chapter summary:
Where Rey's not going to end up alone.
Rey was having a hard time keeping Dala under control.
The horse must be psychic, or at lest intuitive. She had always responded better to Kylo than Rey, but now she must be using her special highly-attuned horsey senses to realize that the two humans on top of her were in a desperate way.
"No, no."
Dala had started to trot. The movements were stiff and jerky, held back by Rey's tight grip on the reins. With each little jolt Kylo would clear his throat or his arms around Rey's wast would tighten.
Another tug of war broke out and then Dala stopped abruplty before neighing and tossing her head from side to side. For a second Rey's heart lurched in her chest. If she was about to buck them off-
"You're pulling too much with your right hand."
Kylo's voice was deep in her ear. There was a slight raspiniess to it now, or had that always been there?
"Here, like this." He reached around her, taking her hands within his. All Rey could think about was how his side was flexing. Putting more pressure on the knife wound that she could feel staining through her clothes where they were pressed together.
"Kylo."
Please, please don't move.
"There."
He adjusted her grip, letting the reins have a little more slack in them. Dala stilled, her head spinning around to try and glare back at them. Kylo let go then, holding onto Rey with one arm around her waist while his other hand reached back and lightly tapped Dala on her rump. With an unhappy whuffle their horse started walking again, and Rey let out the breath she'd been going dizzy on.
"Let me do this. Just hold still."
The weight of Kylo's temple pushed lightly at the back of her head. His thumb rolled against one of her floating rips in a circle, and Rey blinked rapidly as her eyes started to burn with the need for unshed tears.
"Darling, you're doing everything wrong. Don't you know you're supposed to let the man of the house handle all this tough stuff?"
The lilt of jest in his voice sounded forced. Rey couldn't find even a shred of will to make a retort. A single, solitary tear striped across her cheek, burning against the chill of the night air clinging to all the exposed areas of her skin.
They would need to stop soon. How long had it been since they left the caravan? Was it safe to stop yet? With Kylo's unsteady bulk behind her Rey hadn't been able to effectively make sure they weren't being followed.
Can't stop. Not yet. Dawn was going to be here soon, and Rey stupidly clung to the idea that maybe somehow things would look better in the light of day.
"Probably going to be far worse," she muttered.
"Hmmm?"
He sounded sleepy. No. No no. She can't let him sleep. Dala whinnied again, and the weight of his head against her should lifted.
"The reins, Rey. Even tension. Do as your husband orders."
Gods, she knows what his voice is supposed to sound like, and this pained wheeze isn't it. Of all the things she knows about her husband, it's the sound of his voice she's memorized the best. He's hurting, and trying to hide it from her.
"Ass," she whispers, another fresh line of tears streaking down. The sky was maybe a shade lighter by now, but that just meant it was a paler shade of black. Can't stop yet, dawn couldn't come soon enough.
Kylo's thumb rubbed her waist in another circle again before lifting up to try and catch her chin. Rey pulled away from him, not wanting him to feel how damp her cheeks were.
"Rey."
She closed her eyes. His hand fell heavy onto her thigh. Dala steadied herself again when Rey let her grip grow slack before letting go of the reins entirely to clasp Kylo's hand with her own.
"Rey?"
The urge to scream was all consuming. If this was a nightmare, why hadn't she woken up yet?
"Kylo, don't stop talking to me. Keep talking. Anything."
It was selfish of her to ask that. He needed to stay still. Save his strength. But Rey needed to hear him more right now.
Kylo's breaths were heavy and uneven. Rey pressed herself closer and opened her eyes.
A paler shade of pale black filled the sky. The stars were fading, and Rey forced herself to look down. Even in the dimness she could see all the blood staining the back of her robe. Her husband's blood.
She swallowed, trying to force out something, anything through her constricting windpipe. The scream bottling up in her had nowhere left to go, but Kylo immediately shushed her when her shoulders started to shake as she lost her fight to hold her tears.
"Rey," he kissed her forehead and the tears wouldn't stop spilling across his palm as he stroked her cheek. "We're not going anywhere. Either of us. We're here together, and everything's going to be alright."
Alright? Alright? How could he possibly-
"Promise me, Kylo."The words come out in hiccups.
A long silence stretches. Kylo holds her tighter than he should, but she can't stop him. Not like this.
"I promise I won't leave you, Rey, if you promise you won't leave me."
That. They hadn't finished their conversation last night. It had ended at a silent impasse, before it had just ended.
In any other circumstance it would have been a despicably dirty move of Kylo's to make her promise herself to him now. Now when he couldn't possibly be held accountable for his own end of the deal.
Except now it was an easy choice.
"I promise."
Kylo's hand fell away then, drifting back onto her leg as if the effort to keep it on her face was too much for him. She felt him smile, though, and wondered if it wouldn't be for the last time.
"Beautiful."
The changes in his voice were subtle, but they hurt worst of all.
"Me or the sky?"
Rey tried and failed at levity, but it gave her another smile against her shoulder.
"My wife under the sky. I could drown in you both, you're so beautiful."
It wasn't fair for this dawn to look like this. Purple's rolling across the edges of the silhouetted desert hills. The stars were still shining and the setting moon was still up in the air. The cold night winds had fallen still, and there was just enough growing light for Rey to see the heavy waves of clouds looming in all directions except right above them.
"We should stop."
It had felt like an eternity that they had left the caravan. The memory of it was fading in her mind, being drowned out by dire thoughts and grim practicalities.
"Kylo? Don't you think we should stop?"
A pause, then he hummed. He kept falling silent and she hated that more than she hated anything right now.
"Where do you think we should stop, Kylo?" she prompted. "How about over there?"
She pointed at the over there. A dark, rounded shape in the distance that dimly looked like a boulder. Wherever they were now was very flat and over there had been the only distinguishing characteristic she could see as the sky took its sweet time showing them the way.
"Looks good."
Kylo says it in a reedy sigh. She squeezed his had a second passed before he squeezed it back.
The boulder was about three feet high and, by the time Dala dragged her hooves the longer-than-it-looked distance to it, Rey could see it really was just a lone rock. All around them were sand dunes ringing the distance and cracked, dried out ground underfoot. The cloud-covered sky was pink now, and Rey closed her eyes as the first ray of morning sunlight broke through to land on them.
Then she carefully pulled herself forward, unwrapping Kylo's heavy arms from around her waist. She had to brace herself before she looked back at him.
"Good morning," he said with a soft smile.
His hair looked matted against his forehead, but his smile grew when Rey reached up to smooth it back.
"Can you sit up on your own?" she asked.
He nodded, then pouted his lips as if pretending to be offended by the notion that he couldn't.
Rey didn't miss the flicker of a grimace he made when she pulled herself fully away and dropped down off the saddle. He supported himself with both legs against sides and Rey couldn't bring herself to look at his injury yet. The blood on her robe was still wet. That meant he was still bleeding. That meant these next few hours or less were the most critical, but what in all the gods was she supposed to do with that knowledge? There was no one out here. They were pitifully alone.
Rey uselessly circles around Dala, trying to find something to tie up her reins to. She settles on jamming her staff into a seam of the boulder, and Rey could almost swear she sees their horse roll her eyes at the pointless gesture.
Then out of the corner of her eye Rey saw Kylo's dark head bob, his weight shifting and making Dala shuffle as he started to get off of her on his own.
"Don't!" she called out, giving up on the reins to hurry over. "Just stay up there and-"
It was too late. Kylo didn't hop down but rather soft of oozed off the saddle, sliding sidelong until he had a foot down on the top of the boulder. Dala made an unhappy sound and looked back at him, and Rey mentally cursed his pig-headed stubbornness as she hurried over to help him the rest of the way down.
"You shouldn't have done that," she hissed, wincing in sympathy as he fell to his knees against the stone. One of his arms was wrapped tightly around his torso, and his lips were pressed into a tight white line.
"Needed to take a piss," he muttered. "Figured Dala wouldn't take to keenly to it if I did it on top of her."
Rey started to object again, but he pushed her back from him. The movement was weak, and she fretted in a close circle as she watched him unsteadily get off the boulder and try to find his footing.
"Can you stand?" she asked quietly.
He huffed and nodded.
"'Course."
He took a step, swaying slightly, but waved Rey back as she moved to help him.
"Kylo-" she protested, frustrations bubbling up inside her to mingle with every other negative emotion her psyche could come up with right now.
"Can handle this part myself, wifey, though I know you're an expert with my tackle after last night."
That earned him a half-hearted scowl before she turned her back to give him some privacy. Maybe this meant he would be alright? Kylo wouldn't be Kylo if he wasn't being an asshole Getting under her skin came to him as easily as breathing. So that meant he was was still breathing, albeit with obvious pain and difficulty.
Next she turned her attention back to one of the very few things she had any control over: their remaining few belongings. The loosely wrapped bundle of whatever they had left had been hanging haphazardly off the back of Dala's saddle, perhaps explaining some of her irritated temperament, and Rey untied it before setting it down on the ground. Some strangers in the caravan had "packed" it for them, if you could call this that, and there was no surprise at all that it seemed like half their belongings or more were missing.
Clothing. They mostly had clothing. That and a few odds and ends like a small knife and candles and a pen and paper. No food or firestarter and, far worse, only one small leather pouch of water. It sloshed in Rey's hands trembled as she picked it up. This was it. They were out here in the desert with only one flask of water.
The weight of their situation suddenly crashing down upon her so hard the whole world seemed to spin. She blinked, her hands falling on the small pile of items but not moving.
At the first muttered grunt of pain Rey's reverie broke and she rushed to her husband's side. He was sitting on the rock, one of his hands tightly pressed to his wound while the other idly toyed with her staff and the tether of Dala's reins. He didn't look up at her when Rey sat next to him.
"Does it hurt?" she whispered.
There was a long moment of silence, before yhe nodded.
"I've had worse."
Rey doubted that, but she let it pass. Carefully, with whisper light softness, she reached out and touched the forearm wrapped around his waist. His skin was clammy to her touch, and Rey frowned when he didn't move.
"Let me see it," she requested.
Kylo shook his head.
"It's fine. Nothing. We should get going before the sun comes out to ruin our life. How much water did those karkers leave us with?"
Rey looked down so he wouldn't see the lie in her eyes.
"Enough for a few days. For us. But not enough for Dala."
Kylo swallowed, his dark eyes flickering up to look at their horse. Dala stood stoically, though one of her ears was cocked in their direction at he sound of her name. Rey shook her head, dispelling the suffocatingly morose line of thought her mind had began to wonder down. She tugged on his arm, her fingers lightly pinching the rolled up fabric of his cuff.
"Let me see to it, Kylo. At least I can dress it properly."
He sighed, his breath warm against her forehead. His arm rolled away, his posture sagging. Rey squeezed her eyes together for two breaths before forcing them open to look.
It was a clean wound. That was the good news. But it looked like it went very deep. Fresh blood oozed from it still, the brightness of it shining against the darker stain of wherever it had dried before.
Rey stood and went back to their bundle of items. She pulled out one of his shirts and used the edge of the pen to cut it so she could tear it into strips. Then a thought hit her as she started to turn away,.
The boy. That little stable hand who had brought Dala to them when they had been thrown out of the caravan. She had seen him slip something into one of the saddlebags. He'd held her eye for a moment too when he had done it.
"Kylo?" she called.
A deep breath and a grunt followed after a moment. "What?"
"Nothing."
Her stomach tightened as she jerkily unsnapped the fasten on one the saddlebags. Empty. The other, however, had something small shoved deep into the bottom corner.
No more water. That one paltry flask really was all they had out here.
The something was a piece of fabric. A square of canvas. It was wadded up into a ball and, when Rey pulled it out, something the size of a coin fell out into her palm.
It was a ring. Plain gold or maybe not even true gold, and decorated with only a large center wooden charm.
Rey knew immediately what it was. Her heart started to pound as she regarded it. She twisted the central charm between her thumb and forefinger and there it was, the symbol of the resistance. That little stable boy had known. Somehow, he'd known.
Another grunt of pain emanated from Kylo and Rey hurriedly tucked the ring into her bodice. She grabbed the canvas the ring had been wrapped in and took that as well as their singular flask of water and the scraps of Kylo's shirt back to the rock.
He had been trying to stand up again, and the fact that he hadn't been able to accomplish even that sucked every wisp of air right out of Rey's lungs. Mutely she pressed her hand to his shoulder and guided him back down.
"What's wrong?" he asked, his hand reaching out for her but she stepped around him to go to his side.
"Hold still," she whispered.
Her hands were shaking so badly she nearly dropped the bandages right into the dirt. Rey uncorked the water flask and offered it to Kylo. He eyed it for a long moment before shaking his head.
"We have plenty more," she lied, "if you're thirsty then you must-"
"I'm fine, Rey. Let's… let's save all our water for the hottest parts of the day, alright?"
Rey nodded and pulled out the canvas cloth, intending to dampen it and clean the wound as best but minimally as she could.
"What's that?" Kylo asked, his voice dropping another octave into deep scratchiness.
There was something on the canvas. A drawing. Fine lines scrawling in-
In the shape of hills and dunes and mountains.
Rey gasped when she realized what it was. It was a map. Rey had seen General Kamen carrying one just like this, if not this very map itself. The stable boy must have stolen it for them during all the chaos.
"Oh."
Rey corked the water flask and stood. She held the map out at arm's length, trying to make any sense of it. Master Luke had tried to teach her this once. These lines on it showed how high or low something was. In one area they were much closer together, so that would be… a mountain? Mountains?
Rey turned in a circle, trying to match any feature at all that could show where they were now.
"You look like you're dancing," Kylo murmured.
He had slumped backwards, his weight resting on his elbows and his head lilting to one side. In the growing light of dawn Rey could see how pale he really was. There was a thin sheen of sweat beaded on his forehead and his eyes were half-lidded as he watched her.
"Let me see that," he said.
Kylo shifted to take the map from her and Rey sat down behind him so he could lean against her shoulder for support. He looked at it for a moment then huffed, his head turning to look back at her.
"Darling?" he rasped.
There was a slight smile- just the barest of a shape- to his lips and Rey tried to burn every nuance of it to her memory. She raised an eyebrow in questioning.
"You're lucky I didn't marry you for your intellect."
His smile grew as he took in her frown.
"What?"
This was good. If he could still tease her, this was good.
He held her gaze as he rotated the map around.
"This way's up, darling. You were holding it upside down."
His finger tapped at the compass drawn on the corner.
Oh. Right. Well she had karking extenuating circumstances.
"Why did you marry me?" she asked, shifting as he weight began to press heavier against her.
Kylo turned his head then. He rested the map on his lap and his arms fell slack to his sides.
"Other reasons."
It was his only answer. Rey frowned deeper, but when she started to pull away it came as a relief to see that Kylo could still support himself upright without her.
"I think we're somewhere around here."
he pointed at a low-looking area of far apart lines at the lower right corner of the map. There was no indicator of how far the distances were, nor were there any towns or even the caravan's route line marked. In fact, he only thing that stood out on the map at all was a small smudge in the opposite corner.
Rey picked at it and it flaked off, leaving a faint stain to her fingertips.
"Soot," she said, bringing her hand to her nose. "Soot and lantern oil."
Exactly the things that a little stable boy would have had on hand if he wanted to mark them something. It appeared too deliberate to just be from a clumsy hand print.
Kylo didn't answer. His eyes were closed and, when Rey gripped his shoulder and lightly shook him, it took too long for them to slide back open.
She swallowed, leaning closer to him but not finding any words to say.
Kylo smiled, though. His hand unsteadily rose to touch her face, his figners sweeping acorss her cheek before falling away again.
"Beautiful," he murmured.
Rey's chest constricted at the sound. She committed that to her memory, too. Wanted to memorize the sound of every breath he took.
"Let's get you cleaned up," she forced herself to say.
Carefully she leaned him down flat on his back and spent a few precious splashes of their water to swipe away all the fresh blood that had seeped out from his wound from the time he'd been sitting here. Beyond that and bandaging him, there was very little else she could do for him. That was one of the hardest parts of all of this.
The day came and went.
Rey felt every second of it. One minute felt like an hour. She rested Dala as much as she could, but an awful sense of hopelessness was beginning to sink through her.
Kylo was getting worse. Of course he was. He wasn't going to get better until they found help, but…
but…
Rey didn't let herself finish that thought. Didn't let herself think about how slowly the landmarks were changing. They were heading towards that sooty little mark on the map, and Rey numbed herself to all the caustic doubts she felt every time she looked at it.
When they stopped at noon the only shade they found was from a lone, long dead tree. Rey had dressed her husband's wound again. He'd tried to be fussy. Tried to give her a hard time about it. Told her that he liked when she gave him so much attention. Those had been the good parts. He'd soaked through his bandages. She'd forced him to have at least a few mouthfuls of their water. Dala had looked as miserable as she had felt.
Like the day, the evening had came and went. Kylo was been getting quieter and quieter. Rey's mouth was dry, her throat aching and parched, but she'd forced herself to keep talking. Tell him about how pretty the sunset was. He'd hummed in agreement. His hand had clasped hers until it couldn't hold its grip any longer.
Rey kept going long into the night. Dala was the one that stopped them, not her. Rey would have pushed them night and day if she could.
The night had been bitterly cold. Such was the way of the desert. Every hour it seemed to find a way to make life unlikely if not wholly impossible. Rey had given Kylo every blanket, every scrap of clothing. Kylo had whispered to her that it was going to be okay. She curled herself around him and hid her tears against the chilled flesh of his neck.
On the second day Rey's husband had stopped talking to her.
His weight was heavy against her back. She'd had to slow Dala's pace just to keep him steady so he wouldn't fall.
Rey had tried. She had tried so hard. She talked to him. Told him that she didn't see anyone. Didn't see even a trace of long ago someones. But not to give up. She wasn't giving up, and he wasn't allowed to either.
That afternoon their water had ran out. Rey had helped Kylo swallow the last drops of it. She'd had to hold the flask to his lips, but his eyes had opened and his mouth had moved like he was trying to tell her something. Rey had pressed herself close, brought her ear to his lips, but he didn't repeat it. He closed his eyes and there was a slight smile on his lips.
He was still alive, but not for long. Rey had stared at that forsaken map so many times- dozens of glances a minute likely- that she had every curve and line of it burned into the back of her eyelids. They were making progress. Slowly. If Dala would last, they might make it to that smudge in another day's time.
Except Kylo didn't have another day. Rey held each of her breaths, waiting to exhale it until she felt his rise and fall as well. The spaces were getting further and further apart.
All the hope that she had was dying right along with him. The last frail, painful flicker of it resided with that mark on the map. If it was nothing, if it really had been just an accidental swipe of a clumsy, dirty finger, then…
Rey felt so wretched about how she was pushing Dala. She saw the decline in the loyal horse too. No water, harsh days, freezing nights, and being forced at the end of a whip to keep going through it all. If Rey didn't find salvation for them soon, it might be a kindness to put this poor animal out of its misery rather than let it parch to death on its own.
And there was another side to this. Rey had finally forced herself to think about it that evening. Kylo was sleeping quietly. He had bled through nearly every piece of clothing they had. Rey had no idea how much blood was in a human body before now, and she was left in pieces by the sheer volume of the answer.
That night Rey waited as long as she could bear. Kylo was resting. Dala was shaking. Rey couldn't let herself cry. She had fallen to hallucinations after the sun had gone down. Had seen footprints where there were none. Had heard voices then silence the moment her shattered focus had been brought back to them. Twice now Rey could have sworn she saw that same horrible, dark shape that had blighted them so many nights ago. The one that she and her husband had fled from when they had been watching the stars, back when everything was so much more healed.
This time, however, rather than running from it, Rey had lunged at it. Had dropped literally everything in her hands to sprint toward the distant, shadowy figure. It had disappeared in less than the blink of an eye. A trick of the light. A cruel game of the rising moon against the endless, empty desert lands.
The ring the boy had given her had begun to consume her thoughts next. It was welcome in a way. A moment's break from the endless listening to her husband's heartbeat slow and stagger as she pressed herself to him, giving him every ounce of warmth she could possible offer.
The ring…
What if… what if that mark really was for the Resistance? Somehow? She would be bringing their greatest enemy dying to their doorstep.
That would be the cruelest trick of all. So unbearable it must surely be impossible, right? The universe wouldn't be so cruel?
And there it was again. That most treacherous of emotions. Hope. Despite everything, despite the sheer oddly and absolute certainty, Rey still felt a sliver of hope. It cut itself into her heart, a living breathing torment that snatched her breath away even when she had no tears left to shed.
She didn't deserve this and, despite all his flaws and terrible choices, neither did her husband. Fate would look after them. Would make this right. It had to.
It was the middle of the night when something inside Rey broke out.
Kylo was cold. His pulse was so faint she could barely feel it at all. He was nearly gone. Rey wouldn't let him. He didn't get to leave her all alone again.
The only thing worse than feeling him slowly die in her arms would be to do nothing while it happened.
Rey left him laying next to Dala. She kissed him first then the horse goodbye.
"Be with him when I can't," she breathed, swiping her fingers along the center of soft fur between Dala's eyes.
Dala made a soft noise. It sounded as sad as she was, but Rey was glad for that. If Kylo was about to- to- then at least he would have someone with him, even if that was only a horse.
Rey took her staff and left. She walked numbly forward, heading in the direction where she had last charted their course. This was their last and only chance. She would walk until she found someone or until her legs gave out and she fell to the ground to meet her own fate.
Time didn't have any meaning when she saw it again. That dark figure. He was there- or rather it was there- watching her from a tall rock ledge. The shape was rail thin and wrapped in black. A literal shadow of a nightmare.
This time, though, Rey screamed at it. Howled like the sky itself was crashing down around her. It blinked out of existence but she didn't stop. Rey threw herself forward, climbing hand over hand, foot over foot towards where the creature had been.
When she got to the top, there were footprints. Real footprints. They were spaced well apart. Whatever this thing was had been moving fast, but Rey was quicker still. Fear had no place in her heart now. Whatever it took, whatever this cost her, she was going to find this thing and demand he save her husband. No matter what.
Rey rounded a corner of a tall rock, her feet nearly spinning out from under her, and there it was again. The shape moved impossibly fast, bounded away from her and there was something wholly unnatural about it's hunched over lurches.
Rey drew her staff back, aimed, and sent it hurtling through the air. It collided right in the center of the black shape and a cry sounded out. A not quite human sounding cry.
Fear pricked but Rey was faster than even that. Faster than she'd ever been before. In one moment she was racing forward, then the next she had leapt onto the form and spun it over, pinning it to the ground under her.
Two solid white, soulless eyes stared back at her. The wraith trapped her in its gaze, pinning her just as she was pinning it. It's bony hand reached out, its fingers pressing to her temple.
Rey tried to scream again. Tried to jerk herself free. Hopeless. Hopeless as she ad been these last two horrible days.
A voice spilled into her head but the wraith's lips never moved.
You're safe.
Master Luke's voice. He spoke through this being true and clear, his words pouring into every recess of Rey's consciousness.
Hope.
Hope had kept her going and hope had brought her here, right into the hands of a monstrosity.
Darkness spilled into her mind and this time, Rey didn't fight it.
author's note:
Heh. Weeeeeellll… Okay, I'm just to go out and give spoilers that my stories have a happy ending. I'm probably going to put my characters through hell to earn it, but in the end they'll always get it. I've never written a story with a major (important distinction) character death and I sure as well aren't about to start now!
For those of you who've been kept waiting on the update to Horizon to Horizon, don't worry. I haven't abandoned that fic. I love it too much. Right now I'm just trying to get the plot sorted and I've got a lot fo WIPs and some one shots and actually some other fandoms I want to create for (any fans of The Witcher out there?). H2H will happen though, I promise :)
Also a big Happy New Year to everyone! 2019 was… good up until TROS. That film was just... Fuck that fucking film. Fuck that guy. Here's to a new decade though and all the unknowns it will bring *raises glass*
And, as always, you can find me on twitter at Ava_Avdal and on tumblr at lost-inthesunlight! :)
comment replies:
ldsrsc – Oh, yes, Kamen will get what's coming to him, don't worry. I got ya covered ; )
Benfan1 – Glad you liked this chapter! Sorry the update took me so long but… reasons...thank you for commenting!
Paul Lenzen – Thank you! Don't worry about Kylo, he's got so much more of annoying the everloving kark out of Rey ahead of him yet! Thanks for commenting!
Tough Spirit – I know, I was mad for rey and Kylo too and I was the one that wrote what happened to them! All will be settled in time, promise. Thank you for commenting!
.2019 – Thank you! I'm glad you liked this chapter! 3
Samantha – Oooh, glad you liked it! Thank you for commenting!
Pobrediabla – Um, heh, well TROS was a VERY mixed experience for me. There were parts of it I really liked, but it also made me so karking angry. You were given a 40 year old franchise and THAT'S how you treated it! Disrepectful to the extreme, basically.
Sorry, got off on a rant. That movie was very polarizing and rant-able, lol. I'll definitely think about writing a fix it fic! Probably just a 1 shot but I've got to make this right!
Thanks as always for commenting!