Rated for language. Boys will be boys, after all.

Running footsteps rushed down the corridors of Home One, loud and obnoxious. They flew through the officers' wing, past the barren mess hall and into what had recently been deemed the clandestine gambling hall of Rogue Squadron: three tables closely arranged in a small navigation alcove that no one used. There were barely enough seats for the beings currently sitting there and one low work-lamp illuminated a sadly diminished array of alcohol.

There were no rank insignias of any kind allowed. Ever.

Wedge Antilles leaned back in his chair, staring at his cards with a critical eye. He was convinced Hobbie was bluffing: mostly convinced, anyway. He was also annoyed at the increasingly loud footsteps growing closer to the Rogue's sanctuary. When the hatch breezed open and Grizz Frix threw himself against the nearest bulkhead with dramatic intent, Wedge just nodded without looking up from his cards, and said: "Shut up, Grizz, or you'll wake the whole damn Alliance."

Grizz didn't audibly reply and instead made a series of hand gestures while breathing harshly and trying not to asphyxiate. Wes Janson looked lazily from his cards to Grizz, eyed him for a beat too long, and then looked back down. "It's for you, Boss."

"How do you figure?" Wedge wasn't interested. He stood to make a few credits with his hand, and that was the most important thing to him at the moment.

"If Grizz is running anywhere, it's something important."

Wedge shook his head. "I'm off-duty and I'm about to hand your asses to you, my friends, so it can't be for me. Tycho?"

The quiet Alderaanian in the corner tilted his head. "Unlikely. I'm flying with Gray Squadron now and Gray doesn't get summoned as often as the Rogues do."

Hobbie nudged him with an elbow. "Since when?"

"Since always. It wasn't Gray that stationed you as look-out, was it, Grizz?"

Grizz shook his head but still couldn't seem to speak through his gasps. Tycho threw his arm out in a halfhearted gesture toward Wedge. "Wes is right. It's for you."

"Damn," Hobbie said. "I'm putting in for a transfer. No Falcon watch duty? I'm in."

Wedge rolled his eyes and refocused on his cards. Grizz tried a choking sort of sound, but the others in the room drowned him out, groaning at Hobbie's complaint.

"I still don't understand how you got transferred, Tycho," Wes said, pointing a finger at him and ignoring Hobbie completely. "A Rogue's a Rogue. You can't Gray a Rogue."

Tycho gave him the barest hint of a smile. "Rumor has it you guys are flying under Red Squadron again for whatever this big push is. So a Rogue's a Red and a Gray and whatever else Ackbar wants you to be."

"Speaking of," Hobbie chimed in while Wes shrugged. "You know anything about this assault, Boss?"

Wedge shook his head, took a measured sip of whiskey. "No idea."

"It's awfully hush-hush for just another strafing run, isn't it?"

Wes threw one last card into the tray. "And we're at Sullust of all places. Something's up or we wouldn't all be here at the same time."

"Mobilizing," Hobbie added, like the proper vocabulary was important. "You'll let us know what's going on when you know?"

"Sure," Wedge said. "After this hand. C'mon, pions, I don't have all day. Call it."

The Rogues groaned again and made several rude gestures to their commander, to which he smiled and threw his hands behind his head. The worst part about leading these maniacs was that not a single one of them was Corellian and therefore couldn't hope to challenge him in Sabacc. Gods, but he missed Solo.

How long had the pirate been gone? Six months?

Among the ruckus that ensued Wedge looked sidelong at Grizz, still trying to catch his breath across the room. The hand gestures had stopped and Wedge was struck by the way Grizz hadn't tried to say anything out loud yet. A little unsettled, he waved to Grizz. "What did you want to tell me?"

Grizz heaved one last breath and then said, very slowly and very clearly: "She's back. The Falcon."

Wedge stood up so fast that his head spun. "They're back? All of them?"

Grizz shook his head. "I didn't get many details. Calrissian called in clearance but didn't indicate anything else."

Wedge's brain worked as furiously as it could in its inebriated state. Officially, the mission to rescue Solo from Jabba the Hutt didn't exist. No Alliance supplies or resources had been used, though both Luke and the princess had been granted official leave and Luke had been gifted his X-wing. Before he'd left, Luke had said something about a good feeling. Whatever that meant; Wedge didn't know. Luke had said it in the increasingly freakish voice he'd been using since rejoining the fleet. Wedge hadn't asked many questions; Luke was still a Rogue, still his friend. But damn if the guy wasn't a little on the inexplicable side these days.

But. Luke had had a good feeling.

Wedge was out of the hatch in record time, his own drunken footsteps loud as he flew through the corridor. He was concerned about a lot of things these days; life had gotten messy since Hoth. Simple survival was priority one, of course. But the major cast of characters in this crazy setup had been ripped apart. Luke wasn't himself. Neither was the princess. This new addition - Calrissian - seemed like a good enough guy but Chewie and Leia treated him like the spawn of Palpatine. And Solo was lost, gone without much of an explanation except that he was being sold to a Hutt crime lord.

The hows and the whys of that situation were under strict lock-and-key. All Wedge knew is that Luke had lost a hand, Solo was in some sort of hibernation state, and the princess walked around like she couldn't find her fire if it was burning a swath right in front of her.

Down the corridor Wedge ran, zigzagging, backtracking the pathway of Grizz's loud steps. He skidded to a halt outside the hangar bay and realized that, first, he wasn't supposed to be here with all this whiskey in his bloodstream. Somewhere in his sober brain was a list of Alliance protocols he was criminally violating by standing anywhere near expensive, valuable war matériel while intoxicated.

Second: he was still holding his cards.

He shook his head, annoyed with himself. Chances were good this was just a short stop-off for the Falcon. Wedge had heard some pretty terrifying stories about this Jabba figure. He'd be smart to keep his expectations low for the time being.

Before Wedge could get a good look into the hangar bay, two bodies ran into his back with a grunt; two heads peered over his shoulder and into the hangar bay. He shrugged them off but felt a little less ridiculous. Apparently he wasn't the only one desperate to know where the Heroes of the Rebellion were. The last set of footsteps stopped next to him and Wedge peered around the corner of the bay.

Together, Wedge, Wes, Hobbie and Tycho stared at the sight of the Millennium Falcon settling onto her struts with atypical care.

"That's not Solo," Hobbie said.

Wedge agreed. Han would have come in faster and without that slight lilt to the side. Landing patterns were as identifiable as human fingerprints; everybody landed a ship in their own particular way. "It's Calrissian. Chewie would have dipped her nose first."

"Where's the X-wing?" Wes asked.

That had occurred to Wedge, too. He could see the environmental seal reestablish itself behind the Falcon: no other ships were incoming. "I dunno," he said. "I'm sure Luke's fine."

Luke had had a good feeling. Wedge had held onto that sentiment pretty hard these past few weeks.

The Falcon's boarding ramp hissed into its descent mode and Wedge strained to see details through blurry eyes. The old CEC freighter made a forlorn sound as it settled in her berth, patched up and souped up to Solo's unique specifications. Nothing about her looked any better or worse than her usual state, which, granted, didn't mean a great deal. The old girl wasn't going to win any beauty pageants anytime soon.

"The Falcon looks like she's in decent shape," Tycho said from behind Wedge.

"As good as she ever does," Wes added.

"No carbon scoring," Tycho continued without acknowledging Wes. "No hull breaches. That's good."

Hobbie leaned over Wedge. "We don't know who's aboard, though. Maybe they didn't find him. Maybe he's dead, maybe he's still there on Tabooine - "

"Tatooine," Wes corrected. "With a tee. He was our commander for three years and you don't know where he's from?"

Hobbie turned a foul look on Wes. "What the hell ever, man, Luke's planet is the galaxy's trash bin."

Through hazed vision Wedge saw a uniformed man approach the descending ramp and wait patiently for the crew to disembark. The man, General Carlist Rieekan, clasped his hands behind his back and tilted his head at the freighter. His eyes never left the Falcon's ramp, though his expression seemed guarded to Wedge.

"Rieekan knows something," Wes said. "Look at him. He's smiling."

Wedge squinted but saw no hint of a smile on the Alderaanian's face. Compassion, sure. A little bit of anxiety. But not a smile.

Hobbie turned to Wes, standing just to Wedge's right, and glared at him again. "That's not a smile."

"Yes, it is! That's … that's positively joyful."

Hobbie threw up his hands. "Alright, Professor. Since you know so damn much about Alderaanian body language - "

"Shut up," Wedge and Tycho said in tandem. They watched a human, Calrissian, come down the Falcon's boarding ramp and approach Rieekan with arms outstretched. The man's cape was in pristine form, billowing behind him to absolute majestic effect. Wedge was minutely jealous of the guy's sense of grandeur. Calrissian came right up to the general and gave a small nod. From his place, Wedge could definitely see the man's bright smile, starkly juxtaposed against his skin.

Then Chewbacca descended, his long stride taking him to the two humans in just a few steps. He clapped Calrissian on the back and growled in a conversational tone. Wedge felt himself start to smile. No way Chewie would come that close to Calrissian if their mission hadn't been at least partially successful. To be fair, Wedge wouldn't even give odds for Calrissian's survival if the mission had gone badly.

Next came the tottering form of See-Threepio and then two more humans, male and female, walking down the ramp slowly side-by-side. They didn't touch but something about the set of their shoulders seemed to scream intimate, familiar.

Wedge's smile grew.

"They got him!" Wes shouted, punching the air and coming dangerously close to Tycho's nose. "They - do you see that? How the hell did that lucky son of a bitch manage that?"

"Keep your voice down," Tycho said, ever the responsible adult. Wedge briefly considered that that might be the reason he'd been transferred out of the Rogues. "We aren't supposed to be here."

"Ah, hell, man," Hobbie said. "Lighten up. Solo survived. This is now an official party."

Wedge barely heard him. He was watching the small group with interest, noting Luke's absence but working to not jump to conclusions. The princess smiled at the general, and Wedge thought with a pang that it might have been the first time he'd seen her do that since before the evacuation of Hoth.

Rieekan stood with them for a moment, then shook Solo's hand and turned away with a kind of happy disbelief, nodding his head. Wedge tried to read meaning behind every motion, clues to Luke's whereabouts or the details of Solo's grand rescue.

"Check out the princess," Wes said after a moment. "She looks better."

Wedge turned to look at his companions, eyebrows up and with exaggerated innocence. "Huh. I wonder why that is?"

"Oh, fuck off, sir," Hobbie said without the slightest hint of malice. "They're not together."

Wedge shrugged. "You can apologize for that when you give me my money. All bets are on; we are back in business."

And, oh, what good business it was bound to be, too! Solo and the princess had walked down the boarding ramp with what his mother would have called negative space. The space between them had spoken more to their closeness than simple space usually did.

But he wasn't feeling generous enough to enlighten Hobbie at the moment. He'd keep his more romantic thoughts to himself.

"You'd think after three years, you would have given up on it. She's - oh, shit," Hobbie interrupted himself. "He's heading this - good evening, General Rieekan, sir."

Wedge cleared his throat and turned to the older man now standing frighteningly close to them. Rieekan's eyes, always shrewd and perceptive, seemed nearly clairvoyant to him now.

Flustered and caught, Wedge started running through a very short mental list of reasons why a quarter of Rogue Squadron was drunk and spying on the main hangar deck in the middle of their off-duty hours. His brain was running slow, so he gave up and shrugged at Rieekan's cocked eyebrow. "I - uh," he stammered. "We were looking for, uh, Commander Skywalker."

"You have outstanding timing," Rieekan said. "What luck that you're here just as they've returned. All of you."

Rieekan's tone held a baffling mix of amusement and censorship. Wedge squinted at his superior and tried to look competent, entirely certain he failed miserably. There was one important detail the general was missing: the Rogues had been stationing lookouts for the Falcon for weeks now. Since the princess had left to join the rescue party, in fact. It was, technically, an abuse of his rank to order his pilots to do it. But Wedge couldn't find it in himself to feel any remorse. Not a single bit.

"Yes, sir. Luck," he said, because the fuzzy outline of Rieekan seemed to want an answer. "Is Commander Skywalker okay?"

"Yes," Rieekan nodded. "Though I really wish he'd stop disappearing at such critical moments."

Wedge smiled gratefully, felt a hand clap his shoulder. The boys behind him tried to stay unobtrusive, but the news of their own hero's safety was definitely welcome. To Wedge, it felt a little like vindication. Rieekan nodded to the Rogues and brushed past them.

"I told you he was joyful," Wes muttered.

Shaking his head, Wedge turned back to the hangar. Calrissian was waving to Chewie. The Wookiee seemed to be waiting for a signal from Solo, absently growling to Calrissian as the caped human turned heel and walked out of the bay.

Solo, though … well. Solo's focus was on the princess.

Wedge eyed them carefully. He often used the betting pool - Wes' solution to long, dreary rec nights in a doomed Rebellion - as a cover for his genuine interest in these people. Outwardly, he had put money down on romance happening between the sometime-rivals. And the only things a Corellian takes more seriously than his ships were his bets.

Truthfully, though, he liked the idea of the two of them. He liked their story, if they ever managed to have a story. Because, hell, they were fighting for freedom, right? What was a better analogy for galactic revolution than the last princess of Alderaan and a nobody Corellian smuggler hitting it off? Two sides of the social spectrum, polar opposites on first glance. Rich and poor, privilege and want. It would make one hell of a romance ... if the two leads would just get moving on the romance part, that is.

But that wasn't even the best part. In truth, Solo and the princess were so damned similar, with superhuman confidence and ruthless capability. And their passion was just bubbling beneath the surface. They fought because they cared and it scared both of them shitless. And that was the drama of the romance; it was like watching two puddles of combustible material slide closer and closer together, inch by inch, over the course of three long years.

He couldn't look away. The fireworks were bound to be spectacular.

Solo smiled down at the princess and she slowly ran a hand up his arm, from wrist to elbow to bicep. A practiced motion, a familiar one. Intimate. Wedge sucked in a breath, heard Tycho shush Wes and Hobbie, but he was too focused and tired and drunk and fascinated to split his attention.

This was it. This was it.

The princess said something and Solo laughed, stepping closer, wrapping an arm around her waist. She didn't back away from him, just tilted her head and pushed her fingers into the hair at the nape of his neck. Wedge leaned in, thinking c'mon, c'mon, c'mon …

And then fireworks.

The princess pulled Solo's head down to hers, brushing a kiss against his lips, and then leaned back enough to force Solo to follow her. Follow he did, curling around her like a vine, leaning down, rocking them side to side as he closed his eyes and dragged his hand up to the nest of braids at the back of her head.

Wedge slapped the hatchway in triumph, his chest warm and a happy grin spreading across his lips. He abandoned all pretense of caring about this for the betting pool. This was magic, too good to deny.

"Whoa," Wedge heard beside him. Wes, maybe. Wedge didn't care.

This wasn't their first kiss, either. Wedge could tell. Subtle things told the story. There was no hesitancy, no polite space between their bodies, no questions or moments of doubt. No uncomfortable separation of the hips. This was exultant and possessive, celebratory and familiar. They looked like puzzle pieces that fit comfortably together, already bent to fit the shape of the other so that everything tucked nicely together without any obstacle.

"You're kidding me," Hobbie's normally dismal voice said. "You're kidding me."

Wedge shook his head, still watching. Chewie lumbered off in the same direction Calrissian had gone, growling softly to himself, fed up with the display. Another reason to conclude that this wasn't a new development. Solo leaned back and kissed the princess' forehead: her eyes closed, her lips upturned. Solo looked like a damn spice addict on a high. He said something to her, and Wedge was struck with the odd realization that he didn't want to know what Solo was saying. Whatever it was, the princess smiled, really smiled: full-wattage and brilliant.

"Well now," Wes said. "I stand … corrected."

Wedge turned to his pilots, cocky grin in place. "What did I tell you?" He hit the hatchway again. "What did I tell you?!"

"I don't usually listen to what you say, sir," Hobbie muttered.

"Years! I've been telling you for years!" he crowed, maybe too loudly.

They all turned quickly back to watch, worried that the couple may have heard Wedge's proclamation. But luck was on their side. Solo shook his head at something the princess said, gestured to the deserted hangar bay around them, then leaned down and kissed her again.

Oh, they looked good doing that. Their height difference should have been a problem but the princess rose up on her toes and Solo hunched down toward her and somehow splitting the difference made it all seem like a cakewalk. Easy. Not a single problem in their way.

"We get it," Hobbie groused. "You're great at making out. Awesome for you."

"Leave them alone," Wedge defended. He was enjoying this little display of theirs. There was very little purity in wartime, and hardly any measurable progress. He poked Hobbie in the shoulder. "This is my victory lap."

"To be fair, you take a lot of victory laps," Tycho said without cracking a smile.

Wedge turned his lecturing finger on him. "That - is not always true."

He turned back to the hangar bay, dismissing the other Rogues' knowing looks. His eyes took a moment to readjust to the harsh lights of the bay, so much brighter than the normally low setting of the corridor. He suffered for a moment, reminded of the curse of too much alcohol on a human's system. But he prevailed for one last look; Luke had had a good feeling and Wedge was a little addicted to the manifestation of that good feeling. Slowly, the two human shapes came back into focus, small and large, some distance between them now. Wedge's vision cleared bottom-up, their feet coming in first, then legs, hips, torsos and then finally heads.

And they were looking right at him.

Wedge froze. His whiskey-soaked brain failed him completely. How did he justify this? Was there a justification that the princess would accept? Gloating in a private moment? In a hangar bay? When he had absolutely no fucking reason to be anywhere near the scene?

Forget the princess. Wedge's stomach dropped at the furious look on Solo's face. The captain looked like he was about to break Wedge in two.

I'm about to die, he thought.

"Hi guys!" The brilliantly wrong words came out of Wedge's mouth, followed by a low curse. His voice was high-pitched and overexcited. Terrified. "What's … up?"

Solo just stared at him, looking like he was trying to decide how best to dismember Wedge on the spot. Wedge shrank further back, moving his body around the corner: if Solo could only aim for his head he had better odds for survival. Right?

Then again, he'd seen Solo's speed draw. Wedge wouldn't exactly have time to duck.

But then the princess stepped in front of Solo, blocking the captain from the shoulders down. Her face was flushed and her hair was disheveled, pulled apart by Solo's fingers. "Wedge," she said, breathless. "It's good to see you."

Wedge flipped his gaze back and forth, Solo to princess to Solo again. "You too."

"Luke's on his way back," she said. Her usual composed voice betrayed none of the nervousness he saw on her face. "He'll meet us here in a few days."

Wedge managed a little shrug, his stomach still tied in knots. "Yeah. Great."

An uncomfortable silence weighed on them all. Solo's rage softened: unsure of how to proceed, his mouth pressed into a hard line and his hands hanging at his sides. The princess eyed Wedge speculatively, though not unkindly. And Wedge felt horribly awkward, intrusive, his ebullience mellowing into a sort of drunk uncertainty.

He glanced to his side and was unsurprised to see that Wes and Hobbie had already left, fleeing the scene of the crime in the wake of Solo's retribution. Wedge couldn't honestly blame them. Tycho stood quietly around the corner, unmoved and dependable but still not in the direct line of fire.

If the fire was inevitable, that is. Wedge was beginning to wonder if he might survive this encounter after all.

The princess finally ended the awkwardness. Making some sort of decision, she reached behind her and grabbed one of Solo's hands. Solo's mouth popped open in surprise, and Wedge commiserated with him. It certainly wasn't what he'd expected her to do. The princess dragged Solo from behind her to her side and looked up at him with what Wedge could only describe as amused challenge.

Solo blinked at her. The important question was clear on his face: are you sure about this? The princess' expression didn't change except for a small smile, young and tentative, but still. A smile.

Solo shut his mouth and nodded once. Then he turned to Wedge with an enormous, wolfish grin, all questions erased from his eyes. "Hi'ya, Wedge," he said. "Good to see you again."

Wedge blew out a breath and thanked every god of Corellia that he knew. "Man, I thought you were about to kill me."

Solo and the princess walked toward him, her hand still holding his. "Nah," Solo said. "You crazies need all the Corellian pilots you can get. Can't kill one of the decent ones."

Wedge filed away that half-compliment for future gloating.

"We only need you when you aren't driving the rest of insane. Hi, Wedge," the princess said, warmer now, releasing Solo's hand to wrap Wedge in a hug. "How are you?"

"Glad you guys are back. Things have been strange around here without you."

And he really did mean both of them. Solo's presence had been sorely missed: the captain's ridiculous mix of egocentrism and self-deprecation made everyone around him feel a little more … optimistic wasn't the right word. Some combination of optimism and annoyance, at least. Made them simultaneously forget that they were caught on the wrong side of a war and remember it with stark clarity.

But looking at the princess now, her eyes free of that horrible weight she'd been dragging behind her the past few months and her ready smile bright on her face … it was like looking at hope incarnate. She radiated an internal bouyancy. The Alliance should fly her to all those uncertain planets, the ones with guns and ships and troops sitting on the sidelines of this war, and let her beam that smile around for awhile.

Recruiting numbers would be off the charts.

The princess nodded and Solo clapped Wedge on the shoulder. "No one else around to take your credits from you?"

"Something like that. We're playing now. Want to join us?" Wedge offered, wondering if Wes and Hobbie had retreated to their bunks. He liked the image of them hiding in the barracks under their Alliance-issue blankets.

"I promised Her Worship I would visit the med center. For a few tests," he said the last four words to the princess with a mock-glare. She cocked an eyebrow at him but didn't take the bait. "Maybe I'll catch you guys later."

Wedge couldn't help himself. "You know, Solo, I don't think you will," he said, glancing incriminatingly between the two of them. "You look like you might be a little busy later on."

Solo grinned again but kept his mouth shut. Wedge was shocked when it was the princess that responded to him. "A lot busy," she said with a wink.

Holy hell. As Solo and the princess wished him a good night and moved past him, Wedge stared after them with his mouth hanging open. His bet wasn't accurate, not yet, at least. He'd put down credits for a much more extensive type of relationship between the two. He'd figured that it was either that or they'd kill each other before they had a chance to get to that point. Combustible materials, and all that.

Oh, but he'd lived to witness those fireworks. And he'd been right: they were spectacular.

When Solo and the princess were out of sight, Wedge looked over to Tycho and gave him a helpless look. And Tycho, strong, stoic Tycho, waited a beat and then just … shrugged.

It was enough to trigger Wedge's laughter, a half-maniacal laugh that stemmed from actual happiness for the couple and a lingering adrenaline hike from when he thought Solo had been about to kill him. And probably also the whiskey. The whiskey might have had something to do with it, too.

Luke had had a good feeling. Wedge shook his head in wonder and followed Tycho down the long corridor, past the abandoned mess and the officers' barracks: back to the Rogues' impromptu gambling hall with considerably fewer seats filled than before. The lone work-lamp was still lit. Their steps on the journey back were noticeably quieter now, devoid of the rush. Wedge was amused to discover that he also still had his cards in his hand. At least part of his brain had kept hold of what was important.

He was a wiser man, now. Still drunk, but infinitely wiser, and he couldn't wait to collect his credits.

Solo and the princess, he thought. Spectacular.

Author's Note: This is for Organanation, who prompted me to write how news of Han and Leia's relationship spread throughout the base when they kissed publicly for the first time. Which is … not this. Sorry, dear. I'm sure the boys will gladly spread the word. So it kind of fits? Anyway, thanks ON!