Edges of the World

Chapter 23

They were still distributing blankets when Leia first saw the strange white shape lingering in the corner of her eye.

What was even weirder was how the Force swelled with that strangely familiar presence when she saw it, before whatever it was vanished.

She saw it again, when Sana had shoved her back towards the cockpit with her once they ran out of blankets to hand out.

Then again when they dropped back into real space.

She honestly had no idea what was going on.

By the time they were back on Horox III Leia was half certain she could make out the blurry outline of a Human, or near-Human, figure.

She wanted to know if the stress of her situation was getting to her, or if there was really something there in the Force, just out of her sight.

Hopefully Luke would be able give her his opinion on this soon. He would be able to tell her if she was just imagining things.

Unfortunately it would apparently be a long while before the fighter squadrons returned to base.

To distract herself from waiting for Luke to return, she focused on helping the people who had returned to Horox III with them.

Of the people they had rescued, about half of the adults wanted to join the Rebel forces. The rest had been eager to move to one of the Rebellion's secure farming sites, and live a pastoral life as farmers among other refugees from across the Galaxy, with only a handful of those rescued opting to strike out on their own.

Some of the refugees had seemingly latched onto her. They had mentioned to those who were screening them that they wanted to stay at whatever place she was based out of, and fight alongside her. Moreover she could feel the weight of several gazes on her as she moved around the hanger, and recognized the swiftly ending whispered conversations she kept encountering as people talking about her. Neither the refugees nor the troops she had been with understood that she was a different person from her counterpart, and she knew stories were already spreading across the base that the famous Princess Leia Organa was a Jedi.

General Madine had been giving her rather distressed looks, yet so far Leia was doing a great job of avoiding actually talking to him.

She really was not looking forward to the conversation to come with the full Council.

There was that lingering presence again. She really wished whatever it was would just show itself and get it over with.

She took that thought back immediately, when she reached out towards the disturbance and this time she actually recognized it. Uncle Obi?

By the Force, what was going on?

Uncle Obi's presence didn't fade this time. And when she turned her head towards where she sensed him... it was like he was a hologram, yet his image was strangly stable. He wasn't flickering at all.

She also was sure there wasn't a holocaster placed in that part of the hanger.

He looked bad. His robes were disheveled, his beard unkempt, and he seemed decades older than when she had seen her Uncle a week ago. His expression was full of tragedy mixed with overwhelming hope.

They maintained eye contact for a bit, and then he gave her a small and apologetic smile and vanished.

Oh no. Nope. He was not pulling a vanishing act on her. If this universe's Obi-Wan Kenobi was anything like her Uncle could get when he felt upset, he'd probably hide out for well over a week and then slink on back apologizing about whatever it was he thought he had done.