“The nerve,” Han grumbled, holding the still-crying Ben against his chest as he hoisted himself off the couch. “Ooh.” A flash of pain simmered along his lower back. Old battle wounds. Or just oldness. Or both. Fantastic. The holoscreen across the room said it was 0430. He had a pile of boring meetings today, kicking off a week of planning and preparing for the inaugural meeting of the New Republic Pilots Commission, which Han had grudgingly accepted the leadership of—a mistake he was still trying to figure out how he’d been suckered into. Han hated planning. He also hated preparing. But what he really hated above everything else, besides maybe the Empire itself, was meetings. And now the Empire had been gone for more than two years, the remnants of their fleet blasted out of the sky over Jakku just as Ben was being born, in fact, and that cleared the way for meetings to take the number one slot on the Things Han Hates list.
And if there was one thing this fledgling republic loved, it was meetings.
Ben’s sobbing had once again settled to a whimper and now became snores. Han laid him ever so gently on the couch and made his way toward the counter at the far end of the room. “Kriff,” he whispered as the sharp edges of one of his son’s cyrilform cambiblocks, and then another, dug into his socked foot. “Kriff kriff!” He glanced back at the couch, but Ben slept on.
“Caf,” Han muttered to BX the kitchen droid, whose photoreceptors lit up in response. Mon Mothma’s know-it-all voice rang through his mind: They are, after all, committed to our safety and comfort. “Please,” he added grudgingly.
“Right away, Master Solo! It is my absolute pleasure to be of service.”
BX-778, a brand-new class 3 culinary septoid droid, was supposedly an expert gourmet chef in more than fifteen thousand different styles of cuisine (although that remained to be seen). He was also way too enthusiastic about his job. Unlike the old WED septoid repair droids the Imperials used on their battlements, BX-778 had a rounded head planted among his seven arms. And since he was a household unit, Lando’s creepy geniuses at Calrissian Enterprises, or perhaps Lando himself, had imbued BX-778 with a personality. Of sorts.
“Coagulating the finest Endorian caf beans,” he chirped jauntily as one of his appendages swung open a floor hatch and another plunged into the crawl space below, appearing moments later with a scoop of the dark-brown beans. “Ah! Picked from the cliffs of the Campalan mountain range on the southeastern peninsula of the forest moon by well-compensated, humanely treated Ewok caf farmers!”
“Okay, okay, keep it down, scrap heap,” Han said. “We’re trying to keep this kid asleep for a minute.”
“Ah!” BX-778 exclaimed.
Han rubbed his eyes and groaned.
“Apologies, Master Solo. Now lowering volume by twelve percent.”
“Fantastic.”
BX-778 poured the beans into a cylinder at the end of a third appendage. “Caf beans roasted at the gourmet artisanal factories of Hosnian Prime by the finest culinary master droids in the galaxy.” He paused, directing those wide, yellow-lit eyes at Han.
“What?”
“Except you, Beex,” the droid said, shaking his head. “You’re supposed to say, The finest culinary master droids except you, Beex.”
“Is there a mute button on you?” Han asked, but his voice was drowned out by the whir of the caf grinder. “Keep it down, I said!”
“In order to make caf, caf beans must be ground.” Han was pretty sure he detected a sour note in the droid’s voice. He opted to ignore it. “Put another way,” the droid continued, “a culinary droid must grind the beans to make the caf, Master Solo.”
The first hint of morning crept along the dark-purple sky over the towering spires and domes of Hanna City. From the bedroom, he heard the faint, urgent mutterings of Leia and Mon Mothma as they debated whatever new crisis had rocked the Senate. Han sighed. The endless series of meetings and paperwork of the day ahead jabbered through his mind like an angry ghost. How did Leia do it? His wife seemed to have been born for the tedium and drear of politics. Sure, she griped to Han late into the night about intricate Senate intrigues and intergalactic wrangling, but even when she was frustrated, the thrill of it seemed to somehow light her up—a world she understood completely and was intimately a part of.
Han, on the other hand, could barely make it through a whole paragraph of that mindless bureaucratic jargon. He tried to keep the thread, especially when it was Leia talking, but his mind inevitably spun toward thoughts of open space, the escalating tremble of a ship about to enter hyperspace, the thrill of flitting carefree from moon to moon. Everything had seemed so simple during those heady, breathless years of rebellion. It wasn’t, of course—torture and death awaited any wrong move, and life in the grip of a seemingly unending war had ground them all down over time. But there was a mandate, a clear enemy to evade and destroy, a sense of mission, and with it all the reckless freedom of life in the underground.
Now…Han glanced at the small sleeping form of his son on the couch. The boy had seemed to light up the whole world when he’d first arrived: this simple, impossible sliver of hope amid so much death and destruction. But after all those years of war, Han was still braced for battle, and a new, fragile life meant a whole new sense of vulnerability. Leia had proven again and again she could fend for herself, even saving Han’s life more than a couple of times, and Han had finally managed to stop worrying so much about her all the time. Now there was a small, squirmy extension of himself out in the world and he honestly had no idea what to do about it.
A burst of steam erupted from the other side of the counter. “One piping-hot and delicious mug of Endorian-harvested, Hosnian-roasted, and Chandrilan-brewed caf, Master Solo,” BX-778 announced, now back to normal volume. “Get it? Because I brewed it here!” The droid placed the ceramic cup on the counter and threw all seven of his arms up, releasing a raucous peal of laughter. “On Chandrila!”
Across the room, Ben erupted into tears once again.
“Beex!” Han hollered. “I told you…” He sighed, rubbing his face, and headed back to the couch. What was the point? “I’m gonna bring you in for a personality makeover and a memory wipe.”
“Oh dear,” BX-778 warbled. “You seem testy, Master Solo.”
“Han,” Leia said, bursting into the room with her hands tangled in her long brown hair.
“Huh?”
“I need the room, love. Gotta use the holomaps, and the bedroom projector isn’t big enough.”
“Big enough? What are you—”
Leia shot him a look, the one that canceled out whatever he was about to say without a word, and Han held up both hands. “Say no more, Princess.”
“Han,” Leia warned.
The room glowed with blue light again. “If we triangulate the coordinates, we should be able to…oh!” Mon Mothma’s flickering image entered a few seconds before T-2LC rolled through the door. “Excuse me once again, General Solo.”
“Han,” Leia said. “Put a shirt on, would you?”
“Caf for Senator Organa?” BX-778 chimed.
“Sure,” Leia said, and then she slipped into a gentle coo, opening her arms to the still-crying toddler on the couch. “And what’s wrong with my baby boy, hm?” She swept him up into her arms, groaning a little as she lifted him. “Ooh, he’s getting heavy so fast. Come here, little man, hush.” She rocked him back and forth, her braids dangling around him like a canopy, then shot a sharp glare at Han. “Did you feed him?”
Han raised his eyebrows. “Feed him? I…we were sleeping peacefully until the honorable chancellor here decided to—”
“Coagulating the finest Endoran caf beans,” BX-778 announced.
“Oh, here we go,” Han groaned.
Leia passed Ben to him as a map of the galaxy spun wild shadows and lights across the walls. “Take him in the bedroom, please? We’ll talk about this later. There’s something going on that Mon
and I have to attend to.”
Red and yellow lights flashed urgently at various points on the holomap, and Han recognized the converging blips of the New Republic fleet. “Are you mobilizing?”
“Han,” Leia said. “Go.”
“All right, all right!” He hoisted Ben onto his shoulder and headed for the bedroom.
“And put a shirt on please!” Leia called over BX’s babble about Ewok caf farmers.
* * *
—
Peace.
Han took a deep breath. After all that fuss, he’d gone and left his caf in the front room. He sat on the bed, adjusting Ben in his arms. No way was he going back out there. Not even for caf. And anyway, the bed was so comfortable. Leia had been up late the night before going over some boring statistical analysis of crop production on Yavin 4 and Han had volunteered to keep Ben out of her hair, partially just to preempt any kind of, Force forbid, conversation about agriculture. He’d flipped on a holoshow, some cartoon they had now called Moray and Faz, and the next thing he knew it was half past four and the flickering chancellor was monmothmaing all over his living room.
He could probably catch a tiny snooze before he had to get ready, he thought, lying back. Little Ben looked up groggily, those dark eyes settling on Han, studying him. Han had no idea how a two-year-old could have such ancient eyes. It was as if Ben had been waiting around for a millennium to show up at just this moment in history.
Slowly, Ben Solo’s eyes drifted closed as his chin settled on Han’s shoulder.
Han shook his head, smiling. Here he was thinking about fates and destinies. He was starting to sound like Luke.
The thought simultaneously made him smile and unsettled him, and it was that muddle of feelings that drifted along with him as sleep crept up without warning once again, and dissolved the bedroom, the fussing on the other side of the wall, the chirps of morning birds outside, the half light of a new day, all into a pleasant haze…
…Right up until a frantic knocking shoved Han rudely back into the world of awake.
“What?” He slid Ben carefully off him and stood, heart pounding.
Bang bang bang!
The balcony. It was coming from the door to the balcony. Keeping out of sight of the tall windows, Han picked up Ben and laid him ever so gently on the carpeted floor, on the far side of the room from the knocking. Then he crept to the bedside table, slid open the drawer, and retrieved his blaster. Disengaged the safety. Made his way to the door.
Bang bang bang!
In the corner now, one hand on the doorknob, the other on the trigger, he glanced at Ben. Still asleep. Everything in Han wanted to just kick through the nearest window and let loose a barrage of blasterfire. But that wasn’t the way, and if this was any threat at all, such recklessness would probably get himself and Ben killed.
Slowly, smoothly, he craned his neck to look at the small datascreen showing the balcony security feed.
All the tightened muscles in his body eased at the same time as he threw open the door, a huge smile breaking out across his face. There, in the purple haze of morning, stood Lando Calrissian, decked out as always in an impeccable dress shirt, half cape, shined boots, and a perfectly trimmed goatee.
“If it isn’t…” Han started, but he let his voice trail off.
One thing that was different about Lando: that wide scoundrel grin was not stretching across his face. In fact, he looked downright pissed.
“What’sa matter, old buddy? And why are you—?”
Han didn’t finish because now Lando was reaching back, winding up, fist tight, and then swinging forward with what looked like all his strength. And then, sure enough, fist met face and Han flew backward with a shocked grunt, thinking, as the world flushed to darkness: I should’ve probably seen that coming.
“NEXT THING I KNOW,” LANDO said, reaching for the bottle, “I’m laid out, by my own protocol droid no less.” He poured himself another three fingers of Corellian whiskey and shook his head.
“Wait,” Leia said, taking the bottle off the table and stashing it in a cabinet. “Why were you in a towel?”
Han looked up from the other end of the room where he’d been sulking and applying a glass of ice to his cheek. “Yeah, why were you in a towel?”
Lando stood. “You don’t get to ask questions yet, Han. I’m coming to your part in a minute.” He turned to Leia, flashed that smile. “Your Highness…”
Leia shook her head. “Sit down, Lando.”
He did, shrugging. “Anyway, Kaasha got off a few shots on the droid, and—”
“Kaasha?” Han cut in.
Lando shot him a look. Han went back to sulking.
“Kaasha?” Leia asked.
“Kaasha Bateen. An old friend of mine from the Pasa Novo campaign. She’s good with a blaster.”
“Mm, bet she is,” Han muttered.
She was actually, Lando thought. It had been one of his last thoughts as the whole world fizzled into a gaping void: She can shoot, too? He shouldn’t have been surprised, really, but the last time he’d seen Kaasha she’d been running tactical attack models in the war room on Baltro and he’d never seen her fight. They’d had a good time together, but Kaasha had always made it abundantly clear she saw right through Lando’s smooth talking and all the broken promises of his wily grin. He’d liked that about her. Liked it more than he was ready to admit. But then the battle had ended and the survivors had trudged off to their respective planets, and that had been that. Or it should’ve been anyway, but the truth was, a tiny, smirking hologram of Kaasha seemed to have stayed with Lando somehow, like she’d sneaked an implant of some kind into his brain that last time they’d held each other.
He’d never reached out because that’s not how it works. That’s against the code. The promise of an obviously broken promise is that it stays broken, no matter what. Otherwise, what was the point?
Leia got up and retrieved the whiskey, poured a glass. “Was she in a towel, too?”
Lando grinned, both hands raised like he was being held up. “It’s not like that.”
“I’m sure it’s not,” Leia said. Han reached for her whiskey, and she moved the glass out of his grasp. “You have a pilots union session today.”
“And you’re about to meet with the security council.”
She rolled her eyes and clinked glasses with Lando. “All the more reason for a quick little nip.”
“Anyway,” Lando said, “when I come around, I’m staring up at this hooded droid. Not the protocol one—it’s the thing that was standing behind Dee-Arrex. Some kind of crookbacked class four from the look of it, but I’ve never seen a face quite like that one. Had glowing red eyes and a nasty mesh of rusted cables snaking around its head. Couldn’t see much else under that hood.” He shuddered. The fact was, it had been terrifying, coming back around to find that deranged droid monster glaring at him with those red eyes. Lando had actually gasped before he’d caught himself and forced on a more stubborn, cocky demeanor. “The Phylanx, the droid says.”
Han cocked an eyebrow. “Huh?”
“That’s exactly what I said,” Lando said. “Phywho now? And the droid says: The Phylanx Redux Transmitter. And when I say that’s not much help he claps me across the face and puts the blaster between my eyes.
“Are you or are you not the registered owner of a Corellian light freighter called the Millennium Falcon? the droid says.”
“Uh-oh,” Han mumbled.
“Yeah, you’re damn right uh-oh. I said I’m not now but I was once, and I still don’t know about no damn Phylanx Transmitter. At this point, I’m trying to figure out if I’m going to have to blast my way out of this, but the droid’s collected all our weaponry. I’m guessing if I stall long enough, eventually Lobot will show up with the Bespin Wing Guard, but who knows how long that’ll take and anyway, this droid doesn’t
seem like the type you can get one over on.
“The Phylanx Redux Transmitter was illegally obtained by the owner of the Millennium Falcon ten years ago, the droid says, and I would swear it sounded like it was really, really pissed about it. For a droid, anyway. My master would like it back.”
“Master?” Leia said.
Lando slammed his glass on the table. “That’s exactly what I said! Fyzen Gor, it said.”
Leia shook her head. “Doesn’t ring a bell. Han?”
Han was fiddling with the strap on his boot, a glass of ice still pressed against his face. “Hm?” he muttered without looking up. “Haven’t heard of him.”
“That’s fascinating,” Lando said, waving one finger like he was coming to the crux of a withering prosecution, “because I said the same exact thing! Why would I know about a Phylanx Whoozimawhatsit and a random gangster from a decade ago? Except then I realized something equally fascinating.” He looked at Leia.
Han was humming a little tune, still fussing with his boot.
“You didn’t have the Falcon ten years ago,” Leia said. She shot an eyebrow up. “Han did.”
Lando and Leia both turned to Han. He looked up. “Hm? Oh! Oh that Fyzen Gor? The Pau’an gangster who used to run with the Wandering Star?” A wide smile broke out across his face.
“Why I oughta—” Lando scooched his chair back with a screech and lunged halfway across the table.
“Easy.” Leia stood and threw an arm in Lando’s way as Han hopped up, palms out.
“Hey, hey, hey! It’s not…it’s just…”
“Yeah, you can’t even get that lie out of your lying mouth,” Lando growled. “This guy Fyzen is prepared to unleash a massacre on Cloud City if I don’t get him his little toy back, and whoever he is, he clearly has the means to do that. His droid got past my security, dropped two Wing Guard units single-handedly, and somehow turned my own protocol droid against me. Droids are my business now. It’s what I do. So if some creep can out-droid a droid impresario, well…that’s not a good look, okay? Everything can come crashing down. And you are the last person who seems to have seen this Phylanx thing, Haan, so start”—Lando leaned all the way across the table—“talking.”
Last Shot Page 2
