Close to Me {Poe Dameron}

twenty-four

"We hope," Rose said as she hurried past, getting ready to help with the attack.

"We hope," Finn confirmed, reaching out to give her a quick kiss.

"You heard the General. All Wings, cover that lander." Poe ordered.

They all flew towards the command ship. Kat gripped her steering wheel tight. Nerves were coursing through her bad, bordering on fear. She trusted Finn's judgment, of course, but there was so much risk and only so many of them and there was still no sign of Lando and Chewie.

Just then the Star Destroyers thrusters roared to life. They were getting closer and closer to take off. Kat took a few deep breaths. She still had hope. They had this, they weren't expecting them to not use speeders. They still had some surprise on their hands.

"Those thrusters are hot." Poe's voice came through the comm system. "How are we doing?" He asked.

"We're going to blow our way in and take down that nav tower," Finn said.

"All the hatches are blast-proof!" Jannah reminded him.

"All right, BB-8, you're up!" He then ordered, causing the orange astromech droid to start rolling towards the hatch that led to the nav tower with Jannah and Finn covering the droid.

The droid got the hatch open and soon Finn tossed down every grenade he carried with him which led to an explosion that climbed up the navigation tower.

"Nice one, Finn! Nav signal's down but not for long." Poe exclaimed once he saw the explosion.

They had been victorious with their first part of the plan despite some detours and yet there were still no signs of the Falcon, of help from any others, which Snap pointed out. Kat sighed, wanting to make a quip about his optimism but she had always appreciated his straightforwardness.

Apparently, Artoo had chirped in agreement for Poe answered, "I don't know Artoo, maybe nobody else is coming."

"What do we do General?" Jess asked.

"Poe, we gotta hit 'em ourselves," Kat said after letting out a sigh. She didn't like this at all but it was all they could do at the moment.

"We gotta hit 'em ourselves." He agreed with a heavy sigh, not liking the idea either but Kat would have suggested something else if there was another way. "Alright, you heard the General. Just do your best to stay alive and hit those cannons."

Even then there were far too many of them and not enough Resistance fighters. Pilots were being shot down left and right. They could barely even take out a canon. The ground team was still fighting against the Red Stormtroopers and while Finn had a plan, he wasn't sure how successful it would be. He just knew that he had to take down this command ship then maybe, that would buy them enough time for help to arrive. Things were happening far too quickly after all, or so it seemed.

When he heard the warning to Snap, Poe looked around to find his friend's location but it was too late. Snap had been hit and his X-Wing crashed into the side of a destroyer. "No!" He cried out, flashes of Muran came up, making it hard to breathe. He then looked frantically for Kat's A-Wing but all he saw was so many of his friends being taken out by the TIEs. Pilots voices were shouting through the radio connection but all he could think about is how he once again led all of his friends to a losing battle. He had brought everyone to their deaths and now he couldn't even find Kat.

"Poe, you still there?" Her voice finally came through.

He let out a sigh of relief before that same fear settled in once again. "Kat, my friends, I'm so sorry. I thought we had a shot. There's just too many of them."