*

The Next Afternoon

*

Wes Janson looked up as the aide stuck another circular patch to his forehead. “Are you sure this is going to work?” he asked.

Dr. Anreson nodded and sat on one side of Wes. “As long as you cooperate,” she said, smiling. Looking up, she saw Luke Skywalker enter the room and sit on the other side of Wes.

“He’s better cooperate,” Luke said teasingly. “Otherwise I might be tempted to straighten out his maturity levels.”

“Please do!” Hobbie and Wedge cried from the edge of the room. Both had been allowed to watch the procedure, though Wedge had gotten official orders for his part. Wes rolled his eyes at them, then laid back on the couch.

“Let’s get this party started,” he said.

Luke and the doctor exchanged nods, and Luke closed his eyes. Anreson looked down at the datapad on her lap to watch vitals. She could feel Hobbie and Wedge’s eyes on her, but she pushed them away. She watches the datapad with all her focus, wishing she could actually see what was going on inside.

*

“Wes? Where are you?”

Luke looked around. He was in a dark office, staring in the shadows. It looked like the inside of Wedge’s office, but things had been changed around. It was almost… cold. Empty. The walls were twisted a bit, forming darker shadows over the center of the room.

He could hear whispering from the back of the room. He walked slowly, and saw Wes sitting in the chair behind the desk. Behind him, Senator Beruss, the clone, was leaning over his shoulder, whispering into his ear.

“I wanted her. I wanted everything that she had to offer.”

Luke turned to see Wes standing behind him. Btu it wasn’t the Wes he had known. This was the Wes he had seen pictures of. Thin, long haired and unshaven, wearing his black flightsuit. He looked… Luke shuddered. He looked like an Imperial.

“Did you really want her?” Luke asked. “What was she offering?”

Wes closed his eyes. “Her body, the power I could hold…”

“No,” Luke stated, forcing Wes to open his eyes. Luke locked them with his own blue gaze, and made him see the scene in front of him. “Remember what she really offered.”

The scene around them shifted. They were in a hallway now. Luke turned and saw the imaged Wes fighting with Beruss in the hallway. Wes continued to fight down Beruss’ offer.

“What if I offered you information on your sister?”

Luke felt something jar in Wes’ mind. A pain that had been hidden was coming back. “Look at it, Wes. You did it for your sister.”

“Siee?” the hallway Wes asked. He walked closer to Beruss.

“She died…” the Wes beside Luke muttered.

“You didn’t know that!” Luke stated. “You agreed to help Beruss because you needed proof of that!”

“No, I - “

“Wes! Look at it for yourself! Stop hiding from it. You thought Siee was dead! You didn’t want to believe it, so you hid yourself away from it.”

They watched as Wes lowered his head, Beruss yelling at him that he had to make a decision now on whether to do what she asked. Finally, he agreed. Beruss smiled and walked off, tossing a datacard into his hands.

“Siee was dead…” Wes stated. Luke looked up to see that Wes’ face had softened a bit. He walked towards the image, his eyes on the datacard. “I sold myself for that information, and it wasn’t even true.”

“But it was your sister,” Luke said. “You loved her, and you would do anything for her.”

*

Hobbie turned his head as two faces stuck their heads in the door. Siee Janson and Jagged Fel looked inside, and Siee motioned for Hobbie to come to her. Hobbie exchanged a quick glance with Wedge, then walked out of the room.

“You shouldn’t be here,” Hobbie said, looking more at Fel than Siee.

Fel looked at the floor, but Siee kept her gaze on the tall pilot. “I’m being sent out on assignment in a few hours, and I wanted to check in on my brother.”

Hobbie sighed at his automatic defensiveness. “Luke’s with him,” Hobbie said. “We should know hopefully soon what’s happening.”

Siee looked through the window into the next room. She bit her lip as her gaze fell on her brother. "I feel like it’s partly my fault too,” she said.

“Not as bad as I feel,” Fel stated. Siee turned and clasped his hand. Hobbie lowered his gaze as the two comforted each other.

“Well, I have to go,” Siee stated after a few uneasy moments. “Please tell Wes I love him, and I’m sorry.”

Hobbie nodded. “I will. You take care.”

Siee nodded. She walked off with Fel. The young man took one last mournful look in at Wes, then followed the Janson sister. Hobbie watched them, then turned and walked back into the room. Wedge cocked his head to the side in a wordless question, and Hobbie just waved him away. They both focused their attention back on Wes, Luke and the doctor.

*

Airspace. For a moment, Luke was amazed that he was standing in the middle of vacuum and not cold or out of breath. But he then remembered he was in Wes’ dreamscape, and nothing could harm him here.

Ships danced around him. X-Wings and Y-Wings mostly, yet there was a few capital ships, including the Home One. He saw what he thought was Wes’ X-wing fly through space past him, but it was a different set of markings.

“I’m there,” Wes stated, a hand pointing into the starry sky. He indicated an X-Wing that was stalled on the corner of space.

“What are you doing?” Luke asked.

“To get them to surrender,” Wes stated. “I didn’t want any blood shed.”

“Of course,” Luke stated. “That’s the way you are.”

Suddenly, Luke watched as a Y-Wing took off towards where Wes was stalled. The X-Wing took off, diving away from the overanxious pilot in the Y-Wing. The Y fired on Wes’ ship, and the Rogue rolled away from the firing. Then, the X-Wing came about and fired two ion blasts at the ship. It took Luke a moment to remember the new versions of the X-Wings had ion cannons, and it all fell into place.

“You didn’t kill her,” Luke said.

Wes’ eyes were on the scene, watching something that Luke wasn’t aware of. “Yes I did.”

Luke looked up curiously as another X-Wing came at the disabled Y-Wing. Two laser bolts shot out from the second X-Wing and sent the Y-Wing into an exploding fireball.

“That wasn’t your fault!” Luke stated. “You tried to save that pilot.”

“No, by ionizing her ship, I left her open prey for Fel’s sights. I may not have fired the lasers, but I might as well have.”

Luke turned on Wes, pulling his gaze to meet his once more. “No, by ionizing the ship, you gave her a chance to live. Fel was the one who killed her, taking away her life. He is the one who killed that pilot, not you.”

“I killed the other one, though.”

Luke took a step back. “What other one?”

Wes turned his head again, and this time the scene changed. Luke knew of this battle. Wedge had told him about how the defectors had staged a front to get the NR Rogues, particularly Wes, away from Beruss control. Luke watched as the NR X-Wings tried to retreat from the overwhelming forces. An A-Wing was flying madly on Wes’ wing, trying to take shots at his engines. Behind another X-Wing in Wes’ group, a B-Wing was trying the same maneuver. Luke watched as Wes lined up behind the B-Wing and fired four lasers into the cockpit, sending the B-Wing into a spiraling fireball.

“I killed that pilot, and there is no way you can say otherwise.”

Luke watched the fireball dissipate in the vacuum of space. “No, you did kill that pilot, Wes.”

“I became an Imp.”

“No. You saved a life of your fellow pilots, who were under your command.” Luke sighed. “You did your job.”

“The pilot I killed was an ally.”

Luke looked at Wes. His eyes stared off at nothing, and a tear was running down his face. “Wes, by choosing to defect, they became your enemy… not in heart, but in an official state.”

“But it still hurt.”

Placing a hand on Wes’ shoulder, Luke focused his mind into Wes’ inner core. He could feel that this was where the pain was lying. “You think it made you turn against everyone you knew?”

Wes looked down at the ground. The air shifted again, and images of Hobbie, Tycho, Wedge, Ngo, Gavin, and others surrounded him.

“You killed her,” Ngo stated.

“What happened to you, Wes?” Hobbie asked.

“How could you?” That was Gavin

“You’re no better than an Imp,” Tycho stated.

But Wedge remained quiet. Luke saw that Wedge was almost iridescent, as if he was a ghost. It hit him that Wes had thought Wedge was dead as well. But why did he still think it deep down in his core?

Finally Wedge spoke. “You failed me, Wes.”

Wes lifted his head. Luke saw that his image had changed before his eyes. Wes now wore the uniform of an Imperial officer, and though his hair was still long, it was Imperial shaped. “You abandoned me,” Wes stated. “What was I supposed to do?”

“You were supposed to join us.” Tycho said.

“I couldn’t.”

“Then you were supposed to die.”

Luke jumped in front of Wes, blocking the view of the images from his eyes. “Don’t listen to them, Wes.”

“But they’re right,” Wes muttered. He looked past Luke as the area filled with faces. Faces from Rogues, Wraiths, and people who he knew filled his vision. They all stared down at him, faces skewed in anger and sadness. In Wes’ hand, a blaster appeared. “I should have done this the first time.”

“No!” Luke shouted, and slapped the blaster from Wes’ hand. Wes looked up in anger, then pushed Luke away.

“What do you know about pain, Skywalker?” Wes shouted. “You think you can come in here, tell me what’s wrong with me and expect me to come out all perfect and back to normal? You don’t know me, Luke. No one knows me!”