Archive of Our Own ^beta

Lux had been exercising a lot more in the past few years – he swore he had, every single time he’d managed to dig a tunnel out of his mountains of Senate paperwork – but he couldn’t ever remember relating to all those metaphors about plaster more than he did right now. It was sweltering beneath his hood, and once this whole mess was behind them, he’d probably have to pry his hair off the back of his neck with a crowbar.

Though, he decided as a blaster bolt scorched the wall half a meter above his head, perhaps his spotty workout regimen and half-assed disguise weren’t wholly to blame for the sweat.

“The Imps’ aim is getting better,” he muttered. His voice pitched a little too high to count as singsong, but hidden in the ruckus of Imperial laser fire, it was close enough.

The Rebel officer crouched on her heels beside him whirled, the staccato punch of her blaster falling silent. One of her lekku – much longer now than when he’d first met her five long years ago – nearly smacked him in the face as she turned, but the warning in her vivid blue eyes kept his mouth shut.

“It’s not getting better. I’ve just shot all the stupid ones,” Ahsoka Tano growled. Her hand tightened around her blaster, artfully conveying she’d mentally grouped him in with the dead and was merely making up her mind when exactly she’d send Lux to join them.

His eyes flicked back up to the smoking rent in the metal as it was joined by a half a dozen others, and he decided he’d rather not invoke Ahsoka’s ire right this second. Her crack-shot aim and subtle uses of the Force were the only things keeping them alive. Few others could manage that when the entire Imperial base knew where they were, and was dispatching more storm troopers to deal with them even now.

Satisfied the wordless battle of wills was won, Ahsoka moved back to the edge of the console they were squeezed behind, and Lux went back to the information on his datapad. He was by no means the fastest slicer the Rebellion had – in fact, his chief role was as one of their Senate informants – but he was the only one who could parse dense legal documents quickly, cutting down an infiltration team member whose skills could be used elsewhere. If the Imperial firewalls didn’t have any weak points he could use to copy the files to his ‘pad, he’d relay everything he could remember from this treasure trove of Moff legislation proposals directly to Rebel Command.

It also didn’t hurt that unlike most Imperial Senators, Lux had combat experience. In fact, it was one of his twin hand blasters that Ahsoka was firing now, the grip comfortably smooth to the touch after years of use. He wouldn’t be losing his cool today, no matter how many storm troopers the base’s commander sent their–

Lux yelped and nearly dropped the datapad when a trio of blaster bolts whizzed by close enough to singe his hood. “Ah–shla!” he hissed, remembering Ahsoka’s codename at the last second.

“Seven of them made it through the door,” she hissed back. “I can’t redirect every shot and still make it look believable!”

Lux shook his head and tried to tune out the salvo of blaster bolts. It was just a few more seconds before his program finished chipping away at the firewall, and they would see if it had been enough to copy the files in their entirety.

The ‘pad buzzed, and Lux tapped eagerly away from the files he’d been viewing. The notification from his programming software nearly made him whoop for joy.

Sensing his change in mood, or perhaps picking up the vibration with her uncanny Togruta hearing, Ahsoka craned her neck at him. Fear ran like ice water down his spine when a laser flew at her right lek with alarming accuracy, but she moved effortlessly out of the way at the last second. The only casualty was a loose fold of the headscarf concealing her more easily identifiable markings. “Are we happy?” she asked.

“We’re happy. Just need a second to copy everything.” He selected every file in the directory and programmed his ‘pad to copy them to its internal storage. “Almost…”

Ten seconds elapsed, twenty, thirty, and then the device buzzed again. Lux yanked his computer spike from the wall port and shoved it, his datapad, and the connecting cable into his pocket without bothering to disconnect them. There would be time for that later.

He looked up to find Ahsoka staring at him again, and flashed her a blinding grin. Something in her expression shifted, and he watched a surprised sort of wonder dance over her raised brows and parted lips. Then she shook herself and asked, “Is your ‘pad still jamming the cameras? Hoods and scarves won’t do us much if they can run a holo trace on the security holograms.”

“It was a moment ago.”

“Good. Get ready to run.”

It was all the warning she gave him before she leapt out from behind the console. The cover fire lain down for them over the last few minutes had been a distraction, a spray of laser fire perfectly calibrated to keep the enemy’s numbers down and keep the survivors from getting close enough to hit them. Now she was shooting to kill, and within seconds, all seven troopers and the four that came to reinforce them were dead.

It was breathtaking. She was breathtaking. But as often as that realization had come back to him the last few missions they’d done together, it was nothing new. A part of him had loved her ever since they met.

“Let’s go,” she said, hooking a hand under his arm and hauling him to his feet. That, too, made a flock of convorees start flying formations in his stomach, but the punishing pace Ahsoka set across the data center and out into the corridor was quick to dispel it.

Two junctions later, just when Lux’s breath was beginning to come with a little more difficulty, Ahsoka released his arm and brought her hand up to stabilize her borrowed blaster. She shot down the incoming troopers almost before Lux heard their footfalls or the click of their armor.

The ruckus of laser fire and falling bodies echoed loudly. Lux winced. “The others will have heard that,” he said. “They might try to box us in. I’ll cover your six.”

“Got it.”

Ahsoka broke into a fast jog instead of a run, focusing on silence instead of speed. Lux followed her example, grateful for the worn-down soles of his boots. The quiet made it easier to hear over the roar of blood in his ears and rapid beat of his heart, and this time, he heard the troopers coming.

As they rounded the corner behind him, Lux squeezed off a trio of shots, sending the troopers darting for cover on their side of the junction. They wouldn’t stay there for long. Taking breaths as deep as his body would allow, he aimed for the few gaps in their armor that were visible. He only hit two before they began firing, but that was two less blasters the Empire could train on him and Ahsoka. He’d take what he could get.

A quick glance forward found her looking back at him in barely concealed worry. He smiled, only to have a flash of white two junctions up made his blood go cold. There was no time to warn her or ask if she’d sensed the danger. Instinct took over, and Lux put on a burst of speed, tackling her to the side just as they reached the next junction.

He broke Ahsoka’s impact with his body as best he could, wheezing when her elbow connected with his diaphragm. A second later, blaster fire erupted, and the corridor they’d vacated turned into a blur of burning red.

Ahsoka took the deadly crossfire in with wide eyes, then looked back down at him, lekku flushed pink and mauve beneath her scarf. “I think you just saved our lives.”

It might’ve been the lack of oxygen addling his brain. It might’ve been adrenaline. Or it might simply have been the sheer delight of having Ahsoka close to him when there was nothing he craved more in the entire galaxy.

He kissed her.

And she kissed him back, hands cupping his cheeks and raking down into his hair. Stars burst behind Lux’s closed eyelids, and the pain of his bruised shoulders and side fell away, lost in the sweet warmth of her lips and weight of her body.

That is, until she froze, shoved back, and staggered to her feet. “Idiot,” she snapped, reaching down to grab her fallen blaster. “Acting the fool in the middle of enemy territory like that is gonna get us both killed!”

Lux gaped at her. “I–”

“I don’t want to hear it. Get up. The troopers will be on us in seconds.”

She was running before Lux had staggered to his feet. Lux grabbed his own blaster and scrambled after her, right shoulder protesting as he brought the weapon to bear. He ignored it. It was nothing compared to the vitriol in her voice, and his own certainty that she was absolutely right.

Ahsoka had never been so glad to see open sky as she was when she and Lux tore out of the Imperial base, through the hole she’d covertly cut in the perimeter wall with her lightsabers, and down the hill. The atmosphere on this moon was thin, but the gravity was thinner, and each stride carried them several extra feet.

They reached her freighter just as the Imps made it around the wall – the troopers had taken the main entrance an extra five hundred feet away, the fools – and thundered up the ramp just as the enemy began firing. Ahsoka slammed the console to retract the ramp and shut the blast doors, closing out the watery blue-grey sky and allowing a more normal oxygen concentration to saturate the space.

Behind her, Lux inhaled deeply, breathing in the richer air. To his credit, he didn’t stand around long. “I’ll cover you,” he said, heading for the gun turret. “Get us in the air.”

“Right.” Ahsoka couldn’t help the tightness in her voice, but she didn’t regret it. Not yet. She’d decide whether or not she’d overreacted once they were safely in hyperspace.

She scampered to the cockpit, ran a quick preflight sequence, and took off. As soon as they were airborne, a few quick bursts thudded a counterpoint to the deeper rumble of the engines. Cannon blasts. Ahsoka turned on one of the ship’s rear screens, and blinked when she saw the three TIE fighters on the landing platform near the base in flames.

She touched the button to patch her into the ship’s comm. “Nice work.”

“The commander was sloppy. If they were smart, they’d have launched the TIEs the second they realized we’d escaped the chokepoint at the data center.”

“Still, it was quick thinking on your part.”

Lux was silent for a long moment, and it surprised Ahsoka how much she hung on it, piloting the ship almost on instinct up out of the moon’s atmosphere, as she waited for him to say something. At last there was a thump and a rustle, and he mumbled, “Keep an eye on the scopes and comm me if you see anyone in pursuit. I’m going to set up a secure link to Command and transfer the files.”

“Okay,” she said, and Lux closed the commlink.

Despite herself, Ahsoka deflated. Lux had grown out of his tendency toward passive aggression when he got upset as he’d grown older. Years in the Senate where such slips could be a detriment had trained him to turn professionalism and duty into a sort of cold shoulder. He’d take refuge in his work, and she wouldn’t see him for a few hours.

Unless he expected an apology. Which he might, considering how harsh she’d been to him after something she’d participated in – that she’d wanted, but hadn’t been brave enough to act on before. Then he’d stay in his quarters until they reached the Rebel base.

No, he was still passive aggressive. But they could work on that.

She made the jump into hyperspace without incident, and once she’d completed a quick scan for bugs and tracking devices, she rose to her feet. She was out the cockpit door and heading for his quarters before she’d consciously made up her mind. Perhaps that was an answer in and of itself.

She’d had conflicting feelings about her old Jedi teachings ever since the birth of the Empire. On one hand, she hadn’t met any other survivors – only heard vague rumors she’d never been able to confirm. Part of her wanted to preserve what she’d learned exactly the way she’d learned it until she had the opportunity to pass it on to a willing student, but preserving meant living by it. The other part, the one that had pushed her to leave the Jedi Order in the first place, acknowledged the flaws in what she’d learned. That was the part that won most of her mental arguments – except when it came to emotional attachments.

Maybe those teachings were too deeply ingrained. Maybe they weren’t, but she’d forgotten in that year on the run between Mandalore and Raada how to trust other people completely. But with Rex in hiding, Lux was the only living person from her old life she had a real connection with. She could be herself with him without secrecy and self-censorship. She wanted to hold onto that, whatever shape the thing between them took on.

It didn’t hurt that she’d been drawn to his good looks and earnest charm ever since they were teenagers.

This freighter was old, a loan from the Rebellion, and all the door chimes but the one for the refresher – no doubt given special priority for repair – were broken or worn out. Ahsoka knocked on Lux’s door hard enough carry through the durasteel, shook out her smarting knuckles, and waited, releasing any stress that cropped up into the Force before she could really feel it.

The door slid open a few seconds later. “Something wrong?” Lux asked, frowning.

“Nothing’s wrong. Well, nothing with the ship. Or the Empire. Uh.” Ahsoka fought away a grimace at her stammering. “I just wanted to say I’m sorry for snapping at you earlier. And I think we should talk.”

Lux’s shoulders relaxed, some near-invisible tension lifting, and he smiled, moving aside so she could step into the room. “I thought you were angry with me.”

I underestimated you, she thought, and made a mental note to check the voice that insisted on passive aggression the next time it badmouthed him. It seemed she had things to work on, too.

“I was,” she said, sitting down on the bottom bunk. Instead of taking the stool at the desk across the room, he sat down beside her. The closeness was somehow comforting and exhilarating at the same time, and Ahsoka’s lekku warmed. She cleared her throat to collect herself. “You did jeopardize the mission.”

Lux winced.

“Duty to the Rebellion has to come first. Especially in a dangerous situation. But, had you done the same thing at a more opportune time, in a less public setting, I… wouldn’t have reacted the same way I did earlier.” Speaking about this was its own unique brand of terrifying, but Lux had made the first move. She knew him. If him kissing her had been a celebration of survival shared with a friend, she would have sensed that.

What she felt from him – what she felt for him – was much, much deeper than that. And even without the Force to guide him, Lux seemed to have picked up on it.

“What would you have done?” he asked, his voice a low croon.

Ahsoka shifted closer. “Kept you there for as many hours as you’d give me.”

Beside her, Lux wet his lips. Then, he lifted a hand and brushed his knuckles lightly along her side, inquisitive rather than proprietary. “We have hours now,” he said.

“We do,” she agreed, taking his hand and threading his arm around her. With difficulty, she tore her eyes away from his delighted smile and eyed her wrist chrono. “On second thought, it’s getting late. I think the talking can wait until the morning.”

Lux opened his mouth, and Ahsoka had no doubt he was about to say something very clever and probably more flirtatious than he’d ever dared. She kissed him instead, and the way he kissed her back was as eloquently as any lover’s poem.