This was supposed to be a Stray Thought, but it wouldn't cooperate-so it's a one shot instead.
Storm Front
Six weeks ABY
Dark clouds churned on the distant horizon and thunder rumbled ominously in the heavy air. With a sigh, Han Solo wiped the sweat off his face with a damp sleeve and bent down to pick up the hydrospanner he'd tossed on the ground. Eyes narrowed, he scanned the storm brewing on the horizon. There was rain every day on the steamy jungle moon—Yavin 4 was tropical; though it sure as hells wasn't a paradise—and today it looked like they were in for a real howler. He swatted absently at the insect biting at his neck. Well, they could be back on Tatooine, Han thought philosophically. The climate there was lightyears worse; and Jabba was on Tatooine, which wasn't exactly a selling feature. Here? Here there was Jan Dodonna and the other tight-assed leaders of the Rebel Alliance. But the kid was here, and he was a friend. And there was Princess Leia Organa, who...he wasn't sure what she was.
Thunder growled a little louder, and the dark clouds flickered with lightning. Han shook his head.
"Might as well pack it in, Chewie!" he called out to the Wookiee. "It looks like the kriffing storms are starting early today." With a grunt of disgust, he tossed the spanner into the open tool chest underneath the Millennium Falcon's boarding ramp. The resultant clang was lost to another roll of thunder. Craning his neck, Han spied the hindquarters of his friend, whose head and shoulders were lost inside an open maintenance compartment atop the ship's portside mandible.
"Chewie!" he called again. "C'mon down from there before you get hit by lightning."
There was no response from the portside mandible.
"Besides," Han said to himself as he wound loose cables together in his hands, "I hate the smell of wet Wookiee inside the ship."
With an angry yowl, Chewie's head and shoulders appeared. He expressed his feelings about the scent of wet human in a series of loud barks and grunts. The glowing tip of the soldering gun he held in his furry hand looked like some bright, incandescent insect as it cut crazy patterns in the air, guided by the Wookiee's wildly gesticulating arms.
"Oh, that you can hear," Han responded irritably.
The wind rose, lifting and bending the branches of the giant trees surrounding the Falcon. The thunder grew more insistent, now joined by bright, forked flashes of lightning. Chewbacca slammed the compartment door shut and nimbly jumped down next to Han. Together, they hurriedly gathered the rest of their equipment, carrying it up the ramp into the ship as the first hard splashes of rain hit the ground. Han palmed the hatch shut as Chewie stowed the tools away.
"This is gonna be a bad one," Han said, settling himself behind the holotable in the ship's main hold. The sounds of thunder, wind, and rain were muted, but not deadened, by the ship's hull—a testament to just how violent this particular afternoon storm had become.
Chewie warbled in agreement as he shambled into the tiny galley and peered into the cold cell. He removed two bottles of ale, and brought them into the hold, offering one to Han as the Wookiee dropped down across from him at the holotable.
"Thanks," Han said.
The two drank in silence, broken only by the rumbles of thunder from the storm outside.
Chewie held up his bottle, and barked an observation.
"I know we're getting low," Han answered. "We're getting low on everything." He rubbed his hand along the back of his neck. "We really gotta get out of here; we've been here too long."
Head tipped to one side, the Wookiee contemplated his friend for a long moment. Finally he warbled out a question.
"I don't know where we're supposed to go," was the glum response. "Somewhere we can get paid enough to restock, I suppose." Another muted roar of thunder filtered into the hold. "Somewhere where it doesn't rain every kriffing afternoon!"
Chewie rumbled out an observation.
"I know they've given us stuff, but it's not the good stuff," Han said. "Besides, they haven't got that much themselves, and they're spending all their credits trying to get more fighters. They lost almost everything when the kid blew up the Death Star." His face looked unusually serious.
Chewbacca lowed in mournful agreement, taking a long drink of his ale. Then his face perked up. He made another observation.
"Yeah, Jabba doesn't know where I am now. But if we stay here long enough he'll figure it out. Sooner or later someone is gonna recognize me, or you, or the Falcon, and word will get back to him; he's got spies everywhere. We'll just be on the run anyway." Han stood up and paced once across the hold. "At least if we leave now, we can control where we run. Besides," he sighed. "It just doesn't feel right staying anyplace this long."
He returned to the table and drank down his ale in one long pull, setting the empty bottle down with a thud.
"Kriff!" he said, for no particular reason, as he stared across the hold. Another crash of thunder, and the sound of rain hitting the ship filled in the silence.
Suddenly, Chewie tipped his head back, listening. He warbled sharply.
"It's just your imagination," Han replied. "There's no one knocking."
The Wookiee barked in disagreement as he stood and headed to the hatch.
"Hey, pal, you're hearing things. No one would be crazy enough to be out in this. It's just the wind blowing stuff around."
Chewie argued that the wind wouldn't be as rhythmic—or as insistent—as the knocking on the hatch was.
"Fine!" Han said as he followed Chewie to the hatch. "If we open this, and all that's out there is rain, you get to clean up the mess." He palmed the hatch open. "There's no one out there."
But there was.
Han stared in disbelief as the hatch lifted. Hair dripping, soaked clothes plastered against her body, her lips tinged faintly blue, Leia Organa stood on the boarding ramp, huddled as close the entrance as she could get.
"It took you long enough," she snapped.
Han stood motionless while rain spattered inside the hatch, dampening his shirt and pants with dark spots, the wind lifting his hair. Mesmerized, he watched a drop of rainwater slide off the princess's nose and down across her breastbone before losing itself in the valley between her breasts. The plain white shirt and khaki pants she wore clung enticingly to the curves of her body. Unconsciously, Han ran his tongue along the inside of his upper lip.
"Are you going to move out of the way, or are we all just going to stand here getting wetter?" Leia demanded. The disdain in her voice would have been more effective if her teeth weren't chattering; the princess's drenching had been so complete that even Yavin 4's sultry atmosphere couldn't warm her. The cooler, dryer air inside the Falcon wasn't helping any.
His own hair blowing wildly in the tempest, Chewie grabbed Leia by the arm and pulled her inside the Falcon past his preoccupied shipmate. As he bustled the dripping woman to the hold, he chuckled, and waroowed a vaguely ribald comment to Han. Tearing his eyes away from the princess, Han slapped the hatch closed with an irritated grunt and followed after the pair.
"Laugh it up," he called to the Wookiee. His only answer was Chewie's continued laughter.
By the time Han caught up with them, Leia was seated at the holotable, wrapped in a rough ship's blanket. Reaching over her, Chewbacca was rooting through the supply of extra soft goods stored in the high bins, hunting for more. The princess looked better now that she was out of the storm—her teeth had stopped chattering—but she was still soaked through. Han noted that a small puddle had formed at her feet.
"There are some towels in my quarters," Han said. "I'll go get them."
Half an hour later, the storm was still rumbling ominously outside the ship. After some heated argument, Leia had finally conceded to getting out of her soaked clothes, and putting them through the autovalet. She was now wearing a shirt and pair of pants belonging to Han. While they weren't as eye-catching as the wet things she'd taken off, the Corellian had to admit she did look attractive in his overly big clothes. Not that he would tell her that, of course.
"So, your Worship, what were you doing out in the jungle in the middle of a storm?" he asked her with a smirk. "If you were coming to see me, you should have commed first."
"Everything isn't about you, Captain," Leia answered. She paused as Han shot her a patent look of astonished innocence. She rolled her eyes. "I wanted to check in with a few of the outlying sensor posts," she continued. "I thought I had enough time to get back before the storms started, but they proved to be uncooperative today." The look she shot at him didn't even bother to hide the fact that she found the storms no more unpredictable than the Corellian.
Han only grinned, pleased at the unspoken comparison. "Why didn't you just comm them? Or send someone to check on things?" He leaned back in the seat at the engineering station, stretching one leg out in front of him. "You're a big shot with this group, why didn't you order a minion out there to check on things?"
Even as he spoke the words, Han wondered what it was that made him want to provoke the princess. She hadn't even started it, this time. It was like he couldn't help himself. She obviously didn't have a very high opinion of him, but lots of beings didn't. It had never bothered him before…
"I don't have minions!" Leia shot up out of here seat, nearly upending the cup of kaf on the table in front of her, the blanket that had been draped over her shoulders falling away. "I don't know what you think of me, Captain Solo, and I don't care!" The color was high in her cheeks and her eyes glittered with anger. "But understand this, I don't send anyone to do anything I wouldn't do myself." The princess's chest heaved with the vehemence of her response.
Gods, she was one beautiful woman when she was really angry, Han thought, as he eyed her with undisguised interest. Especially with his too large shirt hanging low, exposing a faint curve of creamy white breast.
Leia caught Han's roving eye and her lips pursed in irritation. With as much dignity as was possible when you were still damp, and dressed in someone else's clothes, she retrieved the blanket and sat back down at the table. She grabbed the kaf in both her hands and drank, trying to hide her obvious discomfort. She looked down into the mug for a long moment. When she looked up again, the challenge in her eyes was gone, replaced by an unsure, introspective look.
"Just what do you think of me, Captain Solo?" she asked him, her tone formal.
"What?" Han was surprised by the question, and not sure what kind of an answer the princess expected.
"A lot of people think that my job is to look good," Leia's dark eyes bore into his. "That I'm some sort of rallying point for the Rebellion. Poor Princess Leia, her whole world was destroyed and look how she carries on. Is that what you think?"
"No!" The word burst from Han before he had a chance to think about it, but it was the truth. He wasn't sure exactly what he thought about Leia Organa, or her place with the Rebel Alliance, but figurehead sure wasn't it.
"I saw Alderaan destroyed," she said in a soft voice. "Tarkin and Vader, they made me watch. They thought I would break." Her voice got even softer. "I didn't. I wonder if it would have saved them if I had broken. Could I have saved Alderaan if I had given them the Alliance?"
She looked different to Han, now; she looked vulnerable. He hadn't known she'd been forced to watch when they blew-up Alderaan—her home, her family and friends. That was…it was a lot for anyone to have to live with.
She was looking at him, the blanket wrapped tightly around her shoulders, her eyes big and expectant. Like what he thought mattered to her. The princess really was just a kid, he reminded himself; she probably wasn't any older than Luke. What had he been doing when he was their age? That was when he left Shrike; when Dewlanna had died for him. He remembered the pain he'd felt then. He'd only had one death on his conscience, not billions, and that had been hard enough.
"It wouldn't have made any difference, you know." Han said, speaking almost as softly as Leia had.
"What?" The princess looked as if she really hadn't expected him to answer.
"Tarkin and Vader," he continued, his voice resuming its normal pitch. "You could have given 'em Mon Mothma and Dodonna for lunch, and they still would have…" Han hesitated, not wanting to cause the young woman any more pain, but he saw her chin rise firmly. "They still would have blown-up Alderaan. Because they could." He smiled, but there was no pleasure in it. "That's what bullies do. They pick on the ones who can't defend themselves." He thought about Shrike, and Dewlanna. "Tarkin just has bigger rocks to throw than most." His lopsided smile became normal. "Or had. The kid took care of that," he added.
"Luke couldn't have done it without you," Leia pointed out.
Gods, but he was tired of hearing that! All he'd done was come back to help out a friend, who admittedly, might have ended up as a greasespot on the surface of the Death Star if Han hadn't shown up. But that's what you did. Dewlanna had taught him that.
Waving a negligent hand, Han rose from his seat and walked across the hold. When he turned back, ready to give his usual smart response, Leia stopped him dead.
"Thank you," she said.
It was different for Han, hearing her say that here in the hold of his ship, compared to the flowery speech she'd delivered when she'd given him that medal. She was different, not the princess, nor the leader of the Rebel Alliance. Right now, she was just Leia. She seemed delicate, approachable, and remarkably desirable. It scared the sithspit out of him.
"You're welcome," he answered her. And she'd never know he had that medal stowed away safely in his cabin, either.
He paused for one breath, two… "I sure as hells don't think you're a, uh." Han paused again, searching for the right word, "…a symbol," he continued. He made his smile easy, teasing. "You fight way too much to just be a figurehead, your Worship," he informed her. "At least you fight too much with me."
Leia tossed her head back; the frizz of her drying hair blowing in the Falcon's air circulation. Her eyes sparked. "I've never known anyone more stuck-up or dull-witted than you, Flyboy." The blanket slipped off her shoulders. Han's eyes slipped back down to the v of the shirt she currently wore.
"Eyes up," she snarled, shooting him an angry look, hot enough to melt a comet. Han swore he could see the air around her glow from the heat radiating off her. There was definitely something burning inside him, too, but a completely different kind of heat.
"Certainly your royal Princessness." He offered her a mocking salute, she sneered in return. Thank the gods, Han thought. They were back in known territory
"Chewie," she called out. "Are my clothes through the autovalet yet?" The princess started to get up, then paused when the blanket caught on the edge of the holotable. She sank back down again.
Han sniggered; Leia glared back. Yes, things felt right now, Han thought.
Chewbacca offered the dried clothes to the princess, who grabbed them and disappeared into the crew quarters to change. She reappeared quickly, wearing her own things. She held Han's clothes in a bundle.
"I'll see that these are laundered, Captain, and returned to you as soon as possible," she said formally.
"You can just leave them here," Han offered. "I can clean 'em." He grinned. "I wouldn't want to put you out, or your minions," he taunted.
Leia grunted inarticulately and thrust the garments into his hands. She paused then, listening. "I think the storm has passed," she commented.
Sure enough, the sounds of wind, rain, and thunder no longer were evident. A quick look out of the cockpit canopy showed low hanging branches, laden with dripping leaves, but clear skies above.
Leia moved toward the hatch, Han trailing behind.
"Thank you for your hospitality," she said.
"You're welcome anytime you want to come by," Han leered. He palmed the hatch open, watching as the ramp slowly descended. Water splashed down from the hatch frame onto the ramp.
Leia started down, then turned back. "Thanks for answering my question," she said. Without another word, the princess continued down the ramp and onto the damp path. Han stood in the hatchway and watched until her slim form disappeared in the trees. Unconsciously, he fingered the fabric of the shirt Leia had worn, which was still in his hand.
The Wookiee turned to look at his friend. He warbled out an observation.
"No, I don't like her!" Han objected. "You don't know what you're talking about." He turned and stalked back into the ship.
Chewie laughed as he followed his friend. Of course you don't, he awroooed to himself.