Read Online Star Wars Journal - The Fight for Justice by Luke Skywalker by John Peel - Free Book Online

wobbly. Then Leia opened the door and we were heading back to the ship. The Imperials still didn’t have the far door open, so they didn’t know we’d made it to the other side.
    I was still all mixed-up inside as I ran with the princess. She’d kissed me! Okay, it was only a peck on the cheek, but she was the only woman who’d ever kissed me. Oh, Aunt Beru had when I was a child, but relatives don’t count. It made me feel so good. The princess was starting to like me! And I was crazy about her, of course.
    I’d never known anyone quite like her. Leia has such a directness about her, such a certainty that what she’s doing is right. She doesn’t see her rank as one giving her rights, but as one giving her opportunities. You can’t help admiring her.
    Well, I can’t, anyway.
    Han can’t understand why she’s fighting for the Rebels. She’s rich! He says that what’s important in life is money, and that’s all he wants. Maybe that’s what he believes himself, but I don’t. I think there’s more to Han Solo than he wants people to see. Oh, he’s certainly interested in money, but I don’t think he’s as selfish as he pretends to be. He couldn’t be that shallow.
    I may as well admit that I’m talking so much here because I don’t really want to talk about what happened next. But I can’t keep avoiding it, no matter how painful it is. So I’ll just take a deep breath and move on…
    We made it back to the docking bay at about the same time as Han and Chewie. The droids were there, too, but Ben wasn’t back yet. Han and Chewie ran to the Falcon . Leia, of course, stared at it the way I had when I’d first seen it.
    “You came here in that?” she asked us. “You’re braver than I thought.”
    I’d figured it out by now, and tried to explain to her that Han deliberately made the ship look like it was junk. That way, when the Falcon zipped right past the Imperials, they’d be caught completely by surprise. I didn’t get far with my explanation because I suddenly felt this chill clean down to my bones. I turned around. Shocked, I saw Ben with his lightsaber activated.
    His opponent was a figure I’ll never forget. He wore black armor and a long, black cloak. He was taller by a head than Ben, and obviously tremendously strong. Yet Ben was holding him off without too much effort.
    Ben must have run into trouble while he was fixing the tractor beam. He caught sight of us as he fought and gave a nod to show he’d fixed it. We could leave.
    Except we couldn’t abandon Ben, of course.
    The person he was fighting could only be one man. I realized now that Ben had felt him when we’d landed. It had to be Darth Vader, the man who’d killed my father. I stared at him with hatred and loathing—not caring what Ben had said about such emotions laying you open to the dark side of the Force.
    With everything I had inside me, I willed Ben to kill him.
    And Ben knew this. I could tell. He could feel me through the Force. Then he did the most unbelievable, most idiotic thing he could have done.
    He broke apart from Vader and said a few words to him. Then he raised his lightsaber—not to fight, but as a kind of mocking salute.
    I couldn’t believe it! Ben had been winning, and he simply gave up!
    Vader took advantage of Ben’s move, of course. He didn’t do anything noble or quixotic like saluting back. He brought his own lightsaber down over his head and right through Ben.
    At least, that’s what should have happened. There should have been two pieces of Ben, sliced nearly down the middle, lying on the deck.
    Instead, there was just the rustle of his cloak settling to the deck.
    I didn’t understand it then, and I don’t understand it now. Somehow, Ben’s body had simply vanished . Vader had won the fight, but he didn’t have anything to show for it except Ben’s cloak and his deactivated lightsaber, rolling across the deck.
    It didn’t matter. Ben was dead . I simply went crazy. Right then and