valarltd | Cracked out Crossover

So,

svmadelyn had a cracked out crossover.
My challenge was to get Han Solo, Jean-Luc Picard and Aslan together.

"Discovering the Undiscovered Country"
Rating G

The air was clean.

This in itself was a novelty. Han Solo had encountered air on more planets than he could remember, but never anything so pure. No hydrocarbons, no industrial wastes, nothing, just clear air that smelled of chlorophyll from the green ground-cover and trees.

He had no idea where he was. The last thing he remembered was reaching for the hyperdrive levers, and everything going black instead of streaky.

He got up from where he was sitting under a tree and started wandering toward a low hill he could see in the distance.

The first thing Jean-Luc Picard smelled was lavender. Fresh lavender, like his mother used to grow in hanging baskets when he was a child. He opened his eyes to a sky that looked like home. Ridiculous, of course. Enterprise was nowhere near Earth.

He was sitting under a tree, an alder, and a brook flowed nearby. Grapevines terraced a hill on the other side of the brook. He made his way across a line of stepping stones and walked toward the vineyard.

The man just cresting the hill walked with a pilot’s rangy swagger, his hand near his weapon. Picard found he had no phaser, so raised his hands as the stranger drew closer, holding them palm forward near his chest.

He made eye contact and said “I’m Jean-Luc Picard of the Federation Starship Enterprise.”

The other man moved his hand away from his blaster and held it up in imitation of the gesture. “Han Solo, Captain of the Millennium Falcon.”

“Pleased to meet you, Captain.”

“Where are we?” Solo looked around the landscape. “Looks kind of like home.”

“It does look like Earth, doesn’t it?”

“I was thinking Corellia, but yeah. Earth, huh?” Despite an excellent memory Han had never seen the name on a star chart.

Picard looked at the man, slightly younger than himself, less encumbered by regulations for all he claimed a captaincy. “What are the coordinates for Corellia?”

Han gave them, and asked the same of Earth. Picard helped himself to one of the vines, tasting the fine Bouchy grapes as he tried to place where the coordinates were.

“Those are edible?” Han tried one, sniffing it first and then placing it gingerly in his mouth.

“For humans, yes.”

“I’m standard human stock. They’re good.”

“My family makes wine out of this variety. We have for a hundred generations.”

“Wine I understand. My family makes it too, and brandy. Biggest distillery on Corellia. I never took to the work.”

“Nor I. That’s why I’m in Starfleet.”

They found comfortable hummocks in the shade of the vines and exchanged carefully edited life histories. Han lay back and looked up at the sky.

“This is weird. The sun hasn’t really moved.”

“I noticed as well. We’re obviously in an artificial environment.. But I’ve never heard of one so large.”

Han stood up. “Look, Jean-Luc. I can’t lay around here waiting for something to happen. I’m going to go explore.”

Jean-Luc considered briefly. “I think I shall remain here for now. I’ll look around more later.” He watched Han until he disappeared behind a ridge.

“Good afternoon, Captain,” said a familiar voice at his elbow. He turned.

“Data?”

The golden-eyed android smiled. “Not my true form, but one you would be comfortable with. In time, I shall show myself.”

“Q! Stop this game at once.”

The android shimmered and a great lion remained in his place. The eyes remained the same deep gold. The voice deepened until it sent a thrill through every blade of grass and hummed in Picard’s very bones. “I am not your Q. He is but one of my lesser servants. Do you not know me, Son of Adam?”

“Aye, I know you now.” The tales he had read as a child had all come back.

“Then come. Taste and see the wonders of My country. I will see to your companion as well.”

“How did I die?”

“Peacefully. In your sleep, in your own bed aboard your ship. Leave the shadow life behind, my son. There is much for you to do and see, and greater vistas to explore than even spread before you in the stars.”

Han walked until his legs ached. He had no way of keeping track of time, but knew he could do that slow ground-eating lope for about twenty kilometers before it got to him. He sat down under a tree--that looked like all the other trees--to rest.

“Did you find what you were looking for, Han?” Luke’s voice from just behind him made him jump.

“Don’t know what I was looking for, kid. I’m dreaming. You’ve been dead for three years.” Luke was very much alive, warm beside him, the light hitting his golden hair.

“For one who is ready, death is nothing but a doorway, Han. Didn’t I tell you that? Don’t you know that now?”

“You sayin’ I’m dead too?” It made sense. The blackness as he pulled the levers, then nothing.

“Han, how old are you?”

“I–“ He got a fuddled look. “I’m not sure. Forty?” He was sure it couldn’t be much older than that.

“You turned a hundred and ten last birthday.”

“Ok. I’m dead.” Han absorbed the information with relative ease. “But I don’t believe in an afterlife.”

It was no longer Luke’s hair that was golden, but all of him. He changed as Han watched. “You do not need to. For I believed in you. Son of Mirn, do you not know me?”

“You aren’t Vard the Maker anymore than you were Luke.”

The golden temple apparition shifted into a large feline, as high as Han’s shoulder, the tawny mane fading to fur the color of Luke’s hair. “No, my son. Vard is the name your world calls me. Here, I am Aslan. Your Luke knew me by yet another name. Come. He awaits you. He will show you the wonders of My country.”

:”What about Jean-Luc?”

“He has found himself a place here. You shall see him again.”

Han looked up. At the top of the next rise, a familiar form stood waiting. “Come on, old pirate! We may have eternity, but that’s no reason to dawdle.”

Han gave the Lion one last look.

“Go on,” Aslan said. Han went.