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Sometimes, in the flight from a planet or a mission, it's handy to have a real pilot around.
Cassian is competent. But not much more than that -- a quick hand at navigation, but honestly never quite managed the fluidity in commanding a ship that really good pilots took for granted.
So, no complaints from him as he crosses the tarmac, steps up the ramp of the tiny ship that he doesn't even know the name of, and slides his bag off his shoulder. A glance confirms that Dameron is already there, running through preflight, and Cassian joins him, after stowing the mission materials.
Dameron. Not who Cassian would have picked to be his partner on an assassination. But easily the best pilot in the Resistance, and that's some reassurance when they're going to be picking their way out through a thick double-ring around the planet, crawling with First Order sensors. The way in will be clear, obviously; the way out will have to be disguised, and that's where the rings come in.
Cassian is curt and quiet during the ride in. They get a landing site in a paved field, crowded. There's a local festival going on, one that requires the planetary governor to make an appearance. The governor is a First Order loyalist, handing his planet over gladly to the hands of stormtroopers.
"Stay here," orders Cassian, once they're down. He shrugs on a parka, since the wind outside is bitter and cold, and snow has started to fall. "I'll be back in four hours, no more. If I tell you, or if you don't hear from me for more than that, you take off. You go." No need to get them both killed if Cassian bungles this. "When I say, you get the ship ready to go."
Dameron doesn't even know what Cassian is here to do. Operational security.
He slips out and into the crowd.
In fact, it's three hours later (after he's moved through the crowd, dodged the additional security, overwhelmed with the influx; after he found his vantage point and fired a handful of shots, left behind the evidence to frame one of the planetary factions) that he returns. The spirit of the place has turned quickly from beehive to hornet's nest, and Cassian is breathless from the run when he ducks back inside.
"Go," he snaps, "now, go." He slams the ramp control, and shucks off the parka. Chaos scares people; there are already a handful of ships fleeing, and they haven't gotten the port shut down yet. They might not be able to, given the huge additional numbers of ships that are there for the occasion.
Cassian is competent. But not much more than that -- a quick hand at navigation, but honestly never quite managed the fluidity in commanding a ship that really good pilots took for granted.
So, no complaints from him as he crosses the tarmac, steps up the ramp of the tiny ship that he doesn't even know the name of, and slides his bag off his shoulder. A glance confirms that Dameron is already there, running through preflight, and Cassian joins him, after stowing the mission materials.
Dameron. Not who Cassian would have picked to be his partner on an assassination. But easily the best pilot in the Resistance, and that's some reassurance when they're going to be picking their way out through a thick double-ring around the planet, crawling with First Order sensors. The way in will be clear, obviously; the way out will have to be disguised, and that's where the rings come in.
Cassian is curt and quiet during the ride in. They get a landing site in a paved field, crowded. There's a local festival going on, one that requires the planetary governor to make an appearance. The governor is a First Order loyalist, handing his planet over gladly to the hands of stormtroopers.
"Stay here," orders Cassian, once they're down. He shrugs on a parka, since the wind outside is bitter and cold, and snow has started to fall. "I'll be back in four hours, no more. If I tell you, or if you don't hear from me for more than that, you take off. You go." No need to get them both killed if Cassian bungles this. "When I say, you get the ship ready to go."
Dameron doesn't even know what Cassian is here to do. Operational security.
He slips out and into the crowd.
In fact, it's three hours later (after he's moved through the crowd, dodged the additional security, overwhelmed with the influx; after he found his vantage point and fired a handful of shots, left behind the evidence to frame one of the planetary factions) that he returns. The spirit of the place has turned quickly from beehive to hornet's nest, and Cassian is breathless from the run when he ducks back inside.
"Go," he snaps, "now, go." He slams the ramp control, and shucks off the parka. Chaos scares people; there are already a handful of ships fleeing, and they haven't gotten the port shut down yet. They might not be able to, given the huge additional numbers of ships that are there for the occasion.
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"You really want to know?" Because he's not sure that Poe does. Besides the confusion and the disorientation that comes from not knowing the plan.
An alarm goes off; Cassian hits it. "Star Destroyer in orbit," he says. That was fast. They must have had a detachment waiting a microjump away. He thumbs two switches on the communications panel. "I have a message queued," he says, to Poe, "and it will lead them straight to us. Tell me when I can broadcast and you can still get us away. And cut it as close as you can."
The message, of course, uses a weak encryption that the partisans on the planet use for short messages. It's a standard distress call, but it'll do two things, one of which is purely to make Cassian feel better: first, it'll continue the frame job from what Cassian left on that hill, and second, it'll draw the bulk of the First Order activity away from the civilians.
And towards Poe and Cassian.
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The news of the Destroyer earns a quiet growl from Poe, a rising feeling of anger that comes with a side of surprise that he's still so capable of feeling betrayed by the fact. Just like Ro Kiintor years ago, it wasn't the New Republic on the other end of a distress call. (It shouldn't sting like it does.) He bares his teeth, adjusts their flight path with an almost lazy tilt of the yoke. The other craft ahead are starting to scatter as their sensors pick up on the massive cruiser and move to evade. The sky darkens as they rise, the horizon a smooth curve now -- fifteen seconds until they break free of atmosphere, maybe less. Poe's attention fixes for a moment on the dull grey wedge of the Destroyer, small yet. That'll change soon enough.
He attempts to run the calculations in his head, wishing once again that his astromech had accompanied them. Any answer is only a gross estimate at best, dependent on a lot of factors he doesn't have at his disposal yet. But any sort of edge could sharpen that at least a little -- "ID on that Destroyer?"
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On the other hand, it does mean that this particular ship isn't Kuat. Also, that it's fairly new. That means it's powerful, but the craftsmanship probably suffered, possibly suffered badly. Cassian brings up the readings, double-checking, making sure that there isn't just a computer flaw.
"It's not the Finalizer," he confirms. He knows the dimensions of that ship. This one is smaller. "Not Resurgent-class. Just a Star Destroyer." Just a Star Destroyer.
He looks to Poe. The absolute focus, the control, reassures him immensely. Poe's hands are on the controls like he's tapping in to the ship itself.
"The Governor is dead," Cassian admits. "And his two closest advisors." And five stormtroopers. Or six, depending on whether that gut shot got attention soon enough.
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The news of the Governor ... after those reports, well, he doesn't find it in himself to be surprised. On the contrary, there's a savage hitch in his chest, a thread of something a little like retribution -- Poe's spent his entire career with the Resistance flying circles around people like them, scratching out whatever victories the Resistance could muster with their hands essentially tied by the New Republic's rules. "So here's where the fight really starts, then," Poe says quietly. "You think it'll make a difference?"
He glances at his sensors once more, then settles back in his seat for the rattling sensation of the Heartline shrugging off the planet's atmosphere. No point in deliberating, when the truth is he has little guide him on outside of his confidence in his skill. "Send your message, Captain, unless you want me to move in closer, first -- let's get this started, huh?"
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He reaches out, and touches Poe's arm.
"It will make a difference." Calm and absolutely certain. Either the death of the governor, and the chaos it will cause, tying up the First Order's resources -- or the frame-up, pointing to the worst of the Vader Lives partisans, who hate the First Order as much as the Resistance does. More.
Cassian is a murderer, but it's for a cause he believes in. He turns away. Down to business. Time to focus.
"Transmitting," he says. Flips the last switch.
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For those few seconds, he just holds steady. No nod of understanding or agreement. No denial. Truthfully, for all his love for the New Republic and what it stands for, it's hard to place his trust in people much further than the Resistance itself. He wonders, vaguely, if the gesture is one of empty reassurance, simple hope, or real belief.
When Andor pulls back, Poe releases a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. One way or another, Andor -- they -- did it. Maybe Poe didn't pull the trigger, but in his mind, allowed ignorance long ago ceased to be a valid defense. He doesn't have time to think of the implications.
He glances at the green light on the ships' board, then watches as the Star Destroyer shifts course. Depending on the recklessness of the Star Destroyer's captain, it might take just under a minute for the huge ship to catch up. It might take two. Less important if --
Ah. Less important, if it releases its TIE fighters. Poe chews the inside of his cheek. "Four minutes to jump."
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The planet has a double-set of rings, from some collision of two moons, one on a skewed orbit, hundreds of millions of years ago. They make a rough X when viewed from the side; one is further in towards the atmosphere, one mostly further out. Because of the constant impacts where the rings intersect, the debris is thicker and smaller than usual. Harder to avoid, harder to track in.
This is why Poe Dameron is at the controls, and not Kay.
Cassian's hands go to the hyperspace calculations, doing what he can to shift it along faster.
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For a period of about thirty seconds, he doesn't say anything else, content to let the ship run with only minor twitches of course correction as he watches the numbers scroll down. Their path skims along the upper curve of the planet, a smooth insertion into the closest ring that follows the orbit of all that debris. This close, Poe's pretty sure he can make out occasional chunks of hull that mark the graves of ships that hadn't survived the trip -- those that hadn't yet been pulverized by colliding rock. He's willing to put money on the fact that somewhere groundside is a squadron of thrillseekers who get their kicks hopping the field as frequently as they can manage.
"Those TIEs riding up our tail," Poe says, seemingly unconcerned as he rolls the ship to pass beside a finger of debris roughly the length of a y-wing. "You figure they're coming to shoot us down, or try to herd us back toward that big ugly's tractor beams?"
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An Imperial-class Star Destroyer in a fleet populated with Resurgents; a captain perhaps honored by the promotion and slighted by the assignment. The most discontented, after all, are the people who end up in second place. An assassination on their watch. It would be one thing to get the assassins and crush them so soon, but the bigger victory...
"Capture," Cassian guesses. "I think capture."
The ship rolls and avoids an obstacle in a neat, trim, elegant arc. It comes home to Cassian, suddenly, that he must trust Poe completely, in this moment. There is nothing that he can do to stop those TIEs from coming after them. And it is, in this instant, much, much more difficult than he had anticipated. Cassian has worked alone for too long, and he has only ever placed his trust piecemeal, situationally. He swallows once, twice on a dry throat.
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"Was thinking the same thing. For now, anyway," Poe says, after several more seconds of relative silence. The Heartline slips just beneath another spinning chunk of rock, no more than three meters between the cratered surface and reinforced hull. Immediately, Poe tilts the ship gently onto its port side, then glances over at Andor. He looks -- well, determined. Maybe just a touch paler than usual.
Poor guy.
"I suppose," Poe continues, "the real question is how long it'll take for that Captain to come to grips with the fact that it's not gonna happen. Be interesting to see what they do then."
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For now. Cassian agrees.
It's a mistake to think that the First Order doesn't have gifted, talented, and innovative ship captains, especially the ones that end up in charge of Star Destroyers. The Empire was different; as far as he heard, the captains who got promoted in the later years especially were the ones who played the political game. Had patrons, had people in power advocating for them. The First Order's power structure is still fresh, no matter how long ago it was that their burgeoning forces wiped out Cassian's family. There's still room for advancement for anyone quick enough, smart enough, ruthless enough to get that far.
Which means... it may not be very long at all. Or this captain might be a gambler, holding out for a big score rather than taking a safer bet.
"Which would you rather?" he asks.
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They're about as close to the heart of the ring as Poe wants to be. Any closer, and he's going to need to trim their speed, and with two dozen eyeballs almost on their tail he's more interested in keeping their options open. "I'd rather those TIEs be competing to deliver their heartfelt sentiments -- y'know, fistfuls of blueblossoms and palomellas, passionate love letters for the charming pilot and his roguishly handsome companion. Recognition of prior stupidity; promises to stop ruining lives. Otherwise?"
The ship slips between two small asteroids locked in a collision course. "Better hope they're hopeful. This ain't anything to worry about, but if that Star Destroyer starts breaking up some of these rocks, we're in for a rough ride."
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Just one question, and Dameron's off, stream of consciousness.
The way he's flying -- absolutely efficient, not a wasted motion, and when Cassian thinks of that, he tends to think of, for example, the purely mechanical flight that K2 practices. This is nothing like that. A long time ago, Cassian spent a lot of time on mountaintops, watching, gathering intelligence, and on those mountaintops were birds. Gorgeous things, huge wingspan, sharp beaks, and these fiercely intelligent eyes that, somehow, never made Cassian feel particularly uneasy. Those birds were predators. They didn't fly for the joy of it, for the freedom of stretching their wings. They flew for one perfect, deadly purpose, and no motion was wasted. Everything finely calculated.
Cassian has a feeling that Dameron would fly for the joy of it. But this, right now, is more like those predators -- birds with wings wider than Cassian was tall, that could fly in the ten-centimeter gap between Cassian and a rock wall, barely brushing him with a folded wing as they went by.
Dameron is, in fact, reacting to obstacles before Cassian even perceives them. Four moves ahead, all the time. Cassian would have a hard time just keeping track of what Dameron is doing and keeping up a conversation at the same time. Dameron just chatters away.
Cassian laughs, soft and disbelieving. "Roguishly handsome," he echoes. His accent is a little stronger when he's under stress. "Don't tell me you're keeping another companion in the storage net." A joke; but, in fact, Cassian doesn't really consider himself handsome. He's not really one thing or the other. Not short, not tall; not Republic, not Rim; not a soldier, not a spy. Not quite handsome, not quite pretty, but maybe a hint of each.
He doesn't use his looks to get what he wants, anyway. It's not out of any moral high ground. It's just that there are much better and more effective ways to find anything he needs to find. Seduction, when necessary, is rarely even about looks, anyway.
I accidentally some words in there - should've been can't help but wonder, haha
Poe says none of this, of course. He's just attempting to break up a stressful moment with gentle teasing -- no need to get carried away.
For a little while, he falls back into silence, dancing the ship through the debris field and grateful to be the one in control as he watches the distance scroll down between them and their tail. And soon enough -- sooner than he'd wanted -- the first streaks of green energy come streaking past their ship, overhead and to starboard. "Well," Poe says at last, and flicks another glance to Andor as he reaches out to activate the Heartline's respectable deflector shields.
The energy pull is every bit as respectable, and he bares his teeth as the ship seems to lag for a moment, before smoothing out once more. "Suppose I was right about those heartfelt sentiments at least, huh?"
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"Seems heartfelt to me."
A dark tone. He really wishes he could do something besides sit here and nurse the hyperdrive.
He bites his lip.
"The longer they chase us," he says, "the longer for innocents on the planet to get clear." Just putting that out there. Every smuggler has romantic notions of navigating a close-in asteroid belt, hiding and losing a tail, but Cassian is starting to think that Dameron might actually be capable of it.
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It's easy enough to suit action to words. Those laser strikes are still wild, but there's definitely more of them now, shearing off chunks and shards of those asteroids -- shearing off, but not obliterating. The larger ones, at least, seem sturdy enough to withstand a TIE's lasers, and Poe breathes out slowly through his nose. It's easier to manage the debris, though it ultimately means a little less opportunity to catch those unshielded starfighters with rocky shrapnel.
The Captain's words catch him by surprise, but Poe doesn't dare look now. Instead, he hums thoughtfully; the Heartline is durable, but it's a repurposed smuggling craft, built to be fast and low-profile, with no weapons to speak of beyond a defensive flare launcher array. "I suppose we could play tag for a while -- chew up those squadrons until we hit our fuel limit."
A pause. Poe's the kind of pilot that crashes in like a tidal wave and smashes the opposition. Grinding TIEs in the teeth of an asteroid belt won't be the hardest thing he's done by lightyears, but he's not certain how much time it'll buy, ultimately. "Which isn't a no," he adds, because the idea of buying any time for people to get clear suits Poe just fine, "but we're looking at ten minutes, maybe eleven before we're gonna need to jump."
Refueling hadn't been on the itinerary, planetside. In this moment, Poe's half-tempted to curse at the oversight.
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Tense silence, and then the numbers finish on the hyperspace computer. "Ready to jump," he says. Slots them into the navigation. All Poe has to do is pull the lever to get them into hyperspace.
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Then again, Poe hasn't been much inclined to argue. In the heartbeats following Andor's announcement, it feels like he's leaving the specifics of their departure to Poe himself.
And then there's no more time to think about those things, because those TIEs are close enough now to take half-decent shots, and it leaves Poe needing to split his attention between the obstacles ahead and TIEs jockeying to maneuver around the ship. He turns the ship on its side once again, and scoots between two larger asteroids; a number of those TIE's sweep around the sides, but one is daring enough to follow through.
It's a mistake, one announced in an explosion to their aft as a solar array scrapes craggy rock and catches there, momentum grabbing the fighter and swinging into the side of the asteroid like a child smashing a toy into a wall.
Poe glances up, sees the underbelly of a pair of TIEs racing ahead of them, arcing high. Not far ahead, the debris is getting thicker, smaller, more dangerous as they near the space where those rings cross. "Thanks for that," Poe says at last. "Guess we'll see if these are any good, huh?"
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But he puts great stock in his instinct. And, instinctively, this feels like a situation where Dameron knows better than Cassian what to do. How to proceed.
They can jump from within the rings, though the odds start crowding up on being yanked back out of hyperspace before getting far. Should pick a vector as clear of space rock as they can, or get out of range of the debris before making the leap.
"The cluster ahead," says Cassian -- "Scattering our sensors." Warning Poe that the obstacles behind it might not be visible, and also telling him that it may increase the confusion among the TIEs.
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A TIE manages a lucky shot on their aft, though the deflector shield absorbs it without a significant drop. Poe twitches the yoke, and the Heartline quickly slips to port, skimming just meters above the battered, sheared-off hull of some sort of freighter as they race for the chaotic expanse ahead. Andor's comment prompts a glance at the board from Poe, as well -- not that he doesn't trust the Captain, but because he wants to know how bad it is.
Not great, but not impossible. "Guess that explains some of the casualties out there," he says, and weaves his way through another span of asteroids, chased by green bolts of energy. To have an effect that size, he supposes some part of one of those moons of long ago must've been loaded with iron ... that, or maybe it's a deterrent of of some sort.
Where his sensors are still functional, another three TIEs have disappeared from the board. "Make 'em pay for it, if they decide to chase us," Poe murmurs. "might send 'em circling the dead zone, waiting for us to come out, too. Buying time, right?"
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Some of the fragments are large, Cassian realizes. Large enough to --
"Land on one," he says, suddenly. "Land, and shut the ship down." The fragments here are orbiting in two different directions -- they'll untangle and the TIEs won't know which cloud to follow. Their attention will be split, and they'll be caught up in hunting in a thicket of rocks. "That one -- there is a hollow." A crater that's deep enough that it's nearly a cave, walled with iron. The hollow means some limited shelter against collisions. Its rotation is relatively slow; not fast enough to be dizzying, and not impossible to match with a few choice maneuvers.
Not for a pilot like Poe Dameron, anyway.
"We'll wait," says Cassian. "The orbit carries us south and starward. From there, almost nothing is in our way on the hyperspace vector. We detach, and jump." Several hours, but if they can pull it off, they can go from engines cold to jump in less than thirty seconds. Not enough time to be caught.
He looks to Poe. His eyes are alight, with the idea, the plan. They can do this.
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"All right," Poe says, glancing at Andor, a little taken aback by the sudden surge of life in his eyes. The sensor board is mostly useless at this point, but the amount of fire has reduced dramatically in the last few moments, and that means plenty -- likely they're mulling over directions, receiving orders from that Star Destroyer on whether to pursue or fan out to wait. "All right." Either way, if they want to do this, there's not much time, and so rather than think too hard about the potential for screwing this up catastrophically, he tries to gauge the speed and angle of the asteroid's rotation, and slips beneath the oversized chunk of rock, switching to retrothrusters in a maneuver that leaves the inertial compensator struggling to keep pace.
He feels terribly vulnerable like this ,but forces himself not to think about that, either, to instead activate the ship's small tractor beam to pull the ship in as he feathers thrust and retrothrust to keep pace with its rotation. He doesn't dare use the spotlight, and the effort feels a little bit like groping in the dark.
It's not a completely elegant landing. The length of the ship means he has to turn it sideways to fit the shape of that narrow crater; as a result, only half of the viewport affords a view of the stars in front of them. One of the landing struts crunches and squeals against an outcrop It's not perfect, not by a long shot, but they're shadowed by a jagged overhang, nestled up tight against the belly of their asteroid. Ready and capable of bolting, if need be.
Poe realizes he's holding his breath as the ship's hum abruptly cuts to silence, as the lights from the consoles bade to darkness. He releases it in a shuddering sigh, then glances to Andor, vaguely curious -- but there's a little bit of pleasure there, too. "Don't suppose you brought any cards along, huh?"
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Silence.
There's nothing like the silence of space. On a planet, the quiet is never quite quiet; there is always a breath of wind, the rustle as it passes through leaves or grass or the hollow sounds it makes over stones and sand. There are birds, there are creatures. On a ship, a functioning ship, there's never quite a silence either. The constant, distant hum of engines, life support; vague hints of people moving through the corridors. Often, voices, distant or proximate.
Silence is never fully silence.
Except here.
A dead, flat quiet. And yet, when Cassian closes his eyes, he can hear the soft sound of Poe breathing. He can hear a hint of strain as the ship grows accustomed to the lack of internal gravity, of the stresses of rotation. He can hear Poe shift, turn his head to look to Cassian.
It's a silence that throws a spotlight on every sound, and casts all else into obscurity.
"No," admits Cassian. "Too bad. I could stand to win a few credits off a pilot."
There's a bunk in the back. Blankets. Cassian undoes the harness holding him to the chair and delicately pushes off from two points. He maneuvers in microgravity with a graceful precision; it's always come easily to him. No up and down, and every limb, every shift of his body, must have a purpose. He floats by the ceiling, one hand flat on the ceiling to arrest his motion, one foot against the wall to keep him steady.
He slides open the emergency compartment and flicks on the two oxygen recirculators. Unfortunate fact about that technology: it works better and longer the more oxygen is already in the air. Something that small won't give off a signature large enough for Imperials to spot.
He anchors them to the wall with two carabiners. There are a few chemical heat packs, but they shouldn't end up needing those so quickly. That's for exposure to the elements, on more hostile worlds. There are two blankets, though, and Cassian retrieves them.
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It's an empty bluff -- Poe's terrible at sabacc, terrible at anything, really, that requires deception. He's pretty sure Andor would wipe the floor with him, but it's a nice thought, anyway.
His attention finds Andor once more, as he maneuvers himself out of his seat, gently propelling himself across the cabin. It's a little interesting, how natural he looks like that, like he was born to it -- Poe's learned how to be functional in zero gee over the years, but never felt particularly confident about it. He finds himself wondering if it's something he learned before he joined up, but doubts he'll ever ask.
Mostly, it reassures Poe a little to think that Andor's done this before, and he turns his attention back out the viewport while his companion works in relative silence. That's the part he's not terribly fond of, really -- quiet is one thing, but silence? Usually, it marks the passing of something terrible.
He glances back, catching a glimpse of the blankets in Andor's arms as he returns toward the small pilot's cabin, and makes a face. "Wish I'd have known we were gonna be taking an unscheduled rest stop," Poe calls over the back of his chair. "Would've dressed for it."
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"I didn't know," he says. It's an apology. "I didn't expect they would have a Star Destroyer so close." And, in fact, that speaks to the possibility that Cassian just took out someone more important than even the Resistance had realized. "I would have warned you."
Operational security be damned.
He slides into his own chair, getting the blanket under control and wrapped around him under the harness.
"You were insulted, weren't you?" asks Cassian, looking over to Poe. "That she didn't just use you for this assignment."
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