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[gidge]

PICK YOUR POISON
PIC PROMPTS / TFLN / RANDOM SCENARIO
HAN SOLO velocities	BETTY MCRAE bombsheller	RIVER TAM subsulcus	RIVER TAM (AU) comprehender
SIMON TAM vest	BRIA THAREN exulted	NADINE CROSS bridaled	GU JUN-PYO toddler
available on special request: veronica sawyer, benjamin linus, imani, maria deluca, mushu, poseidon, niccolò machiavelli, malik al-sayf, chloe

Comments

later in the ancient au is good, and oh boy, the rust is t h i c k, oof

[organa]

"Burnt or unburnt?"

It was meant to off far more lighthearted than it comes out, but the offer is incongruent with the present setting. Some freighter a friend of a friend of an ally of their father's secured for them to infiltrate a seedy trading operation and shut it down. A place where she would stand out as a recognizable sore thumb were they going about this in their own time, but here, they blend right in.

They can be making hotcakes at some ungodly hour of the night and nobody thinks twice about it.

"Two. No, three."

[velocities]

"Why do you have to assume they're gonna be burnt?"

Maybe because the last time he did this, they were, Han. But there's no heat in his words despite the display of defensiveness. This assignment is easy, as far as 'assignments to do things in the past to change the future' can be easy.

For now, at least. Seedy trading operations can get hinky in the moment, but for now?

He likes this. Alone with Leia, the gauzy haze of domesticity in the middle of the absurdity their lives have become--that they always were, honestly.

"I'll make you four, just in case."

[organa]

The look she gives him says as much, that the last time he tried his hand at making hotcakes, he did indeed burn them. But she absolutely ate them, burned or not, for she had consumed far worse and less edible things in the midst of war. Supplies were often scarce and she refused to eat better than the forces following her orders, just because she had a royal title and was Alliance High Command.

"Four is too much."

It's not. She's starving and she will absolutely eat four. Five if he doesn't guard his plate.

[velocities]

He notices the look and, graciously (for once) opts to say nothing about it. Doesn't even grumble, just smiles at her. Han knows how she eats, and how she doesn't, and exactly how many hotcakes she can put away whether they're burnt or not.

"You say that now, Princess..."

Because he also knows he's gonna have to guard his plate like a secret base to keep her from snatching his.

[organa]

Where all of those carbs go is a mystery. She was blessed by the Force or something to eat as much as she does sometimes and not gain a single discernible pound. Skywalker genetics.

"You think we'll ever get back to where we belong?"

[velocities]

The question throws him off for a second. Not enough to burn the hotcake currently cooking, but he does take his eyes of his work to look over at Leia.

It's a hell of a question, too, and he turns back to the stove as he considers how to answer for a moment.

"I don't know."

So, honesty on this one instead of bravado. They've been here a while, now, without any bright lights of temporal anomaly coming through to whisk them back home. "For now, I figure it's easier to worry about what's in front of us. Try not to think about it." More honesty, punctuated by a flip of the hotcake.

[organa]

Try not to think about it.

Easier said than done, flyboy.

"If we do go back... Then, what? How do I explain carrying a lightsaber to Mon Mothma?" She brandishes said weapon, just the hilt, the blade remaining deactivated. "I haven't even told her that Luke and I are siblings. There wasn't any time."

What goes unspoken is the implied worry that the opinions of those around them will change. They needed her to be the rebel princess of an unjustly demolished world, not the Jedi daughter of Darth Vader.

[velocities]

Ah, so it's all of this.

Han flips the hotcake again, all cooked no burns, and moves it on to a plate.

"Then, you'll tell her." Matter of fact, as if it's that simple, as he turns away from the stove to face her instead of putting another one on. "And Luke will be there with you, and so will I."

He's trying very hard to be reassuring and not say anything about how he doesn't care what the rest of the rebellion will think of the situation once they all get back.

[organa]

Mothma didn't even know Luke was Vader's son yet. There was so much that happened leading up to the destruction of the second Death Star and rushing to aid Bakura. So much Alliance High Command was left in the dark about. Darth Vader being the fallen hero of the Clone Wars whose twin children fought to remove the emperor he served from his throne.

Leia had been living with the truth for nearly a year and there were times when even she wasn't yet used to it. And thanks to this mishap with time, she'd gotten to know the man her father was before darkness overtook him pretty damn well.

"Oh by the way, Luke's my brother and Vader is our father. I can see that going over well."

[velocities]

Welp, so much for reassuring.

Han moves away from the stovetop to lean against a non-heated counter, arms crossed in front of him as he tries to re-calibrate a response that isn't going to have Leia hitting him.

"What are you afraid they'll do, once they know?"

Genuinely and seriously asked, because if she thinks it will be more trouble than maybe a few rumors or sideways looks there's whole other contingency plans to work out.

[organa]

Smart man. Getting hit by Leia is even more of a hazard now that she knows how to use the Force to hurl things in his direction. (Thanks, Anakin?)

"Question my loyalties. Both of our loyalties. Our motivations. People have gone under more intense scrutiny for lesser connections to the Empire."

[velocities]

For his small part, Han can't imagine anyone questioning her loyalties and that has almost nothing to do with his own feelings for her. Or at least he can't imagine anyone high up enough to have known Leia.

"Maybe, but none of them were leading the rebellion."

It seems an important distinction.

[organa]

Where going home used to fill her with excitement and longing for a world she was more familiar with, it now causes her nothing but anxiety. She's changed, and she's not sure how the woman she has become would fit into the puzzle that was the Rebel Alliance as they knew it.

"I used to be so... out in the open, and now I'm back to doing my best to fly under the radar. To go unnoticed and not draw attention to myself. I thought I had left those days behind when my cover in the senate was blown."

And Alderaan was blown to smithereens.

[velocities]

A lot of things change a lot of people. Are any of them the same as they were before this all started? Not even the time travel this but the rebellion, the Empire, all of it. None of them are unchanged by it, or unchanged by what they're getting up to now in the past.

Han considers that, and Leia. He knows very well what the unsaid addendum here is, but he doesn't say it out loud.

"I guess the next question is, what if we don't go back?"

[organa]

That question earns him a startled, wide-eyed stare. As if the possibility is something she's never considered, which is a lie. She contemplated it quite frequently during her early days in the past, when she had no one but her father on her side, relying on a force (ha) she didn't understand to endear her to him in order to keep herself safe from the man who would be the emperor. And while she has thought about it on occasion since he and Luke were sent back, she hasn't thought about it as often.

Almost like she was sure that between the three of them, they would find a way. That together, they could accomplish the impossible as they had before.

"I don't... I don't know."