Archive of Our Own

Kell sat quietly in Mon Remonda's medical bay, listening to the humming of the two bacta tanks and playing a simple game on his datapad. It was smart of Face to organize this informal guard rotation for the two badly wounded Wraiths, after those assassination attempts on General Solo and Commander Antilles earlier. (If nothing else, it had persuaded Klivian to stop hovering around the medbay and get some sleep.) But midnight guard shifts were never fun even in the most informal of settings.

Putting away his datapad, he looked up at the bacta tanks. One held Kell's wingman and sometime roommate, the Thakwaash pilot called Runt, recovering from severe burns; the short brown fur that normally covered his body was burned away in splotches and blackened at the edges of the marks. The other tank held a stocky human male, brown of skin and black of hair, who also bore burn marks as well as a blaster wound that had nearly cost him his right arm. This was the veteran Rebel pilot Wes Janson.

Kell still didn't feel he understood Janson. He had come to realize the man was not a threat to him, at least. On all recent evidence, Janson was a brave pilot, a skilled marksman, and dedicated to protecting the lives of his squadmates. He'd sustained that blaster wound while covering Kell's friend Shalla on a desperate headlong charge into enemy fire during the Wraiths' most recent mission, a reconnaissance of an abandoned facility on the planet Saffalore which had turned out to be a cleverly disguised deathtrap.

But once—not too long ago, really—Janson had been the avenging monster of Kell's childhood nightmares. Years ago, he'd shot down Kell's father for fleeing a battle in which both had been on the Rebel side. Kell had spent years hating him for that, dreaming of revenge, but when he first encountered Janson in person a few months ago, he'd been almost too scared to move.

Even at this hour, the medbay noises included constant footsteps and semi-regular doors activating. One of the sets of footsteps came over and stopped near Kell. He looked up in surprise to see Face Loran, his commanding officer.

"Trying to figure out our XO?" Face asked, smiling lightly. "He's a confusing one. I'm still not sure I have a handle on him. He doesn't let anyone see much."

"Says the man who puts on a disguise to go to the fresher," Kell joked easily.

Face snorted. "True. Oh, I wanted to warn you, I put you up for a citation for initiative. You figured out how to use the Binring building's support structure as a radio antenna, probably saved some of our lives."

"I appreciate the advance notice," Kell said. He didn't mind the citation; that was for his engineering knowledge, something he was comfortable being praised for. It was when he earned awards for courage that he got stressed out.

Face was smiling slightly. "And Janson's getting another one for bravery, that death-or-glory charge after Shalla. He's got to be about running out of room for them by now," he said wryly. "I think the only time I've actually seen him scared of anything was you, back on Folor."

Kell blinked, twice. It didn't clear anything up. "Me?"

Face frowned and raised an eyebrow at him. "Oh, sorry, I thought you knew. Once it got cleared up, anyway—but you never realized?"

Kell returned the eyebrow raise and added the other one for good measure. "How about you explain what you're talking about and I can tell you what part of it I realized."

Face pulled up another chair. "Okay, so, Folor Base, our early training. You were scared spitless of Janson, right? I never knew why but it was visible from halfway across the Pig Trough. You locked up every time you were in the same room with him."

"Right so far," Kell said cautiously. He was not interested in explaining to Face that he'd been expecting Janson to kill him like his father as soon as he put a toe wrong. He had at least come around to realizing that that particular fear was frankly irrational: Janson simply wouldn't have continued as a trainer, even under Commander Antilles' protection, if he'd been in the habit of shooting his trainees for minor infractions.

"Well, he's a way better actor than you are," Face said bluntly, "but he was terrified of you too. He managed to keep it mostly natural above the waist, but he locked his knees every time he had to speak to you. Ton and I," an instant's wistfulness flickered across his face, "thought it was hilarious. We had a bet running which of you would realize first. We never did get that one cleared up, actually—you both just showed up to breakfast one day acting halfway normal." He offered a teasing smile. "Care to enlighten me? Just for my own curiosity, at this point."

Kell considered how much to say. "It was when Donos was... ill, on Night Caller," he said. No need to mention in public their squadmate's catatonic flashback during their first official mission. "I was—I'd had the impression that Janson was far more of a hardass than he turns out to be." That was close enough to true, as far as it went. "And you know about my father; I think Janson believed I was out for revenge. But I overheard him and the Commander talking about how to secretly help us cover for Donos. I hadn't thought he'd do that for anyone, and it really changed how I saw him."

Face smiled a bit. "They did that, huh? They're good leaders. I wonder if I could tactfully get a few hints out of the Commander, about how to pretend I don't know what's going on when necessary, now that I'm in command."

"He'll probably tell you to invent your own tactics," Kell said. "But it might be worth a shot." He stood up and stretched. "Are you here for the next watch or just to check up on me?"

"My watch," Face said. "Go get some sleep."

"Well, they see the galaxy’s best-looking—oh."

"Devaronian pilot," Kell said.

"Right, sir, I get it," Elassar Targon replied.

"How many Devaronian TIE interceptor pilots do you suppose there are in the Empire?" Kell asked, keeping his voice calm.

"I understand, sir, I really do."

Kell shook his head and dropped off Elassar's TIE, landing on the ground. He was thoroughly unconvinced that Elassar was Wraith material. The young Devaronian had excellent TIE simulator scores and the medical training the Wraiths sorely needed, but he also had a major knack for putting his foot in his mouth, and so far he'd shown very little talent for devious thinking.

That long-term decision wasn't Kell's problem, but since Kell was the leader of 'Drake Squadron'—otherwise known as the TIE interceptor flight of Wraith Squadron—Elassar was his problem until the man either shaped up, transferred back into X-wings, or got himself or Kell killed through bad tactics.

This evening, though, Kell had other things to worry about. Drake Squadron's flight in to this planet had gone well: they were on a loosely Zsinj-controlled world called Kidriff Five, posing as Imperial TIE interceptor pilots on leave. The patched-up Corellian freighter nicknamed the Millennium Falsehood was also on the planet, hidden in a deep forest. In the morning, once the Falsehood was spotted by planetary security and made its planned attention-grabbing escape, the Drakes would drop their disguise and help cover it.

Since the purpose of the whole operation was to strengthen the pretense that General Solo was flying the Millennium Falsehood missions in person, some of the Drake pilots needed to head into Kidriff Five's nearby entertainment district and be seen on security recordings. If Zsinj's intelligence division later examined the recordings, they could identify the pilots as part of Han Solo's taskforce, further confirming the ruse. Since Imperial TIE squadrons rarely included nonhumans or women, however, neither Elassar nor Shalla could accompany Kell on this duty without an unnecessary risk of blowing the group's cover early. Which left the fourth member of Drake Squadron: Janson.

Kell shortened his stride as Janson fell in beside him. Both wore snug black TIE fighter flightsuits, and had left their helmets and life-support rig in their fighters. Leaving the personal-vehicles lot where the four TIEs were parked, they chatted lightly in character about which bars and dining establishments looked interesting, before falling silent for a bit.

"Hey," Kell said quietly after a moment. "I wanted to say thank you. For talking to my girlfriend about... you know." Tyria had been struggling lately, since she'd been forced to shoot down the brainwashed assassin who'd attacked General Solo. It had occurred to Kell a couple of days ago that, though their situations were not entirely similar, Janson might have some insights that could help Tyria; he'd made the suggestion, and Tyria said the conversation had helped.

Janson half-shrugged and nodded without breaking his stride. "I'm just glad I could help her," he said equally softly.

That seemed to be that, then. They wandered in and out of a couple of establishments before settling down in a corner of a fairly quiet bar with an ale apiece. "You think we've been visible enough?" Kell asked.

"Yeah, unless you want to start a bar fight or something," Janson joked with a wry half-grin.

"And let Elassar organize our breakout after we get arrested? I'll pass," Kell said.

Janson acknowledged the joke with a snort and took a sip of his ale. Glancing around briefly to make sure no one was in easy earshot, he said half under his breath, "I'm glad you're standing by Tyria. She's lucky to have you."

Honestly, it hadn't occurred to Kell not to, but he could see the concern. "I love her," he said. "I could never hate her. It's making me reconsider some things."

"Oh?" Janson asked casually.

It was an awkward conversation to have with Janson, but this might be Kell's best opportunity to bring up something that had been bothering him. "She made the right choice," he said. "I can't deny that. But it's making me wonder... if our positions were reversed..."

"Whether you could do the same? Or even should," Janson finished.

Kell nodded.

Janson took a thoughtful sip of his drink. "I'd be lying if I said I hadn't been thinking about it as well," he admitted. "But I think... Let me figure how to say this." He frowned. "If I can be blunt?"

"Please," Kell said.

"I don't know if you could kill a friendly. Not because you aren't brave or capable or whatever. But because you've grown up thinking of it as the act of a monster." He half-lifted his hand as if to forestall argument. "I don't take it personally. And it's very good to see that you're not putting that on Tyria. But it's a lot harder to forgive yourself for doing something you've sworn you never would. I think..." He took another drink and fidgeted with his ale bottle for a moment. "Please understand I don't say this as an insult. I think it'd break you. It's just a question of before or after."

"We're fighting a war," Kell said uncomfortably. Janson wasn't wrong. But if it was necessary...

"Yeah," Janson said. "We signed up to do what the cause needs. Even if it does break us." He glanced over and met Kell's eyes. "But I also think you shouldn't take the kill, if you wind up in that position. Two reasons. One, even though we're not here to put our own mental stability ahead of the mission, none of us are fighting alone. It's fair to consider what effect you breaking would have on the squadron. Two—at this point, with what we know? I legitimately don't think it would be the right tactical move."

Kell took a drink of his own ale and gave Janson a dubious look. "Even if it was to save someone like General Solo or Commander Antilles?"

Janson nodded slightly. "As I'm understanding it, the big next step at this point is to capture one or more of these brainwashed assassins alive, find out what's making them tick. When you take that into account, the crucial difference between you and Tyria is skill. She had to go for a kill shot; she doesn't have the skill or training to reliably disable an A-wing in combat. You, on the other hand?"

"Damn," Kell said, realizing. "You think, even if I took longer to line up the shot..."

"You have the skill and you're motivated to try," Janson said. "And even if we lost someone really critical like Wedge or Solo, the lives that could be saved from getting this taken care of quickly..."

"Yeah," Kell said. It made sense. He finished his ale in silence.

Janson was fidgeting with his bottle again, rotating it in little circles while staring past it at a blank spot on the tabletop, deeply lost in thought. Kell let him cogitate for a bit, glancing around the bar, which had very little of interest going on, and resisted the urge to fidget with his own empty bottle as well.

"I'll do it," Janson said, his voice grim but decisive. He finished off his drink and stood up. "Let's get back to the ships. Morning comes early."

Kell stood up as well. "Do what? If I can ask."

They disposed of their bottles and left the bar. "I'm going to put together a training," Janson said, his voice heavy. "The best ways to disable friendly snubfighters without harming the pilots. Voluntary, I think, but I hope you'll attend."

Kell kept his stride short, letting Janson lead. "I’ll consider it," he said. It would be extremely awkward for both of them, but it was good of Janson to make it clear Kell was welcome. However… He debated with himself for a moment whether to ask—how to ask what was puzzling him. "Is there a handbook or something I can review?" he asked tentatively. "A source for the techniques?"

Janson's harsh, almost raw laugh startled him. It startled the people around them too, drawing some momentary attention.

"Not here," Janson said, forcing a smile and shaking his head at the passersby. "C'mon, let's find someplace quieter."

This part of Kidriff Five, the tourism-focused Tobaskin Sector, was modeled on Coruscant, though with less intense vertical relief in the architecture: a bustling city of skyscrapers. However, unlike on Coruscant, there were parks and small wooded copses scattered about. They found a large park where a central open-air auditorium held some sort of music performance, light-filled and noisy, but the rest of the park was darkened and mostly deserted.

Janson sat down on a bench within distant earshot of the music, far enough that they could talk but close enough not to seem suspiciously isolated. "So," he said. His voice sounded roughened, tired. "No, there's no handbook. Because I haven't written it. Because I'm a fucking coward."

Kell frowned, trying to piece together what Janson was implying. "I think I'm missing something, sir."

"Not 'sir'. Not about this." Janson paused for a moment, drew a deep breath. "Did anybody ever tell you how your father died? The real story?"

Oh. Kell had a horrible feeling he knew where this was going. It didn't make any sense, but... but it was the only thing that made sense. "Maybe not?" he said. "All I know is that he deserted under fire and you, uh. Killed him... for it?" He bit back the 'sir' that wanted to come out, the instinctive don't hurt me, I'm not a threat signaling.

Janson laughed again, ragged and slightly hysterical. "He doesn't know. He doesn't fucking know." He buried his face in his hands for a minute. "Wait, why'd you send Tyria to me if you didn't... Never mind, first things first. Sit down, Tainer, I can't think when you're looming over me like that."

Kell sat. Janson stood, tried to put his hands in his flightsuit pockets, and discovered the TIE flightsuit didn't have any. He clasped his hands behind his back instead and began pacing slowly as he talked. "So the early Rebel Alliance was extremely undersupplied," he said. "Volunteer pilots, scavenged gear, mostly stolen or salvaged ships. We tried not to pirate from civilians, so most of our food and fuel had to come from raiding the Imp supply lines."

Kell listened in silence. He couldn't think of anything to say.

"Your father was a highly skilled freighter pilot," Janson continued. "He probably wouldn't have passed the psych tests we use for combat fitness these days, but..." He sounded regretful. "To be frank, the Alliance of those days couldn't afford to turn anyone away. If you wanted to fly combat, you got your chance. Tierfon, where we were stationed, was one of several bases intended to let rookie pilots fly an easy mission or two and self-select out before they got killed, if they weren't going to cut it."

"Obviously something went wrong," Kell said. His voice didn't sound like his own.

"Everything went wrong," Janson confirmed sourly. "Like I said, with no supply lines, we had to raid Imp freighters to supply the base. Our first combat mission, his and mine, our squadron got set up to ambush one such freighter as it came into a hidden Imperial asteroid base. But our intel was bad, and the freighter's TIE escort was twice as big as expected. We'd take heavy casualties if we hit it. Probably couldn't capture the freighter. The Captain was trying to figure whether it'd be worth the sacrifice to deny the Imps the supplies, or if we should just lay low till they left."

This part of the story, at least, was starting to fit together. "And that's when my father ran?"

"Yes." Janson's voice was heavy, closed-off. He sat down, perching on the far arm of the bench with his back to Kell. "He had a panic attack. If it would've been an option, we'd have just let him go. Let his gunner bring the Y-wing back later. But if he bounced into Imp sensor range or communicated on a standard frequency instead of just our squad frequency..." He swallowed hard. "We were all dead. So the Captain sent me and Jek—that is, Porkins, the original Piggy—to bring him back. Or... or stop him."

"Go on," Kell said. It was an ambush. He was endangering them. They didn't just execute him for desertion. He had to hear the rest of the story, before he could process any of that. He had to know the truth.

Janson's voice was shaky. "Brieth, his gunner, couldn't talk him down. Jek couldn't force him down. I had—I had to take the shot." He pulled in a ragged breath. "I almost made it. I did make it. He set down. Brieth was fine. But then—" He choked. "His flightsuit. It was faulty. My shot cracked the cockpit. He suffocated." He stood up and tried again to put his hands in his pockets, seeming too distressed to remember that they weren't there. "I'm sorry."

Oh, no. Oh, no. "So you practiced," Kell said, feeling as if the words were coming from very far away. Everything felt oddly cold. "Learned how to disable other Rebel ships. So that you'd never fail another squadmate like that again." How was this the true face of the avenging executioner he'd feared for so long?

"Yeah," Janson said thickly. "And then when it would've come in handy, I was in fucking bacta and nobody else had the skillset." He sounded angry with himself. "I should have told Wedge years ago. Written the damn textbook. Made it mandatory training. Then maybe Corran and even Tyria could have done something with it. I've let them down."

"You tried to save him," Kell said slowly, still trying to wrap his mind around the realization.

Janson made a derisive little growl in his throat. "Does it matter? I failed." He started walking away, back toward the street that led to the personal-vehicles lot.

Kell caught up easily. "It matters," he insisted. "Back when Jesmin Ackbar died, I didn't think I deserved the Crescent they gave me, because I failed to save her. But I've had to accept"—Tyria had made him accept—"that it still says something important about me, that I made the effort. If that's true for me, it's true for you too."

Janson laughed mirthlessly. "They gave me a medal too, you know," he said. "True Gunner. Officially it was for consistent excellence or some such, but everybody on Tierfon base knew."

"What a mess," Kell said, meaning everything: his father's death, Janson's distress, Kell's misunderstandings, the long-ago Rebel leaders' choices, the assassination plots that had brought everything to the surface...

"What a mess," Janson agreed wryly.

They were approaching the personal-vehicles lot. Kell suspected Janson would rather not continue the conversation around Shalla or, perish the thought, Elassar. "Does Tyria know?" he asked quickly.

"Yeah. I told her... enough." Janson glanced over at him. "If I'd realized you didn't know, I would have asked her to pass it on."

"Thank you," Kell said. "For telling me. And for helping her."

Janson shrugged. "May as well somebody get some good out of it."

They were too close to the TIEs now to say more. Kell nodded to Janson and climbed into his interceptor. He needed to get what rest he could before dawn local time, but he had a lot to think about first.

"Group, this is Leader," Wedge's voice said over the comms. "As soon as we have a little bit of moon horizon between us and the planet, the Drakes are going to separate and head on out to Rendezvous Point Beta."

Wes clicked his comm in acknowledgement and heard the other three Drakes do so as well. Since their TIEs had no hyperdrives, they'd rendezvous with Mon Remonda at the edge of Kidriff system, before the ship jumped to Rendezvous Point Alpha to pick up the Rogue and Wraith X-wings who'd also be jumping there.

Out of combat and no casualties for their side. Always a good start to the day. He'd grab some breakfast on the way to Point Alpha—there'd been no time for even a ration bar before they launched from Kidriff Five—then talk to Wedge about the new training, and probably spend the day in the sims brushing up on how to disable X-wings. He was distinctly not looking forward to it, but it had to be done. Maybe he could get Hobbie to help, so at least he wouldn't be working on it alone.

Face had some sort of private report for Wedge, it seemed; Wes had noticed him and Lara hanging back from the main furball. Something wrong with one of their ships? Hopefully not his problem. The comm waves fell silent while the two leaders conferred. At the appropriate time, the Drakes broke off from the main group and began their straight-line flight toward the spot where Mon Remonda waited.

When Face returned to the comms after a couple of minutes, Lara's voice came through, sounding upset. "You know, don't you, Face?" she asked.

Wes frowned, glancing at his comm board. Know what?

"I know that you're Gara Petothel," Face replied to her.

Petothel? Oh, sithspit. The Zsinj-affiliated slicer who'd destroyed Talon Squadron. Wait, Lara? Seriously? What the kriff was Face thinking?

But no, she was admitting it. What the fuck. What was she doing here? Why hadn't she sabotaged them yet? Had she... She was saying, "I never betrayed you." Wes had so many questions. At least she seemed to be co-operating, powering down her weapons. This was going to be such a long—

An all-too-human wail split the airwaves, one he'd heard twice before: over Ession, when Falynn Sandskimmer had died, and on the recording of Talon Squadron's disastrous mission to Gravan Seven. Myn. No. Oh no.

On his sensor board, in the scatter of X-wings still receding behind Drake Squadron, Myn was vectoring toward Face and Lara. Trying to get into laser range. Sithspit. No, Myn. What the fuck, I taught you better than that.

Wes reached for his comm board to say as much, but the words stuck in his chest. Had he? Had he really?

He'd never spoken of this fear aloud, even to Hobbie, but it had plagued him ever since he first became a trainer: the fear that whatever wrongness had made him willing to kill Kissek Doran would infect his students as well, make them too ready to fire on friendlies or noncombatants.

He'd never proposed the training on disabling friendly fighters because he couldn't bring himself to put his trainees in that situation on purpose, couldn't face watching it play out over and over again. Yet here they all were. Myn going after Lara, and now Tyria was out of formation too, sighting down on her wingmate. "Myn," Tyria choked, sounding much like Wes felt, "please don't do this."

Can't we all just stop trying to kill each other and go home? Wes didn't bother saying it aloud. It wouldn't help.

Dragging himself back together, Wes tried to consider whether he could in fact help. Words hadn't worked on Myn: orders, threats, persuasion. Tyria was right that action was next.

The Drakes were far from the X-wings by now, maybe too far, but his TIE interceptor was fast. He could try to get back there in time, take the shot in her place. Spare her from having to kill a second friendly in less than a week. And maybe, just maybe, save Myn from his own folly as well.

Or kill him. That was also possible. More likely, even.

There was a dead gap in his chest where his heart belonged. He could feel the swirl of possible futures around him, could see the obvious choice in front of him, but couldn't bring himself to make it. To kill the last Talon himself, for the sake of the woman who'd destroyed the squadron...

Everything he'd said to Tainer last night, he knew should apply, but it seemed like mere excuses now. Considering the effect on the squadron if the kill broke him; taking care enough to line up the disabling shot, even if they lost Face or the invaluable intelligence of what in the entire fuck Lara was doing in the squadron; not taking that care because Myn obviously wasn't brainwashed and therefore Lara's intel was more important...

He had a chain of command. This was what they were for. Wedge, he couldn't ask; in a worst-case scenario, more than anything, the squadron needed Wedge free of the guilt that breaking Wes was in any way his doing. Face was out of the question, beyond busy arguing with Myn. That left—

—the one person Wes would never, ever have pictured himself asking about this. The one person for whom it might be an even more painful, more loaded decision than for Wes himself.

The one person who had all the details to make the correct decision right now.

Wes keyed his comm for the Drakes' private frequency. "Orders, Drake Lead?" It was all he could manage to say. He'd have to trust Tainer to know what he was asking and to make the right call in time.

Kell wasn't sure who Gara Petothel was at first, until he heard Donos's cry. Then he realized who she had to be.

Damn it, wasn't it just the other day that he'd been thinking how much better Donos was doing? What a mess.

Tyria... oh no, Tyria. "Myn, please don't do this," he heard her say. Fuck. Why did this keep happening to her? Why couldn't it be literally anyone else in this position?

Last time, when Tyria shot down Tua'lin, Kell hadn't been flying, his hands still covered in bacta bandages. This time—he wasn't too far away, he could still reach them, but he felt his stomach lurch at the thought of firing on Donos himself. Besides, he didn't have the expertise to be sure he could disable the fighter. Could Janson...?

(He was all too aware of the irony there. He just couldn't afford to stop and think about it.)

His comm crackled. "Orders, Drake Lead?" It was Janson's voice—he must have been thinking along similar lines—but half-broken, as strained and low as Kell had ever heard it.

Just yesterday morning, Kell wouldn't have hesitated. If it was between Janson and Tyria... and Janson was both a more skilled pilot and far more experienced at disabling X-wings...

But that was when Kell had believed Janson to be a hardened killer, someone capable of shooting down an ally when necessary and going on with his day. Now he knew his father's death had been an accident. A failure on Janson's part, and one that the man clearly still regretted. If Kell ordered him to fire on not only a friend and squadmate, but a trainee to whom he was especially attached...

Kell didn't doubt that Janson would take the shot. Unlike Kell, he had no tendency to break before the job was done. But afterwards? That quiet plea... Janson was on the edge.

"Drake Flight, maintain course," Kell said firmly. If Janson broke down, with Face and Donos and Lara all potentially dead or removed from duty, the squadron would likely shatter. That had to be the deciding factor, not his personal feelings.

"On course," Janson confirmed, his voice shakily grateful. Elassar and Shalla acknowledged as well.

On his sensor board, Donos was still pursuing Lara and Face, with Tyria behind him. "Wraith Three," Tyria's voice choked out, "power down or I'll be forced to fire."

Dammit, Donos, if you make Tyria vape you, I will personally reassemble you from your component atoms just to beat you to death myself, Kell vowed.

"Wraith Four," Face told Tyria, "this is Wraith One. Do not fire, whatever happens."

Oh, thank fuck. Kell sagged in his seat with relief. Nobody was going to have to shoot Donos. He hadn't sacrificed Tyria's stability for Janson's. He could... he could live with that.

By the time Drake Squadron reached Mon Remonda, Lara was gone, fled into hyperspace, and Donos was silent, held under Captain Celchu's guns. The Commander had issued new orders for the X-wings to stay together until Face's fighter, damaged by Donos' torpedo, could be towed in.

Kell climbed out of his TIE and saw the others doing the same, all taking off their helmets and life-support gear. The retrieval shuttle on the other side of the hangar bay was preparing to take off. Until the X-wings arrived, there was really nothing for the Drakes to do.

Janson moved toward a corner of the hangar bay, out of the way, and stood staring out through the magcon field as if he could see into the minds of the faraway pilots. Kell and the others joined him, though there was nothing to be seen with eyes except the near-distant sun of Kidriff system against the untwinkling starfield.

"Lieutenant Janson," Elassar asked, "what was that out there? Are you all right? You didn't sound very good."

Janson half-turned his head, his face blank. Damn, Face was right that he didn't give anything away. But he didn't speak, just turned back to the stars.

"Lieutenant?" Elassar said again. "Sir?"

"Back off!" Kell snapped, startling himself. "He obviously doesn't want to talk about it."

"Flight Officer Targon," Shalla said very sweetly—but with enough emphasis on Elassar's rank to remind him that the rest of them were all lieutenants—"you know what would be really helpful right now? None of us have had any breakfast this morning. Go to the kitchens and bring back four mugs, a large pot of caf, and a tray of meat rolls or whatever snacks they have. On the double!" she added in a sharper tone.

Elassar snapped to attention and saluted. "Yes sir, ma'am!" he said and hurried off.

Kell relaxed a bit. "Good thinking, Shalla," he said. "Sorry, I don't know what it is about that guy." Well, other than having to babysit him a bit in combat, but Runt had been much worse in their training days and Kell had never snapped at him.

"We were all young idiots once," Shalla said. "Janson, anything else we can do to help? I'm not asking what's wrong, but you do look a little peaky."

Janson half-turned his head again, managed a thin smile of gratitude for each of them and a quick little headshake for Shalla before returning his gaze to the void where the faint running lights of the slowly approaching X-wings could now be glimpsed, discernible from stars only by their movements.

By the time the X-wings returned to Mon Remonda, the caf and snacks Elassar brought had been duly devoured, and Janson looked significantly better. He headed over to the main group, flanking Commander Antilles along with the other senior officers as Antilles spoke sharply to Donos and then to Face.

Shalla stuck by Kell as the rest of the pilots drifted apart. "Is there anything I should know about why Janson reacted so strongly to what just went down?" she asked in a low voice.

Kell considered it. Where to even begin? "I don't think I could even start to summarize it," he said honestly. "Some of it isn't mine to tell." A great deal of it technically was, if he wanted to tell it, but he so very thoroughly did not. "Just... know you did the right thing pulling Targon off of him. He has to have gone through at least three or four layers of his own handcrafted personal hell out there."

"That's fair," Shalla said. "Should we keep an eye out for him?"

"Discreetly, if we can," Kell said. "This whole brainwashed assassins and friends vaping friends thing, it's likely to be hitting him especially hard." Hopefully Shalla wouldn't ask why.

"I know he's close with Captain Celchu," Shalla said, nodding. "Do you want to spar?"

That was perfect. Linking Janson's upset to Celchu's history with brainwashing accusations was as good a misdirect as any. "I can't," Kell said. "I have to see if the mechanics need me to help rebuild Face's X-wing. It has to be functional again by tomorrow."

Shalla nodded. "Good luck with that."

As Kell moved through his duty schedule for the rest of the day, his thoughts kept drifting back to Janson.

It made sense that Kell's first thought had been to protect Tyria from pain. He loved her. She was integral to his life. And he'd already been supporting her as she wrestled with her feelings about killing Tua'lin.

But why this sudden flare of protective feeling toward Janson? Every time he thought about that soft, desperate plea for orders, for permission not to make any life-or-death decisions in that moment... Janson could easily have turned to Commander Antilles or Face for guidance. But he'd asked Kell. Trusted him to make a decision Janson didn't trust himself to make. Trusted Kell to understand what firing on another squadmate would do to him, even after all the time Kell had spent not understanding that very thing.

That... Kell didn't understand why, but it gave him a strange twisting feeling in his stomach. Not fear or dread. Something else. He didn't want to go through the upset of the day's events again, absolutely not, but some part of him wanted to feel again the flicker of... something that came with that moment.

"So I will bid you good evening, Mistress Sarkin." The door slid closed behind Squeaky, and Tyria frowned at the empty bed on the other side of her room: Lara's bed. Gara's? Squeaky had just finished packing up the woman's effects. He seemed to like Tyria, who'd always been polite to him—at least as much as he liked anyone—so Tyria was now in possession of all the information he was willing to offer about Wraith Squadron's current status. Lara gone, her possessions headed to NRI for analysis; Donos off duty pending an official investigation; Face uninjured, his snubfighter fully repaired thanks to heroic efforts by the mechanics' squad (including Kell).

Tyria had barely seen Kell all day, except for a quick hug and kiss before he dove into the huddle of mechanics. She decided to check if he was in his room. Much more pleasant than feeling like she was being watched by the ghost of someone who had, apparently, never existed.

Kell smiled when she opened his door, and pulled her inside for a long and thorough kiss. "How are you holding up?" he asked.

Tyria sighed and leaned her head against his shoulder. "I feel bad. Donos was my wingmate, and I didn't even notice there was anything the matter with him mentally. Lara was my roommate, and I don't even know where to start dealing with any of that. What about you?"

"Well, I'm a little farther from that side of this mess, at least," Kell said, petting her hair. "I'm sorry I didn't have time to check in on you earlier today."

"It's fine," Tyria said. "I'd rather think about something else anyway. How are you doing?"

"...odd," Kell said. "Would you like me to braid your hair while I talk about it?"

"Sure," Tyria said. She kissed him quickly and sat down on the one chair in his quarters. Kell’s family had been from Alderaan before changing their identity, and she enjoyed letting him practice the elaborate Alderaanian hairstyles to keep his hands busy and help both of them relax, though on her own she tended to wear her hair in a simple ponytail.

Kell got out some hair supplies and started brushing Tyria’s hair. "I had an interesting conversation with Lieutenant Janson last night," he began. "Did you know… When my father died, it wasn't a pitched battle he was fleeing? The Rebel side was getting ready to spring an ambush. There was a risk he'd betray their presence and get them all killed. That's why Janson had to take him down."

Tyria started to nod, stopped when the motion tugged gently on her hair. "He told me—was it only yesterday? The day before? It feels longer. After the party, when I asked him about it. I was going to ask if you knew, but..." She gestured around. "All this."

"Yeah," Kell said slowly. "I never knew that Janson tried to save him. Disable his fighter." Tyria had gotten to know Kell well over the past few months, and he was usually much more articulate than many people realized, but right now he sounded like he was trying to think something out and didn't quite have the key to it.

"It's changing how you see him?" Tyria asked. She hoped that was good. Kell had a real knack for coming up with perspectives nobody else had ever considered. In combat and mission planning, that skill was a lifesaver. Outside of those settings, it mainly tended to overcomplicate his life. She'd come to accept that helping Kell untangle his thoughts was part of loving him, and she was proud of how far he'd come, but Janson was... a volatile topic.

(Her own opinions on Janson were less complicated. Patient, competent, brave, unfailingly sunny. Scrupulously fair in the face of Kell's early animosity. Most recently, a bluntly kind man who'd spoken in plain words of the pain they shared, the guilt and self-doubt and the strange grief of killing an ally. He hadn't been able to offer her much comfort, but the knife-clean honesty he gave her instead was perhaps more valuable.)

"I think so," Kell said slowly, starting to divide her hair into sections. "I don't know. He's so different from... anything I ever thought he was."

Tyria kept listening, making little noises of agreement.

"He helped you," Kell said. "He tried to save my father. He even talked to me about... what happened. He's done nothing but good for his squadrons."

"True," Tyria said. It was good to hear Kell finally realizing some of these things—even better that he was figuring them out on his own. He'd come so far.

"And this morning," Kell continued. "He was ready to... he would have fired on Donos himself if he had to. Rather than make you do it."

Tyria gasped slightly.

"He's been practicing, Tyria," Kell said. He was working on a simple braid, seeming too distracted for anything more complex. "Ever since my father died. To take down friendly fighters without killing the pilots. I don't even..." He fastened off the braid. "I don't know how to deal with that. That I've spent all these years hating him, fearing him, and he was trying to ensure he never made the same mistake again."

Tyria stood up and kissed him gently. "You had no way to know. Now you do."

"I guess," Kell said unhappily. He wrapped her in his arms again. "I can't stop thinking about it. About him. I don't know why."

Tyria tucked her arms around his waist. "It's not surprising," she said. "You've been thinking about him for years, nearly a decade. He's had a fixed niche in your mind. Now you've found that he doesn't fit there anymore, but he's still central."

Kell sat down on the bed, pulling her into his lap. "He asked me what to do," he said slowly. "About Donos. He... he trusted me to make that decision for him."

"And that's bothering you?" Tyria asked, trying to follow along.

Kell shook his head. "No. Yes? Not the way you'd think. It's not scaring me. I want..." He stopped, frowning.

Tyria tucked her face into his shoulder for a second, hiding a smile. Oh, Kell. "You want him to do it again," she said, feeling fairly confident she was guessing right. "To give up control and trust you to make the right decisions for him."

Kell nodded, still frowning. "But I absolutely don't want things to go this wrong again, so..."

"Kell, darling," Tyria said, "you're so good at thinking around the corners of every problem that you can't see what's right in front of your nose."

Kell gave her a look that tried to be unamused, but fondness crept in around the edges. "So tell me," he said, kissing her quickly. "That's what teamwork is for, isn't it?"

Very true. Tyria ruffled his hair affectionately. "Honesty to On?"

"Honesty to On," Kell confirmed. It was so cute how seriously he took this little ritual.

"How would you feel if Janson asked you to pin him against a wall and kiss him?"

"I... uh." Kell looked as if he'd grabbed an ungrounded hot wire for a moment. "Oh. Uh. Oh, sithspit." He covered his face with his hand.

Tyria tried to bite back her giggles. "I'm sorry, you're just so adorable when you finally realize something this obvious."

"My mother can never know," Kell groaned.

Tyria laughed harder. "I promise I won't tell her." She still hadn't met Kell's mother, and was more than a little concerned about what would happen when she did, but that was a problem for another day.

"Janson can never know," Kell continued.

"Why not?" Tyria asked.

Kell blinked, stopped in his tracks again. "I—I—every reason?!"

Tyria kissed his temple, smiling. "Take a deep breath."

Kell did. "Well, the most important reason: don't you have a problem with it?"

Oh, not remotely. Janson wasn't quite her type by himself, but the mental image of Kell pinning him down in bed... oh, she could absolutely get on board with that. Not that Kell needed to hear about that aspect of her opinion right now. "Why would I?" she asked instead. "He's not competition for me." She leaned in and kissed Kell's lips gently. "Now, if he was another nice girl you could build a life with and bring home to Mama someday, I might be worried."

"He is precisely none of those things," Kell agreed, starting to look slightly less rattled. "But he's my subordinate. I'm his flight leader. What if he puts me on report for inappropriate advances?"

"For telling him politely that you're interested and letting him turn you down if he's not?" Tyria said. "We only have eight pilots allowed to fly right now. You'd have to be incredibly inappropriate to get taken off duty."

"That's not better," Kell said grumpily. "What if he ought to put me on report but doesn't, for the good of the squadron?"

Tyria flicked his forehead. "You're overdramatizing things again. I know you're capable of getting turned down without crossing those lines, because I've turned you down myself and I didn't have to put you on report about it. Next objection?"

Kell sighed. "I suppose you're right. Next objection is Klivian."

"They're not together like that," Tyria said smugly.

Kell looked baffled. "...do I want to know how you know that?"

"Girl talk," Tyria said. In point of fact, Shalla had been quietly asking around about Janson's hypothetical reaction to being propositioned by a squadmate for some time now. Tyria had picked up from her that Janson was not with Klivian, was not in or looking for a serious relationship, and was supposed to be amenable to casual hookups with beings of any gender. She hadn't expected this knowledge to be relevant to her own personal life, though.

Kell was still frowning. "Look," Tyria said, wrapping her arms around his shoulders, "you don't have to do anything about it right away. You can stop and think about it for a while. But we both know that when you try to think things out without doing anything about them, you wind up tying yourself in all sorts of knots."

"True," Kell said. He held her close for a moment. "I think I might hit the gym. See if not thinking about anything sorts my head out a bit. Are you doing any better?"

"Some," Tyria said. "Can I sleep in here tonight? Not to check if you come back or anything. It's just weird having Lara's bed across from me."

"That's fine," Kell said. "You really wouldn't mind if I wound up spending the night with him?"

"You love me," Tyria said simply. "This thing with Janson doesn't replace that. Either you'll get it out of your system, or we'll talk about it some more and work out how to balance everything. I trust you."

Kell kissed her deeply. "What if I get too emotionally attached and I'm not fit to command him?"

"What if you're already too emotionally attached and you need to fuck it out in order to keep commanding him?" Tyria teased, smiling. She booped his nose and stood up off his lap. "Kell, you're thinking too much. Go hit something."

It was later than Kell had realized, and the ship's gym was almost deserted. There was only one other person, carefully practicing unarmed beginner katas on the mats: Janson. He glanced over when Kell entered, then went back to his work.

Kell wrapped his hands and set up with one of the practice dummies, punching and kicking it. He wasn't trying to pay attention to Janson, but his eyes kept drifting in that direction.

It felt... different, very different, from how he felt about Tyria. Kell had never been especially attracted to other gym rats: Shalla and her sister Vula, for instance, weren't his type at all. Being twisted into knots and thrown around like a cleaning rag did nothing for his sexual fantasies, and he was more interested in comparing muscles than admiring them. Janson was well-built, in the chunky way that suggested he was more of an all-round physical laborer than a dedicated athlete, but nothing that had caught Kell's eye on pure looks.

Kell's usual type was more—well, female, really. There weren't many examples, and Tyria was the only one he'd actually managed to establish something with. Physically, Janson was Tyria's opposite in many obvious ways. But if he looked deeper... Kell's teenage fantasies had revolved around type characters played by one holo-actress: cute, bubbly, highly competent characters with a tendency to get just a little too far in over their heads. He'd daydreamed of rescuing them, becoming their protector.

All right, if he was honest, he could see the connection. Janson was smart, cheerful, always on top of squadron management, fully able to take care of himself... and Kell had been allowed a glimpse of the man's vulnerable side. He wanted to both protect that and have the privilege to see more of it.

One, two, three, and turn... No, dammit, he was turning on the wrong foot again. Wes scowled and started the kata over.

Maybe katas weren't the best way to wear himself out so he could sleep. He didn't have a good enough grasp of them yet to do them quickly and with precision. But he didn't really feel like hitting a punching bag or lifting weights, and asking Tainer to spar was simply not an option.

Especially not right now. Kriff, it'd been a complicated day. And night, and previous day. Trying not to think about what had or hadn't changed with Tainer was one of the reasons he couldn't seem to fall asleep.

He might as well pack it up. This wasn't helping.

On his way out of the gym, he veered towards Tainer. "Hey," he said. "Thanks for this morning. I was in no shape to deal with Targon myself." That seemed like about the minimum he could politely say. (Thanks for not ordering me to shoot Myn was, again, just completely out of the question to say, no matter how much he meant it.)

"Anytime," Tainer said with a nod, seeming a bit distracted.

That was that, then. Wes turned and started to head toward the exit.

"Hey," Tainer said from behind him. Wes turned back, tilting his head. Tainer looked strained for a moment, then said all in a rush, "I think I'm attracted to you. Tyria said you should know."

Wes just stared for a moment, wondering if he'd heard right. What came out of his mouth, after a few seconds of uncontrolled gear-spinning, was, "To me?"

"Yes. If that's all right. You... you're kind," Tainer said, taking an awkward half step forward. "You helped Tyria, and me. You tried to help my father. And you offered to help with Donos."

Wes kept a straight face and managed not to pinch himself. If this was a dream or a prank, he suspected Tainer would be at least slightly less awkward. Still, this was easily the least passionate way he'd ever been propositioned. "Are you looking to do something about it, or are you just telling me for information?" he asked. That was the only question he could come up with that seemed likely to move the conversation forward.

Tainer blushed. "I'd like to. If you'd be willing," he said, taking another half step. Then he paused. "But should we? I mean, I am your flight leader, and..."

That was hardly the part of the situation that Wes felt he needed to be concerned about. He had to let out a laugh before he exploded from the absurdity of the whole situation. "Yeah, and I was your trainer," he said, starting to stretch his shoulders a bit, mainly so he had an excuse not to look at Tainer for a moment. "We're both lieutenants, and there's nothing against regs about it. Will it be a problem for you?"

"Not for me," Tainer said. "Are you... you are interested?"

The small part of Wes's brain that handled normal-people behavior simulations was going Tainer?! Seriously? You cannot actually be going through with this, are you? Wes took a moment to seriously consider its point of view.

True, he was pretty sure he was Tainer's official nemesis or something—or had been up until last night, at any rate. And it was entirely possible that having the man actually in his bed would wind up giving him a whole new category of nightmares. On the other hand, this was absolutely the funniest thing that had ever happened to him, and if Wes Janson had one committed relationship in his life, it was to the bit. He simply couldn't tell this story and let it end with 'and then I turned him down'.

Not that he was going to say that. He offered a lopsided shrug and his most charming smile. "You've already had my back twice today," he said. "And I could really use some... exercise to help me sleep, if you feel like taking it that far tonight. Otherwise, I could see you at breakfast?" That seemed like it covered most of the possibilities.

Tainer smiled and stepped forward once more, right up into Wes's space. "Let me help you," he murmured, and leaned down to kiss Wes, pulling him into a slow, gentle hug.

Wes shut his eyes and let himself melt into the embrace for a long moment. Damn, that felt good. He hadn't slept with a guy bigger than himself in a long time, and he'd almost forgotten how comforting it could be.

"My place?" he suggested when Tainer broke the kiss.

Tainer nodded, smiling down at him. "Let's go."

Kell woke up with the vague feeling that something was off. Tyria was the wrong shape somehow, snuggled up against his side. He blinked awake and realized he wasn't in his own quarters, which meant the unsquishily masculine body next to him was...

...Janson.

Kell lay still for a bit, waiting to see how he felt about that. Anxious, a little, but he thankfully didn't find himself overcome by nausea. Amused, a little; Tyria was going to laugh so hard. And more than a little excited.

He looked down at Janson, who lay still fast asleep—arms wrapped around Kell's waist, mouth slightly open—and felt his pulse quicken. He was so far from getting this man out of his system. To see Janson looking so peaceful and relaxed, to know he'd contributed to that feeling... oh, it made him want so much more.

He lightly brushed a curl from Janson's face, and the man blinked suddenly and woke up. "Hmn? Oh. Mornin'," Janson said, his default daytime face slotting neatly into place. "Have fun?"

"I did," Kell said, cuddling him close. "I don't suppose we have time for any more?"

Janson's grin turned mischievous. "Well, not this morning. We have another mission briefing after breakfast. But I don't recall either of us saying this had to be a one-time thing. Maybe later?"

"I'd like that," Kell said. "I'll have to talk to Tyria."

Janson nodded, his fingers tracing Kell's biceps. "Let me know what you decide," he said. "It's not everybody who can just pin me down without mechanical assistance." He stretched happily. "I'd be glad to go again when we have some time."

Kell rolled over, half on top of Janson, and kissed him thoroughly one more time. "I'll look forward to it."