Mighty Things
Post-ROTJ; 6ABY: Legends AU
Rated M for language and sexual situations
Author's Note: This story was initially published before the Disney takeover and utilizes the old Expanded Universe canon as a jumping-off point. Please read Mighty Things with the understanding that Han and Leia are in a committed, stable relationship after the events of Return of the Jedi, they were not married on Endor, and no child named Ben Solo has or ever will exist in this universe.
This story has been re-edited and polished in 2017 with the assistance of two delightful people: Erin Darroch and HoldoutTrout. A big thanks to you both for your eagle eyes and lovely encouragement in all things spies and grammar!
"Mighty things from small beginnings grow." (John Dryden, Annus Mirabilis)
At midday, the newly-reconstructed Imperial palace of Coruscant buzzed with the hurried air of governance at work. Couriers ran through the halls, packages and signed documents in hand. They bustled around aides, undersecretaries and other couriers as they turned corners and pushed through crowds of people from every gender, species and orientation.
The lifts were never quiet; their low hums echoed from hallway to hallway, lost in the muffled cacophony outside Leia Organa's office door. The din grew as See-Threepio entered the room and then hushed as the door slid shut. The woman in the padded chair paused, identified a rhythmic grinding noise and realized it must be coming from the droid himself.
"Threepio," she said. "How long has it been since we replaced your motivators?"
The droid managed to look chagrined as he shifted his armload onto her desk. "It has been just over three point four months, Mistress Leia, and nearly two weeks longer than that since I had my last oil bath."
"Could you schedule that sometime soon, then?"
"Of course. Do you want it scheduled this week or next? Perhaps it would be better if it were scheduled sooner rather than—"
She kept her voice low, returning her focus to the datapad in front of her. "It doesn't matter. Schedule it."
"Of course, Mistress Leia." He moved toward her data collection, stacked perilously high against the far wall of her office, and tapped out a command on the file control. "It appears that the Provisional Council is holding an emergency meeting in preparation for the first round of elections. Will you be presiding over that or will Mon Mothma be doing the honors?"
"I imagine she will." In truth, Leia was dreading the upcoming elections. The polls thus far anticipated a young senate with very little representative experience. As member worlds sorted out the disintegration of the Moff system, the political battlefront had turned up a new breed of politician. They were brash, loud and uncompromising in how they campaigned. The list of officially-declared Inner-Core candidates was downright frightening to her. She'd taken one look at it and decided to keep a copy of the "Declaration of a New Republic" stashed inside her private datapad at all times, just in case.
The other members of the Provisional Council were much more optimistic than she was. Borsk Fey'lya was a shoo-in for the Kothlis seat, as was Sian Tevv for Sullust and Kerrithrarr for the Mytaranor Sector. All three were very favorable to the new generation of politicians. Ackbar, concerned with cleaning up Coruscant after the take-over, was more worried about the military budget than the elections, and Doman Beruss and Verrinnefra found the change in political opponents refreshing and exciting.
New blood, Beruss had said last week. New blood for a new galactic order.
Leia shook her head at the thought. Where was all this new blood when the bloodshed was happening? When the Death Stars loomed over the fledgling Rebel Alliance? When hope had seemed ridiculous, when defeat after defeat plagued even the most faithful in the ranks?
But no. It was much easier to be brash when you knew you were safe from tyranny.
Mon Mothma and Leia, neither seeking a senatorial seat, were more concerned than their peers about the potential attitude of the first senate. Leia spent a great deal of time reminding herself that her insecurity was a natural consequence of member elections. The freedom to choose representation was the freedom to choose bad representation, and Leia would not violate that freedom. She was as much a veteran of the Rebellion as anyone else.
It was just very difficult to allow people to make mistakes.
"Threepio, has the Mon Remonda checked in yet?" she asked, turning her attention to a much more pleasant topic.
He straightened and tilted his head. "No, Mistress Leia. Were we expecting a situation report from General Solo?"
She wasn't sure whether to be evasive or nonchalant. She was settling for cold diplomacy when her office door opened again and a small, lithe woman passed through; she was Leia's age and had explosive white hair wrapped in her traditional Alderaanian braid. She wore a demure blue robe that seemed to Leia both pleasant and instantly forgettable. Careful grace was embedded in the way she walked, a small bag hooked over her right shoulder.
"A report on what?" the woman asked.
Leia leaned back in her chair and folded her hands across her stomach. "Nothing. What do you have, Winter?"
"Well," Winter Retrac said. She sat in the chair directly across from Leia's desk and crossed her legs. "I have both official and unofficial news." She removed a datapad from her bag and flipped through a few files. "Shall I conduct the official briefing first?"
Leia was tempted to grin and comment on the ridiculousness of a woman with an eidetic memory carrying notes. She refrained, bit the inside of her cheek and nodded. Leia knew the notes were something of a ploy; Winter was too unobtrusive for anyone on the Provisional Council to suspect her resourcefulness as Leia's aide. Never underestimate intelligence agents, she remembered Han saying once. They're the ones who'll shoot you before you even know they're there.
She's a former intelligence agent, Leia had corrected him. And before she was Targeter, she was my only friend and confidante on Alderaan. If I can't trust Winter, I can't trust anyone.
Winter's voice brought Leia back to the present. "The Coruscant committee is performing well. There are seventeen crisis agencies working together to clear sector three, between levels three hundred and six hundred. Droids are still being renovated for the job, so it's just human workers at the moment. It's slow work. They'll proceed southward from there: clearing sectors six and twelve, then loop back toward the senate building to cover five and two."
"Only at the three to six hundred levels?"
"Yes, Your Highness." Winter grimaced. "No word on the two hundred and lower levels."
We are avoiding the poorest levels. Why does this not surprise me? "Anything else?"
"Sure." Winter sagged into her chair. The careful air of a governmental aide disappeared in an instant. "But it's all fairly monotonous and I'll catch you up later when you have a pressing need to be bored to death."
Leia took in Winter's narrowed eyes and was instantly suspicious. Winter was seldom dismissive about work. A tiny part of Leia's mind buzzed as if inflamed, like adrenaline had been shot directly into her neck. "What's the unofficial news, then?"
A slow grin grew on her oldest friend's face. "There's word from the Mon Remonda."
Leia didn't let it show, but the excited buzzing increased in her ears. "By your smile, I'm anticipating fantastic news."
"For you and me both."
Leia had to hand it to her. Winter's face belied none of the excitement Leia knew she was feeling. Winter's paramour, Commander Tycho Celchu of Rogue Squadron, was stationed with Han's fleet for the Zsinj campaign. The fleet had been tasked with the discovery and destruction of the Imperial warlord using what Han had laughingly termed insane unconventionality.
Truly, the only insane part of Solo fleet was how underestimated they'd been. The first reports of Zsinj's death had arrived two days ago and her office had been immediately flooded with media requests. Why anyone thought Han Solo wasn't capable of one of the largest Imperial defeats since the destruction of the second Death Star was beyond her. It hadn't surprised her in the slightest.
The tone of Winter's voice and her coy smile told Leia all she needed to know. "They're coming home?"
"Oh, well, officially the schedule hasn't changed. But they're nearly done with the cleanup and ETA to Coruscant is three days."
Oh, yes. This was fantastic news.
With the fleet's first return since Han's great victory over Zsinj, she suspected something of a media cyclone to hit Coruscant. The Provisional Council's communication director had been pushing the Zsinj campaign as an example of the New Republic's ability to both simultaneously re-establish the galactic electorate and fight the remnants of the Empire. It'd been framed as a heroic venture, though it'd been underfunded and included their most controversial general.
This victory was going to consume Coruscant for the next week. At least.
That meant a rush of senatorial candidates to pose and claim support for the fleet. It meant increased media pressure to appear at whatever celebratory event the Provisional Council would foist on the poor members of Han's command. It meant a careful handling of public and private lives, specifically hers with Han.
But it also meant him here, safe, with her.
She smiled. Her week suddenly seemed very full and much more interesting, too.
"Threepio, could you please bring me my schedule for the week?" She sneaked a quick glance at Winter, calmly packing away her notepad with a giveaway smirk plastered on her face. "Let's see what we can reschedule."
XXX
General Han Solo wanted nothing more than to get off this goddamned ship and away from anyone who called him sir.
Unfortunately his luck was running dry today.
Outside the viewport floated the remnants of a half-repaired fleet, mechanics in EV suits buzzing around the shells of capital ships and starfighters limping their way back to unpressurized docking bays. The hull of the largest Imperial capital ship, the Iron Fist, had been breached two days ago by a proton torpedo with barely enough momentum to break through the hull's durasteel. The ship had been rendered ineffective by the same sequence of events that had been conquering large warcraft for ages: failing defensive shields, an overly-proud captain, and then vacuum screaming into a space that had one minute before been alive and frantic and was now dead and imploded.
Han shook his head.
Zsinj would've been unimpressed with what the remnants of his fleet had offered against Han's cleanup effort. The battle here had been just shy of pathetic. The enemy fleet was uncoordinated, out-commanded and massively overpowered. He'd been told it registered as a great defeat in the history annals, but it had felt like widespread slaughter. Picking off leftovers for sport? Not his style.
He turned to his communications officer. "Have they surrendered?"
"No, sir." Ensign Preos didn't have to look down at his screen; he'd been waiting for the sublight transmission for hours now. "We got a notice that it was going to come earlier today, but no word."
"It figures," Han said. "What about the Iron Fist?"
The ensign gestured past the viewport to the hulk of metal nearest them. It was caught in a lazy counterclockwise roll, one engine burnt out and the other exhausting itself trying to pull itself out of the rotation. "Your guess is as good as mine, sir."
"I don't like my guesses." Iron Fist was supposed to be refitted and rehabilitated into regular use by the New Republic, but by the look of its exterior paneling, that rehabilitation wouldn't be happening any time soon. "When is our relief coming?"
"On their way now." The ensign looked up. "Command just sent an official message for you."
Han scrubbed a hand over his eyes and exhaled, resigned. He walked to the communications monitor, leaned down to read the screen:
Upon docking, all commissioned officers above the rank of commander to be presented at a gathering in honor of Zsinj's elimination. Gathering to commence at 2000 in main reception hall, Imperial Palace, Coruscant.
"Fuck," he muttered. "That's just great."
"Yes, sir," the communications officer replied, a grin belying the serious tone of his voice. "Permission to distribute the message to all commissioned officers ranked above commander?"
"Go wild, Preos. Tag on a note about dress uniforms, will you? Perrik won't wear one unless he's ordered to."
"Yes, sir."
Han brushed past the comm officer and meandered through the bridge until he was satisfied things were looking somewhat to spec. Then he left his XO in charge and looped back to his quarters. They weren't far, but the corridors seemed to shrink ahead of him as he walked. Against the military code he'd publicly sworn to uphold, and every military code he'd privately sworn to disobey, he loosened his shirt collar and started unbuttoning it before he even reached his deck, gingerly testing his right shoulder and rolling his neck. He'd bruised it in the last of Zsinj's death throes, slammed into the nav station during an evasive maneuver that he himself had ordered.
He'd hoped the bruising would calm down before Leia had a chance to see it. With just days until they docked, he was pretty sure the gig was up. He fully intended to spend some time with her without a shirt on. Preferably without pants, too. She was bound to notice the sickly green-yellow of healing bruises. Nothing he could do about it now, though the thought of her reaction made him grin as he arrived at his hatch.
He palmed open the hatch, did a quick mental check that everything was where he had left it almost thirty-six hours ago when he'd last managed some sleep. Satisfied, he dropped onto the bunk like a rock, his bruised shoulder protesting its harsh treatment.
Damn it.
It'd been a long time since he'd felt energized. This was the normal seasoned-soldier routine, he reminded himself. It was draining; it was heartless and cruel, but necessary, work. He felt exhausted. Mission success had cost him a lot more than just a few nights' sleep. The last time he'd felt any sort of thrill had been … what? Months ago. With Leia.
He blew out his breath at the thought. Of course with Leia. Always with Leia.
Killing Zsinj was a veritable miracle, according to Coruscant, though Han didn't quite see how. He'd used skills and instincts he'd picked up on the wrong end of Imperial patrols: within their blaster sights and screwing around with fate as much as he could. It wasn't half-hearted genius that had destroyed Zsinj. It was simple logistics. He'd been the right man for the job and he'd had the right people with him to do it.
They'd been at it for nearly two years. Almost constantly.
Two years was a long time to rely on half-buried instincts and sharp personnel, because instincts maxed out and personnel had a nasty habit of dying when things got tough. The only real constant was that they were still at it, day by day, fighting for a great ideal but without tangible progress. The fleet felt it, too. It was everywhere, from his bunk to the lowliest ensign on refresher duty.
We're still here. We're still fighting and we're still far away from home and we're still dying.
You couldn't argue with that logic, he thought as he idly gripped the slipcover of his bunk in his hands. Even Chewie had had enough, working late in the maintenance bays to keep from losing his mind with stress. They'd left the Falcon with Leia on Coruscant, a gesture he'd meant as a kind of parting bid of commitment. Getting Leia to agree to marry him should have been enough, and it had seemed like it was enough for her, but he'd wanted the point made. Period.
He'd known it would be painful to leave without his baby, and there had been several times when he would have rather been out dogfighting in the great black than on the bridge of a Mon Cal behemoth.
But it might have been a good thing in the long run. He'd been forced to think big-picture. He'd been forced to expect his command to think creatively. And the sacrifice had paid off. After the last assault on the Iron Fist they'd investigated the warlord's death. Han's best EV crew had boarded the Iron Fist and they'd found a mess of pressurized remains crammed into the lockers off the main bridge, dressed in the lackadaisical whites of an inflated Imperial warlord. The genetic tests confirmed what they all knew by looking at the compressed shell of a human shoved in the locker bay. The bastard was dead and their mission was complete.
It wasn't until then – and only then – that Han started to think about returning to Coruscant. To his ship and to … His heartbeat picked up at the thought. To Leia. It'd been almost six months since his last leave. It felt much, much longer than that.
Feeling a little better, he picked up his personal datapad and scrolled to the bottom of the long list of new messages, hoping to bore himself into sleep. Fleet reports, budget referendums, nothing he gave a damn about until the third-to-last message. Something from Airen Cracken's consortium of spies: what they now called New Republic Intelligence. This wasn't particularly surprising; he often received intel packages from NRI: statistics, fleet movements, resource catalogs and the like.
If it had been anything important they would have scrambled it, he reasoned, and deleted the message without reading it. He had the presence of mind to set his alarm and then fell asleep, the thoughts he didn't allow himself during the day coming to the forefront and chasing him into a black oblivion he knew all too well.
XXX
It was one of four meetings Threepio had been unable to reschedule. The other three all pertained to the Coruscant cleanup effort in which time was of the essence and rescheduling would cost lives. Leia managed to delegate enough time to meet with the committees and settle their serious, but hardly difficult-to-solve, problems.
This meeting had initially seemed to be like the myriad of other appointments that were not time-sensitive. When it failed to disappear from her schedule this morning Leia had asked Threepio about it, only to be told that General Airen Cracken had no intention of dismissing the meeting and was looking forward to seeing her this afternoon.
It was an unbearable ending to an already unbearable day. Solo Fleet was returning to Coruscant this evening and every turn of the clock seemed to take longer and longer, like time dilation on awful display.
"Madame Minister, I'm sorry to keep you waiting," the general said as he entered his office. He brushed a hand across his cropped salt-and-rust hair and smoothed his wrinkled face. "We, like you, are planning some additional security for the fleet's arrival tonight. It sounds like it'll be quite the spectacle."
She nodded, wondering if perhaps this was the reason for the meeting. Though, she realized, the official report of the fleet's arrival had only arrived yesterday, and this meeting had been scheduled the week before. "Please don't call me that," she said.
The general sat behind the desk and propped his elbows on the polished wood. "Why not?"
Leia chose her words carefully. "Once the senate is elected, and if Madame Chief of State approves, I would be honored to assume it." She smiled, trying to ignore how her stomach clenched at the thought. "But it's too soon to be presumptuous."
Cracken's hard eyes sparkled, pleased with her response. He shifted his wide shoulders and sat forward. The movement seemed painful but his face betrayed nothing. "Probably wise. What should I call you, then?"
"I'm a member of the Provisional Council. Councilor is fine."
"Councilor," he repeated. "And you won't accept anything else until Mon Mothma tells you so?"
Cracken's tone was dry and biting and Leia's annoyance flared. Surely he had more on his mind than her position in their new government? "I won't accept any title until I've been elected or appointed as such," she corrected. "Is there a point to this?"
It was rude, but she wasn't feeling particularly generous at the moment; as he himself had said, she wasn't a confirmed staff diplomat. She was surprised when he chuckled, the loose skin of his neck moving with his low laugh. Leia eyed him carefully. She didn't have reason to work with him often anymore since she'd transitioned into the burgeoning political arena on Coruscant. Cracken, too, looked like he'd been desk-bound: his girth noticeably growing since the Battle of Endor. The lines on his face were deeper, the skin of his wrist scarred beneath the commlink strap he wore.
"That's up to you. I am offering you a rank and position in New Republic Intelligence."
It took her a moment to process his words, another five seconds to be completely sure she'd heard him correctly. "Well." She stood and turned toward his office door. "If that's all —"
"Sit down, Princess." His voice took on the quality of sun-warmed sand, thick and grainy and full of heat. All mirth was gone from his weathered face. She noted that he'd chosen to avoid her preferred title. "You are being officially recruited into a major Republic agency."
In his voice, she felt the underlying anger of a man whose offers were not often rejected. Whether through Jedi heritage or her own political experience, the intention was clear to her: don't insult me.
Oh, but Leia had never been good with egomaniacs.
"General, it is my impression that I can choose whether or not to be recruited into any major Republic agency," she said, dropping her tone to match his.
"Of course. But at this moment I outrank you. You spend enough time with military officers to know what rank can do for a man."
The dig to her affiliation with a particular naval officer didn't rankle her—she was used to it— but his mistaken expectation that it would gave her a moment to clear her head. She sat down, willing him to continue quickly so that she could leave.
"You are uniquely trained to handle difficult situations, Princess. A whole galaxy's worth, in fact. I don't believe you know how broad your skill set is." He shifted his arm with a grimace to turn on the datapad that lay by his right hand. "Your history is … impressive."
He twisted the datapad to face her and she leaned in despite herself. Her name and Imperial docket picture stared back at her, bulleted underneath with certifications and experiences that she was well-prepared to put behind her. Hand-to-hand combat instruction by Giles Durane; intergalactic flight certification; confirmed aptitude for naval command and tactics; knowledge of and experience in guerilla-style warfare involving small- to large-scale assault groups...
She cleared her throat. "General, this dossier belongs to a different life. A different person."
"I've learned two things about diplomats in my time here," he said. "First: they feel the need to unnecessarily compartmentalize their lives. Are you under the impression that you function as a politician outside of how you function as a private citizen?" His mouth slipped up into a grin that only reminded her of Han's in the sense of worry that washed through her. "Outside of your past experiences? Outside of the company you keep?"
Another dig. She bit her tongue.
"The second thing I've learned is that politicians like you drive themselves crazy trying to make a difference from the top down." He swiveled the datapad toward himself and called up a second file, then pushed it to her again. She could now see a list of her proposals, amendments and voting record from her time as an Imperial senator. "Name one of these proposals that made it to the Emperor himself."
"The Imperial Senate was part of a broken system."
"The Imperial Senate was a representative body of beings. Perhaps not a stellar example of democracy, it's true, but can you really tell me you aren't worried about the same thing playing out here?"
She couldn't. She'd already admitted that to herself. "Airen, what you're suggesting is ludicrous. I have no intention of joining the NRI."
Cracken shook his head, the stiff neck of his dress shirt cutting into his skin. "Ludicrousness aside, you have a long, fruitless career in front of you, trying to make beings across the galaxy happy with how the government is functioning. Is that really what you signed up for? Is that what you want your legacy to be?"
"If no one signed up for it, a government couldn't exist."
"I didn't say nobody should do it. There are whole systems full of beings made for a life of political intrigue and power. The Bothans, for example, would kindly submit a delegate to take your place as expectant Minister of State."
"Which is a good enough reason for me to stay where I am," she replied, standing and pushing the datapad toward him. "If there's nothing else?"
Cracken didn't blink. "Think about it, Princess. When you decide you're truly ready to make a difference, your commission is right here." He tapped the datapad and smiled easily, his wry grin so confident that she considered kicking him in the groin under the table just to remove it.
"Councilor," she spat, then squared her shoulders and moved toward the exit, hyperaware of his eyes on her back as the door slid shut behind her.
General Cracken was not a stupid man, Leia thought two hours later as she waited in a booth adjacent to the docking bay where the Mon Remonda was berthed. The bay was a larger version of the one that normally housed fleet arrivals. It was swarmed with mechanics and workers hooking up fuel lines, releasing hatch after hatch as military personnel busied around. They lowered boarding ramps and entered the flagship to take report from the crew. The entire operation buzzed, a joyful deviation from most fleet returns
She started counting the deckhands to keep her mind busy. She was in fair danger of running out of the booth and into the bay in a most undignified manner.
Her efforts were in vain, however. Unbidden, Han's profile came to mind: smirking, handsome, infuriating. She wondered what he was doing, how long she would have to wait to see him, how much time they had before the reception….
She tried to rein herself back in, turning her attention back to considering the strange meeting from earlier that day.
Cracken wouldn't have made an offer like that without believing he had a reasonable chance of her agreeing to it. He was a careful man, more cunning than Jan Dodonna and without Carlist's easy familiarity. He operated his spy network in the same streamlined manner he had used during the war, typified by arrogant self-congratulation.
There was more to this offer than met the eye.
Leia was so deep in thought that she didn't notice Winter until she stopped next to her, the silver-white cloud of hair fanning behind her. "Not long now, I suppose," Winter murmured, eyeing the scene next to Leia.
"Where did they put the press?"
"The press and our senatorial visitors are resting in the corridor outside." Winter moved a fraction closer and whispered, "Can't you hear the self-absorption from here?"
Leia smiled. Winter was used to operating as two very separate entities through her work during the war and Leia was used to her slipping in and out of roles at will. "I'm afraid it's muffled by the sound of credits dropping into their claws after today's campaign fundraisers."
Winter straightened back up and threw Leia a quick smile, moving on to the matter at hand. "Major Plantik is the docking bay chief today. He offers to send General Solo to this booth once he is cleared to exit the Mon Remonda." Her eyes shifted behind Leia's shoulder, and Leia understood the warning. They were not alone here, and, as excited as she was to see Han, she wasn't willing to feed the gossip-mongers any more than she already did.
"That won't be necessary," she said. "We'll board the ship once it's cleared."
Winter arched an eyebrow. "We'll board the ship?"
Leia ignored her and watched the deckhands' work, the ship almost completely secured now. "Looks like they're done," she said, eyeing a group of fighter jockeys descending the main ramp of the Mon Remonda. Their military-issue bags dragged behind them and their eyes scanned the various transparisteel booths for family and friends. The booth she was in was a more exclusive one, reserved for ambassadors who came to pose next to their heroic homeworld brothers and sisters; a Sullustian and a human female from Commenor waited patiently, chatting amicably in the corner.
When the flood waned, she nodded to Winter and they left the booth. The non-commissioned personnel and pilots had cleared out, though not everyone had left the ship. Leia counted on Han's habit of staying behind until everyone else was gone. He also had a tendency to give his battle commanders and squadron leaders some time to themselves before they docked, and then kept them aboard a little longer than strictly ordered. The goal, he'd told her, was to get their help checking the ship before they handed it over to the mechanics. The crew knew her better than anyone: the mechanics' reports should include the knowledge of the most familiar personnel.
Or so he said. Leia suspected he was trying to keep his favorite people from being accosted by the media upon their first breath of real planetary oxygen.
Leia and Winter exchanged a few congratulatory hugs with some of the older members of Han's fleet: former Rogues and a few current ones, too. Then they made their way up the ramp. There were still plenty of personnel on the ship, checking filters and various communication feeds, but their uniforms were often unbuttoned and they radiated a sense of barely-contained impatience. Leia knew without checking insignias that these were the officers who would go straight from the Mon Remonda to the celebratory reception arranged for them.
They walked until they found Tycho Celchu, huddled over a piece of metal and tinkering with a multitool. He was outfitted in standard Starfighter Command-issued attire, though his jacket was wrapped around his waist and his boots were scuffed. His hair was just past regulation length, Leia thought, and considered pointing it out until she realized who was probably at fault for the lax style.
"Commander Celchu," Leia said, because Winter wouldn't do it first. He looked up blurrily, as if confused, and then immediately stood when he recognized the two women in front of him. He offered them a salute, but with it came a genuinely pleased expression and Leia felt gratified that the same charming Alderaanian she had met just before the Battle of Endor retained his pride throughout the rough months since the Coruscant take-over.
"Your Highness. Lady Winter." He nodded to them and the grin widened. "Much as I'm flattered to see you both, I suspect one of you is in a hurry to welcome someone else home."
Leia laughed as he came forward and hugged her. "Maybe." She released him, patted his cheek. "It depends how bad of a mood he's in."
Tycho nodded, moved to Winter's side and grabbed her hand. "Bad enough. It might have been better to spring the reception on him this morning. Save us two days of cursing and insults."
"I'll remember that," she said as Winter lightly hit him on the shoulder. "I think I'll go hunt down the happy general, if you don't mind." She nodded to Winter. "I'll see you at the reception, yes?"
Winter responded to the affirmative. Tycho simply nodded, as enthusiastic a grin as she'd ever seen growing on his face as he turned and pulled Winter closer. Leia chuckled under her breath and turned away. Tycho had loosened up from the straight-laced man that had pursued Winter: grown more comfortable in his skin, more confident with taking command. And he's obviously grown used to taking orders from a general that isn't particularly keen on military discipline.
It didn't surprise her. Han's style of management seemed to operate on the assumption that he had earned the respect of his crew without totally earning the respect of his superiors. That was how she interpreted it, at least. She knew he was careful about rules, ignoring a few to keep many others in line. That had surprised her when she'd realized it: he strategized his method of command.
She'd always known he would be an incredible asset to command. She'd known it from the minute he'd torn down a corridor on the first Death Star to give Luke and Leia cover.
These corridors were the same soft blue-gray as all Mon Cal interiors, an organic design that seemed both peaceful and slightly unpleasant. She assumed Han would be at the bridge, directing the clean-up and trying to forestall the inevitable reception. She passed the mess hall, where various droids were tearing down tables and booths, then a row of barracks, then moved toward the bridge. She passed an open hatch that led to the officer's lounge and stopped.
General Han Solo of New Republic Fleet Command sat at a table in the far corner of the room, his back to her.
She'd know those broad shoulders anywhere.
His table was completely covered with printed-out sheets of flimsy and three datapads were scattered on top of the mess. His head was in his right hand as his left flipped through the nearest stack. Leia took a cursory look around the room. Hobbie Klivian sat at the makeshift sabaac table nursing a bottle of ale, and two women stood closer to the hatch, eyeing her carefully.
One of the women, a blonde, called out. "General Solo, sir."
He didn't look up as he tapped the datapad. "Yes, Major Felps?" His voice spread across Leia's chest like heat from a fever and she fought to keep her face blank.
"Sir, if the cleanup is complete, can the nav display be downloaded into the navy specs?"
His head came up and the tapping stopped, but his back remained facing the hatch. "You saving me work?"
Felps continued to watch Leia's reaction, a ghost of a smile tucked into the way she pursed her lips. "Is that a problem, sir?"
"You know damn well you can do my job anytime you want to," he said. Leia couldn't help smiling now as Hobbie looked up and nodded to her from the other side of the room. "Feel free to promote yourself while you're down there and go to the damn dinner for me," Han added.
The blonde smiled outright now, winking at Leia as Hobbie collected his bottle. "Think the princess will notice?"
"I don't know," Han resumed tapping on the datapad. "What do you think, Your Worship?"
She rolled her eyes, too captivated to be truly angry at his ploy. He turned in his seat and grinned at her . "Perhaps Major Felps would look better in uniform?" Leia said, amused.
He lounged in his chair, looking relaxed and in charge. Leia took in the smug look on his face and then his right fist, clenched by his side. She decided she must know him better than he realized, because his sabaac face was telling her he wanted the rest of his crew out of the room now.
"Felps always looks good," Hobbie said, walking past her. "But I'd take the one with the higher rank." He winked, squeezed her arm and brushed past her, swigging from the bottle as he went by.
"And that's my cue," Felps moved to the hatch as well, dragging the other woman with her. "Sir, I really am going to download the feed. I'll start the prelim analysis, too, if you'd like."
"Sure. Shut the hatch when you leave."
Leia was already walking to him when the door sealed, the hiss of air a faint sound next to the cadence of her steps. "Felps is helpful," she said, feigning composure.
"Uh huh," he teased, eyeing her as she moved to him. "Hell of a kisser, too."
"Really." It took eight steps to get to him; she used her ninth to turn and sit on the edge of the table, pushing back flimsies as she crossed her legs and stared down at him. She knew she failed miserably in her attempt to look unexcited. He did, too. At least one thing in the universe hadn't changed; the air sparked in the space between them. "I'll take that into consideration."
A shadow swept over his face for a split second and then it was gone. He reached for the fabric of her dress, pressing his palm into the flesh of her thigh. The weight, the warmth, was a relief: a reminder of who they were behind closed doors. She'd desperately missed the way he looked at her. Not the starved look on his face now but the one she remembered from drinking caf on the Falcon with him on the flight to Bespin. The one from peaceful moments in their apartment, just the two of them. Relaxed. Happy. Comfortable.
Without another word he stood and grabbed her hand where it rested on the table in front of him. "You look younger than I remember."
It was a confusing thing to hear. Not more beautiful or better, but younger. She wondered if it was like the way he looked more responsible, though his hair was past regulation length like Tycho's and the top two buttons of his shirt were undone.
None of that mattered, though. He was alive and safe and standing next to her. "I missed you," she choked out.
He was at her mouth before she finished speaking, pressing his lips to hers and sliding his free hand into the hair at the back of her neck. He felt glorious, warm in her arms, as passionate as she felt. She closed her eyes and ran her fingers along his jawline, pulling him closer to her as she spread her knees to accommodate his hips. He mumbled her name as he took a breath and then pulled her to him again. Leia was lost, drifting away from the chaos around them and into the thrilling, living bubble that surrounded them when it was just him and her, alone.
His lips slid to her cheekbone, pressed a soft kiss to the shell of her ear. "Love you," he said. "Missed you. It's been hell, Leia."
She nodded, wrapped her arms fully around his neck. Her throat was tight; her arms trembled. "I know," she said.
"Did you bring your clothes with you?"
She shook her head, still pressed into his hair. She had no desire to move. "No. We don't have time for that right now."
He sighed and leaned away, kissing her forehead and stepping back to look at her. "I'd try to get out of this dinner if I thought I'd have any luck."
"You wouldn't." She hopped down off the table and onto weak legs, trying to gather her wits about her. She threaded her arm through his and pulled him toward the hatch. "After."
He grimaced. After was a nebulous promise for hours into the future, and she knew it. "I'm going to hate this," he said, though he kept a hand at the small of her back. It was gratifying to know that he needed to touch her as much as she needed to touch him.
Leia stopped, stood on her toes and kissed him again. Softly. Like she had all the time in the universe, like they didn't have to parade around a reception in his honor tonight before they could be alone again. He felt real, pressed so tightly against her, and she thanked whichever deity had brought him safely back to her. "Yes," she said, her lips just a breath away from his. "You will."
XXX
He pushed her toward the bed before his brain registered that the door to their quarters had shut, that there were no lights on, that Leia was breathing shallowly against him. He broke the kiss to grab the bag she held, then kissed her again as he dropped it to the floor, kicking aside the shoes she'd discarded as her tongue brushed against his. Her hand knotted in his hair and her mouth was sweeter than the wine at the reception. The only word he could think was finally.
She broke away to settle on their bed and he followed her, pushing at her dress until it was a flash of color on the far side of the room.
Nothing about the way they moved together was restrained or soft, and yet it seemed like a purer expression of homecoming than the past three hours had been. He was releasing endless months of frustration, of want, into her ready embrace, and he imagined she understood and reciprocated it. Six months of waiting to be here, in this moment, with her.
He was completely overcome.
"I love you," she whispered against his throat, as he hitched her leg higher on his hip. Gods, but he'd needed to hear her say that. He closed his eyes against her words, pulled closer to divine oblivion by the way she moaned into his ear.
When the pressure was too much to stand, he concentrated on her warmth, her sighs, her breathing, and felt for the millionth time since his return how much he had truly missed her. He ran a hand up and down her thigh, felt her shudder and murmur his name. It simply became too easy to give up, to let his physical release flood the wordless sentiments away. She answered by wrapping her legs and arms tighter around him, her body an easy escape as she cried out and tensed around him.
The first sounds he heard when he collected himself were her still-harsh breaths. They felt reassuring to him: a soft, beautiful reality in an otherwise cruel galaxy. He shifted her on his chest, her face nestled into his throat, her braid frazzled but intact down her spine. He felt her lips press a kiss to his collarbone and she sighed, eyelashes fluttering against his skin as she murmured welcome home.
Han's last thought before he fell asleep, Leia clutched in his arms and the cool air of their bedroom whispering across his skin, was that it wouldn't have been a homecoming if she hadn't been there.
