The Babysitter
First, a Winter story, because I like the Celchus. But don't worry, Mandofic is coming. How could I pass up the chance to write for buckets?
Title: The Babysitter
Fandom: Star Wars
Prompt: Devotion, Separation, Hidden
Pairing: Winter/Tycho (implied), Leia/Han (implied), Leia/Winter friendship
Rating: G
Summary: Leia prepares to send her children away to a secret location where they will be safe from Dark Side influence in the infancy. Winter will go with the children to act as their protector and nurturer during their years of seclusion. Leia and Winter argue the issue and debate the nature of duty and love.
The Babysitter
Leia Organa-Solo stood in front of a suitcase folding small, child-sized clothing and trying not to cry. Keeping her tears in check was made easier by the nearby presence of her oldest friend and most trusted aide, Winter. It wasn’t so much that Winter’s presence was soothing or cheering as it was that Leia found it hard to dwell on sorrow when she was arguing with her white-haired friend.
“Princess.” Winter smiled. “Who else are you going to send? A nanny droid? Some stranger who answers an ad on the holonet? I don’t think so.” Leia still frowned rebelliously. “You certainly can’t go, you’re needed here, and you could no more abandon your duty when the Republic needs you so desperately than you could compromise your principles for political expediency.” Leia huffed crossly. Winter resisted the urge to smirk and continued, “and Han alone in some remote, secluded, secret corner of the galaxy?” Winter shook her head. “He’d absolutely find a way to attract trouble, and attention, and your secret outpost would suddenly be not so.” Leis sighed in reluctant agreement. Both women knew that Han Solo had an almost supernatural ability to find trouble wherever he was. If he was the only living creature in any given area, someone else would come, just to give him trouble or the chance to cause some.
Winter gave that idea a moment to sink in before she went on. “Who else is there? Luke is every bit as busy as you are. Artoo, perhaps? The children could converse in beeps and whistles, I’m sure, but you’d need to bring Threepio around to translate any time you wanted to converse with them. Or perhaps you were thinking of sending him?”
Leia’s only reply to that idea was to shoot a frown at Winter intended to express the princess’s conviction that her aide wasn’t funny. Winter smiled back serenely. “No, highness, you need to keep the children somewhere safe and protected, and you certainly can’t stay there with them.” Winter put a hand on her oldest friend’s shoulder and squeezed it. She knew it hurt Leia, but she also knew it was true. And as long as she had known the princess, Leia had never shirked what had to be done out of weakness or fear of hurt. She had never shirked harsh duty because of the cost.
But Leia also stubbornly tried to prevent others from doing as she did. “I couldn’t possible ask this of you, Winter,” she said. “Disappear for two years and watch my children for me? Absolutely not.”
“Princess,” Winter said, her face going hard and cold, “this is my duty.”
Leia scowled defiantly. “What about Tycho?”
Winter raised an eyebrow. “How so?” she asked.
“He’s got military duties,” Leia explained. “He can’t just run off to the middle of nowhere to visit you.”
Winter’s voice was chill. “There is no reason why Tycho would need to know where the children are being hidden,” she said.
Leia blinked. “If you go with them-and note please that I have not said that I approve of this ridiculous idea, but if you go, he would have to know where they are in order to visit you.”
“I thought this was supposed to be a secret, princess?”
Leia blinked. “What, don’t you trust Tycho?” she asked.
“Of course I trust him,” Winter replied, rolling her eyes at her princess. “But the more people who know a secret, no matter how trustworthy they are, the more likely it is that the secret will be exposed. That's why even you and Han don't know the location.”
“Oh come now,” said Leia, “Tycho would never-”
“Betray us? Of course not,” Winter scoffed. “But I’m not going to suggest making him party to such a dire and precious secret as the location of the children’s hideaway simply because I might get lonely.” Her cold tone of derision left no doubt what Winter felt about people who compromised sensitive information for their personal comforts.
“Then it seems you can’t go,” Leia said simply. The princess smiled.
“And whyever not?” Winter asked.
Leia tsked in exasperation. “What, just kiss him goodbye and disappear for a few years?” she asked.
“Yes,” Winter nodded.
“Winter!”
“Highness?”
“You can’t possibly think that I-you love him, I’m not going to ask you to-I absolutely refuse to allow-”
“Princess,” Winter said in her calmest, most dangerous tone. “If you don’t mind.”
Leia fell silent but still scowled defiantly. That was the problem with wonderfully stubborn rebel princesses: they didn’t know when to back down from a fight. “You’ve spent too much of your romance apart as is,” Leia snapped crossly. “I’m not going to add to it now.”
Winter sighed. “Princess, Tycho and I are both slaves to our duties. We understand that sort of life and we accepted it long before we even knew each other. What we have-” Winter shrugged. “We love one another, no matter how far apart we are, or how long it’s been since we’ve seen one another. Our few moments together are precious, but we’re not going to compromise what we fought for or believe in, the values by which we live our lives, in order to snatch a few more moments. If I shirked my duty to see him-well, I could no more live with myself than he could if he did the same.”
“I don’t understand you.”
“Of course you do, princess. You’ve lived the same life. Your duty just kept you apart from Han less often than Tycho’s and mine do the two of us.” Winter winked. “The privilege of royalty, I suppose.”
Leia snorted and threw a balled-up pair of small socks at Winter’s head. The longtime spy easily caught the soft projectile and, smirking, tucked it into a packing crate. Most of the children’s things were being folded up and put away for the imminent journey to their new, secret, temporary home. Leia could have asked Threepio, or even Winter, to take care of the chore, but they were her children, and she was about to lose them-voluntarily. She would pack their things herself.
The children were out with their father and Chewbacca, being entertained and spending quality time before they were sent away to secret safety. Leia just hoped that everyone would come back in one piece, relatively clean-and by that, she meant filthy, but not so filthy that they would be entirely unrecognizable or requiring a sonic cleanse-and without any warrants for their arrest. She knew the odds were long, but she resisted have Threepio calculate them for her. She didn’t want to know.
She looked at Winter, bent over a small case that she was filling with some of Jacen’s favorite toys, and sighed heavily. Leia was beginning to think that Winter might be right. Certainly Leia was unable to think of anyone else she could send with the children-the one gaping flaw in her plan to spirit them away to safety, far from danger or Dark Side influence. She knew she couldn’t go herself, she knew it, and yet-and yet she had resisted finding someone else. And yet she had resisted asking the question, “will you take care of my children because I cannot? Will you secret yourself away from the rest of the galaxy so that my babies can grow up healthy and whole in mind and body? Will you sacrifice years of your life for me?” Leia had wanted to ask that of no one, all the while knowing that she would have to, and now here was Winter, arguing for the task. Claiming it was her duty, as if anyone would believe such nonsense.
If Winter had any duty, it was trying to keep Leia from taking an action that would bring harm to their New Republic. If she had any duty, it was to be smarter than her princess and senator, and help keep their fledgling Republic from self-destructing. If she had any duty, it was to take what chance for happiness she had, what little the destructive war had left them all with, and enjoy it to the fullest. No, whatever duty Winter might have had to Leia ended long ago, paid off a thousand fold. It was Leia who owed Winter, not the other way around. But try telling that to stubborn Targeter.
Leia scowled at her friend. “If I have any royal privilege,” she said, “I think it would be in being able to order one of my people not to do something stupid and self-sacrificing.”
Winter shrugged. “I suppose you could issue such an order,” she said mildly. “I suppose some might even follow such a command, were a princess to give it.” She looked up at Leia and raised an eyebrow. “I would nut suggest that you labor under the misapprehension that I am some people,” she said sternly.
Leia gave an exasperated sigh. “You’re impossible!” she complained.
Winter nodded. “True,” she said.
“How have I put up with you for so long?” the princess groaned. “How have I survived you?”
Winter smiled. “I’m the closest thing you have to a sister,” she replied. “If I don’t aggravate you every now and again, I wouldn’t be doing my job.”
“Your job,” Leia muttered. “This is not your job.”
“Very well then, I just like it. And your brother bribes me to annoy you. He thinks that as a Jedi Master he has to be too dignified for that sort of sibling rivalry, but he doesn’t want you to feel like you’ve been neglected.”
Leia’s facial expression said clearly that she was less than amused. “You know what I was talking about,” she said.
Winter nodded. “So I did, princess. I misinterpreted you deliberately, you are correct.”
“Then I’ll say it clearer so that you can’t: don’t do this. Secluding yourself for a few years to baby-sit my children is not part of your job description as senatorial aide, or as aide to an Alderaanian princess.” Leia planted her hands on her hips and frowned fiercely. The diminutive princess could have scattered half a legion of stormtroopers with her frown.
Winter was unmoved. “Of course it is,” she said mildly. “You can’t keep them here, you can’t go with them, and you wouldn’t be able to do anything useful the whole time they were gone if you were fretting about them.” She resumed her packing and folding. “I can think of no one whom you could send with them who would prevent more fretting than myself.”
“But what about you?” Leia asked. “What about your life, what about Tycho?”
Winter turned around to face her princess. “Well, it is my life,” she said. Her face was set in a thin frown. She was running low on patience for this particular discussion. “I suppose that I would be the person best qualified to choose my actions.”
“Not if you’re going to be foolish like this,” Leia snapped.
Winter arched an eyebrow. “I beg your pardon, your highness,” she said icily. “I was unaware that I was not thinking rationally enough to please your highness.”
“Oh stop that,” said Leia impatiently. “We both know you’re more rational than anyone who isn’t composed entirely of circuits. That doesn’t make you right.”
“And what about the children?” Winter asked. “Who then, if not me, will care for them?”
“But what about you?” Leia asked.
“What about me?” aid Winter. She shook her head. “Highness, please stop. I assure you, I have no intention of throwing my life away. I think I can afford to spend a few years out of the morass which we call politics and society, don’t you?” She smiled grimly. “Locked away all alone with screaming infants, smelly diapers, and temper tantrums…I think I’ll have the easier job of it.” She raised an eyebrow. “Not to mention more mature companionship, Senator.”
Leia’s face was sad. “You would be all alone, cut off from almost all your friends, your lover-”
“If Tycho and I could make it through our distant assignments during the Rebellion, our long silences when I was under cover or he was on assignment, our forced separation when he was imprisoned by Isard and the time following then when he was suspected of being a sleeper traitor, I think we shall also be able to handle a brief period of separation while I look after the children, your highness.” Winter’s face was hard and her eyes were cold, but her tone was soft and kind. “I love the children too, you know,” she said gently. “I want what’s best for them. I certainly don’t want to see them harmed or corrupted by the Dark Side of the Force while they’re too young to protect themselves, and we haven’t any sort of Jedi Day Care around to look after them, so…” Winter shrugged. “This seclusion really is the only safe alternative,” she said. Her voice went hard as she continued: “And frankly, your highness, I would trust no one but myself as their guardian during this time.”
“But…” Leia was torn between sorrow and annoyance but a small part of her was whispering that she had no choice but to accept Winter’s arguments. Her friend made too much sense, as usual, and Winter was every bit as stubborn as Leia herself. Once she made up her mind about something, not even a Jedi would be able to shift it-and Leia was not a Jedi yet. All she was, was a friend, and as such she had to make one more try.
“But I need you here,” she said, hoping that Winter would not recognize the argument as a simple ploy. “How can I do my duty as a senator without you?”
The thin quirk to Winter’s lips told Leia that her white-haired friend wasn’t fooled. “I suppose the same way you’ve done it every time I’ve been away on other business or under cover,” she said. “Just like you’ve done since you were appointed to the Imperial Senate Seat for Alderaan all those years ago, and your father had me skulking all around the galaxy and far away from any opportunity to aide you properly.” Winter smiled mischeviously. “Besides,” she added, “you’ll have Han to help you.”
“Oh yes,” snorted Leia, “what a help that’ll be. Han’s idea of diplomacy is through his DL-44.”
Winter nodded sagely. “I’ve met enough politicians to recognize this as a wise policy,” she said, straight-faced. “I suggest he start with Fey’lya.”
Leia giggled. “Not too loud,” she cautioned, grinning. “If Han hears that idea, he’ll take you up on it in a heartbeat.”
“Ah, excellent,” said Winter. “I’ll make sure to speak especially loudly when he returns, then.”
Leia threw a stuffed bantha toy at her friend. Winter gracefully plucked it from the air and tucked it into the open case she was packing. “Chooba,” Leia muttered, then realized that she must have been spending too much time with people like Han and Lando if she was swearing casually in Huttese.
Then she looked up at her friend, sobering. “You won’t let me stop you, will you?” she asked.
Winter sniffed. “No,” she said curtly. “Face it, your highness,” she added, “I know you too well, and I’m by far the better slicer. You can’t hide secrets from me, and there’s nothing you can do to stop me from going. You may as well accept it.”
“But will Tycho?” Leia asked quietly.
“Of course,” said Winter. “As I said, we have understood duty for years. We are well used to this sort of thing, after all this time.”
“What will you tell him?” the princess asked, her eyes sad.
“The truth,” said Winter simply.
“I thought you didn’t want to tell him that.” Leia was confused. She trusted Tycho, she would have been willing to confide the location of her children to the Alderaanian pilot, for Winter’s sake, but Winter had refused the idea already.
“He doesn’t need to know where,” the white-haired spy explained. “I’ll tell him what I’m doing: taking the children away somewhere safe and secret, and staying with them until they are old enough to brave the perils of the galaxy.”
“And that will be enough?” Leia asked dubiously, thinking of the arguments and angry blustering she would get from Han if she tried to disappear somewhere for a few years and not tell him where.
“It will be enough,” said Winter.
Leia sighed and hugged her friend. She could think of nothing more to say.
Winter smiled. “I’ll miss you too, princess,” she said and returned the embrace. “Now come, we ought to finish packing before Han and Chewbacca return with the children, or they’ll all want to help, and then we’ll never be done.”
Leia laughed sadly. Winter, as always, had a point.