Chapter Text
In hindsight, using the binoculars may have been a mistake.
He wasn't entirely sure when they were handed to him, he can recall a hazy murmur of "Dameron, here-" and the feeling of a metallic, rusty apparatus being shoved into his hands as the rest of the Resistance fighters rushed back into the cave. His skin was far too warm against the cold wind that blew at him from just beyond the barricade. The red salt had already painted a pattern onto his face and neck as he desperately watched, waited. The color was fitting, as he could feel the inevitable burning anxiety wrap it's magma fingers around his throat.
Finn was out there. Disobeying a direct order from him and flying himself directly into the line of fire...on a battering cannon.There were gasps and screams and Finn was out there risking his life without backup. Without him.
He had told everyone to peel off, to get back to the trench, and somehow this cocky ex-stormtrooper had found the audacity to blatantly disregard his life to complete the suicide mission he had willingly began.
The trench was just high enough that he had to lift himself upwards to see anything beyond 12 feet ahead of him. His hands were beginning to shake as he poured over the entire horizon.
"Come on- come on Finn."
It feels like hours before he sees it- the sand skimmer closest to the cannon. For a second he drops the binoculars to his chest and turns his head to the side, his stomach trying to empty itself onto the crystal-like red floor of the trench. After a few shaky gasps, he convinces himself to just look at the wreckage.
A destroyed cockpit lay facing towards him, the charred and torn seat- empty?
Poe's mind races, scanning the entire wreckage trying to find him.
God he's out there dead, snapped his neck on impact or severed his spinal cord when he was thrown from the cockpit or-
His entire body shakes so violently that he cuts the bridge of his nose against the rim of the eye-piece.
He can't seem to relieve the tension growing in his stomach, as the knot he had formed more than a month ago seems to grow too heavy. His knees lose their strength and he has to quickly smack his hand to the lip of the wall to hold himself steady.
The wind howled, or was it his blood rushing in his ears. God everything was so loud, and he could barely keep the damned thing steady enough to see. It wasn't calibrated right, sharp black crescents waned across the corners of the image. He could just barely see the faint triangled tips of his own eyelashes pressed against the glass.
"Come on Finn- come on please-" His voice cracks as he can feel himself reaching his limit.
For a moment everything swims, he can feel his stomach trying to leave though his throat again.
"I cant- he can't do this. Come on Finn!" He's shouting into the void at this point but anything to calm his sparked nerves is helpful.
A droplet of blood rolls down the side of his nose and slips into the space between his lips.
Finn came racing across his vision so fast that he almost completely missed him.
"Oh thank god-" Poe really was thanking whatever powers made this man not dead because- his throat tightened to even think about what he would have done if Finn hadn't made it.
He watched in confusion as Finn dived face-first back into the rubble, wiping his burned and bloody hands on his black cargo pants.
The steaming, freshly crashed cock-pit's door was ripped open upon impact. The pilot pulled out by Finn's strong hands. Poe squinted, trying to make sense of the adrenaline addled events that transpired before him.
The person in the cockpit was leaning forward-
"Rose." Poe pulls away from the binoculars again. It finally clicks, the position of the sand-skimmers, the damage. She had hit him to save him, to keep him out of the line of fire.
Grateful isn't the perfect summary of what was crossing his face, it probably looked more similar to a mixture of pain and relief.
Something suddenly feels off, his chest aches and his stomach drops so fast he can barely steady himself.
He yanks the eye piece back up to his face, watching intently as Finn yells at her. She must be speaking because suddenly his face drops and he leans forward to listen, like a puppy hearing a command.
The wind blows so hard that he's blinking back tears. A particularly strong gust sends him careening into the stoney wall. He grapples with the binoculars again and finds the spot in the distance with less difficulty this time.
And then he sees it.
He's managed to only snag the end bit of it, but clear as day it's happening.
Finn's kissing Rose.
He blinks. He can't do this.
If adrenaline was driving him before, shock is now. He drops the binoculars, the sound of them clattering to the ground muffled by the Tie Fighters still hovering in the upper stratosphere.
He turns on his heel and heads towards the juncture of the cave and the trench.
But something stops him, some loud nagging voice in the back of his head that sounded suspiciously like General Organa seemed to demand for him to halt.
To turn around and ensure that Finn and Rose had made it back to safety.
And for a small moment, nothing mattered more than checking for him.
He stumbles slightly on the uneven surface of the trench right before the wall, raking his palms against the salt. The pilot lets out a hiss comparable to the doors of the evac-ship and tries to rub the salt crystals out before they begin to burn to their full effect.
Every part of him felt strange. He could see himself acting out motions but couldn't remember making the decision to perform them in the first place.
He was suddenly hoisting himself up and over the lip of the trench, his hands throbbing in time with his newly amplified heartbeat.
Nothing he was doing made sense. It was as if he was just watching from the sidelines.
Suddenly he was dodging to the left, ducking as large chunks of salt flew in every direction. "Shit-"
The Tie Fighters. Another green laser beam smacked onto the surface, this time only a few yards away. Poe managed to roll out of the way as a brick of salt the size of his head tried to knock him down for good.
Why am I still here? I should be back in the base, helping the others-
His thoughts are interrupted by that same nagging voice again, some part of him feels the comforting tone of a mother he's never met.
"Save Finn first, then you can help the others."
For a moment his steps fell with a regained urgency. But as his body pressed forward, his mind can't help but flood with thoughts. He tries to fight it, that presence he can feel occupying some crevice in the deep, distant part of his consciousness.
“Poe stop fighting me.” The voice sounds so familiar that the instant they speak he relaxes. The throbbing in the back of his head ceases immediately, and he sighs in relief.
The salt in the wind begins to burn as it slices small, almost invisible cuts on his neck and face.
His eyes sink slightly.
He was kissing her.
It just repeats, the image as clear as he had just seen it. Her hand on his face, Finn’s holding her other so gently. He shuts his eyes in a desperate plea to keep himself sane. But the image is still there, and he has to grit his teeth to keep from sobbing.
Finn is only another 200 yards away.
He has Rose in his arms, and Poe feels like yelling. Tears form small rivers of clear skin down his now red-speckled face. He brings a worn jacket sleeve up to his face, scrubbing at his cheeks angrily.
I don't want to feel like this.
Something in the way the voice speaks tells him that they are smiling. A mournful tone that makes his heart hurt.
"I know."
He loses his footing for a moment and scrambles to catch himself, his jacket sleeve ripping in the process. Normally ruining a jacket like this would send him into hysterics for a day or two but nothing could distract him from the conversation he was having with the air.
I want it to stop.
His breathing gets shaky, coming out in unpatterned gasps. He can't tell if it's from fear or from running or from something else entirely, but his chest is so tight he can barely suck in air. The burning sensation under his bottom eyelids signalling to the presence that the salt wasn't the only thing making him tear up.
"Please just-" he bites back a sob as he says it aloud. He's nearly there, just another 20 yards.
His left leg is screaming at him and his chest burns.
"Make it stop, please. "
"I'm sorry Poe. This feeling...it doesn't ever stop. It just manifests in different places."
Finn is holding Rose in his arms, stumbling back towards the base too slowly. When he sees Poe, his face lights up and the pilot feels his throat tighten.
"Come on! We gotta get out of here!" Poe shouts over the harsh wind. He's shielding his eyes from the sun with his hand, pointing the other back towards the decrepit base.
Finn nods, squinting in the bright sun. He readjusts Rose on his shoulder, who is quite obviously unconscious and injured. He winces as her abdomen puts pressure on his arm, which by the looks of it, is sprained. Although it may be a broken collarbone.
Poe puts his hand on her back and yells again, "I'll take her, you're hurt!" The leather fabric of her jacket reminds him of his old one. The one he gave to him. The one he's looking at now, stretched across Finn's surprisingly strong arms. It had framed him so well that Poe had almost lost control when he first caught sight of him, after the adrenaline had died down enough to give way to a clear head. Finn has said something about giving it back but it was so blurred out that Poe had just panicked and told him to keep it. He remembers so vividly how fast his heart was pounding against his ribcage.
Admittedly, his heart was racing faster now than he had ever felt it before. He's pivoted so they are side by side and leaned so her body could be easily transferred from shoulder to shoulder.
He stumbled as soon as her full unconscious weight was on him, his left leg giving out in a dramatic protest. Finn lurches down, looping his hands around the other's waist to keep him upright. Poe ignores Finn's woah and jerks himself out of his grasp. "I got it."
It comes out a little more stern than he had planned it to, and the voice crack on the last word had not helped in the slightest. A hot wash of guilt burns its way up his neck and into his face. He turns away from Finn's look of bewilderment, praying for some magical strength to carry him through this.
They have 500 yards to cross with no cover and no sign of backup.
From the lack of new ships in the atmosphere, Poe could tell that no one had answered their call. The rebellion was on their last leg.
"We have to get out of here," Finn turns to him, his big, dumb, perfect eyes casting across the pilot for some answer to a question he had missed. "Are you alright to walk?"
His embarrassment quickly turned to anger. It took everything in him not to scream at the poor guy.
Not only had he just woken up from a coma, but he was thrust back into the insane world of a rebellion soldier within the hour. He didn’t deserve Poe’s worst just because he was jealous.
"Of course I'm alright to walk!" Poe curses whatever piss-poor mood he had found in the trash today. His leg had taken some serious damage when his ship had crashed just minutes before Finn had refused to follow orders. He hadn't even bothered to look at it, he had just succumb to the fear and let it carry him.
He nodded to himself, throwing Rose up higher on his back, using his right hand to wrap her arms around his neck. His leg screamed, and he couldn't stop the pained grunt that left him as he took his first step.
Finn, from the corner of his vision, was wearily wiping blood off his left temple. He hadn't used his right arm since Poe had seen him lift Rose off her feet.
400 yards left.
They were now almost running. Poe had shouted for the other to just keep going. The storm trooper had ignored Dameron's stop waiting up for me! And remained loyally by his side.
I hate him.
"No you don't."
The voice scared him so badly that his arms tensed, almost locking up in their position. His leg and arms ached in protest.
Unfortunately he had completely forgotten about this voice. His whole body felt hot as a wave of embarrassment soaked into his skin.
There was no line of protection in his mind to keep him under the radar. In the outside world, the physical one, all he had to do was find some pretty girl and let her take the reigns. As long as she was happy and he was comfortably safe inside the shell he had formed, he was satisfied. But Finn made everything so damn difficult.
He had broken it off with the last girlfriend because the Resistance was a good enough excuse to stop dating altogether. It had been relatively mutual but there were a few moments of bitterness between them in the months that followed. And there he stayed, in this limbo of being too busy and too close to the line of fire to want to put anyone through heartbreak again.
And then he was captured by the First Order. It wasn't exactly convenient and he wasn't really banking on making it out of there alive, but at least he was doing something important.
And then a stormtrooper took off his helmet and his world just collapsed. Of course the bad guys were hot, of course he couldn’t get lucky enough to have ugly unfeeling captors. But then, the first time he had looked into this gunner’s eyes, something in him had told him that this soldier was good. That he was special, and he needed to get him out of here as soon as he could.
He was lucky enough to usually be alone in his head. And now he had a visitor and no clean space for them to sit.
They could see every strong thought that crossed his mind and he hadn’t had a weak one all day. A shiver ran through him.
Some form of fear or anticipation cycled its way through his nerves.
Something big was coming.
He could hear it, not too far away. The click of a button, the movement of a gunner’s joystick.
“Finn! Get down!” It hits 5 feet from Poe’s right side. A flash of green and suddenly he’s sent flying to the left. His left elbow collides with Finn’s chest as they make contact and Rose is luckily caught between them.
Poe manages to roll over slightly, which felt impossible under the weight of both Rose and Finn. He lets out a groan as he feels something hitting him. He hasn’t managed to pry his eyes open yet, the dust and smoke still kicking his protective instincts into overdrive. Something hits him again, this time more urgently.
Finn’s voice comes drifting into his ears faintly. He’s saying something important but he can’t seem to grasp it.
Finally he feels something on top of him. Heavy and sharp, pinning him to the rocky surface beneath him. A hard slap to the face gets him sober fast.
His hand flies to his cheek as his eyes snap open. “The hell Finn?!” He manages to mumble, staring at the man on top of him. His face is covered in red dust and he seems to be breathing heavy. “Get up!” Finn screams. It’s so loud that its overwhelming. He hears them as soon as Finn yells, his hearing seemingly back online. Tie fighters. More than he’s heard from the outside of a ship in a while.
One is too close. Some instinct kicking into gear as he hears the telltale signs of one swooping low. He yanks Finn down just in time as sure enough, one sweeps itself just above the ground. He presses Finn to the ground as he realizes the ship has stopped moving. Finn lets out a muffled protest, but Poe isn’t listening. He slams the other’s head into his chest and rolls himself so he’s fully on top of him, his legs on either side of the other’s waist. Normally, straddling Finn would have been something he could have only dreamed of, but in the heat of the moment he barely even realized what he was doing. He lifts his head to the front of the ship, using his left elbow to cover Finn, putting a barrier between the inevitable blast and the storm trooper. The poor guy lets out a grunt as the pilot sets the entirety of his weight on his stomach.
For a long second Poe stares into the black glass covering the cockpit. His reflection looks rather rough, red and splotchy. A large swath of particularly large bruises on his jaw make him wince. His breathing is heavy and slightly labored with the larger man’s weight on his chest. The heartbeat in his ears is suddenly so quiet that he’s worried he died in the blast, that these are all the visions of a dead man.
He hears it again.
The shift of a gunner’s joystick, and the click of a button.
The green flashes bright. His heartbeat is so slow that it feels like seconds before he hears it again. There’s a low humming noise in the back of his head, the presence he felt earlier watching helplessly.
It starts in his chest, a swelling feeling. Like a tensing of muscles that he didn’t know he even possessed. His throat tightens.
Although the presence is still there, the lifting of his arm is done of his own volition.
An instinct drives him to it.
The wind rushes past him, his hand shaking.
He shuts his eyes so tight that they throb, fearing the darkness that follows what those lasers will do to two shieldless people.
But then nothing happens. He blinks them open as he feels a resistance against his hand. A pressure with no physical sensation.
The beam has stopped halfway between Poe and the Tie fighter. Standing still in mid-air like some sort of hover bike. The wind blows past him, sanding him in red salt. The pressure beyond his hand steadily increases. The beam shifts and wobbles slightly, its forward motion stopped dead in its tracks.
Poe sputters out a laugh, relief and surprise folding themselves into delight at the fact that they were both still alive. Tears pierce through the bottom lid and spring over the edge of his eyes, falling down his face as he openly cries.
They made it. The trench is less than 250 yards away and they are saved. Finn was saved.
The pressure blooms harsher against his hand, the bones in his arm wailing. His smile quickly falters.
He grits his teeth slightly and tries to press against it, letting the effort and relief coast him through. The tie fighter remains motionless, the person inside seemingly frozen in place along with their attack.
The blood rushes hard against his eardrums, every muscle in his arm screams now. Every instinct tells him to bow out, to let this beam just strike him down and give him some relief. Everything is so quiet and loud at the same time.
There are shouts from people that he’s never heard before, the sound of screams and laughter, of waves and thunder from places so far off that he’ll never see. Sounds of the jungles and deserts, of songs so beautiful that his soul mourns for the people who will never hear them.
He stretches his fingers out more, hoping to get a better grasp on whatever power he’s borrowing. Instead a shooting pain coasts from his elbow down. The strained tendons shaking heavily as he uses every ounce of strength he can find.
Closing his eyes again, he reaches beyond those sounds and screams. Crying out for someone to give him the support he needs. Instead he sees the dark, cold waves of a place he can feel deep below him. A place full of something too wrathful to sink his toes into. It calls to him, trying to wrap its hands around him and drag him deeper. Instead he screams again, launching himself away from that energy entirely.
The pressure is pressing so harshly that his wrist begins to throb. He opens his eyes and watches as the beam begins to move again, following its course towards them.
“Poe?” Finn asks cautiously, trapped below the pilot’s body. He watches in a mixture of fear and awe as the pilot lets out an anguished scream.
The jacket sleeve on his arm tears away, and the flesh beneath is an angry red. The blood begins to pool beneath the surface of the skin, bringing an almost blue hue to his wrist and palm.
Poe is clenching his teeth together, sucking in loud, nearly useless breaths. His eyes begin to burn from the wind but he fears if he closes them again, the beam will surely kill them. The presence in his mind is gone, leaving him utterly alone in this fight.
His hand is shaking so roughly that the beam is beginning its descent faster. He can feel whatever power, whatever strength he temporarily possessed was beginning to fade. He bites back a sob as the pressure shoots a newfound pain up to his shoulder.
It takes every last ounce of his strength to wave his hand to the side.
The beam is suddenly back to full speed but deflected to the left, slamming to the ground a few yards to the left. He slumps to the side, smacking the back of his head into the craggy stone. The tie fighter, not unlike Poe, slams heavily into the ground, it's wings shattering upon impact. A piece of metal comes clattering to a halt next to his boots. He sighs and closes his eyes, breathing in and letting the feeling of the air sweeping through his lungs relax him.
Finn wraps his arm around Poe’s neck and breathes in shakily. A tired smile plays at the pilot’s features as he reaches up with his left hand and pats the other’s back.
He lets his leg slip off of Finn and feels the storm trooper roll out from under him. His large hands are helping him up, urging him gently to move upward and towards the trench. Finn is lifting Rose up onto his good shoulder with a loud grunt.
He feels horrible. His his right arm is entirely numb and his leg won’t keep steady for the life of him. He’s literally on his last leg.
They don’t get more than 50 feet before they hear the door to the cockpit swing open.
Poe turns around so fast that his knee nearly dislocates then and there.
Anger boils against the inside of his head as the silver-toting storm trooper cocks the blaster in their hands. Panic overtakes his fury as he realizes he can’t stop this threat like the last.
He’s used everything he had to keep them from being killed one way just for the next way to pop up undetected. He holds out his arm to keep Finn behind him, the other trying to press through.
He ignores the other’s Just let me take this guy down- and takes a quick moment to glance around. The only shelter was the trench behind them, and they were still a good 150 yards away. It would take a miracle to get them there before this gunner took them both down.
Every heartbeat made his arm and leg ache. The gunner lifted their blaster and took aim, Poe’s heart leaped into his throat.
“Go.”
Finn looked at him, shock rolling over his pretty face. “No!” It’s almost a shout, his voice raising an octave or two.
“Finn. Run-now!” He shouts as the storm trooper begins to fire. Poe pushes the other back using his good arm. The action seems to kickstart him because suddenly he’s sprinting as fast as he can with Rose over his shoulder towards the edge of the trench. Nirvana was just beyond those walls and all he had to do was keep Finn and Rose safe. The blaster fires, a shot hitting just a few feet from Finn.
Poe forces his aching muscles to comply for what will undoubtedly be his last act. Leaning back on his heel for just a moment, he launches himself at full speed towards the gunner. Letting the momentum carry him as far as it could before he took another step. Finn yelps as a blast hits the dirt right behind him.
“Hey!” Poe yells. The storm trooper takes their aim off Finn and redirects the blasts towards him. He’s already almost upon the gunner when they fire a shot that hits his bad shoulder. It nearly stops him in his tracks. A cry of pain escapes his lips before he can stop it. The blaster cocks again. He throws his good hand out in some desperate attempt to stop them. His knees hit the ground as the pain overwhelms him, nothing in his body working with him anymore.
The gunner takes aim. And for a moment, Poe finds a small second of peace. He turns back and sees that Finn is sliding down the trench now, Rose safely in his arms. A smile turns the corners of his mouth, and his heartbeat slows. The soft thump in his chest gives him some comfort, as his eyelids become heavy.
The world slows down, giving him enough time to accept his fate. At least he’s safe. He’s done what he had to do to keep a Finn alive, which is more than he could have asked for.
His blinks are becoming harder to perform, and he finally gives in to the exhaustion.
A blaster fires.
There’s no pain. No burning sensation that typically follows a shot from a blaster. Just the wind weaving through his fingers. Another blaster fires, echoing against the quiet mountains. He hesitantly opens an eye, sweeping it across the terrain.
The storm trooper is on the ground, a large maw-like hole gaping through their silver helmet.
“Dameron! Get in here now!” A resistance gunner’s head peeks over the edge of the trench, their helmet gleaming brightly in the sun.