All the Stars

Chapter Two

The days went by, and Hera's injuries slowly healed. She'd been transferred to the best medical facility on Chandrila, where she excelled at physical therapy and threw herself fully into any task they gave her. Spinal and internal injuries were, nonetheless, extremely challenging obstacles to overcome, no matter how hard she worked. Chopper had been completely repaired, and he was there by her side. Friends came and went, and they found her much the same as they always had. She spoke to Jacen every day, knowing her holo-image didn't quite betray how battered and broken she still was. She and her father had decided that it was best to wait until she was more fully herself before seeing him again; still, she longed to feel his small arms around her neck, and see his blue eyes twinkling up at her.

Zeb and Alexsandr, who had been in occasional contact over the previous few weeks of her convalescence, appeared one day with the remnants of her ship. They'd spent weeks scouring the deserts of Jakku in search of the parts that had been scavenged, and had been able to recover a great deal of what was taken. Overjoyed, Hera asked how they'd managed to recover so much of her ship. Zeb cradled one huge fist with his other hand and said, "We just made the best offers. You know, 'give us that part, and we won't kill you and just take it anyway'." His booming laugh was music to her ears.

With the fighting over and the remainder of the Empire chased from the galaxy, Hera had felt at a loss for ways to occupy her time until she was fully recovered, and could get back to teaching. Putting the Ghost back together would do nicely. Chopper, by her side as always, had already begun complaining about the amount of work he'd have to do.

Hera's doctors didn't bother trying to discourage her from working on her ship, which was smart of them. Her injuries included some mild nerve damage, and her doctors and physical therapists agreed that using the fine motor skills required for working on the ship would probably help. She could have had mechanics on Chandrila put the ship back together for her, better than new, but it seemed very important to do it herself. Not that people didn't offer their help continually- Leia Organa and Han Solo, new parents to a dark-haired baby named Ben, stopped by frequently to see how things were going. Han, who seemed to be having a hard time settling in to his new role as a father, was always offering his help- often in the form of advice that Hera neither wanted nor needed. Leia's amused and knowing smile always helped Hera smother her exasperation. Chopper, on the other hand, took rare but twisted pride in his own work by using every crude word at his disposal to describe the Millennium Falcon.

Life had slowly begun to return to normal for Hera, with friends new and old around to help out. She knew she would overcome the physical impairments in time. Emotionally, however, Hera felt much more deeply wounded. The aftermath of her meeting with Kanan had been difficult. She talked to psychiatrists, who of course could never quite believe her story. They all told her that she was finally coping with the profound grief over Kanan's death, and that it would just take time to process. But it was more than that. Hera Syndulla, born into war, no longer had a war to fight. She didn't know how to slow down and live an ordinary life. So she focused on putting her ship back together, and on Jacen, who would be coming to Chandrila from Ryloth in a week's time.

One afternoon, a few days before Jacen was due to arrive, she was working on installing a brand new hyperdrive and heard Chopper give a loud, excited whoop from beneath the ship. He started chattering nonsensically, and she wondered if he was malfunctioning- he was, after all, very old.

She shimmied out from the crevice she'd wedged herself into while soldering some wiring, and made her way down to Chopper, who was still bleating nearly hysterically. When she saw him and what he was hysterical about, though, she almost followed suit with her own nonsensical noise.

Standing on the tarmac beneath the Ghost was Ezra, Sabine...and Kanan.

Hera collapsed.