This chapter is my "missing moment" that occurs within the events of Intermission by Erin Darroch and Justine Graham, during the fateful Trip to Bespin:

"Their first union had been the purest physical expression of love... and the second, a few hours later, had only intensified that connection. The third time—initiated by Leia's hand gliding with purpose over his hip, waking him from a sound sleep—had felt as natural and right as waking up with her in his arms felt now."

A big thanks to Erin Darroch and Justine Graham for allowing me to play in their universe and for their generous efforts in helping to make this first fic better than I could have imagined. I was inspired as well by this beautiful cover image, which may be the work of the talented Leela Starsky - if anyone can ascertain the identity of the artist, please let me know so I can give credit where credit is most clearly due!

Leia awoke in the darkened cabin, blinking to clear her eyes as she surveyed the unfamiliar surroundings. Her momentary disorientation began to ease as the tumultuous events of the past week seeped back into her consciousness. A time in which her life had been turned upside down by yet another seismic shift, this one shaking her off the icy hellscape of Hoth mere footsteps ahead of the Empire but landing her again within the safe confines of the Millennium Falcon, now limping towards Bespin on overtaxed sublight engines.

The Falcon's captain began to crowd her waking thoughts, as Leia rolled to her side in the double-wide bunk, facing the other occupant but careful not to disturb him. With the stress of completing in-flight repairs to his beloved but temperamental ship and ensuring that they made it to Bespin, Han needed all the rest he could get. As she cautiously stretched to relieve the stiffness in her arms and legs, other more unfamiliar but nevertheless pleasant aches reminded her of what had transpired earlier in the night, hinting at the challenge it might be to keep either of them in a state that resembled rested or relaxed.

Flushing with warmth at the memories of making love, Leia focused her eyes in the low light of the cabin on his stilled form, lying on his side facing her. He was still asleep, confirmed by the deep steady sound of his breathing. She watched the slow rise and fall of his bare chest, still a bit amazed at finding herself likewise naked and in bed with Han, although shedding her clothes had been much easier than lowering the long-held emotional shield she had used to keep him at bay.

With that barrier at last discarded, a myriad of conflicting feelings—nervous excitement, relief, fear of an uncertain future, regret over time lost—swirled around her. But for now, for this moment, Leia chose to set those worries aside and instead bask solely in the overwhelming joy she felt, as if savoring the sliver of light that had pierced through the dark storm clouds that seem to have settled over her life of late.

She had wanted this—him—for so long now, although until tonight she had only ever admitted that in the most private chambers of her heart. Han had always stirred a riot of emotions within her, which had proved a dilemma for her practical and logical mind. Even in their first fraught moments together on the Death Star, with Han wielding his blaster and his mouth with the same indiscriminate recklessness, she had been simultaneously enraged and excited by him. How could someone's mere presence be irritating and riveting at the same time?

But as Han remained with the Alliance to smuggle supplies and run the occasional mission, all the while proclaiming to be uncommitted to anything other than himself, his co-pilot and his ship, she had found her trust in him inexplicably deepen to where she not only relied on him but came to need him, and not just for supply runs to procure more bacta or powdered blue milk.

As her need for him had grown into a fervent want, it had taken near superhuman efforts to hide her attraction to him, so often betrayed by her hair-trigger blush, which Han seemed to love eliciting for his own enjoyment. But she had secretly thrilled whenever she heard the deep rumble of his voice, whether he was arguing with Chewie over repairs or laughing over Luke's incredulous reaction to finding himself on a planet surrounded by nothing by frozen water. Sometimes blood would rush to her face—and to other more interesting regions—with just a glance at Han, especially when her gaze unexpectedly met with his hazel eyes, which blazed out above a nose clearly broken more than once and full sensuous lips underlined by a mysterious slash of scar. He had appeared unbidden in her sleep, between nightmares, and soon after invaded her waking thoughts as well. She had tried to banish him from her mind and bar him from her bruised and battered heart—after all, he was going to leave at some point, as he reminded her and anyone else listening on a regular basis. But the more firmly she resolved to purge him from her system, the more entrenched hold he took on her mind, her heart and her body.

Tonight, though, the long battle that she had waged within herself was over at last, attested to by the vivid memories from their earlier encounters of that evening that now innundated her mind.

Their first time together earlier that evening, as their passion flowed unchecked, had been overwhelming in its beauty and its intensity. Her body still felt tingles of hot waves of pleasure from Han's questing mouth and his caressing hands as he took his first loving inventory of her bared body, and the heat of him when she arched against him as he instigated a tender and more intimate exploration. But while the pleasure he stoked in her trembling body had been beyond anything she had imagined, it was her ability to finally express what she had been trying so desperately to deny for years that had provided her with a more explosive release. The much needed unfettering of her emotions had amplified the exquisite pleasure he incited in her, making her unable to focus on what was going on outside the immediate confines of her body and mind.

In the hazy afterglow, as she began to come back to herself and the reality within the cabin, she had wondered—in a state of happy delirium—whether her body, mind or soul would ever go back to their previous normal state of being. Casting a shy smile at Han, who had returned the most genuinely content smile she had ever seen on his usually smirking face, she'd crawled back into his waiting arms and nestled herself against his damp cooling skin, pressing her lips softly to wherever they happened to fall and listening to his soft sighs in response.

Exhausted by their outpouring of passion, Han and Leia had drifted in and out of a light sleep. But each time they had bobbed to the surface of consciousness, their hands had come to life as well, resuming a lazy circuit of gentle caresses, reluctant to break that vital connection that had been so hard fought to establish. Before long, their touches had become more sensual and deliberate, and as Han nuzzled her cheek, he whispered heatedly that he wanted her again. As he beckoned her back into a hazy sea of arousal with his increasingly heated play, she'd marvelled this time with open unbridled lust at his long muscled body—his broad chest with a light dusting of hair and firm flat stomach, his lean hips and powerful thighs, and his beautifully sculpted backside.

As she began to tentatively chart and claim this new territory for herself, she had delighted in noticing the slight tremble in his hands as he stroked her flushed cheeks, seeing his eyes squeeze shut in a look of pained concentration when her lips traced a delicate and haphazard trail over his hard masculine contours, and hearing his ragged gasp as she grazed his straining erection. Earlier, when he had pleasured her with great tenderness, passion and skill, her own lack of depth in this realm of experience had left Leia slightly anxious about whether she would be able to ignite in him the same sort of euphoric ecstasy in which she was awash. But these doubts dissipated as she beheld his unbridled responses to her tender caresses.

Looking up at him, now poised over her with a potent look that was both hungry and needful as he moved within her, she saw the undeniable proof in his eyes of the powerful effect she had on him, a realization that sent an immediate rush of intensity to every part of her inflamed body and quickly propelled her over the edge. As her body continued to quiver with aftershocks, she drew him down close in her arms and hugged him tightly. He buried his head next to hers, moaning a quiet but pleading "Sweetheart" into her hair while his hips drove out his own frantic release. Then, utterly exhausted and finally overcome, they had fallen into the deep and satisfied sleep of new lovers.

Now, wide awake from reliving the vivid memories of the night's events, she swept her eyes over his still form, stirring her hunger for him and overriding her concern for his adequate rest. As she extended her hand to trace her fingertip over the intriguing vein running down his bulging bicep, his breathing abruptly shifted and he rolled onto his back, leaving Leia with an unobstructed view of his beautiful and apparently aroused body. Even in his sleep, his body seemed to react to her nearness, acting beyond his conscious control, as if in a state of persistent need for her.

Leia's hand changed course and glided over his hip, drawn irresistibly by the enticing sight of his erection on display for her. She reached out to curl her slender fingers around him and, finding him hot to the touch, jolted as if sparked by a live wire. She gentled her grasp, letting her fingers explore the rock-solid hardness of his long length, marvelling at the contrasting textures of the smooth soft skin and coarse curly hair. She was fascinated by both the seeming oddity of the male sexual organ and by the strong primal feelings it stirred in her, especially in light of her new-found knowledge of the pleasure it could bring to both of them.

Greedy to discover further intimate secrets of his gorgeously charged body, Leia rose to a kneeling position near his side and then sat back on her heels. As her fingertips mapped the rippled contours of his muscled abdomen, she glanced up at Han's face to find a pair of smoldering eyes staring back at her. He made no movement, except for that of his eyes intently following her hand, seemingly giving his tacit permission to continue her bold exploration of his body.

"Just can't keep your hands off me, Your Worship?" he murmured, his voice husky with sleep. His eyes began to crinkle and the corner of his mouth tilted up in a gratified smile.

In silent reply, she held his gaze steady as she wrapped her small hand around his thick length again and began a slow stroke, while her other hand slowly glided up his abdomen to his chest, her fingers sliding through his chest hair to graze and tease his nipples. His bemused look quickly gave way to one of breathless anticipation, as his brow furrowed and his mouth fell open to release a hoarse groan.

Gauging the size of him in her tiny hand, she slid her other hand at his chest back down to allow both to bear fully on his rigid manhood. In response, his hips began to thrust in counterpoint to the motion of her hands, and he began to moan her name as if praying before a goddess.

Leia felt the wild surge of her own arousal course through her as if she had been hard-wired into a high-voltage circuitry grid, evoked by the potent combination of Han's ready body on display for her and the evidence of intense pleasure she could incite in him. Although Han displayed swagger and cocksure attitude to the galaxy at large, the vulnerability he revealed in these private moments of passion, coupled with the deep desire and frenzied want that she could stir in him, were heady for her, transforming any of her remaining hesitation into a powerful want and drive of its own.

Leia moved to kneel between his parted legs to take further command of his body, but Han, no longer able to remain a passive participant, reached for her, his large hands quickly swarming her body. He pulled her small frame possessively down towards his own, groaning as he drew her soft full breasts and hardened nipples to his hot open mouth for a ravenous midnight feast.

When his hungry mouth at last devoured her lips in a fiery kiss, she whimpered and opened her mouth to the rough insistence of his tongue. As their kiss quickly deepened, he rolled her to her back and she folded her legs around him, allowing Han to slide his impatient erection against her aching core, his hips already thrusting in instinctive need. As she felt him glide hard against her ready center, he let out an agonized groan and quickly adjusted the angle of his hips to sink deep inside her in a single powerful thrust, driving a ragged echoing moan from Leia.

Finally intimately connected, the frenetic energy that had snapped their bodies together like a pair of magnets seemed to ease slightly, soothing the fierce urgency to which they had awakened. As their hips continued to move together in a slow hypnotic rhythm, they shared sweet unhurried kisses and clasped hands, interlacing fingers as Han gently moved her arms back to brace them beside her head. This languid midnight coupling, in contrast to those earlier, was quiet yet powerful, filled with soft moans and deep contented sighs, while their locked eyes bore witness to the tremendous flow of feelings coursing between them.

At the heightened state with which they had initiated this latest union, it wasn't long before they were both teetering on the slippery edge of release. As Han moved his hand down between them to add a perfectly placed touch to the intimate joining of their bodies, Leia began to writhe beneath him, moaning in earnest. The last thing she saw was a look of sweet joyful pride on Han's face before she arched back and split the silence of the cabin by wailing out for him with the desperate cry of his name for the first time. Seemingly robbed of control by her plea for him, Han's movements became forceful and erratic, until he finally exploded within her with his own strangled shout.

Sated but thoroughly spent, the weary lovers began to recover in the resumed silence of the cabin, clinging tightly in their embrace to maintain warmth as their bodies rapidly cooled. Leia could still feel the roiling heat of her emotions, and a glance up at Han revealed an almost pensive look on his face.

Noticing her eyes on him after a moment, his face conjured a faint smile, so unlike his usual trademark grin, but his eyes glittered at her like a kaleidoscope, projecting wonder, fear, and love. Tightening his arms around her, Han broke their shared gaze, closing his eyes but tenderly anointing the crown of her head with the warmth of his lips, as if admitting the truth of what his gaze had just revealed.

Ensconced securely in the safety of his strong embrace, she nestled closer to him, burrowing her head on his chest to feel the comforting beat of his heart, pounding out a coded message to her own. The buzzing of her emotions began to quiet, as if they were finding their proper places to settle, and soothed by the low humming lullaby of the Falcon's engines, she closed her eyes, content and fearless to give herself to sleep, to Han, to life.