ccp: Now, if I tell you, it wouldn't be very fun, would it? xD
Saber Girls: You'll find out about Han in this chapter.

Note: I forgot to say this, but this is my first time - ever - trying out first-person/present-tense. Bear with me, please, I'm trying my best.

Also, considering the grammar mistakes... I frankly have no idea what happened there. After attempting to fix it ( stupid QuickEdit 2.03 ), I've realized thatI've gottah capitalize the parts that they say with inflection - and I hate doing that. Gaahhhh... x.x

Oh, by the way, I won't be saying anything about the story from this point on.

CHAPTER TWO

"This is my fifth year of the Rebellion - " started a young, male voice. "And it is as cold as hell, here. We have arrived at Hoth less than a week ago - right, Wedge? Right."

"Who is that?" I ask, grinning, seeing my mother laugh.

"Wes Janson in the background - and that's Wedge Antilles - " she points at the man on the right. "And - look - its your Uncle." she grins, pointing at the short blonde boy on the left.

"Janson, I doubt that 'cold as hell' is an appropriate term to use here. Personally, I would welcome a drift of hell on this iceball."

"No one cares, Wedge. Now, in case I die, freezing, in my bed tomorrow, I would like to leave this as a contribution, and I shall have all of my numerous friends here with me. See? Luke and Wedge - I'll be joining soon, don't fret - aha! Here comes Dodonna! Come here, General, join us!"

"Over my dead body, Janson."

"Ah, I don't like that guy that much anyways." A pause. "Hey, guys, I think we should scat, he's coming - "

"Who?" asked Luke, turning his head in the holo, a look of mortal terror crossing his face. "Ah, I see, yeah, lets go..."

"YOU STAY RIGHT THERE!" shouted a deep, extremely angry voice.

"Captain Solo!" came Janson's voice, pleasurably. "Nice to see you're well."

"'Well'?" the voice was much nearer now. "You call 'well' comin' back to an empty ship, expectin' a warm meal on this ice block, only to find a gift of ration bars and zero blankets? With all my clothes missing? And THIS?"

"My helmet! Wherever did you find - "

"Don't give me any damned crap, Janson, I want my stuff back."

"We didn't do anything!"

"Like I'd believe that."

"Hey, I have a great idea - "

"If it involves me participatin' in this little holo-fest of yours, I'm out. I wouldn't join you whining, snotty idiots even if I weren't so mad at you for takin' my stuff."

"Han!" came Luke's voice. "This is supposed to be something nice to look back on - "

"Shut up, kid, I don't want any of your goody two-shoe Jedi crap - "

"That wasn't Jedi wisdom, Han."

"Like I care. Give me my stuff." Both pilots in the holo point somewhat to the left, towards Janson.

"JANSON!" roared the man's voice, again.

"Hey, don't get mad at me - get that thing away from me - I did it for the greater good!"

"Yeah?" the sneer was apparent in his tone. "What greater good when it comes to dealing with y'all's supply runner's blankets? I don't have to do this, you know, I can leave whenever I want..."

"Ah, come on, we just gave them to - "

"Solo!" screamed a furious female tone.

"Another famous argument. This has got to be recorded." came the young Luke voice.

I watch, startled, at the newly formed image of a tall man in blue slacks, a long-sleeved white shirt, and a black vest pointing a blaster at Wes Janson, whom I knew the older version of.

"Oh, great..." muttered the taller man, holstering his blaster. "Yes, your Highness? Of what service may your humble servant provide you today?"

"Cut the crap, Solo." said the female, newly appearing into the image, as Wes Janson backed up after taking his helmet from Han, who was turned toward the woman.

I jump and laugh as the woman entered, and as she glared upwards at the Han Solo man. She was small, petite, and she was wearing a white snowsuit and had her long brown hair in a ridiculous fashion of braids. Nonetheless, she was beautiful. But furious. And I know the fury all to well. The man, Han Solo from what I guessed, bore down on her, just as angry. I got a better look at him. He had light brown hair, with a strong build. Even from here, and with the fuzz of the picture, I could tell that he was extremely good-looking.

"WHY is all of your stuff in my room?" asked my mother. "Have you decided to move in?"

"What the hell are you talking about, Worship?"

"I'm saying, you incompetent, arrogant mercenary, that all of your clothes and sheets are dumped at the entrance of my room!"

"Watch who you're callin' incompetent, Highnessness, because I swear that I'll - "

"You'll what, Solo? Throw your giant nerf slipper at me?"

"That's Chewie's!"

"Uh-huh."

"I'm not any more happy with my stuff being dumped in a prissy Princess' room than you are!"

The woman's cheeks went red and her eyes flashed dangerously.

"Well, then get it out!"

"Don't order me around!"

"It's my room, I can do as much ordering as I want!"

"It's my stuff!"

"What do I care?"

"Well, if you want it out, you're gonna have to ask nicely or bring it out yourself!"

"No, I don't! Get it the heck out of my room!"

"What if I don't wanna?"

"What do you mean, 'you don't want to'? You want to be freezing at night? Fine, I would rather have your blankets anyway, as payback, and then I'll store the food in the corner and take your shirts and rip them up and burn them for fire - " Han, then, pushed his hand against the Princess' mouth, looking back at the now disappeared Janson as the woman glared at him nastily.

"What the hell did you put my stuff in her room for?"

"She seemed cold!" came the voice.

"I seemed cold!"

"You won't even give up your stuff for Leia?"

"Why the hell would I do that? Ice Princess is doing perfectly fine in her natural habitat - OW!" his hand jerked away from the woman's mouth, as he glared at her. "What the hell was that for?"

"'WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT FOR?'?"

"Whoa, you cussed, that's a fir - " He was silenced by a good, hard slap, and the woman stormed out of the image.

You are going to get my crap back into the Falcon." he said, pointing at where Janson supposedly was, before storming off as well. "I'm not finished with you, yet, Worship!"

"Go to hell!"

"Gladly, it's a lot warmer than where I'm at now..."

The holovid shifted again, and in came the view of Luke and Wedge, sitting on the ground while observing the scene, with Janson rushing in with his newly re-acquired helmet.

"And you - the viewer, whoever that may be - have just witnessed one of the infamous arguments between the Princess Leia Organa and Captain Han Solo."

"I must say, Janson, this was one of their better ones." said Wedge. "I think this falls into the top five."

"I dunno, Wedge, you didn't hear them on the Falcon on the way here... Chewie and I had to hide in Han's quarters under fear of losing our hearing."

"Whatever, it was great. Well, that was a day of our typical Rebellion." said Janson. "And remember - we're fighters for justice, and, above all, peace." All three of them grinned, and Luke got up, and the last image was the hand of Luke Skywalker reaching over the holovid.

Mom and I are silent for a while, staring at the chip. I glance over at her. What shocked me was that she had silent tears streaming down her face. I hadn't noticed, being too concentrated on the holo.

"...Mom...?" I say, tentatively. My mother looks over at me, pools of tears swimming in her deep brown eyes. I have seen her cry before - but I could sense that, as of now, she is in grief.

"Its okay, babe, it's just - " she pauses, glancing over at the chip. "Memories, is all..." she mutters.

I venture out a question. "Who was that man? Han Solo?" I search my memory. "I never met him before... I've heard of him, his name appears in the holo-books sometimes. But he was a part of the Rebellion. How have I not met him?"

"He was a smuggler that joined the Rebellion." my mother says shortly. "He died, while I was pregnant with you."

"Is that all?"

"Drop it, I don't want to talk about it anymore."

"Why?"

"Because. I'm busy."

Now, I'm quite sure that she had made that excuse up on the spot, but I'm not about to push her buttons for fear that she might explode like she did in that holovid. I felt slightly hurt, thinking that my mother couldn't talk to me, and I shut the door on the way out as another tear ran down her face.

So I decided to head over to Luke's, confident that he would satisfy my curiosity. I was curious because I have never seen my mother get so upset over a stupid holovid. There has to be some background to that story, and her reluctance to tell me about this Solo.

My speeder bike burst from its tropical clutches and into a clearing, where two children played with fake lightsabers made out of metal and I could see Mara, watching them and correcting them. She doesn't even look around at the roar of my speeder bike, she just waves as I hopped off and took off my helmet.

"Hey Aunt Mara." I grin, jogging up the steps, and leaning over and kissed her cheek.

"Hey Syrmé, where're you off to?"

"Uncle Luke. I got a few questions for him."

"Isn't this your day off?"

"It has nothing to do with school."

"Oh. Well, he's in the kitchen. Or his study. I dunno, somewhere in the house."

I grin. "Thanks for the help." I said, letting the door slide open as I walk in.

"Uncle Luke!" I cal.

"Yeah?" comes his voice.

"Where you at?"

"Kitchen!" he calls back. Aha. So Aunt Mara was correct. I walk in, where he is eating some sort of fruit that I really don't care to have the name for, and I sir down on a chair. "What is it?"

"I have a question. Mom refuses to answer."

Luke looks at me thoughtfully, turning. Suddenly he seems slightly guarded, and sits down across from me.

"Yes?"

"Who was Captain Han Solo?"

Luke physically jumps at this question, and there's no doubt that he's guarded this time. Now I'm curious. Him and Mom both?

"Why?" he asks, quickly. I stare for a second before answering.

"Because... I want to know...? I know you guys were friends - or, I think you were - but him and mom hated each other, from what I infer - " I stop at the look on his face. This is getting too weird.

"From what you infer? What are you inferring from? How do you know about him?" I frown, and I know I have an affronted look on my face.

"Jeez, I just wanna know. I found a holovid chip in my X-wing and it had vid with you, Wes, Wedge, mom, and this guy in it on Hoth."

Luke relaxed, leaning back.

"What's the big deal? It was just a question... I mean, Mom just told me to drop it after we finished it - "

"Do you have it with you?"

"No. It's in Mom's office. Why?"

"Just wondering."

I look at him strangely. "Anyhow, it seemed to upset her. I noticed afterwards that she must have been crying during the whole thing."

Luke peers down at his hands, also looking sad - but not surprised at all.

"Luke. What's going on? I mean, I already knew about him, he's in the holobooks, but I don't know him. Mom told me he died when she was pregnant with me."

"That's... true."

"...And...? Can I know any more about this guy? Was he your friend?"

Luke smiles softly at me, and I knew right there that I would get what I wanted to hear.

"Well..." he sighed. "Han Solo was a smuggler." I knew that. "He flew Obi-Wan Kenobi and I from Tatooine... he helped rescued your mother from the first Death Star." he smiles weakly. "He brought us - Leia, the two droids, and I (as you know, Ben died on the Death Star) - here. To Yavin, where the base was at the time. As all the fighters and I were getting ready to fight the Death Star, Han was getting ready to leave. I was upset - I had gotten to know the smuggler very well on the voyage. Even Leia was upset, I knew, even though Han and her were at each other's throats constantly. He was a good pilot, and he seemed like he was turning his back on us to pay off some old debts for the Hutts. Han left with his copilot, Chewbacca the Wookie, with a large sum of credits, back to Tatooine. I and the other pilots took off into space, and started to engage in battle around the Death Star. Many of us were killed, there were only a few left. I was flying down the trench, and I had flipped off my targeting computer, letting the Force guide me until I got to the exhaust port. Wedge was unable to help with the three TIEs - including my father, Darth Vader - on my back, because his X-wing was damaged. I was alone, but I was close to my destination. But, then again, I also knew I was seconds away from being blown into oblivion." He pauses to smile at the memory.

"But Solo came back?"

"Yes. At the right time, as I was about to be shot at, I heard a large crash behind me, and I knew one TIEs had lost control; another was shot, and Darth Vader's spun away. I suddenly heard a loud whoop - accompanied by some roars - over the comm. And I'll never forget these words: 'You're all clear, kid, now lets blow this thing and go home.' Han had come back out of hyperspace, shooting one TIE, the other stopped paying attention, knocked into Vader, and crashed as Vader spun off into space. I shot the torpedoes - and there we go. The victory at Yavin. Without Han, none of us would be alive now. Most of the credit is give largely to me - but I owe it to him. Everyone does." he said, quietly, more to himself. I pause a moment, digesting this all in.

"How did he die?"

Luke shakes his head. "...I don't know. No one does. He left on his ship - the Millennium Falcon - one day and... just didn't return. We tried. For three years we tried to contact him. But the communication signal was dead. Han... well, he was reckless. At one point during the Rebellion, he flew your mother into an asteroid field trying to escape the Imperials. My only guess was that... he crashed, or was hit by an asteroid, or boarded by pirates. The galaxy is a huge place - we have no idea where he may be, it could take decades to find a trace of his ship. Leia and I were devastated." Another pause. "Your mother and Han became extremely good friends, even though they still argued all the time."

"Really? When did this happen? Because the argument I saw while they were on Hoth was brutal."

Luke grins at me then. "Nah, they liked each other then, too. Both were just too stubborn and pig-headed to show it."

"You're kidding."

"I'm completely serious. Besides, Han was always threatening to leave, and was always teasing Leia with names such as 'Your Worship' and 'Your Highness'. Sometimes he would combine them or add strange suffixes." Luke said softly, looking down at the table - not intentionally - with a small smile on his face as he reminisced at these thoughts. I would bet anything that he could probably meditate at this, seeing at how calm and relaxed he was. "Then your mother would shoot at him 'mercenary', 'flyboy', and a favorite was 'scoundrel', which occurred a bit later. I also seem to remember 'stuck-up half-witted scruffy-looking nerfherder'..."

I laugh, knowing my mom's strange homemade nicknames all too well.

"Never heard that one before."

"Of course you haven't, she doesn't say any of them anymore."

I frown, thinking back to my mother and... her grief after Solo had arrived in the hologram.

"He was a good friend, wasn't he?"

"One of the greatest. Once you got him to like you, which I admit took a while, especially with that crazy Wookie roaring at you if you pissed either of them off."

I think back to the holo. The name clicks. "Chewie?" I inquire.

"Yeah. Chewie was great, though. Just like Han, you had a friend for life once you got to know him."

I am silent for a moment. "I'm sorry he died, Uncle Luke. I would have liked to have met him."

Luke frowns, and I could feel a wave of sadness through the Force.

"I'm sure you would have. I'm sorry he died, too." Luke looks back up at me. "Promise me you won't mention this conversation to your mother?"

Would even I be that stupid?

"I swear it."

"Knew I could count on you. Now get your rear out of here, I'm going to meditate."

"After you stuff your face?" I grin, dodging the half-eaten fruit thrown at me and twisting out of the door. I jog outside, waving at Aunt Mara who was still critiquing her toddlers' fighting, and hop onto my speeder bike.

On the ride home, I start thinking about the conversation Luke and I just had. I thought of that figure I had seen at a distance in the hologram, finding it had to imagine that him and my mother got along. I could imagine him and Luke - when they had talked for that brief second, they seemed playful, but my mother had actually slapped him. It was probably a stressful day for her.

Then another thought strikes my head: if he was such a great friend, why did my family never mention him before? Not even Aunt Mara, who must have known him for at least a little bit before he died. My mother had known a lot of people who are currently dead - including her whole planet - but she can talk about the late Alderaan and yet she never mentioned Han Solo before. This baffles me. I thought talking about those who are deceased was supposed to ease their passing. Perhaps they had been friends, and he did make a contribution from what Luke told me. Did he leave in anger? That may have made my mother a bit distraught, but I wouldn't have thought to this extent. And if they spent three years, as Luke had said, searching for him, wouldn't have I remembered that? Or is my memory that bad? Still mystified by all of this, I pull into my yard and worked the rest of the day on my new (old) X-wing.

I'm satisfied with my progress tonight. I had managed to at least make it look a bit better, and now it gave signs of attempting to start up before the engine sputtered and died - it was an improvement because it used to just sit there. I am covered in grease and my own sweat - gross, I know - but I couldn't resist going into the kitchen and grabbing some water and plain bread - it sounds bland, but for some reason I love plain bread. I sat munching, leaning casually against the counter, staring around the silent and bleak kitchen. I sighed as soon as I finish with my snack, wiping my dirty hands on my old dark pants that I put on while doing rough work, and head straight for the 'fresher where I look forward to a long, hot water shower.

I stop as I hear my father's voice uttering a strange phrase from his study, where there is a door slightly ajar.

"I love you too..." I stare. Was my mother in there? I approach the crack in the door, peering in, interested.

I am shocked and horrified to learn that my mother isn't in there. A quick Force check tells me she isn't even in the house. My eyes went wide, and I push the door open an inch or two to allow better view of the room.

My dad's back is turned toward me, and he is looking on the table where his holocomm is, and my heart dropped to my stomach as I saw a woman. No, the woman is not my mother. Yes, she is blonde and young and beautiful. Probably around thirty, which makes me feel sick. I back out of the room as gracefully and quietly as I can, backing into the 'fresher and letting the door hiss close, as I pound it with my fist. I receive no relief from my anger and hurt, just an extremely sharp pain on my right hand.

"Gods damn - " I start sharply, shaking my hand in an unsuccessful attempt to numb the pain.

I strip down, turning on the water shower and almost tripping as I step in.

Hopefully I would drown.