Author's note: This is the very beginning of the relationship between Luke and Boba that appears in chapters two and ten.
Fett had long figured out that the universe had it in for him. Why give him a happy childhood then have it ripped away? Why give him martial skills and then shun him from the culture that valued them? Why give him the face of the one person he desperately wanted to see again, but all reflections ever showed him was disappointment? Always existing on the outskirts and edges. Still, Fett had managed fight his way through life, breaking even some of the time. Standing defiant against whatever got thrown at him.
Now the universe didn't have the decency to let him die with even an ounce of dignity.
He had known he wouldn't survive escaping the Sarlacc, which he mostly was escaping out of spite. Death by explosion, or death by exposure and injuries once he was on the surface. He had wanted the former, but being a realist expected the latter. He'd cursed all the gods he'd never believed in when those miserable little scavengers stripped his face and form from him, not caring if he were still alive or not, exacerbating the injuries of this useless corpse he was trapped in. Leaving him exposed to the merciless heat of the Tatooine's twin suns.
It was a strange feeling, feeling the life slowly bleed out of him. He was more bothered by his anger, the anger that had sustained him since his father died, dissipating; all passion and drive vanishing from him as if they never existed. Even the spite that normally kept his anger sparked was gone.
And it all led to numbness.
So when he saw the damn wannabe Jedi Vader had been chasing hovering over him in concern he just gave up. Their eyes locked for an instance and Fett knew the bastard was ripping through his mind like the sarlacc had. Fett managed a gust of breath and closed his eyes.
After he was released from medical treatment, Luke found that caring for Boba Fett was like caring for a toy soldier droid that had had all but the most basic programming erased. The (former?) bounty hunter could take care of himself, and clearly did, but he met no one's eyes, said nothing, and even though there was abundant evidence he moved about Luke's quarters during the day Luke found him seated on the couch in the same position he had left him in each day. It disturbed Luke that he could literally pose Fett like a doll if he wanted to.
Of course, everyone (except Wedge, but he had seen the state Fett had been in when he helped Luke retrieve him) thought what he was doing was dangerous and that he should let Fett rot in prison. They were probably right. Two things, however, kept Luke from allowing that. First, in his current state, Fett probably wouldn't even last one day in a prison, and second, Luke couldn't forget what he had felt in Fett's mind for the few split seconds he had accidentally been in it. He couldn't explain it, and he was loath to try to reproduce the affect - no one should made to feel like that and Luke couldn't shake that it would be an invasion of Fett's privacy to share it.
It didn't stop him from having long and exasperated conversations with his father's Force Ghost as it had been Anakin who had sent Luke to Tatooine to save the bounty hunter. Anakin has been adamant that Fett be recovered and tended to. His reason chiefly seemed to be that Fett was the way he was because the Jedi dropped the ball and made a bad situation worse and Anakin wouldn't elaborate any further than that because it was Fett's story to tell.
"But what I am supposed to do?" Luke had ultimately argued, "Keeping him here in this state as a living reminder that the Jedi can be fallible seems cruel."
"He's not as far gone as he seems," Anakin shrugged, "it may take a while, but he will get better, it's," he chuckled slightly, "it's the Will of the Force. Which is why I wanted you to recover him, I'd rather he get better here under your care, than elsewhere. You and your sister are going to have enough problems without a rogue bounty hunter holding a grudge against you."
A week or so after that conversation Luke returned to his quarters from a very long day trying to convince a group of senators that he had no intention of restarting the fostering practices of the old Jedi order and that he was still working out exactly how the new Jedi order would function when he found Lando Calrissian arms crossed sitting in a chair across from Fett on the couch and box of very expensive something on the table in front of Fett.
"Lando?" Luke asked hesitantly, "What are you doing?"
Lando looked over at Luke with sad grin. He levered himself out of the chair, did a little stretch and shake, and walked over to Luke.
"Trying make an apology," he admitted, he glanced back over to the unmoving Fett, "to make a long story short, we had a relationship when we were very young, it got screwed up, mostly by me I admit. I thought I didn't care anymore especially after what happened on Bespin, but," he shrugged, "but when you brought him here, it shook me up to see him like that. Regardless of what he's done..." Lando shrugged again.
"What's in the box?" Luke asked as he went to take a look. He got the feeling what Lando was telling him was something not a lot of people knew about.
"Atzerrian lokum. He used to love the stuff," was the amused answer.
Luke was startled to realize he was mildly jealous; he liked Atzerrian lokum as well and the flower that gave it its flavor was becoming increasingly rare in the wild on Atzerri, and hothouse grown just didn't taste as good.
"How long were you sitting there?"
"Two hours. I talked for about a half hour," Lando had to shrug yet again, "he hasn't moved or responded."
Luke glanced from Lando to Fett and back.
Lando nodded wryly, then shook his head with a laugh.
"Anyway, I had better be off; a charity sabacc game, if you can believe it," Lando said cheerfully as he moved towards the door.
"Han told me about that," Luke replied as he accompanied Lando, "he and Chewie are going to be watching..." something flew through the air and hit Lando's squarely between the shoulders. Not hard, just a very light thump, and both men turned.
The top of the box of Atzerrian lokum was lying on the floor at their feet. They turned their attention to Fett and noted that while he apparently had not moved, the rest of the box and its contents were nowhere to be see.
"Well," Lando's grin was genuine, "maybe I did do some good here. Good night Luke," he called further back, "good night Fett."
Once he was gone, Luke picked up the box lid, and wandered back to Fett. He saw that the box had been carefully tucked into shelf by the arm of the sofa. He set the lid down, and went to change out of his Jedi robes.
There were four pieces of lokum carefully placed on the table in front of the chair Luke normally sat in, and the box, recovered, was back on the table.
And Fett still didn't seemed to have moved.
Luke picked up one of the pieces and popped in his mouth and imagined he could hear Leia giving him a heart-felt, but exasperated, lecture on why he shouldn't be eating something Boba Fett was offering. Luke had heard people describe the taste really well made food as life-changing, and at the moment he had to agree. The lokum was delicious, and it left Luke wondering if he could persuade Lando to bring more, for therapeutic purposes. He decided he had better made him dinner before eating the rest.
"You know," he said, since he usually talked aloud, even if Fett didn't respond. It made it seems little less creepy, "on Tatooine, after a certain age, sharing food other than just the staples was seen as flirting on most the settlements. I don't know what it was like the cities though," looked like it was going to be prepackage Correllian stew, again, "anyway that lokum, well, a lot of people would consider sharing that tantamount to proposing," Luke chuckled.
"I spent a lot of time on Tatooine, how do you know I'm not?"
The soft drawling voice was raspy from disuse and the stew would have gone everywhere when Luke dropped it, but he was able to catch just before it hit the floor using the Force. He did not turn to look.
"Proposing with candy someone else gave you is not a serious proposal," Luke said drily.
"You don't want it, I can take it back."
Luke considered it; it had been a long time since he had had something that had tasted so good.
"I'm not that picky; I'll keep it."
When he turned around again, a piece had been placed to replace the one he had eaten. But Fett still wasn't looking at Luke. Luke sat down in his usual chair.
"I know you've probably eaten already, but would you like something? I sometimes feel a little guilty sitting here eating, while you have nothing in front of you," Luke said gesturing with his fork at Fett.
Fett slowly lifted his eyes from the spot on the floor he always seemed to find fascinating to a spot just beyond Luke's shoulder and replied:
"Pointing eating utensils at people is considered rude; it implies you're planning on stealing their food," cloudy brown eyes slowly blinked, "or possibly you're planning on eating them, and then it's considered ruder not to follow through...I never quite got that part."
It took Luke a moment, but he had to set the bowl and fork down on the table. He let his face drop into his hands, and did his best to stifle the urge to laugh. Either Fett genuinely didn't get the joke, or he was playing with Luke. What little he had seen in Fett's mind during their accidental connection made both entirely possible.
When he looked up Fett was looking at him, and for a split second Luke thought he did see a glint in Fett's eyes, and was the corner of Fett's mouth turned up? Luke felt a weird thump inside. He sat up straight and leaned back in his chair and finally really took a look at Boba Fett. He was startled to find he liked what he saw.
Will of the Force my backside, Luke thought, this is stupid and dangerous, but then so was throwing my lightsaber away in front of the emperor.
Still Luke smiled at Fett.
And Fett smiled back.
