Chapter Fourteen

Lisa held the portable screen up as Luke read over her shoulder. He was still unable to sit up, so he was lying on his side, poking at the screen whenever something he thought was important caught his eye. They were still coming up empty.

“And I thought Alnilam was hard to find,” Lisa muttered when Luke had again said that the planet they’d been reading about was not the one from his visions.

“Alnilam, from what you told me, is enchanted that way,” he replied, yawning and rubbing at his eyes. Rolling over onto his back, he said, “Hidden by design, you’ve said. This planet isn’t.”

“You sure about that?” she asked, placing the screen down onto the table and standing so he could see her.

“Positive,” he said, and he believed it. He felt in the Force that this planet, though elusive, was not shielding itself like Lisa’s home planet was. It was just difficult to find when most of his energy was being used to heal, and thus he couldn’t use the Force to pinpoint the location yet. Sighing, he reached for her hand. “Let’s take a break.”

“Sure,” she said, running her thumb over his knuckles.

He shut his eyes, not to sleep or go into a trance, but just to rest for a moment. Taking a few deep breaths, he fell silent, thinking.

“Credit for them?” Lisa asked after a few minutes, sitting at his bedside. “What’s on your mind?” She could only hear snippets and fragments – not enough to piece together what he was contemplating.

“Mm?” he asked, then, “Oh, the students.”

“What about them? The fact that if the planet is being this annoying to find, the people will be worse?”

Luke chuckled and looked at her. “No. I’m almost positive as soon as I’m healed, searching will go easier.” He took another deep breath. “No, I’m thinking about the diversity I was seeing. The faces are always obscured, but I can sense the children, the couples, the parents and guardians…I told you that before, remember?”

She nodded. “Yeah, I do. It’s exactly what we want to build, right?”

He didn’t nod but gave an affirmative hum. “They were all so happy. And I don’t think that’s an accident.”

“How so?”     

He shut his eyes again. “We’ve been looking for a planet. The Force is showing me something else.”

Lisa waited as he went quiet, focusing and lightly reaching into the Force.

Harmony, he thought. Emotional balance. Presence.

“I don’t think we’re supposed to find it yet. I think we’re supposed to be ready for it.” Luke opened his eyes and looked at her. “What I saw…we’ve already started doing that. You grounding me…me guiding – or trying to guide. But it’s not just a location; it’s a state. No one was afraid of what they were feeling. They knew what to do with it.”

She still didn’t say anything, allowing him to work through his thoughts. She just continued brushing slow, absent circles over his knuckles.

“I feel as if we’re getting closer, but…” His brow furrowed faintly. “The Force wasn’t pointing me to a place. Not really. It was showing me the balance – the calm, even when something goes wrong.”

Her fingers stilled for just a moment against his hand. “So…what? You think we’ve been looking at this the wrong way?”

He huffed a quiet breath, almost a laugh. “Wouldn’t be the first time.” He shut his eyes again, not in strain – just in thought. “We’ve been trying to find it. Like it’s something hidden in a database somewhere.”

“And it’s not?” she asked gently.

“I don’t think so.” He shifted his head slightly against the pillow. “Or…maybe it is. But not yet.” A pause. “It feels like…” He trailed off, searching.

Lisa waited.

“…like it’s not just about where it is,” he finished. “It’s about when.”

She blinked. “ ‘When’?”

“When we’re ready to actually go there,” he said simply. “Not just look for it from a bed and a datapad.”

Luke was the only one in the bed, but she knew what he meant and was grateful he was including her. This Academy was going to be the product of the both of them, after all.

Lisa studied him for a long moment, then smiled, a little cheekily. “So the Force is telling you to listen to your doctor.”

Luke cracked one eye open at that. “I don’t remember it sounding like 2-1B.”

“Same message, though,” she said lightly.

He let out a quiet breath, somewhere between a sigh and a chuckle, and closed his eyes again. “Yeah. I guess it is.”

Her hand resumed its slow movement over his. “Then we keep doing what we’re doing,” she said. “You heal. I’ll keep digging through the data. And when it’s time…”

He squeezed her fingers, just slightly.

“We’ll go,” he said.

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