Never Walk Alone

Chapter 2 - Discovery

Author's Note: In which Luke makes a discovery. ;)

~ Amina Gila

Escaping Tatooine itself is a bit... tricky, but they make it out uninjured, which Luke counts as a plus in and of itself. Han and Chewie are nice enough, and there's plenty of space on the Millennium Falcon for Ben to start Luke's Jedi training. It's somehow different than Luke thought it would be, and it makes very little sense, but he's catching on, and it feels right.

He can feel the Force awakening inside him, and it's thrilling.

Things are going well until they get to Alderaan, only to discover the planet is missing entirely. And then they're pulled right onto the moon sized battle station that the Empire somehow managed to create.

Luke has no idea how that's even possible, and he doesn't want to think about it, but here they are.

It's when they land in the hangar that he feels it. Something... dark. Cold, but familiar. He knows that. He feels it in his dreams all the time, every night. That's the feeling he always associated with his father, though it's somehow both stronger and darker, even more overwhelming than he thought it'd be.

"You okay, kid?" Han asks, throwing a worried glance in his direction as they climb out of the smuggling compartments.

"Yeah," Luke answers offhandedly, though he doesn't really think so. He doesn't know what this feeling means. "I just think there's something... important here." It's more like someone important here, but Luke doesn't know enough about the Force to have any idea if it's even possible for him to know something like that. It's just a guess, really.

He just wants to know what, or rather who, he's sensing. It's too familiar. To real.

"What is that?" Luke asks a little breathlessly. It's something Jedi, and he's certain of that. Ben should know, even if Luke is admittedly wary about trusting him. "It feels cold."

"That's the Dark Side," Ben replies, standing.

"What does it mean? Isn't it – a person?" My father, he wants to say, but something holds him back. Maybe it's just that it sounds a little too ludicrous to explain. He's never told anyone the details of his dreams before, and he doesn't know how to start, now. It's never been important, and nor was it something he even knew how to talk about.

"It is a Sith," Ben explains, "Those who use the Dark Side of the Force. It corrupts them, destroys them and everything around them."

The Dark Side.

That's his father. It's – Luke is half certain of it, but he doesn't think he can comprehend what that means right now. All he's wanted is to find him, but to know that he's alive and on this space station too, isn't really something he can fathom right now. It's all too overwhelming.

"Better save the lesson, old man," Han cuts in, "Empire ain't gonna be waiting for us."

"Right," Luke mumbles, scrambling for the door. They can talk later.

Ben doesn't say anything else about it, just leaving almost right off to deactivate the tractor beam. Which is when Luke hears that Leia's here and takes off to find her.

Finding her isn't easy, but he senses the strange familiarity when he sees her in person even stronger. She feels like home in a way he can't understand, but it soothes something in him, as if the part of him forever craving for his father is somehow... made less empty.

He likes Leia. Han, too. And Chewie, though Luke can't really understand him. He's never seen a Wookie before.

To be fair, their forced bonding experience in the garbage masher, and then running through halls away from stormtroopers probably helped with that.