LEIA sank onto the cot in her temporary quarters. Three weeks. She was stuck with nothing but an arrogant smuggler, a wookie, and a fussy, golden droid for three weeks.
She considered reaching through the Force and calling her father back to them, just to end the torture. But she couldn't explain why she would willingly walk onto a star destroyer. And how could a star destroyer catch them without killing them?
She heaved a sigh. It wasn't just Solo's inability to fix things that was leaving them hanging in space. It was the ship. Only an hour before, she'd slipped into the hold and tried to repair the hyperdrive herself. She could leave it to Solo to connect the final wire, so as not to arouse suspicions.
But the hyperdrive had practically been a puddle at her feet. She couldn't even fathom trying to piece it together. Even the Force was completely confused.
Beside feeling completely helpless and useless, the fact that she was supposed to be playing a princess did not help. Why in the galaxy would a princess know what a negative power coupling was? Why would she know how to fix the hyperdrive? She had to let the men do the job while she sat around and waited.
Her father might not have a problem with letting underlings do the job, but she, on the other hand...
A drumming sound jerked her from her thoughts.
Solo.
"What is it, Han?" she snapped. She almost slipped up, again. She wanted to call him Solo... maybe as a reminder of what he always would be.
He shrugged casually as he entered her cramped quarters. "I dunno. Maybe I want your opinion on the hyperdrive."
Before he'd entered, she had turned away from him, looking at the wall. She still sat on the mattress, but when he so casually voiced his "want," she rose, spun, and said stupidly, "What?"
Solo looked at her, a half smile on his arrogant features.
"Your opinion. On the hyperdrive," he said slowly, as if he was speaking to a small child.
"And why do you want my opinion? I do not know anything about ships. Unless you want me to go and argue with it. I'm sure that'll do a lot." Her tone couldn't have been more caustic; he winced and actually took a step back.
"Look, sweetheart, I-"
"I am not your sweetheart, for the last time!"
He cocked an eyebrow. "Are you anybody else's sweetheart then?"
"God, Han, no!"
Her ire had come out of nowhere. Still, after three years with this insufferable man, she needed the venting time.
She prepared to emotionally scar him, but he spoke first.
"Is that because Sith don't love?"
She stopped. "What?"
He moved past her and lay down on her cot, propping himself up against the pillow. "I said, are you single because Sith don't love?"
Leia's world froze. Her mind, however, was burning up. How could he know? How was it possible? What do I say?
Struggling, she replied in a calm, level voice, "What would Sith and loving have to do with me, Solo?"
He held up a hand and started counting off fingers. "One: you're a princess and supposed to fall in love. Two: you never, ever call me Solo. Three: you are a Sith. I heard you talking to..."
"To whom?" she snapped. "Answer me!" There was no chance he had heard her with her master. No chance at all. That one conversation... he hadn't even been in "costume." He couldn't possibly have drawn the conclusion that she was speaking to Vader!
He swallowed.
She opened herself to the Force. A frantic array of emotions flew at her. Fear, shock, resignation, misery, disappointment... All his.
"To Vader."
The two words brought her scheme crashing down onto her shoulders. She didn't even try to deny it. She gestured with a hand; the door swooshed closed.
Solo jumped.
She reached for her lightsaber. It flew readily to her hand, and in one, smooth motion she ignited it. Calmly, she pointed it at his throat.
"You've watched the Jedi scum practise with this, Solo. You know what it can do. Tell me what you heard."
He edged away from the tip of the crimson blade.
"You talked about stuff. Our location in relation to the star destroyers. Skinning me alive. The old man. Luke." He locked eyes with her. "If you hate the Jedi so much, why'd you make out with him?"
She recoiled. That mocking question topped all his other statements.
"Do not remind me. That was so disgust-" She paused. "I have better things to do than listen to you. You're just getting in the way. I'm sorry." She smiled innocently as she drenched herself in the Dark.
A refreshing wave of his terror swept through the Force.
She shifted her hand around her lightsaber.
"Wait!" Solo said quickly.
Exasperated, she made no intention of stopping.
"What are you going to tell the Alliance High Command? What about Chewie?"
"I think I can deal with 'Leia Organa' suddenly dying in a fateful collision with a super nova. And you don't think I can handle one wookie and a fussy droid?" she asked coldly.
"Who'll fly the ship? It takes two people."
"I have the Force."
"The Force can't shoot enemy fighters, sweetheart, or land at Bespin."
She threw the lightsaber past his head and let it impale the wall. He gasped in astonishment and disbelief. Sparks flew across the panel.
"Most unmanly, Han," she half-snarled.
The lights flickered out above them, her lightsaber providing the only source of light.
"I'll get that later," Leia said after a moment. "It, uh, only hit the stuff for this room. Nothing important."
He turned to look at the blade humming an inch from his head, then at her.
She called it back to her, repointing at him.
"You will fly me to Bespin, and then you can go. Tell the High Command that I ended up dead somehow, or captured by Vader." A cynical smirk lit her face.
"Got it?"
Solo stared at the crimson blade, then at her.
"Y-Yeah, sure thing," he mumbled.
"Excellent," she purred. "And... nobody needs to know about this, do they?"
And she deactivated her lightsaber and stalked from her room.