Chapter Text
The base fell into a flurry of activity following the destruction of Starkiller Base. Orders came down from Resistance leaders to pack up and ship out. Though their destination was need-to-know, everyone knew that they were moving bases. The First Order, though bruised and bleeding, still had enough teeth to cause problems now that they knew the primary location of the Resistance and now that the helping hand of the New Republic fleet had been eliminated.
Supply officers left first, leaving behind only a skeleton crew on D’Qar. Technical and medical crews followed and with them, their patients. Bacta tanks were loaded onto transport ships alongside those still healing from the Starkiller Base attack.
Poe neglected his duties the day they loaded Finn onto a transport. In fact, he had been neglecting his duties more often than he would admit since they brought Finn back almost dead. The General tended to look the other way when it happened and today was no exception. Sometimes being the best pilot in the Resistance had its perks.
Leia accompanied him from the med-bay to the transport, saying nothing but offering her silent support as the doctors maneuvered Finn’s bed onto the ship. She stayed by the remaining crates as Poe walked beside Finn’s prone form up the loading ramp. Whatever words he whispered to his friend, she never heard and she pretended not to see him wipe his eyes when he approached her. “He’s in the best hands, Poe.”
His shoulders slumped, he merely nodded in polite agreement. A myriad of words he wanted to say but wouldn’t – not to her – flit through his brain and across his face. The General saw them all.
“You’ll be there when you can. That’s all anyone could ask,” she assured him, gripping his shoulder tightly.
“Hey, Poe!” his fellow pilot, Jessika Pava, called out from across the tarmac. “Need you to take a look at something!”
The General offered him an encouraging smile. “Work never ends, no matter how we’d like it to.” Though she kept her grief locked away, converted into an indomitable iron will, she let enough show so Poe would know he wasn’t alone.
Pava hollered again, drawing a weak smile from Poe. “That it doesn’t, ma’am.” He nodded at her and went to see what Jessika needed.
A fixed compression coil and a couple of oil leaks later found Poe loading nonessential supplies on another transport ship with no idea how exactly he’d gotten there. Without Finn there to draw on his time, Poe had too much time. Too much time to worry. The more he worked, then, the less he thought about the friend he’d sent to a world unknown.
Night fell as more ships took to the sky. The base emptied over the next few days. The remaining supply personnel swept the grounds to ensure they had left nothing behind. General Leia was among the last to leave, and Poe, as Black Leader, and the rest of his squadrons ran protection for her transport.
With BB-8 beeping through the comlink, he powered his X-wing up. BB-8 beeped a question, the translation, though unnecessary, popping up on the ship’s display screen.
“Yeah, buddy, we’ll check on him soon as we land.”
BB-8 trilled happily.
Poe had to smile at its antics. Leave it to BB-8 to brighten his day, especially when he really needed it.
Leia’s ship transmitted the hyperdrive coordinates to the rest of the convoy. Plugging them into the X-wing’s computer, Poe launched the ship into hyperspace.
***
Mastala had nothing to its name besides rocks and ice. In no species’ eyes would the planet be considered remotely habitable. Poe had heard stories of the Rebellion’s desperate hide and seek with the Empire on Hoth and he remembered all too vividly the frigid surface of Starkiller. He shivered at the thought as he surveyed the desolate expanse of white below him.
The First Order could find them soon and chase them off this kriffin’ forsaken place if Poe had anything to say about it.
He eased his X-wing into the newly built hangar, landing it gently beside Snap’s and Jessika’s. BB-8 popped out of the ship as he slid down the ladder hastily attached for him.
A high-ranking officer, one Poe hadn’t seen before, approached the General’s ship. Poe made his way over to her, curious to hear what she had to say, BB-8 hot on his heels. She nodded at him, her lips quirking up at BB-8 rocking back and forth in his shadow. When the last of the General’s crew had disembarked, she spoke.
“Welcome to Mastala. I am Cailleach Fraser and I’m responsible for keeping everyone alive while we’re on this rock.” She proceeded to describe the conditions on the planet and they were about as miserable as Poe assumed they would be. Aside from the general housekeeping rules, which had been the norm on D’Qar, she informed them that no personnel were allowed outside unless in specialized gear or ships. “If you have any questions, message me on the comm.” She looked around the hangar. “We’re gonna be here a while, folks, so get comfortable.”
She led them to the back of the hangar. “We go down from here.” As they descended the treacherous path of corridors, some natural and others built, she explained why they built so deep into the planet. Mastala had a system of naturally occurring caverns that maintained a fairly habitable temperature, especially when compared to those on the surface. Such a deep network also ensured some protection from aerial bombardment should the First Order decide to show up.
Poe had to admire the thought that went into their new base. Any idiot with eyes could see it would be one of the best places from which to launch a campaign against the First Order. Still, he had something else far more pressing on his mind.
Finished with her introductory speech, Cailleach waved the newcomers into the mess hall. From here, she would let the General take over. Poe shouldered through the dispersing throngs of people, BB-8 making good use of the gap he left in his wake. “Ms. Fraser,” he began.
Cailleach looked up from a supply datapad. “Mr. Dameron,” she greeted. “What can I do for you?”
He opened his mouth to reply but she beat him to it.
“Wait. That kid they brought in – Finn? They send you’d be asking about him.” She handed the pad to one of her supply coordinators. “I’ll take you to the med bay.”
“Is he – I mean, did he – ?”
She held a door open. “He’s stable but he’s still comatose.”
BB-8 beeped hesitantly, tilting its head to look up at Poe.
Cailleach tapped a code at another door as she led them deeper into the base before kneeling down in front of BB-8. “I wouldn’t worry so much. The docs seem a lot more hopeful about his chances than they usually are.” Standing, she pointed down the hallway revealed by the opened door. “Third door on your left.” She tapped on another pad. “They’re expecting you.”
Poe wasn’t sure what he expected when he walked into Finn’s room. It really wasn’t all that different from the one on D’Qar. A med bay was a med bay no matter its location. The harsh, sterile smell of bacta pervaded the room. He kept his breathing shallow to avoid it as much as possible. Between that and the sight of Finn still comatose on his bed, a machine carefully sounding out each beat of his heart, Poe’s chest tightened painfully.
“Hey, buddy,” he said, his voice hoarse.
BB-8 rolled into the room. Gears whirred as it looked up between Finn and Poe. It beeped sadly.
“Me too.”
One of the medical staff brought in a chair and handed it to him with a sympathetic smile. Nothing the Resistance had was built for comfort – if it functioned, it was used. Poe almost preferred to stand than sit in the chair he unfolded and dragged loudly next to Finn’s side. In the end, it might hurt his back less.
BB-8 bumped him gently in the leg and motioned at the chair. When he didn’t move, the droid bumped into him a bit more forcefully.
“All right, all right, fine,” he acquiesced. “I’ll sit in the damn thing if it makes you happy.”
BB-8 trilled.
Poe shook his head but he sat down, if only to please it. The chair was about as comfortable as he thought it would be but his legs were glad for the reprieve. He might have been sitting in his X-wing but the cramped space did nothing to prepare him for the hike that was his entrance into the base. If the General required him for many missions before Finn woke, he would never be able to use his legs again.
He scooted the chair closer to the bed and reached for Finn’s hand without thinking. A lifetime of handling weapons had left calluses, thick and rough, and Poe ran his thumb over them, wishing their owner would wake so he could ask about them.
“You need to wake up, you know?” he told the prone form. “This place is bigger than anything and damn if I’m gonna explore it alone.” He sighed. “Miss you, buddy.”
A knock at the door startled him. He turned to see Pava standing there, her gaze on Finn. “How’s the kid?”
“Still fighting.”
She saw where Poe’s hand held Finn’s. Oh, I hope you wake up soon, she thought. Poe needs you. She dug up another chair and sat it beside Poe. “Brought requisition forms and the like. Didn’t figure you’d have thought about them.”
He eyed the pile of datapads in her hands. “That’s a lot more than I remember needing to fill out for D’Qar.”
“Well, we have housing, medical, dietary restrictions – why that’s a separate form, I don’t know – ship registration, special clothing and gear requisition, and so on,” she ticked off as she flipped through them. “That Commander is on top of things, I’ll give her that.”
Poe reached for the form on top. He scanned the first page. “This is ridiculous.”
Pava huffed. “At least you’ll have something to do, you know, while you wait.”
“The General can’t be happy with me practically sitting my on ass.”
She grasped his shoulder. “Poe, you haven’t stopped since Jakku. You’ve got a little leeway to do whatever the hell you want.” She dumped the rest of the pads in his lap. “Besides, she understands,” she added quietly.
Poe didn’t ask if the General understood his almost obsessive need to stay with Finn or his inability to close his eyes without seeing Kylo Ren’s face or hearing his voice twisting and coiling in his mind.
Pava was standing, drawing his thoughts out of the darkness. “When you get those filled out, have BB-8 let me know. I’ll drop ‘em off for you.”
“Thanks, Testor.”
She waved him off. “Yeah, yeah. Don’t let it go to your head.”
When she was gone and once again he was left with only the sound of Finn’s mechanized heartbeat and the occasional beep from BB-8, he looked more closely at the forms she had left. Most of them were fairly standard and he filled them out with minimal thought. He bristled at having to list all the modifications to his X-wing so he left that blank. If the base’s commander took issue, she could deal with the General.
He sent BB-8 to find Pava once he had filled out everything he cared to. For the first time since arriving on Mastala, he was alone with the man who had saved his life – hell, who had saved the Resistance.
Every word he could think of sat on the tip of his tongue, begging to be said but refusing to leave his mouth. He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “I almost think you got the better end of the deal. You won’t remember any of this, will you? And hell, you’d hate this planet. Too much like Starkiller. I froze flying in just looking at it.”
He could almost see Finn’s smile.
The weariness that he’d kept at bay since Jakku finally crept up on him. Clutching Finn’s hand, to anchor himself and to maintain some awareness should Finn wake, Poe rested his head on his arms and fell asleep before he got comfortable.
Pava came in a short while later to find him still like that. She shook her head and went in search of a blanket. All she could find was a threadbare little thing and Poe’s – well Finn’s – jacket. She maneuvered the jacket onto Poe’s lap and the blanket over his shoulders. As she grabbed the forms and left, she saw BB-8 roll over to its master, glance between him and Finn, and power down.