FLYING SOLO ➳ luke skywalker

EIGHT! THE BETTER PILOT

ALL Analia wanted to do was help Han pay off his debt to Jabba the Hutt. That was all. At no point had she volunteered herself to play a fretful game of fatal hide-and-seek with Stormtroopers in a miraculously oversized Imperial space station. She was in way over her head, even for a self-titled amazing fighter and pilot like herself. 

By the grace of some miracle, they managed to reach the hangar, but they lingered by the doorway, not daring to make a run to the Millennium Falcon while it was still surrounded.

Truth be told, Analia was beginning to wish Han had dropped her off at Oovo IV all those years ago. She probably would have been better off—safer—rotting in a prison cell then running about an Imperial space station like a complete idiot. Perhaps being a prisoner would even be better for her dignity, considering she looked like a fool hobbling through the hallways on her injured leg.

"What kept you?"

"We ran into some old friends."

"Is the ship alright?"

A frantic exchange of words between Han, Leia and Luke seized Analia and hauled her out of her daydream about the Oovo system. She blinked, surprised to see Luke and Leia but happy to find that they were still alive—for now, at least.

"Seems okay, if we can get to it," Han responded to Luke's nervous inquiry. "I just hope the old man got the tractor beam out of commission."

She hadn't been intending to, but Analia caught Luke's eye. They both promptly looked away, only to glance at each other again. Analia allowed her lips to curl into a small smile, because hey, if they were about to become laser pinboards for Imperial Stormtroopers, the last thing Analia could do was let Luke know she appreciated him and his company, however stupid he might have been sometimes.

Across the way, by the Millennium Falcon, the group of five Stormtroopers all looked to one another, before nodding their heads and shuffling across the hangar, entirely out of Analia's view.

"Now's our chance—go!" Han said.

The others didn't need to be told twice. They darted out of their hiding spot, blasters held aloft incase their use became necessary, all the while Analia silently praised herself for the wrap she had created for her wound. It was making running a little more bearable, even if it was still quite uncomfortable.

"Ben?" Luke's apprehensive whisper distracted Analia from her prideful thoughts. She followed his eyeline and found, with a sense of foreboding trickling down her spine, the old man engaged in combat with someone who, until that very moment, she had honestly believed to be a myth.

She had heard whispers—tales, if you will, of the infamous military leader Darth Vader. Not that anyone had ever come in direct contact with him and lived to tell the tale, but perhaps ex-military personnel had muttered about Vader over drinks at a cantina and his words had spread. However the little information Analia knew about the sinister Darth Vader who controlled his troops with an iron fist had come to her knowledge, she knew that he was feared and powerful, and that a frail old man like Ben couldn't possibly stand any chance against him.

Looking at Vader then, Analia took note of the weapon he held. It was a glowing sword—a lightsaber—just like Ben's, only Darth Vader's shone with a blood red glare, casting an ominous light upon the wall that framed his duel with Old Ben.

Ben froze mid-battle. Analia's blood ran cold. As one might expect, Darth Vader seized his opportunity, cutting Ben down with one single stroke of his lightsaber. Ben's body seemed to vanish as his robes crumpled, which certainly confused Analia, but that was most definitely the least of her concerns in the moment. Old Ben Kenobi, Luke's friend who had come to be trusted by the crew of the Millennium Falcon, was gone.