Chapter Text
The air is cool on Yavin IV, cooler than its normal sticky buzz. Still a bit humid and recovering from last night’s rain, the morning nevertheless shines with less bite. Rey takes this opportunity to settle beneath her favorite massassi tree, savoring the barely-there breeze cutting through the dense terrain.
It’s quiet. Not the absence-of-sound sort of quiet, not the lonely-days-spent-outside-her-walker sort of quiet.
A resting, peaceful sort of quiet.
Small drops from the earlier rainfall decorate the fauna, the green and yellow leaves gleaming and winking at her whenever light catches. Every so often, she hears the scratching of whisper birds balancing on the tree limbs, despite their namesake’s advantage. She spots a woolamander rustling through undergrowth, searching for grub, trailing dirt as it climbs over her outstretched legs.
Dusting the soil from her leg, she picks up a leaf and begins tearing tiny pieces off, watching as Poe swings her quarterstaff around and jabs at invisible targets.
“Your hands,” she reminds him, settling the shredded pile aside and starting again with a new leaf.
Poe grumbles, his mouth doing that funny thing where the corners pull up in an almost-smile, but his eyes cross at her.
(When he had first made that face at something Kes had said during dinner, she ended up spitting her koyo juice all over Finn and doubling over into Rose’s side.)
He re-positions his hands along the weapon, farther apart to balance out his control, sneaking a rude hand gesture towards her, and she laughs.
“As the princess commands,” he mimics her accent, bowing at the waist.
“Watch your mouth, flyboy,” Rey warns cheekily, grabbing more leaves as her pile grows.
His eyes cross again as he tries to literally watch his mouth. “What am I supposed to be looking at?”
She rolls her eyes fondly as he winks at her. Shrugging, he adjusts his stance and returns to another set of hits and swings while Rey continues on with her pile.
A worm nudges the moss next to her leaves, its white body a brilliant contrast against the green. Her heart skips.
There are moments every once in a while when she sees the color green and becomes vividly aware of her surroundings.
Yes, she’s on an entire planet that’s covered with green, but she forgets some days. Then, she’ll be training or resting and become reminded — the green of the leaves or the grass or even the melons absolutely swallows her whole.
She has no words to name the irenic feeling. She just knows it feels what home must feel like.
Her emotions get the best of her, and everything is so very real to her, amplified and sharpened through the force. When she first saw green (besides the sad, small glimpses on Jakku) in the forests and grasses on Takodana, her world expanded. There were places — entire kriffin’ planets — filled with natural wonders and creatures she couldn’t even begin to imagine.
(I didn’t know there was this much green in the whole galaxy.)
Coming to Yavin IV was a miracle, not only because of the old rebel base with supporters still gathered nearby, but Poe’s father — his home — is here. She’s never seen the pilot so happy to be anywhere but in the sky.
The worm digs a path beneath a gnarled root and disappears, knocking her pile over with its exit. She smiles at the scene.
A squawk sounds to her left. She whips her head around to find Poe staring down a woolamander hanging off her staff.
“No, you can’t have it,” he commands, shaking the weapon a little.
The woolamander snarls and pulls at the strand of hair that always seems to fall across Poe’s forehead.
She foolishly feels a bit jealous of the native creature before mentally scolding herself.
Get a kriffin’ hold on yourself, Rey.
Poe leans back and detangles the paw - hand? gripper? - from his curls.
“Yes, that’s my hair. No, you can’t have that, either.”
A small mewl escapes the woolamander, who bites the staff only to realize it probably tastes like sand, dirt, oil, and sweat. The animal gives Poe an offending stare before hopping off to find something else to eat.
Poe lets out a grumbled oof as he drops down on her left, a protective grip on the staff, shaking his head at the scurrying creature.
“My savior,” Rey coos at him, taking her weapon to inspect the bite mark. The rough metal is free from any teeth impressions or dents, but there is a slimy trail of saliva along it. She wipes it on the moss and dusts it off.
“Anytime,” Poe tilts his head.
A comfortable silence settles between them, one she’s accustomed to with the pilot.
Her temper is a match for his, so their arguments can get heated, sometimes to the annoyance of anyone nearby. Rose had to pull them apart the other day after Rey got frustrated during her flight lesson and Poe screamed at her for her doing “dangerous” maneuvers too low to the ground.
It was fine. It wasn’t that low.
Still, they hadn’t spoken for a week afterwards, and only when they returned to the air together did they break their silence, joking and laughing once more.
There are moments, however, when they can work on the Falcon or sit in the mess hall with no words or questions spoken between them. It’s relieving, this warmth she feels with him.
“You’re getting better,” she breaks the silence, wanting to let him know.
“Thanks, Sunshine. You are, too.”
She smiles, thinking back to last night and the excited crackle of his voice over the comm as she showed him her improving skills, flying the X-Wing in loops and spins above the base.
Poe uses a stick to clear mud from his boots, his face focused, his voice is quieter when he says, “About last week. Sorry for freaking out when you almost ran the fighter into the trees. Just worried. You’re a natural, you know.”
Rey blushes, bumping her shoulder into his. “Perhaps naturally stubborn. Thanks, though. I wish I could say the same thing about my Jedi training. I got my butt handed to me by a tree limb yesterday trying to lift it with my mind from where I was balancing on my handstand.”
“I don’t envy you,” Poe mumbles. “How’s Luke?”
Her face softens. “Good, he’s been less grumpier teaching me since we got here — said something about knowing what it’s like trying to concentrate in a humid climate while an old man stands off to one side, yelling at you.”
“Yoda’s not a man,” Poe makes a confused face at her.
Rey furrows her brow, confused and amused at the comment. “That’s true.”
“He’s a…yoda.” Poe shakes his head and grimaces. “Nope, that’s not right.”
She chuckles, “I’ll ask Luke next time.”
Poe raises his eyebrows, reaching up to wipe the sweat from his forehead. His fringe falls back in place. Rey leans over and blows at it, watching as Poe squints his eyes.
After reigning in her blush, she pulls a smirk as he glares at her. Pretending to reach over to her right shoulder, bringing her eyes away from his other hand, Poe tugs at her buns.
“Hey! I worked hard on these this morning!”
Poe laughs, and she feels less annoyed at the sound, watching as his eyes light up and his smile pull at his cheeks.
He points at her, “Lie.”
She gapes at him as he continues to laugh. “It is not.”
He closes his eyes, still smiling as he shrugs, not budging from his statement. Rey watches the pile of shredded leaves float from the ground to an inch above his head and waits for him to open his eyes. She drops the pile as he looks at her, delighting in the surprised, startled Poe.
“Ah! What is this?!”
Rey falls over as she laughs, clutching at her sides. Poe scrambles and bats at his hair. Rey hiccups another laugh as she watches his face scrunch as the torn leaves rain from his head.
“Oh, your face, Dameron!”
As Poe realizes the leaves aren’t going to eat his face off, he stills and turns to her as she pushes herself back up to a sitting position.
He’s smiling again, eyes crinkling like there’s sun in them, and her insides squirm.
She glances down, afraid to be caught staring. Her gaze falls upon the familiar sight of his necklace, faded metal catching light even still.
When she asked about it a few days after Crait, his smile was sad then, but his eye had a glint in it when he said, “Treasure. I’ll tell you about it one day. Deal?”
Clinking her cold caf to his, she acquiesced with her own “Deal.” She was beyond intrigued to get to know the pilot more.
Now, months later, Rey remains curious. She’s had plenty of opportunities to ask, but something always comes up and she forgets afterwards. Luke would say it was the force meddling with her.
Rey blames it on shite luck.
Opening her mouth, she gets out, “Poe, your — ?” before the telltale hums and whirs of a rolling droid break through the trees.
A beep or three later and BB-8 skirts to a stop before the pair; the screech of a nearby woolamander accompanies the intrusion.
The droid rounds off a greeting, something about Snap knocking a vase over, Finn bragging about his newly stitched pants, and dinner being ready.
Poe claps his hands, energy lighting up his bones as he stands. “Alright, buddy. You had me at grub.”
Poe Dameron’s appetite could rival Rey’s some days, she’s sure of it. Given, it is Kes’s cooking.
Accepting Poe’s offered hand, she climbs to her feet and asks the droid, “Those blue ones he split when he tried to dash across that bridge?”
BB-8 tips back, shaking his body affirmatively.
“Which vase was it? The red one?”
Before BB-8 can answer, Poe grabs her by the shoulders, sighing dramatically. “Food, Rey, food.”
She rolls her eyes and tsks, playing along. “You’re right. Way more important.”
He gives her one last shake and nods with a grin. “You’re thinking straight now, Jedi.”
Her own smile breaks and she follows the pilot and his droid back to base, thoughts of the elusive necklace once again forgotten.