Smile
Ascension.
There really wasn't any choice involved. It was either up and over, go around for miles, or try to walk through a nest of gundarks.
Neither of them wanted to pick a fight with a bunch of hungry gundarks, and, separated from the rest of the group already, they didn't have time for another detour. So, over the mountain it was.
The sound of Cody's ascension cable firing was a quiet puff, followed by the soft crack of the cable's sharp end lodging itself a hundred meters up the cliff side in an outcropping of craggy grey limestone. He tugged on it experimentally once, then twice, to ensure it was well embedded and capable of carrying weight. Apparently satisfied, he turned and held out a hand.
Barriss stepped closer, burying any sense of nervousness behind a calm, determined façade. The past two days of cutting their way through the fetid jungle in an attempt to regroup with the rest of Ghost Company had been in turns embarrassing, awkward, exciting, and oddly intimate. Long treks and difficult missions were usual for both of them, but there were usually others around: Master Unduli, Master Kenobi or other troopers that ensured continued formality and propriety. With only the two of them, the formality and propriety they both clung to seemed oddly artificial, a construct of politeness they maintained more out of habit than anything else.
It was hard to cling to regulations when you were stranded and needed to rely on someone else to survive.
Now it seemed she'd need to cling to him physically as well. The cliff face was too flat for her to safely climb, the limestone shearing off into a wall with long, tall cracks rather than something rough enough to provide hand holds. She could not climb by hand, and there were too few perches too far apart for her to try to Force-jump her way up. That left Cody's ascension cable.
There were two ways they could go about this, and Barriss knew which she would prefer immediately. She could try to ride up, piggyback style, but the thought of wrapping her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist, even from the wrong direction, was entirely too unsettling a concept, and she would not allow herself to blush the entire way up the mountain with completely inappropriate thoughts running through her head. Utterly unacceptable and unbecoming of a Jedi.
The second method seemed much less distressing. She stepped in and slid an arm over the back of his shoulders, and the other across his chest, fitting herself neatly against him, tucking her shoulder under his arm. He hesitated for a moment, then wrapped an arm firmly around her waist, and Barriss found herself pulled tightly up against him, her body pressed snug against his armor. His fingers flexed nervously in the soft space above her hip and below her ribcage, almost tickling. She breathed in a sharp breath and tried not to laugh at the touch.
Perhaps this wasn't a better idea after all. She couldn't see his face under his helmet, and it took a great deal of effort not to laugh or flush or bite her lip nervously.
She gave him a firm nod, and Cody's head lifted to look upwards. A slight tug on his ascension wand, and their feet lifted off the rocky ground as they slowly began their ascent.
Sharp rocks, everywhere below. The place was a maze and there was little vegetation beyond sickly gray-yellow moss and other fungi. The jungle beyond, though, was ripe with color, green and brown trees punctuated with streaks of yellow or red from flowers or fruits. The screeching howl of an animal interrupted the air, and a flock of reptilian avians rose squawking from the canopy.
They bounced, and Barriss turned her head back to see what Cody was doing. He'd gotten his feet between them and the rock face, and was lightly pushing them off while they rose higher into the air, slow but steady. Her hair, loosed from its dark hood the day before while they traveled, whipped out long and wild, streaming in the wind. He adjusted his grip on her, tightening it further. "You alright, Commander Offee?"
"Yes, thank you," she replied, glancing downward. Her legs dangled uselessly, feet peeping out from the dark hem of her now-tattered black robes. They were both much splattered with mud from all the hiking in the jungle and from the intermittent thunderstorms. She must stink a great deal. "Would it be more effective if I kept us at a constant presence from the rock? You wouldn't have to jump and there would be less risk of hitting the surface and potential injury." She looked up to see him staring down at her again, the matte black of his helmet's visor inscrutable. It seemed terribly unfair for him to see her but for her to be unable to see him. She had a sudden desire to remove the helmet from his head and see his face; he'd been incredibly stubborn about wearing it constantly since their first awkward encounter the first day, which involved a great deal of huddling together during a particularly nasty storm.
It was truly unbecoming of a Jedi to use the Force to snoop around other people's thoughts, but since it was terribly unfair for him to be able to hide under his helmet, Barriss decided cheating a little with the Force was more a leveling of the field than real cheating.
So she looked up into the face of his helmet and pried - just a little- into his current state of mind.
Her eyes widened a little bit. Well, at least she wasn't the only one struggling to keep her thoughts from straying into entirely inappropriate areas. Cody was apparently finding hauling her up the mountain surprisingly enjoyable, for all his stiffness and formality about it.
"That would be helpful, thank you Commander," he intoned politely.
With a nod, she leaned up against him again, and felt a little ripple of consternation, frustration, and excitement pulse through him. It was almost entertaining, and she chided herself for enjoying the effect she had on him. With a very gentle Force push, they floated slightly away from the grey rock, bodies coming to hover half an arm's length from the surface as they continued to rise.
She applied the Force as evenly as she could, to hold them at a comfortable distance from the stone surface, but maintaining such a steady push required a great deal of fine control for such a long time. They wavered periodically, sometimes wobbling out a few extra inches, sometimes swinging a bit too close to the cliff and Cody would bounce them off the rock with his feet again. They worked in silence, smoothly assisting each other as they neared the end of the ascension cable.
They were well above the rainforest canopy now, though it was in the distance. Far below, Barriss could see the nest of gundarks, two adults moving around in the rubble and mess of bones that housed the adolescents. There were three younglings in the nest, apparently huddled around a recent kill and eating messily while the adults looked on. Not something they wanted to fall into. She braced herself against him.
"Almost there," Cody said, and Barriss looked up again. They were halfway up the precipice, but almost to the end of the cable. This would be the difficult part, sending up the cable again. There was a narrow lip of rock that jutted out from the rest of the smooth cliff face, and it would have to be from there that they deployed the cable again. The ride came to a smooth halt as they reached the outcropping. "Can you hold on?"
His voice was tense; he didn't want to release her to dangle over the canyon below, but there was no choice in the matter. She nodded and reached out, fingers grasping the rock tightly. "Ready," she said, and he slowly slipped his arm off of her waist, to pull himself up onto the ledge and rip the cable's tip out of the hard stone. Barriss hung on, closing her eyes and calming herself as a breeze moved past her, setting her skirts rippling. This high up, the air was rushing in gusts around the mountains, and she found herself buffeted by the wind, dark hair flying wildly around her face, sticking to her cheeks. Another soft puff of air signaled Cody's successfully jettisoning the cable a second time, and a moment later, she felt his presence beside her on the cliff again.
She opened her eyes in time to see him reach for her, his weight supported by the rappel line; once he had an arm around her, high under her arms, she twisted off the ledge she was clinging to and got an arm around him. With an arm already around her, her arm slid over his, up around his neck, and her other arm could only follow. This time, she wasn't just clinging to his side, she was pressed fully against him. The rock was hard against her back, and Cody in his armor was only slightly more pliant. She hooked her fingers into the joints of his armor, where the back of the chest plate ended before becoming shoulder guards. His black bodysuit was saturated with sweat and warmth. Her robe wasn't likely to be any better, slick from jungle heat and nerves.
They swayed on another gust of wind. Cody's voice was rough when he asked, "Ready?"
"Yes."
They began to ascend again, and he lifted a foot to push them off the rock. Barriss managed to keep a strangled noise inside her throat when his foreleg rose up between hers in the process, tangled in her skirts. She pressed her forehead into his shoulder in momentary embarrassment, then began to apply the Force with as much firmness and control as she could. Cody seemed to realize where his leg was a moment later, and she felt a buzz of embarrassment course through him as well. She shivered; there was something odd thrumming under his embarrassment, something needful that coiled low in his abdomen.
The slow rise on the ascension cable was becoming agonizingly embarrassing. They continued to inch up into the blue sky, and the jungle and the rocks dropped away below them; the gundarks were now small, dark red splotches moving across the ground. The height was dizzying, and a fall from here would be difficult to manage; if she could avoid the gundark nest, she could probably slow herself with the Force enough to land. Probably. Catching Cody would be exceptionally difficult if it happened. The sooner they were up the cliff, the sooner they could work their way down the other side. From the way the promontory jutted out, the other side should be more of a slow gradient downward rather than a sharp drop. At least, so they hoped.
The climb began to slow; Barriss twisted around as much as she could to see the top of the cliff approaching. At her motion, Cody grasped at her more tightly, hard enough that she winced as the edge of his forearm plating cut into her shoulder blades. "Too tight!"
He eased his grip immediately. "Sorry, Commander."
She nodded rapidly, several times, grasping at him as she felt herself slide. "Now a little too loose."
The grip tightened again, and she felt a little more stable. She couldn't help but notice she was a couple inches lower than she was before. It made her nervous and she hugged him more tightly, trying to wriggle back up to where she was. Cody made an interesting gasping noise at the movement, but otherwise stayed silent save for some ragged breathing. She got her chin over his shoulder again and clung tightly; she could feel his chest rising and falling under his armor.
The ascension slowed. "We're here," he announced, tightly. "Be careful."
She nodded again, and felt his other arm let go of the cable and circle her waist, to help guide her upward. She twisted around and reached, fingers seeking out flaws in the rock to use as handholds. They had come to a stop half a meter from the ledge; she'd have to climb the last little bit. Her fingers curled around a dip in the stone, and she tested it warily; it held. Slowly, she applied weight to it, and reached up a bit further, Cody's arms slipping from her waist to below her hips as he inched her upward in accordance with her pulling. She stopped for a moment when she realized his arms were now around her knees, closed her eyes, and wished she could take a moment to cover her face with a hand. If his arms were around her knees, her rear had to be right in his face. Wonderful.
Her left hand reached up again, this time immediately finding purchase, and plenty of it – the top of the bluff. She strained up again, her right hand joining her left, and then she was able to pull herself up, careful to keep her legs together and close to the rock to keep from accidentally kicking Cody in the face. She pulled herself up further and twisted, sliding along the top of the stone until she was lying flat across the surface.
It was windswept and grey, but it was the top, and it was broad enough that she could see they would not have to use the ascension cable on the way back down; at least not immediately. It would be easier going. She rolled herself up onto her knees, then leaned back out over the ledge, a hand extended. Cody was braced against the rock, trying to pull himself up on the same hand holds she had used. Seeing her hand extended towards him, he reached for her fingers, straining, but not quite reaching.
"Hold on," she told him firmly, keeping her hand reaching out as she touched the Force, gathering it under him and buoying him upward. His feet lifted from the rock as he floated upward the last few inches it took to reach her hand. He grasped her wrist firmly as she augmented her strength with the Force to half float, half pull him up over the rim, the last couple feet of the ascension cable trailing limply after him as he crested the edge. She reached out with her other hand to pull him forward so that the bulk of him was hovering over the solid ground instead of hovering over empty air.
Then he began to fight it, wobbled, and toppled over with a small cry of surprise, which ended in him crashing into Barriss heavily enough to knock her over and send them both sprawling across the rock.
Cody was heavy.
The armor was part of it, but he was also all muscle under his armor, and that alone gave him a fair amount of weight. She could hear his breathing, slightly modulated from his helmet's speakers. Though their pose was awkward, they both lay very still, catching their breath and feeling the relief of solid ground.
There was also something oddly comforting about the weight of him. He was so solid, but it was a more pliant solidity than the flat, hard stone under her back. He draped over her, molded against her, the top of his helmet just under her chin.
She lifted her hands and slipped them under the edge of his helmet and began to tug gently. He lifted his head and looked at her, head at a puzzled tilt, but the change in angle made it easier for her to pull it off him, and she found herself looking up into his sweaty face a moment later. She set the helmet aside and reached up, wiping some of the sweat off his brow. This time, she could see his eyes widen and dilate at the motion. His breath was warm and fast against her face.
She closed her eyes, and a moment later, felt a hand tentatively caress her tangled hair, fingers catching in the snarls that had formed from travelling free from her hood and blowing in the wind. It pooled around her head in a dark mass. The awkward touch was gentle, hesitant, but as it met no resistance, it grew bolder in that it was repeated two, then three times.
Warm, prickly skin pressed against her cheek, and she opened her eyes to see him close, pressing his unshaven cheek against hers. His breathing was still ragged, though she suspected this time it was not from the climb or the dangling in the air. She ran a hand over his hair, soothing him as much as herself. Their legs were tangled up together and this time, she didn't really mind. There would be awkwardness to come soon enough, once they stood again and started the next leg of their journey, to try to reach the rendezvous point in time for extraction.
Right now, though, there was a strange sense of contentment, curling up and hanging on to each other now that the latest obstacle was overcome.
She turned her head and pressed her lips against his rough cheek. He shivered once under the contact, turned his head to face hers, and, in one abrupt motion, pushed his lips against hers. It was clumsy, and fumbling, and a little off center, and really quite perfect in all its abrupt inelegance.
And it would have to be forgotten very soon, but as they both calmed from the steady rush of adrenaline that fueled them up the cliff, it was also very welcome.
Barriss sighed a little, and wrapped her arms around his neck again, and allowed herself to be something a little less than the model Jedi she usually was.
Kissing Cody was surprisingly pleasant, and amid their clumsy pressings of lips, she smiled. She felt light.
This one kind of hit me out of nowhere. I wanted to write random Cody and Barriss fluff, but it's hard to get them off on their own, and neither has a very fluffy personality. So, they're on a mission and they got separated from the rest of the group, and oh dear they have to go the long way around to meet back up with everyone, poor kids….
~Queen