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Kes woke up to a brief shaft of light entering the room. “Huh - ‘lo?” He propped himself up, rubbing his eyes. The quarters came into focus as his eyes adjusted to the renewed dark. A familiar, unexpected shape greeted him. “Gods-”
“Hey, soldier.” Shara Bey tugged the zipper of her flight suit down, flipping her hair out of the stiff collar. “Did I wake you?”
“You can wake me whenever you want,” Kes breathed, reaching out across the narrow space to brush a hand over her hip. “Is this real?”
“How flattering.” Her skin was warm and real under her fingertips, and Kes tugged on her undershirt, trying to bring her closer. “Hold on, I just need to-” she hopped around with a shortage of dignity, trying to kick her boots off while wiggling out of her pants.
“Kriff, I missed you.” Kes made to get out of the bed, but Shara put a hand on his chest and pushed him back; sleepy as he was, he rolled back onto the mattress with little effort on his diminutive wife’s part.
“Let me join you?”
“Mmm, I like the sound of that.” Kes pulled back the covers, not minding the blast of cold air that entered the cozy cocoon he’d built for himself, too warmed by the soft giggle Shara let out. “I’m not complaining, not at all” - he groaned in happiness as she slid next to him, much less dressed and warm and real - “But I wasn’t expecting to see you ‘til next month.”
“I convinced the captain to let us come back a few hours early.” Shara wiggled in close to him, and Kes exhaled through his nose, wrapping an arm around her middle. “Figured we’d have a few hours of overlap.”
“Yeah?” His next words were lost as he kissed her tenderly, wanting to reduce any space between them, Gods, he’d missed her so much he was certain it was carved into his genetic material by this point.
“Yeah.” Shara breathed the word between them as he carded his hand through her tangled curls. He moved to roll over her, but she stopped him with a hand on his hip.
“C’mon, I wanna greet you proper.” Kes kissed under her jaw, and Shara sighed and rubbed her hands on his arms.
“I know - but - just this, for right now?”
“Of course.” He kissed her a few more times before cozying up next to her on the mattress, and Shara snuggled in close to him. She knocked her knees against his, and Kes made a space between his shins for her feet, and immediately hissed. “Were you flyin’ barefoot?”
“Something like that.” She wiggled her icy toes with a hum of smug contentment. “Oh, but you’re warm.”
“That’s why you keep me around, isn’t it? Warm your bed?”
“Exactly. Glad we’re on the same page.” She leaned in to kiss him, and Kes surged into it, having already forgiven her for leeching his hard-won warmth. He wouldn’t begrudge her anything, after all. “When do you leave?”
“0900.” Kes checked his chronometer, parked on the side of the bed, with bleary eyes. “So, eight hours from now.”
“Wake up at 0600 and ‘greet me proper’?”
“Deal.” Kes buried his nose in her hair and inhaled deeply; ozone, engine oil, and something undoubtedly green and sharp and home. Shara’s fingers curling into his sleepshirt were the last thing he noticed before he fell back into a much easier sleep than before.
He opened his eyes to the alarm on Shara’s chrono and mumbled under his breath about woolamanders.
“What about them?”
“Sorry.” Kes yawned and rolled over, slipping his leg over her shins, wrapping around her like a cuddly dianoga. “Still waking up.”
“You can go back to sleep.” Shara skated her nose along his collarbone, and he could feel her smile when she pressed her lips to his neck. “I’ll wake you up later?”
“No, no.” Kes took her jaw gently in hand and guided her to kiss him more fully - they both had morning breath, not that he cared, not in the least. If anything, it made this feel more real. “I’m awake.”
“Good.” Shara kissed him firmly with a palm pressed to his cheek, and Kes admired the cool metal of her wedding band against his skin. His heart twisted slightly at the sensation - Shara wore it around her neck while flying, but when it was on her hand, it meant she intended to be grounded for some time.
If only he could be grounded with her.
“What did you have in mind?” Kes asked, warmth and desire pooling through his system, heightened by the way Shara was now draping herself over his body.
“Something nice.” Her small hand tripped under the blanket, along his chest, down his stomach. “I don’t think you’ll mind.”
“I don’t think so either.” His hand twisted to follow a similar path to hers, and he crooned at the supple warmth of her torso under his fingers.
After, when they were both red-cheeked and starry-eyed, Kes kissed Shara’s nose gently and stroked her sweaty curls back from her eyes. She wrinkled her nose fondly while she smiled at him, smiling as he traced the scar on her eyebrow.
Then, without warning: “I miss him.”
Kes propped himself up on his elbow to look at her better when she rolled onto her back. Shara blinked up at the ceiling, something working in her throat. He stroked along her bare side tenderly and leaned down to kiss her shoulder. “I know. I miss him too.”
“Do you think he’ll understand?” She whispered, fear evident in her question. “When this is all over - do you think he’ll forgive us?”
“Forgive us for what?” Kes studied her face, and found nothing but the grief he constantly felt.
“For not being there.” Shara’s lip quivered, and Kes’s gut clenched in symbiotic response - Shara never cried, rarely let slip any negative emotion, and it hit him like a suckerpunch to see her suffer. “Do you think he’ll forgive us for missing so much?”
“Of course he will.” Kes kissed her shoulder again and lowered himself to lie down his side, so he could hold her better as he comforted her. Shara was shaking slightly under his arm, and he stirred a comforting circle into her hip. “We’ll be there to make it up to him.”
“You always were the better optimist.” Shara aimed for a joking tone, and Kes let her pretend that she’d succeeded. The effect was slightly ruined by the silent tears that spilled out of her eyes without warning, and Kes made a soft noise while he wiped them away, stroking her cheeks tenderly with his thumbs, kissing the tracks left behind. He pulled her in to bury her face in his chest, and let her grief echo through him, urging her without speaking to let it out.
“Next Life Day,” Kes said, before clearing his throat and starting over. “Next Life Day, the war will be over, and we’ll be able to celebrate as a family.” Shara tensed in his arms, but didn’t call him on his foolish projection - truthfully, he had no idea how long it would be to the end of the war, none of them did, this horrible behemoth of a war that staggered onward. But, Shara didn’t call him on it, and he didn’t add an additional comment to his prediction, and they held each other silently in the warmth of their bunk, as time had the cruelty to continue on.
“I love you endlessly,” Kes murmured to her, when their time together was almost up. “It’s infinite.”
“Forever.” Shara’s chill-tipped nose brushed along his jaw, right before she stood up to use the ‘fresher. “That’s how long I’ll love you.”
“That so?” Kes sat up as well, missing the warmth of her next to him already.
“Can’t help myself.” She tapped on the access pad to their fresher, not even turning around. “I’m attracted to morons.”
Kes snorted and stood to get dressed, skipping the ‘fresher because he’d have to go through decontamination anyway before the mission. He hauled on a thick pair of pants and tucked his shirt into them, and pulled a sweater over his head, smoothing his hair until it was flat. Whistling to himself aimlessly, he walked to the wall, feeling a mischief broiling under his skin while he waited for Shara to finish up.
He got lost in the task, still whistling, and didn’t notice when the water turned off, or when the doors hissed open.
"What are you doing, Dameron?” Kes looked up from the wall almost guiltily, vibroblade in his hand. His wife stood in the door of the fresher, black hair slicked back from the water, a tan-scratchy towel wrapped around her lithe frame.
“Somethin’ immature.” He pocketed his vibroblade with a smile, and Shara walked over, squinting at his handiwork.
“K.D. loves S.B.” She smirked and traced the still hot letters with her pointer finger. “Sap.”
“Only for you, querida.” Kes wrapped an arm around her, not caring that the water soaked through the front of his uniform, and kissed his wife on the side of the head. Neither one moved away from the embrace for a long time, and Kes willed himself not to cry. “Only for you.”
Small, warm hands pressed into his back, holding him close, and they stood there for what couldn’t even be considered a moment, not responding to the alarm that started to ping on Kes’s chrono.
“You gotta go.” Shara was the one to push away, her palm to his chest now, stepping back. Her small hand gripped her towel in place as she studied his face for what felt like an eon before she reached up to straighten out the scarf his father had knitted for him, green as the planet that shielded their son.
“Shara, I-”
“I know.” She jerked her chin to the door, her smile well in place, even if her eyes betrayed her sadness. “I’ll miss you too, laserbrain.”
“Yeah?” Kes kissed her tenderly, the way she always squirmed and complained about, but as always, her ears and cheeks were pink when he pulled away. “You gonna watch me walk away, Shar?”
“Always do.” He turned with a barely palpable but deep reluctance and shimmied his hips for effect as he walked to the door. “Go make the galaxy a safer place, Dameron.”
“May the Force be with you.” She murmured the wish back to him, and Kes rested his hand on the doorframe for another stolen moment, smiling at the small woman whose hand was on her cocked hip, before she lifted her hand and shooed him away.
The last thing he saw before the doors hissed shut were their initials, etched into the durasteel, the only thing he was able to leave behind as a reminder to his wife that he loved her.
***
“Poe?” The pilot looked up, startled, from his holonovel to see Rey, the Jedi he definitely didn’t have a super-inappropriate-massive-ridiculous-more-than crush on, smiling at him nervously.
“Yeah, Sunshine?” Yeah, that’s normal, you call all your platonic friends that.
“I had a few questions.”
“Hopefully I have some answers.” He gestured for her to sit across from him in the mess, and Rey settled down on the bench, wringing her hands together before resting them on the table. He eyed her outfit dubiously. “Cold?”
“So cold.” Rey shivered and smiled at him, ducking her chin down into her collar. She was wearing two sweaters under her issued vest, and he had a feeling she was wearing two pairs of leggings as well.
“You need a scarf.” He unwound his without thinking and held it out to her. “Here.”
“Are you sure?” Rey’s eyes widened as she took the item with near reverence, her fingers carding along the softened wool.
“Mhm.” Poe reached over the table, setting his holopad aside, to help her loop the ends around her long, elegant neck. He swallowed hard and sat back down, his cheeks blushing.
“What is it?”
“It suits you.”
It really did - the green was a pleasant shade next to her freckled skin, and even more pleasant was the way she wiggled her chin into the warm, inhaling deeply, her stubby lashes fluttering as she hummed in contentment. “I love it.”
I love you. Oh gods, this was torture. Not that Poe was unfamiliar with that at this point.
“It was my dad’s.” Poe smiled at her, and his fingers fidgeted over his holopad, debating if he would look more or less nonchalant if he picked it up. The fact that he had to debate it did not bode well for his cool-as-a-koyo composure.
“That’s what I wanted to ask you about.” Rey’s cheeks turned pink, and Poe could honestly say he had no idea where this was going. “Um. Your dad’s name is Kes, right?”
“Right.”
“And your mother’s?”
Poe opened his mouth, more than surprised - he’d talked about his mother, but how had he never said her name? He’d told Rey about the ring, the A-Wing, barrel rolls around Yavin sitting on her lap while his father howled in half-protest, half-amusement on the ground - but how had he not mentioned her name ?
“Sorry, that’s probably intrusive.” Rey ducked her head to stare at her clasped hands, mistaking his silence for offense. Poe’s heart staggered for her, still so unsure about social interactions a year and a half after her escape from Jakku.
“No, no, I was just” - Poe cleared his throat, realizing he’d reached out without thinking, covering her hands with one of his. Rey was nearly his height, but he was endlessly fascinated by how much smaller she was - the strongest person in the galaxy, all the power a person could imagine, contained in someone so slender, so beautiful, so perf- “Shara.” He fought to keep his face straight as he said it, the name still enough to get mist in his eyes, twenty five years later. “Her name was Shara Bey.”
“S.B.” Rey whispered, seemingly to herself.
“Sorry?”
Rey stood quickly and tugged on his hand. “Follow me.” She didn’t wait for him to stand up, just rushed to the exit of the mess hall. Poe swore and stumbled as he got up from the table, trying to keep up with the swift Jedi.
“Rey, wait up!” He jogged after her, and Rey spun in the entrance, gesturing for him to take her hand; he did without thinking, and they ran down the corridor together, towards the more abandoned part of the base. “Where are we going?”
“I found this the other day while I was looking for a place to meditate,” Rey explained without really explaining. “I didn’t notice at first, I just chose the room at random, and then-”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Poe laughed as they came to a stop outside a normal looking door. He looked around, noting the ice webs that skated along the walls nearby. “I don’t think this part of the base has been used since-”
“Before the Battle of Hoth.” Rey put her hand on the access panel, her brow furrowed.
“I don’t think the codes to get in these would work anym-” The door hissed open without any code. “Huh.”
“The Force.” Rey smirked at him while shrugging with one shoulder, and Poe nodded in blithe acceptance.
“Good to know you use your Jedi hocus-pocus for hacking into abandoned rooms,” Poe joked, and Rey rolled her eyes before grabbing his wrist and tugging him into the room after her.
It was about ten degrees colder than in the corridor, the heating clearly having been shut off years prior - Leia hadn’t subverted any unnecessary power to warming rooms that wouldn’t be filled, not by their still meager numbers. Poe looked around the spartan quarters, and noted the double bed. His neck warmed at the reason that Rey could have pulled him in here - mind out of the gutters, flyboy - and his blush only worsened when Rey tugged on his wrist again, impatiently, for him to turn and face her.
“Sunshine.” He licked his lip nervously, the secret about to spill out now that something might actually be happening. “I-”
“S.B.” Rey pointed to the wall behind her, her own cheeks flushed, her eyes almost wild with nervousness.
“Huh?”
“S.B.” She turned and walked to the wall, and traced something that he couldn’t quite see in the dim light. “Shara Bey.” Her hand moved slightly up and to the left. “K.D. Kes Dameron.”
“What are you talking about?” His heart pounded uncomfortably behind his ribs - this was a far cry from what he was expecting when he walked in here, or what he had just assumed seeing the sort of bed the Alliance had reserved for couples, and Rey was still looking at him expectantly.
“Get your light.” Poe unclipped the flashlight from his belt and clicked it on, walking towards Rey until they were shoulder to shoulder.
He squinted to what she was pointing at, etched into the durasteel a foot or so above their shoulders, and then his breath caught painfully in his throat.
K.D. loves S.B. His hand was shaking as it reached out to trace the letters, and he mouthed the words aloud over and over again as he felt the bumps of the carved durasteel. He pressed his hand to the letters S.B., as though willing himself back in time, and tears burned at his eyes, an unbearable sting in the cold air.
“Poe?” He realized he hadn’t spoken in minutes, too busy tracing the letters in a trance. He didn’t lower his hand from the wall, but he did drop the flashlight, switching the beam off; Poe turned his head to face Rey, who was looking at him with unmistakable concern.
“Should I not have-” She rubbed her neck and dropped her gaze to the floor. “I’m sorry, I didn’t think that it might upset you.”
“I’m not upset.” Poe spoke softly, wanting to placate her unnecessary worry - but he was unsure if he were telling the truth or not. Something was boiling in his gut, something he couldn’t quite name. But, he knew what one of the emotions roiling there was. “Thank you.” His gratitude was palpable, his gratitude for this thread connecting him to the past, to the woman he missed so much it was a physical pain sometimes.
“Of course.” Rey was standing so near to him now, his teeth ached from it, but it clashed with his grief, his nostalgia, and his fear, always his fear that what they’d sacrificed hadn’t been worth it, that he couldn’t carry on their work, that he insulted his mother’s legacy daily -
Rey’s hand cupped his cheek, light as a Sriluurian butterfly’s wing, and brushed away the tears that were pooling in his beard. “She’s so proud of you,” Rey said softly.
“What?” Poe blinked in surprise, his hand coming up to wipe at the tears Rey had missed, and she didn’t pull away from him.
“I can feel it,” Rey tilted her head and smiled at him before lifting her hand to press against the letters. “Your parents - they were proud of you even then. They loved you so much - your mother loved you so, so much. I wasn’t sure what this was at first” - Rey’s breath hitched, and Poe realized with a start that it wasn’t just Rey’s emotions the Jedi was feeling right now, but an echo from the past - “But I had a feeling it was something to do with you. Your mother...she’s proud of you. She wants you to know she’s so proud of you, and all you’ve done, and your good heart.”
“Rey, I-”
“Starling.” Rey dropped her hand from the wall to cup his other cheek, and Poe’s stomach twisted as though he’d dropped out of Hyperspace without pulling up on the grav-modifier.
“W-what?”
“That’s what she called you.” Rey smiled, and Poe couldn’t stop the sob from escaping his lips. He hadn’t been called that in so long, not since the fever, the funeral - “Her starling.”
He bowed his head, the grief and love tangled up too much to bear, and rested his forehead against Rey’s, who hummed to him a lullaby he’d almost forgotten.