The weekend passed by far too quickly for Leia's liking. Every time she left the Rebellion, she felt as though she were betraying her true self. It took quite a bit more energy to spend time at home with the cheery, royal façade of a young woman in the prime of her life. Now she was supposed to be in love, and faking that did not come easily.

She hadn't seen Han the entire day before as she was off in meetings and he was grouching around his ship fixing whatever piece had broken down now. When she made her way back to the ship the night before, she had felt an odd sensation in her stomach and felt a grin surface as she glanced at him.

Regaining control, she wiped it from her face and offered her fiercest look of contempt. Leaning against the doorway of the cockpit, she watched as he fiddled with the controls before clearing her throat and drawing his attention to her.

"Will we be ready to go tomorrow?"

He was filthy from the dust, grime, and grease of working all day, from his hair to his clothes. From the light in his eyes, she could tell he was as exhausted and exhilarated as she felt from putting in a full day's work. Passion did a number on one's emotions.

Looking up at her, he smirked. "Sure thing, Your Royalness. Do you have a full itinerary for our day planned out or could you just tell me what time you want to hit the road?"

"I have a few meetings I want to partake in in the morning, early afternoon, but afterwards, I think it would be necessary to head back to Alderaan. We want to arrive when it's still light out so that the public can see their favorite 'lovers' return."

Despite the look of exacerbation she had when she said it, Han stood from his chair and faced her straight on. Though she sensed a hint of a smile, there was a serious huskiness in his voice.

"Lovers? I like the sound of that."

She knew he was egging her on, knew that he enjoyed the blush that rose to her cheeks and the fury in her eyes, but she couldn't control herself around him. It was infuriating. Had she any common sense, she would have turned away and went to bed, but she couldn't bring herself to leave a fight.

Blood rushed up through her ears and she could feel her heart thumping. "You're deluded."

"Forgive me, sweetheart, but you're the one who brought it up."

"As a delusion that we are leading everyone to believe. If you can't separate fact from fiction, then you too are deluded."

She watched him take another step towards her, but she did not back away, no matter that a flush betrayed her cool exterior and she felt as though her heart was now pumping out of her chest. He was a predator, but she refused to be the type of prey who just ran off at the first sign of danger.

His voice was a near whisper as he leaned in. "The line between fact and fiction is always blurred, no matter how hard you try to keep them separate."

For an instant, she could feel his breath against the side of her cheek and her lips parted in anticipation, but he brushed past her, content in believing that he had the final word. She could have let him walk away, but instead she grabbed his arm in the space right below the elbow, holding him there.

"Captain, maybe that's true for someone like you who's run amuck from one side of the galaxy to another for gods knows how long, but I pride myself on my principles and my discipline and don't think for one second that your wily charms and crude innuendos can change that."

She thought she had him for an instant and she couldn't help the pride that rose up in her, which was stifled immediately as his temporary stunned expression changed to one of triumph.

"I knew you thought I was charming."

This time she let him go, unsure as to how she had gone wrong.

Han was dealing with the repercussions of lack of sleep from the night before as he sat, waiting for the princess to finish her meetings. He didn't believe her to be known for her tardiness, but the longer he sat whittling away the hours, the more impatient he was growing. He was certain that the moment he put the Falcon up into the air, she would reveal another piece of her that needed to be fixed, but at the moment, when he was desperate for something to do with his hands and to distract his mind, he couldn't find it.

He was certain that by the end of their run, she was going to take his sanity. He couldn't stop thinking of her, all the bad and some of the good if he was being honest with himself. She was consuming his life. From the long hours of solitary confinement where she left him to his own mind, the lack of flying and moving and exploring, to being holed up in a castle or a military base, separated from his best friend and oftentimes, his home, he was ready to explode.

The most fun he had these days were teasing her, but it was difficult to do when she made herself scarce. When she was around, she was a fun target because she threw it back in his face. With most of the women he'd spent a few days with, his words would be above their comprehension and they could never maintain the rapport. Part of him enjoyed riling her up, but the better part of him was relieved to have found someone he considered an equal. But Tatooine would freeze over before he ever admitted that to her.

From his view from the cockpit, Han watched as pilots came and went from practice runs or people rushed from meetings to the dining hall. One of the next three figures that approached and stopped outside of his ship looked familiar. He could tell it was the princess immediately, from her short stature and self-important stride he had come to enjoy watching.

Observing the small group, he saw their defined outlines as they stepped into the light. Riekkan shook Leia's hand before placing a gentle squeeze on her upper arm in comfort, as a father might.

The third figure revealed himself to be the over-eager Jedi Han found he couldn't help but like. The kid might be tripping himself over Leia every opportunity that he found, just to speak to her or be close to her, but his innocence and optimism was charming. Though he asked a lot of questions, Luke was an interesting person to have around, especially when Leia wasn't joining them. It was fun to talk to someone about ships, bragging about how fast the Falcon could fly and the heightened thrill of being in the midst of battle.

The kid had done quite an impressive bit of flying during the destruction of the Death Star and Han found himself an active participant and admirer when the princess wasn't part of the conversation, oohing and ahhing at the might of the Rebellion's young hero.

At the moment, his warm feelings for Luke dissipated as the kid leaned forward and clumsily threw his arms around Leia. A smirk rose to his lips as he watched as the princess's first instinct was alarm, before she pulled herself together and offered him a one-armed embrace.

He wasn't willing to let her get off that easily when she finally made her way onto the ship.

When he sensed she was standing in the doorway, he rounded on her. "For someone who's allegedly engaged to be married, I thought you might be more careful than to stand around exciting young heroes."

His desires were satiated when a bright blush crossed her face. "What? Have you been sitting around all day brooding? I invited you to the meetings, you could have made yourself useful."

"I've been working on my ship."

"What else could you possibly have been doing? I'm doubting our chances to even make it back to Alderaan in one piece on this hunk of junk."

"Speaking of making it back, I thought you wanted to get there during daylight. At this point, we'll be lucky if we make it back before tomorrow's sunset."

There was a fierceness in her eyes he hadn't seen before and he found himself wanting to explore that. As he opened his mouth to speak, she cut him off.

"Sometimes there are more important matters than feeding into the public's proclivity for romance. I'm not certain how many times I have to remind you of this, but your number one job is to fly me back and forth between Alderaan and the Rebel Base, while occasionally indulging in people's fantasies of the possibilities between a princess and a heroic captain falling in love."

"You keep talking about all of these different people, but I think you just can't get the images of all of these possibilities go from your mind. If you gave me a chance, I could make them more than just fantasy."

He tried to swipe past her with his final word, but she stood in the doorway, her arms crossed at her chest, blocking him.

"I am a princess and I will not be spoken to in such terms by some- some lousy smuggler who happened to be in the right place at the right time helping the right person. Now sit back down in that chair and get us back to Alderaan as safely as we can in your precious time bomb. If there are any respectable matters in which you wish to discuss, then I will be in the main cabin awaiting our arrival home. I beg you not to bother me."

Listening to her steps fade as she stomped away from him, he grumbled something about begging and went about making take-off preparations. This most recent battle was not the type he enjoyed, based more in condescension rather than the usual angry, heated banter.

By the time he set the Falcon into hyper drive, he had run through all the different ways he could get himself out of this mess. Many of his favorite options included spacing the princess into oblivion, but he knew he would be left facing an angry Wookiee along with the king, and that was not in his favor.

With the princess holed up in his cabin, Han stuck his feet up in the co-pilot's chair and leaned back, willing himself to sleep for a few hours, with the promise that upon their arrival back to Alderaan, he was going to tell Bail, and convince Chewie, he wasn't the man for the job.

Han was in the middle of a pleasant dream when distant screaming tore him out of sleep. It took him several long moments to realize where he was and what those screams might mean, but his feet got him to his cabin before his mind could catch up.

The continued screaming and pleading from Leia prevented him from hesitating at the door as he burst through, ready to face a mysterious attacker. Flicking on the lights, he found the princess writhing around on the bed, limbs attacking, scream after scream emitting from her throat. Faced with the prospect of awaking, and then comforting the princess from a nightmare, Han thought longingly of the physical threat that could have loomed.

Keeping his voice low, he attempted a gentle approach first. His whispers of "Leia-Leia-Leia- were drowned out by the sounds of her wailing, but he found that yelling back at her had no effect. Instead, he made his way over to her and laid a cautious, gentle hand on the arm closest to him. It was difficult to steady her as all four limbs fought to resist, but when he pulled her up into his lap, he waited as her breathing steadied and her body relaxed.

It wasn't as difficult as he presumed to comfort her, keeping an arm behind her back to stabilize her and the other hand stroking the hair she must have unbraided before bed. Han could have been lost in these motions, the beauty in the sensation of relief and peace washing over the sleeping Leia, but he was also on alert, both for signs of a returned nightmare and an awakening princess.

One eye opened, then the next. At first, she was as disoriented as he had been by his abrupt alarm, but her eyes widened in realization and her body flinched at the contact. Expecting a loud, menacing spiel about holding her in his lap, one arm around her in a semi-hug and the other weaving long strokes through her hair, instead, the voice that spoke out to him was soft and questioning.

"Alderaan, it-."

"S'only a nightmare. You can try to go back to sleep if you want. I'll just-"

He went to extract his arms from around her and push off from the bed, but as she sat up, she held him there. His eyes were trained on their conjoined palms, relishing in the sensation of it, but her serious tone drew him back to attention.

"It was more than a dream, Han, I-I-I saw it happen, it- it felt so real."

"They always do until a little later and you'll forget all about it. I'm sure you're just anxious to get back home and with the war and everything."

"It exploded into a million little pieces."

"That's impossible, sweetheart. Nothing in this galaxy is big enough to-"

"The Death Star could've done it, I heard rumors all about it."

Han frowned, but then offered her a smile. "Then it's a good thing your Rebellion took care of it."

She ignored his wink, looking deep in thought. "Thank the gods for Luke for that."

Standing abruptly, he allowed her hand to drop from his. They both looked at each other in alarm, her just realizing that they had been holding hands.

"Sure, yeah," he grumbled. "The kid is a regular hero."

"Han, I-"

"Listen, why don't you try to lay down. Focus on your breathing or something and try to forget all about that nightmare. S'all it was, I promise. No more Death Stars, no exploding planets."

"It's strange. I had a weird feeling about it, like it was happening in some alternate universe."

She was pleading with herself to understand as much as him. He allowed her a moment of ponderous silence before attempting to lighten the mood.

"Now you're just speaking crazy talk." He was pleased by the pinkness that appeared on her cheeks, seeing that she was relaxing and starting to swipe the memory of the dream away.

"Get some rest, I'm sure you haven't slept well while we were on base and gods knows how much sleep you get back at the palace. We'll be there in just a few time parts. Not too long after sunset, actually. I did a little maneuvering."

He wasn't certain why he so enjoyed bragging to her, but the small smile she returned was worth it. As he turned off the light, he heard her yawn and call out to him.

"Han? Why don't you lie down in here on the spare mattress. Just in case I- Well, it's far more comfortable then stuffing yourself into that pilot's chair in any case."

Lying down just a few feet away from her on the lumpy old mattress he couldn't bring himself to space, he expected that he would have too much to contemplate that would keep him awake, but the next thing he realized, the Falcon's alarms were blazing, signaling that they were coming out of hyperspace.

Leia came out of the cabin several minutes after he had, in time for landing. Though she did not speak of her nightmare or any of the conversation they had partook in just a few hours before, she was considerably warmer to him than she had ever been. Some nasty remark about the Falcon's landing capabilities may have been sitting on her tongue, but she kept it to herself, remaining silent as he landed the ship.

It was with a renewed resolve to perhaps stick this job out for its duration after all, since it would be well worth the money and the freedom it would allot from Jabba, or that was what Han kept reminding himself as he stole quick glances at the quiet princess who sat in her now designated space, diagonally behind him. Every so often, he couldn't help but feel as though she might just be watching him as well.

Despite himself, a smile grew as he saw the figure that was waiting for them to land come into view, which turned into a full on laugh at Leia's reaction.

"What d'you reckon could Grandma Organa be up to now, princess?"

Her eyes creased in concentration to go along with her frown. "Whatever it is, I have a bad feeling about it."

Han did not have a bad feeling about the smile she provided him in return.