Chapter Text
Finn often forgets how much the political side of postwar negotiations drains him. That’s not to say he doesn’t enjoy it—in fact, there are very few things ranking above the rush of determination and focus he feels when going on pseudo-undercover missions where people know he’s with the Resistance but maybe don’t know some other possibly-important details. But dealing with the occasional shady bribe, countless detailed and complicated messes of political rivalries and arranged marriages and faction wars and what-have-you? That’s draining.
Especially when Poe, who—while his strong suit is being one hell of a pilot—has admirable social skills under pressure, isn’t there with him.
They’re both fine on their own, they don’t have some sort of weird codependency thing going on no matter what Rose says when she’s teasing Finn, but there’s a reason the first thing Poe did upon becoming General was to promote Finn to co-General. (Well, more than one reason, but there’s the official reason and then there’s the less official reason.)
Finn and Poe, General Dameron and General Finn, they fit together like two well-oiled gears forming the key link in a powerful clockwork, maybe with a few flaws here and there, they aren’t the flawless machinated parts of the First Order, but they work , they work well together. Briefing rooms, throne rooms, shady club backrooms, out in the middle of the wilderness where there are no rooms—wherever they end up, their combined skills have a track record of getting them out of nearly any situation.
Except, this time it’s a party hosted by some local royal with old Senate ties who had quietly financed the Resistance for decades and now, only now, was ready to break out the opulence in full force to celebrate the end.
Something feels wrong about celebrating like this, all flashy and fancy and laced with under-the-table dealings of the old-money folks who Finn is pretty sure cared more about how many credits they’d be running off with then who actually won the war.
But someone has to represent the front lines here, and while Leia would have done it once, she’s gone.
That loss hangs heavy over all of them, especially Poe—whose responsibility it is to step up into her shoes—and so it wasn’t even a question of whether Finn would be with him, when the invitation came.
The only problem is that Poe was severely and inconveniently held up by a call that had come in after Finn had left their quarters to go scope out the rest of the decadent building that hosted the equally decadent suite they’d been given for the duration of their stay. Which means that Finn, alone, in his fancy tailored suit, tie tied in the knot that Poe’s dad had taught Poe and Poe had then taught Finn, made the trek through one of an indeterminate number of courtyards and to the golden doors of the ballroom.
“Your name?” the bouncer asks, only briefly looking up from their datapad.
Finn squares his shoulders, realizing he hadn’t thought this through. There’s no real danger here, but he can’t shake the racing of his heart. He swears he can hear Rey’s voice somewhere in his head, lovingly chiding him for allowing himself to continue panicking when they both know that he can meditate, and that he’s tied to the Force too.
“Finn,” he says without missing a beat. At the time, so long ago, back in the space between Jakku and in-pursuit TIE fighters, the name had been a surprise, albeit a welcome one, and it had stuck— quickly . He only hopes he’s well known enough that they’ll let him in alone, because Poe had been the one to receive the initial invitation and Poe is the one they know and Poe . It’s Poe who was the general first.
The bouncer scrolls through something on their holopad, brows furrowed, and then looks back up at Finn with that same slightly perturbed expression.
“Last name, please.”
There’s a brief moment of heart-wrenching panic, of everything falling to the floor around Finn and then dragging him down too, and then he doesn’t even think about it until after the words are out of his mouth; it’s intuitive, instinctual, the first thing that comes to mind, and the implications are secondary—to him, at least.
“Dameron. Finn Dameron.”
Somehow, he expects the bouncer to say something to the contrary, to somehow know the nuances of his history with names—his history with Poe —but that’s just him being paranoid again, because the bouncer types something in on their holopad and, without hesitation, flashes him a thumbs up.
“You’re good to go, Mr. Dameron. Do you know when your partner will be here?”
Finn has to force himself to smile, because he nearly freezes up on the spot at that.
He blinks.
“Poe?” he questions, unsure what the word partner means in this context, but he’s getting a sinking feeling of what it does mean, and in an even more distressing twist, finds that he isn’t too bothered by this concept.
It’s not what you think . The words are on the tip of his tongue, but they’re quelled by Finn’s ever-growing suspicion that it is exactly what they think.
The bouncer looks at Finn expectantly.
Finn pulls up one neatly tailored shirtsleeve and glances down at the comm on his wrist.
“He’s been held up, unfortunately. He should be here soon.”
“Would you like me to inform you when he arrives?”
Oh, kriff. Oh, all nine hells and then some. The bouncer is smiling. The bouncer thinks they’re married . At least it wasn’t General Dameron, Finn tells himself. At least the bouncer wasn’t familiar enough with Poe, like so many people here will be, to pry too much further. And at least Poe isn’t here right now, but Finn knows they’re going to be having a very interesting conversation when the actual Mr. Dameron does show up.
“Uh, no thank you,” Finn blurts out, cursing himself for losing his cool and collected facade, no matter how momentarily, “but I appreciate it.”
The bouncer steps to the side, with that, and smiles again.
Finn’s heart is racing even faster than before as his feet carry him into the ballroom.
When Poe finds him just a little while later, Finn is on the second floor of the ballroom, leaning on the railing of the balcony. He doesn’t have a drink; he’s never been one for alcohol or for inebriation of any form, even after he was no longer bound by the strict rules of the First Order, and, well...the view here is more intoxicating than any drug could be.
Poe strides up to Finn at a quick pace, navy blue suit unbuttoned to show his black tie and white shirt, looking only slightly shaken despite how late he is. He’s shaved recently, but let it grow in just enough to give him that three-day stubble look he favors, and his hair, although it looks as if he’s attempted to tame it, is as beautifully messy as ever. His brown eyes gleam with that light he somehow always manages to carry with him, that fire of a thousand suns that Finn would stare straight into for an eternity, given the opportunity. Even if it burned his eyes out, he would, just to look past the blinding light and into Poe’s soul, his very connection with the Force, which, however untouched—he’s no Jedi—is there, and strong, manifesting itself in everything from the way he carries himself to the way he pilots his ship and the way he never gives up even in the darkest hour, as the clock ticks towards midnight, and the way one corner of his lip is downturned just slightly right now, in a look of something between excitement and apology.
“Sorry I’m late,” he says, pushing a hand through his hair, and comes up to stand beside Finn.
Elbows resting on the rail of the balcony, Finn shrugs.
“You’re fine,” he says. The words for what he wants to say next formulate themselves in his mind, coagulating on his tongue, but he isn’t quite sure how much Poe heard from the bouncer, so he waits. He heard somewhere that, when you want to get information out of someone, if you give them space to say more they probably will, out of some primal desire to fill up missing gaps in a conversation.
Maybe that conjecture isn’t true, but Poe speaks anyways, moving to lean his elbows on the railing too, side by side with Finn.
“That bouncer called you my partner. Mr. Dameron , they said.”
Finn blushes. Says nothing. Studies the grain of the false wood in the balcony, overlaying plasteel, slightly worn over the years but holding up pretty well. It’s interesting, how this kind of fake wood is easily distinguishable from the real stuff, but still manages to look so well put-together nonetheless.
“Not that I have a problem with that,” Poe adds after a moment, barely audible; with uncharacteristic hesitation lacing through his every word.
The implications—of Mr. Dameron, of Your partner, of Not that I have a problem with that —hang heavy over them, heavier than the three moons gleaming above them in the evening sky as the horizon begins to turn pink, those odd celestial entities in orbit around this planet without crashing into each other once, climbing over the distant mountains.
“In my opinion, it should have been General Dameron,” Poe says, lightly shouldering Finn.
“We can’t have two General Damerons,” Finn replies, shaking his head. Both of them are smiling, and Finn chances turning his gaze to look directly into Poe’s glowing, glinting eyes, the reflection of the golden lights inside illuminating all the little details of his irises.
“You can’t just be General Finn,” Poe says. “Rey’s a Skywalker now, you could be too.”
Finn doesn’t miss a beat. “Oh, hells no.”
“What,” Poe half jokes, “you love Rey too much to do that?”
Finn rolls his eyes at Poe. “We’ve been over this. I love Rey like a sister, but even so...I wouldn’t feel right calling myself a Skywalker.”
Poe doesn’t ask for the details. What he needs to know, he does. What more there is, the Jedi business , as he calls it jokingly, between Rey and Finn, he is content not knowing.
Instead, he shifts a little, making himself more comfortable, and looks off at the horizon for a long moment, watching the curved, hazy outlines of the moons begin to appear in greater focus.
“You know, that bouncer implied that we were…”
Finn almost laughs at Poe’s expense, because for once in his impulsive, hard-headed life, he can’t finish a sentence, can’t risk saying what he wants to. But he can, he can say it to Finn, and he should know that, and Finn fixes Poe with what he hopes is his best I’m listening gaze, because he wants Poe to know that.
Their eyes meet.
Finn fills in the gaps this time. “Married?”
Poe drops his gaze. Someone passes by the partially-open doors to the balcony, and when the golden lights are visible again, accompanied by faint music and laughter and the high of joy from the other partygoers, Finn can see that something silver is glinting in Poe’s hand.
That chain he’s always worn around his neck. Finn has never questioned it, never even seen what its pendant is, but now Poe is fiddling with it, and he can see. It’s worn, looks like it was made out of something that wasn’t a ring, maybe a gear or the like, and despite clearly having seen countless years of love and care, it’s in good shape save for a few scratches on the surface, and a bit of tarnish.
“My mother’s wedding ring,” Poe says in a low voice, soft and quiet and pensive. “I’ve had it for years. Always wanted to give it to someone, but I never thought I would.”
“There’s a lot,” Finn says. Stops. “A lot between us that we haven’t talked about.”
“I think we both know,” Poe says. “And you could be Finn Dameron, if you wanted to.”
“Are you just—are you saying that to appease me?” Finn asks.
“No, I—” Poe cuts himself off, and then, in one swift move, pulls the chain from around his neck. The ring dangles from his hand, the rising moonlight glancing off of it. “Kriff, this timing is horrible. Of all the circumstances we could be having this conversation in, this is not the way I saw it happening.”
Finn leans in a little closer, raising an eyebrow at Poe, smirking at him. “You imagined this?”
Poe leans back, and Finn keeps leaning forward, and they stay the same distance apart, both leaning on the railing at an odd sort of angle, both grinning madly. The chain holding the ring is still clutched in one of Poe’s hands, and he’s struggling to prop himself up on the railing with just his other arm, so Finn does the chivalrous thing and reaches out with one arm of his own, and setting it in the small of Poe’s back as if they’re dancing.
“Don’t tell me you haven’t imagined it too,” Poe says, and now his arm, the one with the ring in hand, is resting over Finn’s shoulder, against his neck, and he’s smirking too.
“You got me there.” Finn shifts, still half leaning on the railing so he doesn’t fall.
“Well, I mean—” Poe leans forward suddenly, losing his balance, and Finn finds himself stumbling back with both arms thrown around Poe to keep them both from falling, and his back hits the wall next to the doors, golden light spilling out over Poe’s face, and they reach a strange equilibrium again, Finn’s hands on Poe’s sides and Poe leaning against him.
“—We don’t have to get married or anything, not right now. But it suits me, and if it suits you, I want to give you this ring. A promise, if you will.”
Finn can’t help it; he laughs. A single snort, and then he rests his forehead on Poe’s shoulder as he briefly shakes with laughter. They haven’t even kissed yet, not after the Battle of Crait and not after the end of the war, even though they’ve had this unspoken thing between them for so long now.
Poe’s face is serious now. “Am I moving too fast?” he asks, searching Finn’s face, and Finn, still laughing, shakes his head.
“Look, we’ve been through all the messy stuff. All of it,” Finn says, and he doesn’t have to elaborate, because Poe knows, because they’ve been by each other’s side pretty much from the moment they reunited after that mess where they both thought the other was dead, both thought that the thing that had sparked between them had been cut off just after it began to pick up steam. They might as well have been married and in love for years now; all that’s been missing is an official declaration.
And this is that, isn’t it?
Poe reaches up; laces his fingers together behind Finn’s neck. The ring is still in one hand.
“Let’s try this again, shall we?” he asks, and Finn smiles at him.
“Go ahead.”
“My name is Poe Dameron, and I’ve been in love with you for so long I can’t remember how it started anymore. And I know this seems like it’s out of the blue, but we’ve been through so much kriffing hell together that at this point, I’m ready to spend every last breath I have with you, if you’ll have me too. We don’t have to do anything official yet, we can take it slow, but I want you to have my mother’s wedding ring. A promise that I’ll always be with you, even when I can’t be there physically.”
Something cracks inside Finn’s chest, and he’s suddenly aware of the spreading warmth that has made itself known in his ribcage, his throat beginning to close up, the corners of his eyes crinkling with a close-to-tears smile of adoration.
“My name is Finn.” Finn stops. He thinks he might actually be crying right now. “Finn Dameron . And I—” he stops again, swallowing the overwhelming emotions tumbling around in his heart, taking a deep breath. “I’ve been in love with you since I saw you flying over Takodana and I, I just knew it was you and that you made it off Jakku alive and—I don’t know how, Rey says it’s the Force. For me, it’s an instinct. All of it. And I—kriff, how the hell do I say this? I would be honored to be the one to have your mother’s ring.”
Hells, hells, hells . And now Poe is crying too, and he’s pressing his forehead to Finn’s before stepping back, placing the chain around Finn’s neck.
The ring falls against his sternum, settling between his collarbones, weighing comfortably down against his chest as it slides beneath his shirt. He wants to wear it out, where everyone can see it, everyone can see Finn’s heart worn proudly on his sleeve, but he fears he’d lose it wearing it on top of a suit and tie, so instead the ring stays nestled against his heart.
Poe brushes a hand over Finn’s collar, over the Rebellion-turned-Resistance logo lapel pin he wears, and then over his jaw.
“Can I kiss you, General Dameron?” he asks, softly.
Finn angles his head upwards, leaning into Poe’s touch.
“Please do, General Dameron.”