AN: "Always Find Me Here" (no lyrics) was what finally prompted this one to come to fruition.
They drifted quietly through an empty expanse of space, ship and captain, as they had so many times before. The stars were more distant than ever before, more cold, more uncaring.
He was gone.
His friend, his co-pilot, his companion in dozens of crazy adventures. Somehow, he thought that they were immortal, that death would never catch them or if it did they'd all go down together, captain, first mate, and ship. Surely after all the three of them had survived, nothing could take them down. The unstoppable trio.
Invincible.
Now the chair next to him is empty and always will be, even if someone else sits there. He's lost track of the times he's turned that way, a quip or a remembrance on his lips, only to have it die unspoken when the intended recipient wasn't there to hear it.
He tried to drown the sorrow at first, spending hours moping in cantinas, hoping that the bottom of a glass would give him some comfort.
It never did, but it sure didn't stop him from trying for a while.
Then he got busy. For a few minutes here and there he forgot. But it kept sneaking back up on him and he couldn't fight it anymore.
Which is why he was here, drifting in the endless, soundless black, listening to the bone-deep familiar sounds of his ship while the rest of the galaxy raged. He'd done a lot for that galaxy - risked his life and ship and family to free it, then to keep it safe. But right now, he figures he's due for some peace and quiet. Not for long: they still need him, and he loves too deeply to abandon them now.
The idea of becoming a free agent again crosses his mind. It's tempting to go back to caring for no one and nothing but the ship and his credits. Sure would hurt a lot less. Nothing to lose if no one's close, right?
But no - that shuttle sailed years ago, when he first met a whip-smart Princess and a befuddled kid fresh off the farm aboard a moon-sized battle station. If he knew it'd come to this, would he have changed it?
Not for the universe.
He sighs, propping his feet up on the console, and tries to decide what to do next. He's got enough supplies to hang out here for quite a while. Even as he thinks it, he can almost hear the growls from the co-pilot's chair, telling him to snap out of it, that his cubs still need him. A faint smile tugs at his lips. Yeah, that's what he would have said, if he were here.
The ship creaks again, as if in agreement. He wonders, idly, if she misses her co-pilot too. The three of them together, swooping through the stars, going from one risky adventure to another that might get them all killed or make them rich beyond their dreams. Those were the good old days, alright.
Days when he called this ship home, before he realized that home isn't a fancy pad on Coruscant or slum on Nar Shaddaa or even the fastest ship in the galaxy. Even though the black of space is more familiar to him than any world, it's not quite home in the way it used to be.
Home, he learned, is people. And now part of that is gone. Part...but the rest is still there, and it calls above the pain.
He heaves another sigh before setting his boots back on the deck and punching coordinates into the nav computer. His best friend is gone, but he knows in his heart that moping around isn't how he would want his sacrifice repaid. He'd want him to keep fighting, make it all worth something, not hide out among the stars. Even though the loss still threatens to rip him apart, he knows it's time.
So he hits the hyperspace lever, watches the familiar sight of stretched-out stars, and heads back to civilization, to the wife and kids and crazy mystical brother-in-law and everybody else.
He heads for home.