An Alderaanian Love Story

Chapter 16

  "It's done."
  "Not really."
 "Well, you don't have to deal with me anymore."
  Leia laughed at Raal's comment and sat back against the bedroom wall. "True. I hated dealing with you." She reached into the bowl between them and found a few more red candies. This was a long tradition of theirs, rooting back to their toddler days. One bag of Loper's Gum-Hard Candies, Raal got the blue ones and Leia got the red.
  "And now you can have someone to talk to."

  So quick into their conversation, the comment irked Leia, but she still smiled in agreement. "Yeah. Now I have my friend to talk to again."

  "And you can tell me all about how horrible Gram and Isolder are and how badly you wanted to pull your hair out." He grabbed another handful of candies and held them up in the air, proposing a toast. "To staying friends?"

  "To staying friends," Leia agreed, a sort of peace finally beginning to calm her soul. "And to true friends who listen."

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  [Alright, Cub,] Chewie hurried back to the cockpit, handing Han the supplies he'd gathered. [Just stay there, buddy. I got you covered. Look, I brought some hot soup and cookies from the downtown cafe, some reading material, some tissues, and Bria's goodbye note so you can remember it can always be worse. Anything I'm missing?]

  "No, that's fine, Chewie. Thanks. I think I'm just going to go work on the repairs in the . . . uh . . . the, um, the turrets. Yeah, I'll go fix the . . . yeah." He rose from the pilot's seat to set off, but Chewie stopped him with a long, hairy arm. [I'll let you go,] he assured Han. [But let me first remind you that 99.9% of the time when you go off to work on repairs . . . it's because you're upset. Now go ahead. And why don't you fix the missile launcher while you're at it.]

  "But we already fixed the missile launcher."

  [And we already fixed the turrets. Explain it to me.]

  Han left, shaking his head. He headed for the circuitry bay instead. Surely, there was plenty down there to fix. There always was. There was when Bria left. Han hated that Chewie had dared compare this to when Bria had left because, to him, this was completely different. He'd only known Leia for so long, but what was he to do when his heart weighed so heavily in his chest? For all the hope he'd ever kept stored there, it ached to see it so clearly squashed before him. Even if he'd never had a chance with her.

   Solo, he thought to himself. You're Solo, living up the solo lifestyle. I thought you liked things that way, just you and Chewie, running from  one bounty hunter after another, smuggling carts of spice, paying off debts. The epitome of solo. Without Bria, without the princess. Without anyone. What difference should this make now? Quit acting so stupid, thinking so naively. This is the same as when Bria left. Only, you had a chance with that Corellian woman.

  He shook his head again, taking a hydrospanner and loosening a latch to look in. A thick, goop of substance lined the inside of the pipe, spanning to the very back. Probably even further, Han surmised. He snatched a cloth from the work bench he often left in the bay and began trying to clean it out. He figured that eventually, if he worked on the Falcon long enough and found enough problems, his mind would be occupied and busy, not able to address the issues of his own D.O.A. love life. And so he put himself to work, fixing this and that until the circuitry bay shined like new durasteel and buzzed as happily a tune Han had ever heard his baby sing.

  Once he was finished and the Falcon was restored to her regular beauty, Han found himself digging through the rations cabinet, scavenging for whatever meals him and Chewie had stocked up. Their stock usually wasn't too bad. Some ration bars, frozen greens and frozen wampa steaks. Even if the steaks were the small kind, half the regular size, the tasted good enough to keep down. However, to Han's growing disappointment, today's choices were scarce and limited. The meats looked like they'd been picked from, bearing bite marks and saliva drippings as proof of having been founded first by invaders. Sure enough, crawling up the side of the freezing unit was an army of long, black, hissing bugs, their exoskeletons waving up and down as they went. "Hutt slime!" Han swore the child's curse, slamming the door shut. "Chewie! The freezer unit's infested with little crawlers. What are we gonna eat?"
  Alarmed and frustrated with his own repair tasks at hand, the wookiee clambered in, waving his arms about and protesting Han's claim. "No, it's true, Chewie! I'm telling you; there's a whole line of them marching around the door. Take a look. And they got to the food! Just great! Guess I'll just go out and get something for us."
  [Alright,] Chewie agreed, investigating the situation. [Meanwhile, I'll clean this up.]