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“I met the rebellion’s favorite flyboy today.”
Kleya looks up from the datapad she’s been studying all afternoon to find Vel standing in the door to their room.
“Skywalker?” she confirms and gets up from her pillow on the floor to pour Vel some tea from the pot on the little gas cooker, half her attention on Vel as she moves around the space, hangs up her jacket, pulls off her boots in her usual routine.
They’ve been sharing the room, two cots set up next to each other. It’s efficient, what with more recruits pouring in on crowded transports every day and space in the ice caves of Hoth being limited. It’s more comfortable here, not as comfortable as Vel’s sparsely furnished but lived-in hut on Yavin, but definitely more so than in the soldiers’ accommodations where bunkbeds and sharing rooms with four to ten other people is the norm. Kleya tells herself all these things to ignore the obvious reason; neither of them sleeps well anymore, neither of them has slept well in years, but waking up from a nightmare in freezing Hoth nights with a start and hearing the breathing of someone you trust nearby helps, just a little bit.
Vel hums, belatedly answering Kleya’s question as if only just now registering it. “He needed some weapons for the convoy mission next week, I showed him around the armory”
Kleya places two mugs on their little foldaway table, sits down, patiently waiting for Vel to finish pacing around the room and join her. She watches her, almost off-mindedly, notes the strands of hair escaping from her updo as they are wont to do by the end of the day, and ignores the urge to get up and push them out of Vel’s face, to cradle her head between her palms, gently.
“What do you think of him?”
Kleya knows what she thinks of him, having had to listen to his chatter over comms at her radio station for the past month, ever since he showed up out of nowhere with the princess and saved the day by blowing up the death star - without a targeting computer, or so the rumor goes.
Now, he babbles away in his outer-rim drawl all day long into Kleya’s ear during his training sessions with the other X-wing pilots, casually making jokes as he performs breathtaking maneuvers that have already amassed him a sizable group of fans amongst the other pilots, despite complaints about how green he is in other aspects of the rebellion, such as following orders and obeying safety protocols.
She is starting to begrudgingly respect him, Kleya has to admit, just as she respects all rebels who can back up their talk with actions.
Vel finally sits down on the floor across from her, wraps her hands around the steaming cup. Her cheeks are pink, regaining some of their color. She takes a sip and smiles at Kleya in quiet thanks. “He seems alright. Talks too much. Won’t be sending him on any covert mission any time soon.”
“Definitely gets overly excited about every single new thing,” Kleya adds.
Vel huffs. “And so optimistic it’s practically pouring out of him with every breath.”
“Cass would have hated him.”
Vel laughs under her breath. “He would have loved him. Kid from nowhere running on nothing but hope? He’d have eaten it up.”
“Rebellions are built on hope,” Kleya quotes the words she has heard out of many a young rebel that Cassian recruited over the years, ignoring how the memory stings in her heart, the wound that the loss of Cassian left behind still too fresh.
“Exactly.”
They sit for a moment, lingering in remembrance. Suddenly, Kleya has a thought out of nowhere and finds herself giggling at it almost hysterically. “He would have had the kid in his bed within days.”
“Oh, for sure,” Vel joins in her laughter, “dragged him off as soon as he shot down the death star. He always did have a thing for competent people.”
“Did he ever try to drag you off?” It’s more a joke than a serious question because Kleya never got that vibe from either of them, but then again, soldiers on frequent suicide missions do many a strange thing.
Vel, for her part, just huffs in amusement. “Ours was more a playing cards and getting drunk kind of friendship. When we weren’t butting heads, that is.”
Kleya hums, and feels Vel’s hot gaze on her. She wouldn’t have cared either way, but she’s secretly glad about what Vel is telling her. It makes a little part in this whole mess a little bit less complicated.
Going back to their conversation about the man who carried Cassian’s mission through to the end, she asks the question that has been bouncing around the base all month. “Are we definitely sure the shot wasn’t luck, though?”
Vel clearly takes a moment to consider her answer, but what she ends up with is, “Cass wouldn’t have seen it that way.”
The memory of their mutual acquaintance - their friend, if Kleya is honest with herself, which she rarely ever is - is enough to quiet the worry in the back of her mind that it really was just a lucky shot, that tomorrow the Empire will find them and Luke Skywalker’s luck will have run out, the rebellions luck will have run out, that none of it, neither Cassian’s nor Luthen’s death, will have mattered because the Empire is too strong.
She always trusted Cassian when it came down to it. She trusts him, still, and she knows he won’t betray that trust, even in his death. He died for Luke Skywalker to blow up the death star, and he died for the rebellion to win.
Over the table, Vel’s hand finds hers. It’s warm, even in the coldness of Hoth, and when Kleya looks up from their intertwined hands, she finds Vel’s gaze already on her, steady.
“I should get some work done before dinner,” she says, words unconvincing even to her own ears.
“You should kiss me,” Vel says, putting her hope out into the world, the space between them in their tiny room in a freezing base, far away from any place either of them were just some weeks ago.
Kleya agrees, and does just that.
It’s hope that keeps the rebellion going, after all.