Work Text:
They were alone, finally. Luke reached forward, his hand gripped Lando’s arm gently but firmly. His helmet slipped out of his other hand, falling to the floor with a dull thud. Lando glanced down for a second, before looking back up to stare intensely into Luke’s eyes. This could be the end for either of them, for both of them. Neither knew whether they’d make it out of this alive.
Wordlessly, Lando ran his hand up Luke’s arm to rest on his shoulder, pulling him closer, their foreheads almost touching. He’d wanted to say how he felt for sometime but the moment had never been right. And now, it seemed he may never get the chance. Luke gave him a sad smile and whispered ‘good luck’. Lando returned the words and they parted, each heading off to their own missions, each wondering if they’d see each other again.
Years later, in a dusty box, Luke finds the helmet. He notices the scratch on the top straight away. It’s a fairly faint mark, nothing particularly outstanding, but it’s important to Luke. The memory comes back so strongly, so powerfully, it’s like he’s back in that moment - about to face his father, about to embark on a mission he might not survive - and he can see Lando’s concerned expression and feel the tension in the air between them.
At the time, he’d thought that it might be the last time he’d see Lando and so he’d tried to memorise everything he could, so that if it was, then at least Luke would have that special memory. Now, because they both survived and it wasn’t their last moment together, the scratch on the helmet suddenly has a meaning. Luke knows now that he dropped the helmet, not out of any sort of nervousness about his impending mission, although there was some of that, but because he understood. He understood, on some level, in that tiny, brief meeting between the two of them just how deep his feelings for Lando were. Or - as he hears a soft step behind him and a smile crosses his face - just how deep they still are.