A/N: After watching TLJ for the millionth time on May 4th, I was struck by the way Lieutenant Kaydel Connix stuck by Poe Dameron during the mutiny. So that made me wonder what their relationship was like. That made me wonder what had happened behind the scenes.
This fic will probably have at least one more chapter - one more story to tell. It will probably have a few more chapters come December. We'll see how it goes. But here's the first moment of significance between Kaydel and Poe. Do with it what you will.
Always Here
Commander Poe Dameron was a talker. A chit-chatter. He didn't like being alone in a cockpit in empty space, especially when there were no other x-wings to keep him company or if he had to be in hyperspace for a long period of time. Kaydel had even caught him talking to BB-8 on the open channel a few times and it always made her feel like a stalker. She would try, as politely as possible, to remind him that his radio was still open and his communications were being monitored because they recorded everything. Not that Commander Dameron was ever shy. Kaydel had never, not once, ever picked up on anything but his blustery confidence.
And she would know. That was her job as Operations Controller. The OpCo's were the nervous system between all the parts of the body of the Resistance. They handled communications and ensured a smooth operation from the supply runs for the cafeteria to the special missions and everything in between. Her job was to know what was going on.
Junior Officer Kaydel Ko Connix adjusted her headset and stretched her arms above her head, feeling the sweet relief of popping joints. It was getting late and the command center was nearly empty. One of the other OpCo's in the room had killed the overhead lights and cast them into the soft glow of desk lamps and monitors which marked out who was still left on duty amongst the banks of desks and consoles. The night crew was significantly smaller than the day crew today, although that wasn't always the case. It depended on what missions were running and on which planets. Tonight, there were only a few missions that needed supervising.
"You still with me, Connix?" came the familiar warm tone over the encrypted, secure channel that was funneled directly into her headset.
Kaydel smirked to herself. He really hated being by himself. "I'm always here, Commander Dameron," she replied. She looked up at a screen that was monitoring his progress until he went dark. "I mark you as approximately one hour from Jakku."
"BB says we're actually at fifty-three minutes, if we're being technical," came Poe's dry reply that danced with humor.
"Copy that. I'll update the system. How's the flight so far?" She knew the systems were running fine. He was on schedule to make contact on the planet. She knew the flight was good from every technical standpoint. But she also knew Commander Dameron.
"Eh, about as boring as they get. I got to see my dad on Yavin though," he shared in his aimable tone. She could tell he was glad for the excuse to keep talking. "His koyo harvest is pretty impressive this year."
"Oh yeah? You better bring me back a melon when you stop by for Black One."
"You and Snap and everyone else wants a melon…You realize how small this cockpit is, right?"
"Your dad grows the best," she said with a smirk. "How's that T-70 treating you?"
"The engines are great but the controls are sluggish. I think it probably needs a good cleaning. The sand on Jakku won't do it any favors. Those mechanics on Yavin need a refresher on x-wing maintenance. You'd think all the humidity would make them more sensitive to the issue but the New Republic bases out here just aren't up to par anymore…"
He went on like that for a while and Kaydel let him chatter away. She occasionally asked some questions to keep him going but mostly she just listened. It helped her to stay awake and alert until he was a half hour from the planet's surface.
"Time to go to radio silence," he finally reported. The time had flown by in a distantly friendly sort of way – like how you might spend a long shuttle ride chatting with someone you only just met. "Thanks for listening, Connix."
"Any time, Black Leader. Be safe out there. I'll be here when you get back," she replied.
Then he went silent. Even with the encrypted line, it was still safer to be silent until he had completed the mission and was on his way home. Kaydel glanced at the time. It was morning by now. Early morning. The sun had just set on Jakku for Poe but on D'Qar it was just past five am and she yawned. A large part of her wanted to go take a nap but she didn't want to miss Commander Dameron's check in when he was on his way back. She always felt a sense of responsibility with these missions – especially when a pilot was out alone. It was only right that someone else knew exactly what was going on. She felt like she was on the mission with them, even if only from a seat in the command center. Leia had always told her that she made a good operations controller because of that attitude, although Kaydel didn't want to stay in the command center forever.
She yawned again and stood up to get some blood flowing in her body again. There were stands of hair in her face and she was sure she looked a mess. It had been a long shift.
"Connix, what's your status?" asked the short supervising Lieutenant Zui. He had a datapad in hand and the freshness of someone just starting for the day.
"My mission has gone to radio silence, according to schedule. I expect a check-in at 0600 hours, sir," she reported.
"Excellent. You look like you need a cup of caf, Connix. I can monitor this channel if you need to take a break."
Kaydel hesitated. A break would have been perfect but she felt guilty for leaving Commander Dameron to someone else. This was her mission. It wasn't like Poe could just take a break when he got tired out there. Well, that wasn't true. She was sure he took time to drink a cup of caf when he needed it. Everything had gone according to plan anyway. It wasn't as if someone else couldn't just listen to a quiet channel.
"Thank you, sir. I'll be right back," she said with a relieved smile as she ducked out of the room.
Early as it was, the hallways were already starting to see signs of life as grunts started work-out routines and command staff began to organize for the day. The cafeteria was just beginning to set out trays of fresh food. It was good food from a local farm. She knew this because Kaydel knew everything that happened on base – or enough of it to make her feel like she knew everything.
Later, Connix thought to herself. Breakfast could wait until the mission was complete. More important than breakfast was the caf, which was hot and freshly made because the Resistance support staff knew the importance of small vices like caffeine. She stirred in some heavy cream and a dollop of sweetener and curled her hands around the mug. The heat was soothing and the smell made her feel calm. It was a small token of comfort but it was one of those things that kept her grounded in the midst of what the Resistance was attempting to do. It was far too easy to get consumed by the sheer weight of what they were standing against and they hadn't even come to a full battle yet. It was also easy to feel left behind by it all. Pilots like Poe Dameron were on the front line. Junior Officers like Connix were left at a computer, easily replaced.
She let out a sigh and sipped at her caf. Too sweet but not worth getting a new cup. She drank it anyway as she walked slowly back to the command center. Nothing had changed since she was gone. No dramatic emergencies were playing out. A few new people had arrived. What grabbed her attention was that Lieutenant Zui wasn't sitting at her station. The channel was left unmonitored.
Alarmed, she darted to her seat and dragged the headset around her ears, knocking the buns askew even further. It was quiet. No chatter. Nothing had happened. She didn't feel relief though. She felt a worm of discomfort at the thought of what could have happened in the minutes she was gone.
That discomfort soon gave way to attention to other duties. There was always something to do around here if you knew where to look for tasks. Connix peeked at the upcoming rosters for the survey missions that were to be conducted later on in the week and made mental notes about what logistics needed to be in place for those things. She had just sent in a requisition for datapad chargers for the survey crews when she peeked at the time again.
0550 hours.
Almost time for a check in but still time to make a few more orders for supplies. She was just about to open a new requisition form when there was an innocuous blerp from her monitor. It blerped twice more.
She sat stock still for half a moment and then her fingers started flying across the keypad to draw up the tracking information on Black Leader. Radio silence didn't mean going dark dark. It didn't mean 'turn off your cloaked tracking data'. But Commander Dameron's ship just disappeared.
Kaydel waved down her supervising commander even as she tried to bury down her reaction of panic. "Lieutenant Zui, I lost my pilot. The ship is offline. I'm trying to raise him now," she reported smartly.
Zui snapped off a command to a nearby OpCo and then pulled a chair up next to Kaydel, nearly pushing her out of the way to access her station. She didn't push back, focusing on her headset then to try and raise Commander Dameron.
"Black Leader this is Command, please respond. We seem to have lost your signal. Do you copy? Black Leader, please respond…"
There was nothing.
"Connix, get on our intelligence lines for that quadrant," Zui snapped to her, relinquishing her station back to her. "And someone get the General down here right away!"
Just like that, the command center nearly exploded in activity. OpCo's, Intel, a few of the pilots, the General herself – everyone crammed into the center and made it suddenly cramped. It took nearly a half hour for the answers to start coming in from Jakku.
The First Order had struck a village. The village. It had been burned to the ground and sent shockwaves through the local community. There was wreckage of an x-wing but there was no sign yet of Poe Dameron. He was simply gone. It would take hours if not days to identify the bodies. Some had been burned beyond simple recognition.
In the end, they sent Snap Wexley to do some recon and try to figure out exactly what had happened to the commander and the lines on his face said that Snap was not hopeful. But Leia was. Leia looked fiercely determined to find him.
Kaydel was too. She had moved towards her station again, hellbent on tracking down this man. She refused to allow this mission to end in failure because it was her mission as much as it was his. She was responsible for him.
"Connix!" Zui snapped at her. He looked like he had been yelling her name for a long time.
She blinked at him, not recalling the last few minutes of conversation. "Sir?"
"File the report and go get some sleep. I need you back here at 2000 hours."
"But sir, I can still—"
"Get some sleep, Connix. There's nothing more you can do right now. File the report and make room for someone who's awake." The lieutenant glared at her a moment and then walked away.
Kaydel stared at him as he left, feeling the sting of an insult although no insult had been intended. It just sounded so final. File a report. He was talking about an MIA report. She was not being invited to work the problem of the First Order in the desert or the whereabouts of the intel that had been expected to be there. Because Black Leader was her responsibility, not the mess that was on Jakku. And so far all that they knew was that he was missing in action.
Her alarm sunk into a dull, almost numb, ache. Pilots went missing all the time. Or they were outright killed. It wasn't the first time Kaydel had lost an asset to the First Order and the familiarity of it was not welcome. She did not want it but it was hers, all the same. There was no swell of sorrow, just a cold resignation to the facts. The sorrow would come later when Leia officially pronounced him gone. Then it would become reality. Then she would feel it. But for now, she worked out the facts on the form and submitted it to High Command.
And then, on autopilot, Kaydel retreated to her quarters to sleep.
The next day had yielded no better answers although there were more detailed answers. The village that was razed was Tuanul. Among the dead was the famous Lor San Tekka. Very few people knew what was important about that village but the word was already out that Commander Dameron was MIA. It wasn't hard to put together the pieces. Whatever the mission had been, they reasoned, it was the cause of Dameron's disappearance. No one wanted to say 'his death' yet.
The energy in the room was jittery as if they couldn't quite believe that such a significant commander in the resistance was really gone. It made things more…real. It was almost as if this was the beginning of something major and they could all sense it. Kaydel certainly could. She had never been in a real actual war before but she had the suspicion that they were just beginning to scratch the surface.
"Better put your feelings on hold," one of her friends, an older veteran, had warned her that morning in an ominous tone. She cast Connix a grim smile. "It's only going to get harder from here."
Connix pondered this as she made her way to the command center which felt smaller than it did the day before. It felt like she spent too much time in that room. It felt like she needed to be out doing something.
The first few tasks of the day stuttered by on a distracted imagination. She could barely remember what it was she had actually done by the time she finished it. Something to do with supplies. Why did she always get the supply jobs? Supplies and pilots…
A perky noise blurbled from her headset, indicating an unexpected hail from a secure line of communication. She accepted the hail with a slight frown as she tried to remember who would be on the field without an OpCo assigned to them.
"This is Black Leader, requesting communication."
Kaydel stared at her monitor. That was not the message she had been expecting. She checked the source code, the location. It was coming from Yavin IV. From Black One.
"I repeat – this is Black Leader. Anyone there?"
Kaydel jolted and hit a button on her headset. "I hear you Black Leader. This is Command. We weren't expecting you…" As she spoke, a small spark of excitement lit her words. She smiled at the monitor even as she sent off a message to General Leia and her supervising officer.
"Yeah…Uh, things happened. I got grabbed by the First Order. But I escaped. I got off the planet too." He sounded off – like he was distracted by something.
"Understood, Commander. The General is on her way down. What's your status?" Kaydel asked.
"…I was compromised."
Compromised. Tortured? Broken? As quick as the excitement came, it was gone again. It was Kaydel's job to know things and sometimes she hated that. And when she didn't know something, it was also her job to figure it out. Things like 'how to handle torture victims'. It made her stomach clench. She was not a psychologist. They didn't have a psychologist on staff yet. The position had never been filled.
"Understood. Can you confirm your location for me?" she asked, maintaining a level, calm tone. Emotion wasn't going to be helpful here.
"I don't think I gave away the base," he continued, as if she hadn't asked him anything. "But I-I…I don't know for sure. He wasn't after the location of the base. He wanted BB-8…Listen, you need to tell the General that I gave the intel to my droid and he ran off. I don't know where he is but the First Order is looking for him. He has the intel. You need to find him."
"I'll tell her. Commander, are you somewhere safe?" she pressed, firmly.
"Yeah. Yes. I'm at my dads. Yavin IV. Is the General there?"
"She's on her way. Can you fly? Or do we need to send someone to pick you up?"
"I can always fly," he insisted indignantly. There was a hesitation. "Can I report back to base?"
She heard his hesitation and translated it. Did they still want him if he was compromised? Was he useless now? Her heart squeezed uncomfortably. "Affirmative, Commander. Come back as soon as possible to debrief and receive medical attention. Do you copy?"
"I copy. I'm on my way," he said resignedly.
"I'll be with you the whole way back, Commander," Kaydel insisted. "I'm always here."
A pause. She could hear his breathing and the way it shifted. "Thank you. I'm gonna say goodbye to my dad. I'll be right back."
Kaydel caught motion out of the corner of her eye and muted her mic as she turned to look at General Organa. "Commander Dameron is on his way back. He was captured by the First Order and managed to escape. He's in a safe location right now but he's been compromised. He says the intel is in his droid and that the First Order is looking for it right now."
The general nodded sagely. There was something deeply sad in her face for half a moment but that was quickly masked by the cool level-headed leader that she was. "Make sure there's a medical team on alert for his arrival. Let me know the moment he lands."
Kaydel nodded. "Yes, General." She sent out the appropriate alert to the medical team along with an ETA. Leia had moved on to another operations controller. Connix heard mention of the orange BB unit and knew that a search would be underway immediately.
"You still there, Connix?"
She unmuted her mic and turned her attention back to the man on another planet who needed her. "I'm here, Commander," she replied. "I'm always here. I gave your report to the general and she'll be alerted when you arrive. Are you heading out?"
"I'm off the planet now. Look, BB-8's gone and my brain is fried. I'm linking you to Black One. I know this sounds stupid but could you calculate this jump?" He sounded so exhausted. There was no confidence in his voice and it was alarming to hear.
"Of course. Just give me a minute and I'll have it programed into your system," Kaydel insisted, her fingers flying across the keyboard. She had a brief vision of his fingers being broken. When he said he could fly, he hadn't sounded sure of himself. Her wild imagination sent her to a draconian torture chamber in some Frist Order Stronghold. Ridiculous, of course, but unnerving regardless. "Calculations are there for you. Punch it when you're ready."
She watched the screen in front of her which would tell her exactly when he would be in hyperspace and offline until he got back to them. Several minutes passed with no activity.
"Do you need to talk about it?" Kaydel asked tentatively.
"I'm fine," came his automatic answer.
"How are those melons coming along at your dads?" she asked instead.
Silence.
Had she pushed too far?
No, she knew Poe Dameron. She knew that man needed to talk and it was her job to keep him functioning until he got back to base.
"They're really good this year. Really sweet," he finally said. "I paid for a ride off of Jakku with melons." He snorted a slightly hysterical laugh at the very idea.
"Really? Who wanted melons?" she asked with a slight laugh of her own, just to humor him.
"This…blarina. Ohn Gos. Jakku doesn't exactly have a thriving agricultural business so he got excited when I said he could have as many melons as he could carry if he got me off the planet and to my dads place."
"How many did he end up taking?" she prompted.
"A couple hundred, I think. I didn't count. It was a lot. My dad would have given him the whole harvest if there had been room," Poe remarked. He sounded wistful.
"I'm glad your dad was there to help."
"Yeah, me too." It was a watery statement. "I've had a really shitty day."
"Yeah, you have. Sounds like a pretty rough night too," she sympathized.
"Kriff me..." he muttered. There was something haunted in that cuss word and the image of the torture chamber sprang back into her mind.
"It's going to be okay, Commander. We'll figure it out."
There was a noisy huffled sigh and she almost thought she head both a laugh and a sob inside of it. "I lost the map to Skywalker, Connix. I put it in BB-8 and he's gone. I let a psychopath into my head and who knows what he took out of there. I failed. I'm compromised. It's not going to be okay…"
His statement sat there between them and she thought she heard some sniffles coming over the line. She had the distinct feeling that maybe they ought to drop this. This channel was being recorded. Anything they said here could be reviewed. If he really was a traitor, Poe could be court marshalled. But Connix knew he wasn't a traitor.
Another thought occurred to her. Maybe he was contemplating running away. It was absurd to consider because this was Commander Poe Dameron – the golden boy of the resistance. But she'd also never heard him cry before. This was a vulnerable moment for him. Many a man had fallen to the whisper of vulnerability.
"You're going to be okay, Poe," she said in a softer tone. It wasn't the crisp tone of a junior officer. It was the sympathetic expression of someone who really did care. "Just come on home and we'll take care of this. We still need you here. We still want you here. Do you understand?"
"You gonna be there when I get back?" he asked her. It was a weirdly forward question since they had never had anything more than a casual work friendship but she realized he was not in a good headspace at the moment. He was probably grasping for acceptance, from whoever was available to give it to him and she just happened to be the person on the other end of the line.
"I'm always here, Commander," she assured him, picking back up her more formal tone again. "Come home."
Just like that, he flicked on his hyperdrive and vanished.
Kaydel let out a breathy gush of air as the tension finally broke. She pulled the headset off and rubbed at her temples. Relief bubbled through her, though it was soured by pity. But there wasn't time right now for either emotion. She set it aside and updated the medical team on Poe's ETA. It was a short jump from Yavin – just enough time to alert anyone who needed to know his whereabouts. Snap Wexley was the next person she messaged, followed by the crew down in the x-wing hanger where Poe would land. The confirmations she received back were just text on a screen but Kaydel could imagine the energy that she must have stoked by telling them the news. It wasn't good news yet – not until they knew how Dameron was doing and just how compromised he was. But it was better news than they had yesterday and that was enough to get people moving with purpose.
There was a presence beside her again and Kaydel looked up to see Leia coming to sit beside her.
"How is he doing?" she asked. There was worry in her eyes, in her voice.
Kaydel thought about it a moment, wondering how much to disclose. It wasn't like the general couldn't just listen to the whole conversation. But she was asking for Kaydel's thoughts on the matter. She wanted a personal insight. "Whatever happened to him…it's shaken him up," she answered honestly. "He's confident about flying but I'm not sure about his mental state."
"If he was captured by the First Order, you'd be right to worry about his mind right now," Leia replied knowingly. "But he's a fighter. He escaped. He'll overcome whatever they did to him."
Whatever they did…Put so bluntly, Kaydel felt a real twist of dread for Poe Dameron. She nodded mutely in agreement though. He was strong. He was a bright ball of optimism and there was no way this could keep him down for long. Or so she hoped.
"Make sure he's taken care of," Leia went on, "I have someone else tracking the droid. I'll debrief with the commander when he arrives but I'd like for you to be his liaison until he's back on his feet since you've been following his situation. As much as we'd like to not entertain the possibility, we need to monitor for any suspicious behavior – for everyones safety."
"He's not a traitor, ma'am," Kaydel insisted, feeling offended on his behalf.
Leia raised a hand. Her expression was pained in a very motherly way. "I understand that. But we've dealt with enough spies to know that it's not always that clear-cut. He may need monitoring for his own safety as well. I'm not asking you to spy on the man. Use your judgement and make yourself available if he needs anything. Keep tabs on him. Just until he's ready to get back in the game."
Connix nodded again, her lips pressed into a line. She suspected there was something else Leia was thinking but it wasn't her place to ask about it. The whole business of 'liaison' made her a little uncomfortable.
"Speak your mind," Leia encouraged. She leaned in closer to Kaydel with a knowing look.
"Ma'am, he barely knows me. I might not be the best advocate for him right now. I'm sure one of his pilots would be better suited to the job," Kaydel confessed. "It's going to feel like I'm spying on him."
"Junior Officer Connix, you have been his lifeline since he left," Leia insisted. "His friends will be there to support him but he might want a more impartial party to help him with some matters. He may need someone neutral, but friendly. Someone who can handle the details and the paperwork and also offer a kind word. He might not need any of that at all but we won't know until he arrives. But you need to be prepared to help him. Do you understand what I mean?"
Kaydel frowned but she nodded again. "I'll take care of him, ma'am."
"Good. I'll meet with him in my office once the medical team has cleared him. If they want to keep him for more than a few hours, I'll come down to medical. Keep me posted on his whereabouts," she said.
"Yes ma'am."
All things considered, this assignment was exactly what Kaydel did every day with all of the pilots and operatives in the network. Liaison was an appropriate title. But she had never been assigned to someone so personally before. She usually had the luxury of a desk and a headset between her and any given situation. But this assignment required her to…well follow someone. It made her uncomfortable but there was also a slight thrill of novelty, if she were being honest.
Professional, Kaydel told herself. Above all else, she needed to prove that she was professional. Up for the challenge. Ready to handle this emotionally charged situation.
Determined, she adjusted her headset, gathered her datapad, and headed towards the hanger.
Poe sat in his cockpit for a full minute, in silence, before he opened it. He didn't want to open it. He was hit, again, with a desire to just fly away from everything for a few weeks. Responsibility wouldn't let him. But responsibility also didn't want to face the people gathering around his x-wing. He didn't want to explain what happened. He didn't want to face their sympathy knowing that he had betrayed them. He just didn't want the attention.
And yet, simultaneously, he wanted their comfort. He wanted an ongoing bear hug. He wanted people to be friendly and relaxing and there with him.
He opened his mouth to say something to BB-8 and then immediately shut it, feeling a twist of guilt as he pushed the cockpit open and pulled himself out.
A technician was there to take his helmet and the man was being painfully careful not to take it too quickly, as if that would break him. Poe scowled and made a point of taking the ladder two rungs at a time as he climbed down. As soon as his boots touched the permacrete, a swarm of medical personnel came at him. Well, a swarm as in a droid and two nurses with a gurney between them.
Poe scowled at the gurney despite the fact that he was barely on his feet as it was. His whole body ached. He felt distantly nauseous and vibrantly hungry. He felt like he had sand everywhere and that a long cool shower would probably be the best thing that could happen to him.
"I'll walk," he tried to insist to his medical team. "I'm fine."
They were beginning to protest when a big man came running towards him. "Poe!"
A weird mixture of relief and dread blossomed in Poe as he let himself be caught up in a hug. "Hey Snap," he mumbled into the man's shoulder as he hugged him back. The hug felt good but it also felt horrible as Snap squeezed his sunburned skin. Was this how his life would be now? A life of dichotomies?
"What took you so long, buddy?" Snap asked, still holding on to him.
Poe let out a chuckle and groaned. "Sand," he replied dryly, still mumbling into Snap's shoulder. "Too much sand on Jakku." As much as it hurt, he didn't want to be let go yet.
"Well you got back just in time. Pava was getting ready to paint her x-wing black," the older man insisted with a smile in his voice. "I think she was hoping to take over as Black Leader."
Poe smiled back because this kind of banter was comforting. Just comforting, nothing else. "I'm sorry to spoil her plans."
"Don't be. Hey, check it out. You get a special ride all the way to the med bay. How about that?" Snap had finally let go of him and was gently nudging him towards the gurney.
Poe cast him the same scowl that he had offered the medical team. "I can walk. My legs aren't broken."
"Yeah but you don't get to take advantage of a free ride like this very often," Snap countered, smiling at him. He continued to nudge Poe towards it.
"Where are the others?" Poe asked instead, glancing around the hanger. There were a lot of people here but they looked like they had been purposefully told to stay away and mind their own business. He was glad for that.
"Out looking for your droid. They were looking for leads on you up until about an hour ago. Here, sit down."
"I don't want to—"
"Sit down, Dameron," Snap snapped.
Poe sat on the gurney, glaring at him. But he was too tired to fight back. "I'm fine, I swear," he protested, as the nurses started wheeling him away.
"You look like shit, buddy," Snap said lightly.
"Gee, thanks…"
Snap smiled at him. "I'm glad to have you back, Poe. I'll catch up with you after you get done in the med bay. I have to finish up the work you're not doing because you have a sunburn."
Poe smirked back at him. "Thanks Snap."
The older pilot peeled off down a hallway as the medical team continued on towards the med bay. It wasn't until Snap was gone that Poe noticed two familiar blond buns following at a polite distance. Once they made eye contact, she smiled at him and came closer, walking beside the gurney as it was being wheeled along.
"Commander Dameron, I'm glad to see you back," she said lightly. She held a datapad in hand and had a headset on, covering one of her ears.
"Connix? What are you doing down here?" he asked in a more bewildered tone than he meant. It was weird seeing her outside of the command center, let alone seeing here while he also heard her at the same time. He usually was only doing one of those two things – seeing or hearing.
"The General sent me to assist you however you need it," she replied. "I'll be with you for a little while. Just until you're settled again."
Poe frowned at her. "You're my babysitter," he said flatly. It was easier right now to be curt and sarcastic. He had to be. He needed to be several steps removed from his actual emotions since everyone was around him right now. He wasn't stupid. Poe knew the next few hours would mean fielding a lot of questions and getting poked and prodded. It just wasn't nice to know that they didn't trust him to be able to handle that on his own. Like an adult.
Like someone who wasn't a traitor to the Resistance.
"How's your dad doing?"
He blinked at her as they rounded the corner. "My dad?"
"How has he been handling that harvest? Does he have hired help on the farm?" She watched him with a level gaze that was sympathetic but not overly gushy.
"…Yeah. Yeah he has help. A man my age and that mans son comes to help him with the harvest and the planting," Poe found himself answering. "I grew up with the guy, actually. We went to school together. He never wanted to leave the village though. Not like me."
"Nothing wrong with that," Connix said with a nod.
They were in the med bay now and Poe noticed how they were taking him to a private room for an exam. He appreciated the discretion although it made him feel twitchy as they walked past the wide open exam area and headed for the smaller rooms where they could shut the door and lock him in.
His stomach twisted.
"Commander, would you like me to pick up a clean set of clothes from your quarters?" Connix was asking.
He was glad of her implication – that she would not be staying to watch the examination. But it was uncomfortably violating to think of her going into his room. "I'll be fine. Thank you," he insisted.
He had turned to focus in on Kaydel Connix and her very innocuous questions that were very professional and very friendly. And with his attention on her, he hadn't noticed that someone had gotten very close to him. Was reaching across his face.
All Poe saw was the hand coming right towards him.
He was launching backwards off the gurney before he could even think about. There was a tremendous crash as the gurney came down with him and instruments were sent skittering away. Several pairs of hands came to grab at him and he mindlessly batted them away, his vision going blurry. There was a ringing in his ears and garbled tones. It was hard to breathe.
He struggled against something, wanting to get out of there. Wherever there was. The urgency was deep and primal and cut off his rational brain before it could tell him to calm down. A spike of pain lit up the spaces behind his eyes and his distant nausea came spinning dangerously to the forefront.
It was really hard to breathe…
But then his vision started to come back. And his hearing. Slowly, little by little.
"…it's okay, Poe. You're okay," came a soft murmur beside him. "Can you take a deeper breath for me?"
He obeyed the voice and drew in a steadier lungful of air. And with that, his senses came all the way back.
Cold floor, bright room, white walls, throbbing ribcage.
"I-I'm fine," he rasped.
"I know you are. Just hang out down here with me for a few more minutes," said the voice. Connix.
She was squatting beside him, holding his hand. She stroked the back of his hand with her thumb in a rhythmic gesture. Her datapad was sitting beside her. When he finally looked up at her face, she caught his eye and offered a small smile when he looked stricken.
"You've had a shitty day," she supplied for him.
Poe nodded, dumbly. He looked down at his lap, embarrassment creeping up on him. Then he finally looked around. "Where are we?"
"In the medical center, across the hall from where you started. Just another private room," she told him, looking at the empty beds in there. No one was in the room with them. "When you're ready, we'll get you into that bed over there. Okay? It's more comfortable than the floor."
Poe swallowed. Nodded. "Okay. I need to take a shower and change. I don't have a lot of physical injuries. Just bruises and cuts. Maybe a few cracked ribs. I don't wanna stay here long."
Connix nodded back at him. "Alright. Let's have the doctors check you out and make sure the ribs are fine as they are. Then we'll get you back to your quarters. The general would like to debrief you too if you're still up for that. While you're showering, I'll get you something to eat. Okay?"
"Yeah, okay," Poe said quietly. Whatever pretense he had of being strong and snarky had left him the moment he launched into a panic attack. Now he just felt bone tired and like his nerve endings were dancing with electricity.
"Okay," she echoed back to him. She stood up and kept a grip on his hand to help him up as well. He wobbled but she held him steady as he shuffled to the nearby bed and sunk down into it. She started to walk away, he assumed, to get the medical staff who were creeping at the doorway.
"Hey, can we leave the door open?" Poe asked Kaydel.
She processed that for half a moment and then nodded. "Of course."
"They might try to close it – the doctors. Can you let them know to leave it open?" He swallowed nervously, feeling stupid for even asking.
"I'll wait in the hallway and guard the door so nobody closes it," Kaydel promised.
"Thank you."
She smiled at him and he tried to smile back, abashedly, but it came out as more of a grimace. It was the best he could manage at this point.
The pain behind his eyes had turned into a migraine that throbbed in time with his heartbeat. Kylo Ren was the obvious culprit for that. But he wasn't the only cause of Poe's troubles. Sunstroke, his brain supplied him, morbidly. Dehydration. Trauma from the crash. There had been more than a few cheap shots to his head on his way from the shuttle to the Finalizer detention levels from a few emotionally repressed stormtroopers. And gods only knew how many dozens of chemicals the interrogation droid pumped into him. That cocktail alone was probably enough to give him migraines for the rest of his life.
Overall, Poe felt like his body was one size too big and that there was a layer of static between him and his skin. His lungs felt heavy. His heart felt sluggish. He was exhausted but his brain kept jolting him with a frantic adrenaline every few minutes as if he couldn't quite convince his subconscious that he was completely safe.
And underpinning it all was a complete sense of failure.
Poe leaned back into the bed and pressed his forearm across his eyes while the doctors came forward again, moving slower this time and talking to him in sickeningly sweet tones so that they didn't startle him. And as much as he would have liked to think that he had a lid on his emotions, they did keep startling him and he'd jolt and they would wait until he settled again before they continued to fix up the battered war-torn surface of his body.
"Commander, we can give you a sedative," the nurse kindly told him. She looked like she was about ready to stick him with a sedative whether he consented or not.
"I don't want a kriffing sedative," he nearly growled at her. He turned his glare to the med-droid who had an injector already ready. "Y'know what? I'm fine. I'm going back to my room."
"Commander, please, we've barely started. You need blood work, antibiotics, bacta on those burns and cuts…" the nurse pleaded.
"Is everything okay?" came Connix's voice from the doorway. She drifted in near his bed. It was obvious to anyone paying attention that things were not okay. He did not answer that question and she did not ask it again. She changed tactics. "Is it alright if I sit here with you, Poe?"
He watched her approach and he knew it was to make sure he didn't do something stupid. He vaguely resented that. And yet, at the same time, he also appreciated her being there. Try as he might, Poe couldn't actually remember the names of the two nurses here with him. They were strangers. "Yeah, fine," he relented with a sigh.
Poe looked warily at the nurse and med-droid again. The droid had swapped out injectors for one that was empty now, for gathering blood. Poe's jaw tightened at the sight of the very smallest of hypodermic needles as it approached his arm. He wasn't planning on offering his arm to the droid. In fact, he was getting ready to tell the droid where to shove that needle.
But then Kadyel had his hand again.
His head swiveled around to look at her as she gently squeezed his hand and started rubbing it again with her thumb. He stared at her. And then flinched as the droid held on to his wrist and deftly slid the needle into his arm.
"How many siblings do you have?" Kaydel asked him.
He knew what she was doing. He knew she was trying to distract him. He closed his eyes with a pinched expression on his face…but he still held her hand.
"None," he answered after a beat. Poe did his best to focus on her rather than on what the medical team was doing to him. The fingers on his free hand drummed against the bed. "I'm an only child. But I have dozens of cousins."
"Do you? I only have two cousins but three siblings," Connix replied. It was nice just listening to her.
"Older or younger?" Poe asked.
"My siblings? One is older and one is younger. I'm the middle child. My cousins are both much younger than I am. Both teenagers," she told him. "How about you? Are your cousins older or younger?"
"Both. From both sides of my family. M-my uh…" He hesitated as someone swabbed out a particularly painful wound with a cleaner. "My oldest cousin is in his forties. My youngest cousin is…maybe twelve?" He let out a shuddered breath.
"Are all Yavinese families so big?" she wondered, still rubbing his hand.
Poe nodded. "A lot of 'em. Most of my family all lives in the same area too. Makes family gatherings pretty crazy."
His hand twitched tighter around hers as the droid finally did inject something into him. He kept his eyes shut though, not wanting to even see it.
"Some medications," the droid explained. "You should feel relief soon."
The pain did start to ease even as the droid explained it to him. And with the easing pain, Poe realized that they had decided to hit him with a sedative anyway. While part of him was angry that they'd done it against his wishes, the rest of him eagerly slipped into the lull of rest and sleep took him before he was even lamenting it.
It made sense now. All of the worry in General Organa's expression, her insistence on a 'liaison.' Everything was made perfectly clear as Kaydel watched Commander Dameron relax for the first time since he arrived on base.
She had thought the medical team was busy before but now that Poe was unconscious, they descended upon him in earnest. His filthy clothing was stripped away. Two different IV's were inserted and fluids started pumping into his body. The droid drew another three blood samples and stashed them away inside itself for analysis. Bacta gel was applied to the burns on his face and neck and arms. Once the blood analysis was finished, the droid added two additional things to the half-empty bag of IV fluid.
As the team worked, Kaydel sent updates to Leia and made arrangements to get Poe transferred to his quarters when the team was finished. And she tried very hard not to stare at all of the bruises that darkened his skin.
For someone who was used to being stuck behind a desk, having such a raw symbol of struggle in front of her was hard to ignore. This wasn't just another report for her to sign off on. This was a man who had been captured and beaten because of the mission he believed in. This was the Resistance. This was real.
Kaydel had a hard time deciding if she was inspired by it or if she was horrified.
They finally dressed him in some scrubs and that signaled the end of his treatment – or the immediate treatment. The nurses left to get a gurney to transport him and the droid handed her a packet of foil envelopes that had one days dose of medication sealed inside with Commander Damerons name, rank and number printed on each one.
Was this what it was like for a spouse or parent? Kaydel wondered. She was certainly being treated like the authority of this man while he was unconscious. The medical staff didn't even question it. And she felt protective of him even as they walked him down the hallway. Kaydel kept pace right beside his head, only moving out of the way when the nurses lifted him from the gurney onto his own bed in his own quarters.
Even with all the movement, Poe still slept. They told her he would be out for at least another hour. She sat down in a chair by his bed, with her datapad, to wait. An hour passed. He shifted in his sleep and whimpered but then settled again. It was another half hour before she heard the change in his breathing.
Kaydel looked over at him and was surprised to find him already looking at her with half hooded eyes and a pondering expression on his face. She smiled at him.
"Commander. How are you feeling?"
He considered that question, blinking fully awake and drawing in a deep breath before he answered. "Like…like my skin fits again. But drowsy. Someone gave me a tranquilizer…?" His eyes narrowed a little at her.
"You were agitated. Your heart rate was through the roof. The medical team couldn't do what they needed to do without distressing you further," she explained without backing down from his narrowed glare. She had been the one to let them sedate him. She didn't apologize.
Poe just nodded, eyes cast downward. "They find anything dramatic?"
"Your bloodwork was all over the place and you have some medications to take to get your levels back to normal. You have a hairline fracture along one of your ribs but the rest of it is just bruising," she reported to him. She held up the package of pills for him to see before she set them down on the table. "The sunburns should be just about healed."
Gingerly, Poe prodded his cheeks which had been bright red a few hours ago. They were a nice tan now after the bacta treatment. He seemed satisfied with how his skin felt and looked back over at Kaydel again. He just looked at her with an expression that told her he was trying to work something out.
"Have you been babysitting me this whole time?" he asked her cautiously.
Kaydel took a cue from the other pilot in Poe's squadron, Snap. She held up her datapad. "Some of us have work to do while others get to nap," she told him with a slight smirk.
He snorted at her, the barest hint of a smile on his face. "I'll trade you," he grumbled.
"Don't worry, you'll have plenty to do soon. There's a tray of food on the table there for you. I've sent a message to the general to let her know you're awake. She'll be down in a few minutes," Kaydel explained.
Poe looked over at the food and finally made a move to sit up, going slowly. She waited to see if he needed help but he looked like he was more in control of himself now than he was a few hours ago.
"Why are you here?" he asked her, suddenly.
Her head tilted. "I'm sorry?" Did that mean he couldn't remember what had happened? Was he taking another shot at her babysitting him?
His hand waved above his head. "In the general…scheme of things," he tried to clarify. He stood on legs that seemed wobbly at first but then steadied as he moved to the tray of food on the table. "Why are you always here? With the Resistance?"
Kaydel's eyebrow hitched up. She hadn't been expecting that question at all. "Uh…I was assigned to the base."
"No no, I mean…Did you join the Resistance because you expected to take care of tortured pilots?" Poe pressed. He selected a piece of fruit first.
"Well, obviously not," she insisted. She wasn't sure how to take this conversation. Was he feeling self-conscious or was he feeling defensive? "I joined because I'm good at what I do and I wanted to put my skills to use for something…better."
He studied her a moment. "Better than what?"
Kaydel gave him a look. She took her time thinking of an answer that would satisfy him without opening herself up to something uncomfortable. She opted for something that looked favorable. "I'm an administrator. An…organizer. I was on a career track for a lucrative cooperation job on Dulathia. But then I decided I wanted something more important. Something that mattered."
"So you joined the Resistance to save the galaxy," Poe summarized. She didn't like how it sounded when he put it that way.
"Why did you join?" Kaydel put back to him, not wanting to comment on his summary.
He looked over at her with a sad expression – like someone had just told him that his dog had died. "I wanted to save the galaxy," he replied.
This was a confidence issue, Kaydel decided. He was feeling self-conscious and she wondered how much he was aware of that. "Well," she finally said, "we both have some more work to do then. We've got a long ways to go. Are you going to be here with me to do that?"
Poe was quiet for a long minute, chewing his fruit in silence. He looked off into nothing. Then a soft, "I'm always here."
Kaydel nodded. This was what made them good soldiers in this fight – no matter how hard it got.
They were always here. Until the very end.
They sat in companionable silence for a few more minutes until Leia arrived and Kaydel excused herself from the room so they could have a private conversation. It was only a couple of hours later that BB-8 had been found. Kaydel went back to the command center and Poe went back to his x-wing and they both barreled forward into the skirmish.
TBC (probably)