Chapter II
The Empire Strikes Back
Leia Organa almost screamed as the Slave I lifted off. It would fly away through the clouds of Bespin, with Han aboard, and she would not be able to scream in front of Lando as much as she would like to… She would not give the Baron-Administrator the satisfaction of seeing her emotional. Perhaps Chewie would see it. But first, she was going to run back to the Falcon even if keeping up to Boba Fett's ship on foot was incredibly futile…
She turned, already on the balls of her feet, and heard the screech of metal behind her. She whirled around. R2-D2 screamed, as did Lando.
Another ship had crashed into the Slave I and driven it partly back over the platform. It was not a plate-buckling collision, although the other ship must've been moving quickly to be nowhere one moment and in front of Boba Fett's face the next. Metal sides simply screamed against each other, and the Slave I spun in place over the landing pad. The other ship was bigger than Slave I, a flat model like the Millennium Falcon, but not of any design Leia recognized. It slewed sideways and pushed the Slave closer to the walls of Cloud City.
Leia barely thought about her next action. Like a predator, she took the advantage she saw. Like a sniper, the trajectory line aligned—she aimed her blaster and shot the locking mechanism on the rearward ramp of the Slave, as many times in succession as she could. When the smoke cleared, sparks were pouring from the lock keypad and the ramp was lowering, with the angular figure of Boba Fett descending inside.
Inside the Ebon Hawk, Revan grasped the copilot's controls desperately in her sweating hands and glanced at the diagnostic screen beside her. The neon blue graphic was intimately familiar, very different from the orange clouds and floating buildings which had suddenly appeared in front of the ship. They would have fallen like a rock, had not Carth somehow made it to the pilot's seat and executed the quickest, most on-the-fly startup sequence in galactic history (or so Gwen imagined). Even more surprising was how quickly she had neatly taken her place beside him.
She said, "We just crushed one of its guns. That's no ship I've ever seen—"
He only responded with a flash of white teeth, and the ship slewed again. Then, "Put down the landing claws."
As Gwen complied, the Exile, Anna, entered the cockpit with a swish of her black cloak. "People out there need help," she said.
"I sense it too," Gwen replied, without looking back at the younger woman. The Force in the back of her mind quietly compelled her to act on that information. Gwen closed her eyes for a moment, but the sudden thud of the landing claws and the roar of the engine didn't stop. "Where are we?"
"Aahh," the Exile said, making Anna glad of the coherence she had, and ran out of the cockpit toward the exit.
Leia did indeed think as she pointed her blaster at Boba Fett's masked face. She realized that she was threatening the best bounty hunter in the galaxy, the supposed product of an entire warrior culture, and she definitely realized that she was threatening the person who was stealing away from her the man to whom she had rather recently said "I love you". That last one made the first two seem rather unimportant. "Give him back!" She screamed.
R2-D2, plugged into the wall, beeped and whistled. C-3PO translated— "Princess Leia, Boba Fett is calling for reinforcements from the Empire!"
"Where's your pride?" said Lando as he came to stand beside Leia, blaster also at the ready. She glanced at him.
"Pride is no good to me if I'm dead," grumbled Boba Fett.
"I tried," said Lando, beginning to circle around the bounty hunter. "Now, return Han to us."
Fett sighed, an oddly wavering and metallic sound from inside his helmet. "I have to admit I didn't expect you to bring in another Rebel ship just for this barve,"
Leia was not about to say 'Whoever they are, they aren't Rebels'. But then she almost was, because people—two women with ignited lightsabers —lightsabers??--, a Zabrak, and a few others hanging back near their ship which was now crowded onto the round pad with Fett's, came into view and looked threateningly at Fetttoo.
"I won't lose my pay," Fett growled, reaching for something out of a belt pack—out of which a thermal detonator rolled harmlessly to the feet of the lightsaber-wielder in red. Leia glanced at her and received a serious smile in return. She felt a strange sense of empathy, as if this woman with a weapon like Luke's knew Leia's fear of losing Han.
Fett had no reaction to the unspoken threat. "Fine. I'll get the cargo out for you."
The lead Jedi woman said, "And I'll be keeping track of you while you do."
"Huh?" Lando expressed his confusion about this suddenly appearing group who seemed to be on his side.
"Shh," Leia replied. She put on her politician's stony expression as she waited for Fett to come back out of his ship. He did, pulling the hovering slab of carbonite that encased Han behind him.
The Jedi woman gritted her teeth and leapt forward. She gestured with both hands—the carbonite slab slid down the ramp, and Boba Fett flew back into his ship.
Something exploded inside. A puff of smoke rolled out of the ship. Leia found herself smiling. She grasped a corner of the smooth carbonite slab as best she could. The red-clad Jedi broke into her thoughts about avoiding looking at Han's transmuted face.
"You need a ship to get out of here?"
"No. We have one—"
"Can we follow you, please? We're…a bit lost."
"Right…okay." Whatever. Jedi. Han. Saved us. Han.
Lando was speaking to her further, but Leia turned away, shaking. She searched around the side of the carbonite slab for a release button.
Then she heard Luke's voice in her head. Help me…Leia…and she could pinpoint him, somehow, as he went through the worst moment of his young life. "Lando!" She gasped. "It's Luke. He's in trouble." The world reeled around her. Too much was happening…
"Fine," said Lando. Then he took her by the hand—she pulled away, and found Chewie next to her like a furry wall—and moved them and Han off the landing platform. They ran as a staggering group to the pad where the Falcon sat, and Lando opened the hatch.
Leia had to remain in the cockpit, looking out at the sky over Chewie's shoulder, to look for Luke, but most of her thoughts remained on Han. The carbonite slab had been placed in the common room. She would not leave him to escape the carbonite freeze on his own…
The sight of Luke hanging from the vane below the city, wracked with pain and emotion if his face were any indication, almost shocked her out of her fugue. Lando's communication with the pilot of the mysterious ship unsettled her too, but that had to be cut off when he opened the Falcon's top hatch and ascended, to brave the whipping winds of Bespin to rescue Luke. Leia ran to his side when they returned. Luke moaned and spoke words meaningless to her—she felt nauseous when she realized that he was minus one hand. She did not want to imagine how his conflict with Vader had gone—or how it had been contrived. At least Luke was not frozen in carbonite too.
She and Lando hooked him in to the ship's appropriate medical systems, but all they could do was stabilize him.
"Vader," he murmured, and Leia had to return to the common room. She knelt beside Han's iron-gray form.
She didn't bother asking Lando whether it was logical to unfreeze him now. The Baron-Administrator had returned to the cockpit. Surely the Falcon and the mysterious ship were sweeping out of the atmosphere of Bespin right now. Probably, Imperials were coming after them, if any TIE fighters or Star Destroyers existed in this system. But the Falcon could get them out of there, and she was not going to worry about the other ship, even if they had saved her life, and the life lying in metal and winking light before her. She would thank them. But now…
She pressed the button that would awaken Han. The carbonite around Han's eyes and mouth began to glow; Leia's breath caught. Was that normal? The light engulfed him, and he was revealed alive, breathing heavily, and—Han.
It almost felt like Leia had forgotten his face, and the overwhelming resemblance of the man before her to her half-remembered love shocked through her. He sat up, eyes blank. "Leia…"
She reached for him, touched his face.
"Leia. What's going on?"
"Luke's been hurt by Vader. We're getting off Bespin. We're going to be fine." Leia explained as she ran her hand though his hair.
Han sighed, and crawled shakily out of the carbonite frame. They quietly embraced on the floor of the Millenium Falcon.