This is a chapter dedicated to Poe – poor lad. He just wants to live like a poet, and without thinking most of the time – which is a good thing considering you stand near a man who wants you dead and can read your mind.
Let's live like the light that kills
and let's as silence,
Because Whirl's after all:
(after me) love, and after you.
E. E. Cummings, Let's live suddenly without thinking.
She is beautiful, but she almost looks like a young, more tamed version of Holdo. Nothing wrong with it, except the whole context is just demented and downright insulting.
Perhaps in his deviant mind, all of them have their particular roles within the system he wants to build – this is Holdo, only serving the First Order.
(Poe is under a distinct impression him and Finn are the only ones left outside that First Order orgy either way – no place for a Stormtrooper deflector and General of the Rebel Scum.)
And where did he get that insane idea from, if there is any sort of system to his madness?
He is now quick to remember – Amilyn Holdo was a friend of his mother's. He must've seen her; he might've even had his first boy's erections to her. Poe noticed this thing has a thing for strong women. Damn it, his perversion must be mentally infective.
„What on planet are you wearing"?
He'd embrace her fiercely, but the bucket heads swarming around them act as a major turn off.
„I have no idea and frankly, I try to forget it ever happened".
But then she embraces him and holds him for a long time that is never long enough.
"Wait for me", she whispers to his ear and the dark hair there vibrates under her warm and scented breath. "I have something to give you - but not now. Later - when this whole madness is over. They won't pay that much attention".
They distance themselves from each other. He cannot see him, but by the looks of Rey - annoyed and half-anxious - she fears he sees them from some high-tower carved in single obsidian stone or something.
She takes his hand into hers and leads him like a child.
Damn it.
They are escorted to a vast chamber, all carved in dark grey marble, walls covered with long and pompous banners of the First Order.
Only a middle-sized banner attached to the great table set for negotiations harbors the symbol of the Resistance with the Jedi sigil within it: wings hugging wings, a bright star buried in the heart of the Rebellion.
She makes him feel like a poet – he'd conceal her in his own heart just like that.
But he frowns as he deliberates on the disproportion between the First Order flags and theirs.
Could they find an even smaller rag? A complimentary hotel towel? A cocktail-sized paper umbrella, perhaps?
But to his partial relief, it still it oozes such strength, hope, and compassion in stark contrast to the decadent opulence of the First Order. Just like her – a girl lost among these beasts.
Her delicate long powdery cloak strangely mirrors his heavy, black Darth Vader cosplay.
Poe underestimated the weariness of his men and overestimated their strength. He wanted to go ballistic at the Council and kick the presiding right in the crotch but then he remembered: he was presiding. He was only promoted days ago and that title didn't sit with him from the beginning.
So he resigned from his position. He doesn't want to have any part of it.
But then he remembers again he'll be leaving her alone in the middle of "negotiations", so he volunteers for the position again.
And now he's stuck here, with her, with these monsters, dancing to the tune of their music. He must not think much – Kylo Ren ignores him, but he knows what he's capable of. Reading his mind. Penetrating the deepest, darkest fears and most embarrassing secrets buried inside his skull. But Force help him, he would gladly rip his skull open and eat from it.
He notices his friend Hux is nowhere to be seen. He grins. He might be alive, but only barely. Stuck somewhere in the outer regions of Mandalore system, so he's heard. It will take a long time before someone tracks him down and brings him home.
The sign in begins. The Supreme Leader makes a quick over-sized scribble, but it actually looks ancient and somehow calligraphic. Rey is simply „Rey". It's almost touching. Given the chance, he'd gladly turn her into Rey Dameron – that sounds very right. He'd forgive her this spell of insanity.
Poe leaves the stamp of the Resistance and his crude signature near it.
Poe also has a quick sniff of her hair as he leans forward to sign the treaty. Her hair is picked up high in a small bun. She wears elaborate earrings that dangle on both sides of her delicate neck. The dress covers her to her ankles, but her shoulders are revealed, showing her strong stature and the hint of that flesh wound she acquired on the „Supremacy".
All the weight of the galaxy on those tiny shoulders, Poe thinks and thinks again.
She definitely makes him feel like a poet.
"Poe", she takes him to the side in the commotion that ensues after the signing of that accursed treaty.
His hand still burns where that embroidered black pen was. He is such a Vader fan-boy. Surprise he didn't let the pen be engraved with the small replica of Vader's helmet on top.
"The disc", she whispers and her small hand is in the pocket of his leather jacket.
0k.
"The maps of the First Order", she whispers still and it's strangely enticing, the whole subject and the whole situation considered. "The plans of their movements, the military exercises schedules, their spies and their uncertain allies, people that can be turned to our cause... I memorized it all and recorded it there".
Poe can't help himself but grin.
"For the Rebellion", he whispers and shakes her hand.
"For the Rebellion", she returns with one of her brightest smiles.
A bright star buried within the wings of the Resistance - very becoming, indeed.