much I'm dealing with," he started again.  "The uncertainty and the responsibility of my life....  I'm still searching for answers and I don't know how much I can promise you. What I do know is the life that I've chosen; that responsibility always has to come first. I can't change that. I wouldn't want to," he admitted.  "But it's not fair to you.  You deserve to come first to the person you love."

   Her mouth twisted into a slight smile at his unintended complement and the sentiment behind it, but Luke only closed his eyes, again uncomfortable with what he had to say, with how it hurt him to say it.  "I can't pretend that my life isn't dangerous.  When you were injured, I hated the thought that I might not have been able to protect you. They could have used you, your pain, my feelings for you, all of it, just to get information from me. 

   "It made me realize something that I hadn't before.  Being close to me will make you a target, a way for others to get to me; being close to me will put you in danger....  It would be very hard for me, to live with that, but I don't know how I can ask you to accept that risk, and I know that I couldn't live with having you come to resent – all that caring for me could cost you."

   He was silent and didn't look at her.  She shifted his grip on her hand and took his in both of hers.  "Not too long ago I sat up here and I looked out at the stars, and I told myself that there was no way I could trust you. That risk was too much, the fall was too far, and the pain was too great.  But you showed me that I could see past all of that, and the thing I thought I couldn't do – the thing that scared me the most – is one of the best things that I've ever done. 

   "Feeling the things I feel for you is one of the greatest gifts of my life.  I know this path isn't going to be easy, Luke, but I'm not afraid of that risk anymore. I know this is worth it. I love you, and all of you – not just the side that makes me laugh and touches me so softly." She shook her head gently. "I love your honor and compassion, and how you give so much of yourself to the people who need you, not just to me.  Expecting you to put me first, before being a Jedi, before your responsibility to the New Republic – it wouldn't just be unfair.  It would be taking something away from the deepest part of you. And that would be regret; that would be something I couldn't live with." 

   He looked to her cautiously. "Can you live with this?" he asked softly. "Do you want to?" 

   "I do," she breathed certainly.  "I want this, and everything it means to me to have you in my life. All the rest, we can handle," she stated confidently. 

   Luke nodded, but he was still troubled.  "I know that you'd lay down your life for mine in a heartbeat, but you have to understand, too, that I can't promise you forever; neither of us can promise that, and we've both lost too much already.  The most I can promise you is until death parts us – and that time may come too soon, Lara, for you or for me."

   "I won't lie," she whispered, "I can't stand the thought of losing you.  But it's a risk I'm willing to take.  I'm willing to give you the rest of my life, Luke, be it one day or one hundred years. You're worth that risk."

   He smiled, knowing.  Luke looked deep into her eyes for a long moment, gathering himself. 

   "I love you. Good or bad, for all that I don't know, no matter what comes.... I want to share my life with you." He smiled shyly and took her hands in his. "Will you marry me, Lara?" he breathed. 

   Her eyes flickered over his face as she felt a breath leave her; and she blinked, recovering from the unexpected surprise. She had known that this was what he was talking about. He wanted more than a promise; to feel what he felt for her, he wanted a lasting commitment....  That was a part of who he was, a man whom she both respected and admired. But it still had taken her by surprise; she had confounded him so many times with the recklessness in her own emotions, the overwhelming need for self-reliance.  That combination had pushed her into more than one near-disaster, and she had tried so hard to push him away.... She hadn't expected him to ask this of her now; considering her history with him, a proposal of marriage was bravery bordering on the edge of foolishness. She wondered if he thought it too... she could see that he was holding his breath, but there was not a trace of hesitation in him.  Luke knew what he felt and he was certain of that, in her and in himself. Lara was surprised, but there was no reason to be.  She had no reason to doubt any of this; she trusted the man she loved, and she wanted the rest of her life to be spent at his side.  She remembered to breathe, and gave him his answer. It was all in the space of a heartbeat. 

   "Yes," she felt herself answer. 

   "Yes?" he asked, smiling. 

   "Yes, Luke," Lara laughed joyfully, cupping her hand against his cheek.  His eyes hadn't left hers.  "I love you," she whispered through her own smile, in the space just before he kissed her.

~

   They wanted to remember this moment. This was the moment when two separate and uncertain futures had become one straight path, stretching without end before them.  Luke and Lara looked across the Coruscant skyline and beyond to the stars that spread across the night sky, and they smiled to each other; neither wanted this magical moment to have an end. 

   Lara closed her eyes almost reluctantly as Luke gently pulled her into his arms. She leaned back against his chest and shoulder as Luke sat behind her, resting his head on hers, his arms securely around her. Lara shifted her body just enough to tilt her head from beneath Luke's chin; it was a curious thought that finally caused a break in the silence.  "Hey?" Lara asked, grinning lightly at the perplexing thought.  "We don't even know if Jedi marry, do we?"

   Luke bent down toward her. "This one does," he mumbled in her ear.

   She laughed at his quick response.

   "I assume my parents did," he added softly, "but that's not the example I had in mind," he finished the thought wryly.

   Her folded arms slid further around his, and her touch was light as she rubbed his arm reassuringly. "Does it worry you?" she asked gently.

   He took a deep breath, sitting up straighter.  "A little," he admitted quietly.  Then he kissed the top of her head.  "But it doesn't scare me," he said. "I want this," he whispered.

   She turned her face to him.  "We'll figure it out," was all she said. 

   He kissed her softly.  She could feel a wash of gratitude where there had been worry and uncertainty a moment earlier.  Her belief in him gave him fresh hope, new courage in the face of his questions and doubts... but nothing she felt for him could answer his questions or banish his fears.

   "I love you," Luke whispered when Lara gently settled her head against his shoulder again. She hated to disturb that feeling of peace and gratitude, but some small part of her heart knew that this was temporary....  There were many things that even love could not fix, not alone. But love, matched with knowledge, and faith....

   "I know you've looked," she began carefully, "which is why I didn't want to get your hopes up. But I came across a few things in the archives, in places where they shouldn't have been.  Things that could mean something..." she clarified, speaking very cautiously. 

   "What things?" Luke asked softly.  By her tone of voice and the caution in her sense, Luke already knew that she was referring to the cloak of mystery that surrounded the Jedi Knights, what they had once been... before the Empire.

   "A few locations and shrouded messages.  It could be nothing; it could easily be a wild chase...."

   "But it could be something," he finished, weighing the possibility. 

   "It could be," she echoed.

   Luke sighed and Lara felt herself wince; she knew that he was trying not to let himself hope... but hope was in his very nature, and he needed to believe in this, that these answers did exist, still, somehow.  "If you want to investigate–" 

   "Yes," he answered quickly. 

   She smiled, guessing as much.  "Then I do too," she added softly, deliberately putting her own misgivings aside.  "You're not alone in this anymore," she said gently.  "Good or bad, this is our search now," she stated quietly. 

   He sighed again. "I can't tell you what that means," Luke whispered, the words coming through an awed smile, "but then I don't have to, do I?" he wondered out loud.  There was a feeling of lightness inside him that he couldn't begin to describe. She reached a hand to his face, touching him softly and closing her eyes at the touch....  Lara felt his joy deepen, his love deepen, as she opened herself to his emotions and felt them with him. "I never expected, to find, to have, anything like this, Lara," Luke marveled, his voice trailing off.  Then something made him laugh softly.

   "What?" she asked, smiling with him.

   "Something I hadn't remembered, in years," he answered.  "When I was little, I couldn't have been more than nine or ten years old – it was right at that age where girls were starting to be something different than they had been before."  Lara smiled at that description.  "I remember asking my Aunt Beru what it meant to be in love. She got the strangest look on her face and I thought it must have been from remembering such a long time ago, when she and my uncle were young.  Then she answered me, saying: 'It's all sweetness and light'.  I never quite understood... but I always remembered that. That look, and the smile that it brought to her face." 

   "What a beautiful way to describe, a beautiful feeling," Lara acknowledged softly. She hesitated before she spoke again.  "This goes beyond anything I expected too, Luke.  Beyond anything I dared to dream," she realized softly.

   Another few heartbeats passed into silence between them.

   "I never understood," Luke whispered, leaning closer to her, "until now. That's what you've given me, and what you are for me... your touch and your love. It's all sweetness and light." He closed his eyes, feeling that amazing emotion wash over him again.  "My Sweetness," he whispered. ~@ ~ ~