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Jessika isn’t quite sure when the whole thing started, and how they escalated so quickly; they were in the middle of the whole thing before she even realised they had began.
There are three things you need to know here, really.
First is that Poe Dameron is kind to a fault, that he goes around being nice like it’s his job, and a job he really loves to boot. It’s been a problem before, with a string of broken hearts around the Academy and then their bases, people half in love and confused about it. And by people she means all beings and some droids, it’s a problem.
It’s not deliberate, it’s not something he sets out to do actively, it’s like he can’t help himself. He’s charming and thoughtful and he goes out of his way to make you comfortable. He’ll switch a shift with you because you seem tired, he’ll save up a piece of your favourite cake for you at the canteen, he’ll remember the names of your kids and pets.
Any single thing doesn’t seem like much, but pile them all up together and they become unbearable, really. Like, how is he even real, where does he even get off.
It’s only gotten worse since Finn, to everyone bafflement. They sort of expected the kindness to focus on Finn, that’d be understandable, right? A lot of people on the base have a soft spot for the kid, it’s impossible not to, when he responds to affection with so much surprise and joy, that big grin that’s brighter than a fucking sun. Jessika isn’t immune, Wexley isn’t immune, General Organa isn’t even immune. Statura grins back at the kid, for fuck’s sake. Poe doesn’t even stand a chance, he melts and flails when he gets that grin, goes out of his way to give Finn everything.
So, yeah, no one would be surprised if he’d just focused on Finn, but it seems that Dameron’s kindness reserves are fucking endless, and it gets only worse for everyone. Like, a lot worse.
The second thing you need to know is that Jessika isn’t like that at all. She’s a bit prickly and she prides herself on being a sarcastic asshole, and she doesn’t deal all that well with strangers until they prove themselves not to be morons.
Sure, she’s fiercely protective of her friends, and she’s been known to fall hard for pretty girls with kind smiles and a core of steel, but you won’t catch her reading adventure stories to a bunch of kids because the base’s teacher seemed like she needed a few hours off. She doesn’t bring people flowers or their favourite food or sing to them when they’re sad, or whatever the fuck. That’s not her.
Except well, except now there’s Rey, and she kind of feels like she could do that shit if it was for Rey. She kind of wants to do that shit for Rey.
And there’s Finn with his dumb sunshine grin, and Rey gets all soft and happy when Finn’s happy, and this is a serious problem, alright?
But the actual second thing you need to know about Jessika is that she has this slight problem with getting really competitive, especially when it comes to Dameron. There’s a reason why the words “I double dog dare ya” have been officially forbidden to be uttered on base by Admiral Statura himself, the order signed off by the General (though she seemed like she was holding back a laugh at the time).
And the third thing you need to know, the most important thing here, is that Poe “I can fly anything” Dameron might be the nicest guy in the galaxy but he also is a cocky, competitive asshole in his own right and that he never backs down from a challenge and that he and Jessika tend to bring out the worst from each other.
Sometimes they bring out the best from each other, but this is decidedly not the case.
Like that time when Jessika was out on recon with Wexley, scanning a dump of a planet for suspicious Order activity, and in the meantime, Dameron took Finn to Yavin IV to meet his father, and since Skywalker was on a mission of his own and Rey was a bit bored, so she has been invited to tag along.
She came back with leftovers of Kes Dameron’s legendary pasta, and a cutting of a kriffing Force-sensitive tree, and she came back looking at Poe Dameron like he hung the moon.
And it’s not that Jess is jealous of that (maybe a little bit), but as she’s eating the pasta (too good) that evening, she looks over at Rey humming to herself as she waters her plants and thinks, I want to make her look like this all the time.
Yeah, so okay, maybe she knows when it started, but the escalation is not on her. That’s all Poe.
***
A couple of days later they’re sitting in the canteen at the squadron’s usual table. Rey is still on her own training time, with Skywalker still off base, and she and Finn are regulars at their meals.
The thing where they all take meals together instead of just fitting them into their schedules when possible, or scrounging something up, is mostly Poe’s fault. He used to gather them like ducklings, asking about their day and making sure no one forgot to eat while tinkering with their ship.
He’s one step away from calling them ‘family meals’ probably, Jess kids you not. It’s particularly hilarious when you consider Poe’s at least a decade younger than Snap.
Poe is stuck in a debriefing with Ackbar at the moment, but they still gather together, conditioned to it, and right now Jess is regaling Rey and Finn with the story of Iolo’s last birthday party and the infamous B-wing Incident. Rey laughs so hard there are tears in her eyes and there’s the already familiar warmth spreading in Jess’ chest at the sight of that.
She’s got it bad, doesn’t she.
But then there’s something wistful in Rey’s expression as she leans back and sneaks a pastry off the plate, a longing Jess is already learning to recognise too. She looks over at Finn, whose face is even more expressive than Rey’s (yeah, that’s apparently possible, she pities Dameron a little), and finds the same wistfulness there and thinks oh.
“When’s your birthday?” she asks, even though she knows the answer.
“No birthdays in the First Order,” Finn says with that heartbreaking lightness that’s always in his voice when he casually mentions yet one more thing he’s been deprived of.
“I don’t know,” Rey shrugs at the same time, her voice just as matter-of-fact, and Jess looks over at Snap, who is pretending not to listen, but who cannot hide his wince.
“What’s up?” Poe asks, sliding into a seat next to Finn’s, placing his hand comfortably on Finn’s knee as Finn leans into him instinctively, a soft smile on his face.
They’re nauseating, that’s what they are.
Jessika squares her shoulders. “Finn and Rey are choosing when their birthdays are gonna be.”
“We are?” Rey asks softly, like the thought never occurred to her, and then she’s grinning, leaning her forehead against the side of Jess’ face. Jess grins at her and laces their fingers together. “The day I got off Jakku,” she says, then looks at Finn for confirmation.
“That’s the day we met,” he thrills, and damn they’re cute. “That’s sort of the day we met,” he adds, turning to Poe and then they’re kissing and Snap mutters something about unsanitary conditions and food, but Jess figures they have the right idea and sneaks a kiss with Rey, flipping off Snap at the same time, because she’s a boss at multitasking.
“It’s also two weeks away,” Poe tells them once he pulls back, flushed and smug, and of course he has been counting.
“I’m in charge of the party,” Jess calls it quickly, before Poe can even open his mouth. She puts her hand up at him. “I called it, Dameron,” she tells him and grins back when he rolls his eyes. Score one.
***
Pava has always been one of the best he has when it comes to mission planning - she’s tenacious, detail-oriented and infinitely sarcastic. The last one is not at all helpful while mission planning per se, but definitely livens up the briefings.
She throws herself into this party thing like it’s a mission, and quickly has the whole base involved and working on the thing in what spare time they have. If it was Poe organising the thing, he’d call in favours and charm his way through it, but Pava just earnestly plays the “It’s Rey’s and Finn’s very first birthday” and that not only has the General signing off on leave for pretty much everyone but skeleton crew, but also Admiral Ackbar providing booze.
Rey is off in the jungle with Skywalker on endurance training - if you ask Poe that is one girl who doesn’t need endurance training, but it might be something different for a Jedi - so she misses most of the preparations and might have something of a surprise party to come back to, but Finn spends the whole two weeks bemused and overwhelmed.
“Are birthdays that much of a deal?” Finn asks after Jess organises the base’s droids into a decorating army. BB-8 announces itself the Commander, it gets a little out of hand for a bit there.
“Sometimes. I usually spend mine with friends, have a bit of a party. Not the size of Jess’ extravaganza here, but yeah.” His birthday actually passed a couple of months ago, but they were a bit busy with a base attack at the time, and then he’d been stuck in medbay for two weeks, and then it just didn’t seem that important. “Some people go big, some don’t even want to celebrate at all. We’ll find out what your style is,” he adds with a smile and Finn grins back, nodding cheerfully. “If it’s too much, we’ll sneak out early and next year we’ll do something just the two of us, maybe.”
“And if it’s as good as Jess promises?” Finn asks teasingly and Poe grins at him, leaning to kiss the side of his jaw.
“Then next year we’re going even bigger and there probably will be fireworks,” Poe promises and he’s only half kidding. If Finn wants fireworks, Poe will get fireworks even if he has to call in that favour with Kare.
As it is, right now he only has to concern himself with gifts, and they’re not that hard - the pilot’s helmet he had special made for Rey has just arrived a couple days ago, and he didn’t yet get around to giving it to her - the paint job took some time, so that would do. And he has the music records he’s been saving for Finn, who is endlessly fascinated by any music that is not Order’s propaganda fanfare - he intended to give the files to him for the anniversary, but it’ll double as a birthday present now, he supposes.
He spends some time helping BB-8 with its gift - the actual gifts are film files the droid scavenged from who knows where, but BB-8 insists on making birthday cards as well, and that’s a little too cute for Poe to deal with, but he finds paints for it anyway.
He wishes he could do something more, but it’s Jess’ pet project now, and she seems fiercely defensive of it, so he lets it go. Asks if he should bring something, and Pava gives him a long considering look before she nods benevolently. “There can never be enough cake,” she offers and so Poe gets baking, unearthing his grandfather’s recipe from his mom’s datapads.
The party is on a nice, warm evening, pretty much the entirety of the base crammed into the canteen to shout ‘Surprise’ even though both Rey and Finn were aware this was coming. Still, Finn tries to look shocked and misses it by mile, but his grin is wide and earnest and so happy Poe almost cannot stand it.
Rey is blinking a lot, her voice shaking a little when she accepts all the best wishes and gifts, overwhelmed in minutes. She sends wide grins Jess’ way, who is just beaming helplessly, looking completely besotted.
“You’re all nauseating,” Iolo tells him and steals a piece of cake. Poe jabs his hand with a fork and glares, partly for show but mostly because he’s saving the cake for Finn and Rey. “Holy kriff, Dameron, this is actually good.”
“What’s good?” Rey asks, joining them at their table, as always perking up at food. Where she packs it all, he has no idea. “Oh,” she thrills and scoops up icing with her fingers, ignoring the fork Poe is handing her. “This is amazing, did we know you could bake? I mean, we knew you can cook, but this is…” she pauses, chewing happily with her eyes closed. “Jess, try the cake. Did you know Poe could bake?”
Jess sends him a dark look for some reason, but then Rey is extending her hand with icing offered on her finger, and Jess’ eyes go dark for an entirely different reason. She’s flushed as she licks the icing off of Rey’s finger, closing her eyes for a second.
“It’s good,” she says gruffly, her voice rough. Couple of moments later, when Rey and Finn are both shuffling their feet with embarrassment as the General takes some time to thank them for everything they’ve done so far, Jess leans into Poe’s side, her face inches from his. “Cake, Dameron?”
“You said there’s never enough cake,” he points out, and her eyes narrow.
“I thought you’d charm the quartermaster into getting you some, not that you’ll bake it yourself.”
“What’s wrong with it?” he asks, a little offended, because his grandfather’s recipe is foolproof, he’ll let you know.
“Nothing. I’m pretty sure my girlfriend wants to marry your cake,” she mutters, and glares some more for a good measure. “Suck it, Dameron,” she tells him, and before he can ask her how she’s guessed his plans for Finn for later in the evening (because sometimes he is an asshole, everyone knows that), she straightens up decisively. “Alright then. It’s on.”
“You’re on,” Poe shoots back, because he’s never stepping down from a challenge, especially not one thrown by Testor, even if he has no idea what it is. “What are we doing?” he asks to clarify and she huffs at him and marches towards Rey. Okay then.
***
Dameron catches on quickly enough, sometime around the time Jess knits Rey and Finn a couple of scarves. She initially means to make one for Rey, because she grew up in a fucking desert and while she never complains, she does shiver in the evenings and Jess is not always there to bury them both in blankets.
They are still at war, after all, she tends to get sent out on missions quite a bit.
She hadn’t knitted in years, but she has learned when she was a hyperactive kid stuck in bed for a while after she broke her leg and cracked a couple of ribs (don’t ask). Sweaters are beyond her, she’s never learned the art of attaching sleeves, but scarves she can do, and so scarves she does.
She makes one for Finn after he admires Rey’s so cheerfully and earnestly, you wouldn’t think it was uneven, wider at one end before she remembered how to do it properly. Soon later she’s stuck in a safe house on Nar Shadaa for a couple of days, and she’s packed some wool and needles somehow, and she ends up making a way too long scarf for him.
He looks adorable all bundled up, she has to admit, wide grin peeking from over the black and orange. And of course she’s chosen the colours on purpose, because she lives to mess with Dameron, and the face he’s made at the sight of Finn in his colours was one for the holobanks.
Honestly, have you ever seen a grown man be turned on by a badly knitted wool scarf? Because Jess now has and it has been priceless.
Still, she’s pretty sure that was when Poe caught on, judging by the dark look he’s sent her way, eyes narrowing at her mocking salute. Good, war was always much more fun when the other side knew it was on.
Well, not the real war, that was bad. But yeah.
***
“What the fuck,” Rey said, picking up Finn’s pillow and burrowing her face in it, possibly to scream silently into it.
“I know,” Finn muttered. The past few weeks has been… difficult. He’s not complaining, per se, in fact, it’s definitely quite the opposite of a problem.
Except in all the ways it is a serious problem and he honestly cannot deal with it.
“I can’t deal with this,” he informs Rey and she peeks from over the pillow, nodding sagely. “I thought it was bad before, but… He let me take apart the engine of his ship,” he says, heartfelt. He doesn’t know how to explain it otherwise, and it sounds a little strange, but Rey nods with sympathy.
“I know, I was there,” she says. Finn mentioned his repairs work have been going quite well, and Poe slapped him on his back and asked if he wanted to take a look at Black One then, see what made the ship tick.
Poe, who got twitchy whenever someone came out near the thing with as much as a wrench, no matter if he had known and trusted them for years. And then he turned to Rey and extended the same offer, and Rey’s face did that thing where it went all soft, eyes shining.
They have spent an entire afternoon tinkering with the ship, and Poe watched them with not even a twitch, not even a ‘be careful,’ but with a quiet contentment that did things to Finn’s stomach.
And some other things to some other parts of his body, thank you very much.
“Yeah,” Rey nodded again, hands digging into the pillow. “I see that and I raise you the swimming lessons.”
Right, yesterday Rey let it slip that she had never swam before, and Jess’ eyes went big and soft, and then she was turning to Finn with a question on her lips. “We’ve had training,” Finn told her, and didn’t elaborate on what was involved in the ‘drownproof’ training. “Wasn’t that fun,” he said instead, and she gave him a considering look before commandeering a speeder and getting them to a lake nearby, leaving a message for Poe to join them once he got out of the newbies training.
Her and Rey spent hours in the water, holding hands while floating, Rey kicking her legs with glee and splashing the water all around from time to time.
Finn watched them from the shore, content to lazy around under the sun rays filtered through the tree, until Poe got there, still in his uniform and shedding it carelessly onto the grass.
It was a hazy, magical afternoon, and warmth spreads in his chest when he thinks of it. Rey probably had an even better time, since she and Jess disappeared behind the waterfall for quite a while, for long enough for Poe to jokingly suggest a rescue mission even though he didn’t even bother to raise his head from Finn’s lap.
“He sings,” Finn complains, because that was another thing. Snap’s wife was the main culprit, complaining the didn’t have any fun in a while (not true, the birthday party literally just happened and Finn was still recovering) and starting on a game where the point was to sing along to a well known song. There were points, Finn didn’t quite understand the system, but he was pretty sure who the winner was, and who knew Poe could sing like that.
“Animals,” Rey points out, and that was a couple of days ago, when somebody found a nest of small furry creatures in one of the old freighters they were dismantling for parts, the mother of the critters nowhere to be seen, and the poor things hungry and weak. Jess took over, throwing everyone out of the hangar, letting Rey and Finn stay and help her feed the animals from a makeshift bottle.
They were still following her around the base, and Rey was probably more than justified in her complaint.
“Look at the bright side, we’re leaving with Skywalker tomorrow, maybe it’ll get better by the time we’re back?” Finn tried without much conviction. Things could very well get even worse, and he wasn’t sure which would be a bigger problem.
Not that he was complaining. Except he sort of was? The whole thing was terrible and confusing and did things to his heart he was pretty sure the medidroids would not approve of.
***
The transmission was unexpected and came in the middle of the briefing for the new pilots, which meant both Poe and Jessika were present in the command centre. He thanks the Force, or whatever deity is on his side, for the coincidence, because he’s not sure they’d be notified otherwise.
The intel on the First Order capturing the Jedi girl and the ex-trooper comes from a dubious source and is most certainly a trap, but the thing is, Rey and Finn has missed a check-in by a couple of hours now, and while normally is not a cause for concern, now it has become one.
And also, even if it’s a trap, Poe thinks he’d gladly walk into it. Jessica meets his eyes over the table, her mouth set into a grim line, and he knows he wouldn’t be walking into it alone.
But he’s been through this before, dodgy intel on possible capture of operatives, and the operating procedure is to wait and double check, recon first, then rescue if necessary and possible. General Organa looks at him with sympathy and understanding when he argues, but shakes her head all the same.
“Commander,” she says sharply when everyone is breaking out, and nods at Pava to approach as well. “The thought of any of my men disregarding orders and going on a half-baked rescue mission on their own has not even crossed my mind,” she tells him, and Poe has the grace to look away. “It probably won’t cross my mind for the next two hours, so until then I won’t be grounding all fighters,” she continues flatly and Poe can hear Jess breathe in sharply next to him.
“Ma’am,” Poe starts and the General touches his arm briefly.
“One hours and fifty nine minutes, Commander. Start with our contact on Sullust, that’s where they started,” she says and turns on her heel, marching out.
“Did she just tell us to go against her own orders?” Jess asks with awe in her voice.
“You fuelled up?” Poe asks her and she nods firmly, already moving.
***
It does turn out to be a trap and in the end Rey is the one to pull their asses out of fire. She does it with grace and with a double-bladed lightsaber, because Jess’ girlfriend is clearly the absolute coolest.
And also sometimes absolutely clueless, because she stares at Jess and Poe for a good half minute after they jump into hyperdrive. “Why did you come here for us?” she asks, like this was anything but a given, like this comes like a shock to her, that they’d mount a rescue mission.
Jess stares at her before turning to look at Poe to check if he can believe this shit, but Poe has his hand on the back of Finn’s neck, their foreheads pressed together, and apparently he’s smarter than Jess, because yeah.
She steps forward and tugs on Rey’s sleeve and Rey gasps softly before their lips meet, and then she’s clinging to Jess, digging her fingers into the sleeves of Jess’ flight suit. “I love you,” Rey says, barely above a whisper, and Jess’ knees wobble underneath her and she laughs against Rey’s mouth.
“I was gonna be romantic about saying this,” she complains. “I was gonna take you to the lake.”
“Oh, we’ll go,” Rey promises her.
***
The next day there’s mail at breakfast, the monthly shipments from outposts coming in, but then Jace, who’s on delivery duty today, stops by their table and drops a number of packages unceremoniously in the middle of the table. “What the fuck, Damerons,” he says.
“What?” Jess asks incredulously and Poe glances at the packages and laughs.
“Care packages from my dad.”
That doesn’t explain why two of them are addressed to Rey Dameron and Finn Dameron. “Did you marry my girlfriend, Poe?”
“We got talking about family names,” Rey says shyly, unwrapping the package with careful hands. There are containers with food inside, a couple of datapads, something soft that looks like a blanket. “Me and Finn, we don’t have them. It’s kind of strange that everyone else does. Kes said we’re welcome to his,” she adds with a glance at Poe, who shrugs smugly.
“Dad’s apparently making it official, so welcome to the family?” he grins and fishes out a small packet out of the file, which he tosses to Jess. “Rey talked about you, so you’ve apparently been dragged into this as well.”
“What?” she mutters before tearing the paper. Chocolate bars and corellian caf, unbelievable. She glances over at Rey, who’s already devouring her chocolate, and Finn, who is going through the datapads with glee. Jess looks back at Poe and nods. “Okay, so we’re back on.”
He has the audacity to grin at her. “We’ve stopped?”
Alright, so now it’s on. Good, she has a trip to Naboo all but planned, and she knows a place with great sunsets. They’re doing this.
***
“Did you hear what Dameron pulled off today?” Temmin asks, turning down lights by forty percent. “He and Pava are sort of ruining the game for everyone else. I feel like I need to step it up, or something.”
“Don’t you dare,” his wife mutters, curling up on the couch with her legs folded under her. “It looks too exhausting, I cannot deal with this.”
“The worst part is, I owe Iolo ten credits, he said it was gonna get more nauseating and I didn’t believe him.”
“Yeah, you’ve always been rather easy,” his wife agrees and Temmin can’t quite argue.