It wasn't really known if the tzical, symbol of the Unity festival, really had feathers, and if so that they were indeed purple. It was an artist's rendering of a fossil fragment. Somehow the idea took off and now feathers were a main component of the holiday. Some incorporated it quietly, with a spray worn on their lapel, while others had whole costumes adorned with feathers. The tzical had been extinct for many thousands of years, but its bones were found all over the planet, large land masses separated by even larger seas. It died out near the time of the rise of humans on Alzrath, and it was seen as the great unifier, for no matter how differently humans evolved on parts of the world, they all had known the tzical, and that gave them something in common.

Across the galaxy, Leia had traveled through civil war to come to Alzrath. She doubted her role in the war would be honored. Perhaps she was like that fossil fragment, poorly interpreted and incorrectly assigned. But there was something to the story of the tzical that grabbed her. Innocence of intent was a romantic notion, really.

"What if," Han was saying, eyes and fingers concentrating on attaching a spread of purple feathers to his vest. Han, her some-time pilot through this war, chosen by her. Unity was also a lover's festival. Mass marriages conducted outdoors. She was terribly aware of the subterfuge, every layer of it.

Her festival wear was two epaulets attached to her shoulders. They were large and high on her body, made up of purple feathers of various length, gold-colored, stiff ribbon, and hair-like strands of synthetic fiber colored gold, black and purple. Her hair had been dyed lavender.

"You look hilarious," Han had said, serving as her mirror, and that's why she chose him. They weren't lovers but he spoke his mind, truthful or not, in a way others held silence. He looked- not hilarious, but certainly a bit extraordinary. A boa of phony purple feathers wove its way in and out of his belt, the only outrageous nod to the costuming of the holiday. The rest was more subdued, handsome even; a good disguise for a smuggler. A light purple bow tie matched the highlights in his hair and the spray pinned to his vest was an elegant touch.

"Let's switch," Leia said of her outfit in return, "since you are rarely funny."

"What if," he continued, smiling down at his spray. Her barbs rarely bothered him when they were off base. In front of the others he might call her Your Humorousness and together they would compete in a battle of wits until the barbs stung with an underlying truth and before they knew it they found themselves alone, glaring at each other without an audience.

"What if humans were responsible for the tzical's extinction. Huh? That'd be ironic."

"They weren't hunted," Leia replied. "They just died out."

"Bet humans did something," Han muttered darkly.

He had come to this truth long before she met him and she doubted she would ever be able to sway him otherwise. It was another reason she chose him. Before the war broke out he was earth and she was sky. She was the tzical, soaring, but also dying.

Han led the way down the narrow hallway, trying to decipher the numbers on each door written in Alzrath. The light was dim but he saw the carpeting was threadbare. It actually had bald spots.

"Here we are," he announced in a quiet murmur. The closed doors commanded quiet. Leia stopped behind him and waited to gain access to the room. It had been a long day of travel. The neglected hallway was a sign it might be a long night.

Han let the door swing open and got his first look at how he was going to spend the night. Not happily, by the looks of it.

"Oh," he said gloomily, turning his head over his shoulder to speak to Leia. "You're not going to like it."

The backpack over his broad shoulders blocked her view. She tried to peer around him "What is it?" she asked. "One bed?"

Han made a noise of disbelief. "Really?" he said. "That's your greatest fear? Sleeping with me?"

"Sleeping next to you," Leia corrected.

Han filed that away for later. There was something else that took his immediate attention. "It's got a bug infestation. Bunch of little critters scattered when the door opened."

Leia sighed. "Ugh." She sounded dejected. "I'm not going in there."

"I don't want to, either. Want to risk switching to another room?"

"If they have one." She debated with herself a moment. "No. My skin is crawling thinking about it. Let's get our money back and leave."

"And go where? This is the sixth place we've tried. Everywhere's full. Seems like the whole galaxy is in town for this shindig. You want a room you gotta bunk with bugs."

"War does not make advance reservations, Captain."

"Right, right," Han nodded behind her as they reversed their steps. "Another of your blanket statements."

"Speaking of which-" she said, preoccupied.

"Yeah?"

But Leia had reached the clerk's desk and was filing a complaint.

In the minutes it took to first obtain and then reject the room it seemed the party atmosphere was picking up outside. The going was slow, the streets filled with a variety of life forms wearing purple and feathers and there to enjoy the festival. There was a lot of laughter and singing, and beings danced where they stood. Vendors sold food, carved figurines of the tzical, and various arrangements of feathers and bone.

"Let's not get separated," Han warned the third time someone blocked their path. "Or shot. Hold the backpack strap and that way I'll know no one is messing with it."

"I won't trail behind holding a strap," Leia said. "It's Unity. That will look ridiculous." She reached her left arm across his lower back. It wasn't her dominant hand and it felt awkward but she hooked a finger into his belt loop.

Han enjoyed the sensation of the light pressure of her arm across his hips for a moment. It left the backpack vulnerable but it wasn't the first time he'd thrown caution for pleasure.

"Stop here." Leia had Han wait outside a boutique. He went through the backpack while he waited to make sure they hadn't been victims of a pickpocket, and then leaned against the wall, watching the dancing. He didn't wonder what she was doing, but that caused him to wonder about himself. Soon enough, she came out with a bulky parcel under her arms.

"What's that?" Han wanted to know.

"I expect it will be more of a souvenir once we get back." She sounded efficient and breezy, the confident and capable Princess Han had come to know. "But necessary for us tonight."

"What is it?"

"Bedding."

"For us?" he repeated, to be sure. This surprised him a little, but there was no denying she had used that word. He moved a finger between the two of them, again to be sure.

Her brows went up. "Would you prefer I invite those revelers to join us?" she indicated a group of beings who were shouting a poem in the street.

"No." Han smiled. "I was making a blanket statement."

Leia rolled her eyes. "Of course you were." She led him across a thoroughfare crowded with speeder traffic. "I admit it was a good one."

They entered a park. There were pavilions, garden paths, a hoverball court, and lots of purple feathers. A stage had obviously been erected for the festival, but it was not in use right now. Leia crossed over what felt like acres of grass and marched to a large tree. When she stopped Han kept going. He figured she had found a short cut.

"Han, come back. This is it."

"This is what?"

"Where we're spending the night."

"Oh." Han let the backpack slide off his shoulder. "We're camping?" He'd been in lots rougher places, and besides, he liked her choice of words.

"There are no other rooms. Lots of beings are using the park. Look at all the people spread out on blankets. We'll blend in with all the celebrating and in the dark we should be safe."

"Fine," he agreed. "Only where will you brush your royal teeth?"

"There's a public pavilion over there. Perhaps you wouldn't mind scrubbing your inner charm."

Han bowed. "Not at all, Your Highness."

She had gone into the boutique to get away from the crowd and the purple and to think. And this is what she had come up with.

She passed Han a bright green down blanket. Hers was sky blue, at least the blue of Alderaan's sky.

"Bright colors," Han observed. "We won't be too camouflaged."

"Actually I am going for visibility. I don't want revelers to use our tree. The colors form a boundary."

"You could have bought a tent."

"It wasn't that kind of boutique."

"We could climb the tree, get off the ground," Han suggested. The branches were good for it, wide and parallel to the ground.

Leia looked up at the dark foliage. "I had a friend once who slept in a tree and fell out. He suffered a paralyzing injury."

"Kriff," Han said. "You're full of surprises, you know that?" He wondered who the friend was. How old she was when it happened, what it had meant. "You learned his lesson, huh."

"I did."

They worked on folding their coverlets and creating a sleep site. Down had been a great choice and she hadn't been thinking of her royal rear but how hard the ground was. The coverlet was large and when folded in half, it was very thick. When Han lay down, his body sank into it and he barely felt what was underneath.

He sat up. Leia was combing her shoulder epaulets with her finger, frowning slightly with her face twisted toward them. He couldn't recall her making an unconscious gesture like it before. She was always so deliberate. He liked watching her tend to the decorations, awful as they were. It was like learning something about her, how she was before all she had was the war.

"I got to admit, Princess, you're handling this escapade with aplomb," Han beamed at her.

"Aplomb?" she lifted her face to his and was smiling. "I see you also scrubbed off an advanced vocabulary."

He smiled back, enjoying himself. "You adapted to this unpredictable set of circumstances pretty well."

"I wouldn't say it was unpredictable," Leia reasoned. "More unexpected."

Han made to get up. "I'll clean that vocabulary again."

She laughed and grabbed his arm. "Don't. I wasn't insulting you. Just... I don't know. Talking. How I know to talk."

"I wasn't insulted."

"Good. I like camping."

"I knew you were gonna say that!" Han exclaimed in quiet triumph. "I honed in on that, now I see you beamed us right to the park. Did you use down quilts then, too?"

Her smile grew wistful. "No, there were proper camping supplies."

"Did you save the budget by having us sleep in the park?"

"No, actually, I shot the budget all to hell." Leia smiled at him like a conspirator. "These," she pet her milky blue coverlet, "were expensive."

Han risked another question. "Is that how your friend fell out of a tree? Camping?"

Leia's expression changed. "That happened on the palace grounds. He was- he'd been drinking. It was stupid."

"Yeah. Too bad."

"Yes. It's not a risk I want to add here."

"But me, fall out of a tree?" Han put a hand to his chest. "I'll have you know, Highness, I learned from Wookiees how to climb."

Leia shrugged expansively and looked faraway. "I often worry about you men. The Rogues- do you have something to prove? The excessive risk-taking... there's a wildness to it at times."

"Thanks for not saying stupid."

"Maybe you interrupted me and I hadn't finished."

Han laughed softly. It made him feel nostalgic, when she was witty. It was how they met. That sharp humor wasn't on display often. Her smarts were, all the time. Maybe war wasn't a time for humor.

She was continuing her thoughts on the topic. "Luke is the only- well, he'd so something heroically stupid."

"That's sounds about right." Han chuckled some more.

"Although you were heroically stupid on the Death Star," Leia added thoughtfully.

Han waved it away. "That was a slip."

They folded the coverlets in half, and then half again. Han was on her left and his blanket opening was beside her. She held the same arrangement, so that her opening portion was farthest from him. She had a feeling it was deliberate. She was next to him, after all.

They lay next to each other, the fold of the coverlet separating them. Leia met his eyes and felt her lips smile softly in response. He was very close, and elsewhere in the park lovers secluded themselves under blankets. The hair-like fibers of the epaulets were tickling her cheek and she was hyper aware of their subterfuge. She had a feeling it was unfair.

"Lots of memories for you tonight," Han said. "Your friend, and camping. And down quilts."

Memories were not uncommon for Leia on a mission. She usually kept them private. A mission had a goal, which ultimately had another goal, which was to achieve justice for her homeworld. "Lack of indoor 'freshers," she added, to keep the memories at bay.

"That, too."

Something about the festival though, the energy and the joy. She and Han could probably take part and be welcomed, dissolve into the night. "Have you ever been to a perfect place, Han?"

Han lifted his eyes to the sky. It was properly nighttime now, but it was hard to see the stars as the city had so many lights. "No," he said.

"Of course not."

"You haven't, either. There's no such thing." There was, Han added to himself, a perfect time, however. And right now was coming close. "Are you tired?" he asked.

"It's not that late."

"I forget; you don't sleep."

"I do, I just have a late bedtime."

"Little early for me, too. I'm hungry."

"We can't leave. I don't want to lose our spot."

"Buy me a big breakfast then."

"I promise."

They listened to the street party. The poem sounded like three separate versions were being shouted in the park. Distantly, the thump of loud music came from an establishment. Speeders hummed and honked. Leia's head rested on her elbow and she was looking at him.

"Something you said earlier," he brought up.

"What did I say?"

"Next. That you were afraid of sleeping next to me."

She shook her head a bit. "I don't know. I don't remember."

Han tucked his own elbow behind his head to mirror her position. "Oh, I think you do. I think it was a slip, like there've been a few tonight."

"A slip?"

"Next to me might lead to with me."

"See, just that. I do remember. Your blanket statements, as they were."

"Hey," Han objected. "I'm insulted."

"No, you slipped."

"I -" Han closed his mouth. Then he brought his hand out from under the cover and wagged a finger knowingly at her. "You slipped first. I think you don't want to, because you want to."

"And I think you want me to slip so I'll slip."

"You already did, Princess. And what happened? You're fine. Sleeping al fresco with your own blanket. A blue one at that."

Her brows went up. "Do you prefer the blue? I'll switch."

"Too late."

"Why did you mention the blue?"

"I'm not sure."

"It was an anti-slip."

"A what?"

"A way of getting control back."

Han growled, not feeling like delving into psychology. Especially his own. He changed the subject.

"You should take these off." He fingered the epaulets on her shoulder. "You'll crush them in your sleep."

Her cheek felt the tickle of feathers and the warmth of Han's hand. She felt like crying. He may have been making an effort. It was hard to tell, whether he was slamming into barriers she'd set up or didn't know how to exit his own, but she just couldn't.

Eventually, he fell asleep. She marveled at the ability, when there was so much noise and activity around them. He hugged the backpack, and she lay for a long time on her back, looking up into the branches of the tree.

"Leia, I think we better go."

She opened her eyes, not having meant to sleep and annoyed with herself. The backpack was between them on the green blanket near their chests. Han sheltered it, leaning a little forward over it, his head propped up on his hand.

"It sounds different," he said.

Her eyes left his so she could concentrate on the sound. The sky was gray and shapes were black. No one was shouting a poem, but there were shouts, incoherent and not connected.

What if humans had done something to the tzical, she wondered suddenly. What if Han were right, because it was happening now, it was happening, human against human. There was- not smoke in the air, not yet, but stress, and tension, and life was going to be irrevocably changed, until there were just memories, like the tzical.

Now there was a rhythm, a tempo, a beat: the snap of armor marching, even across grass. Han's head turned and then with a sudden motion he threw his blanket over his head and rolled atop her, as much as the backpack would allow.

Green atop blue, she unable to feel anything but weight, air too warm and too little to breathe, and she struggled.

"Troopers," he said in her ear. The magic word, she thought with a bitter irony to get her to stop, and her fingers, which had been pushing against him, kneaded once into his chest and stopped.

She felt suddenly very lonely and very stupid, that she was going about this war wrong. What would she have, if she won? A folded blanket, the word troopers, and purple feathers.

When she could have- the word with, one blanket. To stand in the street and shout a poem-

Something to share.

The troopers marched away and the clang of their menace ebbed. Han pulled the green blanket off his head and lifted himself on his elbows. Leia took a big breath.

He fingered her epaulet, doubtless crushed. "Sorry," he said.

"Me, too," she said, and meant it. She indicated she wanted up, and he rolled to the side, watching her. While she folded her blue blanket in quarters, she looked around. The black shapes were clearly trees now, green leaves and gray-brown bark. The grass was littered with bottles, feathers, and other trash. The lovers who had spent the night wrapped in their own blankets had entered the area in front of the stage and huddled together protectively in the wake of the armed display. Three men stood on the stage, dressed elaborately in shining embroidered cloaks, holding rattles of bone. It would be the site of a mass marriage ceremony, Leia realized.

She placed her blanket atop the backpack and folded Han's and lay it atop hers. Then she held out her hand, asking for his. He stood and gave it to her, and they walked the short distance across the grass to find a place among the lovers.

"We'll be safe here," she said.