I had a dream, which was not all a dream.
The bright sun was extinguish'd, and the stars
Did wander darkling in the eternal space,
Rayless, and pathless, and the icy earth
Swung blind and blackening in the moonless air;
Lord Byron
She dreamt of darkness.
It was not a weighty darkness in which she dwelled, not one that enveloped and suffocated everything within it. Rather, it was the absence of light, or the near-absence; pinprick flashes appeared from time to time at some distance as if the dark was moving around her, through her. In her dream she was nervous but not afraid. Something was wrong, but it was a challenge, a problem to be solved rather than an existential threat.
Besides, the rational part of her dream-self lectured, of course it's dark. It's night, you're asleep, you're dreaming. And yet she was certain that this was not the natural blackness of sleep. It was unanticipated, unforeseen: a discrete occurrence resulting from a specific cause.
She opened her eyes.
Now she inhabited a different kind of darkness. One that was not entirely familiar — not her cramped quarters on Hoth, not the comforting nest of the captain's cabin on the Falcon — but somewhere else. Yet also not threatening, not terrorizing. And most significantly, this darkness was accompanied by the warmth of the body next to her in bed.
She turned her head and watched Han sleep, the blanket pulled just under his chin, his slow breaths barely audible. Turning carefully onto her side in order not to wake him, she shifted a little closer. It wasn't typical that they had so much space between them when they slept and judging by the sprawl of his limbs toward three of the four corners of the mattress, he was taking full advantage of it. His long legs were criss-crossed over each other while an arm flung askew above the pillows. She could feel the heat of his loose fist next to her head.
Despite her best efforts to contain her movements, Han stirred and opened an eye. He frequently awoke soon after she did, as if something triggered deep within him when her sleep was interrupted.
Blinking in the darkness, he studied her groggily. "Nightmare?" he mumbled. A hand wandered under the covers until it found her hip and nudged a gentle encouragement.
Rotating onto her other side, Leia drew the blanket around her as his arm draped over her waist and pulled her firmly against his chest.
"No," she whispered. No, it had not been a nightmare. She wasn't sure what her dream was — it felt like a memory long forgotten — but it was not a nightmare.
"Mmm." His exhalations fluttered her loose hairs and tickled her cheek. "Different bed, then."
"Maybe," she murmured.
He brushed the top of her head with his nose in sleepy agreement and then it was quiet, both of them relaxing further into the mattress. Sleep was precious, something to be hoarded greedily in the absence of chaos or disaster requiring their attention.
The night was their second on board the Prevail, one of the oldest vessels in the Alliance fleet of light cruisers. In service since the days of the Clone Wars, it was largely empty in its current state as the demands of wartime operations had drawn many of its officers to more critical assignments. Consequently, the Prevail, overseen by a mere skeleton crew, was used mostly for escorting larger vessels or undertaking diplomatic missions as it was doing now.
Leia had snagged a few days away from Hoth to check in on the week-long intelligence conference between the Alliance's cryptography team and the Caldiran intelligence specialists. Agreed upon nearly two months ago, the conference had been slow in materializing: wartime urgency certainly contributed to the delay, but the bureaucratic arms of the Alliance were still creaky when it came to vetting potential new members, and Leia had been required to step in to clear away obstacles to even get to this point.
Whether or not her effort was worth it was a frequent debate she had with herself. Han, of course, had summarized it succinctly from the beginning: "This arrangement with Caldira's not the end-all and be-all of intergalactic relations, Sweetheart, but you said yourself that the Alliance is falling on its face trying to decrypt Imperial communications. So it seems worth it to see if this goes anywhere." While disputing Han's precise description of their current intelligence challenges, she had to admit that his reasoning helped her focus on getting the meeting off the ground instead of wasting time second-guessing herself. At least the peace negotiations between the two Caldiran factions, the Kyrols and the Veroni, were underway with a separate Alliance team requiring no involvement from her.
Back on Hoth, she had arranged the Falcon as her transport and no one had suggested otherwise. On the record, the reasoning was that the Prevail would be within a day trip of one or two space hubs allowing Han to stock up supplies for Echo Base. But she had suspected for a while that any subterfuge on her part to hide their relationship was unnecessary; although she and Han were careful not to publicly flaunt their new status, neither had they made much effort to conceal it. Even half-hearted observers would have noticed that she spent more and more time on the Falcon these days and she was frankly too busy to pretend otherwise.
The next morning they separated in the corridor outside Leia's quarters, Han heading to the Falcon and Leia to the briefing room. When they had arrived, she had declared it unprofessional for her to sleep on his ship during the visit and insisted that he join her in her room. Instead of the protest she expected, Han had only smirked in return. "I think you're just using it as an excuse to fulfill a long-held fantasy of me sneaking into your cabin at night." She had refused to dignify his supposition with a response.
"Prepare for the jump. Prepare for the jump." The thrice-daily auto-announcement blared through the ship and Leia paused on her way to the briefing room to grasp a safety rope dangling from the ceiling. Per Alliance protocols, all vessels not actively in transit had to change locations regularly as well as encrypt location data networked to individual comms. As befitting her rank, Leia knew the exact coordinates of each planned jump in advance and of course Han could consult the Falcon's nav-computer when undocked. But as a security measure against Imperial scouts most of the Prevail's crew and guests would be ignorant of their exact position at any given time.
Once the Prevail was in hyperspace, Leia made her way through the near-empty corridors to the briefing room on the upper deck. Print-outs with lengthy lines of code, oversized diagrams of process flows, and platters strewn with stale pastries were scattered across the tables along with multiple terminals lined up along the walls. The full-group meeting to kick off the day's work had already concluded and smaller groups focusing on various challenges were huddled around the room.
She grabbed a muffin and an insta-kaffe and sat down next to two Alliance intelligence analysts, Avery and Rami, who were hunched around a terminal with Dalek, one of the Caldiran cryptographers.
"You can see that the branching logic starts here," Dalek was explaining. "At this point, the code will generate a series of reinforcing feedback loops that will run through each of the subroutines identified as relevant for this particular type of communication."
Avery sat back in her chair. Slim and long-legged with close cropped hair, she was one of the Alliance's most experienced code-breakers and the group's informal leader.
"We've tried something like that," she told Dalek. "Several times in fact, with different types of transmissions. But we're rarely able to make it past the first series of decryption points." She grimaced. "And then the sequence just changes once you've failed."
"Yes, but did you include the inflection algorithm in your logic at these specific places?" Dalek pointed to several spots on the screen that looked like gibberish to Leia.
"Maybe?" Avery squinted at the sequence of lines and then turned to Rami. "Did we construct our algorithms like that?"
"Uh…" Rami rested his chin on his hand. "In our routines, we used the Borodin series as the base algorithm. We've had luck with that in the past, just not recently."
Dalek shook his head. "We believe the Empire has very few codes that are still vulnerable to the Borodin series. As you know, they completely rewrite their sequences once a year, sometimes even more frequently."
"We're aware," Avery remarked drily.
Dalek smiled sympathetically. "Let's go through this subroutine and then things will make more sense."
There was clearly no concrete assistance that Leia could offer, so she stood and thanked them for their efforts and moved on to the next group. Her experiences as a senator and wartime leader had made her aware of her own strengths and weaknesses, and she had long ago let go of any insecurity for not having mastered the intricacies of Imperial cryptographic techniques. Thankfully the team was in good hands with Avery.
As Leia migrated from group to group absorbing enough details to form a coherent narrative for her report back to High Command, she mulled over the unlikeliness of an elite anti-Imperial code-breaking operation arising on a isolated planet like Caldira. On the previous day Zivek, the team's leader, had given her a history of how their operation arose from the work of a few talented Caldiran mathematicians whose theories were tested when the planet splintered into civil war. Decoding Imperial communications was a more recent development undertaken almost entirely for defensive purposes, but nevertheless presented a significant opportunity to assist the Alliance.
In contrast to the frustratingly elusive interactions she had experienced during her trip to Caldira, their team's manner on this visit was serious and efficient and certainly less ostentatious than the overtly martial bearing of their on-planet representatives. ("That's because these guys are the nerdy military types," Han had informed her helpfully.) Her initial distrust was waning and she found herself increasingly hopeful that Caldira would become a full-fledged member of the Alliance in due time.
She stopped by the Falcon at the lunch hour to find Han picking through the contents of a crate from his previous day's run to Seris.
"Hey." Han raised his head as she entered and then turned back to the crate before thinking better of it. He stood and walked over to her, spanning the back of her head with his hand as he gave her a lingering kiss.
Leia brushed the stubble on his cheek as they parted. Having informed him that occasional scruffiness met with her approval, Han had stopped shaving when they stayed anywhere other than the Falcon.
"Busy morning?" She eyed the half-opened crates scattered around the hold.
"Not really. Just organizing stuff from yesterday's run." Han knelt beside a different box and pulled out a pack of scented lotion canisters, eyeing them warily.
Chewbacca wandered in carrying a platter of steaming nerf meat. He nodded at Leia and shot her a questioning growl as he sat down.
"Sure, thanks, Chewie." Grabbing a utensil from the galley, she slid in the booth next to the Wookie and forked a slice.
"Oh." Han stood again. "Luke comm'd. He asked if everything was going okay."
Leia frowned. "He didn't reach out to me."
Han shrugged. "I dunno. I told him everything was fine so far." He shifted on his feet and studied her. "Everything's fine, right?"
She blinked. "Yes. The conference is going surprisingly well, in fact." Han abandoned his sorting and came over to the table as she filled him in on the morning session. "The team thinks that we'll be able to cover everything we set out to before the Caldirans leave. And we had an ambitious agenda," she added.
Han grunted. "That's good." He snagged her fork and speared his own nerf strip. "Chewie an' I are going to hunt around for some extra ionic converters later today. They may come in handy for our next trade and I figure an old cruiser like this probably has a bunch lying around."
She rose from the booth. "Speaking of trades, do you have anything tasty stashed away that I can bring to the teams?"
"You mean something that's not stored in ice bricks and warmed up by a droid?" Han pawed through one of the crates. "Here, how about some hathaberry cordials? Just don't tell anyone where they came from. I was gonna save the rest for you."
Leia bent down and kissed the top of his head. "Sure you were, hotshot."
Leia spent the afternoon in her quarters running interference on unresolved issues from Echo Base interspersed with trips to the conference room to check on the proceedings. As the Caldiran delegation was scheduled to depart the following day, the closing dinner was being held that night. She made an entrance at the appointed time to find the teams, fatigued with mental effort, drinking their ales enthusiastically as droids wheeled around trays of concoctions that were surely only rough approximations of Caldiran specialties.
Sitting at one end of the table, Leia spent most of the dinner chatting with Erran and Jena, two of the Kyrol's unlikeliest soldiers. There was plenty to discuss what with the ongoing peace negotiation between the Kryols and Veroni and other galactic events, most of which they were only vaguely aware. Leia filled them in on non-sensitive Alliance entanglements that were old news on most other planets and answered their resulting inquiries. But she was most interested in how these two women managed to occupy positions worthy of respect in their patriarchal culture.
"How did you get involved in military intelligence?" Leia asked Jena as a second platter of desserts were passed around. Erran had withdrawn from the conversation and was conferring in hushed tones with Zivek across the table. Leia caught snatches of their exchange that seemed to center on the timing of their departure the next day.
"My father was a high-ranking officer in the army," Jena replied. She wore a layer of reserve that Leia understood well. "I was an only child and he trained me in the military arts. He was my first teacher and my fiercest supporter."
"Did he worry that you were surrounded by others who may not be as supportive as he was?"
"Yes and no. He never underestimated the challenges I faced on our planet but he had faith that I would overcome them."
"He sounds much like my own father," Leia murmured. "Is he still active in the military?"
Jena shook her head. "He died in one of the last formal engagements with the Veroni." A shadow passed over her face. "His memory is always with me when I am out in the field."
Leia wondered how far the similarities between them extended. "Did your father have any involvement in galactic politics?"
Jena narrowed her eyes. "No. The Empire was rarely a factor in my upbringing. I don't recall him ever mentioning it."
That would have been difficult to believe if Leia had not visited the planet herself and witnessed the lengths the regime went to to keep their citizens sheltered. And yet it still seemed somewhat unlikely that high-ranking military officers on any planet would not have contact with other races.
After the last of half-drunken toasts had wrapped up, the dinner formally disbanded and Leia gathered her things to leave.
"Princess." Erran approached and inclined her head gracefully. "I very much enjoyed getting to know you. If we don't see you tomorrow, I wish you safe travels back to your base."
"The same to you." Smiling, Leia pressed her hand and started to leave.
"Are you also leaving tomorrow?" Erran inquired.
Leia turned back. "Likely the following day. I still have things to attend to here."
Erran nodded. "Goodbye, Princess."
Back in her quarters, Leia uncoiled her braid from the back of her head and fingered the strands apart absentmindedly. Thoughts of her father had been floating in her mind since her conversation with Jena. She remembered the pride he took in her when she was starting out on her studies, a princess already impatient with royal protocols and procedures and eager for more substantive lessons, lessons she would nevertheless abandon to listen to his stories from the old days of the Clone Wars. She loved his descriptions of the interplay between combat and diplomacy, two sides of the same coin and inextricably linked to each other. Only later, embroiled in a war of her own, did she realize how much he had sanitized that history for the sake of his child.
She was still lost in thought when the door slid open behind her and Han entered the room. Their eyes met in the reflection of the mirror and his usual pace slowed at the sight of her relaxed posture and undone hair.
"Good dinner?" He sauntered over, his eyes still on hers.
"It was fine. Your cordials were a hit. Although everyone was pretty drunk by that time."
"Hmmm." He eased closer, his clothes brushing against her own. "Are you drunk?"
The challenge in his gaze was familiar enough. She held his eyes without responding and started to twist her hair at the base of her neck.
"Leave it down." Han reached up and took her hands from her head. His breath warmed her cheek as his fingers lightly traced up to her shoulders and then back down. One arm covered hers and wrapped around her waist while the other caressed her jaw, angling her head up to his.
It was only recently that she was able to let her body be directed by someone else. After all, it had never been in her nature to sit back and follow another person's lead. At the palace as a young princess, her dance instructor would wince as she led her partner, often a shy boy of aristocratic standing, through the prearranged steps with confidence and precision. Leading came so naturally to her that for the longest time she was unaware there was a term for it; only later did she grasp that her inclination was not shared by others to the same extent.
With Han, however, she was learning that she didn't always have to be the one to set a course and ensure the destination was reached. While never doubting that she was an equal partner with him in bed, she was aware of his clear preferences regarding their sexual interactions, though never to the extent that her own mood or desires wasn't incorporated. During their first few times he had let her take charge, and in the early days they had each carefully gauged the other, discovering how they moved together and what was mutually pleasing. Since then, he had been bolder, letting her know with his actions and words that she could relax her control.
Keeping her pressed against him, Han guided them to the edge of the bed. Sweeping her hair aside, he kissed across her neck until he was nipping along her shoulders. She sighed as he drew down the zipper of her dress, the fabric fluttering to the floor, while his hands roamed possessively across her back and stomach and hips.
She arched her back instinctively as he unhooked her bra and reached around to cup her breasts. Needing the intimacy of his kiss again, she threaded her arm around his neck to pull him down to her while his thumbs lavished attention on her taut nipples. His arousal became more obvious against her lower back as he slid one hand down her stomach and fingered the tender skin under the edge of her underwear.
"Han," she whispered into his neck. He nudged her forward again and she climbed onto the bed, crawling on one knee and then the other. After a final suck of her earlobe he pulled his shirt off and draped himself over her, the warmth of his bare skin encouraging her to mold her body to his. They stayed like that for a moment, their clothed hips moving in an easy rhythm, until Leia tossed her head back. Taking the hint, he proceeded to slide her underwear down her thighs, lifting her knees off the mattress one at a time until she was fully bare.
The quickening flame throughout her body must have distracted her; more swiftly than she expected, Han was naked and entering her with a stifled groan, encountering no resistance as he started his strokes. Soon his hips were snapping into hers, the sharpness contrasting with his lazy caresses up and down her sides, his fingers fluttering against her ribs and stomach, driving her latent arousal even higher.
When she felt his palm on her shoulder blades, she melted further into the mattress and wound her arms around her head. The rhythm of his thrusts caused her nipples to drag against the blanket and her feet curled involuntarily against the soft hair of his legs. Her muffled noises turned into more distinct gasps and pleas as long fingers found her center and circled on her nerves. The pressure climbed unrelentingly and she heard herself chanting more, more, more, until her orgasm finally crested. Waves of pleasure rippled through her over and over, refusing to abate even after what seemed an unnaturally long time.
After she came down from her high she was again aware of Han, his hips now stilled behind her, his breaths pulsing shallowly. His fingers remained motionless between her legs until he gave an experimental tap on her clit. Too sensitive to withstand any further stimulation, she managed to swat his hand away before sinking fully onto the mattress. Han nosed along her spine as he settled on top of her, one hand clumsily brushing her hair back while holding her tightly to his chest.
"Damn, Sweetheart," he whispered against her head. Any intelligible response was out of reach, so she only pushed her hips back in further invitation. Raising himself up for more purchase, he started his thrusts again, the motions faster, tighter, deeper inside her, until he surged a final time and collapsed on top of her with a muffled groan.
They lay sated on the bed, legs twined around the bed sheets and each other, as Han stroked her back lazily. She fitted her head under his chin and breathed into his neck, a position that even during other, less naked times, reminded her of their post-coital state. It was easy to be with Han this way: easy to be affectionate, easy to make love, easy for them both to succumb to newfound heights of pleasure. As they were discovering, it was the non-physical aspects to their relationship that created some stumbles.
Back on Hoth, conflagrations arose between them, enflamed by clashing moods or misinterpreted exchanges. Part of her trepidation at becoming lovers with Han was for this very reason: she knew that neither of them were easy people, and minor tiffs common in other relationships carried in theirs the risk for outsized detonations.
But at other times — most other times, she was relieved to discover — every interaction felt exactly right; although they were different from each other in myriad ways, they nevertheless fit together snugly as if they were made only for each other and incompatible with anyone else.
After a final nuzzle, Han rolled away and ambled over to the floor-to-ceiling viewport next to the bed. Leia watched him stare silently out the glass as if the streaks of stars held the answers to age-old questions. As someone who was truly home only at greater-than-lightspeed velocities, the idea of Han settling on firm ground was difficult for her to imagine.
Sensing her gaze, he turned around. "You look like you're thinking about something important."
She shook her head. "Not this time."
He crawled across the bed until he hovered over her on his hands and knees, unthreatening in his flaccid state and yet somehow still sexy. "You sure you don't want to tell me?"
"You missed your opportunity. If you wanted to get it out of me, you should have asked a few minutes ago."
He grinned. "I knew that was your favorite position."
She was beginning to think so too but decided to keep that to herself for now. "If you must know, I was thinking about taking a shower." Twisting away from him, she scooted to the foot of the bed and made to retrieve her dress from the floor.
"Want some company?" Eluded by his prey, Han flopped onto his side and propped himself up on an elbow.
She smiled. "Give me a few minutes first."
"Yeah, yeah." They both knew he wouldn't wait long to invade the stall, usually before she had completed her cleansing routine or whatever the hell it is you do that takes so long, as he had once complained.
In the 'fresher, she turned on the shower and piled the used towels in the corner. Hopefully the housekeeping droid would stop by in the morning. "Are you still going to Ren Altari tomorrow?" she called as she ran a brush through her hair.
"Yeah. Leavin' early with Chewie." Han suddenly appeared next to her at the vanity. He bent to kiss the top of her head and then stepped through the barrier into a cloud of steam.
"What are you —?" She waved her hands in disbelief as he ducked under the spout, seemingly oblivious of her dry state. "I haven't even started!"
"I gave you minutes, woman, minutes. Not my fault you were bein' pokey."
She gave him a friendly smack as she joined him under the water, her momentary annoyance fading as they tussled over the soap. Galactic events would continue to upend their lives, but Han's automatic instinct to treat her like real person, flaws and all, would thankfully never change.
Leia spent most of the following day in holo-meetings with personnel on Echo Base, leaving the conference to finish up without her. Avery comm'd her updates on the morning session before the formally breaking up after lunch. The Alliance team would see the Caldirans off later that afternoon before departing themselves.
She lost track of time and had to grab a late meal by herself in the empty mess room. The Prevail was even more eerily quiet without the activity of the intelligence teams, and Leia was tempted to stop by the bridge and check in with the ship's captain. Instead, she wandered around the ship to stretch her legs before forcing herself back in her room for another stretch of holo-meetings.
Hours passed without interruption until Han comm'd her that he'd be back earlier than expected from Ren Altari and was preparing for the jump to the Prevail's current location. Having fed him the day's sequence of coordinates, Leia double-checked the timing of the cruiser's planned jumps before sending back confirmation that they would still be here.
He comm'd again once the Falcon had docked: "Thought the Caldirans were supposed to be gone by now? We almost hit their ship when we arrived."
She checked her chrono. Almost 1700 hours. Without responding, she darted out of her quarters and headed down the hall. If something had happened to keep the Caldirans from leaving, she would find out what it was.
She was only halfway to the lift, mentally enumerating reasons for potential delays, when the corridor went pitch-black. A silence descended as the ever-present electrical hum, normally unnoticeable background noise, ceased entirely. Power interruptions weren't completely unusual, so she stood in place and let her eyes adjust to the darkness until the lights came back on. But after one long minute, and then another, and then a third, it was becoming increasingly obvious that this wasn't a mere interruption.
Leia jumped when a crackling noise broke the stillness and an auto-announcement blared out: "We are experiencing a temporary power outage. Please remain in your current location until it is resolved." The message repeated, echoing through the empty space, before cutting out abruptly.
There was no sense in her remaining alone in an empty corridor. Although the ship's crew were undoubtedly working to fix the problem, Leia was determined to discover the extent of the issue herself. Running through the list of standard systems in her head, she ventured slowly down the corridor. Feeling along the wall, she inched her way until she felt a puff of air escape a vent. Good. Environmental systems were still online.
Next she tried her comm, tapping both Han and Avery. Counting to thirty as slowly as she could, she waited impatiently for an answering ping. Nothing.
A sudden lurch broke her thoughts as the Prevail's engines shuddered. Well, there may not be any lights or comm network, but at least they weren't floating dead in open space. Leia combed through her recollections from the history of the Alliance fleet trying to recall any other occasion when this specific combination of systems were affected.
Nothing came to mind, so she treaded slowly to the lift. Even the emergency lights along the deckplates were off, so she stepped carefully, her fingers trailing along the wall, to avoid any obstacles. She was used to the Falcon with parts and debris strewn throughout, threatening to upend an unsuspecting visitor.
Of course. Why had she not thought of the Falcon first? It had its own power source and comm network as well as potentially useful equipment for diagnosing whatever was wrong with the Prevail. And absent all of that, it should at least have a couple of flashlights.
She had finally reached the lift and, as expected, found that it remained frozen when she pressed the call button. She would have to find another way to the docking bay. All ships built to standard specifications were equipped with emergency escape routes between levels; it was just a matter of finding the right hatch.
Treading up and down the corridor, she stopped every few seconds and crouched low, searching for a familiar metal ring on a hatch. Back in the direction she came, on the opposite side of the hall, she finally identified it. Stiff and rusted with lack of use, the latch refused to budge when she wrenched it. Cursing with frustration, she pulled and pushed stubbornly to no avail. Just when her anger was starting to boil over, she gave another jerk and the latch protested creakily as it finally gave way. She turned it fully to open the door, the resulting thud as it hit the wall echoing in the empty corridor.
Perched on the metal stairs that weren't much more than a ladder, she listened for any signs of crew members. None were apparent, though at one point on her climb down, she thought she heard a muffled slam of a hatch door far above her. Counting the floors as she went and keeping a firm hold of the railings in the dark, she scurried all the way to the base of the ship and then went back up two flights to what she hoped would be the docking bay.
A similar war of words was waged on another equally stubborn latch and when it finally gave way, she nearly yelped in relief. Emerging from the door, she closed it gently behind her. The absence of other people and lack of apparent activity was starting to unnerve her. Perhaps the crew had isolated the problem and were working in the electrical bays; that was her hope, at least.
The air shifted as she moved along the wall and then she turned a corner and saw with relief the murky outline of the docking bay. Even better, the lights in the Falcon were illuminated and the ramp was down. Winding through the small space — Han had already treated her to several cracks about the tight entrance required for his ship to dock — she noted the Caldiran vessel perched silently with no sign of occupation.
A Wookie rumble greeted her as she trotted up the ramp toward the lanky column of fur. "Chewie!" She gave him an impulsive hug and her uneasiness subsided a bit. "Is everything okay here?"
He nodded and commenced an extended monologue, waving his arms to illustrate the chain of events since his and Han's arrival. Leia's Shryiiwook was still a bit shaky, but she managed to catch the key parts, including that Han had been off the Falcon at the time of the outage and hadn't yet returned.
"All right." She moved quickly through the hold. "First I need to get a message to the fleet. Is the comm online?"
Chewie nodded and followed her into the cockpit. Leia relayed a short message to Echo Base explaining their situation and emphasizing that they were in no immediate danger, but the outage had not yet been fixed and if a few engineering personnel could be spared, they would be most appreciated. Keying in the Prevail's current coordinates, she signed off with an agreement to get back in touch in another hour.
She was rummaging around the Falcon's many storage nooks for some flashlights when she heard Han's footsteps echoing up the ramp. Rounding the corridor, he grinned with relief when he saw her and scooped her up in a fierce hug.
"Boy am I glad to see you," he said when her feet touched the ground again. "I was hopin' you'd come here. I was returning some of those converters to the storage area and almost got lost finding my way back."
Leia briefly recounted her own trip. "Did you run into anyone? Someone from the intelligence team?"
He shook his head. "Not a soul."
"That's odd, right?"
Han shrugged. "Hard to say. The crew could just be in one place working to get things fixed."
"The comm network's down. I haven't been able to reach Avery or anyone else on the team."
"Do you know where they are?"
She shook her head. "Since the Caldirans are still here, they could all be up in the conference room."
"Seems like a bit of a coincidence that they delay their departure and then this happens."
"Maybe." She remembered her dream from a couple of nights ago and felt vaguely reassured that she hadn't felt in imminent danger. If it was in fact an omen, hopefully it was an accurate one.
She thought through their next steps as Han waded around stacks of crates blocking a storage closet. The Prevail wasn't large as vessels went, but any fumbling voyage in the dark would take time. "Can you make your network available to the other comms on the ship?" she hollered over the sound of his rummaging.
There was a crash followed by an extended curse before Han emerged with a slight limp. "Not easily. You know all of the extra security I patched onto it." He handed her a well-worn blaster and tossed one to Chewbacca. "We'll take these. I found us a couple of lights too."
"What about something to jumpstart the doors?" she asked. "I think our first stop should be the conference room and then we'll go to the bridge."
"Yeah." He was belting a leather pack around his waist. "This should have everything we need to hotwire any circuit."
She appraised him silently, his holster hanging off one hip, the tool pack off the other. "I approve of this look."
He leaned closer and lowered his voice. "Good. I'll be sure to wear it for you later tonight."
A disgusted Wookie growl started up and Leia flushed down to her boots. "Sorry, Chewie."
"Oh, just ignore him." Han was already heading to the ramp. "Ready?"
They jogged through the hangar, the beams from their flashlights bobbing ahead of them. After a quick check of the corridor, Leia led them to the emergency stairs she had found. Chewie protested as he folded his body awkwardly through the hatch and onto the cramped stairs.
"You gonna to make it there, pal?" Han quipped, stepping up the ladder to give the Wookie some more space. A pitiful rumble that echoed weakly through the stairwell was the only response.
They started to climb hand over hand, balancing their blasters and lights as best they could. "All the way up?" Han whispered down to Leia.
"I think so. Maybe one floor down from the top." Keeping their voices down came instinctively even though there was no evidence of anyone else in the narrow space.
When they reached the top-but-one landing, they paused to catch their breath. Relieved that she didn't have to struggle with the latch herself, Leia let Han and Chewie open the door to the hall. Han stepped out first with his blaster poised before waving through the other two. Leia stood and shined her light down the corridor in both directions. "This looks like the conference level. Follow me."
They moved more cautiously now, ears pricked for other signs of movement. Despite their lights, the dark was unrelenting, and if not for the dampened churning of the engines, there was little indication they were even on a ship. Han stayed tight at her side mirroring her careful steps down the corridor.
"Here." They had arrived at the double hatch doors of the main conference room. Han put his ear to the surface for a long moment. "I don't hear anything." He banged his fist several times and called out loudly.
At the lack of response, an eerie silence settled over the three of them. Han hammered on the door again, harder this time, and then looked at Leia.
"Let's open it anyway," she decided. "If they're somewhere else on the ship, they may come back here."
"Yeah." He unbuckled his pack and dug through it. "Here, shine the light on this."
Leia held the light steady on the circuitry panel, checking up and down the corridor for wayward movements as he worked. "It's a miracle these doors operate under normal conditions," Han mumbled around the wire casings dangling from his mouth. He spat them onto his sleeve and wrestled briefly with the frayed ends before waving the portable battery pack at her. "Hold this. I need both hands to fuse these together."
She balanced the battery in one hand and held the light in her other. The spark from Han's soldering iron burst into miniature fireworks and lent a soft blue glow around them.
"Almost got it…"
"Help!" A faint shout floated from down the corridor. Leia snapped her head toward the noise, peering futilely into the dark in hopes of finding its source. She couldn't place the voice, but it definitely sounded like a woman. A second plea followed, increased desperation seeping into the cry.
"Someone's in trouble," she insisted urgently. "We have to go help her."
Han grunted as he pried apart twisted cables within the circuit box. Chewbacca had edged away from them and now broke into a gallop down the hall, flinging a reassuring growl over his shoulder.
"Almost done," Han muttered as another spark nearly jolted Leia.
After another few seconds the hatch doors slid open smoothly and they both scrambled to their feet, shining their beams of light into the room. Even among the shadows, Leia could see that the table, normally in the center of the space, had been pushed to the far side. Some of the terminals were also out of place, as if wrenched from their normal positions and turned toward each other.
Before she could say anything, a muffled noise arose from the far corner. Swinging her light frantically, Leia saw a dark form, or maybe two, contorting in a twisting motion. She opened her mouth to call out just before an explosion of pain burst from the right side of her face. Her body buckled as she tried futilely to clutch at the spot. There was a clatter as her blaster and flashlight hit the deck followed by another burst of pain, this time on her left side. She sensed a commotion beside her and heard a bit-off cry from someone who sounded like Han. By this time, her elbows were being squeezed tightly behind her back and it took all of her effort to suppress a yelp. Opening her eyes, she blinked furiously trying to see something, anything at all.
A smooth voice filtered into her ear. "Hello, Princess."
