Chapter Thirty-Four The Resistance
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
The Resistance
Everything was quiet.
I sat back in the pilot’s chair. My fingers shook. My chest hurt every time I breathed. And it was only after a few breaths that I realized my cheeks were wet. That my eyes were blurred—
That I was crying.
I felt like I’d cried enough in the past day to last a lifetime.
Without hesitation, Sian pulled me against him and pressed my head into his shoulder and held on so tight I didn’t fear coming apart, because even if I did he was there to keep me together.
At least for the most part. There was a piece of me still in hyperspace.
A piece of me I’d never get back, forever lost wandering the lanes between time.
There was the me from before.
And there was the person I was now.
The tears helped ground me, and the circles Sian rubbed on my back gave me something to think about, and finally, finally, I settled again.
If this was how stories felt, being in the middle of them, I had told them all wrong since the beginning.
I’d told only about the wonder, the exhilaration, the elegance of it all—even the bad things, even the moments that changed people forever.
There was nothing elegant about any of this. Nothing wonderful. Nothing exhilarating.
It was raw and painful and frightening. It made me want to bury my head in fiction and never come out again. This was horrid. This was disappointing.
And yet Sian’s embrace was warm, and the words he muttered—“We’re safe, we’re safe now, we’re okay”—felt true even if I knew they had never been true and would never be true. Veebee was gone, and my brother was a traitor.
But for the moment, his arms around me were nice. I burrowed my face into his shoulder and inhaled his scent of dusty otherwhere and complimentary shampoo.
It was a comfort.
There was a knock on the door to the flight deck, and then it opened for my father. He had an arm slung around Daaric to stay upright, his other clutching his side. When they saw me, relief washed over both their faces.
“Daughter,” he sighed as I lurched out of the pilot’s chair. He abandoned Daaric and stumbled toward me, and we wrapped each other in a hug. He smelled like blaster emissions, pungent and tart. “Daughter, Daughter,” he murmured into my hair.
Sian slipped off the flight deck with Daaric, who wanted to treat Sian’s wounds from his tumble in the lander. They closed the door behind them.
“I was so worried,” I said, hot tears still spilling down my cheeks. “I’m sorry.”
“Hey, hey, none of that, love,” he replied, kissing my cheek. His beard, rough and familiar, scratched my skin. “You did good. I’m so proud of you.”
“Is e-everyone okay?” I asked, sobbing.
“Yeah,” he replied, also sobbing. “We’re alive. We’re alive because of you.”
But not all of us. Just most of us.
“I didn’t want to leave her,” I cried into his shoulder.
“I didn’t want to leave her.” The words came out of me like a broken record.
VB-35 had been with me through everything.
She’d been my first friend and the first person who’d found me crying after Mom died, the first person to tell me it was okay to be a little messy and a little off-kilter.
She’d always made sure I ate, and she’d always made sure I never worked too hard and never sat too long in my own feelings alone—
I’d spent so much of my life wondering what it would be like to still have a mom that I hadn’t realized I’d had one the entire time. Veebee had been there for me, and I’d never thanked her.
And now I couldn’t.
I didn’t know how long I’d cried into my dad’s shoulder, and I wasn’t sure how much longer I would have if the comms hadn’t crackled, startling us from our tears.
A soft, melodic voice hummed through the speakers: “This is Sosha Soruna checking in. Ha-ha! I haven’t had a thrill like that in twenty years! May we guide you in to land on Endor, Starfarer?”
We landed in a clearing beside a beautiful dark blue lake.
After seeing so much dust and sand over the past few days, even after Alakor, the green grass and lush trees were a welcome sight.
I disembarked from the ship with Dad and walked toward Lady Sosha and her two pilots on a beautiful flower-filled patch.
I tried to tell him to sit down and let me greet her alone, but he refused.
He was still the captain, after all, and he said, “If I stop moving, that’s when the pain’ll catch up to me.”
“That’s because you’re running on adrenaline, old man.”
“Bah! This is just what it’s like to be alive!” he crowed, and kissed me one more time on the forehead as Lady Sosha slid out of her fighter ship, tossed off her helmet, and walked to us.
She threw up her arms. “What an exquisite getaway!” she cried. “Hansifred, you truly outdid yourself. Especially with that injury of yours. Are you sure you should be up and about?”
“Ah, well,” Dad drawled, “it actually wasn’t my flying. It was my daughter’s.”
“What a gift,” the ex-ruler of Naboo complimented, smiling at me. I think she’d already known. “You must be proud.”
“Incredibly,” he replied, his voice breaking a little in the center of the word, as if it didn’t quite encompass how much.
“Thank you for saving us,” I told her. “I was afraid you wouldn’t get the message.”
The older woman shook her head. “You saved yourself, Ardent. We just helped however we could. It was quick thinking to send a message to us from Alakor. I’ll admit that I didn’t expect it.
I’m sorry it took us so long to reach you.
I was hoping we’d get there before the Starfarer, but hyperspace travel can be unpredictable. ”
“At least you arrived,” I pointed out. “I was worried the console was too old to work.”
“It worked well enough. But now we have a problem and, ah, I hope you don’t mind, but I invited a friend to help solve it,” Lady Sosha said, glancing up at the sky as a sleek-looking ship entered the atmosphere.
It was Senator Leia Organa.
She wasn’t a senator anymore. Her insistence that the First Order was a real threat, as well as some other overblown scandals, had made her retreat from New Republic office. But I didn’t know how else to think of her. If not a senator, then…
I wasn’t sure what to call her.
I had seen Leia Organa on holovids before, but much like everyone else, they rarely did her justice.
The woman who strode across the green grass of the valley toward the Starfarer had a rigid spine and kindness hidden in the laughter lines around her eyes.
She wore her gray hair in a practical bun behind her head, matching the rest of her uniform—a soft shirt with a utility vest over the top and coarse dark pants tucked into impeccably shined boots.
The only signifier that she had once been a princess was the way she held herself, her shoulders back and her chin high, as if not even gravity could defy her.
I had never met a story before, but Leia Organa was everything I had imagined she would be.
Lady Sosha told us that Leia Organa knew what had happened—Lady Sosha had called her just after receiving my message—and called the crew down to meet with her.
The guests had begun to filter out of the ship, as well, stretching their legs and wandering about the meadow.
So Dad gathered everyone to introduce them.
“Senator Organa,” he greeted.
She clasped his hand in a strong shake. “It’s General now,” she said, and surveyed us all.
“Right—I believe in getting to the point. It’s apparent that the First Order knows your ship, and most of your faces.
You will be in danger because of that. Also,” she added, turning to me, “I have taken the liberty of buying out your and your friend’s warrant.
Since it was unlawful to begin with, I had some say.
However, I can’t do that again in the future. ”
Dad gave a start, turning to me. “Warrant?”
“For a crime she didn’t commit, I assure you,” General Organa said.
Telly stroked her whiskers and muttered, “If the First Order knows our ship now, it’ll be too dangerous for tours in the future.”
“I was thinking about retiring anyway,” Dad mused, to the astonishment of everyone in the group.
I gaped. “Retire?”
Daaric put a hand on his shoulder. “Sweetheart, you’d sooner die.”
“I almost died today,” Dad pointed out.
General Organa smiled at that. “I think you’re made of sterner stuff, Hansifred Quay.
I’ve a better idea. You should look into changing careers.
I’ve a few friends who could use an old, reliable ship like the Starfarer, and an old, reliable captain like you.
I can’t guarantee exotic locales or safe missions, but we are making a difference.
You saw firsthand the terror of what still lurks out there.
Something is stirring. We need to be ready. ”
My dad scratched his beard. “Erm. I’m not too keen on wars anymore, General. How’s the pay?”
“Abysmal,” she replied.
“Holidays?”
“None.”
“Any perks at all?”
“The safeguarding of our freedoms and Republic. What do you say?” And she reached out her hand.
The captain looked around at his crew. Daaric said, “We follow you, Captain,” and the sentiment was echoed by everyone else.
So my dad turned back to the general and said, “Well, when you put it that way, how can I refuse?” And he clasped her hand in a firm shake. “You’ve got us.”
General Organa smiled. “Welcome back to the fight, Hansifred.”