Hi guys! Sorry for the slight delay, truly has been hectic around here lately.

As always, I have a few shout-outs to make, this week to: Taboo22, iloveashandquinn, Sev, SummerAngelz, and an unidentified but still appreciated Guest. It means a lot that you guys continue to show such support for this story, and I'm very grateful to you all. :) Hope you enjoy this week's chapter.

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


"Miss Alice?" Threepio was knocking at her door. Again. Alice rolled her eyes and debated whether she could be bothered to get up from her duvet nest and tell him to go away. She'd already tried shouting, but it hadn't worked. Post-arguing with Han she'd slouched off to her room and was currently buried under a duvet and two blankets.

"Mistress Alice, it is rather important-"

The droid's voice trailed off suddenly, and after a moment of quiet murmuring, was replaced by Leia's, "Alice, come out."

Alice made a face, "No."

"Alice!" She frowned and stuck her head out from her blanket nest. Was that Han?

"What is it?"

There was a slight pause, then Han shouted, "Luke's been hurt, Alice, this is an emergency, damn it!"

"What?!" She was on her feet in an instant and dashing across the room. Skidding in her fluffy socks and nearly crashing into the wall, Alice heaved the door open, panting slightly, "What's going on-"

"Surprise, kid," Han said, with a warm grin. They were all gathered before her, Chewie, Han, Leia, Luke, Threepio, Artoo and for some bizarre reason, General Rieekan.

"What is this?" Alice said, bewildered, "You're like the world's strangest group of carollers. Hang on," she narrowed her eyes and pointed at Luke, "he's not hurt. You tricked me!"

Leia gave her a surprisingly sweet smile, and said, "We've come to congratulate you, Alice. General Rieekan?"

The fatherly man, neat as a pin in his Rebel uniform, took a step forward, and said, with an air of formality that the rest of her welcoming committee lacked, "Alice Miller, I hereby welcome you into the Army of the Rebel Alliance, in the rank of private. Will you devote your life henceforth to the task of freeing this galaxy from the tyranny under which it currently suffers?"

Alice blinked, "Um…yeah?"

He smiled, "Good enough. Here." He reached out and clipped something to the left breast of her jacket. Alice glanced down and saw that it was a badge, plain white but with a single red square in the centre, made of some kind of enamel. She brushed it gently with her fingertips and found herself smiling.

"Wow…thanks guys. This is…really nice." She looked up and saw that Han's grin had widened. It wasn't exactly an apologetic smile, but the warmth in it went a long way for earning her forgiveness. So she smiled back and held out her arms to them, "Group hug, Team Jedi!"

Luke and Leia each put arms around her waist at once; Han slung an arm around Luke's shoulder and clapped Threepio on his metal shoulder. Artoo sat at Alice's feet, whistling loudly. Chewie simply threw out his massive arms and somehow managed to hug everyone at once. Alice, crushed in the centre, couldn't help grinning around at them all. "Aww, you lot are so sweet."


Now that she had finally passed her qualifying tests, Alice finally got down to the work that Leia had proposed over a month ago: helping the Rebellion's engineers and mechanics catalogue and store their tools and supplies, taking note of what they needed and passing it on to the pilots who flew recon and espionage. It was, in a word, incredibly satisfying work, mainly because she didn't need to know what any of the tools or materials or obscure pieces of machinery she made notes of were for – just what they were called and how many of them there were. Put simply, it was something she could actually do without needing help every five minutes. Which made an extremely welcome change.

To her surprise, she found herself actually missing her daily training sessions, and not wanting to relapse to her old, unhealthy ways after she'd made so much progress, talked Clementine into going to the training room with her once a day for an hour or so. Though truth be told, she didn't think the older woman needed much persuading – she probably went everyday anyway, and for longer stretches than Alice was willing to endure.

When she wasn't organising the storage of mechanical items and exercising, Alice more or less went back to what she'd been doing before: she hung around with Engineer Bob most of the time, helping him carry and fix things, convinced that she would actually learn something from him if she handed him enough wrenches. Luke, Han and Leia were busy with their own duties during the day, but they met up in the evenings, usually for dinner, and they'd chat about their days, and any major news from elsewhere in the galaxy, and Luke might tell Alice how Han had been thrown off his tauntaun just outside the base, an artless grin on his face and his blue eyes ridiculously bright. It was…nice.

Alice had never had a job back home – she'd always been wrapped up in school and academic achievement. But this…having a purpose and a group of friends to share it with…it felt pleasantly like being a complete, grown up person. It felt real. Or something.

She should have known it couldn't last.

A month after her rather informal initiation ceremony, Alice was hanging out with Artoo and Threepio – they'd helped her finish up her work cataloguing the pilots' new finds earlier than usual – and attempting to explain the concept of a snowball fight to the two droids when she heard footsteps at the end of the corridor. "Quick," she hissed, knocking the lump of snow she'd just handed to Threepio out of his grip, "act natural."

She whipped around and fixing an expression of musing expertise on her face, started surveying the wall, her eyes narrowed. "Yes, yes," she said, giving Artoo a nudge with her foot as she heard the footsteps getting closer, "very...structurally sound. Excellent, excellent..."

"Alice?"

I know those dulcet tones!

Dropping her hand, which had, without her knowledge, started stroking an imaginary beard, she turned to find Luke and Han standing behind her, the former looking rather more cheerful than the latter (as per usual).

"Oh, hey," she said, smiling, "what's up?"

"We're about to head off on patrol," Luke said, holding up a pair of gigantic ski goggles as proof, "what are you up to?"

"Er...not sure at the moment, actually. I finished sorting all the new parts that just got brought in…"

Han raised his eyebrows, and said, "If you're looking for something to do kid, Chewie's in the hangar, fixing the Falcon. Don't suppose you'd like to give him a hand?"

"Don't you mean a paw?" Alice said, with a delighted snicker at her own wit. The two men stared at her, unresponsive. I try so hard, and what do I get for my trouble? Nothing, that's what. She coughed, and said, "Yeah, sure, I can do that."

"Great," Han said, his expression darkening a little, "the sooner she's fixed…" he trailed off, glancing between the two of them.

Alice tilted her head on one side, "Yes…?"

He lowered his eyes, "Nothing."

"Right…" She didn't know what it was that was making Han act so suspiciously all of a sudden, but she didn't like it, "Well, I'll head over there now then, I guess."

"See you later, Private Miller," Luke said with a grin, raising his hand to his head in a casual salute.

Something about his voice, maybe the casual way he teased her, struck Alice very suddenly with a wave of affection so intense it felt more like anxiety. She paused and turned back to them. "Be careful."

She'd meant to sound light and cheerful, but for some reason, her words came out sounding…sort of dire.

The two men glanced at each other, surprised, and Alice winced, a little embarrassed. Way to freak them out, Alice. Great work.

"Of course," Luke said, a moment later, and to her relief, his tone was reassuring rather than mocking.

"We'll catch you later, kid," added Han.

Alice shook herself. Whatever that weird feeling of foreboding she'd felt was, wherever it had come from, it was gone now, "Sure. Don't go falling off your tauntaun now, I hear it's pretty embarrassing."

Grinning as Han rolled his eyes at her, she turned and headed towards the main hangar. When she got there, she found that the huge, icy room was far more subdued than usual. There were hardly any orange suited pilots; they'd all been replaced by engineers in their blue boiler suits. Engineer Bob walked past, and Alice waved at him cheerfully, and called, "I'm looking for the Millennium Falcon, have you seen it?"

"It's down the far end," he replied, pointing her in the right direction, "that furry friend of yours is there now, I think."

"Thanks!"

Shoving her hands deeper into her coat pockets, she traversed the long, icy room, and found, to her delight, the Millennium Falcon, looking quietly dilapidated in the midst of all the gleaming (but useless) speeders. She grinned, smiling broadly up at the hunk of junk that was the Falcon. "Boy, am I glad to see you again."

She got a loud growly noise from the wing by way of a reply, and a furry head appeared above her. "Hey, Chewie! So this is where you've been chilling. Ha! Get it? Chilling?" The wookiee whined, and she sighed, "I'm wasted on you lot, I really am." He burbled something and returned to his work: in one paw he was holding a large scary looking tool and in the other some sparking loose wires. Alice lounged against the side of the Falcon, grinning up at him, "Hey, thanks for coming to my promotion party, Chewie. I bet it was your idea, wasn't it?"

He purred/meowed/barked, and from somewhere nearby Threepio said, "He says that of course it was."

"You scamp," Alice said, grinning, "hey, you need any help up there?"

He roared and Threepio translated, "If you could pass up tools to him while he works, he will be most grateful."

"Not a problem, big guy. I've been practicing my tool recognition skills, you're gonna be amazed..."

She took up a position under the right wing near the toolbox, with Threepio keeping her company, and spent a pleasant two hours or so finding obscure tools for Chewbacca. The Falcon was tucked away in a relatively quiet corner of the hangar, so they weren't disturbed, and since she couldn't understand Chewie's answers anyway, she didn't bother him with conversation. Instead, she sat and daydreamed, thinking about this galaxy, and how big it was, and how little of it she'd seen. Suddenly, a question occurred to her, interrupting her reverie, a question she'd never really considered before.

"Threepio?"

The droid, who had 'powered down' about half an hour ago (sneaking a nap on the job, Alice thought, amused) twitched at the sound of her voice. The lights behind his eyes flickered on, and after a brief pause, he turned to face her, somehow managing to look disorientated, even those his expression never changed.

"Yes, Mistress Alice?"

"Um, remind me. How long has the Empire been around?"

"The Emperor has been in power for…oh, nineteen years now."

Nineteen years. Luke's age, and Leia's. And hers, Alice's too. She'd never really thought about the fact that neither of them could remember a time before living in a galaxy wide dictatorship. "And before the Empire there was…?"

"A Republic, governed by a Galactic Senate, which was overseen by a High Chancellor elected for a limited term by their fellow senators. The senate remains in place today, but their power to act on behalf of their planets is limited."

"Right. Got it. Yay diplomacy. So…how did the emperor come to power?"

Threepio, ever exacting, and apparently not wanting her to miss any of the details, proceeded to speak for about half an hour on the subject: it wasn't so much a narrative as it was an in-depth analysis of all the major players and factors in the dismantling of the republic. Alice's inner historian was utterly delighted, and she berated herself for not asking about all this sooner.

"Wow," she said, when he finally paused, "that's mental. And where were you while all this was going on Threepio? Have you always been with the Organa family on Alderaan?"

The golden droid paused, his head cocked on one side, and when he spoke again he sounded uncertain, "Do you know, I can't quite access my memory banks during that whole period. I know that I was complete and fully functional…" For a second he looked almost forlorn. Then he blinked and said firmly, "I suppose I must have been on Alderaan, yes."

"Cool." She said, watching him as he stared absentmindedly into the distance. The poor thing looked like he was trying to remember something.

Feeling more than a little guilty, Alice lapsed back into silence, absentmindedly rummaging through the toolbox in front of her without really looking at the bits of machinery. A few minutes later though, she was jolted out of her pleasantly idle state by the arrival of Han, still fully swathed in his outdoor clothes and with a fresh coating of icy snow across his shoulders. Clearly, he'd just arrived back from patrol - he certainly looked grumpy enough.

"Chewie?"

"Hey, flyboy," she called, waving him to alert him to her presence. Han lifted a hand in response, but before he could say anything, Chewie's fluffy head appeared over the edge of the Falcon's wing. He looked less than pleased, and started wailing loudly at his friend, waving the welder Alice had just given him over his head.

"Alright, alright," Han called back, though how in the world he understood the odd mixture of grunts, whines and growls Chewie was making, she had no idea, "don't lose your temper. I'll come right back and give you a hand!" He looked at Alice, "I've got to go make my report."

"Alright," she said distractedly, worried by the way Chewie was flailing the tool around, "Be careful with that, Chewie! I don't think we have another one!"

Chewbacca growled down at her, and Threepio said, "I believe he is saying that this part of the wing is finished. At last."

"At last," she echoed, stretching. "You need a hand down from there, fluffy?" Not that I can give a seven foot tall walking doormat a hand…

The wookiee shook his head and swung himself easily down to the ground. He was so tall that he could practically reach the lip of the wing anyway.

"Right. What next?"

Chewie grumbled something, and crawled underneath the Falcon, taking his welder with him. Alice yawned, and sat down on top of the toolbox she'd been rummaging through, resting her chin in her hands and watching the wookiee bash away at various parts of the ship. "You know Chewie, I think it's sad we don't spend more time together. You're one of my favourite people after all. You know why?"

The wookiee grumbled quizzically and went on fixing whatever it was he was fixing. Unfazed by the fact that she was rambling, Alice went on. "You never try to confuse me. Everything's plain and simple with you, my friend. Oh, and you hardly ever give me that 'what?' look that everyone else does when I do something stupid." She got to her feet, and stretched, "Do you need me anymore, or is it cool for me to skedaddle? Gotta get back to work."

Chewie chirruped and Threepio stepped in, "He thanks you for your help, and says he will see you in the evening."

"Awesome," she said, giving the droid a thumbs up, "see you boys later."

She meandered back across the room and had just reached the door when suddenly a very disgruntled Han Solo, striding at top speed and apparently not paying any attention to where he was going, smacked into her.

"Woah!" Alice staggered backwards, nearly fell, and managed to steady herself by catching Han's arm.

He gave her a brief, aggravated glance, as if nearly falling over was somehow her fault, and demanded, "Is Chewie done with the Falcon yet?"

"No, he's still doing something...underneath it. What's the matter with-"

"He's doing what?" Han exploded, as if she'd told him the wookiee was ripping the ship apart with his bare paws, "I'm trying to get us out of here and he's-"

Alice frowned and raised a hand, "Hold up. You're leaving?"

Han started and looked guiltily at her as if he had only just realised she was there, "Well, you didn't expect me to stick around forever, did ya kid?"

"Not forever, no," she replied indignantly, "but I thought you might stay a little longer. You only got here like, a couple of weeks ago."

"Well, you thought wrong! I'm not a soldier, I'm a smuggler! What is it with you and Leia not being able to get it into your heads that I'm not...some kind of hero-"

Alice's eyes widened, "Wait, what was that about Leia?"

"Nothing! I just told her I was going and she went completely ballistic, as usual. There is something seriously wrong-"

"What exactly did you say to her?"

He huffed, and refused to meet her gaze, "Ally, come on…"

"Han."

"Fine! I just pointed out she clearly has feelings for me."

Alice smacked a hand to her forehead. "Oh, you idiot."

"What?" He demanded.

"Han, you're not supposed to tell someone else how they feel, you're supposed to ask them."

"Well, excuse me, but since I'm leaving, I thought it was about time she admitted it!" He pushed past her and started walking back towards the Falcon, then suddenly spun back to face her, "Do you know what she said?"

"Uh…no…"

"She said she'd rather kiss a wookiee than me. A wookiee!"

Alice stared, then burst into delighted laughter, "She didn't! Oh, that's priceless! Talk about putting you in your place. Idiot."

"Don't you start," he snapped.

"Sorry," Alice said, once she'd managed to get her laughter under control, "but you're really pretty ridiculous, you know that? Do you want me to talk to Leia, tell her how sorry you are?"

"What do I care?" He said, sulkily, "Tell her whatever you like."

"Right-o, then," Alice said cheerfully, as she made her way to the door, "whatever I like."

"Alice…? Wait…Alice!"

She ignored his panicked call, and headed off, still chuckling under her breath. "Rather kiss a wookiee!" Ahh, Leia. You funny, funny girl.

Though she'd only been joking about going to see Leia – it would probably be better to let her cool off before wading into the mess Han had left in his wake, and she really did need to get some actual work done – for some reason she found herself heading to the control room anyway. I'll just make sure she's not too upset…

The control room seemed busier than usual, with more technicians sitting at their desks than Alice had seen so far. But as far as she could tell, Leia didn't look too swamped, so she made her way over. After all, if Leia was too busy – or as was more likely, still too pissed off to talk about Han – she could always try again later.

"Hey, Leia. What's up?"

The princess turned, her expression tight, "Oh, Alice. Hello. Did you need something?"

"I don't, but I just saw Han." Leia's face darkened instantly, and Alice hurried to complete her sentence, "I just came to check you were okay. He's really sorry about what he said though. I'm sure."

"I don't have time for that immature-" Leia cut herself off, her jaw clenching shut. Alice blinked. Wow, Han really did piss her off.

When she was composed, the princess started again, and this time Alice could detect an undercurrent of tense fear beneath her words, "I've been trying to contact him for the last five minutes. I don't know where Luke is, and Han was the last person to talk to him."

Suddenly, Alice was feeling the cold a lot more intensely, "What? What do you mean we don't know where Luke is? Where could he possibly be?"

"He was on patrol with Han," Leia said, seeing the way Alice was twitching and softening her tone a little, "Apparently he went to check out a meteor strike, but we haven't heard from him, and it's getting dark."

"So? You're telling me we don't have torches?" Alice demanded, exasperated, "Go and look for him!"

"Alice, I don't think you understand. All the other members of the patrol are back already, and our speeders still aren't working. I suppose we could send out some men to search close range but after sunset the temperature outside drops by at least thirty degrees. Any search party wouldn't get far, and Luke was way out beyond the secondary markers when he disappeared."

Alice paused, her hands twisting themselves anxiously into fists. She'd been outside of the base once, in the middle of the day with Engineer Bob to set up some scanner turrets. Even then, the strength of the cold had been frightening – she could almost feel her blood thickening in her veins. She didn't dare imagine how cold it was out there right now. "We can't just leave him!"

"Your majesty…" The two of them turned to see one of the computer operatives leaning towards them, one hand over his headphones, "Captain Solo has taken a tauntaun out to look for Commander Skywalker."

"What? That fool…" Leia snapped, "Get him on the radio now."

"We've been trying, ma'am, he's non-responsive."

"I'm going to the tauntaun stables," Alice said, decisively. Leia, talking urgently with the orderly, didn't notice, so she turned at once to leave. As she walked, she came across Threepio and Artoo heading in the opposite direction and rapped out, "You two, come with me."

"Oh my…"

Flanked by her metal compatriots, Alice burst into the tauntaun stables, shouting the first name that came into her head, "Tal!"

"Private Miller!" The soldier was looking distressed, "Captain Solo…we tried to stop him, but he wouldn't take no for an answer."

"I know," she said grimly, "he's stupid like that. Did he say anything before he left?"

"Just that he wouldn't leave Commander Skywalker to die."

Alice's mouth felt suddenly very dry. She tried to speak, but only a little squeak came out. She cleared her throat and tried again, "Oh. But...he was just being grumpy and rude, right? They'll be fine. Won't they?"

An uncomfortable silence prickled in the wake of her question. She caught sight of Aleya, the girl from the canteen standing at Tal's shoulder, anxiously twisting a cloth between her hands and desperately avoiding Alice's eyes. Not exactly reassuring.

"Okay. Alright." Feeling the desperate urge to punch something, Alice went and sat down on a nearby crate, sitting on her hands to prevent any sudden angry outbursts. Artoo rolled over to her and bleeped softly. "This is just like the Death Star all over again, huh," she said to him, trying to make her voice light-hearted, "those two will insist on throwing themselves into life-threatening situations and…leaving me behind."

The astro droid whistled, and Threepio said, tentatively, "Miss Alice, Artoo says he could try scanning for life-forms nearby."

"Would you, Artoo?" The droid beeped, and nudged her knee gently, "I'll come with you, then. Just let me grab a coat."

"Take mine," Tal said, who had apparently been listening in.

"Alright," she said without hesitation, tugging on the thick, fur-lined coat almost before it was out of his hands and pulling up the hood on the jacket she was already wearing, "thank you. Artoo, Threepio?"

Bracing herself, Alice and the droids headed over to the main hangar, where they stepped out of the huge metal doors of the base and into the freezing wind outside. The cold hit her like a slap in the face, clearly felt even through all the layers of clothes she wore. She squinted into the darkness, trying to see through the swirls of snow blowing past her nose. Or perhaps that was too fanciful – the snow wasn't so much swirling as hurling itself towards her, and the way it bit at her face made it seem more like ice than snow.

"See anything, guys?"

"Artoo is commencing his scan now."

Alice glanced down as Artoo extended a small scanner from his dome and began to sweep it back and forth, then returned her gaze to the horizon. The sun was slipping further and further in the sky, and she felt her tension increase the closer it got to disappearing. She thought back to that horrible period of waiting on Yavin Four, while the fighters attacked the Death Star. It always comes down to waiting…

It really was cold out here. They'd barely been out for two minutes and already Alice's cheeks felt raw from the bite of the icy wind. Her eyes watered, only for the tears to cool and freeze around her eyelashes, and her toes were turning numb.

"Miss Alice," Threepio said, "perhaps you should wait inside. It is terribly dangerous for humans to be out in these temperatures for extended periods of time..."

"You don't say," she said, reluctantly turning to shuffle back indoors, "shout if you see anything, okay?"

"I certainly will."

I never thought I'd call this place warm, she thought, as she stepped into the hangar. It felt like a tropical rainforest in comparison to the cold outside. Leia was waiting inside, anxiously twisting a pair of thick gloves between her hands.

"Hey," Alice said, going to stand next to her friend, "hear anything on the radio?"

"Nothing," Leia replied.

She sighed, "Yeah. Thought so."

Artoo and Threepio came in only half an hour later, at the insistence of General Rieekan. "There's nothing more we can do tonight," he said, his kindly face twisted with sadness, "The shield doors must be closed."

"You didn't pick up anything?" Alice asked, looking anxiously at Artoo. The little droid let out a low, sad hum, and Threepio said, in what was clearly meant to be an encouraging tone, "Well...Artoo does admit that his own range is far too weak to abandon hope entirely."

Behind them, the vast metal doors groaned and creaked as they slid shut, blocking out the rapidly falling snow. The sound they made as they shut had a dreadful tone of finality to it. Chewie let out a mournful roar, Alice hugged her elbows, and Leia looked away.


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