Part 2

Normally, Luke Skywalker couldn't wait to get home at the end of the day. Sure, he enjoyed teaching his students, but nothing was better that coming home to his wife and son.

But today he was wary of going home, and with good reason. He had felt Mara's flash of annoyance at him over their bond when she realized his joke on her, and he didn't blame her one bit. It was a mean joke, to be sure, but he couldn't help but laugh at her predicament. Still, he was prepared to meet Mara's wrath when he returned home.

So imagine his surprise when he arrived home, and instead of being greeted by a very annoyed wife, he was greeted with a home-cooked meal and a very amorous kiss.

"Hello, dear," Mara purred. "Did you have an amusing day?" she asked with just a touch of sarcasm in her voice.

Luke winced. An overly polite Mara could mean even more trouble than an overly angry Mara. "Hello, Mara. Dinner looks great," he complimented her, sitting down at the table. "Where's Ben?"

"He's taking a nap," Mara replied. "I didn't want to wake him up for dinner; he's had a very full day, as you can imagine."

"Yeah—about that, Mara…I'm sorry, I know I shouldn't have done that, but I couldn't help myself—"

"That's alright," Mara cut him off. She placed a serving of food on his plate. "Hungry, dear?" she asked.

Luke looked at his plate, then to her. "Uh, this isn't poisoned, is it?" he asked, only half-joking.

Mara laughed. "Of course not, you silly farmboy. Look, Luke, don't worry about it. It was kind of funny…well not from my position, of course…but still, there was no harm done. Don't worry about it."

Luke felt relieved, but was still skeptical at Mara's quick forgiveness. Still, maybe she had really changed from her days as a sarcastic, biting smuggler. "Are you sure? I would be mad if I were you….you're not planning revenge, are you?" He did not look forward to any revenge planned by Mara.

"Oh Luke, stop being ridiculous and forget about it. Now eat your dinner." She smiled at him.

He leaned across the table to kiss her. "You're the best, Mara." He bit into his dinner. "This is really good!" They ate in silence for several moments. "Hey Mara…I gotta ask…what did you say to Ben?"

"About where babies come from, you mean?"

Luke winced, still feeling bad about doing something so childish. He nodded.

"Oh, I told him the truth."

"You what?" Luke was incredulous. "Mara, don't you think he's a bit too young?"

Mara laughed. "Oh don't get excited Luke, I didn't go into detail. I just told him that when a mommy and daddy love each other, they make a baby and it grows in the mommy's tummy. Then when the time is right, it's born."

"Oh. And he accepted that?"

"Yeah, he was satisfied, for now at least. But when he starts liking girls, you're in charge of the dirty details, got it?"

Luke laughed. "Yeah, I guess I deserve that," he said.

"Oh, and Ben did ask if I was going to have any more babies."

"Uh-oh. What did you tell him?"

"Maybe. That it depends on daddy," she said, her eyes twinkling.

Luke grinned slyly. "Well, speaking of that...what do you say I take you out for a night on the town? You're going to Coruscant next week to meet with Talon. Why don't Ben and I come with you? We can find someone to watch him while we go out, and it would be good for him to get away from all the Jedi stuff."

"I don't know, Luke. Should we really take him all the way there and then just leave him with someone else?"

"It'll be just for one night, Mara. Come on, it'll be good for us to get out." He caressed her arm suggestively. "We haven't been alone in awhile..."

Mara couldn't help but grin. "Alright, Farmboy. You can take me out on a date."

"I thought you'd never say yes," he replied, kissing her deeply.

The following week, Luke was sitting in the living room of his Coruscant residence, watching a holovid with Ben while Mara was at lunch with her former boss, Talon Karrde. They hadn't seen each other for a long time, and had finally been able to arrange a meeting to catch up. Luke knew that Mara had been really looking forward to seeing him again.

Their date the previous night had gone off without a hitch. Their baby-sitters had come in a most unusual form–several of his former Rogue Squadron friends: Wedge Antilles, Tycho Celchu, Wes Janson, Hobbie Klivian, Corran Horn, and Gavin Darklighter.

Luke was hesitant about letting them spend several hours alone with Ben—it had been the Rogues, of course, who had slipped up in front of Ben, and that was even with Luke present, but Wedge had been insistent. "Come on Luke, I'll bring Iella along, how bad can it be?" he had argued. "And Corran's in town, and he's got those Jedi morals you can depend on. We really want to do this for you two, Luke. It'll be good for Ben to spend time with some of us 'regular' folk, don't you think?'

Luke had had to admit that it was a good idea. While he and Mara wanted Ben to be raised as a Jedi from an early age, they didn't want Ben to be ignorant of non-Jedi. So he had reluctantly agreed, after making Wedge swear upon his Corellian heritage, his X-wing, and his prized collection of Whyren's Reserve, that there would be no funny business around his son.

It had taken more than a promise to convince Mara, of course, but Luke had eventually got her to agree to it. "Iella will be there, and Corran too—it can't be too bad with them! Come on Mara," he had persuaded.

Mara had raised an eyebrow. "You forget that I've spent my fair share of time with Mr. Corran Horn and am quite good friends with his wife…you might not want to use him as the moral pillar of that group."

Luke had chuckled. "Please, Mara? It would mean a lot to them."

"Fine," Mara had finally relented. "But if there is any funny business, you're dealing with the consequences, got it Farmboy?"

Luke smiled, thinking about the exchange. Ben had been a perfect angel all day; there were no signs of any slip-ups the night before. It seems that the Rogues behaved themselves after all, he thought, closing his eyes for a short nap.

He thought wrong.

"Daddy?" Ben asked, just as Luke drifted off to sleep. It was almost as if the kid had an internal alarm to interrupt his parent's sleep cycles.

"Yeah, Ben?" Luke replied, stretching his arms and sitting up.

"What's a period?"

Luke gave him a confused look. "A period?" He looked over to see if Ben was working on homework, but all he saw was a coloring book. "You know what a period is, Ben. Remember, you learned about it at school? It comes at the end of a sentence."

"No," Ben shook his head. "Not that kind of period. The kind that Mommy gets."

Luke's eyes grew wide with dread. "Oh no. Oh no. I'm going to kill them..."

"What's that, Daddy?"

"Oh, nothing. Um, listen Ben, you didn't hear that from Daddy's friends, did you?" he asked, hoping beyond hope that maybe Ben had overheard some girl talk between Mara and Leia.

"Yeah! They were talking about it last night." No such luck.

Luke sighed. "Can you tell me what they said, Ben?" I have to know which of them I'm going to have to kill, he thought.

"Well after they picked me up Uncle Wedge said that they had to behave themselves or Mommy would get mad. Then Uncle Wes said that Mommy must have her period. Then Uncle Wedge shushed him and told me to forget I had heard that."

Luke grimaced. Why in the Force had he thought it was a good idea to let the Rogues baby-sit? At the very least he could have made them exclude Janson...

Luke tried to think of how to best fix this situation. If Mara found out what they had said, they would all be dead, Luke included. "Ben, honey, let's keep this between ourselves, okay? Do me a favor and don't tell Mommy about it. We don't want to make her mad."

"Oh. I'm sorry Daddy. I already told her this morning."

Luke felt a pit the size of Carkoon in his stomach. He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to will this disaster away.

He patted Ben on the shoulder. "Don't worry about it, Ben. It's all right. Tell me though...what did Mommy say? She wasn't mad, was she?"

"No," Ben replied. "She wasn't mad. And she told me to ask you!" he grinned.

A few hours later, Luke was lying on the couch, drifting in and out of sleep while a holovid played in the background. Ben was taking a nap in his room, finally giving him some peace and quiet. It had been an interesting afternoon—Luke had tried his best to deflect Ben's curiosity about periods, but there was no appeasing him.

Luke opened his eyes as he heard the door open, and a few moments later he saw his wife walk into the room. She stood by the couch's arm, smiling down at him. "Did you have a good day, dear?" she asked, her saccharine tones conflicting with the flash of mischief in her eyes.

"Very," Luke replied dryly. "You are an evil woman, Mara."

"Me?" She sat down on the arm of the couch, patting his feet.

"Yes, you!"

Mara shrugged. "Hey, I told you if there was any funny business, you were dealing with it," she said, walking into the office to put away some paperwork.

"Yeah, well, it wasn't a fair trade!" Luke called. "You at least have something to do with babies being made—what do I know about all that girl stuff!"

Mara laughed from the other room. "Oh come on Luke, don't be such a baby. It's not a big deal."

"Not a big deal? I spent half an hour trying to explain to Ben what a period is. He wasn't satisfied with my answer that it was girl stuff. Then I tried to tell him that it was grown-up stuff, and he didn't buy that, either. Finally I had to look up 'menstrual cycle: explanation for children' on the Holonet and read it to him! The entire five-page entry!"

Mara came back into the living room and snorted. "Hey, I warned you! It's your fault for letting them baby-sit," she said, walking into the kitchen. "Want something to drink?"

"No, I'm fine. And it's not my fault, okay? They swore they were going to behave. Wedge threatened Wes I don't know how many times and they all promised to keep their mouths shut."

Mara chuckled from the other room. "And you believed them?" she said. "You're still such a farmboy sometimes, Luke!" she chastised him, coming back into the living room.

Luke sulked into the couch. "It's not my fault. It's like the universe conspired against me—"

He stopped, suddenly sitting up straight in his seat. A light bulb had gone off in his mind, and he knew through his bond with Mara that his suspicions were true. Very slowly, he turned around to glare at his wife's very amused face.

"You!" he accused.

Once again, Mara feigned innocence. "I don't know what you're talking about, Skywalker," she said, but her very evil grin said otherwise.

"You planned this. I don't believe you! You agreed to let them to baby-sit, knowing that they would slip up, and knowing that I would be stuck with the aftermath! Don't even try to deny it; I can tell it's the truth."

"Well, it's not the truth." Luke started to protest, but Mara looked him straight in the eye. "I didn't agree to let them to baby-sit; I suggested it. And I didn't just think that they'd slip up; I told them to."

Luke's mouth dropped. His eyes shot daggers at her.

Mara's only response was to raise her eyebrows. "Is there a problem, dear?"

"I can't believe you, Mara. You could have just gotten mad at me to begin with!"

"I know, but that wouldn't have been nearly as funny."

"It's not funny," Luke retorted. "I had to explain a menstrual cycle to our very inquisitive, never-satisfied-with-an-answer five-year-old son!"

"Uh-huh. And you deserved it," Mara said, walking around to sit next to Luke on the couch. She placed her hand on his knee. "Next time, you'll think twice before you set me up like that, huh?"

Luke shook his head. He couldn't really be mad at his wife for this, but he was annoyed nonetheless. "I still can't believe you, Mara. We swore a vow to each other! And revenge isn't the Jedi way," he said, tying to hit her where it hurt.

It didn't work. "No, it's not, Luke," she agreed. "But you forget: I wasn't always Jedi Master Mara Jade Skywalker. Before that, I was Mara Jade. You should know; you married her." She kissed him deeply, almost making him feel better.

She pulled away, her green eyes flashing at his. "And Mara Jade always gets her revenge."