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“Move,” Poe hissed as he shoved Rose out of the seat. He had been content enough to let the mechanic take off and fly them through empty space, but as soon as they started taking fire they needed a real pilot to take over.
“Poe!” Finn protested.
“Finn, I know it isn’t ideal, but someone has to fly this rust bucket and I don’t see another pilot around. Now shut up and let me concentrate before we get blown to bits.” The ship shook as Poe struggled to gain control of the unruly cargo ship. God what he wouldn’t have given to be in Black One right then, or even the Falcon over this. The controls felt almost sticky under his hands, or… no, that was blood. He nearly passed out from both the Gs and the pain as he yanked the ship hard to the right. “Finn, the guns!” he snapped out. There was no way he could outmaneuver or outrun the far more agile TIEs, so shooting them out of the sky was their only option. Thankfully, the two men now had practice together as well as individually, and the pain in Poe’s chest wasn’t enough to keep down his shouts of elation when they destroyed the last of the the enemy fighters after just a few minutes.
“ Force those pilots don’t know when to quit,” Poe sighed, sagging back in his seat. The fight had taken a lot out of him and the adrenaline was already staring to fade.
“And you do?” Rose asked. “You’re flying with a hole in your stomach.”
“I’ll be okay. Just let me set the hyperspace coordi-”
“I can do that,” the mechanic countered, practically shoving him out of the pilot’s chair to get his bloody fingers off the dashboard. His legs wouldn’t support him. He would have collapsed had Finn, rushing back from the guns, not caught him.
“Kriff, Poe!” he barked at the weakened pilot, supporting him in a tight hug. “How were you flying like this?”
“I learned to fly before I could walk,” he exaggerated as his head swam and he leaned his forehead against his boyfriend’s broad shoulder. “So now I can fly even when I’m too weak to walk. Does this ship have a medbay? I think I need a medbay.”
“It has a meager first aid kit,” Finn replied. “Let's get you lying down for starters.”
“That seems like a good idea,” Poe agreed. His hands had started shaking, and the pain was making him feel like he had to throw up. He forced himself not to curl up into a ball and make it impossible for Finn to help/basically lift him into a bunk in the back of the ship.
“Does that medkit have any painkillers in it?” he asked with a groan. Which meant that it was bad, because Poe would normally never admit that he was in pain.
“Uh, it seems to have bandages,” the ex-stormtrooper replied in a growl as he popped it open and checked. “Not bacta bandages either. Just cloth bandages. That's all that hasn't been picked clean.” Disadvantages of a stolen ship, he supposed. Not like they really had any other options after their own ship was blown up, shrapnel from it now embedded in Poe’s stomach.
“Damned junkie transport pilots,” the pilot muttered. “You don't happen to have any secret advanced medical expertise, do you?”
“No. I don't think Rose does either.”
“Kriff. Okay, so,” he sighed. “So picking around in the wound is probably just going to cause more harm than good if we can't fix anything we find. And it'll hurt like being trapped in the belly of a Sarlacc, so best not to huh? Just wait this out. I can wait this out.” He spoke softly, sounding a lot more like he was encouraging himself than talking to Finn. “How long will it be until we're back at base?”
Finn relayed this question to the cockpit and Rose, who replied “five hours, give or take.” Poe just groaned at the response.
“Can you make it that long?” Finn asked him softly after giving him a minute to collect himself. He wiped away the tears from his face with a calloused thumb so the injured man wouldn’t try to do it himself and smear blood across his face.
“Do you mean alive or okay?” Poe asked when he got his breathing back under control. “I don't know the answer to either.”
“... Is there anything I can do?”
“Kriff, I don't know, Finn. Try to keep me from going into shock? Distract me? Let me squeeze your hand until I break every goddamn finger in it?”
“Can do,” Finn agreed. Standing next to the bunk, he slipped in hand into his boyfriend’s and let him hang onto his fingers like his life depended on it. The pilot's whole body was shaking now. Kriff, he could be dying and there was nothing any of them could do about it. Poe was a wanted man practically everywhere, and not even previously safe doctors who were sympathetic to the Resistance would pass up the bounty on him now.
If how hard the pilot squeezed Finn’s hand was any indication, the pain seemed to fluctuate between not too bad and excruciating. That, or his strength was varying. His eyes fluttered closed, mouth slightly open as he struggled to breathe. He looked so unlike the rebellious, never to be broken pilot the stormtrooper had first met. He couldn't stand it.
“You’re gonna be okay,” he soothed. Poe just nodded tersely, eyes staying squeezed shut. “I’m gonna slide in with you on the bunk, okay?” His legs were going numb from standing. Another terse nod. As carefully as he could manage, Finn lifted up Poe’s head and moved the pillow, at the same time sitting down on the cot, his thighs becoming a pillow. That way, he could card his hand through the pilot’s curly hair. He relaxed a miniscule amount under the touch. For a while, he even seemed to fall asleep, though it was hard to tell between how restless the sleep was and how he barely hung on to consciousness when he was awake.
“How much longer?” he asked hoarsely when he woke up.
“A little over two hours,” Finn said apologetically. “We’re over halfway home. How are you holding up?”
“It hurts , Finn,” Poe said, and tears were leaking out of his eyes as he curled up into himself. Finn wrapped an arm around his back to help support him and halfway scooped the injured man up into his arms. “Last time anything hurt this badly Kylo Ren had me under his hand,” he muttered into his shoulder, and Finn pressed a kiss gently to the top of his head.
“You survived that, and you’ll survive this too.” Poe had survived so much; capture by the First Order, the crash on Jakku, Starkiller. He wasn’t gonna die from one simple mission gone wrong. He couldn’t.
“Do you know how to sing, Finn?” Poe asked softly after a few minutes.
“No. It wasn’t allowed in the First Order. There was barely even any propoganda music.”
“That’s a goddamn crime,” Poe said. He sounded more sure of this statement than anything. “I was gonna teach you to sing, Finn.”
“You still can, Poe. When we get home, and you’re all healed up. We’ll sing duets.”
“Maybe.”
“What songs are you going to teach me, Poe?” Finn asked. The older man’s use of the past tense terrified him. He couldn’t let him give up.
“There’s this one Yavinese pop song....”
“Is that the one that I hear you sing in the ‘fresher?”
“Mhm.”
“It’s nice. What’s it called?” Poe didn’t respond, already having nodded back off.
“This is Rose Tico, with Commander Dameron and Lieutenant Finn. Requesting permission to land, preferably on one of the outer fields.”
“You are approved to land on Tarmac 53.”
“It might be a little rough of a landing. Poe’s hurt, badly, so I’m flying. We’re gonna need medical help immediately.”
“It’ll be there,” the dispatcher assured her.
There was music playing when Poe woke up. A soft salsa, lyrics in Yavinese. It muted out the persistent beeps of the med bay, and the jar of fresh flowers on the bedside table covered up the smell of disinfectants. The sight of Finn slumped against the bed, head on his arms, was enough to make Poe forget about all of that.
“Hey, he said softly, reaching out and touching his hair. It was starting to grow out, forming a thick halo around his head and making him look even more angelic than he already did. Finn woke up slowly, but a smile spread on his face as soon as recognition dawned in his eyes.
“Hey there buddy,” he said. “How you feeling?”
“Well, it seems like they got me on the good stuff.” He was going off the startling lack of pain and the fuzzy feeling in all his limbs. “Which makes up for not having them earlier I guess.”
“Poe, I’m sorry you had to go through that.”
“Yeah, well, I survived, and I’ll heal.” Poe was finding optimism a lot easier now without shrapnel embedded in his stomach. “And then I’ll teach you to sing.”