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“We… we did it!” Eli whooped, a giddy grin spreading over his face. “We actually fucking made it!”
His heart still racing wildly through his veins, Nevil slumped back in his seat with a huge sigh of relief, and shot Eli a matching grin. “We did,” he agreed, looking back at Thrawn, who was unbuckling his crash-harness.
“We must calculate the next jump before we can celebrate our victory,” Thrawn said seriously.
“Already on it,” Eli answered. He was practically bouncing in his seat while he talked. Nevil smiled, lost in enjoying the sight of him. Alive. Happy. Free. “Figured I’d set a series of jumps with some backtracks and a few obvious course headings, just in case… Is this thing likely to have some kind of tracking in it, d’you think?”
Nevil nodded, turning his attention back to the tasks at hand. “Good call, it probably does. I’ll have a look. Thrawn, do you want to see what we’ve got in the way of supplies? We might have to cut the scenic route a little short if we stole this before it actually got through re-supply.”
“Of course,” Thrawn said, getting to his feet. He disappeared into the back while Nevil started poking through the subroutines.
He found the apparently sole locator program fairly easily and wiped it; then gave Eli the go-ahead to key in the series of nav jumps before heading for the tiny crew quarters in the back. A moment later Thrawn re-emerged from below-decks, clambering up the hatch ladder just as Nevil was— finally— peeling out of his stolen, sweaty, chafing stormtrooper armour.
“Don’t suppose you found any clothes back here?” Nevil asked wryly. Tossing his breastplate onto the nearest bunk, he started looking around for an empty storage locker to shove it all in.
“In fact, I did,” Thrawn said. He pointed to one of the overhead lockers, already shucking off his own armour as well. “And the two at the foot of the third bunk are empty.”
“Rations and drinking water?”
“The supply will be adequate for our needs.”
Nevil sighed with relief. “Thank fuck for that.”
“Indeed,” Thrawn said, lips quirking as he glanced over at Nevil; then those glowing eyes turned towards the front just before Eli appeared in the doorway.
“You’ll be happy to know we’re full up on fuel and air as well,” Eli reported. His gaze wandered appreciatively over Thrawn and Nevil both as he joined them in undressing. Thrawn was watching Eli intently, and Nevil licked his lips, suddenly extremely aware that he and Thrawn were almost naked, and all three of them were standing in a rather small space together…
With no one else around for— hopefully, anyway— lightyears, at this point.
Eli cocked his head. With his undone jumpsuit hanging low off his hips and his undershirt in a dirty pile on the floor, he stepped closer, until he was pressing up against Nevil’s front. “Auto-pilot’ll take care of the nav jumps for awhile,” he said, biting his lip with a crooked smirk. “Just sayin’.”
Pretending to think, Nevil only half-successfully smothered the hitch in his breath as Thrawn slid up behind him, sandwiching him against Eli. “You sure you don’t wanna wait until we’re back in civilization somewhere? The beds are pretty small back here—”
The other two cut him off nearly simultaneously, Thrawn with a bite at his neck, accompanied by a low but honest-to-god growl into his skin; Eli simply by yanking him down into an almost ferocious kiss.
“I’ve waited for this,” Eli said, low and heated, “for long enough already.”