From a Certain Point of View
In the morning they both had a cup of kaffe and shared what passed as breakfast for someone who couldn't find his appetite and a princess who never ate. The rest of the short trip was spent in relative silence; while the pair mostly just tried to stay out of each other's way.
They sat in the cockpit of the Falcon, waiting to enter Dagobah's atmosphere. Leia stared out the viewport in what appeared to be deep contemplation. Meanwhile, Han stared at Leia. She was dressed in military-like fatigues, her small brown boots polished to a shine. Her hair was swept up in a coronet of tightly-wound braids surrounding her head.
The intricate weave of her hair was fascinating to the spacer, and he thought how its prim, taut design reflected the woman that sat across from him. But it was the little unruly hairs that refused to be pulled into the fray that Han found most tantalizing. A few wispy curls tickled her cheeks by either ear and along her forehead some disobedient strands hung loosely.
That was the side of the princess that he longed to uncover. The free spirit that he knew went along with that sharp wit and attitude. The smile and the sideways glance that peeked out from underneath her hardened exterior and the wispy hints of a woman beneath the cold shell of a politician and soldier.
When they finally entered Dagobah's atmosphere and Han caught his first glimpse of the planet's murky surface, their relative silence was finally broken. "I hope you don't think I'm landing my ship anywhere near this place."
"Calm down, Captain," Leia replied as her eyes scanned the planet below them. "Just give me a minute."
"A minute?" Han asked in return. "A minute to do what, exactly? Build a krethin' space port?"
"There, that looks pretty good," Leia replied calmly as her finger pointed off to a spot in the distance.
"What looks pretty good?"
"Yeah, that'll do nicely."
"Where?" Han asked as his eyes followed her direction, not seeing anything that could fit the definition of 'nice'. "Where oughtta do nicely?"
Leia stood up and pointed more emphatically, "Right there. On that ridge."
Han spotted the clearing she was referring to and said, "If by ridge, you mean deceivingly tall pieces of grass all huddled together to look like something, then no. No way am I landing my ship in that booby trap."
"I didn't know you were so risk averse, Captain, or I would've hired a different pilot."
"First of all, you didn't hire me and second of all, I am not risk averse. I'm a realist."
She turned and looked at him for a moment. The hint of pink-tinged skin was still apparent on her face and the natural light pouring in through the viewport made her eyes shimmer. "Will you just trust me and land the ship on that ridge?" There wasn't any teasing or taunting in her voice. Just pure exhaustion.
Han shook his head and rolled his eyes, just how he got himself into these things he didn't know. Turning back to his ship's controls, he began to maneuver toward the 'ridge'.
It was definitely a team effort and Han was more than a little impressed on how well Leia handled her co-pilot's duties. When all was said and done, it seemed that Leia had been correct about this particular piece of earth and as the Falcon set down with a solid thud, Han released the breath that he had been holding.
Han shut the ship down as Leia exited the cockpit. When he followed behind her several moments later, he found her waiting for him in the lounge with her tiny bag slung over her shoulder and her little droid sidled up next to her like a child.
Han walked past her and toward the exit of the Falcon without a word. Pressing in the ship's code, he watched as the gangway slowly lowered to the ground. The thick, smelly air of Dagobah rushed in like an uninvited guest, making itself at home in every nook and crevice of the small freighter. Han shook his head as he remembered how long it had taken him to get the smell of that garbage chute out of the upholstery.
As the smell crept in, he watched Leia and Artoo amble out. Following her down the platform he watched as she stepped onto the spongy ground and spun around to face him.
He was half way down the ramp when she spoke to him.
"You can leave now, Captain. Thank you."
"What?" He asked as he continued down the gangway towards her. "Oh no, I'm not just leaving you here in the middle of nowhere." When he finished speaking he stood before her, his feet still on the angled platform which magnified their height difference as he towered over her.
"I told you I wanted to disappear, what did you think I meant?"
"I didn't think you meant that you wanted to be slowly eaten by blood-sucking swamp animals on a soggy, smelly planet in the middle of the outer rim," Han replied as he looked at the vast expanse of nothingness surrounding them and his ship. Looking back at her, he said, "Just what do you plan on doing here?"
"That's none of your concern. I asked you to bring me here, that was all. I don't know how long I'll be." They stared at each other, she seemed to recognize the determination in his gaze as she said, "You can leave or you can stay, but I'm not asking you to wait for me."
Han swatted at his neck as he heard something buzzing around his ear. "Fine," he replied with a heavy sigh as he watched her turn around and walk away, her little droid bouncing around behind her.
He watched her until she disappeared amidst the trees, bushes and hazy air. Turning around and heading into the cockpit, he then sent an encrypted message to Chewie on Coruscant trying to explain his whereabouts. Sitting in his pilot's chair, his eyes relaxed and the swamp in front of him blurred. He quickly realized that what he had planned to be just a few missed appointments and an apology was now shaping up to be a potential career-ending, extended, not-so-much-fun vacation. But he had no intention of leaving Leia on this planet, so he settled in and waited.
The first couple of days she was gone, Han spent tinkering on the Falcon with any projects that could be completed on the interior of the ship. The smell and the humid heat combined with the aggravating mix of insects this planet laid claim to negated any ideas of working on the exterior.
Han thought about Chewie and wondered just how mad the Wookiee was going to be at him when they saw each other again. He didn't know what he was going to tell his old friend in explanation of his actions. Although if anyone could understand following a strange tug in your gut, it would be Han's lifelong friend and co-pilot. They had made a life out of following their guts over the years.
His patience worn thin by the third day, Han began to take daily hikes in an effort to locate the wandering princess. Quickly finding his scanner to be of no use - the millions of living creatures he picked up on the readings only serving to worry him more than he was already - Han tried to use his intellect and intuition to find her. He only found them to come up short of the task as well. Several times he thought of taking the Falcon up and moving his search into the skies, but the thought of landing that precisely again quickly shelved that idea.
Nine days had passed since the Princess left him standing on that platform. It was early morning and Han was asleep in his bunk when the Falcon's proximity alarms sounded. Slapping the acknowledge button on the console near his head, Han laid back on his pillow. The alarms had proven to be a nuisance on a planet chock full of roaming, hopping, slobbering animals, but Han had set it every night anyway taking some comfort in their watchful, mechanical eyes.
A light tapping on the ship's hull brought him to full alert, however, as he sat up and rubbed his eyes and waited to see if it had been his imagination. A slightly stronger version of the previous tapping had him up and headed for the exit in a flash. Checking the external monitor, Han breathed a heavy sigh of relief when he saw one petite bundle of trouble standing outside of his ship with her arms folded against her chest.
Pressing in the ship's codes, the gangway let out a loud hiss and began to lower. He stood at the top of the ramp and waited for her and Artoo to trounce up the ramp and then he closed it behind them. She walked passed him and headed straight for the lounge. The smell she left in her wake was enough to knock any remaining cobwebs out of his skull.
When he stepped into the lounge he watched her fling her bag on the holochess table with an exhaustive sigh.
She turned to look at him and said, "We can go back to Coruscant now, Captain."
He let out a quick breath as his mouth hung open and he looked at her in disbelief. "Excuse me?" He didn't even attempt to mask his annoyance and aggravation with her.
"What?"
"Where the hell have you been, Leia?"
She looked at him a moment and then she said, "To hell, Han," her chest puffed up and she added, her voice rising. "I've been to hell and back."
He studied her for a moment. She looked younger than she had ever looked to him before. Well, younger or eerily vulnerable, he couldn't be sure. "What are you talking about?"
Han watched her as her chest quickly deflated and her voice dropped down to a whisper, "You don't want to know."
She had left him over a week ago a tidy, little soldier going off to disappear and do goddess knew what. Looking at her now, it appeared she had fought her own little war, emotionally and physically. There wasn't a tightly-wound braid left on her head and every piece of exposed skin she had was covered in filth and mud. Here was the woman underneath that he had longed to see, but it was definitely not in the way that he had wanted to.
He took a step towards her and she flinched. Halting his approach, he whispered, "Try me."
Shaking her head, she replied, "I'm talking about things that you can't understand. I'm talking about things that you really don't want to know about."
"Why don't you let me decide what I want to know about and what I can understand?"
"Just take me back to Coruscant or leave me here," she replied, her demeanor becoming defensive once again. The politician, the soldier, the hardened shell snapping into place all around her. "I don't owe you anything, I'll pay you for your time and your fuel…but it'll be in credits, not information."
Standing in the lounge of his ship, Han could only look at her and shake his head in confusion and disbelief. What was it with this woman? He had never felt so angry and betrayed by a woman before in his life. He tried to understand what she might have been through, but her cool demeanor and harsh words sliced through his empathy and slung him right on the defensive.
"You need to freshen up before you're welcome in my cockpit," he finally replied.
She looked down at herself and a flash of red painted her face before she straightened up and said, "Sorry, I tried to make due."
"Yeah, well go and be sorry all you want under about a ton of soap and water. Don't worry about conservation, we'll make due."
She gave him a disgusted smirk, as if she was insulted by his audacity to point out that she stank to holy hell. He just shook his head and walked towards the cockpit. Maybe she had finally found something that would turn him off when it came to her.
Han sunk into his pilot's chair and mulled over the princess' words. He wondered just what she had meant by her comments. The sound of the water system humming to life made him picture her in his shower. Naked and covered with soapy water, he imagined her fingers running through her long, unbound hair, the soap bubbles gliding over her breasts and down her abdomen to the sparse patch of hair below. So much for not being turned on by her, he mused.
Han groaned and shifted in his seat when he heard the water system shut down. Get a hold of yourself, Solo. Usually personal chauffeurs don't get to boink the boss, and that looks like about where you rate.
They made it back to Coruscant the same way they had left, the relative silence and dummy hyper jump included. Leia's arms, neck and face had been scattered with scratches and bites and she had at least allowed Han to dab some antibiotics and bacta gel on them for her. The one hand, the mechanical one, was free of scratches and bites and Han did his best not to let his eyes linger on it too long or mention it to Leia.
When they landed, she tried to hand him a credit chip but he refused to take it. She thanked him and shook his hand as if they had just completed some sort of transaction. After she left his ship he felt lost and alone and he wondered just where the hell she had taken him to, literally and figuratively and any other which way he could try to make sense of it.
Han found the life that he had left behind as disconcerting as his bizarre relationship with Princess Leia. Turns out Chewie had left shortly after him and their boss had already sent replacements for them. Vespa cried and carried on dramatically and Han envied her ability to let things out in the open like that. He thought he might prefer that to all the guesswork and confusion all this 'relative silence' had gotten him.
It took several days for the reality of his situation to hit him fully and when it did it came down hard. Everything he had worked for over the past couple of years had been ruined by one fool decision over a woman; typical, but that didn't make it any easier to swallow.
He had not seen or heard from Leia since their return to Coruscant. Not able to stand it any longer, he hung around outside of her apartment building, needing to see her again. When he caught sight of her his heart dropped into his stomach and then quickly leapt up into his throat. She was walking towards him, accompanied by Roman.
As the couple approached him and finally noticed him, Roman grabbed Leia's hand and they both came to a stop before Han. Roman spoke first. "Can we help you?"
There was a long, awkward silence while Han stared at Leia and the couple stared back at him.
"Are you alright?" He addressed Leia as if Roman was not even there.
Leia hesitated and then said, "Yes, I'm fine."
Han stared at her, his gaze boring into the wide, brown eyes before him. She didn't waver, she didn't even blink.
Roman finally broke the silence as he cleared his throat and pulling on Leia's hand, he said, "Come on. Let's go, Leia. Good day, Captain."
He watched her disappear into her building on the arm of another man and it proved to be the final, knockout punch. He staggered back and steadied himself against the wall of her building, watching the busy streets of Coruscant buzz around him. What had he done? What would he do now?
Han got back on his ship and headed for Kashyyyk to try and work things out with the one person that he knew he could count on above all others. He found things on Kashyyyk left him only more lost and desperate, however, as Chewie told Han that he was home now and that their paths were no longer intertwined.
After spending the day with Chewie's family, the Wookiee was walking with Han back toward the Falcon after dinner. Han ran his fingers through his hair and let out a deep, long sigh. "It's good to see you home, Chewie. Malla and the kids seem really happy to have you back."
[They are, as much as I am.]
"I'm sorry I left you like that, buddy. But it looks like it might turn out to be a good thing for you, huh?"
[Yes. It'll probably end up being a good thing for you, too.]
Han stared at the path ahead of him. "Yeah, you never know, I guess."
[What will you do now?]
"Good question. Maybe there's a Sabacc game waiting for me out there."
[Don't set your sights so high, cub.]
Han spun around on his friend and they both stopped walking. His anger swelled inside of him as he saw all of his options fizzling out like suds on a pint of gizer ale. "Well, what would you have me do?"
[I would have had you not leave Coruscant on some fool errand.]
Chewie's words cooled his anger and Han looked away. He reached up and broke off a small piece of a low-hanging branch. Twirling the twig in between his fingers, he sighed, "I've got nothing, Chewie." He looked at his friend and then looked out over the edge of the platform where they stood. Throwing the small twig, he said, "I've sacrificed everything and got left with nothing."
[Why was that?]
Han turned back and looked at his friend. He fixed his jaw and remained silent.
[Why did you leave? What were you looking for?]
"I wasn't looking for anything. She needed help and I gave it to her. I should've known better. I should've never gambled with my life not knowing…"
[You can't go back and change that now. There's a reason you did what you did and only you know what that is.]
"Great," Han scoffed as he turned and the pair began to walk again. "I'm the only one to blame would be an easier way to say that."
Chewie chuckled. [Semantics. I was trying to be nice.]
"Why start now?"
They arrived in front of the Falcon and Chewie offered, [Stay for a few days, for as long as you need. Take your time, sort your head out.]
Han looked over at his ship. The only thing he had left that he could count on. "Naw. I appreciate it, but…"
[No need to explain,] Chewie replied as he rested his heavy paw on Han's shoulder. [Clear skies, cub.]
Han met the Wookiee's stare and said, "Yeah, thanks."
He walked into his ship and shut himself inside. When he sat down in his pilot's seat, he caught sight of the lone Wookiee standing and watching from a distance. Firing up the engines, he took the Falcon and headed for the skies.
Planet hopping had been something he and Chewie had done when they were looking for work, just popping in and out of spaceports all over the galaxy, trying to find work but usually only finding trouble. Han slipped right back into that world like he would an old pair of his spacer pants. Only he wasn't searching for work and whatever he was searching for, he never seemed to find it at the bottom of the bottle. That didn't stop him from tirelessly looking, though.
One morning, Han woke up in a strange place which wasn't that unusual of late, but unfortunately this place was a different kind of strange. He shook his head and rubbed his neck; it felt like he had been hit on the head with a gaffi stick. But then he was hit in the head with a stick, and he immediately made note of the difference.
When he came to, he was tied up and two women were walking around him like predators circling their prey. They were old and ugly and smelled as bad as Leia had when she came back from her vacation on Dagobah. The thought of Leia made his head hurt in a completely different way and almost overshadowed the throbbing pain…almost.
"Yes!" One of the old hags hissed and Han looked up at her with blurred eyes.
"Yes, he does think of her," the other one replied with a toothless grin.
"Now the trap is set."
"Now we wait for it to be sprung."
Han heard the blow to his skull before his frazzled nerve-endings felt it and then his world went black once again.