Part 3 (1/2)

Amazing how getting cleaned up could improve your whole outlook.

Everything was going to be fine.

Han headed back out to the living room and settled himself down in his favorite chair just as Chewie emerged from the refresher. Chewie gestured at the chair and gave Han a derisive little burbling noise.

”All right, so I'm getting a little soft. Is there some grand crime in liking a comfortable chair?”

Chewie didn't answer - but Han could not help notice that the Wookiee declined to take a seat himself. Han grinned and shook his head.

Even after all these years, he was never quite sure what the Wookiee would decide to get compet.i.tive about.

Leia came back into the room. ”I told the kitchen droids to go ahead and get dinner on the table. They can reheat it for the kids.

Maybe a dinner or two of overcooked food will teach them to get here on time.” Han was about to reply when he heard the apartment's outer door opening. ”Looks like they're in just under the wire,” he said. He could hear youthful voices and a bit of giggling and the sound of small feet, but it was not his children who appeared at the living-room entrance, but his brother-in-law. Han had clean forgotten that Luke was eating with them tonight.

”Sorry we're late,” Luke said as he came in. ”I walked in on the kids trying to burn down the palace again. We had to have a little talk.

I sent them to go wash up.”

”What was it this time? Anything we need to know about?” Leia asked.

Luke hesitated before he answered. ”We've already sorted out a punishment. If I tell you, you might feel obligated to reopen negotiations”And that might end up getting us all a worse deal,” Leia said. ”All right. Tell me in a day or two, once the dust has settled.”

Han, sitting back in his favorite chair, couldn't help but smile.

Leia and Luke's side of the family might be the highand-mighty, important one, all strong in the Force and busy in politics, but it was obvious that his children took after him. So what if that did mean the little monsters were a constant source of aggravation?

It seemed as if none of his children was happy unless they were a hairbreadth from some sort of disaster. He had lost count of the times they had ”experimented” with their uncle Luke's lightsaber. Rules did not set limits for the children of Han Solo-they represented challenges.

Han smiled, thinking back on a few moments from his own childhood. It pleased him no end to see so much of himself in his children.

The twins, Jacen and Jaina, were more overt troublemakers than Anakin would ever be. Anakin was a dreamier child, seemingly off in his own little world, but that was deceptive. He was capable of causing at least as much damage as the other two put together. It was just that Anakin never seemed to notice the chaos he caused-while the twins absolutely reveled in it.

At that moment the children came tumbling into the room, the twins just a little ahead of Anakin.

”Come on,” Han said as he stood up. ”Let's go in to dinner.”

CHAPTER THREE.

Famlly hamis Gleasry, agent of the Human League, sat in his hidden bunker, deep in the bowels of Coruscant, an d checked his detectors one more time. He came up with nothing once again. The probe droid had vanished utterly, and was not responding to any call codes.

Phamis fretted to himself, knowing just how costly and difficult it could be to get probe droids, even obsolete ones.

Yes, you expected to lose a certain amount of equipment.

That was part of the fortunes of war. But he could not imagine the Hidden Leader would be exactly pleased to learn the droid had vanished.

But still, the droid's task had been secondary. The real task-of getting to Skywalker-was yet to come. Everything had been carefully timed, the sequence of events worked out most precisely. The Hidden Leader's plan afforded only a narrow window of time for Pharnis. It would have to be after the moment Organa Solo took off for Corellia and before the planned demonstration. If he delivered the message too soon, Organa Solo could elude the trap. If he delivered the message too late, all of the Hidden Leader's other plans might well fall apart.

It was a grave responsibility. And truth to tell, Phamis had not felt completely up to it even before the loss of the probe droid.

It was not a happy meal, Jaina thought. There was something in the air, something unsettled and nervous. Jaina was not as good as Jacen at sensing such things, but it seemed to her that, somehow, her father was at the center of it. Something was going on with him, something that got Mom upset, and even had Chewbacca a little edgy.

Jaina wanted to ask what was wrong, but thought better of it. If the grown-ups wanted to pretend everything was fine, she could do the same thing, even if she did not know what the problem was.

Besides, there was another question preying on her mind, one occasioned by the droid they had just blown up. They had built it to get out of doing work they didn't want to do, work that the grown-ups didn't let droids do for the kids.

But suppose even the regular droids weren't around? She and Jacen would get stuck doing even more ch.o.r.es. What if the droids weren't coming on the trip?

”Dad? Are we taking R2-D2 and C-3PO to Corellia?”

Jaina asked as she stabbed at another bite of food.

Her father sighed, gave her mother a meaningful glance, and got the slightest of nods in return. Jaina knew what that meant: Mom was on his side with this one. She instantly regretted having raised the question.

Bad tactical error.

There was always the chance of getting around Mom or Dad, but she should have known there was no hope at all when they presented a united front.

”We've been through this a dozen times,” Han said.

ne, you kids are getting way too dependent on the droids to take care of you. Two, there won't really be room for them on the Falcon.

Three, I don't like having droids around in general. Four, I especially don't like them on my s.h.i.+p.

I don't carry them if I don't have to.

”But-” Han pointed a warning finger at Jaina and cut her off.

”And five, I'm your father, and that's final.”

”I should think now was not exactly the moment for you kids to be asking for more droid favors,” Uncle Luke said, nodding his head almost imperceptibly toward the compartment down the hall with the melted results of their failed experiment in it. I was going to talk about the other matter with your parents later, but now you've raised the subject.

Of course, if you really want me to discuss it with them here and now-”

”No, no, that's fine,” Jacen said in hunried tones. 'No need to bother. The droids aren't coming. Fine. Fine.”

Jaina gave her twin brother a dirty look. Just like him to retreat like that. But still, what else could he do? The grown-ups had won this round, and no doubt. Even so, there was still a little part of her that couldn't go down without a fight. She was still a little mad and embarra.s.sed about being caught by Uncle Luke. The temptation to stir things up on another front was irresistible. 'Maybe there'd be room for the droids if we didn't have to take the dumb old Falcon,” Jaina half mumbled, glaring at her plate.

There was a moment of utter silence around the table, and Jaina knew, even as the last words were leaving her mouth, just how big a mistake she had just made. She looked up to see everyone, even little Anakin, staring at her. She stole a glance at her twin brother and saw him shaking his head at her in mute exasperation.

”You know how much that s.h.i.+p means to your father,” her mother said, using the coldly reasonable tone of voice that was somehow worse than the loudest yelling. ”You also know that the Falcon has saved the lives of half the people around this table, some of them many times over.

And I know you know that we know you know. So I can only a.s.sume you said something that spiteful and insulting with the deliberate intent of being disrespectful to your father. Am I correct?”