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Leia was up late again. She's been this way for a week now- Han had been gone for a long time before this, but she could always reach him if she really needed to and Ben…
...She still could and that hurt more than Han's absence. It was burning, roiling, like lava- and not at all like her beautiful boy.
So she paced the halls, checking in with the communications officers, talking to the droids, trying to walk the grief off. It's a heavy burden, it sticks in her throat and lungs, words left unsaid.
She turned down the hall that leads to the storage outbuildings, and made a note to tell maintainence that the lights are out. Again. She walked down it anyway- maybe the night air will help- the only sound her feet when-
-She doesn't actually see him, so much as feel the ends of the cables he's cut, the humidity inside the armor as he's been breathing silently in it, waiting for her.
"I don't care if you shoot me,” She sighs heavily, and almost means it. “I just left half a pint of Boon and Jurii's in the freezer and it'd be a shame for to go to waste." She glares at the too-deep shadow.
There is a noise that is indistinguishable between amusement and disdain and he steps out of the shadow. The armor’s changed- most of it got digested, she guessed, but the predatory stride and the way he cradles the carbine are the same.
"General." Fett nods his helmet at her. His voice is rougher now, growling in old age. Of all the people to out-live Han, she wouldn’t have picked him. Some people had all the luck.
"Hunter." she nods back at him, glancing over the Carbine. "You're not gonna do much with the safety on." She frowns at him.
He shakes his head, before stepping to the side. She could easily get past him, to the alarms, summoning the whole of her forces on him.
"What the hell are you doing here?" She asks, too tired for this cryptic bullshit.
There is a pause, insects chirping in the hot summer night, before he looks away from her.
"I'm sorry for your loss." He mutters, voice soft enough to almost be lost to the hum of power generators.
Leia stares for a moment, not quite believing what she heard. Then it it is diluvian, suddenly coming unstuck from her throat-
"You're sorry?" She asks, quiet and dangerous and not giving a damn about the probable armory he's carrying with him, "YOU are SORRY? What the hell do you care- you tried to take him from me enough, you karking BASTARD, where the hell do you get coming to me with this "sorry" fodder?
I don’t want to hear anyone say “sorry’ to me ever again- oh boo hoo, you’re ‘sorry’, like I’m supposed to comfort you with my heart on the ground like this- and everyone on eggshells around me, they don’t want to say it’s may fault for raising him like that but DAMN I can hear it in thier thoughts and- and-” She rounds on him, standing on her toes to get eye-to-visor with him.
“Do you want me to forgive you? Because it's not karking happening. I am DONE, I am DONE with crying and forgiving and- and-" She shrieks, voice going hoarse.
He does not move, save perhaps to look down at her.
"I almost kidnapped him once." He says, voice blunt and flat.
"YOU DID YOU DIPSHIT." She howled. "Or did the sarlacc eat your brains too?"
"Not Han. Ben."
"What." She stares. It's less an interrogative than statement of disbelief.
"On Glee Ansem, you were there for peace talks and I was there to get skin grafts. He was three, snuck away from the bodyguards to play in the tidepools. Cute thing. Realized he was yours the second I saw him. I almost took him- he wanted to see my armor- I wanted to hurt you and Han so badly-" the words come in fits and starts, visor turned away from her.
"Couldn't." he spits. "Not sure why, but I walked him back. Han took him from me, looked so relieved. Said you would've killed him. Didn't recognize me." He sighs. "I'm sorry. I don't know what would've happened if I'd taken him, but- Not this. This shouldn't have happened."
Leia blinks at him a few times, realizing that she remembers. Han taking Ben from a strange man on the beach, trotting back to the hall looking guilty as hell, that had been one hell of a fight- She remembers the man- tall and dark and shoulder covered in bandages, but his face was kind, waving at Ben before he left.
"Why?" She asks, not sure which part she's looking to be explained.
"Han... Han was an ass. But he loved you as much as he could love anything. And Ben- he-" Boba sputtered.
"Your father was beautiful." He suddenly blurts again and leia is about to ask that if he had a fling with her parents to maybe keep it to himself, before he continues. "He was brutal and destructive and out of his karking gourd most of the time, but he was still beautiful. And there are people that take people like him and like ben and they karking break them but-
-Leia, don't let him kill you too. Forgive him, if it'll make you feel better, but don't let him kill you. There's nothing worse a parent can do to their child than die before their time."
There is something soft and sad and vulnerable in his voice and it hurts almost as much as she does right now.
“You knew Vader? Before..?” She asked. It had never occurred to her the Boba might be older than her- she’d always sort of assumed he’d leapt out of hell, fully formed and blasters blazing.
He nodded. “Yeh. I knew Anakin. Not close but… he was on the news all the time when I was in prison. Arrested me the first time I broke out. But- not sayin’ what happened wasn’t his fault, but he had a lot of help to get the way he did. And a lot of people who loved him and tried to stop it too. Your mother-” He stops, stammering for a moment before turning away, staring at the wall.
“It’s not your fault.” he says eventually. Leia stares at him.
“Why are you here?” She eventually asks. He sighs, the sound tougher and wetter than it really ought to be.
“I- It’s karked up. “ he sighed. “I don’t have friends, but Han- made me legitimately happy when I was chasing him. And he got away, in the end. So I owe him some measure of respect.
More importantly- I owe you. Made a hell of a lot of money during the Empire, but never had anywhere safe to sleep. Got better after the war. Hospitals got a lot better too. I probably wouldn’t be walking now if you hadn’t set up all that funding for cancer research.
Dad tried his best to make the galaxy a good place for me. Died doin’ it. Hurt me something awful.
Don’t die, Leia.” he muttered, leaning against the wall, Carbine held close to his chest.
She stared at him for a long time, not quite sure what to make of this… peace offering. He leaned against the wall in the darkness, looking exhausted and cold. Against any form of good judgment, she reached out, touching his arm. When he didn’t pull away, she leaned against him as well.
Slowly, carefully, he set the carbine down, awkwardly wrapping an arm around her shoulders. He was tall enough that he had to bend over slightly to put his chin on her head, but he did.
And for a few moments, the galaxy was not such an awful lonely place.
He lets go and hastily backs up after a few moments, still unused to acting like a normal human.
“I-Ah, After, after I heard, i cleaned out the ship and, I found this-” He reaches into one of the innumerable pockets in his belt, and pulls something out, offering it to her- It's small and delicate and heavily decorated but the small knife is viciously sharp. Leia recognizes the design as Naboovian.
"Did this belong to Padme?" She asked. She'd never quite gotten the hang of calling her 'mother'. That was Breha's title. He nodded, spreading his gloved palm more for her.
"How did you get this?" She asked, reaching out, not quite able to touch it.
"After she commuted my sentence, I tried to kill her." He said. She glared up at him.
"I was seventeen, starving and an asshole." He explained, shrugging. "She drove this right into my leg. Chipped the bone. Took two hours and sixteen stitches to get out." He takes Leia's hand, turning it over and delicately pressing the blade into her hand.
"Take it. Use it." He ordered. "Or give it to your girl."
"Rey? She's not mine." Leia said quickly.
Fett shook his head. "Maybe not your womb, but your clan." He huffed at the confused glare Leia gave him.
"All the Naberrie Girls snarl the same way." he said, and she could hear the smile through the helmet.
She paused, then carefully took the blade from him. it was unexpectedly heavy for something so small- admuntium, one of the toughest metals in the galaxy, she realized. There were prettier things to make a knife out of, but not better.
They stood in silence for a few moments longer. He coughed, putting his hand up to the helmet, and muttered something about needing to go. He turned, about to stalk away, when she caught his hand.
"Boba-" She said, and felt him twitch. "There's still that pint in the freezer.”
He paused. She could see his shoulders move under the short cape as he breathed.
"What flavor?" he asked, and she beamed.