Titles: I'll Be There
Author: Flowerlady
Timeframe: post-DN
Characters: Jag Fel, Shawnkyr Nuruodo
Genre: Romance, Friendship, Songfic

Disclaimer: I own nothing. Characters belong to George and Co. The song used is "I'll Be" by Reba McEntire
Summary: Shawnkyr will always be there for Jag no matter what. And he will always be there for her.

A/N:Reviews welcome

I'll Be There

When darkness falls upon your heart and soul,
I'll be the light that shines for you.
When you forget how beautiful you are,
I'll be there to remind you.
When you can't find your way,
I'll find my way to you.
When troubles come around,
I will come to you.

She didn't really know what was compelling her to run but she felt the need to. She stopped finally to look at the datapad in her hand and scanned the coordinates then got her bearing as to which way she needed to go. Everyone else had given up hope. Even Cem, who was lagging behind her really didn't think they would find him alive. She didn't really know what to think. The reasonable side of her, the part that was all Chiss, believed that too, but the part of her that was his dearest and closest friend couldn't. She needed to find him, she had let too much unsaid between them.

They had been friends for nearly fifteen years. They were best friends and she was the one he would always confide in first even when he was in love with someone else. She had been his sounding board and his voice of reason. They had been comrades in war, watching each others backs and rescuing the other when they got into trouble. She kept telling herself that was what she was doing now. She was just rescuing him, but she knew that was not the only reason. She just couldn't really admit the truth to herself yet. She hoped when they finally found him she would be ready to.

Lieutenant Cem Fel came up to stand beside her, he was breathing hard and leaned over, resting his hands on his knees he looked at her while he tried to catch his breath. "Shawnkyr, if I didn't know any better I would think you wanted to really be a hero and save us both. You keep running like that it won't only be Jag you'll have to carry out of here."

Commander Shawnkyr Nuruodo just stared at him. It wasn't that she didn't get his humor but rather she chose to ignore it. Cem Fel had a tendency to be tactless at times. Finally, she shook her head and replied, "Cem, I would leave you for the scavengers. They would bring you back to the ship because I know they would not want the indigestion eating you would cause them."

"Ha, ha, you are very funny," he stood but did laugh despite himself. Then he sobered and said, "Which way now?" Even if they couldn't find Jag alive, he wanted to bring his body back.

She looked at the datapad again which showed the coordinates for the beacon and the distance and direction in which they needed to go. "It is about five kilometers that way." She pointed in the direction in which they would go. The terrain here was getting rough but the jungle had thinned out which allowed them to move faster, which she promptly did.

An hour later they found the acceleration chair from Jag's clawcraft. It was beaten up and it was empty. Suddenly, her heart froze. Had something gotten to him first? Or worse had the Killiks come back for him? She stared at the empty chair for several moments then her pragmatic mind began to work again. No, Jag would have left the chair to go find shelter but he wouldn't have gone far. The beacon was a component part of the chair. He would realize that if anyone was trying to find him they would find the chair first.

Cem must have thought the same thing because he began to move toward the direction of a small cave off to the right. She thought about following him but then began to move toward the opposite direction where the brush seemed to get thicker. She used a vibroblade and cut the worst of the brush. Suddenly, she found a torn piece of a black flightsuit on a low branch. Her heart leapt, he had gone this way.

"Cem!" She called and began to feverishly hack at the brush.

Cem ran over to her and added his blade to the brush. Soon they found a nest like indentation and in the indentation a bloodied, gaunt figure they both knew as Jagged Fel but who did not look like him at all.

Shawnkyr and Cem both hacked away enough of the tangled mess to allow them to kneel down beside him. She checked his pulse with a hand she desperately was tried to keep from trembling by laying her fingertips at the pulse point at his neck. And instantly breathed a sigh of relief.

Cem looked at her upon hearing her gasp and she turned bright expectant eyes to him, "He's alive, barely but, alive."

Cem only nodded, the tears he had been holding back finally spilling from his bright blue eyes. She knew he was as relieved as she. He really hadn't wanted to be the one to have to tell his parents they had lost another child.

She watched him and suddenly felt her own eyes sting with tears of relief but she fought them back. Tears were a sign of weakness and she was not weak, she sternly told herself.

She instead busied herself with contacting their ship with a long range communicator. Then she desperately tried to keep the unnatural excitement from her voice, "We found him and he is alive. Repeat, we found Captain Fel and he is alive. Need immediate medical treatment. Do you copy?"

There was a pause then, "We copy, Commander, and we are on our way."

While she contacted the ship, Cem got the medical pack out and began to assess Jag's condition. He was severely dehydrated and malnourished. His right leg was broken in at least two places. He had at least three cracked ribs and several infected cuts and abrasions which caused him to have a high fever. They cleaned and dressed the cuts with bacta bandages then injected him with a wide spectrum antibiotic. They then attached an IV bag of fluid to help hydrate him and provide some much needed nourishment. Finally, they set his leg the best they could.

But neither of them was ever so happy to see a medical team in their lives as they were when their shuttle dropped down as close as it could and a middle aged Chiss doctor and a few medic noncoms were dropped from the craft on a repulser sled.

X

I'll be your shoulder, when you need someone to lean on.
Be your shelter, when you need someone to see you through.
I'll be there to carry you, I'll be there.
I'll be the rock that will be strong for you;
The one that will hold on to you,
When you feel that rain falling down.
When there's no body else around,
I'll be.

She was standing by the railing at the balcony that looked out over the city of Csalpar. She was protected from the cold wind by the energy field that surrounded the deck yet gave the impression of being outside. She heard the scrape of boots on the flooring and turned toward it. She wasn't surprised to see General Soontir Fel standing there.

She straightened her already military straight spine more and saluted, "Sir?"

He smiled tiredly and stepped over to the balcony beside her. Then he said, "I'm not your superior here, Shawnkyr. I wanted to thank you. You believed when the rest of us did not and because you did not give up hope my son is alive." He paused and then went on, "Jag truly has an amazing friend in you."

She was not only touched by the normally stern man's words but the sentiment behind them. "Thank you, Sir. I only did what Jag would no doubt have done for me."

Soontir nodded then said, "I came to retrieve you. They are pulling him from the bacta and he should be settled into a room shortly. I know that he would want to see you."

She nodded and followed the elder Fel back into the medical center and headed down the hall to the bacta lab. They had gotten Jag back to the main hospital ship where emergency surgery was done to repair some of the damage the field instrument they had didn't detect, such as his ruptured spleen. Then he was put into a bacta tank where he had remained for virtually a month. During which time he was kept in a coma-like status while his injuries had a chance to heal.

She entered the room with Jag's father to find him drying himself off with a towel. He wrapped the towel around him and looked up at her. Her heart seemed to leap with the slight raising of the corners of Jag's lips that constituted his smile. Then as she realized he was literally nude except for the towel she felt a blush come to her face and then turned away.

But it was Soontir who broke the awkward silence. "I'm sorry Jag," then he turned and said to her, "Shawnkyr. I had assumed you would be dressed by now and when I didn't see everyone else…"

Jag's laugh, although rough with disuse, was the sweetest thing she had ever heard. "Please, Father, it's okay. I've nothing to hide after spending a month hanging naked in a bacta tank." Then he slipped behind a screen and added, "Okay, I'm decent, I think." After a moment he stepped out again wearing a pair of hospital issued sleep pants and an open pajama shirt. She watched him as he stepped toward her, she immediately noticed his limp. "I am told I owe you my life. Thank you, Kryn."

She smiled and replied, "Someone had to go rescue you. I figured it may as well be me, since I am so well practiced at it." She let her eyes take in his appearance. His face was haggard looking but the many cuts and abrasions were healed. His hair was the longest she had ever seen it, as it hung nearly to the bottom of his earlobes. He had lost weight and the open shirt and the way the pants hung loosely on his hips only highlighted how much but she suddenly wasn't just taking that in.

He buttoned the shirt and looked at her as she watched him, then their eyes met. "Well, I'm eternally grateful that you are," his voice held a touch of emotion she couldn't understand.

Jag and Shawnkyr didn't get a chance to say much else as Jag was taken to a private room and the rest of the family come to greet him.

However, two days after he was brought out of the bacta, Jag was to begin physical therapy for the leg factures when he suddenly began to go into convulsions. Shawnkyr was visiting him when the seizure happened and she immediately called the medical staff. She watched in growing horror as the staff injected him with medicine to stop the seizing and then immediately removed him from the room to take him directly to the surgery. She never even got the chance to ask one of the medics what was going on.

Hours later she sat with his family waiting for the doctor to come and tell them what was going on. She looked up and saw the young doctor approach and she watched as the general stood to confront him.

"Doctor, what is going on with my son?" Jag's father asked in a tone that demanded the truth.

The Chiss physician glanced from member to member and when his eyes came to Shawnkyr he said, "I would like to speak to the Fels in private, Commander."

Shawnkyr nodded and stood, she understood the ethics involved, she wasn't, after all, a member of the family and she was one of Jag's direct subordinates. Syal Fel's gentle but firm voice stopped her, "Shawnkyr, please stay. You are practically a member of the family."

The doctor nodded and said, his voice emotionless, "Very well. Captain Fel suffered a small bleed in his brain. It has been localized and surgically taken care of."

"Will he have any permanent damage from this?" Soontir beat Syal to asking the question.

The doctor looked from one worried family member to the next. "It is still too early to tell. His brain function is returning to normal but we will not know for certain until he is completely awake."

She knew it wasn't really her place to ask questions but she did so anyway, "May I go and see him?"

About an hour later, after the Fels all visited with Jag, Shawnkyr had her chance. She entered the dim room and stepped slowly over to the bed where Jag lay sleeping. Monitor machines were beeping softly in the background as she sat down on the chair beside the bed. She gazed at him hoping that he would be all right. She didn't know what to say so she didn't say anything. It seemed pointless to speak anyway. He was after all, unconscious but that didn't stop her mind.

She remembered the years they had spent together, watching each others back. Even during the years they flew with Jaina Solo during the War, Shawnkyr never was far from Jag. She had known that the closeness she and Jag shared had been a sore spot for the self-absorbed Jedi, but Jag never gave up Shawnkyr completely for Jaina. Sure, he chose to be with Jaina but he always fought to have Shawnkyr not far from his back.

Two days later Jag woke up and Shawnkyr received a call, he was asking for her. She made it to medical center and found Jag surrounded by family but they moved to allow her entrance to see him. She smiled weakly at him and said, "I had to rescue you again. Good thing I was visiting you the other day."

Jag gave her a small smile that most people would never have noticed at all, "Yes, you did. The doctors said that it was your quick action at alerting them that saved me from having any permanent brain damage."

Wyn, Jag's young sister, snickered, "Jag, you always had a damaged brain. She just saved you from having more."

Soontir chuckled and said as he began to steer his daughter from the room, "Let's go and get something to eat and allow Shawnkyr time to visit in peace."

After they were out of the room, Shawnkyr stepped closer to his bed. Jag reached out and took her hand. The sensation of his touch startled her but she also relished it. She looked at their joined hands and gently squeezed his as she moved her eyes to meet his light green ones. Then he whispered, "What have I ever done to deserve a friend like you, Kyrn. You are always the one who looks out for me. You were the one who warned me about her so long ago. Why didn't I listen?"

Suddenly, she realized he was talking about Jaina. "You did not choose to listen, that is why."

"Well," he let go of her hand but the sensation was till there, a phantom that reminded her of his touch. "I should have. She has made me into a fool. Because of her I have suffered both physically and professionally. Not to mention what my family will suffer." He frowned and then quietly, "I was a fool to ever fall in love with her."

Shawnkyr met his eyes and said, her voice unnaturally soft, "You are not a fool, Jag. She is the one who is the fool. You loved her and she refused to hold onto that love. She has no idea what a wonderful gift it is." She took his hand and it was his turn to be startled as she continued, "But I will be here and I will not leave you. You are my dearest friend and I will always be watching your back."

X

And when you're there with no one there to hold,
I'll be the arms that reach for you.
And when you feel your faith is running low,
I'll be there to believe in you.
When all you find are lies,
I'll be the truth you need.
When you need someone to run to,
You can run to me.

She could not believe she was here. She did not want to be here. She looked around as beings from all over the galaxy moved around, talking and drinking fine wines and liquors. It had been only a few months since the end of the Swarm War and Jag was once again swayed to become part of galactic politics. He was a member of the Chiss delegation to the GFFA to discuss possible formal negotiations between the two. He was standing by her side dressed as she was in the finest formal wear available. He had personally asked for her to be chosen to accompany him with the delegation for the Ascendancy. Of course, she put op a fight, she hated politics as much as Jag did, after all. But, neither would she ever allow him to go alone.

Jag and Shawnkyr were at the refreshment table. She watched as a droid served his drink and gave him one for her. That was when she noticed the petite brunette headed in their direction. She was dressed in a dark yellow formal Jedi robes and her hair was piled high on her head only to spill down again in long wavy locks. She was absolutely beautiful in a way that only Jaina Solo could.

Jag looked at Shawnkyr as if asking what he should do to avoid the confrontation that was sure to come. She smiled slightly, a smile one used when going into a battle. He would know she wasn't going to leave him. She would be there.

"Jag," Jaina said quietly, unsure of herself. "Commander Shawnkyr."

Shawnkyr saw Jag stiffen and said his tone as cold as a winter day on the tundra of Csilla, "It is Captain Fel, Knight Solo. You have lost the privilege to be informal with me."

Jaina looked from Jag and met Shawnkyr's unreadable red eyes. She saw the flash of jealousy pass over the human woman's face and wondered what was going through her mind. She surly did not think Jag could just forget and forgive her for her actions.

"I'm—um—sorry that you feel that way." She smiled weakly and then looked away as if she was trying to figure out what to say.

Jag filled the awkward pause, "I am not here to visit with you, Jaina. Nor, do I wish to ever see you again. Your mother nearly killed me and if she wouldn't have you or the other Jedi Joiners would have. You cannot possibly expect me to just forget what has transpired over the past two years."

Jaina's eyes grew watery for a moment and then she took a deep breath, afterward she seemed fine and said her voice betraying nothing, "I suppose you are right. I was just hoping we hadn't lost everything, but I guess there is nothing left."

"No, Knight Solo, there isn't." Jag then moved slightly closer to Shawnkyr. She was surprised when his hand brushed hers but neither made any further move. However, Shawnkyr was sure Jaina saw the touch, because she looked at Shawnkyr, her brown eyes sad and resigned. Then she nodded and moved away.

A half hour later, Jag turned to Shawnkyr and said, "Let's get out of here. We made our appearance and I can not stand to be here any longer."

After they arrived at the door to the room Shawnkyr was staying in, Jag said, "May I come in for a moment? I need to talk to you."

She looked at him uncertain at first but then she nodded and keyed to code to open the door. "Of course, you may." She paused and met his beautiful pale green eyes, eyes so different from hers but, yet, she never felt more comforted by their intriguing depths.

"There are some things I would like to discuss with you as well." She looked away and added softly, "Things I have been avoiding for a long while."

They entered her room and sat on the small couch. After what seemed like an eternity, Jag took a deep breath and looked into her eyes, "Kyrn, I am glad you are here with me. I was wondering if I would run into her while here. I am grateful that I will always have you. But it is not because I am still harboring any feelings for Jaina that makes me glad you are here."

Jag paused and for a long moment he just stared at her. Then he lifted his hand. She was surprised to see that it was trembling but even more surprised when he cupped her face with it. She fought the temptation to pull away; it wasn't that she didn't want him to touch her; it was just something he had never done before. As if sensing her thoughts he began to remove his hand but she reached up and stopped him by placing her fingertips on his cheek. They just sat there for a long time then finally Jag whispered, "You were always there for me. I do not deserve someone like you, Kyrn. But I somewhere along the way have fallen in love with you." He swallowed and then said, "I will understand if you do not feel the same way. I do not expect you to, but I needed to tell you. I would not even be here if it had not been for you."

Shawnkyr swallowed the sudden lump and she said in an unnaturally quiet, shaky voice, "Jag, I will always be your strength when you need me to be. I will always believe in you. I will always help you find the truth. I will always be here for you." She moved her hand to cup his face then she whispered, "I will always love you."

Jag moved as she did and ever so gently he kissed her. As he moved away, she opened her eyes and met his and she knew he would always be there for her as well.

I'll be the sun,
When your heart's filled with rain.
I'll be the one,
To chase the rain away.

Fin