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Leia kept her face straight. “That would be terrible. What form would this aggression take? Would you strangle security officers and kick children?”

“Oh, no, Mistress. But I might become…more sarcastic. Even verbally abusive.”

“Goldilocks, go get us some caf,” Han said.

“Yes, sir.” The droid rose. “I don’t believe any has been brewed. Would you like instant?”

“About as much as I’d like a blaster burn on my kneecap. Go ahead and brew some.” Han waited until C-3PO was in the kitchen and the door closed behind him. He turned to his wife. “So what do we do to keep this from happening?”

Leia drew in a breath to answer, but held it for several long moments. Han stared at her curiously. He could tell that she was framing her reply, but she was so well practiced at doing so that she could normally compose a speech as she was beginning to recite it. This sort of delay was unusual for her.

“Perhaps,” she finally said, “the best thing to do would be to not interfere.” The look she turned upon him suggested that she expected him to transform into a rancor and go on a rampage.

“Not do anything,” he said.

“Han, what happens if Corellia continues doing exactly what it’s doing…and gets away with it? Suffers no consequences?”

“Corellia becomes independent again.” Han shrugged. “So?”

“And other worlds follow Corellia’s lead.”

“Again—so?”

“The Alliance will be weakened. Things will become more…untidy. More opportunities for crime. Black markets. Corruption.”

For once, Han spent a few moments considering his reply. A flip answer would have come easily to him, but good government and a stable galaxy were important to his wife, and he couldn’t casually dismiss them. “Leia, there’s got to be room in this galaxy for independence. For chaos. In a galaxy as tidy, as sanitary, as controlled as you’re talking about, I never could have happened. I’d really prefer to live in a galaxy where there’s room for someone like me.”

Leia looked away from him, and in her expression Han could see the dawning of a regret that amounted to mourning. Once again, she was mourning the loss of a system, a government that had always existed only in the abstract—one so fair and reasonable, it could never endure when implemented. “Then the thing to do is warn Corellia,” she said. “Preferably without alerting the GA that you’re doing it. Because it would be nice for you not to be thrown in jail.”

“You’d just rescue me. If I took too long to escape on my own, that is.”

She smiled sourly, still keeping her attention on the viewport and the sliding door out onto the balcony.

“I need your help, Leia. I can’t do this alone.” It took an effort to speak those words. Admitting that he couldn’t perform some ordinary task—such as saving a world from invasion or conquest—all by himself was painful enough. It was worse to ask a woman devoted to order and lawfulness to set those considerations aside for him.

“I know.” Leia looked back at him. “I’ll do it, Han. But only if you’ll help me. Corellia can’t play both sides of the field. If the system is going to be independent, it has to be independent. It can’t continue to accept all the benefits of GA membership and defy GA law. If you tell them the GA is coming in to compel them to obey, you have to tell them to stop playing games. They have to grease the whole bantha.”

Han blinked at her. “They have to grease—they have to what?”

“To grease the whole bantha. It’s an expression. From Agamar, I think.”

“Sure it is.”

“It is. And you’re just trying to keep from responding to what I just said.”

“No, I’m not. You’re right, Leia. No more games for Corellia.”

“Then I’ll help.”

“And more grease for the bantha.”

“Don’t make fun of me, Han. There are consequences.”

“We could grease the protocol droid.”

“Han, I’m warning you…”

chapter six

CORONET, CORELLIA

Wearing only shorts and a blue undershirt bearing the symbol of the original Rebel Alliance in black now fading to gray, Wedge Antilles moved to the front door of