This chapter is brought to you by the 1975's 'You'. It's Korkie's party...

Chapter 25: An Augmented Lifeday

Korkie woke on the morning of his seventeenth lifeday with the realisation that it may very well be his last. He stared at the ceiling of the Yaga Minor apartment and listened to Kawlan breathe in the bunk below him. The apartment had cleared out since the journey to Tanalorr. Cere and Mace were preparing the planet for its role as a haven for Force-sensitive refugees and the new home of the Jedi Order: surveying the planet's wild terrain, documenting its weather patterns and planting crops, transforming their cave dwellings into proper dormitories. In truth, Korkie suspected that the two Jedi were spending just as much time in meditation as they were in preparation; Cere was in the midst of re-exploring her connection to the Force and Mace her willing teacher. They seemed to talk of many solemn matters that Korkie could not yet be privy to. They were old friends, he knew. It was nothing personal. But it was a little lonely. He might have been the only person in the galaxy who remembered that today was his lifeday.

There was no time, however, to mope. Korkie righted himself and swung his legs down from the bunk, vaulting elegantly onto the rug he and Mace used to share as their mattress. He had been disappointed, initially, to have missed out on the latest refugee run with the Faulties; he suspected that either Mace or Cere had told them about his horrible wild Force-trip on Tanalorr and instructed them to let him rest. But in truth he could appreciate that it had been a sound decision. Mace had conveyed in his last holo-call that he and Cere were almost satisfied with their preparations on Tanalorr. And now that they had their haven, their very own impenetrable fortress, the next journey would be to free the Force-sensitive children captured in the Inquisitor's Academy on Arkanis.

No one, of course, had been particularly enthusiastic about Korkie's presence on the mission, but Korkie, of course, had won the argument. Would they have known about Arkanis or Tanalorr without his aid on Nar Shaddaa? Very possibly not. And everyone had seemed to come to the shared understanding that whether they liked it or not, Korkie did not really listen to anything they told him.

He wiped a 'fresher-towel over his face and pushed his hair back from his eyes. Seventeen-standard. He didn't look any different. You have beautiful skin, Mahdi had told him. Like a baby. He wasn't sure about that. He'd seen too much violence and Tatooine sun. He gathered his sparse credits and pulled on his boots then set off down the narrow streets to find himself a lifeday present. A plate of dindras, at least.

As he walked he thought of Mahdi, with whom he had not shared food in several weeks now and who, despite his best efforts, he still thought of at night when he needed some comfort to dispel the memories of the visions he had glimpsed on Tanalorr. On this cool morning, the thought of Mahdi buoyed rather than depressed his spirits. There was no reason not to go see him again and mend the rift of their stupid dispute about whether past trauma made for good breakfast conversation. If he was going to die the gruesome death everyone seemed to anticipate for him on Arkanis, Korkie reasoned, he might as well kiss Mahdi first.

Bo-Katan Kryze had not forgotten her nephew's lifeday. She wished that she had. For instead she was reminded that today marked another year without any sighting of Korkie, without any word of him from anyone, Mando or otherwise, in all her endless travels.

And Sewlen made excuses for optimism all the time – about the enormity of the galaxy, about Korkie's cleverness, perhaps living under another name – but Bo-Katan couldn't believe them anymore. It was difficult to imagine what Korkie might look like at seventeen-standard. He would be nearly a man now. When they'd sent him away, he'd been gangly and ravenous on the awkward cusp of adolescence.

Seventeen was hard. Bo-Katan had been fighting for recognition of her warriorhood on Concordia and telling herself she didn't miss her sister. Kissing Pre even though he was twenty-five and she hated him. Determinedly holding any real love at an arm's length. Kriff, she'd been seventeen when she'd got that comm-call. Satine crying with the hiss of oxygen around her face. Donating far more blood that Sewlen probably should have allowed. The awe and horror of beholding the blood-soaked baby that was too young to survive.

She'd been seventeen when she'd met Korkie. And by the stars, she wanted to be with him now. Just to tell him it would get better one day.

For it had got better. She had mended the tears that at seventeen had seemed irreparable and lived a few precious years of happiness, before everything had fallen apart again.

"Here."

Bo-Katan recognised first the timbre of Sewlen's voice and then the freckles of her hands as a mug was slid across the tabletop towards her. The skin upon the surgeon's left thumb was drawn tight in glistening pink, a healed burn sustained in the Purge of Mandalore. She'd had to relearn all of her knots, practising first with the thick laces of Bo-Katan's combat boots before graduating to twine and then to fine silk sutures. Bo-Katan accepted the offering and took a sip full well knowing she'd burn her mouth.

"There's tihaar in this," Bo-Katan remarked.

The Duchess Martise of Kalevala had slipped tihaar into most of her mugs of tea, Bo-Katan had come to realise in her late childhood, to get her through head-aching mornings before she could transition to the spirit in its purest form as the sun sank down towards the horizon. She'd tasted this combination by accident before. Sewlen sat down at the table across from her, unaware of the lancing memory, a second mug clasped tightly in her own hands.

"In honour of the special occasion."

Bo-Katan had planned to grieve alone but it was perhaps fitting today to have Sewlen beside her. Today was not only the anniversary of Korkie's birth but also the day that she and Sewlen had met in the Duchess's study in the palace of Sundari. Bo-Katan had been so angry at her, this blue-gowned imposter with her blood-stained gloves inside her sister's abdomen. The too-young doctor with her unlined face and her cropped hair pulled back by some strange surgical bandana, who'd cut her sister open on their father's beloved hardwood desk. Bo-Katan had hated her, in that moment. She could never have guessed that she was meeting the woman who would in seventeen standard years be her best friend, more familiar to her now than the memory of her sister.

"Are we celebrating?" Bo-Katan asked. "Or mourning?"

Sewlen gave a crooked half-smile.

"We're remembering."

That tiny, blood-slicked not-even-baby in a bunch of towels on Satine's chest. The impossible rise and fall of his chest.

"You should have got some sort of award for what you did that day," Bo-Katan mused.

Sewlen snorted.

"For taking twenty minutes to realise Korkie was alive, you mean?"

"For saving his mother's life," Bo-Katan told her. "And his too."

Sewlen sat back in her chair, bringing the warmth of her mug to her chest.

"It wasn't me. It was a miracle."

"And my blood donation," Bo-Katan added.

Sewlen chuckled.

"And your blood donation," she agreed.

Bo-Katan rested her head against the cold metal wall of the ship. She didn't know whether there were still miracles in the galaxy, these days.

"Guess what day it is today."

Mahdi had spent every blasted minute since Ben had waltzed into the club trying to pretend he had not seen him and now, cornered at the bar – he'd tried, without success, to strategically time a trip to the freezer – he had no choice. There was no way to escape the entirely inappropriate thundering of his heart.

"I thought you'd lost interest in clubbing," Mahdi mused. "What day is it, then?"

Ben grinned. A stupid, radiant smile.

"It's my lifeday."

Oh. Kriff's sakes. Mahdi felt his throat go tight.

"Really?" he asked.

"Really," Ben reassured him. "The first one I've actually decided to celebrate since the changeover."

"Why's that?"

Ben shrugged.

"Nothing to celebrate before. But eighteen-standard is worth a party, don't you think?"

Mahdi made a non-committal noise of assent and reached for a glass to occupy his restless hands.

"You don't believe me," Ben observed.

"It seems a little convenient."

At this, Ben gave a bark of laughter, leaning closer over the bar.

"It would have been convenient if I were eighteen-standard when I met you, Mahdi," he countered, "and then we wouldn't have spent half a year having this argument."

"Right."

Half a kriffing year? It was all Mahdi could do not to groan aloud at his own idiocy. Stupid infatuations like this were supposed to die out over that sort of time.

"I'd be honoured if you would celebrate with me," Ben said, with all the solemnity of an invitation to some grand royal ball.

Mahdi gestured at the glass he had packed with far too much ice.

"I'm working."

Ben waved a dismissive hand, gave a twinkling smile.

"Later, then?"

The bartender shrugged and said nothing.

Mahdi was trying to break his blasted heart. He'd told Korkie that he was working, had kept his gaze trained low on his ice and fizzing liquids and stupid floral garnishes and now, here he was, elbows resting on his drink-slicked benchtop and flirting with some kriffing girl.

Korkie could have cried. But it was his lifeday and he did not intend to cry. If Mahdi wanted to make him cry, he would have to try a little harder.

He squeezed his way through the crowd to where the young woman sat, her purple hair gathered in three tight buns, laughing at something Mahdi had said despite it being presumably not at all funny.

"He's not into you," Korkie informed her blithely. "A Sunriser please, Mahdi."

Mahdi fixed him with a ferocious scowl. But the woman turned to Korkie, shaking her head with a slow grin.

"Damn. Really?"

"Really," Korkie assured her.

She gave a good-natured shrug.

"What a shame."

"I know the feeling," Korkie told her.

This provoked some grumbling of curse-words beneath Mahdi's breath as he mixed Korkie's drink with far greater ferocity than was warranted by a simple Sunriser.

"Do I know you?" the young woman mused. "I'm Jetta. I think we might have met."

"Perhaps."

Jetta narrowed her eyes, examined him closely.

"I think we might have hooked up here a few moons ago."

Korkie laughed.

"Really?"

Mahdi didn't seem to share his amusement. He slid Korkie's drink across the benchtop.

"Perhaps it was the night you hooked up with every sentient in the club, Ben. Eighteen credits."

Korkie rolled his eyes and handed over the cash.

"I didn't hook up with every sentient, Mahdi."

Jetta's gaze flitted between the two young men.

"Should I leave you boys to it?"

"No," Mahdi answered shortly.

"Mahdi's not interested in me either," Korkie told Jetta, and reached to take her hand. "Shall we dance?"

"I'd love to."

They fought their way back out onto the dancefloor, where the crush of people quickly swallowed them up and Korkie could not see Mahdi anymore. He drank as he danced, finishing his Sunriser before the shift of songs.

"So did he break your heart?" Jetta asked, voice straining over the music. "The bartender?"

"Uh…"

Korkie pondered the question, his mind filled with the pulsing beat.

"No. Not quite. It's unreciprocated love, I suppose."

"Oh kriff, man."

Jetta grinned, shook her head in disapproval.

"That's worse than a heartbreak!" she declared. "A simple Sunriser isn't going to fix that."

She pulled him close to her, showed him a bag of tablets she'd tucked in the waistband of her skirt. It was Korkie's turn, with a cautious smile, to shake his head.

"Jetta, my friend, that's a terribly kind offer, but…"

He wanted to. By the stars, part of him wanted to.

"I can't," he told her. "I have to stay sober for seduction purposes. This is my only drink for the night."

"But these give you confidence!" Jetta insisted, shaking her bag before his eyes.

Korkie chuckled, pressing it back into her hand.

"I have confidence, Jetta. I don't think that's the issue, sadly."

"More confidence!"

Korkie twirled her and watched her black skirt flutter and flare.

"It's very kind of you to offer," he repeated, "but I won't have any. Mahdi will think poorly of me."

Jetta gave an extravagant laugh, throwing her head back.

"So you've still not given up on him?"

Korkie shook his head.

"I'm afflicted with this terrible optimism," he told her. "It's ruining my life."

Jetta and Ben disappeared from the dancefloor almost two hours from closing and did not resurface. Mahdi mixed what felt like a hundred Sunrisers and gave none of them to his favourite customer. It served him right, maybe, for entertaining the flirtation of a woman he had no interest in. But he hadn't thought Ben had it in him to make him pay quite this badly.

Closing time arrived and Mahdi did not feel his usual crashing relief. The club emptied out and there was still no sign of Ben nor Jetta. They had gone home together, presumably. Never mind that Mahdi had assumed Ben was only interested in women as far as dance partners went. Never kriffing mind. It was all his own fault.

Mahdi washed the glasses and wiped down the benchtops and sealed up all the bottles and containers of garnishes. This was his longest shift of the week, his turn to do all the final closing checks. The sun would have risen outside. He was accompanied only by the humming of his solitary cleaning droid, working to mop the spilled drinks and hells knew what else from the floor. He always saved the least pleasant task for last. A-LT would clean the bathrooms for him – thank the stars – but it was Mahdi who had the joy of clearing the droid's path by dragging out whoever had chosen to pass out on the floor this week.

He shouldered open the door and his breath caught; frozen on the spot, the door nearly struck him as it swung closed. Ben, sitting on the floor with Jetta's sleeping head in his lap, greeted him with a smile.

"Stars, am I glad to see you, Mahdi. It's morning-time?"

"Yeah. Closing."

There was a large patch of drool on Korkie's trousers from Jetta's open mouth.

"She's fine," Ben assured him. "Don't worry."

"She looks like shit."

Ben nodded his agreement.

"She was very, very up and now she's very, very down," he recounted lightly. "But breathing just fine. I figured I'd stick around and make sure no one abducted her."

"It's probably time to send her home to bed."

"Ideally," Ben agreed. "But I don't know where she lives, Mahdi."

He raised a challenging brow.

"Do you?"

Mahdi flushed.

"Obviously not."

"I was hoping just to wait it out until she wakes up and is safe to get herself home," he explained. "But I guess if it's closing time…"

The silence hung between them. They could wake her, pack her into a grav-cab, and go their separate ways. Mahdi could instruct Ben to drag her out to the curb and wish good luck to both of them. He'd have done it to anyone else, on any other morning.

"We can wait it out," he found himself saying instead. "I'm the only one on for closing."

Korkie tried to guard against the flush of hope that sprung from Mahdi's words. He'd been right in what he'd said to Jetta on the dancefloor: the optimism was ruining his life. For surely this would be another morning in Mahdi's presence talking around all of the things that he'd have liked to say to him, playing at the friendship that he wanted to be enough but always left him wanting. He delicately lifted Jetta's head from his thighs – the gentleness was probably superfluous, for Jetta was closer to unconscious than asleep – and eased himself upright, placing his jacket as a pillow under her head instead. It was a relief to get off the floor. His joints cracked gratefully as he stood.

"Hear that?" he asked of Mahdi, gesturing at his knees. "I'm ancient."

Mahdi snickered.

"Sure."

Korkie stuck his head under the bathroom tap and took several gulps of much-needed water. He straightened and wiped the droplets from his face.

"Despite my advice to the contrary, she took twice as much as she planned to," he explained, indicating to Jetta once more. "I declined to split the bag with her."

Mahdi raised a brow.

"Why's that?"

"Because I didn't want to give you another excuse not to kiss me."

"Ah."

"Which I've been thinking about, Mahdi," Korkie pressed on. "While I've been sitting here with Jetta. I've been thinking that… well, that I'm sorry."

At this, Mahdi looked surprised, lifting his downcast eyes.

"You're sorry?"

"Yeah. I shouldn't have ruined your conversation with Jetta tonight. And I probably shouldn't have been hassling you all these months either. You have no obligation to like me in the way that I like you and I haven't really been a good sport about it."

Mahdi shook his head, a swarm of conflicting emotions swirling about him in the Force.

"You don't owe me any apology, Ben," he muttered. "Don't be stupid."

"I thought I was finally being sensible."

Mahdi seemed to struggle against pressing words, then spat them out.

"But you know that I do like you. That I always have liked you. You kriffing knew it from the start."

And Korkie felt such a strange lightness in his body then. A fluttering in his stomach.

"Mahdi, please, I've finally convinced myself that-"

Then Mahdi's hands were on his shoulders and with a crashing of noses their lips met. It was nothing, nothing at all, like Korkie's first kiss on the giant moon of Kalarba. Everything had felt numb, that night. But this kiss struck Korkie like electricity, tore the breath from his chest. They broke apart and Korkie could not read Mahdi's dark eyes. Perhaps this was why the Jedi cautioned against romantic attachment. One kiss and he'd lost all his bearings in the Force.

"Was that a pity kiss?" he croaked out.

Mahdi raised a brow. There was the trace of a smile dimpling his cheeks.

"Did it feel like one?"

Korkie stepped forward and kissed him again, deeper, and it did not taste of pity.

In the bathroom of The Yagai Hive as the sun rose, with the shipyard workers on the pavement above his head embarking upon on their morning commute, Korkie Kryze finally tasted victory.

Before she was aware of anything else, Jetta was aware that she'd kriffed up. Too many pills. Too many karking pills. Her head ached and her eyes were scratchy but her neck was the worst. Someone had wedged a folded jacket beneath her head but it wasn't much of a pillow and the muscles of her neck were in full spasm.

She cracked open her eyes and first saw the green of The Yagai Hive's bathroom floor. She saw two pairs of black boots. She turned her head, groaning with the pain in her neck, and followed the two pairs of boots upwards to two tangled bodies. Golden and charcoal hair. Two young men kissing, pressed up against the grimy mirror, wedged awkwardly between the two sinks.

Her throat hurt. She'd presumably been singing all night.

"Hells yeah, boys," she croaked, to the men whose names she could not remember but whose allegedly unrequited love she had not forgotten, and crashed back into an unsightly slumber.

Jetta's interruption was followed shortly after by the clunking of the cleaning droid against the bathroom door, ready to perform its final duties of the morning.

"Kriff. Right. We should probably get out of here."

Mahdi's cheeks were flushed and his lips glistening. Korkie must have looked the same. His heart was still racing. He unpeeled himself reluctantly from the mirror.

"Oi, Jetta, get up!"

Korkie had lost all his patience for his friend's prolonged slumber. Mahdi had said they were getting out of here. Which presumably meant together. The young woman groaned.

"You two carry on," she mumbled. "I won't bother you."

"A generous offer," Korkie conceded. "But I'm not that self-confident. Get up!"

He extended a hand to her and brought her, grumbling, to her feet. Mahdi opened the door and an A-LT unit barged in, whistling its displeasure at having been obstructed.

"You sleep twenty-standard hours of the day," Mahdi admonished the droid. "So what if I hold you up for twenty minutes?"

The droid whistled its shrillest tone yet and commenced spraying a heavy dose of disinfectant around the bathroom without regard for its company.

"Alright," Mahdi managed, between coughs. "Fine. We're going!"

While Mahdi finalised all of his closing procedures, Korkie slung Jetta's arm across his shoulders and marched her across the empty dancefloor and up the narrow staircase until they reached sunlight.

"Urgh!"

Jetta shielded her eyes.

"I still don't see why you couldn't have left me on the floor. It's not like I was going to steal anything."

"It's a beautiful morning," Korkie told her. "Do you live far away? I'll pay for your grav-cab."

"You are so obnoxiously infatuated," Jetta grumbled. "It's all good. I'm nearby. I'll walk."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes," Jetta promised, managing to stand a little straighter. "Don't waste your precious credits on me. Buy the bartender a nice breakfast."

Korkie laid a hand on her shoulder.

"I wouldn't be buying the bartender any breakfast if it weren't for you, Jetta."

Finally, eyes still screwed up against the sun, Jetta managed a smile.

"Don't you forget it, either."

"I won't. Anytime you need a dancing partner, I'm there."

"Deal. As long as you don't hook up with the next beautiful person I choose to flirt with."

"I promise. I won't. So long as it's not Mahdi again."

Jetta rolled her eyes.

"As I said: obnoxious."

Mahdi emerged from the staircase behind them, jangling keys in hand. Jetta gave them a cheery wave as she embarked down the pavement.

"Have fun!"

They walked through the bustling streets in the glaring sunlight. It was the longest shift of Mahdi's working week and he couldn't have felt more awake.

"So," Ben ventured. "My place or yours?"

Mahdi grimaced. It was all rather more complicated in daylight.

"I have to get home. The kids will worry if I don't see them before they go to school."

"Fine by me."

Ben reached for his hand and Mahdi evaded it.

"Not on the streets," he muttered, in explanation.

"Sure. Sorry."

But the young man could not entirely stifle his disappointment. Mahdi tried to ignore the sinking sensation of guilt. He was about to make it worse.

"I don't think you should come up with me while the kids are home," he muttered.

Ben frowned.

"Why not? They've met me heaps of times."

"Today's different."

"They won't know that," Ben countered.

"They might."

Mahdi gestured at Ben's neck.

"You've got something…"

Squinting, Ben spotted his hickey in the reflection of a shopfront window. His face broke into a wide grin.

"Ha! Nice. We can just say Jetta gave it to me."

Mahdi grimaced.

"I'd really prefer to be more subtle about it."

He felt like there were eyes on them already as they walked. As though his secret were broadcast in the blinding light of the morning sun. Lana, he thought, might have had her suspicions already. And that was probably fine but he couldn't fail Riyan. Riyan, who needed a brother who could take care of him. A brother who would never catch the eye of a hateful stormtrooper. Who would never bring trouble to their house.

"What am I going to do?" Ben asked, with half a laugh. "Loiter like a stalker in the street?"

Mahdi grimaced and shrugged.

"What if I go home to my place?" Ben suggested. "And you come around when you're ready? After the kids are gone?"

Mahdi frowned.

"Don't you have some ridiculous number of housemates?"

"Seven," Ben affirmed. "But six are off-planet and I think the other one is working today."

Despite it all, Mahdi could not help but laugh at the young man's confidence.

"You think?"

"He is working today," Ben corrected himself. "I promise."

Mahdi gave a pensive hum. It wasn't a terrible idea. And he did, despite it all, want to be alone with Ben again. He wanted to be alone with Ben again rather badly.

"Yeah. Okay. Good idea."

"You remember where it is?"

"Yeah. I'll see you in an hour or something. Don't fall asleep."

Ben grinned.

"No chance of that."

It was the longest hour of Korkie's kriffing life. His stomach was fluttering too much for him to eat and he couldn't bear the cold water of their tiny 'fresher for more than a few minutes. He dressed himself slowly and paced the apartment. Kawlan hadn't left him any cleaning to do. His housemate was too karking tidy. Korkie pondered joining Kawlan at work on ship repairs in the garage, which was how he was supposed to be spending the day, after all, and asking him very kindly not to come home for lunch. But Kawlan would ask about his night out and Korkie wouldn't be able to keep the secret and Kawlan would laugh at him and make him more nervous than he already was. And he was pretty confident that Kawlan would get lunch out in the warehouse district instead.

So Korkie waited.

Maybe Mahdi wouldn't come. Maybe the guilt that had swelled within him from the moment they stepped out onto the street had engulfed him. Maybe he would never see him ever again. Korkie didn't exactly understand what Mahdi was so worried about. They'd established, with his quietly augmented lifeday, that he was no longer too young for him. But there was something else bothering him now.

Korkie scrubbed at the already clean countertop. If Mahdi didn't come, maybe he would foreswear attachment like the Jedi and never go dancing again. Kawlan would be disappointed. Mace would be pleased. If Mahdi didn't come…

Never mind.

Korkie sensed him – a flurry of nervous anticipation in the Force that mirrored his own – before he saw him through the window, still dressed in bartender's black, eyes downcast as he strode through the crowded streets. Korkie pretended not to have sensed him and sat down at the kitchen table with a cup of water he was too nervous to drink and his data-pad. He couldn't be seen to be waiting at the kriffing door.

But when the knock came, Korkie did away with all pretence of coolness and crossed the apartment in three quick strides to let him in.

"Hi."

"Hi."

They'd spent so many mornings together now. But this was a different experience entirely. Korkie felt faintly breathless in Mahdi's solitary company. Not even two hours ago their bodies had been pressed together, as close as they could get, as they learned the taste of the other. How were they supposed to talk to each other now?

"Do you really fit eight people in here?" Mahdi asked, eyeing the bunk beds with alarm.

"Two in each bed, two on the floor, one on the couch and one in a ship," Korkie affirmed.

Mahdi had washed his face, fixed his hair, since the early morning. Korkie wanted to reach out and knot his fingers in those dark waves again but couldn't seem to move a muscle.

"Would you like any water?" he offered, dry-mouthed himself. "Breakfast?"

"No thanks."

And Korkie knew in his face and in the Force that Mahdi was feeling it just as hard. Perhaps there was no point in polite chit-chat at all.

"This bunk's mine, when the house isn't overflowing," Korkie told him, walking him over to the small ladder. "Take your boots off. Come up."

Mahdi was either too tired or too infatuated to maintain any sort of propriety. No, he didn't need water and he didn't need breakfast. He needed Ben. It was a great relief to kiss him again and even greater to do so lying down in that stupid single bunk. Where their legs could tangle and their hips could press close. Where their hands could explore – cautiously, at first, upon jaws and arms and through tangles of hair, and then sliding beneath the hems of t-shirts. Mahdi traced the lean muscle of Ben's back, the angle of his shoulder blade. And then his finger fell into a strange depression in the skin.

"Kriff. Sorry. Are you okay?"

Ben sat upright, his golden hair hectically tousled, and pulled his shirt off entirely.

"Totally fine. That was just a scar. Sorry."

He reached across and removed Mahdi's shirt too, drinking in the sight of him with eager eyes and a slow smile. But Mahdi was not smiling. For the scar he had found was one of many glistening wounds adorning Ben's torso.

"Sorry," Ben said again, noticing his gaze. "They're a bit gross, I guess."

He sat back on his heels and looked down at his body.

"This one's from a blaster bolt on Corellia," he recounted, twisting his neck to look over his shoulder. "It's actually healed way better than I thought. It was nasty."

This was of little consolation to Mahdi.

"You have so many," he murmured.

"Yeah."

Ben grimaced, pointed to a long, superficial burn on the front of his shoulder.

"This one's from Dantooine. Barely hurt. Then these ones-"

He indicated a series of puncture wounds.

"-are a set of five. From Ryloth airspace. Again, no damage done."

Three across his upper chest, two slung low on his hips, just beneath the waistband of his unbuckled pants.

"You can touch them," he invited, with a teasing smirk. "Won't cause me any grief."

"Ben, I…"

Mahdi joined him sitting upright. Their legs were tangled still. He did not reach for Ben's low-slung scars. He touched him instead on his face. Fingertips upon the buckle of his once-broken nose. A thumb grazed delicately over his cheekbone, which shined the faint pink of a healed burn. Mahdi brought his hands down to clasp Ben's.

"Let's not do all that right now, Ben."

Ben's face fell.

"I didn't think they were that ugly."

"They're not ugly," Mahdi reassured him hurriedly. "It's just…"

He squeezed Ben's hands in consolation. He didn't know how to find the right words.

"All that violence on your body. It's sad."

Ben rolled his eyes.

"Well, I mean… that's a matter of perspective, no? It doesn't have to be sad, Mahdi. I don't think it's sad."

"You don't?"

"No," Ben affirmed. "Not at all. These are all battles that I've chosen to fight."

"But you're still so young."

Ben glared at him.

"I thought we were done having this argument."

"I'm sorry," Mahdi sighed. "You're right. We are."

He laid a hand on Ben's thigh now.

"I don't want you to think that your scars are ugly because they're not. Or that I don't like your body because I really, really do."

His voice scraped over the words.

"Just maybe not today, you know? There's no need to rush. We barely know each other, after all."

Ben groaned.

"If you're wanting to talk childhood trauma again while we're in bed together-"

"That's not what I meant, Ben."

The young man rubbed a hand over his face and managed a grin.

"Okay. Great. That's fine, then. If you want to wait, let's wait."

But despite his attempts at magnanimity, Ben's eyes wore a disappointment that Mahdi could understand. Kriff, his own body was deeply aggrieved by the decision. He physically ached for Ben. But it just didn't quite feel right, in that moment.

"Come here," he murmured.

They lay down together, heads nestled close upon the pillow.

"We've got some sleep to catch up on."

Ben hummed his reluctant assent. He rested his hand upon Mahdi's waist, thumb sweeping slowly back and forth, and closed his eyes. Mahdi ran his fingers through that golden hair and down the muscles along the back of Ben's neck. He was rewarded with a low groan of contentment.

"You're completely beautiful, Mahdi," he mumbled. "I'm sorry for being a brat."

Mahdi snickered.

"You're not a brat," he told him. "And I think you're very beautiful too."

Ben corrected him without opening his eyes.

"Completely beautiful."

Mahdi closed his eyes too. Let go of everything except the sensation of Ben's hand upon his waist.

"You are completely, entirely, exceptionally beautiful," he agreed.

Kawlan returned to the apartment for lunch to find two young men nestled in the top bunk, limbs entwined, half-dressed, fast asleep. He faltered in the doorway. He could get lunch in the warehouse district. He wouldn't risk boiling the kettle and waking them up.

But he paused, a moment, before he left. Paused to make space for the welling of warmth in his chest.

He had known that feeling once. The first bed he had shared with Relya had been small like that, in the days in which their bursting adoration for each other had been so great that it was a joy to be close to each other, always, even when the days were hot and lying together drew sweat from their skin. The young man who must have been Mahdi slept with one arm squashed above his head to make room for Korkie's body beside him. Kawlan looked at the dark sheen of his young skin and felt a pang of something sweeter than envy. He had glowed like that once, when he had been young and in love.

Kawlan shut the door delicately and wandered back out into the streets. He would come home only once darkness had fallen, when the bartender would be back at work.

I'm not crying, Kawlan is.

We love your terrible optimism, Korkie. The galaxy needs it.

For all the non-romance-lovers, next chapter, the team is back together as we prepare for the mission to Arkanis.

xx - S.