Thanks again to all who have taken time to give this a look and post their feedback: WildHorseFantasy, Zireael07, Eldar-Melda, Queen Naberrie, angie, JACarter, saberstorm and Guest, you all inspire me to keep putting fingers to the keyboard.
You'll find a familiar character in unfamiliar form here – a ten-year-old Han Solo, drummed into action. Hope you enjoy this chapter, and the next, which I'm also posting just because I can. What can I say? I was on a roll and went with it.
Imperial Palace in Imperial City
Post-explosion
"Hey!"
It's the second time a crackle of electricity singes his behind, and ten-year-old Han Solo needs a distraction like he needs a blaster shot in the head.
Which he might just get, any second now.
What with the legions of Stormtroopers swarming the hangar, like he needs to worry about the frantic astromech droid chirping wildly as it rolls practically on the Corellian boy's heels.
"I mean it, short stuff, don't fry me again, okay?" Solo phrases it as a question, but it plays like a command from the pre-teen, whose disposition could be succinctly described as street smart. Or smart-assed, depending who was asked. "I can't believe we're out in the middle of this – " he makes an exasperated gesture into the calamity of Imperial troops, overhead alarms and clatter of weaponry that surrounds them " – instead of waiting for your boss-man in the Falcon. This is the one time I wouldn't mind missing the party instead of jumping right into it! "
Artoo lets loose a string of excitable trills and finishes with a few emphatic beeps without changing his route, which is pretty much straight into the fray.
The soot-haired boy scurries ahead of the droid as they find themselves filing into a series of rooms off the hangar. Somehow, they've eluded detection, but Solo's been in enough scrapes to know that a scamp and a squat droid don't merit much notice during a full-scale emergency, of which this has all the telltale signs. "Gotta hand it to your boss-man; those fireworks really got their attention."
Artoo's electro-whine doesn't necessarily approve. The droid's dome swivels about, oblivious to the chaos that makes Solo jumpier by the second, trying to hone in on the com link Anakin carries. Sooner or later, someone will question their business in the heart of Imperial Palace, and Solo will have to come up with a whopper of an answer to explain it.
No problem. Despite his youth, the boy can spin the bantha poodoo with the best of 'em.
How naïve of him to think these little adventures would stop when the tall guy with the sorrowful eyes had seized his hand in the seedy Corellian tavern a few months earlier.
Solo had made him for a Jedi at once – caught a glint of the lightsaber hilt under the man's tunic – and normally wouldn't have bothered trying to pick his belt. Everyone knew the whole no-possessions thing, so what was the point of trying to foist credits the imposing Jedi likely didn't have?
Then again, the man had acquired his mentor's prized starship, the vaunted Millennium Falcon, within minutes of pulling up a barstool, so opportunistic swindler that he was, Solo thought he'd give it a go. Even if he got caught, a Jedi wouldn't likely retaliate with physical violence. Han could suffer through the blah-la-la lecture.
Which came quickly after the Jedi had caught his hand before it got anywhere near the spiffy utility belt with a sly, hypnotizing, "You don't want to take things that don't belong to you."
Snatching back his hand with a suddenly-fuzzy brain, Solo had nonetheless replied, "You would if you hadn't eaten in three days. My guardian says I eat too much."
At that, the Jedi had cracked a smile laced with surprise. The young one possessed a strong countenance if Anakin's mild Force-suggestion hadn't entirely swayed him. Anakin took in his unevenly cropped hair, soil-smudged hands and tattered clothing. The boy was a bit scrawny.
"Is that so? My masters used to say I ate like a bantha, too. Obi-Wan would grumble, but he always gave me seconds." Anakin had extended his palm to the boy and weathered a jolt when the young one's sapphire eyes gazed at him with earnest trust. "My name is Ani. You are?"
The boy had grasped Anakin's hand with the clumsy innocence of a child, albeit a savvy one. "Han Solo. I'm ten. This is my home planet, in case you need someone to show you around, or make connections, or… whatever." That seemed to imply that the youth knew more about the Corellian underworld than he should.
The Jedi's eyes crinkled when he smiled, Solo had noted, but there was little spark in their blue depths. "Glad to meet you, Han. Excuse me." The towering man known as Ani gestured to the rough-and-tumble barkeeper whose favorite pastime was treating Han as if he didn't exist. "My young friend here hasn't eaten in some time. You will be happy to contribute to his continued good health with a hot meal. How about some spiceloaf, stewfruit and – " he turned to the boy " – do you like that potato rice dish they serve in some of the – "
"Gods, no!" the boy responded immediately, a grimace twisting his mouth. The barkeep was suddenly at his service? This could be fun, he caught himself thinking, but quickly banished the notion when the Jedi tapped a finger to his arm in subtle disapproval. Jedi. "Can I have potato sticks instead? And an air cake?"
"Good idea, Han," Anakin agreed. "Add two air cakes, please, and I'll have a caf, and bring some blue milk for the boy, if you have it." The barkeep gave a displeased grunt before loping into the kitchen.
Han appraised the older man with world-weary eyes. He'd seen his share of riffraff and outright criminals in this establishment on the fringes of his native Corellia. Even at his tender age, he knew this Jedi was twice as dangerous, despite his refined ways.
"Can I ask you something?" A mug filled to the brim with caf appeared before Anakin, who sipped at it thoughtfully, then nodded. Emboldened, the Corellian boy traced invisible patterns on the counter before blurting in a whisper, "Am I in trouble, sitting here with you? I know who you are." His eyes darted toward Anakin's hip and the concealed lightsaber. "Jedi, I mean. You're an outlaw now, right? That Emperor guy, Palpa-whooz-its, or Sid-a-whatever, he said the Jedi were criminals and he killed a bunch of 'em." He nearly clamped his mouth shut at the flicker of discomfort that shadowed Anakin's features, but plunged on. "I'm not gonna rat you out or anything. I mean, I'm kinda an outlaw, too."
A steaming plate heaped with what Anakin assumed were the boy's favorite foods, from the way he launched his fork into them, halted his questions.
"Where are your parents, young one?" Anakin had asked when Solo's chewing slowed enough for him to eat and converse without compromising his manners.
The boy had fidgeted on his barstool, a frown crossing his face. He'd become accustomed to answering the question, wanted those who asked to assume it wasn't bothersome.
"Dunno." A shrug meant to be careless, but Anakin sensed a lingering stab of loss. "Haven't seen 'em in a few years."
"You're on your own, then?" The Jedi's eyes softened.
Half of the boy's air cake was gone, and his pace had slowed only a bit. Anakin pushed his own dessert under Han's nose, recalling meals that his mother, somehow, had stretched into multiple days.
"My guardian takes care of me most of the time," Solo answered carefully, mindful that the last time he'd alluded to Garris Shrike's lack of attention to his basic needs, he'd nursed a swollen jaw that accentuated his crooked grin.
Anakin knew what the phrase meant. Gardulla's fists had initiated lessons in what he could disclose about his master; Watto had reinforced them. "You are indebted to this Garris Shrike," he stated, tapping the glass of blue milk. Solo immediately drained half in a famished gulp.
The boy finally pushed back from the counter, calloused hands resting on his stomach. When was the last time he'd actually felt full? Now he needed a nap, but Shrike would likely have him prowling the streets for more marks as soon as the Jedi departed. "Guess that's what you call it. More like my choices are zero and none."
The Jedi's lips curled slightly, and Solo would've liked to pick his brain for the interesting thoughts that fired. "Then perhaps I found this tavern not only for my benefit, but also for yours. I certainly haven't gotten any richer; spent my last credits on this Millennium Falcon your guardian assures me is the fastest freighter in the galaxy." Anakin held the secretive grin until his caf had been drained and he was satisfied his young companion's stomach would no longer ache for sustenance.
"Oh, he's not lying about that. It really moves." The boy was looking curiously at Anakin again. "If you don't have any more credits, how are you gonna pay for my food?"
It wasn't difficult to return the boy's amused smirk. "We, young one, are going to help with dishes and any other odd jobs they have for us back in the kitchen. My master would say an honest day's work is food for the soul."
Solo's joviality faded. "Wouldn't it be a lot easier to do that mind-trick thing again? I mean, dishes? I've seen what's in that kitchen."
This is what it could be like, Anakin had realized with a tremor that evoked a prickling of tears, when my son is a headstrong ten-year-old. The firm hand, the negotiation, the runaway pride.
Did Obi-Wan feel like this, too? Anakin had made his master proud, on occasion. Obi-Wan affirmed it, once, with the warmest smile under that russet beard, right before…
Anakin steadied his hand before placing it on the boy's shoulder. "An honest day's work is food for the soul, Han."
When both burst into laughter at the absurdity, Anakin amended with a chuckle, "It'll keep the barkeep and his rowdy-looking friends off our backs, too."
Grabbing their plates on the way, they'd trudged to the kitchen, where the Solo boy tackled mountains of grubby dishes without dissent. By the time they'd finished, Anakin had "persuaded" Garris Shrike that the orphaned Corellian would be much better off assisting with Ani's venture, which would eventually take the two to Tatooine, Force willing.
Anakin had made absolutely certain to tell Han that no money had exchanged hands. He would not shatter another blue-eyed boy's innocence with the notion that his freedom had been acquired through a business transaction.
"Don't know why I even told you any of that," Solo was muttering as he blindly follows Artoo from one chamber to another. As they venture deeper into the core of the capital – a dark, creepy place even without all the Imps and their blasters running around – the explosive aftermath becomes more apparent. Acrid smoke billows in rising plumes from landmarks that had obviously held charges, and pockets of crumpled durasteel dot a carpet of fragments, both large and micro, from shattered glass windows. The air, as stale and foreboding as Imperial City itself, fairly reeks of disaster.
Kriffin' great, Solo grouses. And here I am, playing follow the crazy astromech.
"He should be looking for us," the boy theorizes, narrowing his eyes to search through hanging puffs of smoke. "Why isn't Ani looking for us?"
The answer comes scant minutes later, when Solo spots the crude, crimson outline of what appears to have been a bleeding Jedi amid a crater of twisted debris. A smear that tapers into a gruesome stripe is peppered with bloody boot prints, leading the duo to an out-of-the-way storage closet. "Put a lid on it, short stuff!" Solo hisses as Artoo rushes to open the door, chirping with anticipation.
"Oh… Gods." It's worse than he could have imagined. Anakin is sprawled on the floor, three limbs splayed; one arm weakly clutches a blossomed stain in his mid-section. The circumference is so large that Solo can't tell whether the wound originates in his chest or his abdomen. Solo whips off his tunic – one Anakin's own, altered to fit the boy – and presses it to the red, taking in lacerations, burns and other wounds not covered by sooty residue. "Watch the door, Artoo," he yelps as desperation claws at him. The Jedi isn't even conscious, his cheeks a grey pallor that matches some of the ashes clinging to his clothes. Kriff, one of his boots is torn nearly off, and he's missing snatches of clothing everywhere. Even his hair is littered with ruin. Fine shards of glass abrade Solo's own hands as he searches for the source of bloody streaks in Anakin's honey-colored curls.
Solo wishes for a lot of things at that moment: a decent med kit, a blaster modified to Shrike's shady preferences, and the words to that oddly-soothing Jedi chant Anakin had repeated, trancelike, as they'd neared this Force-forsaken place. I'm only a kid! he thinks, weighing the option of simply dropping next to the Jedi and accepting his unfortunate fate.
His friend Ani had the choice of strolling out of that Corellian tavern a few months ago with only the Falcon to show for the experience. Instead, he'd sweet-talked Shrike and, Solo freely admits, made an orphaned imp feel like a genuine person for the first time in standard years.
Solo will never be able to recount how he and Artoo somehow carried the strapping Jedi back to the Millennium Falcon without getting them caught. Their fortune is fleeting, of course, and he's soon scrabbling to get the freighter into space as what seems like the bulk of the Imperial fleet rains a furious attack on the starship.
He doesn't have time to savor their miraculous escape as the iffy hyperdrive finally activates. Back in the makeshift med room, Ani's shallow breaths seem to hitch even further, color draining until he's so pale that Solo can't fathom he'd ever been bronzed by dual suns.
"Fast, Artoo – the com link under the floor panel." Ani hadn't mentioned it, but Shrike's methodical takeoff prep had always included a thorough check of every nook of the Falcon. Solo had found the device just before they'd left Corellia.
He'd wondered who would be at the other end, if it ever came to that.
"Anybody out there? Please? I have a Jedi with me; name's Ani and he's hurt bad, real bad! I can fly the ship to a med center, only I think we might be in trouble now and… he's all bloody and his head looks bad and he hasn't moved, and, and, and… I'm a good pilot but I'm only ten!"
When a low, stately voice responds across the stars, somehow, Han Solo knows it will be all right.
"Easy now, young one. You've done well to get this far. Can you relay your coordinates so I can get an idea where you are?"
Solo rattles off the numbers with a drained sigh of relief. Within minutes, Anakin's color improves and his eyes flutter, even if they remain closed. He responds faintly to Artoo's soft whistles, his head turning slightly toward the familiar.
The com link crackles again.
"Anakin should be resting better now. Don't worry." There's a muffled sound – is that a woman's cry? "My name is Ben Kenobi. Listen well and we'll get you both safely home."
Finis.
Proceed to Ani/Padme goodness in chapter 8, if that's your kind of thing.