Chapter Text
She did not know how exactly she got here. This was more of Luke’s dealings. He was the jedi. He was the one who chose to stay on that path and restore what was lost while Leia chose to walk away from being a jedi. It wasn’t her path. It was what would lead her to a life of pain and loss. Luke could rebuild the Order on his own while Leia would help rebuild the galaxy in the aftermath of the horror inflicted on them by the Empire.
Except, it seemed the Force did not want her to completely turn her back on whatever it is (even though she did not turn her back and often used whatever skills she learned from her brother and used them) and thrust her into this.
It started off with this.
A dream.
She wasn’t unused to it. Luke told her that Force sensitives can have dreams that are premonitions. Warnings. Like her dream of her child-
No.
But this wasn’t like that.
She dreamt she was standing in the middle of crossroads. There were countless roads. Countless paths she could take.
Choose one.
Why? She had asked.
She heard no reply.
She stared and stared until one felt right. Walked for what felt like hours until she reached the end where a door stood. She reached out and opened.
The next moment she was awake.
And she didn’t know but she knew. She just knew .
She wasn’t home anymore.
If she had any doubts that she wasn’t home it was solidified when she stumbled out of a cave (yes, an actual cave) to a battle. A battle between droids with Imperial soldiers. Or the remains of it because the soldiers in white and yellow were shooting down the remaining few droids left standing.
She was baffled by the scene. She was not aware of a droid army. She knew imperial soldiers existed. They somehow still existed but not droids.
And not jedi.
Because that’s who was at the forefront. A jedi wielding a green lightsaber.
Leia almost laughed when she realized where she was.
God.
She wasn’t home. She couldn’t go home either because her home did not even exist.
She was in the fucking clone wars.
And then she sees the face of the jedi. Obi-wan. Ben. She knows it’s him because she remembers him. Remembered the man who rescued her all those years ago. No scruffy beard or torn robes. No, this was not Ben Kenobi, the jedi hiding away in Tatooine. This was Obi-wan Kenobi. Jedi Master. General.
When the battle ends, Leia still stands where she does, unable to move. To look away from the scene in front of her. She wants to call out to him. The only one she could trust. (The only one she trusted since she was a child.)
As if he could hear her, he looked at her. A lone woman standing on the edge of the battlefield.
And then she faints.
She dreams when she sleeps. It’s not always the horrible ‘visions’ of a possible future or the horrors of her past.
No, she dreams of good things. She dreams of Luke and his smile as he waves goodbye to her before flying away on that X-wing while Leia would smile back fondly and wait for him to come see her again. She dreams of that brief time when she decided to honor her brother’s hope for her and learn how to be a Jedi so that he wouldn’t be alone in his burden to revive a dead order.
She dreams of her parents and Alderaan and in these dreams she’s happy. She doesn’t remember that they no longer exist. Doesn’t remember that they’re gone . She sees the mountains out far and the soaring towers. The rolling green forests. The view of her city from her balcony. Her mother’s exasperated look and her father’s mischievous smiles.
She dreams of Han. Memories of the time of war when she would look at him when he wasn’t looking at her. Him laughing with the other pilots and Luke. His gentle smile and loving eyes. His smirk when he calls her a Princess. Him. Just him.
And she dreams of Ben. She dreamt of him before she even held him in her arms. Loved him before he existed. Her sweet boy with his bright laugh and curious nature. She dreams of how he reaches for her every time she comes home. Of how he looks so sad when she has to leave.
She couldn’t make him understand that the galaxy still needed her. That the empire may be gone but wicked people still existed and people needed a voice. Leia needed to fight for them. She needs to be there for them.
She dreams of all those she loves and here she wishes she could keep on sleeping. Keep on dreaming so she could keep on reliving the best moment from her life.
So she doesn’t wake up to deal with the aftermath.
She remembers Obi-wan. Vaguely because she was a child when she met him but she remembers him. How can she forget the man who saved her life? Time and time again. The one who gave her a piece of who she was and held her when she was terrified even if she tried to pretend she wasn’t.
She sees him now when she wakes up and realizes he’s a different man from the one she knew.
The man she knew was broken. He was hopeless.
This one is alive . This one was a leader who led troops.
But he was still Obi-wan. He was still kind and caring as he gently asked her where she’s from and why she appeared out of nowhere in the middle of the battle. Asks her her name and she wants to laugh and cry.
Wants to ask him, don’t you know me?
I blamed myself for your death.
My hands are stained with the blood of my people and yours.
I named my son after you. I hope that he will have your heart and your kindness.
She tells him her name is Leia. Tells him she doesn’t know where she is (truth) or how she got here (truth). All truth in a way. He never asks her if she knows at what time period she’s in so she wasn’t lying.
He exchanges a look with a man, a clone by the looks of it, beside him. A sight that troubles her because she knows what they do. The horror they will inflict on others.
“Where are you from?”
“Alderaan.”
The two exchange another silent look while Leia waits. She knows she should tell Obi-Wan the truth because if there’s anyone who can help her get home as soon as possible then it will be him. She trusts him.
But he doesn’t know her and he won’t trust her. She needs to talk to him alone. Use the force.
Before she can request the clone to leave them alone, the door opens and someone else enters.
The first thing that Leia thinks when she sees him is that she knows him. Not like Obi-Wan who she met and knew.
No, this was like… a childhood memory so vague that she could remember only bits of it. Or like a dream that you only remember the feeling of.
He smiles at Obi-Wan and Leia feels the hairs in the back of her neck standing up.
Then his gaze falls to her and Leia feels her heart drop.
She knows who he is before Obi-Wan even introduces them. Knows him because of his eyes. Those blue eyes that glittered with a certain light and mischief.
Luke’s eyes.
“Miss Leia, may I introduce you to General Anakin Skywalker.”
Luke loves Vader. He loved to collect stories about him from his time with the Order. Even if most of the information about the jedi order was wiped, there were records of Anakin Skywalker, the Clone Wars general. He told her those stories. Then he told her more. How he saved Luke’s life and ended Palpatine’s. Proved that there was still good left in him and that he cared for his children.
Leia did all she could to not laugh when he said that.
Luke loved him.
Leia hated him.
She did not care that Vader turned good in the end. Did not care that he killed Palpatine. The one good thing he did was save Luke. The only good thing he did because he was all Leia had left. But that did not mean Leia forgave him. She could never forgive him.
He was part of why Alderaan was gone. Her mother and father were gone. How could she forgive him for that?
Luke likes to talk about him as if Darth Vader and Anakin Skywalker were two different people. Maybe to him they were different. But Leia has only ever known Darth Vader. To her Anakin Skywalker and Darth Vader are one and the same. The only thing that man did was contribute to the genetics that made her. The man who is the reason she has the Force.
She was the daughter of Breha and Bail Organa. She was the daughter of Padme Amidala.
She was no daughter of Anakin Skywalker.
She saw one holo of him. Only one. It was the holo of her mother’s marriage to him. She saw it because she wanted to see Padme. She wanted to know about the woman who gave birth to her and helped her parents establish the beginnings of the Rebellion. She liked to find the similarities she had with Bail and Breha. And once she knew of Padme, she did the same.
She never did that with Anakin Skywalker.
She did not have the heart to ask her brother to stop. She would listen quietly because Leia had parents who loved her and pampered her. Luke had an aunt who loved him quietly and an uncle who had a hard time expressing his care for him. But they were not mother or father . He could never call them those. He could call Vader his father and Leia could not ask her brother to stop doing that. She was just grateful he did not expect the same of her.
She looks at Anakin Skywalker now and she wishes it was Luke who was here instead of her. Luke should be the one here because Luke should meet this man. This man was his father and Luke should have had the chance to meet him. Not Leia.
Luke speaks to him at times. He’s a Force ghost now, Luke told her. He can speak to him at times. Not that Leia needed to know that from him because Vader approached her once. Years ago. She shunned him then.
Luke should be here.
She stares at Vader and he starts to frown. Leia wants to look away but she can’t help it. She does not have his eyes or his hair or his height. Do they have similar noses? If she stands by his side can one tell that he is her sire? What else has she inherited from this man aside from his ‘gift’ of the Force?
“Who are you?” He asks her.
She wants to spit at him.
I am the girl you tortured.
I am the princess of a dead planet.
(I am your daughter.)
“Leia from Alderaan.”
He blinks and his frown deepens. “I didn’t know Leia was a name from Alderaan.”
It’s not. She asked her mother about it once. Why was she called Leia when it was not an Alderaan name.
Your mother gave you that name. We did not feel it was right to take her gift away from you.
She was always proud of her name. She loved her name. It was a parting gift from her birth mother so she would honor it.
It was Luke who told her later on that Leia was a Tatooine name. A name from an old story that gets told to children.
She hated her name for a while after that. All her life she thought it was her mother’s gift to her but it was really Vader’s.
She looked up to see how she could change her name before stopping. (Even if she had opened up the form and started to fill in. She even thought of names to change to.)
“I was adopted.”
Truth.
So far she only spoke the truth. She has not lied because she thinks she cannot lie. They would know. Or perhaps they already know which is why they’re both looking at her like that.
“You can use the Force.”
Leia sighed. She nodded.
“But you’re not…”
“A jedi? No. And I have no intention to be.”
“How are you not at the Temple?”
For a moment she considers lying. She should lie. Anything she says can harm the timeline. Cause disruption.
But lying right now would lead to delaying her return home. She thinks of Ben. She thinks of his face when he realises his mother isn’t coming home yet and her heart aches for her son. She leaves him alone so often.
“Because the Temple does not exist where I’m from.”
They exchange another silent look and Leia’s heart aches for the first time for these two. She knew from Luke how Obi-Wan and Vader were as close as brothers. The look they exchange now is so reminiscent of the silent conversation that Leia and Luke have. She wonders if they have a bond like Luke and Leia do. And if they did, didn’t that just mean they were really family? How did they end up as they were? How did Anakin Skywalker kill Obi Wan Kenobi?
“You said you were from Alderaan.”
“You asked me where I am from. I am from Alderaan.”
“Is there a difference?”
“The question is, yes. The question you should ask me is not where I am from, General. It is when I am from.”
The two exchange another look. This one is incredulous.
“And when are you from?” Vader asked her, a smirk on his face as if he was humoring her.
“From a time when the Jedi are dead.”
When Leia walks through the Jedi temple of Coruscant she almost cries. She thinks of Luke (again). Thinks of the temple her brother is building on Ossus that is merely bricks and stones compared to the vast hall she walks through. She thinks how only in the company of her brother and her son does she feel the Light of the Force and compares it to this feeling she feels now.
So much warmth.
So much Light.
She sees children ( children! ) with training sabers. She thinks of Ben with these children. He would like it here with children like him.
Sees people carry texts that no doubt hold the precious knowledge her brother seeks. She wants Luke here with her so he can carry these home and live up to the legacy he decided to shoulder. She wants to take these with her so she can help Luke.
She walks silently behind Obi-Wan and Vader who haven’t spoken a word to her since her telling them of their doom.
Of sorts.
She never explained to them that Obi-Wan escaped his death until he came to save her. Or how the man beside him is the reason the Jedi are gone.
Sort of. She didn’t tell them about Luke. There was still a Jedi left who was willing to reestablish the old Order.
(She wonders if they would notice if she stole some jedi texts or holocrons for her brother. Perhaps they would but if she is fast enough she could take them back. She blames this line of her thoughts on Han. Years of being married to him has finally influenced her. He would be proud of that.)
Perhaps she is losing her mind.
Obi-Wan doesn’t look at her but Vader does. He often looks back to see if she’s following, a frown still etched on his face. He looks like he doesn’t believe her. She heard him too.
You can’t possibly believe her!
Do you think she is lying?
Yes! How can the jedi be dead?
Because of you , Leia wanted to tell him. You killed them all .
She wonders how that would make him feel. Perhaps he’d be happy.
They wait, both of them watching her warily and Leia resists the urge to smirk at them.
The door opens.
They enter.
Leia decides she does not like the jedi council. She also decides that the first thing she will ask Luke that he is not allowed to collect children and raise them to be morose adults who talk in cryptic words with no real answers.
They do not know how to send her home.
You are here for a reason. Until the reason is fulfilled, the Force will not allow you home .
Blaming the Force for their own ineptness.
She tries not to frown at that.
She frowns when they tell her she is to stick to Obi wan and Skywalker. Where one went, the other followed and given that Obi Wan found her, she was his responsibility.
“You’re not pleased.” Obi wan says.
“I wish to return home.”
“We will do what we can to help you.”
She smirks without humor.
“Is it important to return soon?” That was him .
Leia had yet to look at him. “I have a son.”
They were both quiet. She does not need to look at them to know she surprised them. Leia was young and so was Ben. Still a child and Leia ached to return home to him and Han.
“I don’t want to abandon my child.”
Not like he did. She will not fail Ben like Anakin Skywalker failed his children.
She was familiar with the Senate building. She spent her youth in these halls, arguing with countless Senators only to fail most of the time. But it never deterred Leia. She blazed forward. She failed again and again. She tried again and again.
Too many of her memories were within these halls. Good ones and bad ones.
She did not know exactly why they were here. She knew something about both of them being assigned here temporarily given that they were reluctant to let Leia go until they knew more.
She didn’t think either of them were pleased.
She honestly did not care.
She followed them quietly as she looked around trying to spot the differences. She could feel their stares. Knew they tried to see if anything on her face would give it away.
She was surprised they weren’t interrogating her on their upcoming demise. Not that she would say anything to them. Too much was at stake. Her own future was at stake. One wrong move here and her future would slip. She doesn’t know if she or Luke would exist. Doesn’t know whether she would meet Han.
Or if she would ever have Ben.
She has given enough, hasn’t she? Her life. Her parents. Her planet. She refuses to lose the last bits of her life.
Or, at least that was her plan until she sees them.
She knows she is in the past. Knows things are different here and the horrors of her own life have yet to pass. Understands in a way that what she has lost is not truly lost because they do not exist yet.
But still, Leia cannot help but stop when she sees them. Her heart stops. Hands clench. Wills her tears away when she sees two people.
Padme Amidala and Bail Organa.