( outline of rotj as watching film )

So definitely, need to plan what ooms with who. I know Ashie - you have stuff already planned for Esfir. I need to prethread with Ben and I need to ponder if anyone will be coming along besides Ben for Great Adventures In Blowing Shit Up.

There's a slight sense of something growing near on the ship once they disembark off the Falcon, into the hangar bay. It hasn't been long at all since she was last here, but the war is getting closer.

Pilots are out running attack runs and mocking up plans for possible confrontations, so everything is a bit busier and there's more people around, but when you're just a pair of pilots, in flight suits, with helmets under your arms and a sense of purpose, nobody really cares where you're going.

Being a general might help with that as well.

Han sets his helmet on one of the A-Wings and then starts the preflight.

"Mech droids scanned them earlier this mornin'," but it doesn't mean he's not going to inspect the craft himself, and he knows she'll do the same with hers.

Han's kneeling on a cross-beam in what appears to be a small room full of various blinking lights, wires, and parts as he pulls Esya up into the ship from the bar. There's room enough for two, and only a slight squeeze through the innards of the ship to the deck above.

He's sure to wedge that wrench in the access hatch to the bar, just to be safe, so they can find a quick door back to the bar if they need one.

"Promise, she's a lot more spacious up top," he says, as he turns and makes his up up through the hole and onto the deck panels of one of the mostly-empty cargo holds.

Chewie lets out a soft warble as Han returns into the darkness.

"Yeah, the bar," Han replies quietly, before he drops onto the ground and leans back against the wall. His vision isn't any better. He hadn't expected much of a change but at least some light would have been appreciated. "Woulda brought you somethin' if I'd been able to see where the kriff I was walkin' around."

The wookie sighs and then takes a seat beside Han, and pulls him close, large paw stroking over his friend's already messy hair.

"S'okay, we'll get out of this."

"Mmrraff."

"Yeah," he chuckles. "Just like old times, pal."

( Read more. )

The bar stays gone for the next few years. The scrap of paper gets lost in the shuffle of constant travels and the rush of swoop racing, the races, the fights, the beatings (they don't come as often, since Shrike doesn't want to risk hurting him so bad that he can't work) and the long nights staring at the black outside the ship through the window near his bunk.

Waiting for something.

What it is, he's not quite sure. But over the years the bar stays gone, Han grows into a top class racer, an expert liar, and a quick fingered and smart witted thief.

Waiting for the moment.

It comes when he catches sight of an ad for brave and skilled pilots, and plans to stowaway to Ylesia. Shrike, when he catches him trying to escape, isn't happy. He's almost caught, but Han watches Dewlanna -- his foster mother, the one who nursed him back to health after so many of the beatings -- sacrifice herself, so that he can escape.

He'll pay her back, someday. He swears it.

( Read more. )

There is no journey without risk --

there is no way to tell the passing of days, of weeks, of months. each cycle moves just the same as the next, an endless loop of time, brought on by the quiet hum of progress. blood does not flow, his heart does not beat, eyes do not see.

the suns rise and fall in time with the movement of the universe; the birth of a galaxy, the death of a star.

near hoth, asteroids collide with violent force, scattering projectiles through the empty darkness. steam rises from hot dagobah swamps. transports move about corsucant in neat rows, people, goods, money, all moving, all making their way towards something.

there is no way to know how long he's locked away, eyes dark to the change of the seasons on corellia, hands numb, toes and legs still, his chest doesn't move, his body sleeps.

and sleeps.

and sleeps.

( Read more. )

When he walks back through the door, it's not exactly walking. It's darker than he remembered coming through, and he trips on something in the fog and stumbles, falling, hitting the ground with a dull thud.

"C'mon, Solo," the tin voice of a stormtrooper in his armor. "Get up."

They drag him to his feet and then walk him the remaining distance to the cell, then throw him in. His body feels like hell, and the warm booth at Milliways, the whiskey with Ben Wade, the comfort from Demeter fades like a burnt out star. Maybe he was dreaming it all, just an after effect of the poison running through his veins.

A familiar bark jars him out of his funk and he lifts his head as large, furry arms wrap around him and pull him up.

"I feel terrible."

( Read more. )

The ship tilts as the blasts of laser fire from the Avenger slam into the hull, warning lights flickering in and out in the cockpit, silent alarms, warnings, everything telling Han what's happening to his baby and what she needs to stay in one piece.

This ship following them is faster than the others, and she wants them bad and Han knows it. No Star Destroyer would be following them through the asteroid field, taking the direct hits from the smaller rocks unless it was operating with one goal in mind. Not to kill, no, but to capture.

Like hell they're getting me alive.

( Read more. )

The art of flying a ship in space is one that many pilots take years to perfect. For as young as he is, Han Solo is one of the best pilots ever spoken about in the galaxy. If you ask him, of course, regardless of his age he is the best pilot in the galaxy, hands down.

And while the Falcon may not be quite as nimble as other fighter ships, being a freighter and all, she's still faster than all of them and turns at the subtle touch on the yoke. Han knows how she reacts, how the thrusters fire, how the throttle kinda sticks ever so if they're getting bumped around. How cranky she can get at times, but she always gets him out of trouble. She knows he'll take care of her.

Which is why Han has no problem with launching the ship into a steep, spiral of a dive that if the grav shifters weren't working would have them all either sick of unconcious with the force, but to the people on board, it's just another dive, another roller coaster plunge into the black, green blasters and stars streaking past.

Once they're clear of the Star Destroyers and the TIES are left to chase them, Han orders to Chewie.

"Prepare to make the jump to lightspeed."

The droid protests from his chair. "But sir!"

"They're getting closer," Leia warns, as another blast rocks the ship.

"Oh yeah?" Han smirks and stares out at the black. "Watch this."

He hits the right buttons and waits for the familiar streak of stars going from white to blue, but nothing happens. He glances at Chewie, who glances at him.

"Watch what?" Leia asks, looking up at the both of them.

Han mutters something under his breath, that sounds very much like 'I think we're in trouble'.

When Threepio shouts about the hyperdrive motivator not working and it being impossible to go to lightspeed, Han shoots a desperate glance at Chewie, before he scrambles from the pilot's seat. "We're in trouble!"

( Read more. )

He steps back into the Falcon, well, crawls actually, through one of the hatches in the floor, and once he's certain that she's empty, he makes his way into the crew quarters. The wrapped bundle of bread goes into a storage box where it will stay fresh and won't freeze, and he tucks the small Ratchet plushie in next to his pillow, hidden where nobody will really see it unless they go rifling through his things, which people don't do.

(Not if they like having their hands with all fingers attached.)

For a thief and a beggar, a pirate, a smuggler, and most importantly, a man who made his own rules, Han was rather particular that people followed them when it was in his best interests.

An opportunist, perhaps.

(At the very least, a man who knew how to get what he wanted.)

( Read more. )