The Rebel Queen - Poe Dameron

Chapter XII: Foxhole

Calista

Calista looked at the wrecks around her and said solemnly, "But that freedom comes with a price."

"Doesn't all freedom?"

The question of freedom had imprinted itself in her mind. Calista wondered whether such a virtue was worth all the suffering it caused.

The silence that hung between her and Poe in that moment felt liberating. Here, all the way out in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by only dead things and her own thoughts, Calista felt at home. Poe's presence barely infringed on that feeling. It surprised her how easy everything was with him, how dangerously at ease she felt beside him.

His company wasn't demanding and he didn't have a judgemental air about him. He was sincere in a way that many of Calista's familiar acquaintances growing up weren't. He wasn't like a diplomat, swaying from one side to the next as long as the situation called for it. He wasn't like a military man either, not cold and unreadable like Mokk-Toh or serious like Koa. Poe was an enigma to her and she was trained to nurture her curious streak since childhood.

To distract herself from her ruminations, Calista looked around the sandy terrain and broke the silence with a thought, "I bet this place used to be something to behold in its day."

Poe's voice was soft and whisper-like when he replied, "There are still one or two beautiful things here."

She steadied herself, "Like what?"

He turned to face her and Calista's heart beat with vigour as if to remind her it was still there, knocking against her ribs. When he leaned closer she found herself torn in two, both wanting to know what would happen next and doubtful.

She feared how much damage a simple kiss could do if she allowed it. After all, all great falls begin with a kiss and Calista wasn't sure if she had enough left in her to give. The loss of her mother had stretched her thin and she had had barely enough time to heal before she lost her home too. If the would-be-kiss was a promise of something more than a casual dalliance, something deeper, she feared neither of them could keep such a promise with how tumultuous the tides of war were.

But, if the kiss wasn't a promise, if it was merely an impulse, Calista feared she wouldn't be able to bottle up whatever feelings sprung from it afterwards.

As though the thought of Poe's lips on her own wasn't torturous enough, the storm in the background made his eyes look archaically enchanting, a sort of peaceful darkness about them.

Either way, it would seem, Calista was damned. And then she wasn't. Abruptly, the sky caught on fire and ships rained down to cause unspeakable destruction below.

A gust of wind blew, strong, and Poe's hands wrapped themselves around her shoulders as if it were second nature. He shielded her from the pinching sting of sand grains hurtling towards them. When he released his grip, Poe's face was contorted by anger and shock, his fists clenched tight.

Calista's ears rang as her heart went painfully silent. Ice water made its way through her veins and the shiver crawling up her spine was drenched with adrenaline.

She looked on in horror as a black, beastly ship, previously camouflaged by the dark clouds, fired its cannon at the burning bomber ship.

"Versengen," she whispered in disbelief.

Next thing Calista knew, she and Poe were sprinting towards the tower. Encroaching towards them at impressive speeds was a second ship previously hidden to them. It fired a straight line of plasma rounds into the earth, leaving black marks in its wake. One of the rounds must have hit an old fuel tank because a pocket of flames reached out to the sky from beneath the ground. Cracks formed and the earth trembled. A sinkhole formed before their very eyes, swallowing large parts of shipwrecks into a waterless sea. Their way forward was blocked.