Fic: White Rabbits (Star Wars, 40/?)

[butterfly]

Title: White Rabbits
Part: 40/?
Author: Diana Michelle (butterfly)
Warnings: Spoilers for all the SW movies.
Pairings: Anakin/Obi-Wan; Leia/Han.
Rating: R/NC-17
Summary: Han doesn't see it coming.
Disclaimer: Not Lucas, don't own a thing, not making any money.
Chapter Index

Chapter Forty -- The Unexpected

Han leaned up against the wall, glaring at Skywalker, who didn’t seem to be paying much attention to any of them.  

“Hey, kid,” Han said, and finally Skywalker looked at him, a spark of anger in his eyes. “I don’t want to walk in there blind. All I need to know is if Dex’ll be happy to see you or if he’ll have us killed for standing next to you.”

 

“He was a friend,” Skywalker said. “But I don’t know what this future’s done to him. I can’t even begin to guess. He should still like me. Out of all of Obi-Wan’s friends, he was always the… most approachable.”

 

“He didn’t strike me as all that friendly,” Leia said, reaching down to pat casually at her blaster. “But he’s been hiding from both sides for a long time.”

 

“Because he knows so much,” Skywalker said, slipping on a cloak that had been laying on one of the beds.

 

“Well, there’s that,” Leia said. “And he also never… fully committed to either side. He would trade information and even weapons to us, but he was never willing to join us.”

 

“Dex wasn’t one for politics. He didn’t think too much of the Council, either,” Skywalker said, and Han noticed that he’d picked up two lightsabers from the end table. Kenobi hadn’t taken his with him. That didn’t seem like too smart a move. “And he was always teasing Obi-Wan about the difference between knowing things and understanding them.”

 

“It’s an importance distinction,” Luke said. Chewie rumbled his agreement. Skywalker shot a curious look towards Chewie, his eyes narrowing for a moment, and then he looked back over at Han.

 

“I can’t promise much,” Skywalker said, holding Han’s gaze. “But I won’t let anyone kill you for knowing me.”

 

“I guess I’ll have to live with that,” Han said.

 

The walk back to the Falcon started out quiet – Chewie strode ahead to open the ship up for them, Leia and Luke seemed to be silently communing, and Skywalker’s brashness had given way to a hesitant sincerity. Every time that Han thought he had the guy figured out, something new happened. He wouldn’t have expected the honesty and he hadn’t been expecting Skywalker to give anything away.

 

It reminded him of everything he’d made himself forget. The collectable hologrammic card he’d had of Skywalker training, with a quote on the flip side where he’d been reported saying that all he really wanted was an end to the war and a chance for peace, a way for people to feel safe again.

 

After Skywalker’s death had been reported, Han had tossed the card away, along with everything else he’d had on the team. He’d had all his memories incinerated, because there hadn’t been any point in keeping them.

 

He’d jumped planet with the first trading crew he could find, and he hadn’t looked back.

 

He’d had years of scrambling for enough food to keep from starving for a week, of spending every waking moment filthy from oil and dust, of training himself not to give a damn about the universe and to only have faith in himself, not in some absent and unforgiving ‘force’.

 

Like many beings, he’d stopped respecting the religion that had betrayed him, betrayed all of them.

 

So, he’d forgotten. The name ‘Skywalker’ hadn’t meant a thing to him. The name ‘Kenobi’ hadn’t rung any bells. Hell, why should they? There’d been a famous governor from K’ukaye who’d been named Kenobi. And Han had run into a family of Skywalkers just three weeks ago. There were only so many names and it was a big galaxy.

 

And everyone had simply known that Kenobi and Skywalker had died with the old Republic.

 

If all this hadn’t happened, Han might have gone for the rest of his life without realizing that Darth Vader and Anakin ‘Hero Without Fear’ Skywalker were the same.

 

And he still wasn’t sure how he felt about that. Wasn’t even sure he wanted to know how he felt about it.

 

Han sighed when he saw Skywalker slowing down and glancing back at him. If this was a stupid Jedi trick and Skywalker could tell when someone was thinking about him… but Luke hadn’t ever done anything like that with Han. Then again, Luke was a hell of a lot more polite than Skywalker, which fit enough with what Han was starting to remember.

 

“You sounded like you know Dex better than they do,” Skywalker said, falling in step with Han, his gaze briefly flitting up to where Leia and Luke were walking together. “How is he?”

 

“He’s done well for himself,” Han said, fighting to be polite. “I don’t know what he was like in your time, but he’s an important guy here and now.”

 

“Important how, exactly?” Skywalker asked.

 

“He deals in goods and information,” Han said. “He’s there when people want to keep things out of the public eye.”

 

“You mean, when people want to avoid the law,” Skywalker said, sounding strained.

 

“What did you think we were talking about?” Han asked.

 

“I don’t know. Something else,” Skywalker said. “Dex never… traded for information that I can remember. He’d share things with Obi-Wan, but it wasn’t about money. It was because they were friends.”

 

“People don’t tend to do things because of friendship,” Han said. “Not anymore.”

 

“You aren’t doing your girlfriend’s cause any good,” Skywalker said wryly. “She wants to convince us that this future is wonderful.”

 

“I’m not going to claim that it’s wonderful,” Han said as they neared the ship. “But it’s ours and we fought damn hard for it.”

 

“And you think that we didn’t?” Skywalker asked. Han shrugged his shoulders uncomfortably, not wanting to get into the whole ‘horrible failure’ thing at the moment. Leia would want him to be polite and that meant not punching Skywalker in the face.

 

After a moment, Skywalker headed off inside the ship, where he met up with Threepio and started talking away, like they were actual friends.

 

And that was another thing that was rubbing at Han. Skywalker cared about droids. Like Luke and Leia did. Of all the things that Han might have thought they’d gotten from their father, he never would have gone for ‘compassion’.

 

Nothing fit right, anymore.

 

Days like this, he hated Luke a little.

 

Some lines weren’t supposed to get blurred.

 

Han wiped at his eyes, wishing that he’d gotten more sleep last night. On the other hand, he was still better off than Luke and Leia, who should be sleepwalking at this point. Actually, Leia did look like Chewie’s arm was the only reason that she was upright, but Luke still seemed wide-awake.

 

“Your guy really isn’t going to be expecting Anakin,” Luke said, while Han closed up the ship.

 

“Hopefully, that’ll be Skywalker’s problem,” Han said.

 

“Because he’ll just ignore the messengers?” Luke asked, sounding amused.

 

“Yeah, it doesn’t sound that likely,” Han said. “Remind me why we’re doing this.”

 

“The more we know, the better off we are,” Luke said. “And surprise throws people off-balance, makes them give away more than they were planning.”

 

“How are we the good guys, again?” Han asked, not really looking for an answer. He headed off towards the cockpit, Luke trailing behind.

 

“I think it’s the part where we never tried to oppress the galaxy,” Luke said. “So, how long have you known this contact of yours?”

 

“We’ve been acquainted for the better part of fifteen years,” Han said. “I bumped into him once when I was running away from the Empire. He was doing another piece of business in the same area and helped me out. Maybe saved my life.”

 

“What kind of-“

 

“Sorry, Luke, I don’t own that secret,” Han said, with a touch of regret. Part of him wanted to tell Luke and Leia everything about his past, even the parts he actually was embarrassed about, but some stories were too sick to get into. “He saved somebody else’s life that day, too, and we’ll just leave it at that.”

 

Luke nodded slowly and Han was glad that he wasn’t pushing. Han settled down into his seat, setting the ship up for another quick hop. He’d been doing a lot of those, the last couple of days.

 

“I hope that he’s happy to see us,” Luke said, thoughtfully. “I think that would help Anakin.”

 

Han didn’t reply, since everything he could think of started with ‘I don’t care’. Being supportive was blasted hard. He didn’t know how he’d be able to swallow his tongue for a whole week, even for Leia and Luke’s sake.

 

“Though he seems more balanced today than he was yesterday,” Luke continued. “I wonder if…”

 

“What?” Han asked, despite himself. Luke shrugged, looking uncomfortable.

 

“I talked to Ben last night,” Luke said. Han tried not to wince, but he was pretty sure that Luke picked it up anyway. “Something that he said has been niggling at me.”

 

This time, Han stayed firm and didn’t encourage Luke. Not that that stopped him.

 

“Han, what do you know about alt sexuality?” Luke asked.

 

"All right, where the hell did that come from?” Han asked. Luke glanced out at the city, avoiding Han’s gaze. “Luke?”

 

“I didn’t learn much about it, on Tatooine,” Luke said, his words sounding carefully chosen and slightly uncertain. “They covered the basics – male and female add up to a child unless someone’s taking precautions, sexual desire is a normal part of a human’s growth cycle, and then all of the various physical changes. But there was only a brief mention of same-sex coupling, which they noted is much rarer in humans than in several other species that live on Tatooine. And that’s about it.”

 

Han added the concepts up – same-sex coupling, old Ben’s ghost as trigger, and Anakin being more balanced today. He blinked.

 

“Kenobi and Skywalker,” he said, experimentally. The Team. Never separated, always the perfect balance of talk and action, and yet... “I don’t know, Luke. Kenobi trained Skywalker.”

 

“I’m not sure that would stop Anakin,” Luke said. “He’s… incredibly possessive of Obi-Wan. You must have noticed that.”

 

“A blind Heyas rat would have noticed,” Han said. “Are you basing all of this off of instinct or is there more to it than possessiveness and your ghost’s word?”

 

“Something’s changing between them,” Luke said, unhelpfully. “And we’re all caught in the middle. I don’t have any answers, Han, just questions.”

 

“Well, maybe we’ll get some answers when we see Dex,” Han said.

 

But he wasn’t holding out hope.

 

~end chapter forty~