solo_sword | Coruscant, Friday Fandom time

Once again, Jaina was in a medical ward somewhere, and it wasn't made any better by the fact that she wasn't here for herself.

Jaina knew she'd been a bitch. There was no denying that. It didn't mean she didn't have a point, and it didn't mean that everything she'd said hadn't been building up for a long time, but if given the chance to say it again, she wasn't sure she would. It wasn't even that her opinion had changed about those things; she still had resentment about Leia not being there when she should have, and she still didn't like some of the choices she'd made. It was just that Jaina had sort of rediscovered a more personal respect for her.

By some miracle, Leia was going to get to keep her legs. It hadn't been a sure thing for a while there, but she was going to make a full recovery. In fact, by the time Jaina got to her room in the medical facility, she was looking okay. Not great, definitely, but awake and better than Jaina had been expecting.

"I didn't think I'd see you here," Leia greeted her, sounding a little tired. Jaina decided to ignore the little sting those words caused.

"I'm going to be heading back to Fandom. I wanted to make sure I saw you before I left."

Leia raised her eyebrows and asked, "I thought you'd be heading back to your squadron?"

Jaina shrugged. "I didn't pass the physical exams for them to let me back in yet," she admitted. And yes, she had thrown a very private fit about it before accepting that. "They want to give me recovery time, so I'm going back to do some actual healing and maybe come back in a little while to see what they say then. How are you feeling?"

"'Ow' isn't a feeling, but it about sums it up."

"The bacta'll help there. Trust me on that," Jaina assured her, and there was no recrimination, no thinly veiled reminder that Leia hadn't been there for her when she'd been injured. That sort of brattiness could wait at least until her mom was free of all medication and could snark right back at her.

"I could still use your help here, you know," Leia told her quietly.

"You can't possibly be talking about work already," Jaina said, gaping a little and ignoring the offer. "Mom, you almost ended up an amputee. At best."

"Don't pretend you're shocked, Jaina. You know me better than that. What happened on Duro is all the more reason to work harder."

She couldn't argue with that. And she kind of didn't want to. She felt at least a little more tempered by the experience. She'd had a lot of time to think too hard on it (mostly Jacen's doing), and Leia had been the only person that hadn't treated her any differently due to her injuries. In fact, she'd put her to work that involved more detail than she could physically do. Not that Jaina admitted that. Leia hadn't sent her away from the Vong because she was hurt, she'd done it because it was the automatic mom thing to do.

"Don't overwork yourself?" Jaina said. "If you make yourself worse, there's no one but the idiots who want the job left to do it."

"I'm not sure your father will let me," Leia said. Yet another reason Jaina was glad for her parents' reconciliation.

When Jaina's comlink trilled, she thumbed it off without answering. "That would be me getting called for the shuttle."

"If you're sure you have to."

"I do." She leaned forward, low enough to kiss Leia on the forehead. "I'll call when I get insystem."

"You'd better," Leia said with a little smile. "Take care of yourself."

"You, too," Jaina told her, and turned to head for the door.

Jacen was waiting near where Jaina's shuttle had docked, which she hadn't expected. She'd said goodbye to her dad and brothers before going to see Leia, but apparently Jacen still had things to say. "Come to act as my escort?" she asked.

"Sort of," Jacen said, walking into step with her. "You know how it looks when you've been calling me a deserter for not using the Force and you're going away the first chance you get?"

She glared at him. "You sat there and did nothing while I had to take charge and instruct Mom and what to do with the mining laser. That was a lot of time wasted because you wouldn't help. You and I could have done that together in no time What if she hadn't been able to follow my directions?" she reminded him. "I'm only going now because I can't fight. Slight difference."

"The Jedi could still use you. Uncle Luke would still put you on things," he pointed out, though it was pretty clear she'd made him feel nice and guilty.

"After all I've heard about not putting anyone else at risk because I'm stubborn?" Jaina shook her head. "I'm trying to learn, okay? You got to do it your way, I'll do it mine." And her way probably wouldn't end in her grandfather wanting to come back here specifically to smack some sense into him, which was what she figured would happen when she told him about this. She'd left out that detail when explaining Fandom to Jacen, and with the way things had gone and his need to understand everything, she was pretty happy with that decision for now.

Suitably abashed, he held his hands up in surrender. "Okay, fine. You'll be back?"

"When I can," she said, stopping when they got close enough to the shuttle. "Stay safe out there."

"You, too," he told her, accepting the hug she offered before pulling back and smiling at her. "How many fingers am I holding up?"

"Shut up," she laughed, and headed off to the shuttle.

[NFB, NFI, omg done yay.]