Present Tense (Star Wars - Original Trilogy, M) - 3/3

[Garnet]

This one is fully written as well, I'll just be posting it in chapter chunks. I'm trying to be better about cross-posting all of the stuff that I usually pitch onto tumblr, because I know not everyone goes there. Maybe some day I'll chip away at the dozens of fics backlog I wrote for The Witcher. 

In the meantime, my fixation on The Mandalorian has apparently turned into a whole, uh, Star Wars thing. I rewatched the original movies semi-recently, for the first time in... many years, and was very charmed all around. Here's some soft indulgence with the main trio, and I mean so soft.  Rot your teeth kind of thing, but the heart wants what the hearts wants, okay? It's set about a year after ROTJ, but I otherwise cherry-pick canon with wild abandon so don't worry about knowing any other details. Enjoy!

 

---

 

Leia feels her brother’s presence from before his ship even breaches the atmosphere, clarifying within her perception in a way she’s never been able to accurately describe to anyone else. Not even Han seems to quite understand it, although he comes very close.

It’s probably why she keeps him around, apart from being the love of her life and all.

Nevertheless, Luke registers on some different level, a shape moving through the Force that drifts home to her in a way she never knew or felt that she’d missed, before. It has her ducking out of a holoconference early, shucking her datapad and all of the greater weight of the New Republic to one side just for tonight. Just because she’s allowed to be her own person too, sometimes, and she’s happy to see her twin for the first time in nearly a year. Happy to let him meet his future niece or nephew, too. 

Leia drifts out to the modest garden that their home in Hanna City affords her. There’s a small port nearby, where Han keeps the Falcon, and where she expects that Luke has docked his own ship. He’ll avoid the main hustle and bustle of the city, if he can. He keeps a relatively low profile, these days. They might all be heroes of the Rebellion, but Luke has never been in it for the fame or clout. 

She closes her eyes, surrounded by the swaying blooms, the gentle evening breeze, the humming sounds of the city beyond, and extends her senses beyond herself. 

He hardly needs to com her, once he’s landed. They could find each other blind, in the deepest fathoms of the ocean or across the farthest reaches of space. When his familiar, hooded silhouette manifests up the arching walk, however, the sight finally stirs her into motion.

To her credit, it starts as a determined, striding approach. She’s going to hug and affectionately chastise him for spending so long away, as if she isn’t just as guilty. Maybe she’ll ruffle his hair or peck his cheek. 

Somewhere along the way, however, her composure dissolves, and suddenly Leia is breaking into a sprint to cover the last few meters. Any rehearsed greetings or lectures fly out of her head as they crash into each other’s arms, sharing in a laughing and full-bodied embrace. 

Luke isn’t much taller than her, really. They’re both built slim and slight – Han jokes sometimes about being able to slip them into his pockets and stroll away. He’s plenty strong, however, and does his best to swing her lovingly off her feet, even as she tries to squeeze the absolute Force out of him. Her momentum spins them into a stumbling half-circle as their bond explodes.

Once they’ve staggered and settled out of their twirl, both grinning, Leia just presses her face into his shoulder and lets her energy mold to his. She feels them connect on an intangible level, settling against each other like ships in the same calm harbor. 

“I missed you,” Luke muffles against her. If she strains, she can almost hear his voice crack, and hopes that it’s from emotion and not because she’s threatening to bruise his ribs. He’s holding on just as tight, though. “So much.”

“I missed you too,” Leia murmurs. 

She doesn’t know how long they stand like that. Maybe it’s a few seconds, maybe it’s a few minutes, but she lifts her head when she hears a familiar beep and smiles at the sight of Artoo finally trundling up along behind his master. Luke must have outpaced him in his enthusiasm. 

She’s about to let go and greet the droid, when she feels Luke’s chest hitch suddenly against her own. Leia releases him with worried surprise, afraid that she really was crushing too tight. She’s doubly startled when he whirls away from her in a flurry of robes, inhales sharply, and sneezes hard enough to almost knock himself off his feet. 

“–heh’CHISSHH’uh!” 

A bewildered silence hangs in the air afterwards, both of them blinking. Finally, Artoo gives an admonishing beep, which indicates that he might have gotten caught in the crossfire. Luke breaks with an apologetic huff of laughter.

“Oh – snffh! I’m so sorry, Artoo, did I get you?” He drops to the droid’s side and passes the edge of his cloak over Artoo’s photoreceptor, buffing it out just in case. A light trill from the droid indicates that he’s forgiven, leaving Luke to flash Leia a sheepish smile. “I… have no idea where that came from.” 

Leia shakes her head, fond, and holds out both hands. “Nevermind, come on.”

Luke straightens and accepts one of her hands in the glove that conceals his prosthetic, leaving her one free to rest on Artoo’s dome.  She walks them back towards the house like that, feeling something settle inside her. It’s not just Luke, she thinks, but Artoo as well. Maybe it’s that Han’s been gone for the last week, or maybe it’s the pregnancy hormones starting to catch up with her. Force knows she has no shortage of friends on Chandrila. Still, she has apparently been missing the people and even the droids that she holds closest to her heart, and she’s satisfied to have them for now. 

“I’d forgotten how beautiful this planet is,” Luke admits as they pass from the shadows of sunset and into the cool quiet of her home. He’s still sniffling every so often, and rubs the back of a wrist against his nose once, but she doesn’t think much of it. 

“It is. I’ll give you a tour of the city tomorrow, if you like.”

“Sure,” he agrees, then side-eyes her pointedly. “Seems like a good place to raise a youngling.” 

Leia’s smirk broadens. Oh, he’s already zeroed in. 

“I certainly hope so.” 

He’s not wrong, though she’s still not quite used to it. Leia, who was raised among the nobility of green and prosperous Alderaan, has in most recent years grown accustomed to eking out an existence from one rebel base to another. Ration bars, rickety cots, and junky ships that make her husband’s heap look like an elite touring yacht. Upgrading back to comfortable quarters and peaceful streets has been… strange. 

Sometimes she still feels like she should be living in those desperate and hard-scrabble situations, before realizing that she has a roof over her head, a stable partner, and the relative safety to rear this person growing inside her. There’s nothing wrong with that.

If anyone is familiar with imposter feelings, it’s definitely Luke. She knows how often he struggles, sometimes, but it’s hard to imagine when he’s looking at her with all of the boyish, smiling optimism in the galaxy. 

“Leia, you’re going to be a mother,” he insists, and gives her shoulders a light jostle for emphasis. She rolls her eyes and pushes him off with a smile. 

“Oh, now be honest: how many times are you going to say that over the next few days?”

“So many times,” he grins, eyes crinkling at their corners. He rubs at his nose again on the side of his glove, but drops it away just as quickly, barely seems to notice that he’s doing it. “I think I spent the rest of the day in a daze, after I watched your holo.” 

A household droid approaches them as they pass the kitchen and drift into the high, arched dome of their main living quarters. The air glows a dusky pink twilight through the transparisteel. 

“It’s not really so shocking, is it?” Leia says, slipping the satchel from Luke’s shoulder. He lets her hand it off to the droid with an appreciative nod to both. “People have children all the time.”

Luke’s gaze has been drifting over her abdomen, despite that she’s only a couple of months along, hardly showing. Now it’s his turn to roll his eyes, however. “It’s not shocking, just… I don’t know, exciting. It’s you and Han!” He pauses, then blinks and seems to finally realizing their missing third party. Now that he’s aware, he can probably sense that their final piece is nowhere close by. “Where is Han, anyway?”

“He’s off-world, with Chewie, but he should be back by tomorrow.” She’d received a com from him earlier that same day, and thinks that Han is just as excited to see their wayward Jedi as she was. 

Luke’s frown is immediate. “He should be with you…”

Leia arches a brow. “Because of the baby?” She pushes down the laugh that wants to rise up. “Sweetheart, if Han was glued to my side for the entire nine months, I think we’d kill each other.” 

Luke concedes her point, although his gaze flickers away and his smile is soft and just a little bit sad. “That’s true. I guess I was just…” He starts, then hesitates, looking guilty for a briefest moment before erasing it with a quick smile.

He actually thinks she’s going to let that go? Leia prods back immediately. “Just what?”

Luke cringes slightly, then glances down. He sniffs again. “I didn’t mean to bring it up, I was just thinking about that time after Bespin.”

Leia draws a breath. Oh, Bespin. 

Her first pregnancy scare.

A combination of poor sleep, poor nutrition and, in retrospect, an absolutely astounding amount of stress had caused her body to skip a month. That, matched with how stupid and reckless she’d been with Han right up until he’d been captured, and… well.

There had been a good couple of weeks where she was too throttled with anxiety to even think about seeing the med droids. Terrified of either result. By the time she’d finally worked up the courage, her cycle already righted itself and all of her pent-up emotions about the situation purged right along with it.

She doesn’t know why she thought Luke might have forgotten – of course he hasn’t. She did, after all, confide in him and then spend the entire night curled up in his bunk, face buried into his shoulder as she leaked silent tears of relief and not a small amount of mourning. As much for the baby that wasn’t as for the father she might never see again.    

It’s all in the past now, of course, and Luke knows that, but she can’t blame him if it’s been at the back of his mind.

“This is nothing like Bespin,” she assures him anyway, and cups a hand to his face. Luke leans into it. “I promise. I can’t say that this was… exactly planned, but there have been plenty of thoughts and conversations leading up to it. We’re going to do this right. Or, well…” She sighs at herself. “As right as we can. Like you said, it is me and Han.” 

Luke laughs and places a hand over hers, pressing it to his warm cheek. “You’re going to do great,” he says with all of his usual earnestness. “Luckiest damned kid in the galaxy.” 

“Okay, okay,” Leia scolds without meaning it, if only because she knows that Luke absolutely does. Her tone is affectionate. “You’ve got enough credits with me already, mister, without fishing for any more.” 

Luke smirks. “Always good to know where I stand – oh…” A queer expression flickers across his face, one that Leia doesn’t recognize until he’s taking her hand from his cheek and stepping back with a more obvious quiver to his voice. “One… one second. I need to…” 

The urge peaks before he can finish, though he does manage to dip aside and tuck the hasty cup of both hands to his face. The glove is a bit more obvious like that, compared to its bare counterpart.

“–heh’chissshh!” He sneezes with less explosive force this time, instead fastening it into a softer sound that does require a shaky breath and second, crisply issued “–hih’chsshh’uh!” to satisfy.

He recovers briskly, though his smile has a touch of shy apology. “Excuse me, sorry.”

“Bless you!” Leia offers with a slight squint. “Are you alright?”

She’s not overly concerned just yet. Luke isn’t a sickly person, very much the opposite, and she’s seen him do this a few times when transitioning between pressure changes and temperature extremes. It was actually a pretty reliable pattern, back on Hoth, to have him sneezing and sniffly for five or ten minutes after being out on the ice fields.

“I think so,” he dismisses, scrunching his nose in a quick twitch. Luke must know his own habits, too, because he doesn’t seem particularly fussed. “I’ve just got a tih-…” His eyelashes flutter, and he holds up a forefinger as a placeholder - “hh!” - before turning into an arm: “–hh’chisshh!” 

Just as quickly, he shakes it off and is bright-eyed smiling again. “Whew, sorry. I’ve got a tickle.” Before she has a chance to comment, he transitions right along with a nudge at her side. “So. You were going to show me around?” 

Leia sighs, indulgent, and wraps her arm around his. “Yes, I was.”

Edited April 29, 2021 by Garblin

[angora48]

Ooh, I like it! I think you and I are in the same boat, with Mandalorian love expanding into overall Star Wars love. I've been rewatching the films in chronological story-order and have gotten up through Rogue One. Original trilogy is on deck! (Side note: if you have any inclination toward Rogue One fics, I'd happily read them! Love that whole crew.)

This is so nice. I love how you describe Leia's Force connection with Luke, and I like the balance you're striking between the sweet sentimentality and the wry sharpness. I like the way that neither of them are too concerned about Luke's sneezing (yet! 😈) I'm all for H/C or stubborn denial, but sometimes, an NBD reaction hits the spot too. It's all very cute, and I'm looking forward to the rest!

[Garnet]

@angora48 - Aaah, that's exciting! As for Rogue One, hoo. I loved the film, and the characters are great. I'm not sure if I could get in the headspace of writing for them because, well, the nature of the whole story makes me sad (in a good way, but still). I haven't rewatched since the first viewing, though, so I'll definitely take it into consideration. Lord knows I'm working my way up to noodling with Anakin, probably, and that dude is Tragedy with a capital T. Who knows where the heart leads. 

In the meantime, here's some more schmoop. I'm also one for an admission of illness without much of a fight, buuut I end up picking on Han a bit in the third part and he's... not an easy admission. Best of both worlds here. Thank you for your commentary, as always ❤️ 

 

---

 

By the following morning, Leia is a little less convinced that it’s the planet’s novel atmosphere getting to him. They’d both turned in a bit early, the evening before. They could have easily stayed up through the night, talking and reconnecting, but Luke is spacelagged as hell and her body has started to realize what a laborious change it’s gearing up for. She’s alright with an early night.

She wakes with the sun, and a rolling tide of nausea washing away the cling of dreams. The morning sickness is a relatively new development, but one that Leia is already growing tired of. She lays in bed for a few minutes, swallowing against the green feeling clouding the edges of her perception. She both misses her usual bed partner, and is glad he’s not here while she feels so off-kilter and vulnerable. Thankfully, the feeling subsides without further fanfare. 

Her stomach doesn’t pull towards breakfast, as a result, but Leia can’t abide by laying around and feeling sorry for herself. Her own rock-solid determination coupled with a desire for her brother’s reassuring company heaves her into the day. She washes and dresses, skims through her coms for the pressing issues that can’t wait until tomorrow, and flags them for review in a few hours. Her only concession to the slightly tottery start to the morning is to leave her hair long and loose, unfussed with braiding it when it’s just her and Luke.

She hears him before she sees him. Their guest quarters are a comfortable distance from where she and Han typically reside, so as to afford a measure of privacy both ways. As she passes the refresher closest to where he has set up temporary residence, however, the telling rush of a sneeze catches her attention.

“–hh’chhsshh-uh!” 

Oh, that doesn’t sound good. 

Leia winces, lingering, until another quivering “–hh’chsshh-shoo!” draws her along.

He’s left the ‘fresher door open, possibly by accident, but very much in a hasty duck for something soft to blot against his streaming nose. He’s got a crumpled nest of tissue in his palms already, and it’s clear that she’s caught him right on the cusp of another sneeze. Luke glimpses her in the mirror, soft features trembling, then dips over the sink with a release that breaks his voice in the middle.

“–heh’CHISSH-sheoo!”

Right into the nest of tissue, although he lingers there for a moment afterwards, as if holding back a groan. Finally, he pries his eyes open and gazes at her judging reflection behind him, then tries a watery smile. “G’morning.”  

Leia leans her shoulder to the door frame and clicks her tongue softly. Apparently she’s not the only one starting her day off on the wrong foot.

“Morning,” she greets, albeit with a wry tilt to her head. “…still just a tickle?”

Luke’s expression hesitates for a second, like he’s almost thinking about denying the obvious. That’s more of a Han move, however, to bully his way through injury and infirmity, insisting on his well-being, right up until he drops. Luke isn’t entirely innocent there either, but he’s at least smart enough not to lie to her face. 

Instead, after a pause, he clears his throat roughly and pitches the tissue into the trash. “Um. –snffh! Doesn’t seem that way, huh?” 

Leia folds her arms and raises her brows in an unspoken response. Whether it’s a form of their twin telepathy or just Luke having grown very used to her expressions, much of their communication needs no actual words.  

Of course, sometimes Luke just chatters away regardless, because he’s like that. 

“I thought I was just tired from the flight,” he sniffles again, the sound crackled with persistent congestion, then turns on the tap and splashes his face and palms into the cold water. It might be refreshing in the moment, but Leia has her doubts about it erasing any of the lingering ick that he feels. 

He splutters into the brisk rub of his hands before surfacing again, dappled and shivering through another sniffle. A single bead of water trickles to the tip of his nose and suspends there until he swipes it away with the tip of one knuckle. For a second, his eyes flutter and it seems like that little bit of irritation is going to set him off again, but his expression eventually relaxes.

“Then I was up all night sneezing, so…” He snags a clean towel and muffles a sigh into it, like he’s adjusting to the idea of it all himself. “I must have picked up a little cold somewhere.” He finally turns enough to catch her direct eyeline, his brow steepled in apology. “I’m sorry, Leia.” 

That part throws her.

She steps into the refresher after him, because they’ve certainly been around each other in more dire and compromising situations. At least he’s still clothed, dressed in soft, loose sleep pants and a sleeveless shirt that are both rumpled from a night of tossing and turning. 

“Sorry for what, getting sick?” Leia brushes his bare arm to reassure him. Her touch passes over the faint, fractal scars that branch down his left side, shadows from another time and place. She tries not to think about them, about how he earned these particular badges. At least not in casual moments.

“You can’t help that,” she decides, with a squeeze to his hand. 

She might scold him out of friendly and maybe sisterly duty, but she’s not truly upset except on his behalf.

Luke gives a frustrated huff. “No,” he agrees. “But I don’t want to get you sick.”  

It’s… hm. It’s a distinct possibility, but not worth currently worrying about, as far as Leia is concerned. Her immune system is generally very robust, and even if it fails her, well. A few days of minor inconvenience are worth the price of seeing Luke again. 

“If it happens, it happens.”

Luke pulls back, clearly more upset by the notion than she is. “But the…” He glances down at the soft plane of her stomach reflexively, just for the blip of a second before he’s looking back up. It's enough to narrow her focus. 

Ah.

Leia reins in the immediate flare of irritation that this engenders, taking a slow breath through her nose. He means well, she knows this, but it’s a conversation that she’s already had more than once with Han, and probably will have to endure at least a few times more. It’s just part of her current reality.

“Luke,” she promises with a steady look, moving both hands to either side of his jaw for sincerity. “A cold isn’t going to hurt me or the baby. And anyway, if now is the time you finally decide to treat me like a porcelain doll, I will renounce you and claim Chewbacca as my brother.”

His face crumples in her hands, dissolving into an awkward, snorting laugh that eventually has him pulling back to cough a few times and clear his throat into his fist. 

“Message received,” he finally sighs. It’s with a hefty sniffle, but his smile lingers. “I don’t mean to hover, I promise. Just trying to fit a year’s worth of emotions into twenty-four hours, I think.” 

Leia knows the feeling. “Me too,” she admits. She holds out a hand, and despite his earlier misgivings, Luke accepts with the one he hasn’t coughed into. Her thumb brushes the joint where his prosthetic attaches, thoughtful. “I think we can forego the city for today, hm?”

Luke nods, bangs brushing over his eyes as he considers their joined hands. “Sure, I don’t want to spread it around.” 

“We’ll stay in,” Leia agrees. “Force knows I could use the down-time. And in the meanwhile, a compromise?” When Luke’s gaze lifts back to hers, she smiles. “I take care of you a bit, and I’ll allow for… a moderate amount of fussing over me.” She pinches a thumb and forefinger together, indicating just how little she’s willing to actually tolerate. But for him, she’ll try.

Luke’s grin is a broad and beautiful thing, even in spite of his nose rubbed pink and his hair all disheveled. 

“That sounds alright.”

“Good. I’m going to make some tea and you…” She pauses a moment, when his focus starts to waver. She’s patient until he turns aside, still gripping her hand, and sneezes vigorously into the haphazard cover of an arm. 

“– huh’chissch-uh!” 

He reels back up with a breath snagged in his chest. Leia waits, calm but expectant.

“Another?”

Luke nods, bleary. He’s still turned to the side, and it does nothing to hide the twitch of his delicately angled nose. She tries to let him get there on his own, but after a few unsuccessful hitches, she slips her hand free and takes pity on him. 

Reaching out, she gives him a single, brisk tap right on the tip of his profile. The effect is instantaneous. Luke takes a sharp gasp, giving her just enough time to snatch her hand back before he’s doubling over with a sneeze.

“—hh’CHISSCHH-shoo!”

Is it her imagination, or does the mirror actually rattle a little with that one? She squints suspiciously at the toothbrushes in their holder, but dismisses it when Luke straightens.

“Oh, wow,” he sniffles, looking dazed but relieved. “Thank you.”

“Bless you,” Leia bids to his snuffling recovery. “And you’re welcome.” She leans forward and presses a kiss to his shoulder, then moves to restore his privacy as she steps back into the hall. “Now take a shower and get dressed. You smell like a tauntaun.” 

Luke laughs and gives his nose a good rub on curled knuckles. “I love you too.”

 

—

 

He seems much improved after a shower and some breakfast, which keeps Leia’s concern at bay. Luke might not be quite as perky as his usual self, but he still smiles, leans into her touches and cracks enough jokes to have her laughing in turn. It’s nice to catch up.

Neither of them are much good at being completely idle, so Luke tinkers with a couple of their household droids while Leia sets up nearby. She browses through the coms she’d flagged earlier and sifts through her replies one message or vid at a time. She has to re-record a couple of them because Luke is sneezing or coughing  in the background, sometimes asking her a question without looking up, but she doesn’t mind. 

“Sorry,” he laughs after the third time it happens, with a sheepish nose rub that successfully transfers a smudge of grease from his hand to his face. She smirks at the dark streak and elects not to mention it right away.

“You’re just lucky I’m not sending them as is. The entire Senate doesn’t need to know about the great…” She makes a teasing, illustrative gesture towards him. “Jedi Master’s sniffles.”

Luke flicks his hand in response, and a tiny screw flies out of the pile beside him to bounce off her knee. 

That, of course, necessitates her data pad being tossed aside so she can wrestle him down and spread even more grease all over the both of them. The shower is quite moot, by the time they’re done.

Eventually, however, she catches up on her work and Luke’s energy starts to wane. She shoos him into their main living quarters to watch terrible holodramas, where she keeps him plied with hot tea and tissues. They inch together like that, from a companionable closeness until he’s stretched right out on the sectional with his head in her lap, slipping in and out of a doze. She’s halfway there herself, one hand sifting through the soft, golden waves of his hair, when a familiar presence brightens in her mind’s eye.

Han has been a topic of a few of their conversations today, some of them exasperated, most affectionate. Leia still feels that little spark and rush, however, when she sees her husband’s scruffy, stupid face. She loves him so damned much.

“Well, doesn’t this look cozy,” Han drawls as he surveys the scene. His bag is slung over one shoulder, but he tosses that and his jacket aside as he ambles into the room. Chewbacca is nowhere in sight, which means he’s either still on the Falcon or got pulled away on business elsewhere. Han’s doesn’t seem worried, so neither does she.

He stops to dip low and greet her with a kiss. “You got room for one more?”

Luke has stirred awake by now, blinking slow and sleepy, but with a smile that spreads wide. He also loves Han so damned much, and that’s not even accounting for the gigantic crush he had on the man. Maybe still does, a little bit.

Leia used to feel somewhat bad about that, like an interloper come to steal Han away, but Luke has never seemed bothered by it. 

He’s never quite been the type to settle, anyway, but if he ever does, Leia has a very good shovel talk prepared for that prospective fellow.

Luke stretches and sits up, rubbing at his eyes while he gives a demonstrative sniffle. “Mm, only if you don’t mind catching my cold? Hi, Han.”

The threat doesn’t seem to give Han much pause as he rounds on the couch. “Oh yeah?” He smirks. “Brought us a souvenir, did you?”

“Something to remember me by,” Luke sasses right back. 

“Well, I don’t mind. You never know, maybe it’ll give me your superpowers.”

”I don’t think that’s how it works —oofh!” 

Luke grunts as Han plops down on his other side and immediately hauls him into a ruthlessly fond, bullying embrace that crushes him into all kinds of undignified and probably uncomfortable angles. Luke squirms and laughs at the abuse, but only taps out with a few slaps to Han’s thigh when he has to pull away to cough.

“Sorry, kid,” Han chuckles, patting Luke’s back as he works through the jag. “Had to do it.” 

Luke waves him off, but he calms down soon enough, the red gradually fading from his flushed cheeks. “Hell of a greeting.” He swallows, then flashes Han another dazed smile. “How was your trip? Leia says you were tracking down an old contact.” He rubs his throat, and reaches for a sip of the tea that’s by now grown cold. 

“Oh yeah,” Han says as he stretches backwards and folds his arms behind his head. “This secret side hustle I got as a bounty hunter is going reeeal nice." He pauses, and raises his brows at Leia in dramatically feigned alarm. "Oh, oops. Wasn't supposed to tell the missus."  

She gets to her feet and smacks him in the face with a pillow. “You two idiots catch up. I’m going to start dinner.”

Han takes the pillow away, laughing. “Oh, and she’s cooking? Damn, kid, you really get the royal treatment.” He elbows Luke meaningfully in the side, like he’s extra proud of his joke. Royalty, get it? Leia has heard it approximately one thousand times. 

“If you’re lucky, I might even let you eat some of it,” she sighs. She pauses, however, and takes Han’s jaw in her hands to press one last and slightly more lingering kiss in place. Because she did miss him, and she does like the soft look in his eyes when she pulls back.  

He might be an idiot, but he’s her idiot.

 

—

 

Dinner itself is… only mostly uneventful. Han and Leia eat a lot of pre-fab meals, with how little time they have to cook. Hell, some weeks it’s a rarity if they eat together at all. As a result, and probably because Luke is there too, Han is on his best behavior.

The actual reason he’s been off-world, however, was indeed to track down an old contact. An old smuggler friend of his apparently has received some interesting intel about one of the fractured Imperial territories mid Rim. Specifically, the one containing Chewbacca’s homeworld of Kashyyyk. 

It’s an old conversation, one that they’ve had a few times. Republic support for the planet’s liberation is something that Leia will always vote for, both because she loves Chewbacca and because it’s the right thing to do. But the territory is heavily reinforced, and gathering the force and resources to break through takes time and Senate support that they don’t currently have. 

“I know, I know,” Han insists. “But she’s got a guy on the inside, is what I’m saying. If we could time it just right, between redeployments, we might not even need all that firepower!” 

“Han,” she rubs her eyes. “That’s a huge if.” 

She gets it, she does. Between the three of them, they’ve pulled off some truly incredible stunts with less support and more impossible odds. Worse, she knows that Luke will volunteer his services under those same circumstances, and the thought of both of them and Chewie flying off on a suicide mission when she knows she can move the Senate soon is just…   

Fortunately, all of them can sense the fight brewing, and they take a collective breather by the time it comes to clearing away the dishes. They can table the discussion for right now.

“I’ll wash,” Han says, which is his form of apology. “You go relax. Luke, you can…” He’s probably about to assign him the task of drying and putting up plates, but reconsiders when he sees Luke coughing into his shoulder. “Hm. You just keep me company, Germy.”

Leia touches Han’s elbow to accept the apology, but then Luke’s coughing fit turns into a long, jagged pull of air. They both glance quickly towards him, concern radiating outward, but he’s only cupping his hands in place to receive another, rather enormous sneeze.

“–huh’CHISSCHH-sshuh!”

This time, she definitely both hears and sees plates and silverware rattle in the sink, in the cabinets. She’s pretty sure that even the chairs shake a bit. Han notices too, which lends more credit to reality and not some weird… pregnancy hallucination on her part. She doesn’t know. 

Luke doesn’t seem to quite know either, although he seems at least aware of the sudden, chaotic ripples he's sent surging through the Force. He slowly unfolds, blinking back tears of effort and guilt at once. 

“Uhm,” he sniffles. “Sorry, excuse me.”

Han’s eyes remain wide. “Has that… ever happened to you before?” He waggles both hands to emphasize both the dishes, and because it’s one of his go-to gestures when describing the Force.

“Not… exactly?” Luke says, wrinkling his nose and rubbing a finger along its side as if to quell any lingering prickle of irritation. Leia is a little glad for this effort, in the moment. “I mean, if I’m holding something and I break focus,” he says with a diffidence that suggests he has absolutely sneezed and dropped something by accident before. Hopefully nothing large or important. “But that hasn’t happened for a long time, either.” 

He tosses his bangs out of his eyes and looks upset, a look that deepens when Han tilts his head and asks:

“Should we be concerned?”

Leia resists the urge to smack him. She knows what Han means, but Luke’s horrified expression awakens something violently protective in her.   

“I… I would never hurt you.”

Fortunately, Han goes into immediate damage control with a hand on either of Luke’s shoulders. “Hey, hey. It’s not that, kid. I just want to make sure it’s a normal cold, and we don’t need to be finding you some kind of… spiritual healer or something.”

Luke huffs softly, but leans in when Han pulls him against his chest. “Pretty sure it’s a normal cold. I think I’m just tired.” 

“Maybe you should turn in early,” Han says with a frown, as he pats Luke’s back. He throws Leia a questioning look, over his head. Even being Force-sensitive herself, this is a little out of her element, and she can only shrug back at him, bewildered. For lack of any better option, and unless anything else changes, they’ll just have to keep treating this one symptomatically.

“Maybe,” Luke agrees, as he pulls back from the embrace. Even with Han’s reassurance, Leia can sense him drawing into himself, and she isn’t sure how to stop it. Isn’t sure if she should. “I’m… at least going to meditate for a while, if that’s alright.” He glances to Leia for this, as if for her permission.

“Of course, sweetheart. Whatever you need,” she says, in her best supportive tone.         

Luke gives a nod and a tiny smile, before retreating quietly from the kitchen. Han and Leia share a sigh, afterwards.

They split the dishes between them, which has a meditative quality of its own. It certainly calms whatever feelings had been rising up in the midst of dinner, at least for now. When they’re finished, she blots her hands dry on the dish towel and nods towards where Luke has disappeared.

“I’m going to check on him.”

“Please,” Han agrees, a rare twinge of anxiety audible in his tone. “I barely know anything about all that… Force mumbo jumbo.” Again with the wiggle fingers. 

Leia pauses in the doorway with a hand resting pointedly on her abdomen. “You know,” she says, with a look. “You might have good reason to start learning, pretty soon.” 

She leaves him gaping after her at the implication, which is always a win in her book.

 

—

 

The door to the guest bedroom is open, but she finds Luke laying atop the covers, just gazing up at the ceiling. His head turns to her presence. “Hi,” he greets in a soft croak. 

“Hi,” she says in return. It’s as much invitation as she needs to go and sit beside him on the bed. He turns onto his side, facing her.

“I’m sorry about dinner.” 

Leia shakes her head. “There’s nothing to apologize for,” she corrects, as she reaches out to finger a few strands of his hair. “Emotions have been running a little high around here, lately. And,” she goes on, before he can try to clarify his statement. “It’s not your fault for being sick. As I said.” 

“Hmm,” Luke murmurs, but closes his eyes appreciatively to the touch of her hand combing through his hair. He’s willing to yield this argument.

“How do you feel?” Leia asks, after she’s been petting him for a few moments. Luke’s eyes lull back open, then upturn in thought.

“Sneezy, congested, run down. The usual.” He peers up at her. “It really is just a cold, I promise. I think it’s been quite a while since I was sick, though.”

“I believe you,” she reassures him. “You’ve probably gotten a lot stronger with the Force since then, too.” 

“Oh,” Luke sighs, with a small frown of consideration. “I guess that’s true.”  

She taps his temple with one fingertip. “Now, did you actually do any meditation?”

He bats her hand away with a smirk. “Do I ever?”

One of the most basic and essential tools a Jedi has in their arsenal, he’d told her when he taught her the technique. He also professed that he doesn’t always have the patience for it, and does it less often than he should. There was something about practicing it while balanced on one hand in the middle of a swamp, she doesn’t remember.

Leia, however, took to it very naturally. The practice is one of the healthiest ways she’s learned to cope with a difficult day, or even a difficult conversation with Han. She may have turned from the path of a Jedi, but she will never turn herself from the Force. 

“Come on, I’ll do it with you.”

Luke groans softly, but he yields to her prodding. They both climb off the bed and find a comfortable spot on the floor, instead. Cross-legged and facing each other, they let their hands settle naturally and their minds empty out, open up.

It’s not the easiest transition, with Luke’s constant distractions of needing to sniffle or clear his throat. Leia can’t exactly blame him for that. He does keep at it, though measuring his breathing slowly to hers, and eventually she feels their thoughts begin to flow. Slowly, surely, their energy coalesces into one transcendent being that radiates through the fabric of time, space, and consciousness.

It’s a very profound experience. She’s not sure if it’s like this with all Force-sensitives, or just because he’s her twin, but Leia could lose herself here for hours, if not days. She has too much discipline for that, but when she finally opens her eyes again, she’s unsurprised to find them both floating peacefully a few inches off the ground. Luke is breathing steadily and comfortably, although she smiles to note a touch of wetness at the edge of his nostril. 

They can’t stay here forever. She reaches out to squeeze his knee, and when Luke’s eyes flutter open, he also smiles to find them suspended. 

Then he sneezes, and they both hit the floor.

Leia rights herself out of her sprawl, laughing, while Luke aims another soft “–hh’chsschh’uh!” into his sleeve. “Sorry,” he sniffles afterwards, with a self-effacing little smile. “Like I said, floating and sneezing. Haven’t figured out how to do both, yet.” 

“It’s okay,” Leia grins, as she reaches to pull him upright as well. “How do you feel now?” 

He’s clearly still dealing with a runny nose, and she doesn’t imagine that their deep state has actually moved the virus from his body, but the subtle notes of frustration, hurt, and worry are gone from his aura. 

“Much better,” he sighs. He raises her hand, still in his, to press a kiss to the backs of her fingers. “If we can do that once or twice a day, I’ll be healed in no time.”    

“Gladly.” Leia takes her hand back so he can sniffle properly, then leans on the heels of both palms and considers. “You know, I’ve been wondering something…”

“Mm?”

Luke swipes his nose discreetly on the cuff of his sleeve, which suggests that he’s run out of tissues stashed in his pockets. She’s pretty sure she has a packet of them tucked away in one of the drawers, in here, and makes a note to retrieve them before he makes his poor nose any redder. 

In a moment, though. For now, she rests a hand on her stomach and sighs.  

“Do you think…” Even before she had the doctor’s confirmation and even now, before she has the rounded curve to prove it, she can sense the tiny thrum of life within. A heartbeat within the Force. “… do you think they’ll be like us?”

A tiny notch appears between Luke’s brows. He’s silent for a moment, then sits forward and holds out his left hand, the flesh and blood one, with a questioning tilt to his expression. “Can I…?”

She takes it and presses his palm beneath her own, warm and real  right over her womb, right where she wonders if he can sense the same thing that she can. His thumb traces back and forth slowly, considering. Finally, he sits back with a frown.    

“I’m not sure,” he offers, plain. “I didn’t sense them specifically, when we meditated, but you know how everything sort of blends together in that state.” Leia nods in agreement. “Maybe it’s too soon to tell.” 

“It doesn’t matter to me, of course,” Leia promises, and means that. “I’m happy either way. But if…” She trails off again, aware that she’s loading a lot of big if’s of her own into this conversation. Also that it might not be something Luke is open to discussing or deciding on just now, while he’s sick. 

Still, she feels especially connected to him and to the Force in this moment, and so:  “Will you train them? If they are?” 

Luke’s eyes widen, big and blue and guileless despite all of the Jedi wisdom he has accrued, even in so short a time. “Leia,” he murmurs, looking for a moment too awestruck by that thought to continue.

He breaks the slight trance by turning into a shoulder, clearing his throat to combat the warp of congestion that wants to threaten. Leia smiles. 

“Of course I will, if you want me to,” Luke says when he’s swallowed and turned back. “I’d be honored.”

Something settles in her heart, calmed and loved. “Good,” she sighs, unsure why she was worried that he might say no. “Good. Well, that’s a ways off yet.”

It might not even be a thing at all, if she’s honest, but she was honest too when she said it didn’t matter. Not to her, and not even to Han. One way or another, they’ll figure it out.  

Luke’s gaze grows distant again, but not in the way that it does when he’s reaching beyond himself. More like when his nose twitches, and he’s about to…

“–huh’CHISCHH!” Luke leans away from her at the last moment, sneezing into the crook of an arm. He shudders and starts to unfurl, features still slack and trembling, then changes his mind and grimaces back down into the temporary cover. “–hh’chsshh! … h’chissch-uh!”

Fortunately, nothing in the room shakes and they both stay squarely seated this time. 

He remains buried in his sleeve for a moment afterwards, sounding twice as stuffy and sniffly. “Mm,” he rasps, apologetic. “Excuse me.” 

“Bless you,” Leia corrects, but gathers herself up onto her knees. “I should let you get some actual rest, I think.” Maybe let him blow his nose in peace, if he’s suddenly become too shy to do so in front of her.

Luke nods reluctantly as he pats himself down, still reluctant to withdraw from his sleeve. Oh, right. The tissues.

Intuiting his slight distress, Leia smirks, then closes her eyes and reaches out with an invisible thread of will. She asked one of the household droids to stock the guest quarters even before Luke arrived, and is pleased now to draw an end table open and extract a thin box from within. 

It drifts across the distance and into her waiting hand. She casts a narrow look back at Luke, absorbing his expression. There’s faint surprise, a twinge of embarrassment, but mostly fierce, affectionate pride as she hands the box of tissues across with less ceremony. 

“Thank you,” he chuckles, tearing a few sheets free to fold against his nose. He indulges in a few seconds of effortful clearing, and seems better once he’s recovered.

A faint glitter lingers in his eyes, though, and it has nothing to do with his sinus pressure and everything to do with fond mirth. “You should sleep too. You know,” he tilts his head slightly, and holds her gaze with a teasing smile. “What with the baby and all.” 

Leia swats his thigh with a groan, then uses it as leverage to push herself to her feet. The worst part about it is that she is actually pretty tired. 

“Alright. Brother Chewie it is. I wonder if he can learn to Force meditate?” 

Luke rises as well, still grinning. “Sure, and I bet he won’t drop you coming out of it, either.”

Leia shakes her head and reaches to brush his bangs back. Arching up onto her toes, she presses a kiss to his forehead and lingers there for a second, just absorbing the details of his warmth, the scent of borrowed soap, the faint hum of energy that he always projects. Luke’s expression when she draws back is so unbelievably tender that it almost hurts her heart to witness.

Yeah, she genuinely couldn’t trade him for anyone in the galaxy. 

“I’ll see you in the morning, alright?”

Luke nods, his smile soft. “Yeah, goodnight. And... thank you, Leia.”

The corners of her own eyes crinkle. “For not swapping you for a wookiee?”

Luke chuckles behind her as she slips out the door. “Let’s go with that.” 

[angora48]

20 hours ago, Garblin said:

“Morning,” she greets, albeit with a wry tilt to her head. “…still just a tickle?”

Luke’s expression hesitates for a second, like he’s almost thinking about denying the obvious. That’s more of a Han move, however, to bully his way through injury and infirmity, insisting on his well-being, right up until he drops. Luke isn’t entirely innocent there either, but he’s at least smart enough not to lie to her face. 

**********

“Luke,” she promises with a steady look, moving both hands to either side of his jaw for sincerity. “A cold isn’t going to hurt me or the baby. And anyway, if now is the time you finally decide to treat me like a porcelain doll, I will renounce you and claim Chewbacca as my brother.”

I especially loved both of these bits! I also like Leia allowing Luke to fuss over her a LITTLE bit in exchange for being able to fuss over him. So sweet, and I love how you're writing their relationship. Adding Han into the mix is even better (I'm all for getting the best of both worlds! 😉) I really like Luke's reactions here now that he's more undeniably sick - there's a nice mix of a willingness to be open/vulnerable but also just a little embarrassed/self-conscious, and the effects on his Force abilities are interesting. Great update!

And I get what you mean about Rogue One. You definitely have to be in the right mindset for it, not to mention the options for sliding a fic into canon are limited. If your heart ever leads you in that direction, I'll be glad to read it/possibly cry over it.

[ellwren]

I love it! 

[emten10]

This is so sweet! I love their relationship

[Lady K]

This is everything I ever wanted!  Thank you so much!

[Garnet]

Dip, forgot to post the last bit of this. Here it is. I have a lot of emotions about Star Wars, lately, and this is like a laser-beam focus for it.

 

--

 

Realistically, it’s too much to expect even a few days’ leave from Senate business. Leia can bow out of many of the minor hearings: trade and land agreements, planetary inductions, and the like. It’s difficult to set aside her political duties for long, though, in the New Republic. Every declared galactic emergency might really be one, or it might be a gigantic waste of time and words that could have been spent elsewhere.

Difficult to tell, from the holocom she received that morning, so here she is, putting the last few twists on one of the more complicated Alderaanian braids in her repertoire. It’s a style that requires a lot of time and finesse to perfect, even after years of practice. She does it in quick, familiar motions while pacing back and forth through the kitchen and presiding over the breakfast table.

“It should only be a few hours, and you can reach me by com,” she says, as she tucks the last few pins in place. “If you need me.”

“What are you worrying about us for?” Han prompts with a bemused squint. He’s sprawled backwards in his chair, and even his folded arms can’t disguise his lankiness. Luke slumps beside him, looking tired and sniffly under the gathering weight of his cold. He seems to be in good spirits despite it, but it’s one more reason that Leia is reluctant to leave. 

Han tosses his chin lightly, and adds, “It’s not like we’re going to burn the place down while you’re gone.”

That’s debatable. Han and her brother are both smart, capable, skilled men on their own and she loves them very much. Combined, without her supervision and with time to spare, well…

Leia snorts.  

“I don’t know, sometimes I wonder how you were both in one piece when I met you.”

She’s not happy about this emergency meeting, and it shows. Picking an idle squabble with her husband is not going to help. She heads off Han’s raised brows at the pass with a quick breath to calm herself.

Instead, she combs her fingers through his hair as she passes by. It’s a simple and subtle gesture to communicate that it’s not him she’s upset with. “I don’t actually mean that.”

Fortunately, Han is as easy to calm as he is to kindle. He leans into the touch and offers a placating hum. “I know.” 

“Besides,” Luke says with a smile, his chin propped on the heel of his right palm. He flexes the fingers of the same prosthetic hand for emphasis. “I only lost a piece after we met you.” 

There’s a pause, and then the gallows humor of the remark hits them all simultaneously. The laughter breaks apart any weird tension that has gathered over the morning. 

“Alright, fair point.” She tips them back for a kiss to the brow, each in turn, then hooks her bag over one shoulder. “I’m still going to com and check in during the recess.” 

“Fine, fine, but you’re gonna be bored when you do. Low-impact day on the couch for us, right kid? I’m gonna take great care of him,” Han declares as he slings an arm over Luke’s shoulders. Luke grunts a little under the rough handling, which is as sure a sign as any that he’s not quite feeling his best. Usually he welcomes being jostled around and teased by Han.

“Yep,” he rasps, and rubs a long forefinger under his nose. It’s so raw and pink that it hurts just to look at. She’ll have to remember to pick up some balm for him while she’s in the city, or at least move the humidifier into his quarters. “Super boring. I only…” He squints and saws harder at his miserably flushed septum for a second, obviously trying to scrub away an itch before it becomes a sneeze. 

For the time being, he’s successful, and settles with a sigh. “Ugh – snnffhh! I only knocked Artoo into the wall once, this morning.” 

Han shoots him an alarmed look, but doesn’t take his arm back. Rather, he tightens his friendly hold. “Did you?”

Luke cracks a fond smile back at him. “No, I’m teasing.”

Han visibly relaxes, but gives him an extra little admonishing shake. “You scrawny brat,” he growls, and Luke’s grin widens, so maybe he’s alright, after all. They certainly seem to have gotten over whatever strange transgression occurred between them last night, if they can joke about it now. That eases Leia’s worry, too, about leaving them to their own devices. 

Also, hell, Luke sniped them both in one morning. She has to go.  

“I’m leaving,” she announces, with a more familiar sense of affectionate exasperation. And then, equally familiar: “Stay out of trouble.” 

—

Very predictably, the emergency meeting isn’t an emergency after all. It’s more like a thinly veiled squabble over military allocation to a few of the core worlds, which is a topic that only comes up every single session anyway.

It’s a frustrating distraction, but one she committed to when she accepted this role. She does make a point to slip away when there is a call for recess, however, and makes good on her earlier threat. 

“Hi, beautiful,” Han greets her, upbeat and jovial over the comlink. It sounds more like a genuine good mood than a forced air he’s putting on to avoid suspicion. It says something about her, too, that she can so easily glean the difference from just two words. Oh well, she did marry him. 

“How’s the big emergency senate meeting? Nice and boring?”

“Very,” she sighs. “But I suppose I can’t complain about that.” It beats the alternative of an actual crisis that would demand even more of her time.

From somewhere past him, she hears the muffled and yet distinctly congested sound of a sneeze. It’s followed by the sharp pop of something electrical audibly misfiring, and then Luke’s indignant voice.

“Ow! Han, you said this panel was diverted from auxiliary power!”

“It is!” Han calls back, presumably over his shoulder. “I think.” 

Leia narrows her eyes as she puts the pieces together. “Are you… working on the Falcon?”

It’s not exactly what he’d promised this morning, and she isn’t sure if she loves the idea of Luke hanging around in a big, cold spaceship hangar with a cold of his own. As long as the ship remains docked she supposes they can’t get up to too much nonsense. The Falcon has, after all, been a second home to all of them at one point in time or another. 

“We might be,” Han agrees cautiously, back into the com. Before she has the chance to comment further, he bows out with a chipper tone that is definitely more of the forced variety. “Anyway, I – ah, I should let you go!” 

From the background again, she hears Luke shush and shoo him off. “Han, it’s fine, I said you don’t–…”

Han steamrolls right past his protests. “Good luck with the Senate, hon, we’ll see you at home. Bye!”

He ends the call, leaving Leia to stare blankly at her darkened communicator. 

Well… she didn’t hear any screaming, and she reasons that Luke will probably be in contact if anything more serious than a minor ship fire occurs. 

She hopes.

The loud, chiming gong that announces the end of the recess sounds, so she really doesn’t have time to worry about it anymore. She’ll see them soon enough.

 

—

 

The meeting stretches on longer than it needs, as they all seem to do. Fortunately, Leia isn’t the only Senator who’s irritated by the false emergency, and they manage to wrap up business by the late afternoon. It gives her time enough to pick up a few sundries and, after some consideration, take-out from one of their familiar haunts. Like hell is she cooking two nights in a row.

She makes it back home just on the cusp of evening, and lets one of the household droids take her things at the door. Leia thanks it with a touch, before wandering into the den. The sight that greets her is enough to incite a low, affectionate ache in her chest.

Stretched out on the sectional are both of her boys, fast asleep and quite literally on top of one another. All six feet of Han are unfurled, his face turned into the back of the couch, while Luke is sprawled on his chest. Their legs are tangled together, and Han’s jacket has been draped across Luke’s back like a makeshift blanket. 

She moves forward very quietly, reluctant to disturb them. Sometimes she wonders if Han isn’t a bit Force-sensitive himself, though, because he always seems to intuit her presence as much as he counts on his luck. He stirs enough to crack a drowsy look up at her now, his smile dazed yet sincere.

“See?” He greets in a low voice, slightly graveled. He sniffs and shifts a little, readjusting by a few inches. Leia worries that it’s going to stir Luke as well, but he seems completely out of it, the rise and fall of his shoulders slow and steady under Han’s jacket. “You didn’t miss much.”

“I don’t know, hotshot,” she sighs, coming to perch on the arm of the sectional. She curls over him to press a brief kiss to his brow. “Wouldn’t want to miss this.”

Han makes an agreeing noise as she straightens back up. Leia looks over her brother in the process and smiles with uncertainty. He’s still not moving – is he actually unconscious?

Han chuckles at the question she doesn’t ask. “He’s okay,” he assures her, and shifts enough to free one hand. He passes the broad span of it over Luke’s back, up and down his spine in a path of idle affection. “Poor kid was sneezing so much that he was starting to knock stuff around again.”

“Oh?”

Damn. Luke had been joking this morning, but she’d really hoped that their meditation from the night before might have cured that particular symptom. Another session, maybe. The house doesn’t look destroyed, and Han would be more distressed if the Falcon had taken even an unintentional hit.  

“Yeah. I got some meds into him, but I think they hit him kinda hard.”

Ohhh. 

Leia snorts softly, then leans forward enough to give Luke’s hair an experimental tousle. Nothing. He’s completely drugged to the gills.

“I’d say so,” she admits, thoughtful. “I suppose that’s one solution to the problem.” 

Difficult to sneeze when he’s utterly passed out. 

Han has the decency to look sheepish. “Forgot what a lightweight he is.”  

It’s true, and it goes for just about anything that Luke puts into his body. He can get drunk on a couple of credits, and while she and Han practically need an IV of caf to be functional humans, one cup of it is enough to have Luke running laps around them both like an excitable puppy. 

She even has distinct memories of being fetched by the med droids when they were replacing his hand. Several times, in fact. Finding the appropriate dose and cocktail of pain medications for him apparently took some finagling. When they got it wrong, it became her job to rein in the jacked-up, loopy menace who could fling objects about with just his mind. 

All things considered, it’s probably for the best that this round of meds has just left him flat on his face. 

“And you’ve been trapped here ever since?” Leia muses on their positions, although Han could move him if he really wanted to.

“Hmm, I don’t know about trapped,” Han says as he tucks both of his hands back up under the jacket and the pocket of warmth it provides. “Apart from getting drooled on, it’s pretty comfortable.”

“I hate to tell you, but I think it also significantly increases your chances of catching this.”

It’s something she’s been thinking about more than the possibility of contracting it herself. The concern isn’t enough that she would interfere with their bonding, because it’s obvious that they’ve missed each other as much as she has her twin. Ever since being frozen in carbonite, however, Han has the tendency to get hit hard with even minor viruses. His immune system took a severe blow from the hibernation, and it’s taken time to build it back up. It’s certainly better now than it was, but if he’s going to catch cold, she wants to be prepared.  

She also suspects that Han has also developed a little bit of a complex about it, which probably factors into his usual stubborn bravado. 

Of course he scoffs immediately, as is his wont. “I’m not worried about it. I don’t get sick.” 

“That is patently untrue. Think about who you’re lying to, sometimes,” Leia heaves an exasperated sigh. “I’m your wife.” 

Han only waves her off, blithely determined to skirt the issue. “I’ll be fine.” 

Leia rolls her eyes, but doesn’t belabor the point. If it’s going to happen, she’ll have a very smug I told you so at the ready. Along with an ample supply of tissues.   

“Alright, you stubborn nerf. Can I tempt you from your cocoon for dinner, at least?”

Han tilts her a look that is suddenly very interested. “I thought I smelled Raarka’s.”

“Well, your nose works great.” 

She resists the urge to add a rankling ‘for now’ to that statement. 

“Sounds good,” Han rumbles with appreciation. “Should get some calories into him, anyway. Hey, kid.” He raises his voice and jogs Luke with a light shake to his shoulders. “Up and at’em.” 

Luke groans softly, but he only shifts enough to shiver, tighten his frame, and burrow further under the jacket. Han sighs.

“Unbelievable. You’ve got all the tolerance of an eight-year-old girl. Luke,” he prompts, with another, slightly more insistent jostle. “Get up, you’re missin’ the best noodles in Hanna City.”

“M’wake,” Luke protests in a pathetic croak that makes Leia wince. “Quid’it.”

“The hell you are,” Han doubles down, though he doesn’t give Luke any rougher treatment than that. If anything, his tone gentles. “C’mon, kid, you—… oh.” He trails off, and Leia realizes why when she sees Luke’s shoulders shake with a hitching breath. 

He absolutely does not have the wherewithal to get himself pulled away or covered up in time, not through the haze of medication. As such, it’s no real surprise when he inhales again, shuddering, and then sneezes right into Han’s chest.

“– heht’CHHSSCH-uh!” 

Han jolts by a few degrees anyway, startled by the sensation. It’s understandable, given that there’s a wet patch on his clinging white shirt when Luke draws away. He sits himself up and back by jerky, embarrassed degrees of awareness, the fingers of one hand curling in a guilty cup over his nose and mouth.

“Oh, I’m… –snffhh! I’mb really sorry, Han,” he cringes. The shape of Han’s name slipping through his layers of congestion is a bit ridiculous, but in a sweet way. 

Han pulls the fabric away from himself for a considering second, then slumps back with a chuckle. “Gross,” he says, even if actual disgust never enters his expression. He props himself up on an elbow as Luke folds back over his calves. “Ah, it’ll wash out.” 

“Ughk, still, I did’t — snffh! Didn’t mean to,” Luke sighs through a faint pall of lingering guilt. It eases quickly enough under Han’s easy dismissal. 

“Relax, kid. I know.” 

Leia seems to catch Luke’s attention, then. He gives her a surprised, but blearily appreciative smile, like he just noticed she’s here. “Hi, Leia.” 

Precious. 

“Hi,” she reflects back, fond. “How are you feeling?” 

Sobriety seems to catch up to him as sleep fades, even through the faint miasma of chemicals. “I’m alrighd’t. Just – hkhmm!” He pauses to clear his throat roughly, before proceeding with a somewhat better diction. “Fuzzy.” 

He climbs the rest of the way off of Han, then extends an arm. Han grips it and allows himself to be hauled upright, letting go just as Luke is seized by another sharp inhale. This time, he manages to duck away into the clasp of both hands.

“–heh’chissh-shoo!” 

He slumps back against the sectional, but keeps the prayer fold of his palms in place, expectant. After a few seconds gazing up at the overhead lights with a watery, blue-eyed squint, he takes another breath and scissors forward. 

“–heht’CHISSH!”

The effort leaves him visibly exhausted, sagged in place over his lap.

“Bless you,” Leia murmurs with plain sympathy. 

“S’cuse be,” Luke sighs in return. “Pretty sigk of the sdeezi’g, too.”

He makes a face at his own voice and presses his fingertips into a loose spread over his sinuses. A frustrated, circling massage unfortunately does nothing to loosen the congestion that keeps banking his consonants.

“I was hoping the meds would help,” Han frowns. He pulls the jacket away from where it’s slipped halfway down Luke’s shoulder. Luke shivers in protest, but Han only keeps it long enough to rummage in one of the pockets. “Now I feel like I accidentally tranquilized you for nothin’.” 

Luke coughs his way through a slightly labored laugh. “The sleep’b will help.” 

“Hope so. Here, I can barely understand you,” Han says as he tosses the coat back over him and offers across a small, folded square of linen that he’s retrieved from its pocket.

Luke gazes at the handkerchief for a moment, still doped up around the edges, but takes it when he figures out what Han is suggesting. “Oh. Thag’ks.” 

Han and Leia share a look that’s half worried, half exasperated, while he’s turned away in an effort to clear his nose. It sounds like he’s having limited success, especially when he pauses in the middle and draws a couple of shaky breaths interspersed with frantic little sniffles. 

“Ugh.” Sniff, sniffh. ”Han, I’m…” He curls in on himself that much tighter, his focus flickering. “Think I’m gonna…”

Han’s attention whips right back around, identifying something in Luke’s tone that initially has Leia puzzled. 

This is clearly a routine that they’ve worked out throughout the day, however, because Han automatically reaches to sling him closer. “Yeah? S’okay, kid, I got ya.’ 

Luke hitches in another breath and ducks under the protective mantle of his arm, handkerchief clutched tightly in place. Leia works out the nature of the warning just in time for the whole room to shake.

“--hahdt’CHISSHH-UH!” 

It’s… probably actually not the whole room. Maybe it’s just the sectional, or the immediate vicinity. Either way, the shuddering vibrations are over in a moment and no one the worse for it except for maybe Luke himself. 

“…sorry,” he rasps, once it’s passed. Han pats him, and it’s obvious that despite any ignorance or misgivings he has about the Force, his soft spot for Luke is more than enough to acquit any minor calamities. 

“What did I say, huh? Quit apologizing.” 

Luke issues another few weak coughs, but he relaxes against Han’s side rather than shying himself away. Leia is momentarily overwhelmed by the tenderness.

She’s never had any doubt about Han being a good father, no matter how much of a scoundrel and a ruffian he likes to present himself as. Still, moments like this remind her of his not-so-secret capacity for patience and care.

Leia slips down into the narrow spot beside Han that their positions have opened up. She reaches across to palm Luke’s wrist.

“We can meditate after dinner again, if you think it helped.” 

His gaze buoys back up to her, smiling. “It did.” He yawns behind the cover of a hand. “I’d like that. Is it dinner? How long was I out?” 

Han chuckles. “Couple hours, anyway. You feel up to eating something, pal?”

Luke mumbles an idle agreement even as his eyes sink shut and his shoulders slope under Han’s arm. “Sure. Just don’t let me pass out at the table.” 

“Or on it?” Leia muses.

Luke grins in a thin, wry sliver. “Or on it.”

They limp him along like that, the mood of the evening quiet and intimate. It’s obvious that Luke is too sleepy to keep up with much of the conversation, focused instead on spooning through spiced broth and noodles. Despite the occasional sneeze that he catches into his napkin, however, no silverware is sent flying. Leia counts that as a general success.

She sees him to his bed, shortly afterwards. He’s very much not in a space to attempt meditation after all, but she’s compelled to offer anyway. 

“I don’t think I can get there like this,” he murmurs, already leaning into their hug enough that she’s holding up most of his weight. He’s still draped in Han’s jacket, too large on his frame, and his sleep-soft edges are equally compelling.

Luke is usually such an energetic and driven person that seeing him like this makes her want to crawl into bed beside him and curl close, like a barrier between him and the world. She’s going to feel the same way about Han in a few days, she’s sure, no matter how bull-headed he acts. The fact that both men are entirely capable of taking care of themselves has no bearing on it. Her protective streak has been burning broad and hot, as of late. 

Force, maybe it’s the hormones. She doesn’t know.

“That’s alright,” she pats Luke’s back as he buries his face in her shoulder. Realistically, she doesn’t need to sleep beside him, even if she’s certain he wouldn’t mind, would even welcome it. He’s perfectly safe here, and is going to be out like a light in five minutes. 

“M’just going to sleep it off,” he muffles into her. “T’morrow?”   

“Of course.” She kisses him goodnight on a woozy but obliging cheek and lets him pass out on his own.

 

—

 

That leaves her an evening alone with Han, which isn’t a bad thing. In fact, it’s a thing she doesn’t get to indulge in often these days, and she’s ready to make it count.

They have fantastic sex, when he’s been gone for a while. Neither one of them was quite in the mood last night, but this evening they are both feeling something. They pack up the leftovers, run through their individual evening routines, and then he chases her into the bedroom where they collapse together like lovesick teenagers. 

In the warm, soft haze of their third or fourth afterglow, she spoons him from behind. Her cheek presses to his bare back, her thoughts drifting as she holds him.

Some faint, repetitive sound keeps pulling her back from the near edge of sleep. She’s close enough to it that she can’t quite recognize the noise, until she actually feels Han’s ribs jump with effort. Leia blinks back to muzzy awareness just to properly poke him in the side.

“You,” she accuses, “Are sniffling.”

Han stills, just for a second, then exhales a long-suffering sigh. Of course he’s not sniffling now. He’ll gladly just let his nose run until she falls asleep, she’s sure. “I’m not.”

Leia smirks openly against his shoulder. “You are. That was fast.” 

He moves to turn, tucks her over onto her other side and molds his huge frame to hers with a grumble. “Would you go to sleep already?”

Leia lets herself be rolled, pliant with smugness. “I’m just saying.”

“You’re just saying,” Han mutters. He crushes his face into her shoulder and subsides back into sleep after that, though, so she doesn’t have an argument quite yet.  

—

She certainly has an argument for it in the morning, when she jerks awake to a sudden, heaving rock of the mattress. Her brain won’t be fully online until her first cup of stimcaf, but after a fuzzy couple of half-click seconds, she realizes that it’s only Han. Han, rolling away from her so suddenly that she’s not all the way conscious for his first raucous sneeze. 

“–hh’aaaAAHSSHH-shoo!”

It’s loud and a little bit obnoxious, like Han himself is, but he can usually get away with just one cleansing blast. It’s a slight surprise, and yet not really a surprise at all, when he takes a breath and leans back into his dramatic lurch. “–H’AASSH-shoo!”  

“Bless you,” Leia murmurs. 

Han drops onto his back again, amidst a storm of mending sniffles. “Thag’ks.” He coughs into the cup of a hand and then knuckles fiercely at his nose, clearly in the process of waking up himself. She suspects that he probably would have tried to hold back on the urge to sneeze, were he more present. If he can avoid giving her ammunition, he will. She knows how he thinks.

Han proves it himself when he finally drops his hand away, nose rubbed pink, and cracks her a wary sidelong glare. “I’m fide,” he declares in a warning growl. 

Leia is a being of pure diplomacy this morning, however, and just a tiny bit of spite. She folds her hands together over her stomach and turns her face into a sunbeam that’s creeping its way across the bed, perfectly beatific. “You sound it.” 

It incites the exact kind of reaction she expected, as Han hauls himself out of bed and stalks towards the refresher. He’s grouchy and grumbling about being able to sneeze in his own home, unharassed, but also still very much naked. 

Leia is too busy leaning in, appreciating the view, to have a proper retort prepared. 

She drifts back off to sleep for a while, to the sound of the hot water cascade from the next room over. It’s a real indulgence to have a hydro shower, here on Chandrila, after years of janky sonics and hasty scrub downs between one do-or-die mission and the next. The ritual of it has become almost meditative.

When she snaps back awake, some time later, Han is already out and dried off and dressing nearby. The sounds and motions of his presence are an easy background to her life. Leia props herself up on her elbows and watches fondly as he straps on his belt.

“Where are you off to?”

Han turns and pauses. The shower has obviously put him in a better mood, and the bare curve of her breasts gilded in the morning sun even moreso. For a second, she thinks he’s going to abandon intention and crawl right back into bed with her, but he shakes it off. 

“Chewie’s due back today,” he replies, not without a hint of lingering congestion in his tone. He’s still sniffling, too, albeit he’s clearly trying to be more discreet about it. “Gotta meet him and finalize a couple of contracts.”

“Hmm.” She relaxes back into the pillows and regards him through a veil of early morning contentment, his burgeoning cold notwithstanding. “Sounds mysterious.” 

Contracts are definitely an improvement over murky, long-standing debts, though. Han has chipped away enough at those, over the years. Now his services and skills are generally upstanding.  

His smile hooks with amusement. “It’s really not,” he admits, and ambles over to drop a kiss to her brow.  “Shouldn’t be too long. You’ll, uh…” His expression hesitates, as he straightens back up. “You’ll com me if the kid gets worse?” 

Leia smiles too, because of course that’s his concern. She reaches out through the familiar, comfortable vibrations of the Force, and feels her brother’s presence nearby. Luke is asleep, but his heartbeat is steady and warm through their bond. She opens her eyes to reassure the slightly-fretting shape of her husband.

“I will, but.” She sits herself up, groaning softly at all of the new myriad aches and pains that pregnancy has gifted to her. “I think he’s just fine. Stay safe, alright?”

Han clears his throat, then ducks in for a proper kiss. “Of course.” 

—

Luke sleeps until late into the morning, which is uncharacteristic but probably much needed. As he dozes off the last of his medically-induced coma, Leia catches up on some work. She only starts to worry as noon approaches, but it’s a short-lived concern. 

Luke emerges soon enough, looking and sounding like a whole new person. 

“Morning,” she greets him fondly when he angles up behind her in the kitchen and snags her into a hug. “You feel better?” 

“I’ve been asleep for what, fifteen hours?” Luke laughs. She’s pleased to hear his voice light and a bit cracked around the edges, but blissfully free from the full weight of congestion. “I feel incredible.” 

He’ll have a cough and a rough throat for a few days more, probably a bit of a sniffle, but his energy and general good cheer seem to have been restored. Those are by far the most reassuring signs of life for her brother, and she tells him so when she turns to cup his cheek in her palm. 

“Aw,” he grins, bashful, and steals a quick kiss to her palm. “You and Han took good care of me.” He says it with all of the love in the universe, sniffs, then glances about. “Did he leave?”

Ah yes, now comes the delicate balancing act. She knows that Han is already sick, and would love for him to just get over himself and admit that. However, she also loves her husband enough not to rat him out to Luke. She’ll let him approach that hurdle in his own time and fashion. 

“Just for a bit,” she says instead, airy and dismissive. She squeezes Luke’s shoulder. “Do you want to go into the city for a while? You’re probably not contagious anymore, if you feel and look this good.”

It’s an honest statement. Two days ago Luke felt hollow and depressed across their bond, but he’s steady and vibrant now. 

Luke brightens immediately to the idea, and so it becomes easy to distract him for the afternoon. It’s good to distract herself, too. They walk the river, and Leia shows him her favorite sights of Hanna City: the botanical gardens, the open-air markets, and even the Senate building itself is pleasing to look at from the outside. 

She enjoyed their downtime, and will never say no to an afternoon of cuddling with Luke on the couch. It’s definitely gratifying to see him getting back to his normal self, though, spirited and curious and ready to take on the entire galaxy. Even tempered by maturity and his studies of the Jedi, that’s the Luke she knows best. 

Eventually, they end up back in the smaller garden by her home. Caring for the plants there has become an unexpected hobby of hers, and Luke seems pleased to help her weed and water. As they go, he tells her about the Force-sensitive tree that he recovered from an Imperial base on Vetine some months ago. 

“And there were two cuttings?” Leia prompts, brushing dirt from her hands. 

“Yes, I didn’t expect that. Twigs, really, the last little remnants of the Great Tree,” Luke admits as he looks over their progress. “I sent one to be planted on Yavin IV, I’ve got the other one in safe storage until – hey, Chewie!”

Leia blinks at the abrupt break in his story, then rises to follow Luke’s attention. Coming up the walk are indeed two familiar figures: Chewbacca in all of his towering, hairy glory, and Han being practically frogmarched before him. 

Oh, that jig is definitely up.

Chewbacca seems intent on his best friend, stern and glowering, but he lets up at the sight of Luke. A bright, ululating howl accompanies the embrace that he hauls Luke into, petting him indulgently about the head and shoulders. Luke puts up with the fond abuse readily.

Han edges away from Chewie’s attention while he’s distracted. He almost might have been able to slink back behind Leia, or to the house altogether, if not for the sudden catch of his breath. It snags in his throat sharp and fast, and is followed by Han diving away into his arm with a hopelessly loud sneeze. 

“--hh’AHHSSHH-shoo!” 

Just the one, but it unfortunately draws the focus of everyone present. 

“Bless you,” Luke offers, hesitating and confused. Chewbacca is less friendly about his response, instead issuing a lengthy growl. He throws his arm wide towards Han, indicative, and looks back to Leia. She sighs.  

Her Shyriiwook is still a bit patchy, but she’s come to understand what Chewbacca means most of the time. Currently, he’s almost as exasperated as she is. 

“I know, it’s a work in progress,” she tells him, while Han recovers with a surly sniffle.

Chewbacca grumbles, which Han deflects with a squinty glare. 

“Well, who asked you anyway?”

Chewie’s responding rumble seems to tick something in Han’s rising vexation. “That has nothing to do with it!”

Chewbacca snarls back, all of his long canines bared with purpose. Leia has completely lost the details of their conversation, now, and Luke’s Shyriiwook is even worse than hers. He lingers beside Chewie, wide-eyed and bewildered. 

“Ah, hell, suit yourself,” Han finally spits at the agitated wookiee. In a sudden flare of emotion, he stalks away back to the house, leaving the three of them standing out in the sinking sunset. 

Chewie hoots softly, resigned, and Leia pats him on the arm. 

“He’s always like this, you know that,” she tells him. A soft purr and a gentle, furry jostle of her own is Chewie’s form of acknowledgement and belated greeting. 

Luke cocks his head to one side, having reached some pretty immediate conclusions of his own based on context. “Is Han sick?” 

Leia and Chewbacca both sigh. “Yes,” she admits. “And not taking it very gracefully.” 

“I see.” Luke leans into Chewbacca a little, when the wookiee gives him a sidelong squeeze. “Do you… should I talk to him?”

It would be a low blow, Leia thinks. Han is incapable of denying Luke anything, and setting her brother on him when he’s already feeling frustrated and vulnerable is a recipe for some very raw emotions. She shakes her head.

“He’ll be fine, let’s just give him some space. Chewie, you want to stay for a while?”

Chewbacca hums his easy agreement, and follows them both back into the house.  

 

—

 

Luke and Chewbacca catch up as best they can, with Leia playing translator. She’s not as reliable as Han or Threepio, but Chewie left the droid in the shop for repairs shortly after arriving and Han is… well.

Once Chewie and Luke seem to hit a good stride of communication and turn their attention towards preparing an evening meal, Leia nudges lightly into her twin’s side.

He offers her a quick smile, but the rest of their communication is completely telepathic. She’s going to check on Han, and he’ll keep Chewbacca busy for a while. It’s understood. 

She finds him down in the same workshop where Luke was disassembling droids a couple of days ago. They both retreat to idle mechanical work when they’re ill or distressed, she’s noticed.

Han glances up from soldering a capacitor with a guilty, hangdog look. Leia takes a breath, and forces herself to proceed gently. Han will always match her energy, blow for blow. When she’s frantic and frazzled, he’ll be an antagonistic bastard who is ready to take everything she has to throw at him and give it back just as good. When she’s soft, though, when she’s gentle, so is he. 

“Hi,” he greets cautiously, as Leia settles on a stool nearby.

“Hi,” she sighs, then moves right to the point. “Are you okay?”

Han sets the soldering iron aside and rubs reluctantly at his eyes, the heels of both palms smashing against his long, crooked nose in the process. “I’m fine, s’just a cold,” he admits in a quiet tone, shoulders drooping.

Aaand there it is. 

Leia leans forward to brush the back of her hand across his cheek. “I figured.”

Han leans into her touch and just accepts a few moments of her fingertips smoothing his sideburns. Before long, however, his expression wrinkles and he sits back with a shaky breath.

“Hang on, I gotta…”

“It’s okay,” Leia muses, just as he curls the crook of an arm to his face. He leans aside so hard and deep that she’s surprised he doesn’t fall all the way off his own stool.

“–HRR’AHSSH-shoo!”

Han pauses for a moment, nose buried into the wrinkled fabric of his sleeve, then relaxes. 

“Least I’m not throwing stuff off the walls,” he mutters, as he rummages through his pockets for a spare handkerchief. She wonders if he even remembers donating his to Luke.

“There’s that,” Leia smiles, then approaches the sore spot even as she levitates a stray, clean rag towards her waiting hand. “Can I ask why you were being so evasive?”

Han watches her gather the thick cloth, suspicious at first and then relieved when she tucks it into his hand. He turns away to clear his nose, then recovers with a sigh.  “I dunno,” he mumbles. “Figured you got enough to worry about.”

“You think?” Leia prompts, bemused.

Han huffs and ducks his head. “Between Luke, and the baby and, hell, yourself.” He snuffles softly. “You don’t have to fuss about me, just because of the carbonite sickness and all.”

Ah, so that is a factor, and it’s not all of Han’s usual machismo. Leia places a reassuring hand over both of his forearms.

“And what if I want to fuss about you, anyway?”

Han’s gaze comes up, dark and sullen but interested nonetheless. He sniffles cautiously.

“I won’t make a big deal out of it if you don’t want me to,” Leia assures. “But Luke is doing better, the baby’s not here yet. I’ve got some love to spare, alright?” 

Han’s smile crimps reluctant and yet fond, as she rubs his arms up and down. His head lowers, bangs brushing across his eyes. 

“Alright,” he sighs softly. “Sounds good.”

She leans in to bump her temple against his. “Good,” she echoes. “Now will you come upstairs? If this didn’t work, my next option was to send Luke down here.”

“Oh no,” Han chuckles with the gritted edge of a cough threatening not far behind. “Spared me the big, sad eyes, huh?”

Leia grins. “I did.”

 

—

 

Luke treads carefully around the matter for approximately ten minutes. It’s all he can stand before he’s budging up against Han with woeful apology and big, sad eyes anyway. “I’m sorry I got you sick.”

Han tenses with a thumb pressed to the side of his nose. “S’fide,’” he sniffles. “Don’t beat yourself up about it.”

“I wasn’t going to,” Luke frowns, and touches a hand to Han's hip. “I just want to make you feel better. I owe you one, right?”

Han pauses in the face of Luke’s jibing, because they have promised each other so many friendly debts by now that they’ve stopped counting, and this is just one more of them. Chewbacca and Leia are also glaring at his back.

With a final sigh of resignation, Han sniffles heavily, curls over Luke and thumps his back.

“Sure, kid. You owe me.”

[ellwren]

This is so great!

[angora48]

Love! Very glad to see Han catch it too, and doing the whole "sick, who me?" routine was totally in character for him. The scene of them asleep on the couch together was too cute, and there were so many little details I loved, like Leia recognizing how sick Luke is feeling by the way he shies away from Han's roughhousing, or Han being more susceptible to bad colds ever since the carbonite freezing (which I'm totally claiming as 100% canon.) Chewie trying to manhandle Han into taking care of himself was also incredibly sweet.

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

Of course he scoffs immediately, as is his wont. “I’m not worried about it. I don’t get sick.” 

“That is patently untrue. Think about who you’re lying to, sometimes,” Leia heaves an exasperated sigh. “I’m your wife.” 

Han only waves her off, blithely determined to skirt the issue. “I’ll be fine.” 

Leia rolls her eyes, but doesn’t belabor the point. If it’s going to happen, she’ll have a very smug I told you so at the ready. Along with an ample supply of tissues.

So good! I just love how you write these characters and their relationships. Thanks for another wonderful story!

[Lady K]

I also love the head canon about Han’s immune system.
My personal theory is that Luke’s immune system is also crap because he grew up in the middle of nowhere in a desert and didn’t get exposed to much, plant or animal. 😀

 

Thanks again for writing this, it completely made my week!

[Freshair]

This is so gorgeous in its fluffiness...I can't 

[Whoopdedoodle1478]

On 4/28/2021 at 9:47 PM, Garnet said:

 

“Yeah. I got some meds into him, but I think they hit him kinda hard.”

Ohhh. 

Leia snorts softly, then leans forward enough to give Luke’s hair an experimental tousle. Nothing. He’s completely drugged to the gills.

“I’d say so,” she admits, thoughtful. “I suppose that’s one solution to the problem.” 

Difficult to sneeze when he’s utterly passed out. 

Han has the decency to look sheepish. “Forgot what a lightweight he is.”  

 

this part made me laugh so hard  ty!