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2017-12-23
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Half a League Onward

Summary:

He’s trembling, it seems, the kind of vibration that would signal an imminent catastrophic failure in a starfighter. A pity for all of them that in this case the warning has come too late.

Poe and Leia in the immediate aftermath of The Last Jedi.

Notes:

This has already been done a few times, once in particularly exquisite fashion by deputychairman – but I needed to write one as well to make myself feel better about Poe’s arc in TLJ. Title is from “The Charge of the Light Brigade”, which seems like it would have been broadly appropriate for the battle on Crait absent any deus ex Jedi.

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Work Text:

It takes about a standard day after Crait before he sees it all, truly sees the complete, horrifying state of affairs. For the first few hours, they’re taking stock of the immediate: the supplies on the Falcon, the known sympathizers in the Mid Rim that will provide safe passage for one of the most infamous freighters in the galaxy, the classified comm relays that will pick up relevant chatter once the First Order decides when and how to pursue them. They’re stabilizing Rose Tico and patching up a cut on Rey’s arm that she declines to explain.

They’re giving as little thought as possible to anything that isn’t right in front of them. At least, that’s Poe’s strategy. He certainly doesn’t try to sleep, or really rest at all, subconsciously aware that the attempt would do more harm than good.

“Either Kabaira or Molavar,” says Leia, tapping the map readout in front of her. “Assuming the air system can support all of us on board for a trip that long?” When she glances toward the cockpit, Chewbacca gives a reply that sounds vaguely affronted. “Oh, settle down. It’s a matter of capacity, not a commentary on your maintenance skills.”

“Molavar is less heavily trafficked,” points out Commander D’Acy. “Better chance of remaining undetected for longer.”

“And Kabaira has more resources as well as a friendly governor.” Leia steeples her hands. “Captain Wexley’s group isn’t due back to their rendezvous point for another six days. What can we accomplish by then?”

Poe can’t envision what the word ‘accomplish’ even means under these circumstances. Survival is an accomplishment, maybe. He’s caught off-guard when Leia’s gaze, and thus the others’, falls on him.

“What would you say, Commander?” He doesn’t take notice of her use of the rank until long after the moment’s passed. “Black Squadron ran a mission on Kabaira once, didn’t it?”

It feels like a lifetime ago. A phase of the seemingly endless trek to locate Lor San Tekka. Poe would have gotten his head blown off there had it not been for Kare’s quick reflexes. Kare was dead now, her X-wing so many fragments scattered over the fragments of Starkiller Base. Iolo had taken it hard, withdrawing into silent, furious determination and volunteering for every mission in its wake, right up to the disastrous bomber attack.

There is no one left from Rapier Squadron now but Poe Dameron. There is almost no one left at all. Somehow the enormity of the loss sideswipes him at this moment, robbing him of his breath and swallowing up all sound.

“Focus, Poe,” Leia says when he’s been silent for too long, her tone firm but not unkind. “We need to make this decision.”

He wants to tell them that Kabaira gives them the best chance of regrouping with their far-flung comrades and building new support. But his voice won’t work. Kabaira carries more risk. The risks he has assumed, for himself but even more for everyone else, are bearing down on him—so, so many choices over the course of weeks and months and years, each one with the weight of lives lost or changed. In the past few days his choices have cost so very much, and he can’t force out the words to make another one.

“It’s—not my call, ma’am,” he says haltingly, and flees.

He careens down the corridor without a destination, certain of nothing except a need to get away from those expectant, assessing stares. When he flings himself into what turns out to be the forward crew compartment, Finn glances up.

“Hey.” Finn’s voice is low, a weary and steadfast sentry beside Rose’s bunk. “You look about ready to fall over.”

Poe swallows and summons a response. “How’s she doing?”

“Better. She was even awake for a little while earlier. The medpack had a nerve stimulator, so that was lucky. We’re just waiting to see if it was enough to fully heal her legs.” Finn’s expression is wide open, seeking assurances Poe can’t give. “Are we headed somewhere that can help her?”

“I—don’t know. I think so.”

With a slight nod, Finn returns his attention to his injured friend. “She never hesitated,” he says. “She saved me in so many ways. I don’t know how to be like that, but I want to be.”

Poe starts to tell him that he already is, then stops and starts to say ‘When you figure it out, let me know.’ Both thoughts are held back, cinched in the rising tightness in his chest. Finn had nearly died on Crait, following the trajectory of Poe’s most recent unwinnable charge. The paths of these two brave, loyal individuals had woven in and out of his for days, and now all of them were battered and uncertain.

He looks at Rose’s young face and remembers how fiercely she and Paige loved each other, the last remnants of a shattered family. He imagines Paige’s dying act, how she must have fought to see her task through and then resigned herself to the end. So very many endings—some met head-on, some met in silence, in fire and vacuum, all in service of…what? Was there even a path left that would lead to victory?

Only days ago he’d been so sure of his every move. Had the courage of his convictions really been that unassailable? How many sisters and sons and lovers had he condemned?

When Finn looks up again, his expression shades into concern. “Are you all right?”

It’s a ridiculous question, and Poe wants to laugh, but laughter would require air. He’s trembling, it seems, the kind of vibration that would signal an imminent catastrophic failure in a starfighter. A pity for all of them that in this case the warning has come too late.

“Poe, hey. Come sit down.”

He can’t, not here, not like he deserves to share this space as one of them. Flinching away from Finn’s outstretched hand, he lurches out of the cabin and makes it a few steps into the next passageway before his legs give out entirely.

The grated deckplate bites into his hands and knees as he dry-heaves for what feels like an age. He hasn’t eaten anything in the past day or so, which might be a blessing, but he can’t stop his body from trying to expel something. Shame, maybe, or perhaps pride.

“Poe, breathe. Can you breathe?” A warm hand on his back. “Should I—what should I do?” A series of beeps. “Yeah, BB, I’m guessing you’re telling me his readings are a mess, which I can see, but I don’t know if…”

Poe wants so badly to reassure him. He wants to be the man Finn almost certainly thought he was. He wants to be the man he thought he was.

“It’s okay, Poe. I mean, it’s not, but it’s going to be.”

He loses some time, because at some point Finn’s hand vanished, and now a smaller one is gripping his shoulder. “You’re all right, Poe.” There’s a gravity to her voice that anchors him, and he lifts his head.

Leia kneels in front of him, regarding him with compassion that stands apart from pity. “Should I assume you’ve been running on pure adrenaline for the past few days?”

“That, and caf, and existential dread.” He pushes up to sit on his haunches, still shaky.

“Finn will probably try to apologize to you later for not knowing what to do for you. My sense was that a stormtrooper in a similar situation would have been dealt with rather harshly.” She hands him a bottle of water and rises with effort, taking a seat on a nearby storage case. “I suspect it rattled him to find out you’re not invincible.”

Poe huffs out a humorless laugh. “Another person I can disappoint.”

“You didn’t disappoint me. You never have.” Her eyebrow arches. “Pissed me off, absolutely. But I’ve spent most of my adult life being angry at the people I love. You, at least, earned it by being a little too much like I once was.”

He’s too brittle to unpack that statement just now. “When you came through that bridge door, I’d never been so relieved in my life. I would have done anything you asked. And you shot me.”

“You’d just led a Force-damned mutiny against one of my oldest friends,” Leia fires back. “I didn’t have the time or, frankly, the motivation to explain her strategy to someone who’d already disregarded my orders once that day.”

Even as the remorse washes over him anew, she’s already deflating. “But I brought you to the Resistance in part because of your initiative. I used it when it suited me. It wasn’t fair of me to suddenly be angry that you exercised it against me.”

At that, he nearly surges to his feet. “It wasn’t against you. Never against you.” He has to make her understand this somehow, has to reconcile his intentions with his actions. “Holdo had a solid plan, but none of us could see it. Everything I could see pointed to disaster. I begged her to give me something, any kind of clue, and she wouldn’t. Would you have accepted that, in my place?”

Leia exhales. “I don’t know. And I can’t explain Amilyn’s reasoning. The best I can guess is that she was taking her cues from me, when I took away your command. I imagined I was teaching you something.” She shakes her head. “Like that’s ever been my strong suit.”

For the first time, she looks old to him. Resigned, and saddened, and a share of the responsibility is his.

“I learned,” he confesses, letting his gaze fall to the deck. “I learned that I can’t do this. I thought my instincts would be enough, but I refused an order from you, and Force knows how many people are dead because of it, and—” The sound that escapes his throat is not quite a sob, but it’s primal and ugly and he’d be humiliated if his dignity held any worth to him anymore. “I was so sure. And I was wrong.”

“Oh, dear one.” She reaches for his still-trembling hands and pulls them into her lap. “In the lives we lead, making a bold, huge mistake isn’t shocking to me. It’s that you made it to the age of thirty-two without ever having this experience before.”

It’s a good attempt at reassurance, if one that he can’t possibly accept. “You’re trying to tell me that this is normal? ”

“Is there any such thing as normal to us?” Her lips curve in a wry twist for an instant. “It was calamitous. It should hurt. But nothing else we might have done was going to be a hell of a lot better. I think it feels even worse to you precisely because your instincts have always been so good in the past. You had no frame of reference for failure.”

“I sure as hell do now,” he says, eyes burning. “My whole life has been focused on upholding the legacy of you and my parents, and I—”

“Your mother once flew straight into an ambush that took out six escort fighters.” Stunned at Leia’s words and at the durasteel that has returned to her tone, he falls silent. “Her wingman warned her and she didn’t listen because he’d hesitated to engage once before. Your father once disagreed so strongly with Han on a mission tactic that they lost their window to rescue their own men. To this day I still don’t know which one of them was right. Maybe neither. And me?” A harsh laugh draws his eyes back to her face, and while her features are carved in stone, the anguish glittering in her eyes is blinding. “I raised a son who is steadily destroying everything I hold dear, everything that is good in the galaxy. Everything you’ve suffered—and don’t waste your breath on denying that you have—all of it has some roots in an action of mine. Don’t ever believe your idols don’t know failure.”

It’s too much to take in. Rationally Poe has always known on some level that his parents couldn’t have been perfect, and maybe he should find it a comfort to believe that they were no better than him. Right now, it’s just one more cut, one more reminder that the galaxy is cruel and maybe they never had a chance at all.

Hot tears trail down his face, and he abandons any last vestige of decorum, slumping forward until his cheek rests on her thigh. “How do you do it?” he asks between hitching breaths. “How do you keep going, making choices, knowing how any of them can go so wrong?”

“You listen as much as you can. You have faith in the people beside you and faith in yourself. Think about Rey, and Finn, and Rose, about everything they’ve done and everything they will still do.” Her hand comes up to stroke his hair. “And remember that you are still the same person who gave a stormtrooper a name, and created Black Squadron, and brought us the path to Luke, and led good people to destroy weapons that had caused unthinkable harm. We’ve lost a great deal, but the galaxy is better for having you in it. I promise you that.”

Leia slips off the bench and onto the floor with him, drawing him tightly into her arms.

“I adore you, child,” she murmurs into his ear, “and I know you can lead. When you can’t find your own faith, draw on mine.”

Maybe it should be enough to restore him. After all, if she can’t manage it, surely nothing and no one else can. He’s still grasping, still searching for purchase, but he’s immensely grateful that he has her trust.

At last she pulls back and urges him to meet her gaze. “So, Commander,” she says, and this time he knows it’s not a mistake. “If I weren’t here, if it were your decision to make—because the day is coming when it will be. Molavar, or Kabaira?”

Poe is in no way prepared for that day. He’s not even prepared to face tomorrow. But something in her eyes tells him that she needs this assurance as much as he does. She needs to know that it’s not all on her shoulders. She needs to not know that he was just barely holding it together even before Starkiller, that his nightmares are consumed by the claws of fire that her son raked across his mind. She needs him to be okay. She has so few people left, and if he can keep fighting for her now, maybe he’ll eventually be able to do it for himself.

He’s always been willing to die for her, and now he needs to do more than that, better than that. So he swallows the doubts, at least for the moment, and answers. “Kabaira. There’s a place we can berth the Falcon that won’t ask questions. Snap will figure out how to contact us there. Rose could use their med center. And I think it’s time to get back in contact with Suralinda Javos.”

Leia’s single nod is approving. “I hadn’t thought of Suralinda yet,” she says. “And I agree with the rest. Come on, help an old woman up and find us something to eat. There’s a lot to do.”

He gets to his feet and steadies her as she quietly curses her knees and smooths out her tunic. “Lead the way, ma’am.”

Notes:

I have a continuation of this in mind that will absolutely not fall into line with whatever Episode IX does, but this part stands alone, so here it is. The planet names were chosen nearly at random from Wookiepedia, so if anyone has better knowledge of why they wouldn’t work here, please feel free to suggest others.

Please come flail at me about TLJ on tumblr (@sugarspiceandcursewords)!