The good thing about the Millennium Falcon's hyperdrive, it could power the Corellian freighter across the galaxy in a fraction of the time other ships could get across. The bad thing about the Millennium Falcon's hyperdrive was it couldn't go any faster than it did. Chewbacca would've liked nothing more than to be home already, but they still had several hours ahead of them in hyperspace, otherwise it would take them closer to a week to reach Kashyyyk. The other bad thing about the hyperdrive was it had a tendency to conk out on occasions. This was one such occasion.
Han dropped his toolbox and returned to his seat and told his navigator, "Alright, we'll try it again. I tell you, Chewie, sometimes I wish Luke would've taken me up on my offer to come with us, a spare set of hands would come in real handy right about now, especially if we run into anymore Imperials and have to start blasting."
Chewbacca grunted somberly in response.
"Hey, don't lose hope now, pal, we're still ahead of schedule," Han said. "Just think how excited your family's going to be to see you."
Han threw the lever and to honestly both of their surprises, the hyperdrive kicked in and the scenery outside once more became black sky and long white stripes again.
"Alright, we're back in business!" Han exclaimed victoriously.
Chewie threw his head back and howled in agreement. Now things were starting to look up, he just hoped it wasn't a precursor to the bottom dropping out.
With the kids out of the house for a while, it gave Malla a chance to get some baking done. She was just setting a bowl of wookiee-ookies on the kitchen table when she heard the front door open and heard all the kids roaring and rumbling as they came inside, she went to the living room and found all of them dusted in white and shaking it off on the floor. Malla howled at them to go outside and do that and not track up the floor, with an assortment of whines and grunts they went back out on the tree home's wraparound porch.
Itchy had put his camera away for the time being, picked up his cane and rose to his feet and made his way to the stairs and went upstairs to get his pipe. Time had slowed him down considerably, but he could still get around, and he refused to be waited on, though he knew his daughter-in-law would. He had no complaints about Malla, his son had married well, they'd always gotten along fine, though she could keep her kids a little more in line.
Downstairs the cubs had come back in and Malla promptly put them to work since they still had to get the house ready for when their father came home. Thisny had to take out the trash, Izaal and the twins had to wash and dry the dishes, and Lumpy had to sweep out the snow they'd tracked in before it melted. Lumpy whined as she handed him the broom, but he swept the frozen clumps of snow into a small pile, and when Malla left the room, Lumpy decided to take a shortcut and sweep it under the giant rug in the middle of the room. He swept the pile over to one corner and lifted it up, only to find a a crudely made sign taped to the bottom that read 'Not Here'. Lumpy grumbled and moved the pile over to the other side of the carpet, and picked up that corner, only to find another sign that said 'Not Here Either'. The youngest cub made a whining honk in frustration and stomped his feet on the floor, and swept the snow over to the doorway and back out onto the porch.
In the kitchen Izaal washed the dishes and handed them to Chinook, who dried them and handed them up to Nikomi, who was sitting on his shoulders, and put them up in the cupboards.
Malla meanwhile was sizing up the main course for their holiday feast tomorrow. A traditional wookiee Life Day dinner, bantha rump. But banthas had been in short supply this year. The one she got had been so scrawny, it would've taken two of them to make a regular meal. No matter, they'd make do.
A sudden bleeping sound got everybody's attention, the cubs looked at one another and grunted and honked in puzzlement. Malla roared at them to be quiet and stay where they were and she went into the living room. Itchy had come back downstairs and was already opening up the hidden panel in a shelf that hid their comm link system from Imperial searches. Maybe the Millennium Falcon was making contact.
The screen flashed a few times before an image came on the screen and the alarm quit. But it wasn't Chewbacca, or even Han Solo. It was a small group of people and two droids, a gold colored humanoid droid, and a short blue and white Astromech model, all of them speaking in unison and waving to the screen. Malla snorted suspiciously.
The humans were dressed in heavy snow clothes and gradually removing them and shaking off a ton of snow. One of them was a skinny young man with blonde hair and blue eyes and a huge goofy grin, the other was a shorter young woman with brown hair braided and rolled into buns on the sides of her head.
"Hi everybody!" the boy said. "We're some of Han and Chewie's friends."
The two grown wookiees looked at each other and grunted in conference.
"Oh wait a minute," the boy said, looking to the girl and to the droid, "I know Chewie can understand us, but can they?"
"Oh dear, I didn't think about that," the girl said half under her breath. She turned to the droid and asked, "3PO, can you translate for us?"
"That is what I was created for, Princess Leia."
Itchy snarled at the screen. The droid raised his arms as his only visible sign of reaction.
"That is Chewbacca's father, Itchy, he says they can understand us fine and to go ahead," the droid told the humans.
The girl waved to the screen and told the wookiees, "We haven't been formally introduced, I'm Leia Organa, and this is Luke Skywalker-"
The blonde boy waved, "Hi there!"
"This is C-3PO, and that's R2-D2," the girl pointed.
Malla howled in more than mild confusion.
"What'd she say?" Luke asked.
"Well if I heard her right," 3PO answered, "she said 'He's even scrawnier than the Corellian'."
Luke's face took on a slightly pink hue at that but let it go.
"Uh, I'm not sure if we got the time conversion right," Luke said, "but we wanted to wish you guys a Happy Life Day."
"Yes, Chewbacca's told us a lot about you," Leia added.
"Of course it helps that Han can translate," Luke said. "Well, how about bringing them to the screen so we can tell them hello too?"
The two wookiees grunted in mutual confusion.
Even with the language barrier, Luke's eyebrows knotted together as he realized, "They're not there? Well where would they..." his eyes got wide, "Oh, they haven't arrived yet? That's what you mean?"
Malla howled in confirmation.
"Chewbacca's wife says that her husband and Han Solo always get there on Life Day, so if they are coming, it won't be until tomorrow," C-3PO told them, then added, "oh dear."
Now Leia and Luke looked confused.
"Uh, Malla," Leia said, "Han and Chewie decided to take off early so they'd get there today."
Malla's eyes widened slightly as she let out a stunned grunt. Itchy looked at the humans on the screen and snarled out of one side of his mouth.
"They wanted to surprise you," Leia said. "It...was actually a very opportune time. We're in the process of moving our base, and we decided to split up for a few days."
"Yeah," Luke agreed. "We figured the Empire would be on the lookout for heavy levels of interplanetary traffic, so we got a few shuttles and sent them on an automatic course for Hoth, figured if the Imperials did pick them up on their patrols, it'd send them on a wild bantha chase. We're actually going to be moving our base to Hoth soon and we figured this way the Imperials will disregard the idea since we sent the shuttles on ahead to fool them. We also figured if we would cross paths with any Imperial ships and have a showdown with them, it could wait until after the holiday. We're..." Luke turned so the wookiees could see a large viewport behind Luke, and through it they were able to see a glacial wonderland, the whole outside was coated in a light blue ice and snow, "We're staying on Borealia, this place is amazing."
Leia smiled sheepishly and explained, "He's from Tatooine, he's never seen snow before."
"You should see the way the sky lights up at night here, it's incredible," Luke said. Then he remembered what he was originally saying and got back to the matter at hand, "Anyway, Han and Chewie left yesterday and figured they'd get there today and surprise you guys for the holiday..." his smile faded and a worried expression formed on his face as he said out loud, "but if they're not there yet, they're way overdue."
He realized he'd said the wrong thing when they heard the worried howls of the wookiees.
"I'm sure they'll be there soon," Leia tried to be reassuring. "We've had the misfortune of being passengers on the Millennium Falcon and we know the hyperdrive doesn't always work like it's supposed to."
A strange whistling chirping sound got their attention and saw it was coming from the blue and white droid.
3PO translated, "Artoo suggested that Captain Solo may have cut off the hyperdrive to blend in with the local traffic and draw less attention during the Imperial patrols, flying under the radar so to speak."
"If that's the case they're probably just running late," Luke said. "That would actually be...surprisingly smart of Han, for a change."
Malla howled at the screen.
"Malla says she agrees," 3PO told the humans, "she said Han Solo is a good man, but occasionally he's short on brains."
"Ha!" Leia burst out. "I agree, Malla. Well..." she grew more somber as she told them, "I'm sorry we spoiled your surprise, and I hope they get there soon...if they do, have them comm us so we know."
"Yeah, and try not to worry," Luke said. "We've known these two for a while and they're not going to let anything stop them from getting there."
Itchy grunted in agreement. He knew his son.
"Itchy says they will stay in contact with us periodically and let us know when Han Solo and Chewbacca arrive," 3PO told the others.
"Thank you, Itchy," Leia said. "We hope you guys have a Happy Life Day tomorrow."
The two wookiees waved at the screen and howled goodbye to the humans before the picture cut out and went to static. Itchy shut off the system and replaced the front panel to conceal it from any unwanted visitors.
Meanwhile, aboard Darth Vader's flagship, Executor, an Imperial captain approached the dark lord, stood at attention and told him, "Milord, we have news to report."
"What is it, captain?" Darth Vader asked as he stormed through the corridors of the ship, with the captain following beside him.
"Earlier we picked up several shuttles on our radar flying to the planet Hoth. We attempted contact but received no response. We boarded the shuttles but found no one, no personal effects, the coordinates had been locked in by remote."
"A diversion tactic by the Rebels," Vader said.
"Yes sir, and we have no way to know where the coordinates were sent from, but we did discover something that might be of interest. At the time we were tracking the shuttles, two of our star ships reported an encounter with a Corellian freighter ship that jumped into hyperspace. We have reason to believe it's the same ship that assisted the Rebel fighters when the Death Star was destroyed."
Vader stopped in mid-step. "Is that a fact?"
That day lived on in Darth Vader's memory. One fighter pilot, able to bring down a million man battle station that had taken 20 years to build, and he had been so close to obliterating that pilot.
"I have you now."
Yes, he remembered that day, that exact minute, he remembered the TIE fighter on his right being blown up.
"What?"
He remembered the TIE fighter on his left colliding into his ship and knocking him off course, allowing that X-wing pilot to blow up the Death Star. All because that freighter ship interfered.
"Yes, milord."
Vader contemplated what this meant for a minute.
The captain took the dark lord's silence as permission to continue. "We picked up another report of its sighting a short while ago. We believe its destination lies in the Middle Rim Territories."
That wouldn't narrow the search down much, but it was a starting point.
As if reading the dark lord's thoughts, the captain added as they resumed walking through the ship's corridors, "We ordered a blockade, a curfew, and started a search operation. It's just a matter of time before we find the Rebels."
That was music to the dark lord's ears. He was going to find the Rebel scum responsible for the Death Star's destruction, he would find the people responsible for that pilot's escape, and he would take an immense pleasure in slowly torturing them to death. He was going to make an example out of every last one of them. Their fates would not be so merciful as any of Vader's previous victims.
"I want the Rebels located and identified," he told the captain. "If it means searching every household in the system."