"Where's Ben?" Luke questioned.
Han rolled his eyes. "He's spent most of the week locked in his room."
"Really?" Luke drew his eyebrows together. "I dropped him off here because he missed Jaliyah so much. I thought he'd be spending time with her. Did something happen?"
"Jaliyah..." Leia allowed her voice to trail off.
Luke glanced from his twin sister's face to her husband's, noting the same expression on both.
"She broke his heart, didn't she?" He at last surmised. Leia nodded her head in reply.
"What happened?"
"Apparently Jaliyah and Emmett are in a relationship now, and she's pregnant."
"Ben's friend Emmett?"
"Well, not anymore," Han pointed out.
Luke was at a loss for words.
"I'll go get Ben," he mumbled.
"Wait, Luke," Leia reached out to catch him by the sleeve. "Han and I are really worried about Ben. He's very fragile right now. He's depressed and so full of anger."
"That sounds like a perfectly normal state for a heartbroken teenager to be in," Luke pointed out. "You've always worried too much about him."
"But could you..."
"Make sure he stays on the right path? Yes, of course."
Ben sat slumped in his uncle's landspeeder, reticent and sulky with his arms folded across his chest.
Luke glanced at him from the corner of his eye, wondering if maybe the boy's parents had reason to be concerned for him after all. In the week since Luke had last seen him Ben had gone from slim yet healthy to looking almost scrawny, as though he would weigh eighty pounds soaking wet. And the dejected, pouty expression had not lifted from his face since Luke had picked him up.
"I'm sorry your week off didn't go like you wanted it to," Luke stated gently.
"I don't want to talk about it," Ben mumbled.
"That's okay. You don't have to talk about it. Are you looking forward to getting back to the Temple?"
"I don't want to continue my Jedi training."
"What do you want to do, Ben?"
"What I want to do is find an island or something in a hard to find part of the galaxy and live there by myself for the rest of my life."
"That would be selfish and irresponsible," Luke said. Ben shrugged his shoulders.
"Look Ben, sometimes bad things happen and you can't just run away when they do."
"I don't want to talk, Uncle Luke."
Ben dropped his duffel bag off in his tent and walked to his uncle's training Temple to join his fellow students.
"Look who's back," Darriel sneered. "Did you enjoy your little vacation? No one else got a week long break from this place. Must be nice being the Master's nephew. All those nice little perks."
Ben did not respond but his face pinched in an ominous scowl.
"Were you missing mommy and daddy?" Darriel persisted.
"Darriel," Luke warned.
"Or were you just desperate to bang your girl? Are you happy now that you had a chance to put it in her?"
