Han Solo (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
twelve_not_fourteen) wrote2016-09-01 05:14 pm
twelve_not_fourteen) wrote2016-09-01 05:14 pm
Entry tags:
Lights Out
At least thirty percent of his time, while he was awake, was spent hanging around in bars. Talking shop with the other hooligans. Swapping stories about brushes with death. Playing games of chance. Having a few drinks to pass the time. All of that lingering, hopefully parlaying into a job of some kind eventually. Or at least a lead on one. A new contact, maybe.
There was always something that set Han, in particular, apart from all the other ruffians and freighter bums in the smoky dives he hung around in. That tilt of the head. That smile of his. The timbre of his voice and the way he strung words together. It drew many people in to him. Charisma. Or charm. Confidence? Perhaps all of them working together. He had something intangible that the other low-life’s didn’t seem to have.
People tend to like him. Even when they have no good reason to.
And it’s good that he has that, because face it, he doesn’t have much else going for himself. Not only does he not have a lot of wealth, you frequently hear about mounting debts attached to the name Han Solo. His ship is old and by the look of it, doesn’t seem like anything worth boasting about – much less boasting about it as often as he does.
But every once in a while, he rubs someone the wrong way. He’s talked himself into a job that another gentleman trader was interested in. Beating them handily at sabacc. Saying something impolite. Or hell, maybe whatever is that makes him charming to most, didn’t work on that particular person.
It happens.
The bars of home are so familiar and he spends so much time in them, that, when he ended up in the Nexus … it only made sense that he’d spend a portion of his time in multiverse bars too. They’re only slightly more exotic than the ones of long ago and far away.
This evening, Han had spent many hours spent talking to a pretty, if a little scrappy, pilot from another universe named Kara Thrace. Apparently there, humans were endangered and were entangled in a battle with some really advanced and vicious group of … well she called them Cylons, but as far as Han could figure, they were droids. And they could look like anyone.
He supposes there’s nothing to have really substantiated any of the number of fantastic dogfighting stories the woman had, but he liked listening to them. Brought him right back to his days flying in screaming TIE/LN Starfighters. He countered with a few smuggling tales of his own. Which upon thinking about it, she had no reason to believe any of his stories either.
And they had a few drinks.
Halfway through the evening, they realized they were both card players and promised they’d meet up again to play a few hands. Strictly friendly stakes, of course, they mutually assured each other with the glint of mischief in each pair of eyes.
At the end of the evening, they went their separate ways.
As Han headed back to the Millennium Falcon, he was still comfortably numb from any number of drinks he had to knocked back to keep up with Thrace. The late summer air was cool that evening after the sun had set. The walks back to the ship were usually nice. Gave him at least some kind of exercise after all that sitting and a chance to clear his head.
Usually.
This walk back to the ship happened to be made less pleasant by the presence of two sentient non-humans that must have looked at him and decided they didn’t like them. He didn’t recall meeting them before.
One was humanoid, with brown ridges on its forehead and long eyebrows. The other reptilian by a quick glance and yet somehow, feline on a closer inspection. The posture and body structure, he supposed, was what made it look cat-like despite the scales. It was huge, too. It only took a moment or so of looking at it to realize it was bigger than Chewbacca. Which was all the time he had before it was shoving him hard. At a brick wall.
If he had been completely sober, he would have probably been able to brace himself against the wall, but not in the state he was in now. He actually trips in trying to dig his boots into the ground. Then he hits the wall head first.
He blacks out before he hits the ground.
He’s only out for a minute or two, but in that time, Han had been stripped of his wallet - which he doesn’t even notice is missing - and his jacket - which he does notice is gone. All he actively looks for is the blaster, which remains strapped to his leg.
For a moment he just sits himself up on the edge of the sidewalk and tries to piece together what happened. He finds himself appreciating, on some level, the way those goons got around the AV field by shoving him at the wall. His head is pounding, but not bleeding and honestly, it’s not even close to the worst thumping he’s ever gotten.
He decides to continue shambling home, albeit a bit slower, wondering what the hell he did to piss those two guys off.
There was always something that set Han, in particular, apart from all the other ruffians and freighter bums in the smoky dives he hung around in. That tilt of the head. That smile of his. The timbre of his voice and the way he strung words together. It drew many people in to him. Charisma. Or charm. Confidence? Perhaps all of them working together. He had something intangible that the other low-life’s didn’t seem to have.
People tend to like him. Even when they have no good reason to.
And it’s good that he has that, because face it, he doesn’t have much else going for himself. Not only does he not have a lot of wealth, you frequently hear about mounting debts attached to the name Han Solo. His ship is old and by the look of it, doesn’t seem like anything worth boasting about – much less boasting about it as often as he does.
But every once in a while, he rubs someone the wrong way. He’s talked himself into a job that another gentleman trader was interested in. Beating them handily at sabacc. Saying something impolite. Or hell, maybe whatever is that makes him charming to most, didn’t work on that particular person.
It happens.
The bars of home are so familiar and he spends so much time in them, that, when he ended up in the Nexus … it only made sense that he’d spend a portion of his time in multiverse bars too. They’re only slightly more exotic than the ones of long ago and far away.
This evening, Han had spent many hours spent talking to a pretty, if a little scrappy, pilot from another universe named Kara Thrace. Apparently there, humans were endangered and were entangled in a battle with some really advanced and vicious group of … well she called them Cylons, but as far as Han could figure, they were droids. And they could look like anyone.
He supposes there’s nothing to have really substantiated any of the number of fantastic dogfighting stories the woman had, but he liked listening to them. Brought him right back to his days flying in screaming TIE/LN Starfighters. He countered with a few smuggling tales of his own. Which upon thinking about it, she had no reason to believe any of his stories either.
And they had a few drinks.
Halfway through the evening, they realized they were both card players and promised they’d meet up again to play a few hands. Strictly friendly stakes, of course, they mutually assured each other with the glint of mischief in each pair of eyes.
At the end of the evening, they went their separate ways.
As Han headed back to the Millennium Falcon, he was still comfortably numb from any number of drinks he had to knocked back to keep up with Thrace. The late summer air was cool that evening after the sun had set. The walks back to the ship were usually nice. Gave him at least some kind of exercise after all that sitting and a chance to clear his head.
Usually.
This walk back to the ship happened to be made less pleasant by the presence of two sentient non-humans that must have looked at him and decided they didn’t like them. He didn’t recall meeting them before.
One was humanoid, with brown ridges on its forehead and long eyebrows. The other reptilian by a quick glance and yet somehow, feline on a closer inspection. The posture and body structure, he supposed, was what made it look cat-like despite the scales. It was huge, too. It only took a moment or so of looking at it to realize it was bigger than Chewbacca. Which was all the time he had before it was shoving him hard. At a brick wall.
If he had been completely sober, he would have probably been able to brace himself against the wall, but not in the state he was in now. He actually trips in trying to dig his boots into the ground. Then he hits the wall head first.
He blacks out before he hits the ground.
He’s only out for a minute or two, but in that time, Han had been stripped of his wallet - which he doesn’t even notice is missing - and his jacket - which he does notice is gone. All he actively looks for is the blaster, which remains strapped to his leg.
For a moment he just sits himself up on the edge of the sidewalk and tries to piece together what happened. He finds himself appreciating, on some level, the way those goons got around the AV field by shoving him at the wall. His head is pounding, but not bleeding and honestly, it’s not even close to the worst thumping he’s ever gotten.
He decides to continue shambling home, albeit a bit slower, wondering what the hell he did to piss those two guys off.
no subject
"We could make a game out of it if you did." She teases, a dig at her own sins perhaps, but one that is made in good humor rather than guilt. "I do enjoy competing with you."
no subject
"Han Solo as a good guy?" He says almost as if he can't believe the idea of it. "I don't know. I kinda tried that once. I think it ended up worse when I did ..."