Can't Run
Hillary Adler
Luke stood apart from the party. Humans and aliens celebrated the joyous occasion. The Death Star was destroyed, Vader and Palpatine were dead, and the Alliance had taken a great step towards freeing the galaxy from the tyrannical iron grip of the Empire. 
Luke gazed at his friends and... and at his sister. It would take him a while to accept that Leia was his sister after the feelings he had had towards her. He would have to accept her as his sister... and she would have to learn to accept their father. 
Since this discovery, Leia had been so fragile. She had so much resentment towards Vader, even though Luke had assured her that there was good in him. Leia refused to listen to reason, if only he could assure her that Anakin was still alive inside Vader. 
Leia saw Luke at the edge of the party. He looked detached and troubled. He was there in body, but not in mind. Leia sensed there was something pressing he needed to communicate. 
"Luke? Are you okay?" 
"Leia! You startled me." Luke blushed. 
"You seemed a little troubled. What's on your mind?" 
"Come with me. It will be good for you to see Vader's ashes." 
"NO! I'm not going!" 
Luke was taken aback. He hadn't expected such a violent reaction. "You have to make yourself realize that he's dead. He can't hurt you or anyone else." 
Leia's mind spun. Memories of the pain she endured aboard the Death Star flooded back. She remembered Han's screams on Cloud City. "I can't forgive that monster. He has caused me too much pain to forgive. Luke may think he had good in him, but I don't... I can't believe it." 
"Leia, he saved my life. Up on the Death Star, he kept Palpatine from killing me." 
Emotion flooded through her. Pain, grief, numbness, disbelief choked her. She had to get away. 
Leia ran. Her hair flowed behind her, like a cape. Tears flowed easily as the wind tore them from her face. "Luke has to be mistaken. Vader can't be my father." Yet deep inside her, she knew it to be true. There was no escaping the truth. She could run forever, yet Vader would always be there. Hanging like a shadow over everything she did and thought. There would be no escape. 
And yet she still ran. Thinking she could shake that shadow. Thinking that the trees of the Endor forest could provide the shelter that she craved, and convinced herself she needed. She ran until she couldn't breathe. She had to accept her father, and yet she couldn't. "I must NOT FORGIVE. I can't. My father is Bail Organa. protector of peace and prosperity for the galaxy. My father can't be that heartless shell of a creature. Son of a bantha! Why am I trying to fool myself, I know it's true, but it can't be." 
Princess Leia Organa, onetime senator, Alliance hero, Alderaanian princess, and sister collapsed to the forest floor and sobbed. 
Leia had lost track of how long she had been there, but she found a sort of peace, a oneness with the massive trees towering over her. She gazed up at the branches and patches of starry sky above her. For that short (or long) while that she had been lying there, she felt a calm come over her. Something that her life had been lacking recently. 
A twig snapped from somewhere behind her, and startled Leia out of her reverie. Luke and Han hurried towards her, Han looking concerned, but Luke wearing a small smile. 
"What's so funny, farm boy?" Leia asked as she allowed herself to be helped to her feet. 
"This is the last place I thought I'd find you." 
"Whatddya mean?" 
Luke slid his arm around her shoulders protectively and led her farther into a clearing. 
When Leia saw it, she sank to the ground. 
"There was a reason you stopped here. You need to tell our father everything. Say your good-byes, curse him if you like. You need closure and this is the time for it." 
Han gazed in disbelief at the twins and then at Vader's funeral pyre. 
"What are you saying? Is there something I don't know here, sweetheart, cause, uh, I'm just a little lost here." 
Leia turned to Han with a grave expression. Han pulled her into a warm embrace, knowing he needed to protect her, but he didn't know what. 
"Vader--Anakin Skywalker--was my- our father." Leia managed to say. 
Han stared at the pile of ashes, dumbfounded. 
"I'm so sorry, for everything he put you through.. on Cloud Ci--" Han put a finger to her lips to quiet her. 
"Why are you apologizing? Nothing you did had anything to do with what Vader did to me. You're crazy for thinking you would ever need to apologize for anything that he did." 
Leia pulled gently away from Han and walked like a zombie towards the pile of ashes that lay before her. 
"I can never forgive what you put me or my friends through. I can never forgive you for destroying everything I ever knew. But I can't run from the truth, +the truth that you are my father. I don't like it, but it's there. I just know that every victory the Alliance wins against the Empire, everything that we take away from the Empire will help ease the pain that you have inflicted upon millions of sentients across the galaxy. I must accept the truth, no matter how much I would like to disprove it. I can't run from the truth."