Hello, dear readers! Thank you for...continuing to read. :) I'm glad you enjoy the stuff what comes out of my brain.

I gots some shout-outs: To SerenityMoonPrincess, ThePhantomismyLove, iloveashandquin and Sev thank you so, so much for reviewing - cookies for the lot of you!

Disclaimer: I do not own Star Wars, or any of its characters. Only Alice is mine.


In the middle of the desert, a young woman and an elderly man stood side by side. Alice kept glancing reflexively at her wrist, and growled in frustration each time at her lack of watch. "How long has it been now?" She asked, anxiously, scanning the horizon. As the two suns sank, the blue sky gave up its colour to a riot of orange and pink, making it harder and harder to see anything in the direction Luke had vanished.

Ben, who had been thoughtfully stroking his beard in typical mysterious fashion said, "I'm not sure. An hour or so at least."

"Oh, man." Alice jumped up and down once or twice, clutching her stomach as though in pain.

"What is it? Your hand?"

After finally realising that she'd hurt herself, Ben had bandaged Alice's hand for her using strips torn from his shirt sleeve. She'd been a bit apprehensive – her mum was a doctor, and she wasn't too sure that the dirty robes of a desert hermit would measure up to Dr Miller's exacting standards – but if Ben thought it was okay…

"No, it hurts, but it's okay. I'm worried that's all. Can't a girl worry herself sick about a cute boy she just met two hours ago?"

Ben stared at her.

"What? Don't give me those judging eyes, Ben."

Luckily at that moment, they heard the whine of engines and saw the shimmer of heat in the distance that signalled the speeder's arrival. Alice strode forward, biting her lip as she watched Luke stop the speeder and climb slowly out of it. He paused, dragging his hand across his eyes before walking over to join them.

Oh no.

"Luke," she said, quietly. He looked up slowly, his eyes red. What do I do? "I'm…I'm really sorry."

Tentatively, she rested a hand on his shoulder, wanting to comfort, but not to overwhelm him. He glanced up briefly, his blue eyes extremely bright with the sheen of unshed tears, and nodded once, his throat convulsing as he swallowed hard. A moment later, Alice let her hand drop, and Luke stepped away, towards Ben.

As Ben faced Luke, his expression was grave, but his voice was gentle, "There was nothing you could have done, Luke. You would have been killed too, and the droids would now be in the hands of the Empire."

"I want to come with you to Alderaan," Luke said quietly, "there's nothing for me here now. I want to learn the ways of the Force and become a Jedi like my father. Alice." She glanced up to find that Luke was gazing at her, his voice slightly strained, "If you don't want to come, I have friends you could-"

"No, I'll come," she said, hurrying to cut him off, "can't let the two of you go off and have adventures without me." Not to mention I can't stay here. Not on my own.

Luke nodded, as if he'd expected that.

"So what's next then?" Alice asked, when neither of the men seemed inclined to say anything else.

"It's too late to do anything for now," Ben said, and as he led them back to the speeder, Alice felt a great deal of relief that they had an adult with them to tell them what to do, "we should return to my house for the night. Then in the morning, we'll take the speeder to Mos Eisley," Ben said, leading them back over to the flying machine in question, "to barter a passage off this planet to Alderaan."

"Barter?" Alice repeated as she and Luke followed him, her eyebrows raised, "With what? What do we have of value, besides Artoo and Threepio, who I'm assuming we need to keep?"

"Don't worry," Luke said grimly, starting up the engines, "I'm sure we'll find someone desperate enough in Mos Eisley to agree to be paid once we get to Alderaan."

"Oh," Alice said, turning her head to watch the desert fly by, "I see."

They reached Ben's small house just as it began to get truly dark. The desert air had cooled around them so fast that almost as soon as the suns had disappeared, Alice found herself shivering, and had to zip her jumpsuit back up again, all the way to her throat.

Luke hopped out of the speeder first, and one by one, helped the others out, first Ben, then the droids, and finally Alice.

"Thanks," she mumbled with a yawn, as he gave her a hand down.

"It's alright," he said. His face was grave, and his voice quiet. Alice got the sense that he would have preferred that they left for Mos Eisley tonight – getting on with their mission quest thing would distract him from the loss of his family.

"Come on," she said, taking a couple of steps towards Ben's house, and turning back to look at him, "we can't keep Ben waiting."

He nodded, and they headed for Ben's door, which stood open for them, spilling yellow light onto the dark sand.

Inside, Ben was already busy in what looked like a kitchen, bustling around while Artoo sat in the corner and Threepio got in the way, evidently trying to be helpful.

"Ah, there you are," the old man said, as Luke and Alice entered the kitchen, "Luke, finish preparing these, would you?"

"Sure," the boy said, without much enthusiasm, moving to take Ben's place.

The former Jedi turned to Alice and said, "Come here, Alice, let's have a look at that hand."

"Alright," Alice said, also without much enthusiasm. She didn't like looking at injuries or blood much, not even her own, and she was pretty sure her hand was gonna be pretty gross by this point.

Ben sat her down and started to unwind her makeshift bandages. Alice peeked through the fingers of her other hand and groaned when she saw the surface of her palm, pink, shiny and swollen with blisters. The old man inspected her hand carefully, then got up and started to rummage through a pile of boxes in the corner.

"Is your hand alright?" Luke called from the kitchen, poking his head around the door.

"Well, it looks like a hand-shaped balloon, but other than that…"

"It'll be fine," Ben said firmly, reappearing with a roll of clean bandages and a small metal flask, which he pushed towards her, "here. This will help with the swelling and the pain."

Alice picked up the metal pot with her good hand, flipped the lid off and gave it a tentative sniff. It wasn't a cream, as she'd expected, but a clear gel. It smelled fresh, like grass. She dug out a generous helping of the stuff and started smoothing it into her hand, gritting her teeth at the pain of putting pressure on the burn.

Luke appeared, balancing three plates of…something in his arms. He set the unidentifiable food down in front of Ben and Alice, then collapsed onto a crate at the side of the room, looking exhausted. Alice watched him for a moment, noticing how he toyed with the food on his plate for a second before putting it aside to lean back against the wall, pulling his knees up to his chest.

Poor guy.

After a brief inspection of her own food, which looked a little bit like the space equivalent of boil-in-a-bag food, Alice tucked in, surprised to find how hungry she was. Ben ate slowly and silently, and kept looking over at Luke, who after half an hour or so, reluctantly picked up his food and started to eat, which the old man seemed to note with an approving nod.

When his own plate was clean, Ben got to his feet, "Well, I'd better rest these old bones of mine. We have a busy day tomorrow. There are some mats and blankets in that chest there. Sleep wherever you like, but make sure you get some rest. You both need it."

Alice nodded obediently.

Ben looked satisfied, and said, "I'll wake you at sunrise," before whisking out of the room and disappearing deeper into the house.

She and Luke looked at each other, and without speaking, got to their feet. Alice gathered up the plates and took them through to the kitchen, while Luke opened up the trunk Ben had indicated, and started looking for the blankets.

Alice didn't particularly want to wash the plates they'd eaten off, but couldn't bring herself to leave them sitting on the counter in Ben's kitchen. She could practically feel her mother's stern eyes on the back of her neck and hear her voice as she trembled on the edge of leaving the room: "Rude is one of the worst things you can be in life, Alice; rude and ungrateful." With a sulky pout that no one saw, she grabbed the plates and attempted to try and figure out how to work the sink.

When she'd finally washed and dried the three plates, she left the kitchen to find Luke stretched out on a rather threadbare sleeping mat under an equally threadbare blanket, lying on his back and staring at the ceiling. There was a similar makeshift bed set up a couple of feet away from him, evidently meant for her. Her mouth opened and her eyebrows lifted in surprise as she saw that Luke had obviously given her the nicer bedding; the mat looked cleaner, and the blanket had fewer holes in.

Well. Gosh.

Luke tilted his head back to look at her as she came in, and obviously he mistook her touched surprise for displeasure, because immediately he scrambled to sit up, turning to face her fully, "I'm sorry, I didn't think…I can move it somewhere else if you like…"

Smiling at his earnestness, Alice said without thinking, "No, no, that's fine. I'd rather sleep with you."

Crap.

"Uh," Luke said, blushing even pinker than her.

"Well, you know, I mean," she said, shuffling awkwardly on the spot and laughing a little awkwardly, "not with you, with you, but just like, in the same room." Some of the colour had faded from Luke's cheeks and he nodded in understanding, but Alice kept on babbling, because that didn't seem like enough of an explanation and she really needed this boy not to think she was a creeper, "Because, well, between you and me, I always get a bit nervous sleeping in new places. Homesick, I guess. It's just nice to have someone else here. So, yeah."

To her surprise and faint relief, Luke looked almost pleased at that, dropping his eyes to the mat and smiling a sweet little abashed smile, "I guess that makes sense."

Phew. "I'm going to sit down now."

As she picked her way over to her bed, Luke lay back down, making her think the conversation was over, but as she was tucking herself in as best she could, he spoke up again, "If you don't mind me asking, where is your home anyway? You never said earlier…"

Alice opened her mouth, paused for thought, wondered if she should lie, then gave up and simply said, "Surrey."

Little furrows formed between Luke's eyebrows, "Is that a planet?"

Uhhh…

"Yup. Definitely."

"I've never heard of it. Is it in the Outer Rim?"

"Oh, yeah," she said, trying to sound casual, "it's…way, way out there…in the…you know…far away. It's quite remote. We don't get many visitors."

"What's it like?"

"Oh, um…it's…pretty different to here. Very green, lots of fields and forests and stuff like that. Not, ah, not very many aliens, mainly just humans."

"So I guess you get a lot of rain then, huh."

Does he sound jealous or is that just me?

Alice blinked, "Rain? Sure. Buckets of the stuff. Does it not rain at all here?"

He shook his head, "Hardly ever. There are no rivers either, we have to collect water from the air."

"Ohhh." So that's what he meant by moisture farming. "That sounds…strenuous."

He rolled over onto his side and gave her a surprisingly dry smile. It made him look older. "It's not easy, that's for sure. I've been helping my uncle with the moisture farm since I was old enough to operate the vaporators. Those old pieces of junk are always breaking down."

Ah. That…well-known age. Vaporator-operating age.

"Jeez, that's intense."

He nodded, his eyes drifting away from her face to fix on the wall behind her, "That's why I've never left Tatooine. Because my uncle needed me." He trailed off into silence, absentmindedly worrying the blanket over his chest.

Alice watched him, then asked tentatively, "Are you alright?"

"It's just…" he paused for thought, then suddenly burst out, "He kept so much from me. Ben being a Jedi, my father too – he didn't even tell me they were friends. But now…"

She understood what he was getting at, "But now that he's gone, you feel guilty for being angry at him."

Luke glanced up at her, looking faintly surprised, "Yeah. That's right."

Here came the hard part. What was she supposed to say? 'Just stop being angry at your dead uncle for lying to you for almost all your life, it's not a big deal!' I'm sure that'll go down really well…

"I'm…uh, well, I'm sorry," she said, haltingly, "I'm sure he only wanted the best for you."

Luke hummed quietly, "Yeah. He did."

Silence fell, and Alice cleared her throat, "Well. Um. We should probably get to sleep. Don't want old Beardy Ben to catch us chatting after lights out. I bet he's super strict."

He didn't laugh, but his mouth did twitch into a small smile, which counted as a victory in her book.

"Goodnight, Alice."

"Night, Luke."

BREAK

"So, remind me where we're going again?"

Ben had woken Alice and Luke up bright and early, handed them some of the weird protein bars from his food store and ushered them out the door, barely stopping to close the door of his house behind them. Now they were zooming across the desert, Luke piloting the speeder, Ben riding shotgun, and Alice crushed grumpily in the back with the droids. Though the suns were up, it was still cold, especially with the wind, and she huddled into herself, stuffing her hands into her armpits to keep them warm.

"Mos Eisley," Luke called back, turning his head a little so she could hear over the whine of the engines.

"And Mos Eisley is…what exactly?"

"A space port. You've got all the docking bays where ships land, and then a load of taverns and shops, repair yards, stuff like that. Run by shady dealers mostly. Sometimes deep space pilots stop here to rest and refuel, get a break from flying, but not often."

"Ah. So like the seaports back home then. Or service stations."

"And you will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious," Ben said in a 'now listen up, young'uns' kind of voice.

"Way to sell it, Ben" Alice muttered to Artoo and Threepio, "he'd be a great tour guide."

Artoo beeped once, Alice liked to think in agreement.

The suns were high in the sky by the time they reached Mos Eisley. Alice had more or less fallen back to sleep when she was woken by the sudden cessation of movement. Jerking awake, she pulled herself out of the ball she'd huddled herself into and got up onto her knees, peering out through the speeder's windscreen. They had stopped at the edge of a rocky cliff; below them, the terrain opened up into a large, flat plain, with what was presumably their destination in the middle.

The spaceport was larger than Alice had expected: a sprawling expanse of cramped sandstone buildings and narrow streets, dotted with the occasional gleam of sun on metal.

"Um, that's it, right?"

"Yes." A troubled look stealing over his face, as if the sight brought back memories he'd rather not recall. He shook his head as though to clear it, and turned around so both Luke and Alice could see his face, "Listen carefully, you two. It is very likely we will encounter Imperial soldiers on the lookout for the droids, as well as many others who will be happy to sell us to the Empire. Keep your heads down, and if we meet any trouble, let me do the talking. Understand?"

Alice nodded fervently, and after a moment, Luke followed suit. Ben settled back into his seat, evidently satisfied, and Luke revved the engine, sending them speeding away.

From then on, they began to slope downwards, following a winding path cut into the cliff side. It was extremely narrow and crumbly, and even though they were technically in a flying vehicle, Alice didn't want to find out what would happen if they went over the edge. It turned out she didn't need to worry: Luke seemed as unconcerned by the sharp bends and sheer drop as he had been by the rolling desert dunes, even though they were still travelling at what had to be sixty or seventy miles per hour.

When they reached the plain itself, they started to pass by other speeders or slower vehicles traipsing to or from the entrance to the spaceport, but the idle traffic gave Alice no indication of the rush of activity within the walls. Droids, humans and aliens bustled back and forth like ants in a nest, and it was all Alice could do to not to gape, open-mouthed at the massive array of odd-looking life forms. She saw something that had a face a bit like a cow, walking on two legs, with three eyes. There were little blue people fluttering around on insect-like wings, and they even passed a couple of creatures who looked as if they were shaggy throw-rugs brought to life.

Luke and Ben of course took it all in their stride, but Alice had to bottle in a constant stream of exclamations at each new alien. Come on, Alice, play it cool.

They were speeding along down a wide street, when suddenly, Luke started to slow down. "Are we stopping?" Alice asked brightly. "Because my legs are-"

"Hush," Ben said, sharply, "Imperial troops."

Alice shut up immediately as several white-suited figures carrying large, scary-looking guns came sauntering over to them. Very quickly, they surrounded the speeder, making it impossible for them to leave without knocking a few of them over. She held her breath as one of the soldiers spoke to Luke, his voice slightly tinny, as if he was speaking over a PA system, "How long have you had these droids?"

"About three or four seasons," Luke lied smoothly. Alice's eyebrows twitched, though she kept her eyes fixed determinedly on the floor. He's better at espionage than I thought he'd be.

"They're up for sale if you want them," Ben put in.

The soldier looked unconvinced. Well, as unconvinced as it was possible to look when wearing a mask that obscured his face completely. "Let me see your identification."

This was a cue for Alice to start freaking out – however, keeping Ben's instructions in mind, she did her best to implode silently.

Then Ben said, quite calmly, "You don't need to see his identification."

"We don't need to see his identification," the soldier repeated.

"These aren't the droids you're looking for."

"These aren't the droids we're looking for." Alice's eyes widened – it was like watching some fancy stage hypnotist at work, only wearing a cloak and in a desert, and far less dramatic.

"He can go about his business."

"You can go about your business."

"Move along," Ben said, with an air of satisfaction.

"Move along." And with that, the troops moved off, allowing them to fly away. Alice and Luke stared at Ben, awestruck.

"Ben," Alice whispered, gleefully, "what the hell, that was awesome! How did you do that?!"

"I thought we were dead!" Luke agreed, guiding them past a couple of stumbling Jawas.

"The Force can have a strong influence on the weak-minded," Ben said, pointing casually to a spot for Luke to stop the speeder: "Over here."

"That was honestly the most badass thing I have ever seen," Alice said, hopping out of the speeder, "I wish I could do that."

Ben smiled at her, but Luke was surveying the building they had parked by, a doubtful expression on his face, "Do you really think that we'll find a pilot here that can take us to Alderaan?"

"Most of the best freighter pilots are to be found here," Ben assured him. "Only watch your step. This place could be a little rough."

"Rough?" Alice repeated, instantly anxious, "You guys do realise I'm from Surrey, right?"

Inside it was dark, smelly, and stuffy. There was a band of aliens wearing…well, more or less, tuxedoes in one corner, playing long, dark instruments that sounded a bit like oboes or clarinets. There were small groups of unfriendly looking aliens clustered around most of the tables and at the bar, drinking, smoking and playing dice or cards or whatever aliens did for fun. In short, it was exactly what Alice would have expected a seedy alien bar to look like.

Keeping close behind Luke, she simultaneously tried to avoid meeting anyone's eyes (or eye, singular), while looking over her shoulder constantly, and watching the floor to make sure she didn't stand in anything disgusting. But after about twenty seconds trying to look at two different things at once gave her a headache, and she had to stop.

Ben was already at the bar, talking with a huge fluffy thing that could probably knock the old man's head clean off with one blow of its paws. Alice swallowed, and made the mistake of taking her eyes off the back of Luke's head for more than one second. Immediately, she bumped into someone, lost Luke in the crowd and heard a deep male voice snap, "Hey, watch where you're going!" Quaking with fear, she turned to face what was probably going to be her doom.

The speaker, presumably the guy she'd bumped into, was a tall man with a mop of brown hair, wearing a loose waistcoat, boots and some ridiculously tight trousers. Fashion sense aside, at least he's human, Alice thought.

"I- I'm sorry," she stuttered, "I…um, I didn't mean to- My, those trousers are tight…woah, woah, woah. What are you doing?" As she spoke, the man had reached out to brush at her hair. She slapped his hand away, and stared at him, wide-eyed.

"Relax," he said, holding up his hands, "I'm not gonna hurt you. You had a beetle in your hair, that's all-"

Alice shrieked. "A bug? Oh, yuck, get it out, get it out!"

"Would you keep your voice down?" He hissed, clapping a hand over her mouth, "it's gone. I got it already. Okay?" Alice glared at him mutinously from behind his hand, "Now if I take my hand away will you promise not to scream? I don't know if you've noticed, but this isn't the kinda place where you want to draw attention to yourself."

At which point, Luke managed to attract the attention of everyone in the room by being suddenly thrown very loudly into a table by the spacey-wacey equivalent of the Elephant Man.

Alice flinched, stumbled backwards and managed to trip on someone's foot, sending her toppling backwards on to the floor.

Ouch.

From her new vantage point she could see absolutely nothing, and she scrambled to regain her feet, desperate to see what was happening across the bar. As it turned out, the closest support she could find was the wrist of the grumpy man she'd just bumped into, but this time she ignored his disgruntled cry, too busy trying to see through the crowd. "What happened?" She hissed, wishing (not for the first time in her life) that she were taller.

Ahead of her, someone shifted their position, affording her a clear view of Ben, standing in the middle of a ring of bar patrons, a blue lightsaber sparking at his side. Two men lay on the ground before him, one with a smoking gash across his chest, the other missing an arm. Luke was staggering to his feet across the room, rubbing the back of his head and staring at Ben as if he'd never seen him properly before. I can empathise, Alice thought.

The bar was silent apart from the groans of the two downed men, as everyone waited to see what would happen next. All eyes were on the lightsaber. Then Ben, smiling grimly, simply put the weapon away, and slowly, talk resumed. Aliens turned back to their drinks, and Alice let out a long breath of relief. It was only then that she realised that she was still clinging to the wrist of the guy she'd initially bumped into, her fingers locked in his jacket in a death grip. The man followed her gaze, and snatched his hand back at the same time that she practically flung his arm back at him, feeling a dull red flush creep into her cheeks.

"That's some grip you've got on you," the man said, wiggling his fingers experimentally and scowling, "might as well have just cut my hand off."

"Oh please," Alice replied, rolling her eyes, "it can't be that bad." Her burned hand was throbbing again from when she'd fallen on the floor, and inspecting it, found that she'd scraped some skin off and burst a blister. "Ugh, yuck. See?" She said, holding her hand up in front of the man's eyes, "that's way worse."

He made a dismissive noise and took a swig of his drink, "Doesn't look that bad to me, kid."

Alice's mouth dropped open and she gave a short incredulous laugh, "Says the guy who just compared pins and needles to having his hand chopped off."

"Alice?"

Luke's voice interrupted Alice's interlocutor before he could shoot back with some kind of insult, and she turned to him, ridiculously relieved to have an out, "Luke, thank god. Are you alright?" She looked him over for damage, but he seemed more or less in one piece.

"Sure, fine," he said, glancing over her shoulder at the guy Alice had been speaking to, who had picked up his drink and was eyeing the two of them with an oddly smug expression.

"Knew you'd be the type to go for the innocent ones," he said, directing the comment at Alice, who could only stare, incredulous, certain that it was meant to be an insult, but not quite understanding how. Somehow she got the feeling that he wasn't too sure either. Your comebacks need some work, chum.

"What are you even talking about, Mr-"

"Han Solo?" Ben's voice came from behind them, cutting Alice off before she could find a suitable appropriate insult for her new friend. The old man was accompanied by the massively tall furry creature from the bar.

Han Solo (apparently) glanced over Ben's head at the creature and said, "Well, well, what have we got here then, Chewie?"

The creature growled loudly, and Ben translated the reply for the benefit of Luke and Alice, "My companions here and I wish to travel to Alderaan. Chewbacca suggested we talk to you."

"Well then," Solo said, tipping his head back and downing the rest of his drink, "if you want to talk business, we'd best take a seat. This way." He grinned down at Alice and mockingly offered her his arm. She seriously considered a rude hand gesture, but settled for narrowing her eyes at him instead. With an indifferent shrug, Solo sauntered off, calling back over his shoulder, "I haven't got all day, you know."

"Ugh," Alice muttered as they followed him, "do we have to fly with that guy?"

"Let's see if he'll take our offer first," Ben said chidingly, "and I'll do the talking, young Alice, if you don't mind."

"Fine by me," she said.

To her right, she could see Luke smiling and had to resist the urge to thump him in the stomach. I've really got to be nicer to people.

Solo had taken a seat in a secluded booth towards the back of the room. The furry thing – turned out he was a wookiee, a name which would have made Alice laugh if he wasn't so damn big – sat next to him, and Luke, Alice and Ben piled into the opposite side of the booth, Alice placing herself between the men.

Captain McSmug-Face waited until they were settled, then leaned back in his seat, "Well, here we are then. I'm Han Solo, captain of the Millennium Falcon. So you're looking to go to the Alderaan system?"

"Yes indeed," Ben said, leaning forward on his elbows, "if it's a fast ship."

"Fast ship?" Han said, raising his eyebrows, "You've never heard of the Millennium Falcon?"

Ben looked mildly surprised, "Should I have?"

Savage.

Alice snorted, and Han shot her a sideways glare. In a tone of easy arrogance, he said, "It's the ship that made the Kessel Run in less than twelve parsecs."

There was an awkward silence around the table, which was broken by Alice: "Wow," she said, widening her eyes and drawing out the word with devastating sarcasm.

To her left she heard a strangled choking noise, which she was pretty sure was Luke trying not to laugh.

Han glowered, and leaning across the table, pointed a threatening finger at her, "Listen, girly-"

"Alice," Ben said warningly. She subsided back into her seat, but smiled a tiny satisfied smile behind Ben's back. As if he was perfectly aware of this, the old man said, "Please excuse her, she's still suffering from sunstroke."

Gee, thanks Ben.

Han still looked less than impressed, and carried on loudly, addressing the majority of his remarks directly to Alice, "Look, I've outrun Imperial starships. Not the local bulk cruisers, mind you, I'm talking about the big Corillian ships. She's fast enough for you, old man." He narrowed his eyes at Alice, "Easily."

"Great," Luke said, sitting forward, "then how much-"

"Not so fast, kid," Han interrupted, "what's the cargo?"

"Only passengers," Ben said, "myself, the two young ones here, two droids…" He leaned forward, "And no questions asked."

Han seemed to think this a fine joke, breaking into a wide grin, "What is it; some kind of local trouble? Let me guess," he pointed at Alice, "she's involved with it somehow."

"I beg your pardon!" Alice protested, losing her smug grin at once.

"Hey, I'm just saying, wherever there's trouble, there's sure to be a woman involved…"

"I don't believe this! You are completely-"

"Alice!" Ben said, more sharply this time. Seething, she began to rap her knuckles against the table, imagining punching Han Solo in his stupidly handsome face, despite the fact that she'd never punched anyone before.

"As I was saying," Ben said, clearly irritated by Alice's interruptions, "Let's just say we'd like to avoid any Imperial entanglements."

"Well, that's the real trick, isn't it," Han said, reaching out and pressing Alice's hand flat against the table to stop her tapping. She glowered at him, and pulled her hand back, muttering uncomplimentary names for him under her breath. "And it's going to cost you something extra."

Ben gestured slightly, telling him to go on. Alice forgot her miniature tantrum and held her breath, waiting.

"Ten thousand, all in advance."

To her left, Luke's mouth dropped open in shock, "Ten thousand?!"

"I'm guessing that's a lot," Alice said dispiritedly to Luke.

He nodded fiercely, "We could almost buy our own ship for that!"

"But who's gonna fly it, kid?" Han asked cockily, "You?"

Luke riled up angrily, "You bet I could, I'm not such a bad pilot myself. You know, we don't have to sit here and listen to this, Ben, come on-"

Ben held out a calming hand. Slowly, Luke settled, and Alice gave him a sympathetic glance.

With his two unruly teens finally under some semblance of control, Ben continued, "We can pay you two thousand now, plus fifteen when we reach Alderaan."

Han cocked his head on one side, "Seventeen?"

He's a smart one, isn't he. Alice opened her mouth to voice another scathing comment, but Ben shot her a fierce glare, and reluctantly she closed it again.

Han exchanged a brief look with Chewbacca, then smiled, "Okay, you guys've got yourselves a ship. We'll leave as soon as you're ready. Docking Bay Ninety-Four."

"Ninety-Four," Ben repeated, clearly extremely satisfied.

Han nodded once, then his gaze shifted over Ben's shoulder, and for the first time, he looked serious, "Looks like someone's beginning to take an interest in your handy-work."

Alice glanced over her shoulder and saw a couple of storm troopers across the bar, talking with a couple of the patrons. To her horror, a man in a dirty yellow shirt turned and pointed directly at them. The storm troopers nodded, and started to make their way over.

She glanced at Ben, her heart thumping louder than usual, "What's the plan?"

"Luke, quickly, out the back," Ben ordered.

Luke stood decisively and grabbing Alice's hand, moved swiftly through the crowd to a small door that nearly blended into the wall. He pushed at a small panel, the door slid silently open and together they ducked out into the fresh air. Alice glanced back over her shoulder just before Ben shut the door behind them – the two soldiers had reached the booth where they'd been sitting with Han and Chewbacca, and not finding them, had simply moved on.

"Phew," she panted, pressing a hand to her chest, "that was scarily close. And yet they were surprisingly easy to evade."

"Come," Ben said, beckoning the two of them away from the tavern, "we have arrangements to make. Luke, we'll have to sell your speeder."

"That's okay," he said, shrugging, "I'm never coming back to this planet anyway."

"Really?" Alice asked, as they started walking back towards where they'd left Artoo and Threepio, "Never?"

"Why would I?" He said, kicking at the sand as they walked.

"I suppose," she said, hesitantly.

"Luke, Alice!" They looked up – apparently they weren't going quite fast enough for their elderly companion, "We cannot linger," Ben said, "we do not want to attract attention to ourselves."

"He's so bossy," Alice complained as they tried to catch up with Ben, "old people think they know everything."

"I think Ben does know everything," Luke replied, with a wryness that surprised her a little.

She glanced over her shoulder at the double suns, which were edging towards the middle of the sky and thought wistfully of home, "Not quite everything."


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