Stop Motion
Chapter 7: Interlude
by Amy L Hull
Written for alderannianprincess in the Han/Leia Summer Secret Santa Challenge 2017.
ooo
"Good morning, sunshine."
Leia blinked away layers of sleep and fog from a blissfully peaceful night. "Mmmmm. Morning."
"Ready for your exciting day?"
She laughed. A routine had settled in as Leia's condition improved. Up, breakfast, work for the Republic, napping, exercises, lunch, napping, time with Han, exercises, dinner, bed. "I don't think I've ever slept this much in my life."
"Well, it's been a long war." He sported that crooked grin as he helped her sit up. "That's a lotta running, planning, flying, supplying, negotiating, hiding, building, escaping, fighting... I think you've got a lot of rest to catch up on." He removed the oxygen mask. "Oh, yeah, and you're injured. And recovering."
Leia rolled her eyes.
"Ready?"
She nodded, and he picked her up. "What will we be having for breakfast, good sir?" she asked.
"The finest of reconstituted grain cereals, Your Highness."
"Mmm." She giggled into his neck.
"And after we eat, I have a surprise for you."
He steadfastly refused to tell her any more, so she gobbled down her cereal, pausing only to note that she could hold her head up the whole time now.
He brought her to the 'fresher and set her down. As she relieved herself, he pulled his shirt over his head and dropped it on the floor. She stared at his chest while he undid his pants. This past week and a half in separate beds, plus her time on Naboo, was far too long for newlyweds. Her breath caught, and she took deep, deliberate breaths and licked her lips slowly.
He braced her, then pulled her shirt off. He framed her face in his hands. "Are you ready for your surprise, sweetheart?"
"Yes," she whispered.
He raked his fingers through her hair, then began removing hair pins and setting them on the counter.
"Han?"
"Hmm?"
"What are you doing?"
"You'll see." He unwound her hair and unbraided it, then drew his fingers through it once. "Here we go." He picked her up, holding her to him, then stepped into the shower with her.
A stool was already there, and he set her down and turned on the water, kneeling beside her, holding her balanced, helping the water work through her hair.
The warmth, the tree-scented soaps he'd dug out from somewhere, the feel of him holding her, firm and loved. Her crampy muscles relaxed. Even her face relaxed with a long "Mmmm."
She tucked herself inside of the sensation, feeling it in color. She reached inside herself and pulled that feeling out and around them. His golden presence against her, the deep blue of the water, flowing against her scalp and through her hair, the warmth enveloping them in a deep, translucent red, and all that surrounded by the pale blue that was the Falcon's hull and engines. As Han's fingers massaged trillium soap into her scalp and the earthy scent flowed around and through her in a spring green.
Feeling through the Force was like turning inside out, as if all of the energy of their love and togetherness, of the rotation of the galaxy and light of the stars was contained within her. At the same time, she was but a tiny spark within the fabric of life and the galaxy. It was tiny, huge, vast, complex, and simple. It was everything, every moment in an endless row, and a single point in time and space, passing in less than a flicker, flowing in and through itself and back again.
There was one tiny, orange point, flowing out of synch with the rest. It buzzed, like a biting insect circling around her.
"LEIA!"
"Mmmm, Han, that is lovely."
"Are you all right?"
"Yes. Why?"
"I was talking to you, and it was like you were...gone. I was afraid you were having a seizure or something."
"Han, I'm fine. This feels amazing. I'm fine."
His eyes narrowed. "Where did you go?" He wagged his finger at her. One of these days she was going to have to bite that finger to teach him a lesson. "And don't say nowhere."
She sighed. "I really was enjoying this. You, the trillium soap," she sniffed, "the Rbollean petal-oil-"
He ran a hand through her hair. "Do not try to change the subject."
"I could feel it all in the Force. At least, I think it was the Force." She glanced at him. "Do you believe me?"
His eyes dropped away and he directed the water to rinse them both. "I don't...not believe you." He turned off the water and reached outside the cubicle for towels. "It's just...strange, you know?"
She did know.
He wrapped a towel around Leia's hair, enfolding her in a larger one before carrying her to their bunk.
She kissed his chest and stroked the springy hairs there. "You know, we could…" She tilted her chin up, and he kissed her.
He laid her down and kissed her clavicle, then up her neck. "We could," he agreed. "But I'd like to wait till you're stronger." He kissed the other side of her neck. "I've got...plans. And I want you to be able to participate. Anyway, respiratory distress? Not so sexy."
He had a point.
"Now, if you'd like, I can wait to get us dressed till after your exercises, Your Worship."
She chuckled at his eyebrow waggle. The fact that he could make her laugh-that even in the early days and weeks and awful months just after Alderaan, he had been able to make her laugh, it was part of why she loved him. But, no, if he wasn't going to play along with her, she wasn't with him.
"Han, I couldn't possibly. I mean, if we're not going to keep going, that would just be taunting. I'll have my clothes now, husband."
Han almost sulked as he dressed, pulling his own pants on and dressing her quickly. He stretched and massaged her limbs then twisted her torso and hips. He pressed her knees to her chest and pulled her arms around them. "Now lace your fingers together."
"Bossy."
"I learn from the best, sweetheart."
She tried to muster a glare at him, but that crooked grin just made her chuckle. Slowly, one finger at a time, she joined her hands then squeezed her right hand, then her left, then her right. "Got it."
"Okay. Hold on now."
She tightened everything she could, then nodded. He released her legs slowly. She held on. And held on. And held on. She took a deep breath and, during the exhale, pulled. Her legs came a bit closer to her chest.
"All right!" Han whooped. "Yeah!"
Something about his pitch...it was like the buzzing she'd heard in the Force before he'd called her name. She let go abruptly. Her feet landed in Han's stomach.
"Oof! Ow!"
"I'm sorry. Han, I'm sorry, but remember I said someone was following us?"
He nodded.
"They've been waiting. Waiting for us to get to this chunk of empty space. No hyperspace lanes, no trade routes, no planets or asteroids, just...us." She swallowed. "I think they're almost here."
