Title: Friend or Foe
Author: sea102883/BigFatty
Characters: Han & Anakin Solo, Boba Fett
Summary: This story is the result of a dare where I had to write a story where one of the Solo children has been rescued by Boba Fett
Disclaimer: I own nothing related to Star Wars, I'm just playing in George Lucas's playground
I sit in my chair in the Falcon's cockpit trying to comprehend the events of the past five days. Leia and I picked up Admiral Ackbar before leaving Coruscant to get our youngest, Anakin. Part of me, a big part of me, has always hated having to send away our kids to some secret hideout until they were two-years-old. There have been so many days where I was ready to do anything short of putting a blaster to Ackbar's head and demanding to know where my kids are so I can bring them home and be an actual family instead of parents who get a couple of holos sent to them every few weeks.
Then there are days when Leia and I get reports from the NRI about threats and plots to kidnap our kids. And I know the reports they bring to us are the ones certified to be serious enough for attention. Those are the days when I want to take the twins back into hiding with Anakin and have them stay there forever.
But its always the ones who don't write to tell you what they're planning that worry me the most, like the group of guys who were fed leaked information and managed to find my son. They showed up and kidnapped him four hours before Leia and I got there.
We took the Falcon since the place was going to be abandoned once we got Winter and Anakin. We arrived in-system to the sound of a distress call. Leia and I looked at each other with dread in our eyes and stomachs. We had been so close to being a whole family for the first time since… well since we'd become a family.
We sat the ship down only to have our nightmare become a reality. Marks from ricocheting blaster shots scorched the walls. The three of us ran inside to find smoking hulks of metal that had been so-called top of the line bodyguard droids. At any other time I would've cracked a joke about wanting a refund.
Around the corner, we found Winter alive, but barely. She kept apologizing and saying, "He's gone." This was one of those moments where my wife amazed me. All I wanted to do was point my finger at Winter and lame her for what had happened. I may have even gone so far as to say she shouldn't be alive still. But not Leia.
My wife comforted her best friend. She told Winter to save her strength so she could help get Anakin back. Leia saw on Winter's face that she wished she had died because of her failure.
While Ackbar went to the small comm center to see if he could get any recordings of the kidnappers, Leia and I moved Winter to the Falcon. We decided it would be best to make the seven-hour flight back to Coruscant so Winter's wounds could be treated and Ackbar's data could be analyzed.
Tycho met up with us at the medcenter. I couldn't look him in the eye. Leia, thankfully being the constant diplomat, graciously accepted his apologies for our situation and apologized to him for putting Winter into this position. All I wanted to do was yell about how the one he cared about was floating in bacta in the next room, not stars knew where taken by the scum of the galaxy.
Not surprisingly, Ackbar's data didn't give us any leads. We started going through recent threats we'd received, but there were too many to give us any good clues. After reading files for thirty straight hours, I forced Leia to come back to our apartment to get some rest. We triple-checked on the twins before heading to bed where I rubbed Leia's back and whispered promises of how things would be alright until she finally got to sleep. Just as I was about to fall asleep myself, the comm unit began to buzz in the living room. I hurried to answer the call before it woke up Leia.
The message was short and had been bounced through several different accounts to hide the source. It was also written in an old smuggler's code, luckily I had enough caf still in me to decode it.
I have your son, come alone. It was followed by a set of coordinates bordering the Outer Rim. I leaned back in my chair and ran my hand over the stubble growing along my jawline as I assessed the situation. Really the whole pausing to think about things was a charade, even if Leia wasn't around to see it. Of course I was going to go after my son. I would do it alone, and I would dread having to come home and face Leia afterwards, but I was going to get Anakin back.
I left a note to Chewie telling him to watch over the family while I was gone, not that he wouldn't if I hadn't have left a note. I then wrote a note to Leia explaining the message and why I left. Knowing I would have to have a co-pilot, I put a call into the Kid's apartment and asked Artoo if he wanted to come along. I then added Luke's name to the list of people who wouldn't approve of what I was doing, but I didn't really care. Someone other than me had my son.
Artoo and I made it into hyperspace and I let him take over running diagnostics while I tried to get some sleep. I wanted everything to be in the best shape it could be. It wasn't eh first time I'd faced a likely enemy alone, but it had been a while since I'd faced something like this by myself.
Three days later, the Falcon came out of hyperspace at the assigned coordinates to reveal an abandoned space station that had been dragged out into the middle of space away from any nearby planets or even asteroid fields. Scans revealed only a small section was habitable. A few seconds later, Artoo picked up a beacon leading us into hangar.
I lowered the ramp and took my trusty DL-44 out of its holster and slowly made my way down the boarding ramp. When I saw who was waiting for me at the end of the ramp I couldn't get a shot off fast enough at the man in Mandalorian armor. Right before my finger was able the squeeze the trigger to shoot my long-time enemy, Boba Fett, I was stopped cold.
"Papa!" exclaimed my younger son.
I froze and took in the whole scene in front of me, and not just my foe. Fett stood there, blaster in its holster, holding my two-year-old son's hand. Part of me wondered if I wasn't still asleep on the Falcon and dreaming the whole thing.
Sensing my confusion, Fett began to explain how he tracked down a group of thugs for an unnamed boss and "taken care of them". While going through their ship, he found Anakin asleep in a storage unit. It was then he sent the message to me asking me to come alone since most people in the New Republic, including myself, would want to take him under arrest at the least and see him dead at the most.
Finally getting my senses back, I rushed forward and scooped my son up in my arms. "Are you okay?" I asked while frantically giving him a thorough look for any signs of injury.
"I okay Papa. You okay?" he asked. Crushing him in a hug worthy in strength of Chewie I assured him I was fine and that it was time to go home.
Turning to face Fett, I never in my life hated his blasted helmet so much in my life. I only had my Sabacc face to rely on keeping a neutral expression for this crazy scenario. He could make whatever face he wanted and be kept safe by that helmet. I tried to say something, but I didn't know what I could say. How am I supposed to thank the man who helped put me in carbonite? How can I be mad at the man who saved my son?
With a shake of my head I turned and walked back up the ramp of the Falcon. I told Artoo to get things started for us to take off while I stopped to get Anakin some food. I strapped in my son and the three of us started to make our way back home.
And now I seat here in chair, my son asleep in my lap, and staring at the ominous lines of hyperspace wondering when I see Boba Fett next, do I shoot him or say thank you.