Work Text:
75+ missed messages
General Alert
Thorn: Ponds.
General Response
Thorn: Ponds.
General Response
Thorn: Ponds
It hadn’t been a priority alert, so Ponds had waited until the end of the skirmish to deal with the messages that kept flashing across his HUD. He’s pretty sure he’ll pay for that. Normally, he’s the one doing the spamming. Ponds does not appreciate being on the other end of it.
General Response
Thorn: Ponds
General Response
Doom: Is there really nothing more worth doing on Coruscant?
General Response
Thorn: Ponds
Really, it’s a ballsey move to ignore Doom like that. The Shebse do it all the time, but Fox’s guard triplets usually have too much of a fear of death to do so.
General Response
Ponds: I sense chaos and have arrived
General Response
Colt: Oh, thank force, it can stop now.
General Response
Thorn: Ponds. Your workaholic half won’t sleep.
Kark it, Fox, again? Ponds groans into his helmet. This is becoming a regular thing, and Ponds has no idea what started it. This is the first time it’s happened while he’s been on deployment. For a moment, Ponds considers calling on the Guard’s medics to sedate Fox but dismisses it. He has a better idea.
General Response
Ponds: On it.
Ponds signals that he’s stepping out to General Windu and Lt. Razor, who both nod acknowledgments. Ponds steps out of the debriefing room into the hallway of The Endurance. With that, he opens a new private chat, imputing a com-code he had gotten before his deployment.
Unknown Com Code. Proceed?
The warning flashes across Ponds’ HUD and Ponds didn’t even realize there was a warning if you tried to com outside the GAR. The more you know! He gestured to procced, and the new chat window opened up.
Private Chat:
Ponds: Riyo I need a favor
Riyo: Is everything alright? How can I help?
Ponds: He’s being dumb again.
He knows that Riyo will know exactly what that means. It’s why she’s Ponds’ favorite senator this week.
Riyo: What has Fox done this time?
Ponds: He isn’t sleeping.
Riyo: What can I do?
Ponds: Just check on him? Make sure he’s okay.
Riyo follows Commander Thire through the CG headquarters towards Fox’s office. They don’t say anything between them, but it’s not an unpleasant silence. The sounds of Thire’s boots click across the floor, and there is gentle padding as her shoes follow him.
“This is his office, Ma’am.” Commander Thire comments, gesturing to a door on the side.
“Thank you, Commander,” Riyo responds quietly and pushes the door open.
“For the last time, Thorn-” Fox cuts off mid-sentence as he looks up. He has his helmet on despite the fact that he is alone in his office. The lights are practically blinding, and there is a mess of datapads interspersed with flimsy on his desk.
“Hello, Fox.” Riyo grins at him, stepping into the office.
“Why are you here? All three of us agreed to skip lunch this week since Ponds is on deployment.” Fox cuts back in, a weary undertone to his works bleeding out from what could have been an otherwise cutting statement. She closes the door behind her and sits down in the chair on the opposite side of Fox’s desk from him.
“Ponds told me that you haven’t been sleeping. We’re worried about you.” Riyo answers calmly. Fox grunts and looks back down at his paperwork. He has a piece of flimsy in front of him, and a blue pen that he picks back up off the table.
“It’s nothing. I’m just busy.” Fox responds curtly, and Riyo will bet that it is enough to cut off anyone who doesn’t know him all that well. Luckily, Riyo does. She reaches out across the desk, catching the hand that Fox is beginning to write with.
“Fox, I can hear the exhaustion in your voice – you have three other commanders who I’m sure would be happy to help, and there are countless other men in the Guard who could cover a shift or two so you could get some sleep.” Riyo collects his other hand, holding them over his desk. As Fox tilts his head up to look at her again, Riyo can see him keening back and forth slightly as he tries to keep himself upwards.
“I can’t ask that of them, they deserve their break.” Fox dismisses the idea out of hand.
“And you don’t?” Riyo responds, her usually light playfulness missing in favor of the serious tone she uses when she finds herself in a crisis. Fox has no immediate answer to that, and for a brief moment, Riyo thinks she’s won an easy victory.
“I’m their Marshal Commander. It’s my job to make sure that their needs are met. I can worry about myself after that.” He responds curtly.
“And it’s my job as your friend to make sure that you’re okay Fox. So what can I do to help?” Riyo squeezes his hand and switches tactics. This isn’t the time for a guilt trip. Right now, she needs to reassure him that he can count on her help just as much as he can count on Ponds’.
“I- what?” Is Fox’s elegant response. Clearly, Riyo needs to spend more time with just him if he doesn’t think she’d offer him her help just the same as she would Ponds, Bail, Mon, or Padme.
“I know you have a senate rotation in five hours – Commander Thire told me he’d swapped his first shift with yours so that you’re guarding me during your first shift instead of Senator Taa. So, you have ten hours before the next shift where you actually have to be at the senate.” Riyo explains. Fox moves to protest, but she continues before he can. “I’m going to stay right here, in the guard headquarters until then. That way, I’ll be perfectly safe even if you take a nap.”
“I still have so much paperwork to fill out – the requisitions forms for the phase two armor came through today and since the guard isn’t registered as a formal battalion, each set of phase twos has to requisitioned separately,” Fox says with a shrug towards the stack of datapads to his left.
“Could I do those?” Riyo cuts back in.
“What?” Fox responds smartly.
“Well, obviously you have to sign off on them, but could I fill in the rest of it?” Riyo asked Fox starts in surprise. He must be deeply exhausted because he was never that expressive most of the time.
“I… yeah, probably,” Fox confesses, and Riyo smiles at him again.
“Great. Then, why don’t you take a nap? These forms will still get done, I promise, and you and I both know you will be able to do far more if you sleep for a couple of hours.” Riyo says, standing up, and pulling Fox up behind her. He doesn’t protest. Riyo hears what she’s pretty sure is the very start of a yawn quickly cut off when Fox muted the audio output from his helmet. Now that he’s away from his desk, Riyo drops his hands and instead wraps an arm around his back, guiding him to the cot that Commander Stone told her he had set up in Fox’s office.
“Riyo,” Fox yawns as she eases him down onto his cot. “Why?”
“Because I care about you, you stubborn fox.”