Their Lady Adyé [Star Wars]

The Trouble with Squad-mates

He had to admit that, so far as ships went, the Amaran Flame was fairly large, especially when compared with the Falcon, snub-fighters or, well, a person. But right now, Luke was finding it entirely too small.

No matter where he went, he couldn't seem to escape his squad-mates, and no matter what he said—or didn't say, even—they wouldn't leave him alone. Especially Hobbie and Dak. He suspected Wes would be on his case too if he'd been on this mission, but that was of little consolation. Wedge, at least, was mostly staying out of it, but every now and then he'd add in his own quips and comments, adding to the heckling. They all seemed intent on tormenting him to within an inch of his sanity.

Worse, they seemed particularly intent on making a fool out of him around Tamara.

He knew perfectly well he liked her. As more than a friend. But his squad-mates had made absolutely sure he knew, not that they'd really needed to. He'd been attracted to her—no, drawn was a better way to put it, at least at first; it had been more than simple attraction—right from their first encounter on Dantooine. But then, it was hard not to be. Tamara was young, beautiful and supremely confident. She was witty, she was smart and she was observant. She was bold when she wanted to, hard when it was necessary but could also be reserved and patient when she needed to be. She didn't let anyone take advantage of her. He could go on and on.

And she just seemed to understand him, and he was fairly certain it wasn't just because of her comparative mastery of the Force. Despite her own teasing and her insistent use of the nickname 'Farmboy'—a nickname he no longer minded, when it came from her...not that he was about to tell her that—she still respected him despite his inexperience, and had far more faith in him and his untrained Force abilities than he thought he deserved. And even though there were times when he severely missed Ben's calm patience, she took her tutoring of him seriously. He enjoyed their time together, their training sessions, even despite his limited progress. They just seemed to work well together. And even though he had nowhere near the skills she did, he still somehow felt he knew Tamara instinctively. There were times, even, when he could tell her moods better than anyone else just by a flash in her blue-grey eyes, a shift in her body language or a twitch at the corner of her lip.

Which led back to his blasted squad-mates. There was nothing going on between him and Tamara—not that he didn't want there to be—but they seemed certain there was. Especially since Wedge had first picked up on Luke's growing feelings for the Lady Captain just before she'd thrown in officially with the Alliance.

Wedge was just being his usual, genial yet unintentionally perceptive self when he'd asked Luke if he'd made any sort of move on Tamara. When Luke had started, stammering out questions on what Wedge was talking about, the other pilot had merely shrugged, stating it was obvious that Luke liked her. Luke hadn't thought it obvious at all. He'd barely even realized his initial admiration of the young Captain had shifted into something else in the first place.

It had all gone downhill from there.

In his defense, Wedge hadn't realized Dak had entered the mess and just made it into earshot when he'd asked, what the Corellian fighter pilot had thought, was a perfectly innocent question. But Luke still had to fight back the urge to scowl every time he saw Antilles now. To his credit, Wedge nearly always wore an apologetic expression around Luke since then...save when he was enjoying the entertainment fueled by the other knuckleheads in the squadron... Dak, on the other hand, was a notorious gossip and had quickly seen to informing the rest of the squadron, making sure they knew about Luke's 'crush.' Of course, Hobbie, not wanting to miss out on the fun, had quickly taken up with Dak in heckling Luke and Wes hadn't been far behind.

Usually, Luke was able to avoid too much in the way of teasing by virtue of being the Rogue Group commander and he was mostly able to ignore the ribbing that came after he 'disappeared' to meet up with Tamara for training, not that he had much choice, there. His mates, of course, always took it the wrong way upon figuring out just who it was he met up with, but Luke was helpless to correct them since his Jedi training had to be kept secret.