Something caught Han's attention. He looked past Leia for the briefest instant. "Alright, Padme. I've got to take care of some business before we take off, but if you want to go ahead, my ship is docked in bay 94. The Millennium Falcon."
Leia nodded. "Alright. Just make it fast, will you? The sooner I get off this planet, the better."
She stood up and pulled her hood over her head as she left the cantina. She made her way through the dusty streets of Mos Eisley, drawing on the Force ever so subtly to make herself forgettable to everyone she passed. Now that she was aware of it, she saw herself everywhere. It seemed like every screen she passed on Tatooine had her image on it, with the enormous bounty flashing temptingly underneath. The Mos Eisley docking bay was the largest building in town, and Leia had no trouble identifying it. She kept her eyes carefully down as she walked towards it.
Three stormtroopers guarded the door. Leia stopped half a kilometer from the docking bays and cursed silently. She looked around quickly, and saw a small landspeeder parked next to a small fruit stand. Her fingers twitched, and the speeder's engine hummed to life. The speeder began to move slowly at first, but it quickly picked up speed as it moved down the street. The speeder began to attract attention as people stopped what they were doing and stared, pointing and yelling for someone to stop it. Leia's hand pointed to the left and the speeder sharply turned and crashed into a junk dealer's shop. There was a loud explosion followed by several screams.
The stormtroopers instantly ran towards the site of the crash and Leia slipped silently into the docking bays behind them.
Docking bay 94 looked must like the rest of Mos Eisley: shabby and run down. It was a sharp contrast to the elite and up-to-date imperial bays that Leia was used to. The sloping sides were made of crumbling stone instead of smooth steel, and the bay itself consisted of little more than an entrance ramp and an enormous pit. But the state of the docking bay was nothing compared to the ship.
It was an ellipsoid ship that must have been passed through several owners. That was the only possible explanation for the hodge podge of its construction. It looked like it had been made out of fragments and components of other ships deemed unflyable, and were the situation not so serious, Leia might have laughed at the thought of this thing even getting off the ground, much less making it to lightspeed.
"So what do you think?"
Leia whirled around to see Han leaning against the entryway with his arms crossed and a satisfied look on his face.
"What do I think? This ship is a piece of junk!" She exclaimed. She turned to look back at the ship. "Is this some kind of a joke?"
"Hey, she may not look like much, but she can make it point five factors past lightspeed. I've put in a lot of special modifications myself." Han said defensively as he crossed over to the ship and patted the hull affectionately. "And I'm sick of everyone calling her a piece of junk!"
Well, if the shoe fits...Leia thought, but she kept her opinion to herself.
"And as it turns out, I'm actually a little rushed myself. So if you'll just get on board, Chewie and I will be right behind you and we'll get out of here."
The pilot turned back towards the door to the hangar and peered outside, one hand cautiously on his blaster. Leia watched him with a little bit of concern, but he was still her quickest way to get to Yavin 4 so with a little trepidation she boarded the ship.
The inside of the ship was just as worn as the outside, but obviously cared for. She sat down at a dejarik table and tapped her fingers nervously. Several minutes passed, and neither Han nor Chewbacca appeared. What was taking so long? She stood up and walked into the cockpit and looked out of the window. She saw Han and Chewie standing in front of the walkway up into the Falcon. Except now there were several armed men standing around them, and in the middle was…
A Hutt. Leia thought. She shivered in revulsion. She'd never actually met one since they'd largely lost their influence when the Empire formed, but she'd heard stories from her father. He was usually pretty tight-lipped about his past but once he had actually told his children that he had been owned by Gardulla the Hutt as a child.
Han was gesticulating grandly, pointing up into the ship. She bristled, realizing that he must be talking about her. Hadn't she told him she needed to stay under the radar? Hutts were nothing if not greedy, and if this Hutt realized Han's passenger was worth two million credits…
But then, the Hutt waved his entourage off. After a few parting words for Han, the Hutt turned and left. She saw Chewbacca look questioningly at Han, but the Corellian waved him off as they boarded the ship.
"What was that all about?" Leia asked when they entered the cockpit.
"Just a little confusion over a business deal, nothing for you to worry about." Han said coolly. Leia could vaguely sense his unease, but she decided not to pursue the matter. "If you'd like to take your seat, we'll be leaving this junk heap."
Leia returned to the dejarik table as she heard the Falcon's engines roar to life. The ship took off surprisingly gracefully and the town of Mos Eisley quickly shrank to the size of a pinpoint as the Falcon entered the atmosphere.
Once they were in space, however, the ship suddenly rocked and Leia was thrown out of her seat. There was the sound of blaster fire. "Han?!"
A stream of Corellian curses streamed from the cockpit. She struggled to sit up "Han, what's going on?"
"There are four Star Destroyers orbiting the planet!"
Leia's heart sank. Four? She knew they'd been able to trace her TIE fighter. "Are any of them Super Star Destroyers?" She asked, dreading the answer.
"No, just your regular imperial class...wait a second."
Leia didn't need him to finish. Her father's presence suddenly filled her veins. She could feel him reaching out through the Force, searching for her. And he was furious.
"There's a Super Star Destroyer coming out of hyperspace!" Han yelled. "It's Vader's ship!"
Leia sprang up and ran to the cockpit where Han and Chewbacca were furiously trying to outmaneuver the imperial ships. The Executor loomed in their line of sight cruising almost lazily. "Can't you outrun them? I thought you said this ship was fast!" Leia was struggling to keep her rising panic under control.
"Watch your mouth, sweetheart. I don't exactly outrun Super Star Destroyers every day! Don't worry, I know a few maneuvers, we'll lose them."
A wave of TIE fighters flew out of the Star Destroyers towards the Falcon. Even though she, unlike Han, was fully aware of what was at stake, Leia was shocked by the Empire's display of force.
Chewbacca was growling as his hands moved surprisingly fast over the controls. "Get our rear deflector shield up, or we're not getting very far!" Han ordered as he watched the fighters close in.
Chewie harrumphed in response and flipped the nearest toggle switch. "What exactly did you do to get Vader on your tail?" Han barked at Leia.
"Long story." Leia muttered. She threw up her arms instinctively to shield herself from the bright red light flashing outside as the ship rocked again. "There has to be something you can do!"
"I'm making the calculations for the jump to lightspeed, but it's going to take a few minutes. Until then…"
Han trailed off as he made the Falcon turn sharply to the right, towards the Executor. The sudden change in proximity to Vader caused Leia to rock back in terror. "What are you doing? Are you crazy?!"
"They aren't going to risk firing on their own ship, are they?" Han shot back as the hull of the Executor loomed dangerously close. The Falcon soared alongside the Super Star Destroyer and sure enough most, but not all, of the TIE fighters pulled back.
Leia couldn't watch anymore. She left the cockpit and fairly collapsed in the walkway. She knew they wouldn't blow up the ship with her onboard, but there was nothing stopping them from incapacitating the Falcon and arresting Han and Chewie once they'd extricated Leia. She could feel Vader gloating, he must almost have them. Two more deaths that would be all Leia's fault…
...then all of a sudden, the ship rocketed into hyperspace and she couldn't feel her father or hear the cannons firing anymore. She exhaled slowly. They'd made it.
Somehow Leia didn't feel like celebrating.
"Well, you can forget your troubles with those imperial slugs.I told you I'd outrun them." Han said smugly as he appeared in the doorway. "And now, I think you owe me an explanation."
Leia didn't look at him. "That wasn't part of our agreement."
"No." Han said agreeably. "But anytime I have to out maneuver four Destroyers plus Darth Vader there had better be a damned good reason. Now who are you, really?"
For a moment, Leia considered lying again. But the time for deception was gone. "My name is Leia Skywalker. Darth Vader is my father."
Whatever Han had been expecting, that definitely wasn't it. He leaned up against the wall next to Leia and ran his hands through his hair. "You've got to be kidding. You're the imperial princess?"
"I was known as Lady Vader." Leia corrected him out of habit, before she could stop herself. "But I've turned on my father, and the Empire. I have with me the technical readouts for a battle station capable of blowing up entire planets, and I'm going to see to it that they make it to the rebellion so they can destroy it."
Somehow, Han's face turned grayer. "So that's what happened to Alderaan. The Empire claimed responsibility but I thought it would take a thousand ships with more firepower…"
"You've seen what it can do." Leia cut him off. "So you know why it has to be destroyed."
"I don't get it." Han said as he sat down next to her. "I've been hearing vague stories on the HoloNet for days about a theft from an Imperial base, but they were blaming the rebellion. So it was really you?"
Leia shook her head unhappily. "No, it really was the rebellion at first, but I intercepted them on Danuta. I was still an imperial agent at that point, and they were downloading the plans onto the chit when I found them. I guess they planned to transmit them to the Tantive IV, but I didn't know that at the time."
"And you didn't kill them?"
"I meant to. But then one of them mentioned my mother...I never knew anything about her, you see, not even her name. My father refused to talk about her. And after growing up knowing that Luke was going to be a Sith like my father...she just sounded so different than everything that I thought I knew. I guess it was the first time in my life that I wondered if there might be a different way...if maybe the dark side wasn't the only way…"
"How did you know?" Han asked curiously. "If you didn't even know her name, how did you know that they were talking about her?"
"The Force sometimes...it leads you to things." Leia tried to explain. "Things that you are searching for, especially if you don't know if yourself."
Han looked skeptical at that, but Leia continued. "Anyways...I didn't know what to do. I did take the plans from them, but it wasn't hard for me to convince them to just...continue on with their mission. I waited for them to leave before triggering the alarm, figuring it wouldn't hurt to let them escape since they didn't actually have anything, and they would probably lead us to some of the rebellion's leaders. I went straight back to Imperial Center intending to hand the plans over to my father. But then I found out about the Tantive IV and I met Senator Organa and things started moving so quickly. I kept meaning to give them back, I just...didn't. And then I wouldn't."
"And now you're on the run from Darth Vader." Han leaned his head back against the wall. "Geez, sweetheart."
"If you don't want to help me anymore, I understand. Just drop me off at the nearest port, and I'll find another ship…"
"Hey, don't be so dramatic. I said we'd get you to Yavin 4, so we're going to Yavin 4. This wasn't my first run-in with the Imps and it won't be my last."
He patted Leia on the shoulder, stood up, and went back to the cockpit. She watched him go, and wondered if she should follow him and insist that he drop her off somewhere. Getting away from Tatooine had been way too close for comfort and Leia absolutely did not want to put anyone else in danger. But then it was also very likely that their close encounter had already doomed the Falcon because Vader had sensed her presence. Even if they did separate the Empire would likely still hunt Han and Chewbacca down. At least if Leia stayed with them, she could potentially barter for their safety if they got caught.
She sighed. Now that that was decided, there was one other thing she needed to do. Although she had closed herself off to her father, she needed to talk to Luke. She needed to apologize, needed him to understand why she was gone. He had to understand; he was all that Leia had. She wasn't concerned about making contact with him. Not even Force users could track a person through hyperspace. She took a deep breath, entered a meditative state, and reached out for her brother.
Luke…
But there was nothing. She frowned. Nothing had ever been able to separate her and Luke before. Their twin bond, or whatever you wanted to call it, had always seemingly been unbothered by distance, emotion, anything. But now Leia felt an emptiness inside of her where her brother had always been.
Luke...can you hear me? I...I'm so...I'm sorry.
For a moment, there still was nothing. Then there was brilliant flash of red light, and a wave of anger so powerful that Leia felt like she had been punched in the stomach and she doubled over, gasping for air. She looked up and saw her brother.
Luke…
Leia. The image of her brother said curtly.
She stood up slowly, peering at her brother. There was something different about him. He seemed rigid and distant and when she looked into his eyes, she gasped. His eyes, once a bright and brilliant blue, were changing. There was a distinct yellowness to his pupils that had not been there before. Luke, what is happening to you?
You left me. Luke answered, ignoring her question. You were all that I had, and now you're gone. You were selfish!
I couldn't stay, I made a choice. My biggest regret is leaving you. But you still have our father.
Our father. Luke scoffed. All he cares about is my power. He took me from the Death Star, after you left. And he...I…
What is it? Leia cried desperately. What is he doing to you?
Do you know what has happened to me since you left? Do you know what I am becoming?!
Tell me!
But Luke only grimaced, and then he was gone.