When Rey walked right past his door like she didn't even see him coming through it, he felt like he'd been slapped.

Finn had barely seen her for weeks, and half of that was watching from a distance as she trained with Skywalker in the woods nearby. He had worried at first about being caught, but the Jedi had looked right at him and didn't seem to object, so he'd kept watching. Rey, focused on whatever it was they were doing, never even glanced his way.

But the only task that should be occupying her right now was breakfast, and she was headed the wrong way.

"Rey! Hey, where are you going?"

She turned around just before the bend in the corridor, and Finn's stomach dropped. Freckles stood out sharply on her ghost-pale face, and a sheen of sweat glinted on her forehead. "Oh. Finn. I..." She frowned, pointing vaguely in the direction she'd been walking. "I'm not sure."

He closed the distance between them in two long strides, laying the back of his hand against her forehead. "You've got a fever."

"But I have to..." She shook her head. "I'm cold. Is it cold?"

"Come on. Let's get you to the medbay."

They made it about twenty paces before she sank to the floor, dragging him down with a painfully strong grip on his arm and a keening whimper. Finn had never imagined her making a sound like that. He ended up sitting on the floor with her half in his lap, trying to figure out how to get back up so he could carry her the rest of the way.

Then Skywalker was there, seemingly out of nowhere, kneeling in front of them and asking, "What happened?"

"I don't know. She's sick."

It sounded stupid and obvious to his own ears, but Skywalker just nodded acknowledgement. His left hand curled lightly around the back of Rey's head, his focus intent on her face.

Finn knew nothing of the Force, but when the Jedi closed his eyes, every hair on his arms and the back of his neck stood up. He could almost see the power enveloping Rey, feel it thrumming under his scalp, hear it singing ~safe. warm. loved. sleep.~

"Finn."

Someone was shaking his shoulder, and he snapped his head up with a start. He was still sitting on the floor, but - "Where's Rey?"

"They're taking her to the medbay." Skywalker offered him a hand up, and Finn considered it warily for a second before accepting. "I'm sorry; I didn't mean for that to affect you too. Her connection to you is strong."

"It's okay," Finn replied on autopilot, only half hearing what the apology was about.

When they reached the medbay, Rey was already in bed, a medic frowning at the diagnostic computer beside her.

The woman glanced over her shoulder and turned to address Skywalker when she saw him. "Rinlari fever. The local insects must carry the virus."

"Rinlari fever?" Finn echoed. "Nobody gets that anymore."

"Because we were all vaccinated as children." The medic gestured toward the computer. "According to this scan, she's missing several immunizations. Everything she should have received after about age four."

Before Finn could respond to that, Skywalker put in, "But she should be all right, shouldn't she? Am I remembering right, that Rinlari is only really dangerous for small children and elders?"

The medic nodded. "We've already given her an antiviral, and we'll keep her here a few days to rest, but she'll be fine." She turned to Finn. "I don't blame you for worrying; the symptoms are frightening. You did exactly what you should have."

"Thanks." All he really heard was she'll be fine, but that was enough. "Is it... is it okay if I stay?"

"Of course."

He sank gratefully into a chair, never taking his eyes off Rey while they bustled over her a few minutes longer before leaving her to sleep. She'll be fine.

"You won't lose her."

Finn jumped at Skywalker's voice over his shoulder. "Sorry, sir. I... kind of forgot you were there."

"That's okay. And it's Luke." He was positive he'd never seen the Jedi smile before, but then he wasn't sure he'd ever really seen him before. Somewhere between the corridor and here, the living myth had vanished, leaving only a man to pull up a chair beside him.

"A lot of microbes can't survive in the desert, even where there are people, so her immune system has some catching up to do. When I first joined the Rebellion, I caught every sniffle and stomach bug there was, for months." He nodded toward Rey, the worry in his eyes at odds with the reassuring words. "But I'm not talking about that. What she's learning, how she's changing... You won't lose her. It might feel like that's what's happening, but it's not."

Finn digested that for a moment, then ventured, "Every day there's something else I don't understand about how normal people live. It's all as strange to me as anything you can do. Anything she can do. I guess there's not really much difference."

"Maybe not," Skywalker - Luke - agreed. "But you can make all the difference to Rey."

"How?"

"It's a dangerous time for her." The smile was gone now, and for a moment he looked so old. "There are tests she'll have to face, things that will shake her to her core. Things you can't protect her from. Things I can't protect her from."

Finn shuddered, but said nothing. What could he say?

"When she seems further from you than ever, seems too far to reach... That's when she'll need you the most."

"I don't understand."

"You don't have to. You just have to be there for her. Can you do that?"

The question was almost insulting. "Of course."

Luke smiled again. There was still something sad about it, but the ominous weight of a moment before dissipated like smoke. "Good." Then he rose, shaking off the last of the melancholy mood, and asked, "Have you eaten?"

Finn's stomach grumbled an eager response, but he wasn't sure of a proper answer to the unexpected question. "Um. No?"

"Well, my morning plans are on hold for a few days, and you seem like someone worth getting to know. I'll see what I can get us from the mess hall." He stepped over to Rey's bedside and held her hand for a moment before heading toward the door.

~safe. warm. loved. sleep.~

Rey hovered at the edge of waking, the heavy soft blanket Luke had wrapped around her mind dwindling to a gauzy veil. On the other side of it, she knew, was pain, a phantom spike between her brows and through the base of her skull. So she was content to drift half-dreaming and let it protect her while it lasted.

Not long ago, she would have flung it away instantly. So much had changed.

The first time he raises his hand near her face, brushes against the edge of her presence to show her where it is, she flinches, and a roiling ball of panic slams him into a tree a meter behind him.

"I'm so sorry!" she tries to say, but there's not enough air. Her heart is trying to pound its way out of her chest and the trees seem to be closing in and spinning, she has to sit down, and she can't breathe -

"Rey. Listen to me." Luke's voice is impossibly calm, and she can feel him in front of her, not reaching toward her but there for her to find. "Follow your breath. Follow it in. Follow it out."

They just did this, not ten minutes ago, but she can't control it now, her lungs locked in useless spasms.

"Don't try to control it. Just follow it."

Yes. She remembers now.

"One breath at a time."

How can she... There. That's one breath. It hitches painfully into her lungs, runs into a barrier of tension, and fights its way out again. But it's one breath, followed by another, and then another.

Breathe in, breathe out, slower and deeper and steadier of its own accord, until she can find the stillness in between. The center of everything, between one breath and the next. Gradually expanding her focus from there, the stillness always at the center, until she's aware of every part of her, of the Force flowing around and through her. She wasn't even sure she wanted to learn this, but nothing has ever felt more right.

Has she ruined it all?

When she opens her eyes, he's sitting just within reach, his hands resting in his lap, and his face holds only kindness and concern. "When they took you to Starkiller Base... Can you tell me?"

She honestly doesn't know if she can. She thinks of Finn asking urgently, "Did they hurt you?" She thought she was telling the truth when she answered no.

She's not sure how she begins, exactly. It's halting at first, then the words come in a rush, and it's all she can do to keep them flowing in one direction and making any sense at all.

How she couldn't raise the blaster, couldn't turn to look when the dark figure moved behind her, couldn't pull away when the red blade crackled centimeters from her ear. How she felt herself falling for a split-second as consciousness was ripped away.

The human face behind the mask, the deceptively gentle voice and demeanor - a hollow imitation of Luke's, she recognizes now - so baffling and out of place that she didn't notice the dark tendrils slipping into her mind until they took hold and pulled.

Underneath it all, a pervasive fear that rippled and swelled when she named it to his face. Creature in a mask, she called him, and monster, though that was only after -

She stops abruptly, stares at Luke. He's let her blurt all this, let her forget - as she never would with Leia - that what the First Order took from him, twisted and turned against him, was not just his apprentice but his family.

"What is it?" he asks, and means it. He really doesn't know what she's thinking. He could if he wanted, there's not the slightest doubt of that, but he doesn't.

A hundred questions crowd her mind, with no idea if she has the right to ask any of them. Finally she settles on, "Was he always so afraid?"

"More than I ever knew." It must hurt him, so much, but there's only a slight break in his voice to betray it.

"I'm sorry."

"You've done nothing to be sorry for." Luke holds out his hand, just enough for her to easily reach, and smiles when she takes it. "When I started, it was easy for me to trust. Nobody had ever given me a reason not to."

"I... I can't even imagine that."

He acknowledges the admission with a small nod. "You already knew this wouldn't be easy. It won't always be comfortable. I can't even promise it will always be safe. But I will never, ever take one step further into your mind than you are willing to allow."

"I know that."

"You don't." When Rey draws breath to protest, he continues, "You need more proof. That will take time, and that's okay." He gently squeezes her hand. "And I'll trust you to tell me when you're afraid."

There's a lump in her throat suddenly, and she swallows past it. "I will."

The last threads of sleep drew away, but to her surprise she didn't hurt. There was bright light against her eyelids, and the antiseptic smell of the medbay, so familiar from all the time she'd sat with Finn. She felt... not quite real, and opening her eyes took more effort than she thought it should.

There was a numb spot at the side of her neck, and she reached up to find a small square of thin plastic stuck to her skin.

"Leave that," a brisk voice chided.

Rey blinked, and the face beside her took a second to come into focus. "Dr. Kalonia?"

The woman nodded. "Now leave the medpatch alone. You gave your friend quite a scare, you know."

"Finn?"

"I'm here." He was, on the other side of her, taking her hand in both of his while the doctor adjusted the bed to sit her up a bit.

"He finally gets to return the favor." Dr. Kalonia cracked a smile. "He hasn't left your side all day. How do you feel?"

Rey thought a second. "Thirsty. And sort of... floaty?"

"That's the medication. Believe me, you're glad of that."

"Oh."

The doctor held up a cup of water with a straw and let her take several long swallows before handing it to Finn. "Any pain? Headache, sore throat?"

"No. Just thirsty."

Dr. Kalonia nodded, and Finn held up the cup for her. "The fever is staying down. I think you'll be back on your feet by tomorrow night."

Rey was getting used to the idea of days off, but that still sounded like an absurdly long time to just stay in bed. Finn looked so pleased, though, that it must be good news.

"Best news I've heard all day." The voice was Leia's, and Dr. Kalonia moved to let her step up to Rey's side, Luke close behind her.

"Hello." It was so strange, everyone fussing over her like this. She was vaguely embarrassed, but it was taking most of her attention to keep her eyes open and sip at the water. The straw made a loud slurping sound at the bottom of the cup, and she looked up at Finn. "Can I have more?"

While he went off to get it, Leia said, "You know, if you needed a break from training, you could have just told him." She poked an elbow at Luke. "He listens pretty well. Usually."

It felt good to laugh.

"I do my best," Luke conceded in the same teasing tone, then continued earnestly, "You just rest, Rey. You're allowed to need that."

"Okay."

"Good." He rested his hand on her head for a brief moment, just a whisper of ~quietcomfortsafe~ at the very edge of her blurry awareness. "I'll come back to see you in the morning."

"That goes for you too." Leia poked a finger toward a startled Finn as he returned with the water. "When they say it's time for her to sleep, you go back to your quarters and do the same."

"Yes, ma'am."

Rey watched them go, Luke's arm around Leia's shoulders. Through all the tense strangeness when they had first brought him back, one truth had always been clear: The galaxy needed the Jedi, but the general needed her brother.

Leia got out two glasses and the bottle of Corellian brandy she'd always kept on hand for Han, even when they'd been apart for weeks or months at a time. When she held up one glass inquiringly, Luke nodded and watched her pour a sensible smidgen in each. They both had too much responsibility, and he'd never liked the feeling anyway. But that wasn't the point.

Duty had pulled them all in different directions, over and over again, but home was always with her. This base was new; Han had never set foot here and never would. But he was everywhere in her quarters - in the brandy bottle, the clutter of her desk, the worn silk robe hanging on a peg. The colors were as bright as the day Han had bought it for her, and their faces as vivid in Luke's memory: Leia belatedly pretending she wasn't appalled by its gaudiness, Han comically dismayed.

He took the glass she held out and followed her to the small couch. The stuff tasted as awful as ever, its heat down his throat and in his chest not unpleasant but not exactly pleasant either. Still, it felt, just for a moment, a little like Han was there.

Leia sat back and shook her head. "Those kids."

There was affection, concern, and more than a hint of wonder in the two small words. Luke agreed completely. He leaned forward on his elbows, swirling the last bit of brown liquid at the bottom of his glass. "Yeah."

Her hand was warm between his shoulder blades, and he knew without looking up exactly what measuring look she was giving him. "You see something coming for Rey, don't you? Something bad."

"Something unknown." He finished the drink and set the glass aside, sat back to meet her gaze. "I can't prepare her for everything. I know that."

"But?"

"But I can't prepare her for anything if I can't see it."

She gave a little laugh and reminded him, "Most people go through their whole lives that way, you know."

"Yes, I know. But..." She wouldn't like what he was thinking, but she'd never let him get away without saying it anyway. "Have I already failed her? Before she ever got the chance to begin?"

Leia shook her head again. "You can't think like that," she told him firmly. "You don't get that time back; there's no use second-guessing what you would have done with it. You have to go forward. Just like always."

"Just like always," Luke agreed.

Just like her.

She wouldn't let anyone call her Princess anymore, though she held her tiny frame just as regally and led just as decisively as ever. Alderaan was gone, its significance as a symbol faded. It didn't need a princess, and she didn't need the reminder. What she had learned in its palace was part of her to the marrow. To put her people first, always. To show them only composure and compassion, strength and surety - never doubt or pain or fear.

The girl he'd run off to rescue, instantly spellbound by a shaky hologram, only to find she seemed to know how to do everything and have an answer for anything. The girl who'd reached out to him in his grief and confusion when her entire homeworld had just been destroyed before her eyes. So mature and confident, he'd been stunned to discover they were exactly the same age.

Obi-Wan would never have warned her to bury her feelings; she'd been doing it all her life.

Little by little Luke had learned what lay beneath that image and what it cost her to maintain it. And then only because Leia had let him - maybe because she'd sensed, at some level, the connection that neither of them yet understood; maybe just because he'd been hopelessly harmless.

Always, always going forward.

"Sometimes I think it would be nice if we got to stop," Leia mused, all the sharpness gone from her voice and her eyes. "Of course, I have no idea what that would look like."

"Me neither." That earned him a pointedly skeptical look, and he said. "I know. I wasn't where I should have been. But I wasn't idle either. It's..."

"Hard to explain," she finished for him, amusement taking the sting from her sardonic tone. "You do realize that doesn't hold up when it's your job to explain?"

"To those ready to learn," he returned. "Unless you're changing your mind about that."

She smacked him lightly on the arm. There had been sharp edges in this argument once, but it had long since become just another odd joke between them. She had learned enough to taste her potential, then chosen her own path. It had felt like losing her, until Luke had realized the real risk of that lay in failing to accept her decision.

"I would have forgiven you. Eventually." Leia smiled at his surprise and pulled her feet up under her. "I keep in better practice than you think. And you're worrying very loudly."

"Sorry." He put his arm around her shoulders, and she curled against his side. Closing his eyes, he felt for just a moment like they were twenty-three again, newfound family with all their possibilities ahead of them. Strengthened by the shimmering thread that had connected them since their lives began, that could stretch across a galaxy without breaking.

There were still possibilities, wearing new young faces and looking to them for guidance. They were far from finished.

"He's a lot like you, you know. Finn."

That was unexpected. Of course, he'd barely talked to the boy before today. Leia had been trying to figure out the best place for him since he'd arrived.

"Besides the talent for nearly getting himself killed, that is," she clarified. "He'll walk up to somebody, curious about what they're working on, and ten minutes later they've practically adopted him."

"And that reminds you of me?"

She pulled back, just enough to look at him incredulously. "You think it was normal to be friends with the entire squadron before you knew what all the switches in an X-wing were for?"

"I guess I just figured the Rebellion needed all the help it could get."

"Of course you did." She shifted to face him properly, leaning against the back of the couch. "Finn's pretty good with a blaster, and he doesn't seem to have a problem with shooting at people who are shooting at him, unless he thinks they have a good reason. Which I can't exactly argue with."

"No."

"It just seems like such a waste. He should be a teacher, a leader, and they tried to make him a killer. And they put him in sanitation."

Luke couldn't help smiling at her indignation. "He told me. Give him time, Leia. He's still learning how to handle having any choices at all. The only thing he's really sure of at this point is that he wants to help people. And he'd do anything for Rey."

"See? Just like you." She considered for a moment. "It sounds strange, but I think this might actually be good for her."

"What, being miserably sick?"

"Enforced downtime. A couple of days where she has to rely on other people, and not just you or Finn." She looked at him seriously. "She doesn't know how to be part of a community."

He considered this for a moment. "I know she still feels like she doesn't really belong, like she somehow hasn't earned her place. I hadn't thought of it exactly that way."

"You should have seen that girl when she first arrived, Luke. She couldn't believe she was allowed to eat without something to trade."

"Oh, Rey." He stretched his awareness toward the medbay, reassured himself that the bright presence there was sleeping, healing, safe. He owed her so much better.

"You are giving her the best you have," Leia chided gently. "Nobody can ask you for more."

"I hope so." He looked toward the rug, seeing the simpler challenges of younger days. "We were their age when we both lost everything... but we had it to lose. They had nothing."

"I know." She leaned over and took his hand, held it until he met her eyes. "Now they have whatever we can give them. More importantly, they have each other."

Luke saw the empty space she was talking around, the space where the rest of their family should have been, and pulled her into a hug. "It will be enough. It has to be."

For a long moment, she just hugged him back.