Summary: Rogue Squadron heads back to Hoth to defend an Intelligence Unit. But they get more than they bargained for.
Disclaimer: Star Wars, Rogue Squadron, and the rest are not mine. I write this for my own amusement. Jesina is my own, original creation.
---------------
Chapter 32: Kiss the Bride
---------------
Iella was clutching the bouquet in her hands so tightly that her knuckles were turning white. She watched as Winter reached the second row of seats – that was her cue to start walking. She turned her head slightly to look at Corran, who gave her an encouraging smile, and then refocused on the aisle in front of her. She pasted a smile on her face and tried to look at the people who were turned around in their seats to face her, but looking and walking were too difficult for her to manage at this point in time, so she focused entirely on putting one foot in front of the other and not falling.
Ahead of her she saw Leia step off to the side, and then Mirax, and then Winter until finally there was no one left between her and the man she was about to marry. She continued – barely – up the aisle, up the steps. After what seemed like an eternity, she was beside Wedge and Corran was whispering words of encouragement in her ear as he took his leave of her to take his seat in the front row. She turned to him, clutching his hand, and mouthed "thank you." He squeezed her hand once more, stepping back and down the steps.
Taking a deep breath, she turned to face the officiant, hearing him begin his greeting just as the music ended. But then she glanced at Wedge out of the corner of her eye and didn't hear another word until Wedge jostled her arm.
"Do you, Iella, take this man to be your husband, in sickness and in health, for richer or poorer, as long as you both shall live?"
At that instant her mouth went dry, and she was afraid for a second that she wouldn't be able to speak. But, somehow, she managed. "I do."
He turned to Wedge. "Do you, Wedge, take this woman to be your wife, in sickness and in health, for richer or poorer, as long as you both shall live?"
He turned to her, favoring her with a warm smile. "I do."
"By the power vested in me by the planetary government of Coruscant, I now pronounce you husband and wife." He turned to each of them in turn. "You may now kiss the bride."
Just as their lips met, she heard a click and her eyes flew open and she found herself looking into Wedge's own startled eyes. She shoved the officiant off the top step as Wedge ran toward Leia. Iella hit the floor hard, rolling down the steps as the dais came apart and smoke filled the room.
---------------
Mara walked briskly down the boarding ramp and across the private hangar in the Palace, to which access was granted only to friends of the New Republic higher-ups. Kyp followed behind her, footsteps echoing in the silence.
She headed for the hall where Antilles' wedding was being held. Upon landing she'd received a message that Luke would be there and wanted to speak with her.
She stopped at each of the security checkpoints, showing her own and Durron's identification, and mused about how many additional ones there were today – all because of the wedding, of course – and how useless they all were. If someone wanted to use this event to get their point across, they'd do it. And no amount of security crackdown was going to stop them.
They were just approaching the last one when a siren sounded. Mara broke into a run. Occasionally, I hate being right, she thought to herself, shoving by the last guard and trying the door.
"Locked," she muttered. "Damn it." She could hear yelling from the other side and pounding on the door. She stepped back and drew her lightsaber, then turned to Durron. "Push them back from the door."
"Huh? Oh." Raising a hand, he closed his eyes and stood perfectly still for just a moment. Then he opened his eyes and nodded and she activated her lightsaber, running the blade through the lock. Stepping back to get out of the way of the inevitable stream of people, she looked over at Durron.
"Let them go."
In seconds the old-fashioned doors burst open and a stream of people – notably, all politicians, and none of the military officers in attendance – rushed out. Mara was just barely able to keep sight of Durron in the crowd as she fought her way toward the door.
She finally made it through, ducking under the flailing arms of the fleeing guests. Once past them, she turned back briefly, looking at them disgustedly. This was one of the reasons – one of the many reasons – she couldn't stand politicians. In the clinch, they'd run like children, looking to save their own rear ends.
Turning back to the face the front of the chamber, her eyes went first to the crowd of men in dress uniforms at the head of the aisle. She jogged over to them, hearing Durron's footsteps behind her.
---------------
Just as Leia got to her feet, she heard the door open and saw people flood from the chamber. She turned her attention back to Wedge as he extended a hand to help his wife to her feet. Iella didn't bother to smooth her hair or adjust her dress or veil, looking around the room as the smoke cleared. "What happened?"
"A fake bomb," Wes reported from where he knelt by the dais.
"Was that door supposed to be locked?" a new voice interrupted, and Leia turned to see Mara and Kyp.
"No, it wasn't."
"Well, I just destroyed the lock. I figured that was better than letting people kill each other to escape from…" she looked over at the podium, which now lay in neat pieces on the ground, "a smoke bomb." She coughed and waved a hand in front of her face.
Wedge clenched his teeth. "These games have to stop."
"They're not games," Mara said. "They're warnings. Someone is telling you that he's here, and showing you what he can do. I barely made it through the security in the Palace, but someone was able to get in here, plant a bomb, and lock you all inside. You could all be dead now."
Luke nodded. "He's measuring us. I get the feeling it's someone who's familiar with us – maybe someone who lost to one of us," he waved his hand around the room, "once before."
"And he wants to see if he stands a chance against us now, before he tries anything big?" Wedge asked.
"Possibly," Luke conceded. "It's certainly coming across that way."
"Well, so far whoever it is is probably thinking that they've got it made," Iella muttered. "None of us has been particularly inept at heading off their…activities."
"Then all we can do is show him he's not scaring us," Leia replied as Han slipped an arm around her waist. She glanced over at Corran, who was standing behind Mirax, hugging her to him. "What do you think?" Clearly, Iella agreed with Luke's assessment of the situation, but she was interested to see what the other CorSec-trained mind thought.
"Hmm? I think Luke's right, and I think you're right. This is the type of thing we saw a lot of – if people knew we were chasing them and thought they were smart, they'd play these kinds of games – a sort of, 'can't catch me' thing. The best thing to do was not to let them get to us. If we kept it up, ignored the little stuff on the side, they got tired of it and made a real move that we could do something with."
"So what do we do?" Iella asked, frowning.
"Well, I don't know about you," Corran replied, "but I'm going to go dance with my wife and celebrate my former partner's wedding. And if anyone tries anything else, we'll do with it then."
---------------
After being assured that there was no actual danger in the hall, the guests allowed themselves to be herded into the ballroom for the reception. It had taken a while for people to relax enough to start dancing, but half an hour in, the party was in full swing.
Winter bit into a cracker and looked over at where her husband was dancing with Jesina. Technically, Jesina was Janson's date, but he was off getting food or harassing Wedge and Iella. She was resting her head on his shoulder, laughing. The rest of the guests were acting in a similar fashion. One would never have been able to guess that a "bomb" had gone off at the end of the wedding ceremony that was the reason for this party.
She heard a voice at her side. "I can see myself wearing this again; how about you?" It was Mirax.
"Hmm?" Winter replied. "Oh, yes. It's very nice."
"What's wrong?" Mirax asked.
"I…nothing."
"Liar," the other woman scolded. "Now tell."
"It's…" she waved a hand toward Tycho and Jesina. "Do you know if they were ever…together?"
"Huh?" Recognition dawned in Mirax's face. "Oh!" Winter felt her face grow warm. "Winter, you have nothing to worry about. They were together, once, but it was back before Tycho was even engaged to Nyiestra. They tried, and it just didn't work."
"Why?" Tycho had never talked much about Jesina at all, and her return from the dead hadn't changed that. She knew the woman professionally – she'd worked with her several times as Keyra Nitram – but she knew next to nothing about Tycho's relationship with her. She did know, however, that Mirax had been friendly with Jesina when the pilot worked for her father.
"They're friends – best friends – but as lovers, they just didn't work. They called it quits after a couple of months…you really have nothing to worry about. Tycho loves you – more than anything. And Jesina, well, I'm pretty sure her interest lies elsewhere."
"Oh?" Winter followed her friend's eyes and lit on Janson, who was threading his way through the dancing couples toward Tycho and Jesina. "You mean, her and Wes?"
"Wedge is pretty sure they had something going back during the first time they were at Hoth. And from what I heard from her about everything that went on this time around, she's, shall we say, interested in rekindling that. Janson doesn't seem to be though. He's still upset about her joining Intel and not telling anyone."
Winter watched as Wes cut in on Tycho and Jesina, spinning the woman away. Then she felt a hand on her back, pushing her toward the dance floor, and heard Mirax say, "Go dance with your husband."
---------------
Wedge dipped Iella and pulled her back up, smiling at her laughing face. He was amazed that they'd put the earlier…mishap…behind them so quickly, but he was glad just the same. She'd been through so much lately – she deserved a day of happiness, especially on her wedding day.
"I never knew you could dance this well," Iella said, and he could feel the flush spreading across his cheeks.
"Yeah, well, we had a lot of spare time the first week or so on Hoth." He pulled his wife close and reveled in the sparkle in her eyes. Unbidden, the memories of waiting for her to come out of bacta on Hoth sprang into his mind, and he blinked back tears. He hated to think of how close he'd come to losing her.
She noticed the tears – he could see it in the way the expression on her face changed. But, sensing that now was not the time to ask, she just smiled brighter and continued their banter. "And just who taught you to dance?"
He shook his head, laughing. "I'll never tell."
"I'll just ask Janson," she replied.
"And I'll threaten him with KP and guard duty for a month," Wedge retorted. It was, in fact, Janson who'd taught him. Not that he'd ever admit that willingly.
She laughed. "Not if I get to him first."
In response, he twirled her away and pulled her back, kissing her hard right as she came face to face with him again. "I love you," he murmured when she finally broke the kiss.
"I love you too."
---------------
As much as she didn't want anyone to know that she and Hobbie were together, Inyri was enjoying dancing with him in front of all these people. Together, they'd done everything they could think of to dispel the rumors that they were anything more than friends. She knew Hobbie wanted to tell Wedge, Tycho, and Janson – at the very least – and she appreciated his efforts that much more because of it.
There was one other reason she had for not wanting to tell people – one she hadn't told him. She still hadn't said the words "I love you" – but she was pretty sure she did love him. And she was terrified of having a relationship that meant as much to her as this one fail with the entire galaxy watching.
He was holding her at a slight distance. She stepped slightly closer to him and smiled slightly at his surprised expression. Hesitating just a second, he tightened his hold on her. She leaned forward slowly, her lips near his ear, and said the words that she knew he'd been hoping to hear since he'd said them on Hoth.
---------------
Iella rested her head on Wedge's shoulder. For all their fears, their wedding day had been a success. She wasn't even really that irritated about what had happened at the end of their ceremony – she just kept reminding herself that it could have been much worse. Whoever was responsible had apparently not seen fit to completely destroy their wedding. It had been an interruption that scared the politicians – and that alone had made it almost worthwhile – but had hurt no one
She didn't want to think about this anymore. There was no need. Shaking her head, she stepped closer to Wedge and felt him move slightly. "You all right?" he asked.
She nodded, head still on his shoulder. "I'm fine. Everything's fine."
It was, too. She was dancing with her new husband – her husband! – at their wedding reception. As far as she was concerned, everything was perfect.