Vic
A siren wailed, stopping me dead in my tracks as I recognized it as the warning call of an incoming attack. The deafening roar of the metal doors of the fallout shelters rolling open around the city had goose flesh rising on my arms as a chill pulsed through me.
I turned, breaking into a full sprint as cries of panic sounded around me. One of my troopers, off duty from the blue jeans and white t-shirt that he wore, ran toward me.
"Get as many as you can into the shelters!" I yelled, and kept yelling it, over and over, to anyone who looked my way. I slowed just enough to avoid injury as I slammed into the front door of Beau's apartment building. I tried to turn the handle, but found it locked. "Beau!" I screamed, pounding on the door.
It was opened by a woman I didn't recognize, who blanched when she saw me. "Lord Vicrul-" She breathed.
I stepped over the threshold, pushing the door closed to drown out the shrieking siren and she took a step back. "There's a shelter a few blocks away." I told her, trying to keep my voice even and low. "Get your friends, your family, whoever you can grab, and get there."
Her bright green eyes flickered to the door, to the panicked streets beyond it.
"Beau!" I yelled up the stairs, and heard a door close. A moment later, I saw her coming down. She'd changed into tight black leggings and a massive grey hoodie with the name of a metal band scrawled across the chest.
"That's where that fucking hoodie went!" I seethed.
She gave me an annoyed glare as she descended the last few steps. "It looks better on me anyway."
"Maybe if you're blind in one eye," I admitted, following her into the kitchen. "And have that milky film over the other one." I watched her open the cutlery drawer, metal clinking as she rummaged around. She grabbed the sparkling pink hilt of a chef's knife, and brought it up, sliding the blade out of its matching sheath to inspect it.
"What the hell is that?" I asked.
"Your vasectomy." She deadpanned, not even giving me the courtesy of a blink.
I shifted to move my balls away from her, even though I was almost a whole eighty-six percent sure she was joking.
"Listen, we don't have a lot of time." I told her. "You need to get to a shelter."
She laughed once, snapping the sheath back on the blade. "I'm not going to a shelter." And moved to hide the knife in the waistband of her leggings.
I let my head fall back, sending a prayer for patience up to The Maker above as I let out a deep breath. "Beau, I have to go out there and fight whatever is coming, and I can't do that if I have to worry about you."
She considered, and I stupidly thought that she would actually listen to reason before she reached up to pat my shoulder and said, "Then don't worry about me." And walked out.
The siren wailed louder for a moment while the front door was opened, then dulled again as it slammed closed behind her.
"Beau!" I screamed, charging after her, completely ignoring the girl still standing in the foyer, and ran out. Beau was already down the block, weaving through the masses of people heading toward the closest shelter. I followed, cursing under my breath at the stubbornness of Kylo's wives. But, then I felt like an asshole when I found that she was actually running into the bar she'd just been fired from, screaming a warning to Enrique and the kitchen staff to get out and get to a shelter.
'Vic, where the hell are you?' Ap'lek's voice demanded through the Bond.
'A bar in the South District.' I told him, ushering drunk patrons out of a side door while Beau checked the ladies room.
'I need you here.' He growled, his frustration reverberating down the Bond.
'And, I'll be there as soon as I can.' I shot back, in no mood to deal with his bullshit.
'They'll make planetfall in four minutes.' He warned. Panic sluiced through me. Trugden controlled how long the shelter doors remained open, and knowing him as well as I did, I knew he'd wait until the last possible second. That meant that I had three minutes and some change to get as many as I could to safety.
The last of the people filed out, and when Beau moved to follow them out into the chaotic streets, I caught her arm, pulling her back. "The doors are closing in three minutes." I said. "You need to get there, and stay there."
"I already told you that I'm not going to a shelter." She ground out, moving to pull away.
But, I held her. "Beau, listen to me!" I was unable to keep the harshness out of my voice. "This is war, and it is going to be a massacre."
Her red eyebrows rose. "And, if I don't get to where it's safe, I'll die?"
"Yes!" I hissed through my teeth.
She snatched her arm away from me. "I'd rather die than cower in a shelter while I know other people are being slaughtered." She turned and ran out of the bar, not toward safety, but further into the city.
'Three minutes.' Ap'lek barked.
The distinct crunch of boots on gravel had me turning to see Troopers flood the streets in a wave of black and white, further congesting the mayhem. They saw me, and immediately halted with audible snaps of their armor and an echoing chant of, "Sir."
Shadows darted by, cold, dark power rattling the Bond as Ushar appeared, Kylo on his right.
"It's about time you showed up!" I said as my brother stepped forward and handed me my lightsaber.
"I was…otherwise engaged." Kylo told me, his cheeks tinged pink.
I decided then that I did not want to know.
Beau sprinted out of a nearby apartment building, a small child bobbing in her arms as a woman who was carrying an infant ran behind her.
The Bond throbbed with anxiety. 'Two minutes.'
"Are there more?" I yelled to Beau.
"Yes!" She screamed back, and I ran inside the building, Kylo hot on my heels as we took the stairs two at a time to the top floor. A woman, crying as she shook with terror, strained under the weight of her two children in her arms as she tried to move down the hallway.
"Give him to me." I said, and she obeyed, the child kicking and screaming to get back to its mother. "Run!" She did, and I followed, stopping to scoop another child up as Kylo ran past me with two kids in his arms and another clinging to his back.
We made it to the shelter just as Ap'lek told us, 'Thirty seconds.' Beau helped the kids out of our arms, the last child running inside just as the doors began to grind closed.
'Ten seconds.'
I looked to my brothers, to Kylo and Ushar and our gazes lifted to the skies. The clink of armor sounded around us as Troopers readied themselves, drawing their blasters. My eyes lowered, and I turned to Beau, whose angelic face was tilted up, scanning, waiting, and ready.
"Beau." I called, and she blinked, her russet eyes coming to me. Wisps of her sunset red hair had fallen out of her bun, and I, without thinking, reached up to tuck them back behind her ear. It was the most intimate touch we'd ever shared, and her eyes rolled closed, her lips parting as she shivered. For a moment, we weren't in the middle of a street, seconds away from an attack. We weren't the King's war chief and a disgraced princess. We were two people, a man and a woman, and nothing more.
Regret stabbed through my ribs, into my heart, the knowledge that I'd let everything else cloud my feelings for her sinking heavy in my chest.
I stepped closer to her, stroking her cheek with my thumb. "If we make it out of this-"
"Vic," She breathed, and shook her head. "Don't talk like that."
But, I went on. "I swear, to the Holiest Marker above, I swear, that I will fall on my knees at your feet and beg you for the privilege of being yours."
She gasped, her eyes going wide, and she grabbed my shoulders, pulling me to her a second before an explosion rocked the ground beneath us. The blast had hit a few streets over, and Beau pushed away from me to run and check for anyone trapped in the rubble. I had no choice but to let her go, to turn my focus on the enemy as they descended like a plague.
My power roiled around me, readying, as Kylo unleashed his darkness on the troopships that landed, turning flesh and bone and armor into black dust that glittered with specks of shaved metal. But, for every ship he disintegrated, two more took its place.
"Base!" I bellowed to my Troopers, hearing them obediently shift into position behind me as I ignited my saber, then led them into a full charge. The clash of our forces when they met, the sound of blaster fire, the adrenaline fueled throb my heart, it came together in a symphony that sang to my bones and my blood.
I cut through the enemy lines with my saber, then tightness in my shoulder quickly splintering into pain that I ignored. Those who charged past me were met with the red glow of blaster barrels. They knew what Kylo could do, what he was doing, how he was filling the air with red mist, so they weren't stupid enough to advance on him. Some were stupid enough to charge toward Ushar, though they stopped, dropping their weapons and screaming as they clawed at themselves. Their cries abruptly silenced as they limply fell, their faces frozen in death masks of terror, and shadows crawled out from under their armor.
The thunderous boom of a troopship exploding had me shielding my face in the crook of my elbow, my ears buzzing. Burning bits of debris rained down on me as I felt, rather than heard, another explosion. I looked up, then around for the source, and saw Cardo strapped into a modified AV-7, the fact that he was cackling like a madman not surprising me in the least.
The battle lasted through the night, dawn's early light pinkening the sky before what was left of their armada finally launched into retreat. An eerie silence fell among my troops as we watched the ships flee, and I sheathed my saber, feeling the ache of exhaustion deep in my bones. But, our morning was only beginning.
Kylo and I wasted no time going through those who'd fallen to look for survivors. We helped carry those we could to the hospital, though the emergency room had reached its capacity hours ago, and soldiers and civilians alike were laying on the sidewalk and into the street, waiting to be treated. Their moans and cries were deafening, the stench of blood and sweat and metal turning my stomach, though it was empty.
We sat down the men we carried, and Kylo began frantically searching through the chaos, heaving a sigh of relief when he spotted Rey. She still wore the fighting leathers, her hair wound up in a sloppy bun, and she was absolutely filthy, covered in mud and blood. Kylo ran to her, taking her face in both of his hands. They were too far away for me to make out what they were saying, and it also wasn't my business so I went back to helping my wounded troops.
Dawn turned to mid-morning, then noon, then mid-day before all of the wounded were transported and treated. I walked toward the hospital, so weary I could barely put one foot in front of the other, when a flash of sunset red hair caught my attention, and I stopped. Beau turned, as if she sensed me looking at her, and launched herself at me, knocking the breath out of me when her body collided with mine. I wrapped my left arm around her, having lost all movement in my right shoulder as soon as the battle was done, and buried my face in her hair, inhaling deep. Sweat and dirt and blood, all tinged with the slightest trace of orange blossom.
She pulled away to look at me, her russet eyes searching mine. "Are you ok?"
"I'm ok." I assured her, my voice raw from screaming commands.
She leaned into me again, holding me to her, her breath hot in my ear when she said, "You are such an asshole for waiting until right before a battle to say that shit to me."
I huffed out a silent laugh, the movement sent pain lurching through my ribs. Yeah, that had been a dick move.
When she pulled away again, her face was somber, and I braced myself for the rejection I knew was coming.
"If you didn't mean what you said, or if you feel differently now-"
I shook my head, bringing my hand up to cradle her face. "I dont." I assured her, rubbing dirt and debris off of her cheek as I stroked it with my thumb. "All I could think of during the fight was making it out so I could hear your answer." Her eyes widened, going glassy. "Even if it's no." I assured her.
A confused line formed between her brows. "No?"
I nodded. "I said what I said to your father so that you could have the choice. And, if your choice isn't me-" I shrugged my good shoulder in forced indifference. I couldn't let her see what her rejection would do to me. Even if it would have me sulking in my basement bedroom, listening to country music for the next few days.
But, instead of the easy let down I knew she'd give me, she said, "Vic, my answer isn't no."