Star Wars_ I, Jedi - Michael A. Stackpole [92]
Their departure left us with nothing to do but wait for Leia Organa Solo’s arrival. It could have come at any time, so we spent the better part of a week waiting. I’ve probably spent longer weeks on boring stake-outs, but nanoseconds seemed to pass in hours—and long hours at that. And, despite Kam’s best efforts to keep us focused, our spirits began to ebb.
Princess Leia’s arrival worked wonders for us. She looked tired and a bit haggard, but still every bit the exciting and heroic icon she had been during the Rebellion. Her twins, dark-haired and bright eyed, looked around at Yavin 4 with a mixture of wonder and trepidation. Last down the egress ramp from the Millennium Falcon came Han Solo. He looked to me as if he’d lost a bit of weight during his recent adventure on Kessel, but still cut a dashing and vital figure.
Ambassador Cilghal led the Solos to the Grand Audience Chamber. Sunlight filled the room with a golden glow and warmth that belied the cold and stark reality of Luke lying on a bier as if dead. The sight seemed to stagger his sister for a moment. I hung back enough that I could not hear the family’s whispered remarks, but Jaina squirmed down out of her father’s arms and gave her uncle a kiss. All of us hoped that gesture might work where our powers and medical science had failed, and my heart ached when the disappointed child turned away, defeated.
The enthusiasm spawned by the Solo family’s arrival drained away during the rest of the day, leaving us a sullen and worn company by the time for the evening meal. Han Solo did what he could to help out by using the Falcon’s food prep unit to create a dinner of Corellian food—fried endwa in an orange gravy and butter-boiled csolcir with vweilu-nut slivers. While I didn’t think he normally approached cooking with any more joy than I did, being the only person on the moon who was not Force-sensitive had to be rough on him. The conversations we all had were, in retrospect, very self-indulgent and, in the long run, rather trivial. Providing food was what he could do to help the situation that was beyond helping—and it kept him from having to listen to what we were saying.
I picked at the food, not really listening to the others. I catalogued their voices and relied on the recall I’d developed as a detective to let me replay things later, when I could divorce myself from the fears and defeatism some of my colleagues were voicing. It wasn’t really fair to them, but I had spent a week trying to quell fears and had had enough of it.
Leia Organa Solo tolerated none of the self-pitying chatter, and ended it by slapping her hands on the stone table. “Stop this talk!” She berated us for shying from the risk involved with becoming Jedi Knights and reminded us that the New Republic was counting on us. “You must work together, discover things you don’t know, fight what has to be fought. But the one thing you can’t do is give up!”
I wanted to cheer, but a mouthful of endwa prevented me from doing so. I chewed quickly, chewed a bit more and swallowed hard. The endwa slowly slid down my throat—as good endwa will do—and eventually gave me back my voice.
Just in time for me to scream.
Luke Skywalker had told us that at the moment of Alderaan’s destruction, his master, Obi-Wan Kenobi, had said he felt “a disturbance in the Force.” Anyone who could label what I felt a “disturbance” could think of Hutts as cuddly. The hollow shock one feels when told of a close friend’s sudden death slammed into me at lightspeed. My conscious mind searched in vain for an identity to attach to that feeling, finding a way to contain it, but the hollowness opened into a bottomless void. Not only did I not know who had died, but I would never have a chance to know them, and this