garbageship | That's no moon... Wait, no, it's a moon.

She hears how loud your silence is, Han. "You probably don't think so because of what happened, but like you said. You can't protect him from everything."

Yeah... guilty as charged. He just hopes he's not too late to make up some of the difference.

"I'm trying anyway."

"Unconditional love is probably the strongest thing in the universe. No offense to the force." It's the kind of thing you can spend your whole life trying to find again after it gets ripped away.

That earns her a funny look. From everything he knows (which, admittedly, comes from Luke, who is in the unique position of being both the last man trained in the Jedi ways and the one who defines those ways going forward), there's little difference between the two.

Maybe it's enough. If it isn't, he doesn't know what would be.

"What? I have the soul of a poet, okay?" Not really, but she does feel odd going on about such things.

No surprise that she doesn't follow his thoughts. He's not sure he follows them himself. Trying to explain the Force to her is like a little like discussing the color of ultraviolet light. He can't perceive it himself, can't show it to someone who can't, but he knows just enough of the theory to understand why it's so important.

"Has he told you anything about his training? Before. With Luke."

"Not much. Things about restraint and being afraid it would change who he was and the way he feels things." So, not pleasant things, but she also takes anything from that time with some skepticism because she knows Snoke was working on him too and he hasn't stepped away from all that yet.

"I'm not sure he understands the difference between restraint and suppression of feelings. I'm not sure I do, either," he admits. Not in any way that makes sense. He knows Luke, and that's always been enough. Love without jealousy, without fear of loss. The capacity to kill, but without hate.

It's something he's glimpsed, moments that linger in his memory with the weight of utmost significance, but that doesn't mean he understands any of it. He's the lucky one, in that he doesn't have to.

"I'll make that an uneven three then. He did say he'd teach me more about the Force." And then they got distracted with other things, but she imagines they'll manage some productive time together. They did some actual practicing between hand holding and hugging just now!

"But I know his earlier memories are all a little tainted by Snoke."

"Luke could explain it better." He can't help but sigh softly. "Or, he wouldn't need to. You'd get it if you met him."

Where Ben is impatient, impassioned. It isn't that Luke doesn't feel, doesn't love-- he does so more expansively and deeply than anyone Han has ever known-- but that he isn't moved solely by what he feels.

"You know, eventually, I'm making 'Luke could explain it better' into a drinking game where I take a shot every time you say it. Of course I'll be drunk all the time."

It's also a little frustrating because Luke isn't here. They have to deal with what is here.

"When I was Ben's age, I was pretty sure the Jedi were a myth." Shrugging, he glances out at nothing, across the rocky landscape. "I never believed in the force." He's not cut out for this. Leia had said it didn't matter, that being a father is more important now than being a Jedi... But it's impossible not to feel out of place, between Ben and Rey. Both of them need to learn things he doesn't know how to teach.

"When I was 12 I didn't know any mutants and I couldn't walk through walls. Things change." You're old now, Han. You have a force using wife, brother-in-law, and son.

Sure, he probably knows it better than anyone who's never spent time around that many force users. But no matter how hard you look, you don't see colors your eyes can't process.

"Which is why I'm doing the best I can."

"I know you are. We all are." She gets frustrated when she has trouble catching onto something. It's not something she really had to work through much. And for a person thrown completely out of the comfort zone of their galaxy she's not doing badly, but it's not the same. The force is probably the most important thing right now that still doesn't make much sense to her.

"I told you, it's nothing to be jealous of."

It would have been luckier if Ben had taken after him. That's a selfish thought, but he's had it any number of times.

"I'm not." Not of having the force anyway. A power that comes with the certainty of good or evil? How is that even real life? Isn't everything just shades of grey?

She looks over at him, it's a change of subject, but she's curious after her discussion with Ben and any number of things in this talk have made her remember it. "How old do you think I am?"

Sometimes he understands it better than others; what he does get, though, is half-instinctive, hard to relate. It's just what he's seen, everything he's lived as the odd man out among Skywalkers.

The question takes him by surprise, it feels out of nowhere.

"I have no idea."

She's really just here to keep surprising you, Han. It's her cosmic destiny. "It's not a trick question. I'm not going to be mad if you think I'm older."

"Young enough to call kid."

He's not being polite, not trying to flatter her either way. Honestly, he hasn't thought about it. It doesn't much matter to him; she's an adult, obviously. Old enough to be on her own, though in this galaxy that doesn't mean much of anything. Leia and Luke were nineteen when he met them. Han was a kid, really a kid, when he ended up on his own. His frame of reference kind of sucks for this.

"Younger than Ben," he ventures. Not by much, he'd guess, but can't really tell.

"Fair enough." She doesn't go on to answer the question she posed. She'd been on her own since 13. There are the X-Men and other families she built up around herself, but it was never like it had been. Her age had never mattered to her much, but she was curious today.

"I called him a kid earlier and he got angry."

Ben got angry is never something he wants to hear. It can't have been too bad of a blowup.

"Sounds like you've been spending too much time around me," he suggests.

They already worked it out. He force knocked the rock she was holding away and sounded annoyed. Not super heated.

She smiles. "I figured you'd be a bad influence when I met you."

"Fact of life in this galaxy."

Really. He has a reputation. Just ignore the other reputation, the one with all the heroics.

"That Han Solo is a bad influence? I can only imagine how sweet and innocent Chewie must have been."

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