Hello everyone! It has been a very long time and I don't think it's worth discussing everything on HERE, so I will write a longer post on my Facebook. If any of you are still reading, I would love to hear from you! And good news - the entire story is written, so I will be posting chapters regularly :) I'm STILL figuring out exactly how Mara will fit into the storyline of the Last Jedi, but all I know is that it will be VERY exciting and I can't wait for you to read it!

Additionally, some of this text comes from the Poe Dameron comic series Issue Number 8! :)

~Mistro~

~.~.~.~.~.~

Mara was a few steps behind Poe and Leia, who were deep in conversation as they headed back to the main building. Poe and Mara had quietly snuck out from behind the back wall of the hangar, their smiles hidden in preparation for heavier topics. Things were already back to 'normal', if one could call it that, where she and Poe kept a somewhat safe difference between one another as he conducted his never-ending work. For the time being, she was entirely alright with that due to a sudden preoccupation.

"Is that…" The words trickled so softly from her mouth, she was surprised that Elida had heard them.

"The Millenium Falcon. The real thing." Even plumbers in the Resistance knew of the infamous ship. "It's just sitting there at the end of this runway link a giant hunk of…" She gestured with uncertainty towards the towering vehicle.

"Metal?" Mara chuckled, somewhat taken aback by the state of it.

"Exactly." Elida turned to her with a smile, noting the wonder in her friend's eyes. "Maybe one day you'll get to fly it - if you dare to take the risk."

"At this point, I feel like there's no more risks to take."

Leia signalled for the mechanic straight away, and the girl was sent running without a farewell. She trickled amongst the flustered and cheering pilots, noting several struck faces of those who had lost their partners, friends and family. It would never get any easier, but they had all prepared themselves for the worst.

"I just want to make sure that she's coping. We're going to have to send her back in the field pretty quickly, and her mind needs to be in proper shape before that can happen." Leia was now speaking directly to her and Poe in the control room, but Mara was suddenly fixated on the fact that Han Solo was lost forever, and the strength with which Leia was conducting herself with. "I'm going to leave that job to you, Mara."

Her head snapped upwards and away from her thoughts. "Sorry?"

"There's a girl in the back of the med-pod. I need you to distract her. Han took a great liking to her and I suspect she has a great wealth of knowledge about mechanics, but she's stuck in a bit of a daze." Leia spoke of Han as if nothing had happened. Others would view it as a lack of concern, but Mara understood what she was going through. She had once been the same. Leia was covering her emotions. "Poe will go and discuss the mission reports with Snap, and I'll-"

"You'll sit down." Mara's words were blunt. Both Leia and Poe seemed shocked, but the Princess quickly understood. "Don't worry about the small details," she whispered. "We'll take care of it."

Mara's words received nothing more than a nod from Leia, who quietly retreated to a far corner of the room. When the coast was clear, Poe's brow raised. "That's an awfully daring way to speak to your General, Crescent."

Mara's eyes followed Leia's trail. She eventually sat, with an air of heaviness, near a computer monitor in the corner of the room. While most people in mourning required comfort, Mara understood the necessity to be alone. "If I hadn't said anything, she would have never allowed herself a moment of silence."

Poe quietly pressed his lips to Mara's temple, his hand wrapping on the other side of his head. He didn't need to ask what she meant when he could not find Han Solo anywhere in the hangar. There would be no reunion. Two thirds of the infamous trio were seemingly lost to space, and now Leia was truly alone. The only solace she might have had in that moment were Threepio and Chewbacca, both of which were certainly not at the top of her list of comforting companions. When Poe glanced down at Mara, he sensed her empathy towards the Princess.

"You've done enough, Mara. Now go talk to that girl." His lips hummed against her hairline, before he slipped off towards his own duties.

Mara could spot the mysterious girl from a distance, even as others passed briskly in front of her. She was young, perhaps several years younger than Mara. In fact, she barely looked like a woman. But even from a distance, one could locate an aged soul. The girl's hands were dirtied alongside her outfit, and it wasn't simply from the heat of battle. She was no doubt someone who had lived alone and cared for herself, but wasn't necessarily proud of it.

Slowing making her way beside the scavenger, Mara wasn't surprised when the girl barely noticed her presence.

"It's a shame that I didn't get the chance to speak with him properly." Mara said, smiling down at the man who preoccupied the young girl's attention. Finn was in a coma, of that much she was certain. "Commander Dameron has nothing but sweet things to say about him. If he's as strong as they say, I'm sure he'll pull through." The girl had intially been startled by the stranger's words, but upon hearing her compliments towards Finn, she opened up somewhat. Mara extended her hand. "I'm Mara Crescent."

"I'm Rey," the girl said quietly. Mara waited for her second name, but none came. "Nice to meet you."

A small pause lingered over the two of them as they watched the heartbeat monitors click. The scene was all too familiar to Mara and she knew it was best to leave for both of their sakes. "Well, Rey… I've never seen you around here, so I suspect you've not had the proper tour." She plastered a wide grin on her face, worried that it would come across as unnatural. "Have you ever seen a Vekker Class Battle Cruiser?"

Rey chuckled as if the idea were mad. "Perhaps in my dreams."

Mara grinned inwardly. She had hit the nail on the head. "It doesn't have to be in your dreams." Rey looked up with slight doubt, but Mara firmly extended her hand towards the door with a sweeping gesture. "It's really worth seeing once in your lifetime."

"You actually have one?" The girl stood up instantly. "Here? On the base?"

"I can't tell you how or why, but I can tell you that I'm not a liar. It's not every day that I meet someone who shares my appreciation for old ships."

"The production of Vekkers is so minor… Just acquiring the steel seems impossible. And with its use as a ramming mechanism-"

Mara gently took the girl's hand. "It's better if you see it up close. Trust me."

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~

Poe could see the two girls coming back into the control room. They had been gone for quite some time, and he and Snap were finally done compiling statistics and gathering data from the battle. The surface of their entire fleet was scratched, but concerns about a chase were imminent. It was dire that they went back into the fight as quickly as possible.

Mara, however, was enjoying herself. She could not feel complete warmth with so many deaths registered, but being with Rey was stimulating. The girl was incredibly intelligent, each of her sentences strung together with carefully chosen words. Whoever she was, she was someone special. An energy fluttered off of her drab clothing - an energy Mara could not put into words.

Despite this newfound friendship, Mara knew that it would not last. Not to mention, the case with Oddy Muva was still on her mind. If he was truly a spy for the First Order, his flame would need to be trampled immediately. That being said, Mara and Leo could handle the mission preparations themselves while the General and Commander took a rest.

The stillness of the base seemed to offer them one, until a strange beeping noise danced in the air above them. Mara and Rey's conversation was cut short when a small group began to form at the center of the control room, a hologram spreading out around them like a tidal wave. It was only then that Mara could spot the R2 unit, awake and fully functional, his projector brighter than any of the screens surrounding them.

His projection displayed the map of a star system. Her eyes traced the constallations quickly to establish what she was looking at, while her feet subconsciously took her closer. As the hologram spun slowly, a large blank space presented itself to the growing crowd.

BB-8 beeped loudly, rolling through the center of the floor towards Poe.

Poe, crouching down, understood what was happening. "Yeah, buddy. Hold on!" His feet swiftly carried him towards a nearby computer, taking out the data device that Lor San Tekka had gifted him on Jakku. He could hardly believe that lost hope for the Universe was concealed in something lighter than his own palm. He inserted the device into BB-8, waiting with bated breath.

In a flash, another hologram appeared, its strange shape now seemingly like an elegant portrait. It was the perfect size for R2-D2-'s missing piece, the two holograms coming together like a conflicted current of the sea.

"Oh!" Threepio's robotic voice held a wealth of emotion. "The map! It is complete!"

Leia lifted a trembling hand to her chest. "Luke..."

Mara could hardly utter a word, let alone a cheer, as her surrounding teammates celebrated around her. Arms were thrown over her shoulder, crushing her to unfamiliar chests in a warm embrace. Her eyes stared straight ahead at the map, unblinking, thinking of the legend that was now only a short flight out of their reach.

Luke Skywalker was real, and he was out there.

"Can you believe this?" Poe said, pulling her away from the scavanger girl. "Mara, it's all here... Everything we've been fighting for."

It was only then that she could finally grin, the sides of her face almost hurting from her unrestrained happiness. "I'm so proud of you, Poe. None of this would be possible without you." Uncharacteristically, Poe blushed. A rejection or acceptance of her compliment might have followed, had it not been for the sudden hand on Mara's shoulder.

"I just wanted to thank you," Rey blurted. "General Organa needs to speak to me in private, but I had to let you know before I left."

Mara offered her a warm embrace. They all could have used one. "Of course, Rey. It was lovely to meet you. I hope we can see more of one another in the future." She gently spun the girl towards the door. "As much as I want to steal you back, you don't want to keep the General waiting."

Rey offered another small smile over her shoulder, as big as one could muster up with their friend lying in a coma only several feet away. Before Rey completely vanished from Mara's sight, the engineer called out to her. Rey spun to lock eyes with Mara's brown ones, a curious brow lifted.

"I just wanted to say..." Mara smiled. "Welcome to the Resistance."

~.~.~.~.~.~

Most of the chaos had died down by the evening. Pilots and workers alike couldn't hold back their tears when they saw the amount of X-Wings returned to the hangar. Others were weeping with news that Luke Skywalker had been found. At least, his location, anyway. Although being in the Resistance forced everyone to keep a stiff upper lip, it wasn't always easy when reality was repeatedly bashing you over the head, both literally and figuratively.

Mara had watched from afar as Rey and Chewbacca boarded the Millenium Falcon around sunset. She didn't need to ask where they were headed - everybody already knew.

Was Luke Skywalker still out there?

If he was, what was their next move?

Convincing the hermit to come out of his hole after thirty years seemed like a dangerous, unpredictable game. Mara couldn't shake the thought out of her head as she trickled back inside the base to find Poe. She wondered inwardly what it was that made the Rey girl so special, how Leia put her faith in her as easily as a coin into a bank. There had to be some underlying purpose that nobody could understand, but if they knew one thing, it was to trust Leia Organa.

Mara spotted Poe looking over the unconscious boy. She trickled by his side, the sound of her boots familiar in his ears, which were still ringing from the battle.

"He was wearing your jacket," Mara whispered as they stared down in unison.

"He must have taken it when we landed on Jakku."

Mara glanced up at him, a curious glint in her eye. "Did you give him the name Finn?" Poe's response was a small twitch of his lip. "I thought it seemed like something you would do. After all, Troopers don't usually have names. If they did, most of them would have forgotten it by his age."

Poe's hand reached up to cup the back of Mara's head, his fingers lazily entwining themselves in her loose hair. His eyes didn't stray far from the boy, however, and Mara understood that this momentary silence was not only about Finn. Furillo, Asty, and many other pilots - friends - had just died only hours before, and Poe had been forced to watch. There was nothing he could do to stop it. The First Order was powerful, and this battle did not even begin to scratch the surface of what was to come. Despite knowing all of this, Mara understood the power of release.

"Come with me." Her fingers wrapped around his, sending a warmth back into his legs that he had momentarily lost.

She drug him silently out of the control room and through the main hangar. It was eerily still, and whether that was because matters were being attended to, or if it was just Mara's imagination, she wasn't sure. All she could think about was how good it had felt to shoot with Jessika after her fight with Poe. Unstable emotions had shifted into physical strength, loosening the invisible knot around her lungs.

Poe's brows lifted when Mara took him to the boxing room. It was small, unlit and rather dusty, but she was certainly in the right place. She turned to face him, a long string of boxing wrap in her fist. Without uttering a word, her fingers began to lace the bandages around Poe's arms, weaving in and out like a needle. As she breathed near him, concentrated on her efforts, he felt the warmth of her breath against his slightly unbuttoned shirt. He didn't need to ask why she had brought him here. Even Poe understood the power of a punch and the ironic tension that sprung free from clenched fists.

"I want to talk to you about something." Mara's voice seemed to disappear in the musty room.

"What is it?"

"Before you left the base..." She hesitated. Did she really want to add more stress to his plate? Unfortunately, she was the cook that night. "I was trying to tell you something. It has to do with your missions regarding Agent Terex."

The name was enough to send Poe's eyes rolling. "I still can't understand how he knew about our plans."

"Exactly." Her voice was almost dismissive. Whatever she was going to say, it wouldn't be easy. "You were suspecting that it was someone in your crew. Someone close to you who knew about the mission, who could have put a tracker on your ship. I think it's important that we don't forget that before diving further into enemy waters." Her sigh shook. "Leia, Leo and I were talking about things-"

"Leo?"

"It's a long story, but that was Leia's choice. We all felt that it was important for you to stage another mission and only tell select people. We would be able to have a better understanding if someone really is in contact with Terex, and just who that person might be." Mara's mind flickered back to her old ship. "We have the perfect cover and everything prepared. Leia will likely want you and Leo to leave tomorrow."

Poe stretched his hands out as she finished the last wrapping on his hands. They were too tight. Thoughts trickled into his head and Mara gently took off his shoes and socks, wrapping his feet with the same bandage. "I can't think about that," he confessed. "It hurts too much."

"Reality can hurt sometimes, Poe."

His hands continued to stroke her hair as she crouched by his feet. Even when the topic was serious, he had to touch her. "It kills me to say it, but one of my crewmates had to have done it. The first mission got leaked to a couple of people, but there was no way of knowing about the second one."

Mara's brow furrowed as she tied the final knot. "What are you going to do when you find out who it is?" She crawled her way over to the side of the room, where BB-8 was also waiting. Poe's body bounced in place a few times to get his blood flowing, but Mara nearly screamed when his body swung itself around, his raised foot kicking the pad perfectly in the middle.

He let out of a sharp cry of frustration that matched the sound of his foot hitting leather.

BB-8 let out an alarmed shout.

"Oh, I seem frusted, BB-8?" Poe laughed, albeit without a smile. "I wonder why that could be. Terex... He's got a source inside of the Resistance... Inside Black Squadron, probably. And that, my friend, ain't good." His fist raised to punch the same pad. Mara sat in silence. She understood that Poe's words were not looking for a response and were merely an attempt to set free an ounce of stress.

"I've been going through mission datafiles, looking for anything that sticks out during your time on Ovanis and Megalox." Mara watched his precise kicks with amazement. He might not have been the tallest warrior, but he was certainly stronger than most people could comprehend. "I'm looking at everyone." She couldn't quite blurt out that Oddy was their best contender. Not yet.

"I hate it," Poe sighed again. "I've known L'ulo since I was a kid. Even thinking that he might have betrayed us makes me want to throw up. Kare and I flew together in the Republic Navy. General Organa recruited us to the Resistance at the same time. I know she's loyal." A flicker passed his eyes. Mara knew that it was doubt. "But then I think about things... Like how did she know how to get to Grakkus's place on Megalox Beta? She led us right to it."

Mara's hands began to twist around themselves, her nervous habit flaring up as the secret dared to drip off the edge of her tongue.

"These people are my friends. My family. And now Terex has me thinking about them like criminals." His body spun around itself, hitting two pads with one foot and one arm. Mara backed up slightly, somewhat fearful that she was near the firing line. "If one of them was a traitor, it means they've been lying to my face. Pretending they're worried. Pretending they care. Pretending they don't know the truth."

"Yes, Poe... It's a lot of pretending."

"So now I'm second guessing everything all of them have done since we formed the squadron." His wrapped fist went flying into the largest punching pad, the sound reverberating across the entire room and out the hall. It was the strongest hit yet, and Mara wasn't quite sure if Poe had any energy left in him. He answered her curiosity with a feeble sigh, his head rolling back and his eyes shutting with a flicker. "Were they really trying to help, or was it all part of some plan? Just another lie?"

Mara's hand gently patted the ground beside her. Without even opening his eyes, Poe fell to a slump at her side. Her fingers began to unwind his wrappings as her tongue tried not to blurt out Oddy's name. Just like the bandages, she had to do this delicately.

"I can't trust my own squadron." Poe's voice shook with frustration. After finishing a battle on Starkiller Base with his team, Mara could understand how he must have felt. What if someone had betrayed them then? "It makes me sad - makes me angry." His eyes stared between his feet as Mara exposed them once again to the cool air. "And you know what? It's all Terex's fault."

Mara crumpled the white wraps into a pile at their side. BB-8 joined them, his head slipping to the side in curiosity. "Poe, you don't know that. We don't have any way of understanding what could have happened. Maybe someone in your team is being threatened. Maybe they-"

"You know something." Poe's eyes finally caught hers, narrowing into slits.

Mara's hands shakily reached for her chest, where she felt her breath slip away. "No... I don't know anything, but-"

"You have a lead."

Mara waited as Poe stared into her eyes like flames on a fire. He didn't even blink, and she wondered how they had been showering one another in kisses just hours before. Saying they loved one another. Feeling like the war had ended, when it had only just begun. She nodded, finally succumbing to his silent pressure. "Only one lead. I didn't want to tell Leia about it, in case I suspected someone completely innocent." Mara's hands reached for his. "I know you'll listen to me, and it will be hard, but just hear me out."

Poe nodded. She had his full attention, as always.

"When Oddy Muva caught you and I in the storage room, he was shocked. At first I brushed it off, thinking that it was embarassing for the three of us. After you left, he continued acting strange. His hands couldn't pick up a wrench, let alone hold one. Don't you think it's odd to be acting that way? Just before a battle?" It may have made sense for someone to be nervous before a big fight, but that had never been Oddy. Poe rolled the idea over in his head. "If it is Oddy Muva, and it may not be, I don't think he's doing it because he wants to. I think he's being pressured by Terex. Whatever leverage that monster has against our friend, it seems heavy."

"Oddy Muva." Poe let the same fall from his lips, the aggression lost to him on the boxing pads. "It couldn't be."

Mara squeezed his fingers. "It could be."

He glanced back at her, his brows still furrowed. "How can we know for sure?"

"Take him on the mission with you." Mara encouraged. "If he's with you and Leo, you could keep a better eye on him. If he's sending orders to Terex from the base, he could hide anywhere. With you by his side, he's far less likely to do so."

Poe nodded, taking in each word with serious consideration. As Mara said, this was not a casual accusation. He didn't even know if he should tell Leia about it, for fear that he and Mara may be wrong. What did he truly know about Oddy Muva? He knew that Oddy had a wife. He knew that him and Leia had fought together at Endor, staying close friends ever since. He also knew that Oddy wanted to be a pilot more than anything, a wish he would soon get if Poe asked him to join the mission. It was the perfect decoy, and Oddy would lap it up like a cat with milk.

Poe was just about to finish the deal with a statement, but he was silenced by a hand on his face. Mara pulled him towards her, her lips meeting him with such desparation that he thought he may have missed something. Whatever he reason was, her didn't care. All thoughts of the mission rolled from his mind, just as BB-8 had rolled out of the room in a panic. She was still there beside him, and even though he had to take Oddy on the mission, he wished more than anything that it could have been her.

"I'm sorry," Mara gasped between kisses. "I'm so sorry that you have to think about these things."

Poe wanted to reply and tell her that he was fine. He wanted to show her his strength, but all he could think about in that moment was the taste of her lips, the sweet scent of blueberries that danced off of them, and the words she had spoken to him earlier that day.

"I want you to have all of me. Do you understand?"

All of her?

"Mara." He pulled her away, their breath caught between them. The two stared at one another with wild eyes, their thoughts unmasked. "I don't want to leave tomorrow." I don't want to leave tomorrow without knowing you, without seeing you, without being with you.

She bit her bottom lip, fighting back the urge to protest. "You're Commander Poe Dameron. You have no choice."

"I do have a choice," he muttered before kissing her once again. "At least for tonight."

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