About six months after he'd gone MIA, Zekk resurfaced. Apparently he wasn't able to give much more than a basic rundown of events: he'd been rescued in the Transitory Mists by the Zel twins, and thanks to the fact that the Holonet didn't work out there, he couldn't get in touch to let anyone know he was all right. At least for a while. Then he'd ended up working with Taryn and Trista on Hapes, doing things that meant he couldn't reveal his location...

Jaina understood. It still stung.

It wasn't until things had settled down and they were on a shuttle to Gallinore that Jaina managed to get some time alone with him to talk. He found her checking out some of the systems in back, which was exactly the place to look for her if you knew her at all. "There you are," he greeted her.

She wanted to talk to him, but at the same time, she wanted to avoid it more than anything. Somehow she doubted he'd let her, though. "Here I am."

"I'm sorry I wasn't in touch," he began.

"No, I get it," Jaina said, paying close attention to work that didn't really need to be done so she didn't have to look at him. "You had stuff to do, so we had to think you might be dead for six months. Good thing I knew from Ben you were out there somewhere." Was that a little snarky? She thought that was a little snarky.

"That is good," Zekk said after a brief pause, probably trying to gauge how loud he was about to get yelled at.

Which would be a good thing to gauge, since something about that answer just rubbed her entirely the wrong way. "You know the last six months have been some of the worst of my life?" she asked him. "Half the time I haven't really been able to feel much of anything and the other half I've felt guilty for not having a full-on nervous breakdown I wanted you around."

"I'm sorry. I really am, Jaina," he sighed, and Jaina believed he meant it. "At least you've had Jag."

"That is not even what this is about-"

"No, I'm serious. I'm glad you've had him around," Zekk told her. He even added slightly grudgingly, "You two seem good together."

"Oh."

"Don't look so surprised. It's not like it wasn't obvious long before everything went down."

"Was I that obvious?" Jaina asked. She felt a little bad about it. She didn't regret her choice in the slightest, but she hadn't even rejected Zekk. He'd never even been in the running.

"No. You were completely closed off," Zekk told her. "I figured it out on Kashyyyk. When you tried to kill him and he proceeded to yell at you?"

"I did not try to kill him." She only could have killed him.

"To the casual observer it looked a lot like you trying to kill him. He just found a way to get through to you when none of the rest of us could. I couldn't. Your parents couldn't. Han was especially worried about you. But Jag knew exactly what was going on and how to say it to make it click with you." He shrugged. "Then I knew it wasn't a contest anymore."

"It never was," she protested.

"Yes it was, Jaina. But it's okay. You seem better than I would have thought and it kind of looks like at least part of that is because of him."

Jaina fell silent, because, well. He wasn't the whole reason, but he made it feel easier to move on rather than wallowing in grief and self-loathing.

"He's a good man," Zekk continued. "Even if I have no idea what he's doing as Head of State. Whose brilliant idea was that?"

"My uncle's," Jaina replied.

"Really?"

She nodded.

"Huh. Well, Fel could still be less of a pain in the neck about this."

"Oh, please. Tenel Ka's not making any of this easy on him, either," she said defensively.

Zekk paused. "Did you ever think this would be our lives?"

"I never thought you'd be coming down on the side of the Hapans, no," Jaina said.

"Need I remind you that you're here with the Empire?" he pointed out.

It did still strike Jaina as strange sometimes, yeah. Her parents and uncle had worked so hard to bring the Empire down, and not only did Luke appoint the new leader of it, but Jaina stood a good chance of being part of it someday. "A lot's changed," she shrugged.

"Apparently." He looked like there might be something he really didn't want to ask, and then he went and asked it anyway. "Are you even still with the Jedi?"

She sighed deeply. "Yes and no. Technically I'm here acting as Jedi liaison to the Empire, but I've been on a leave of absence." She felt like that needed more explanation, but all she could figure out to add was, "I just can't right now."

Zekk paused again, asking, "Are you okay?"

For a brief second, Jaina was upset that he even had to ask before realizing that was probably why he hadn't asked before. Not too long ago, he would have know exactly how she was and what she needed, and now he couldn't even guess. He had to rely on how she seemed, and she was very good at faking okay these days. Now they both had some loyalties completely separate from each other, and he had completely missed the time she'd needed him most, and realizing these were even more things that would never be the same after Jacen died made things hurt all over again.

Jaina shrugged, not even sure to put into words anymore where she was. Was she okay? "Probably not," she admitted. "I'll get there."


[NFB, NFI, I wrote this in an airport at five am la la la.]