Author: Whee, me again! Jenna just won't stop pestering me until I have written down her full story...

Summary: Jenna's back with K-Company (and with pretty new officer's bars at that), but all's not as shiny as she would have liked it. This time sadly enough not co-written with joustingforcancer :(

Category: Angst/Action/Adventure

Rating: T, just to be on the safe side

Disclaimer: Okay, this is gonna be funny. Star Wars on the whole belongs to The Flanneled One. But Jenna and Danna were first introduced by joustingforcancer who was so nice as to lend them to me. Thank you.

A/N: Although this one is not co-written with joustinforcancer, it can still be seen a companion piece to his story "Soldier", just like "Screw Up" and "Big Girl". If you haven't read at least the latter (and yet better: all of them), things could be a little imcomprehensible for you. If you still want to read it and have questions, feel free to ask them. I'll try to answer them. And remember:

Feedback will earn you a cookie, flames will roast my marsh-mellows.

Casualties

"I fought the war
I fought the war
But the war won."

Metric, "Monster Hospital"

One

Why, oh why did I ever sign up?

Because, you know, when I signed up I surely didn't ever think that I'd have to hold dying men's hands and lie to them. More so, if those men are the slimiest, most obnoxious bastards I'd never have touched voluntarily. But here I am now, holding Tarkker's hand, still not quite sure how it all happened.

I mean, sure, basically… basically he got hit by a plasma grenade full in the face, and someone could drag him off the battle field and bring him to the field dressing square where I found him when I was desperately trying to find out who of my company survived and who didn't.

And then… then he started shouting for his mum, and nobody had time to attend to him. Nobody apart from me. For a few long moments I just stood there, rooted to the spot. I saw the man who'd been poking fun at me in the box that crashed. I saw the man who'd cheated himself into a promotion on my expense. I saw the man who'd tortured us all with his frigging "I'm your drill instructor, call me God."-complex. And then I blinked, and I only saw a boy who'd never make it to the hospital ship in time and who'd die on some Force-forsaken backwater planet. And for what? Ideals that maybe never even were his own?

It was then I finally grabbed what being an officer really meant. It meant you had a responsibility to all of your people. Even if it meant to comfort a dying man that was the bane of your existence. I walked over to him and grabbed one of his horribly burned and distorted hands and leant over him, trying to make contact with his eyes. In his burned face, they were strangely unmarred, big and terrified. I took a deep breath.

"Joric? Are you listening?" Good thing I had a look at my platoon's files before finally taking over. Otherwise I'd never even have known his first name.

His eyes then tried to focus on me. "Mum?"

I swallowed. Up to then it had been comparatively easy – I'd had survived OCS and a field promotion and practically my very hot trial by fire as an officer by then – but I realized I might not be able to really get through with what I'd wanted to do for Tarkker.

He tried to focus again, knitting his brows together, breathing shallow. The rational part of my brain told me in no uncertain terms that he'd not last much longer. "Mum?", he asked again, this time a very audible note of panic in it. Alright, I thought, time for some heroics off the battle field, Captain.

"Yes, I'm here, Joric." His marred features turned into something that might have been a smile. It nearly broke my heart, and for that I hated him.

"I'm sorry, mum. I shouldn't have… I shouldn't…" I resisted the urge to smirk. Who would have thought Joric Tarkker, asshole extraordinaire was mommy's little boy under all those layers of delusions of grandeur?

"It's okay, Joric. Whatever you did, it's okay." I hated him even more then. Somewhere among all the other soldiers on the battle field there were Magic and Danna and Kierse and Xanas, and I had no clue about their whereabouts, didn't even know if they were still alive – and what was I doing? Holding hands with a dying bastard and pretending to be his mum and telling him everything would be fine. If I hadn't forced myself to put those thoughts in the darkest corner of my mind, I'd have gone insane in that very moment.

The dying bastard then made a sound I later interpreted as a bitter laugh. "I'm dying… mum. Aren't… you… happy now?" Holy shit! What in the universe can happen between a mother and a son that he could think stuff like that in his last moments?, was everything I could think about for a few seconds. Then I decided that nobody deserved to go like that, with such bitter feelings in their heart. I did one of the most difficult things I ever had to do.

"No, Joric. You're not dying, and I'd not be happy if you were. I'm your mother, and whatever you did, you'd not deserve such thing."Big, fat lie, my inner moral compass screamed at me, but I ignored it.

His already weak grip in my hand loosened as it was slowly going limp. I felt my throat constrict and my stomach churn. I'd seen a lot of people die up to that point, but it had never been up, close and personal. I realized that this was the first being ever to die practically in my arms. And how I wished I was about a million light years away. "Don't lie to me, mum… don't… ever lie to me again… you know I deserve everything… and I don't… regret… anything."

I felt positively sick then. What had he done to know that he deserved what was happening to him? What was I doing at the side of a potential murderer, rapist, drug dealer? The answer was easy, but it took me a long time to accept it: I just did my duty. "Don't you ever think that. You're not…"

His gaze locked with mine, and I was sure he was absolutely clear and knew perfectly well who was holding his hand and pretending to be his mum. Unpleasant shivers ran down my spine. "Yes, I am. And you can be proud of me, mum. I'll die for something other people call a noble cause. Just don't lie to me again."

And suddenly his eyes break and his hand slips from mine, and the man that was Joric Tarkker – pain in the ass, bastard, human being – is only a dead shell. It takes nearly all of my remaining force of will not to throw up here and now. Instead I take a deep breath, get up and go in search of the next medic to finally get some order in my non-existent files.