"Everyone has lost something in this war, Leia. You're not the only one."
He was the only one who would tell her like it was. He was the only one who would speak to her as an equal, and not as a princess of a world that didn't exist anymore. He was the only one who would ever dare to speak to her like he was now. He was the only one who wouldn't let her fail in her misery. He was the only one that cared enough to not let her.
"I'm sure, every one of those recruits out there had what happened to me happen to them."
"Leia, you know that wasn't your fault, and you know that's not what I'm talking about."
"Then explain, because I don't think I do."
"You, you lost everything. Your world was destroyed. You lost your family, and friends, and because you were a princess you lost your people. Luke, he lost everything. His world was destroyed. He lost his family, and friends, and because he's a squadron leader he's lost his people, it's the same to him as it is to you. Those pilots, if the Empire hadn't already killed their families, they left them to come fight for the Alliance. They've lost friends in combat. If they are squadron leaders, they've lost their people too.
"You aren't the only one who has lost things in this war. Those people look to you for the strength to move on when they don't have any left. If you lose yourself to your grief, this whole operation is going to come crashing down. And you will lose the war. Then everything you lost would have been for nothing."
As he turned away, she looked up, "And what about you?"
"What about me?"
"You said everyone has lost something in this war. What about you? What did you lose?"
"It doesn't matter what I lost. All that matters is that you realize you aren't the only one. So get over it. Yes, Alderaan is gone. But there is nothing you can do to bring it back. There was nothing you could do to stop the Empire. Alderaan is gone because they wanted it gone. Even if you had told them the base was on Yavin. Alderaan still would have been destroyed, because the Empire wanted it destroyed. There was nothing you could do then, and there is nothing you can do now."
"Han, what—?"
"Leia, forget it. It doesn't matter."
"I think it does. I think it matters a great deal and yet you won't say anything for the same reasons as me. You don't want to relive it, and yet you relive it every night. That's why you are like you are. That's why I'm like I am. What happened to you?"
"I lost my family and friend. Happy?"
"Not really."
"I just answered your question."
She leaned back against the bulkhead. "We have a long time Solo."
"There are better things that I can be doing with that time than explaining to you what I lost. Because it happened eight years ago. And it doesn't matter anymore." He turned and took a few steps before she said anything.
"You were there for me Han; let me be there for you."
"I don't need anyone to be there for me except me," he snapped.
Sighing, she gave up and let him walk away.
Scrounging around in a closet for some cleaning supplies later that day, Leia found an old crate stuffed way in the back. Curious, she pulled it out into the light and opened it. She stared curiously for a moment, then in shock. The crate contained a child's playthings. A girl's playthings. She pulled out a stuffed animal of a wookiee. There were a couple of coloring pages half colored in, and crayons littered the bottom of the durasteel crate. Toys and ribbons and other odds and ends filled the crate. But what she found at the very bottom brought her to tears. It was a datapad, and the only file on it was an image file. She tapped it lightly and the first picture of the slideshow came up. It showed a much younger Han and in his arms was a baby. His face was lit up with a grin that reached his eyes.
As the pictures progressed, the baby grew up. She saw a picture of Han holding the hand of a little girl who was clutching a little stuffed wookiee to her chest. In some pictures, a young woman would be with them, and some were just of the woman and the little girl, so Leia was led to believe that this was the girl's mother. And Han's wife?
The picture's abruptly ended. Leia guessed by the last one that the little girl was maybe five or six years old. In it, the little girl had been holding her wookiee doll and Han had been holding her in his arms. She was smiling up at him and he was grinning down at her, his grin reaching his eyes.
He looked so happy, and content. Like that little girl was the only thing important in his life and as long as she was there with him nothing else mattered. She smiled and packed the crate back up, leaving nothing but the wookiee doll and the datapad out. She pushed the crate back into its spot and closed the closet, having forgotten about cleaning.
She went to his quarters and knocked on the door. When no answer came she called his name gently. Still no answer. She opened the door and stepped inside. Han looked up from his bed.
"I didn't mean to wake you."
He stared at her with a little more than shock written on his face, which grew as she drew near. "What are you doing here?" his voice less than a whisper.
"Not what you think, Flyboy," she said. She sat down on the edge of the bed and hit the light. He blinked a few times in order to adjust and stared up at her in question. "What did they take away from you Han?"
"I told you not to worry about that. It's not important."
"You said your family. Did you mean your daughter?"
He sat up, his eyes instantly hard. "What are you talking about?"
She smiled softly and held up the wookiee doll. "What was her name?"
"Where did you find that?" he snarled.
"In the closet. I was looking for cleaning supplies which seem to be nonexistent on this ship. I saw a big crate in the back and thought that maybe they would be in there. I found this, and this," she held up her other hand which held the datapad.
"Why were you snooping around in my ship?" he growled, snatching the doll and the datapad from her grasp.
"I wasn't. If you kept things in more obvious places maybe I wouldn't have found these. And I still didn't find those cleaning products."
His gaze hardened as he stared at her, demanding an explanation that they both knew she didn't have, because it had been an accident.
"I'm sorry," she said, resting her hand on his. "Tell me, what was her name?"
"Aleya," he breathed. "It's Corellian. It means—."
"Spirit," they said together.
"It's beautiful. From the pictures, she is beautiful," Leia said softly.
"She was."
"Do you want to look, at the pictures?" He shook his head. "Remembering isn't bad, Han. Remembering helps you heal. Maybe these will help you."
"I…I can't," he said and even in the dark she could see tears filling his eyes.
"Yes you can, and I'll be right here," she moved to lie beside him and took the datapad from his hand, turned it on, and started the slideshow.
She heard his breath catch in his throat when he saw the first picture. Without prompting, he started to explain. "That's when I found out she was mine. Her mother showed up at my place with her. She put it as blatant as blatant can be. 'She's yours.'"
Just saying those words caused him to choke. Leia looked at him as he continued. "Her mom brought her over all the time. After awhile they moved in with me."
When the young woman entered the pictures, Leia asked, "What was her name?"
"Kariana, I had met her at one of the local hangouts. I didn't expect to see her after that night, especially not with a kid."
"So you weren't married?"
"No, we weren't. I guess that just adds to the reputation I have, the one that you think so highly about," she could hear the sarcasm.
"I just wondered," she breathed lightly.
He explained every picture. Where they were, what had just happened, what they were going to do, why they looked the way they did. As they neared the end, both he and Leia had tears covering their cheeks. "That wookiee doll was her favorite thing in the world; Chewie had given it to her. She named him Lumpy."
"Isn't that the name of Chewie's son?"
"Yeah, she had never met him though. Chewie was highly amused." He smiled through his tears.
"She was really growing up to be something, wasn't she," Leia said, more to herself, as a statement.
"Yeah, she was." They got to the last picture. "That was the last time I saw her."
"What happened?" He needed to talk about this, she knew. And she knew that know might be the only time she could get through to him.
"I had to go out on a run. While I was out, the Empire stormed Coronet. They killed everyone that protested or tried to fight back. I never saw Aleya again, or Kariana. By the time I got back, the Empire was long gone. I don't know what happened to them."
"I'm so sorry Han," Leia whispered.
"She had just turned six in that picture. She would be fourteen now. What I'd give to see her alive, and happy," he said softly. He turned the datapad off and laid it beside him on the bed. He held the wookiee doll, Lumpy, in both hands, and stared at it for the longest time. "She loved this thing. Kept it with her where ever she went. I think she left it on the ship when she and her mother came to tell me goodbye before I left on that run. I found it about three days after we left and dropped out of hyperspace just to comm her and let her know he was safe and that he was just taking a ride with daddy. She smiled and told me that he would let her know what it was like to be in hyperspace, since she wasn't allowed to go with me. I miss her. I miss her a lot Leia."
"It's hard to think of you as a father, Han. But the way look in those pictures, I can everything a good father needs. Love, kindness, compassion. I wish I had had a father like I think you were to that little girl. My father was a great man, but he spent a lot of time telling me that I could be better. He always pushed me to do better. It wasn't until I was elected into the Senate that I finally felt like he was proud of me. But I can see you telling that little girl every day of how proud you were of her."
"Thanks Leia." He paused for a moment, thinking she assumed. "I was scared to death about being a father when Kariana told me. I didn't know what to do. I grew up with nobody."
"And yet you turned out just fine," Leia smiled.
"I'd like to think so."
"I think so," she said. "I'll let you get back to bed. I'll go check with Chewie. How long did you say it was until we got to Bespin?"
"A long time, I don't remember the exact number of days; Chewie can pull it up on the navicom for you."
"Okay, get back to bed sleepy head," she smiled and tried to sit up. Han caught her forearm.
"Leia," he said softly, making her turn to look at him. "Thank you." He kissed her softly. "Thank you."
"You're welcome, Flyboy," she said, leaving him to his dreams.
Well, what do you think?
Should I continue, because there are places this fic could go...