Leia helped Han clean up and change clothes and filled him in on all the interesting things that had happened since he'd been gone. He was somewhat interested in Leia's secondhand description of Luke's training and of the adventure of the escape from Cloud City, where the alliance was going now and anything she could think of before she told him what Luke had learned from Yoda and from Vader. It was still hard for her to deal with the idea that Vader was her father, and few people actually knew anything more than that she and Luke were siblings, except Beth, Chewbacca, Lando and Mon Mothma. So she finally just said it.

"Luke learned from this Yoda that we, me and him, are twins, separated at birth to protect us from the Emperor."

"Siblings?"

"Yes, to protect us from the Emperor and our father."

"Anakin Skywalker. I thought he was dead."

"No. He became Darth Vader."

"What?" Han was incredulous.

"I'm not happy about it, but that's what happened. I wish it were otherwise, but being Luke's sister isn't so bad. There are worse people to be siblings with."

"I'll agree with that." Han reached for her, pulled her close, one hand behind her head, his fingers sliding into the lower parts of the sandy wrapped braids, and kissed her like he'd been wanting to, but didn't dare try, for quite a long time. When they came up for air, he looked into her eyes and said, "I seem to remember you saying something about loving me too. If you mean it the way Beth meant it when she said it in the cell, I'm gonna be real disappointed."

Leia's face crinkled into a grin. "His highness's going to be jealous if you've been messing around with his girl."

"What about you?"

"I might just have to kill my friend if she's messing around with my guy."

Han grinned back at her and drew her in for another kiss.

His Highness ended up using wirecutters to get the outfit off of Beth. The wire straps left red sores on her hips, shoulders and back. He treated those and redid the dressing on her back as she lay on her stomach on one of the bunks in the other sleeping area. When he was done, he wrapped her in a blanket and helped her sit up.

"Feel better?"

"Yeah. You're not a bad medic. Now where are my clothes."

He lifted her into a chair he'd set out. "Don't you want to get the sand out of your hair?" He undid the metal clips and untied the blond braids.

Beth let him. "Aren't you hungry?"

"Starved. But there are things I need to do first." He was brushing her hair out and sand scattered on the floor.

"Like what?" Beth pulled the blanket in tighter around herself.

"Take care of you. I haven't been alone with you for more than three minutes in over a month, maybe longer" He let her chew on that while he finished with the sand-removal.

"Oh, yeah. Han sends his apologies. We were going to save Boba Fett for you, but Han accidentally set off the rocket pack with a battle prod and apparently, the guy flew straight into the Sarlacc's mouth. Since we figured that was where you were going to push him anyway, we thought we'd just leave him there rather than fish him out for you."

Beth's face brightened. "That was nice of you guys, to think of me. Of course, I had thought maybe to do a couple things to him first, but it's better this way. Bastard invited himself to my second questioning session on Cloud City. I figured out he'd been one of the troopers while Jabba's people were stuffing me into that. . " She paused, looking for a suitable word, found none that truly expressed her feelings and continued. "damnable thing. He took his helmet off for both the festivities. I didn't know who he was until he came in with the armor on at Jabba's"

Luke moved her hair and kissed the back of her neck. "He's dead and not coming back. You're going back to the fleet in an hour or so and Leia and I will be along after we go see Yoda. You don't have to think about that anymore."

"You guys were right."

"No. If we had seen most of what was going to happen to you, you wouldn't have gone in. No one deserves that." He had come around to the front of the chair, knelt, and was holding her face in his hands. "I am really sorry about what they put you through. I have a recognizable face and that would have kiboshed me as the bounty hunter. We talked about that. Besides, Jabba had to believe we were all working separately or he would have killed people then and there rather than wait."

Beth pushed her arm out of the blanket and touched Luke's cheek. "No one deserves lots of things, but innocents still get killed and worse. It worked, we're all out and we're all alive and together." She slid her hand behind his neck and pulled him to her. Her kiss was sad. He put his arms around her and the blanket and kissed her back. He moved carefully, avoiding her injuries and lifted her back onto the bunk. His own clothes were sandfilled, so he stripped down to his underwear before getting in with her. For the longest time, he just held her, putting them both into a light healing trance, searching for the wounded places in her body and psyche, letting the force flow in to help close them. Then, when he judged it would do far more good, he kissed her again.

Looking well-pleased with themselves, Han and Leia showed up back in the cockpit about an hour after first boarding. Luke appeared 45 minutes later, alone and attempting not to look pleased with himself. The rest of them were eating. Lando called the prince's bluff.

"Where's Beth?"

Luke grabbed a tray. "She's sleeping."

"Tired her out, did you, getting her out of that mostly not there outfit. Or just afterward."

"Had to use wire cutters on the damn thing." He sat down, took a bite and realized everyone was still looking at him. He swallowed. "Hey people, I'm not giving you a blow by blow account of the last two hours. If you really want to know what we said and did, you can check the computer. There's a program set up to record, for security reasons, everything that goes on

on and around this ship." The expressions around the table were priceless and suddenly, everyone was staring at Han rather than the prince. Luke smiled to himself. He knew the program was there, he'd set it up himself just before leaving the Falcon unattended for this most recent adventure. If someone was going to mess with the ships, he hadn't wanted it to be a surprise. He'd also turned it off before he'd gone in back with Beth.

Han stared back at the others looking at him. "What's everyone staring at me for? I didn't put any such thing in. Besides, if I had, it wouldn't have recorded what you're thinking of. Look at Lando."

Leia was watching Luke, who was calmly eating. He saw her watching him, smiled and winked at her. Leia shook her head and went back to eating as Lando, Han and Chewbacca argued. When she was done, she quietly went back to check on Beth, who hadn't come out yet.

Beth was getting dressed and moving quite well for someone who had had unsterile surgery less that 24 hours ago.

"How you feeling, Beth?"

"Pretty good. You two leaving?"

"In a little bit. Luke promised to go back and I want to talk to Yoda too. We'll hurry. Luke said the fleet should be assembled soon. It's up to you to get these smugglers there in time, Lieutenant."

Beth mock saluted, then zipped the jumpsuit up the rest of the way. "Yes ma'am, Commander. I will hurry them to the best of my ability."

Leia hugged her. "Are you sure you're really all right?"

Beth nodded. "Yeah. Luke can do those healing trances too, you know. But I'll stop by Medical when we get back, just for you." She was braiding her hair quickly and efficiently, then pinned it around her head. "Looks like Han was glad to see you. Your hair is mussed."

Leia grinned. "So it is. Luke's out there giving them hell for bugging him about what you two were doing."

"Good for him. Come on, I'm hungry. Did you guys leave anything for me?"

"Not if you don't hurry."