sixwordstories | (no subject)

A mistake for you, maybe. It sounds like win for anybody who wanted an eye full.

Guess I should find a good teacher then, and soon.

All I know about your sabacc playing is that you told me it wasn’t good. If I was in your place, I’d probably be trying to get better.

We don’t have to practice in a strip game, though.

It's more complicated than it seems and leaving things to luck has rarely been something I relied on.

I'd prefer we use lesser stakes for practice.

I figured you would.

Not saying that you must have entered a game like this to impress me, but it you did, you didn’t have to. I was already impressed.

I have a tendency to be challenging, so I'm told. It wasn't to impress you but it might have been to see if I could keep up.

Do you? I’m shocked.

If you're shocked already then maybe I should save you the trouble.
[Well if that's how he's going to play it...]

Hey, let’s ease off the thrusters here.

I’m just saying I’m surprised that the princess with a tendency to defy authority has a reputation for challenging people, that’s all.

After facing Darth Vader, watching home be destroyed and suffering Imperial interrogation there isn't much that really scares me anymore.

I didn’t know.

[ Though, that’s a lot to unpack on him all of a sudden. After a lot of flirting and not really telling him any of that. He also, suddenly, feel like he has a lot of questions. ]

There was no way you could have, I haven't really discussed it before. It was never the time nor place. And this wasn't it either, I'm sorry for unloading that cargo on you.

Forget about it.

[ ... ]

I can’t tell if this is something you’d want to talk about or not. I’m listening if you do.

I think we'd need a lot more drinks.

But, if you really mean that, you're probably the closest thing I have to an unaffected party to this.

Of course I meant it.

As far as I can tell we're from a few years apart in our respective timelines. When I'm from the Empire has dropped any sense of being anything but a tyrannical despotic government.

My father helped establish a resistance, and I followed in his footsteps. You commented once that I was a rebel, you couldn't have known how right you were.

[ Is he sure he's still interested? ]

Finally dropped the false pretenses, huh? I wondered when they would.

... so there are people fighting and you’re one of them ...

They've begun conscripting storm troopers from colonies that can't defend themselves, non human species are suffering their prejudice, they are trying to choke out any opposition to them.

[She nodded.]

I have served as senator for Alderaan when the senate was still an active body. It allowed me to move under the auspice of diplomatic travel while trying to ally worlds, ensure the trade of information and arms. It had worked well for some years, until the Death Star.

I don’t know that them doing that is all that new. They were calling all the shots on Corellia for as long as I can remember.

[ That said. He realized it was even worse than her thought when he enlisted and got a look from the inside. ]

I’m gonna guess telling you to get out and run to the other side of the galaxy wouldn’t work with you, huh?

Corellia was one of their primary established power bases, it's a valuable world and asset.

[There was something of a rueful smile, she didn't fault the idea, plenty of people had said the same over the years.]

I can't run when others are putting their lives on the line. Not when I can do something. That's how I wound up with the plans that could destroy the death star, and how I was captured. I was able to get the plans away, that was the important part. But that was the end of my diplomatic immunity.

Well, I don’t know what a Death Star is, but it doesn’t sound great and suddenly I’m a lot more worried about you.

Imagine a battle station the size of a small moon. It had been built for one purpose, to destroy things on a planetary scale. It could not be allowed to be completed. No risk was too great, and lives were lost to acquire the data that allowed us to destroy it. In the process I was captured and interrogated about the rebellion, when the drugs and torture failed to loosen my tongue they turned to threats.

[ She remembered it all too vividly, she rubbed her hands over her upper arms and willed herself to submerge her reaction. ]

Grand Moff Tarkin and Vader brought me to the bridge and I saw that they’d moved the station into orbit around Alderaan. I was given the ultimatum. Tell them where the rebellion forces were located or my home would be destroyed. So I gave them an old base, one that had been evacuated and left but it had been one of ours. Tarkin felt Dantooine was not a fit demonstration for his station. Too remote he said, he wanted something that would serve as a warning and reminder of what it meant to oppose the Empire. He could not be appealed to, regardless of our pacifist history, our lack of weapons or means of war. I watched as my world exploded.

They had no warning, no time.

[ Her voice dropped very low. ]

And it is my fault.

I’m not gonna pretend that I know the nuances of what was going on based on a quick summary, but I know one thing. When the Empire has a weapon pointed at anything — person, planet, ship, whatever — they’re always intending to pull the trigger, Leia. Always.

You got put into a no-win game. There’s nothing you could have done to change your planet’s fate.

I know, but that's little comfort.

[Leia nodded, grim acceptance.]

I've told myself that same thing a thousand times. And that ultimately we were able to save countless more planets in the long run, that is difficult condolence.

It was actually there that I met Han Solo. He was part of a rescue party that came to free me. It wasn't the best of introductions.

Yeah, but you said it’s my fault when you know damn well, it’s not. Besides that, there’s nothing to be gained from putting that tragedy on yourself and you’re playing into their hand when you do.

Grieve. You should. But don’t let them bend you the wrong way. I can’t imagine anyone you love wants you to be haunted by this. It sure won’t bring them back.

[ ... her first impression of him seems like such a small foot print in all of this. For a moment, he tries to ignore the fact that he was involved but ... he just can’t. ]

I was in your rescuing party?