It was like waking up underwater – drowning in air, flailing for the surface. Han gasped and felt himself falling. He put his arm out just in time to break his fall on the cold stone floor.
Everything was dark, even when he opened his eyes. A dark swirl and the sound of his heart pounding in his ears, the rest of his senses screaming at him all at once. He shivered, in a cold sweat as he felt something hold him by the waist and drag him to a semi-upright position.
A strange, metallic-sounding voice, reassuring him. Then her voice: "Someone who loves you." Leia. Her lips on his, drowning in each other for a moment.
That horrible laugh. Jabba. Kriff. Blind, backwards attempts at bargaining with the Hutt as they dragged him away. And dragged Leia Force-knows-where.
Thank the Maker they threw him in with Chewie. Chewie took care of him, gave some shape to the blind confusion that was Han's new world. Although he could hardly believe what Chewie was telling him. Luke thinks he's a Jedi Knight? Lando's traitor ass came to rescue me? And why in seven hells did you ever let Leia be a part of this?
[Cub, when was the last time Little Princess let anyone keep her from doing something she was set on doing?] Chewie said. [We all tried, told her to think of who she was leaving behind.] Who—what? [You know how she is when she's on a mission.]
Han wasn't sure whether the fog in his brain was the hibernation sickness (probably), his guilt over Chewie, Leia, Luke, and even kriffing Lando putting themselves in Jabba's way (yes), or the flood of rescue plan details coming at him (also yes), but he couldn't absorb all of what he was hearing. He felt around and found a dry spot to sit down, and let Chewie hold him while he tried to rest.
"Daughter?" Han's face was incredulous. "My…daughter," he said slowly, as if not understanding the words that had come out of his mouth.
Leia's face was a mixture of tenderness and concern, with a hint of a nervous smile on her lips. She looked into Han's eyes and gently put her hand over his. "Our daughter," she confirmed.
Han still looked gobsmacked, and Leia was starting to think that hitting him with this news so soon after the rescue had been a bad idea. But after he had gone from near silence to a full-on rant in the cockpit of the Falcon demanding to know "what the kriffing hell is going on," Chewie had given her a grave look and said, [Time for your talk.]
Han's face softened. "Our…my?" Leia nodded. "Our daughter," he repeated softly.
They were both silent for a moment. Leia seemed suddenly almost shy as she began again. "I got – we….we made her on the way to Bespin. I didn't know I was pregnant until about a month after we got back."
Han felt a rush of regret as he realized, She had our kid, alone. In the middle of the kriffing Rebellion. "Leia…" he sighed, reaching for her hand again. She squeezed it lightly.
Suddenly he had a horrible thought. "Is she— Are you—"
Leia's smile broadened. "I'm fine. She's fine. She's back with the fleet. You can see her when we get back. If you want."
"Lilya." Han tried out his daughter's name. He smiled his crooked grin, the first time Leia had seen it since Bespin. He reached for her and kissed her tenderly.
Hours later, Han lay awake in his cabin, Leia asleep and cuddled around him. Funny, on their journey to Bespin, it had usually been her whom he'd had to coax to sleep. Turn that big brain off for awhile, will ya, Princess?
He'd actually slept better in Jabba's palace dungeon the previous night. And at least at Jabba's, he had a basic idea of what was going on, what to do. "Just stick close to Chewie and Lando," Luke had said, sounding strangely confident for someone who'd just been sentenced to being digested over a thousand years. And then, a whirlwind of blasters and screams, falling over the side of the skiff, pointing a blaster at Lando's head (which had been quite satisfying in the moment) before re-aiming at the tentacle wrapped around his leg (more of a vaguely snake-shaped blur in Han's vision). Then they were all together on the other skiff, taking off as Jabba's barge exploded in a ball of flame. Leia guided him through a sandstorm to the Falcon, a cloak hastily wrapped around whatever humiliating thing Jabba had made her wear.
That's about when Han had started to feel lost again. His improving vision actually made it worse. Now he could see Luke dressed all in black, his face so much more serious now than on Hoth, even when he smiled. He saw the long looks Leia and Luke exchanged before Luke got into his X-wing. "Give her my love," Luke said, and Leia smiled and kissed him on the cheek. "Of course. And hurry back, she'll miss you."
He tried to shrug it off, but the hits kept coming. Lando looking a little too comfortable in the captain's chair, and exchanging gentle jokes with Leia, who was no longer giving Lando the ice princess treatment from Cloud City. Mentions of Zanziga, Sullust, of this mysterious Lilya (followed by whoever had said the name hurriedly trying to pretend they hadn't), Lando joining the Alliance (what?), Leia doing Alliance intelligence, something about a Bothan mission…Han was swimming in a pool of names and places and stories that had happened without him. He first tried to follow along, figuring he'd catch up later, but found himself with nothing to say. Nothing. After what felt like the eighteenth significant look between Leia, Lando, and Chewie, he lost it. Then Chewie growled something at Leia and pushed the two of them toward the lounge, where she sat him down and told him that the mysterious Lilya was his daughter, and hers.
He wasn't really sure what to do with this information, or with the thought that Leia had left her child – their child – to help rescue him. He barely knew what to do without the threat of Jabba hanging over his head. He stroked Leia's hair gently. I did what I had to do, she had said. And I did it for her as well as you. She deserves to know her father.
Her father. Come on, brain, turn off and go to sleep, will ya?