Close to Me {Poe Dameron}

twenty-one

They had barely gotten back to work when Kat's commlink began to ring. She quickly put a hold on the wires and moved to sit on one of the jump seats in the room. Hope filled her chest as she answered. "Poe? Please tell me you have good news."

Poe let out a heavy sigh. Finn, Rey, BB-8, and C-3PO were all in the back of Ochi's ship while he remained in the cockpit to call Kat to give her an update. Things on Pasaana were a complete failure, not to mention he had to tell her about yet another loss to her family. "It's not the greatest, Kat."

"I really don't like the sound of that. Are you all okay?"

"Mostly." He sighed once more. "Listen, Kat, we've had a loss."

Rose whipped her head around to face her friend, worry written all over it. "Finn okay?" She called out so she could be heard.

"Yeah, Finn's fine. It was Chewie. He was taken by the First Order and Rey tried to bring the transporter back by the Force but Ren started to pull on it too until it became too much of a strain on Rey and it blew up."

The moment he said the Wookiee's name, Kat's heart dropped but as he continued to tell what happened, she started to hold back tears. "No," she gasped out. "No, I don't believe it. He can't be gone."

"I'm so sorry, Kat." He leaned forward, shoulders slouched over with the added weight of yet another loss. He pinched the bridge of his nose, giving her some space to grieve before moving on with the update: there was currently no plan because the one thing they had needed to continue had been lost with Chewbacca.

She sniffled, trying to reign in her emotions for the time being so she could help plan their next move. They could still lean on Lando. They could go back with the First Order now gone.

At the sound of her sniffling, Poe's head popped back up. He hated that he wasn't there to physically comfort her. "Hey, hey, no crying while I'm not there. I can't wipe 'em away if I'm not there."

She let out a sound that was mixed between crying and laughing. "Does this mean you're coming back to base?" Maybe that would be better. They could regroup then head back out. If only they weren't on a time crunch.

"No." He shook his head, hating that had to be his answer. They couldn't return, not now. It would take up too much time. "Right now we're hiding out in an asteroid belt to wait out the First Order. We ran into Lando Calrissian though and he was helpful so maybe we'll head back and talk to him once the coast is clear. Cause we found this dagger that had the location of the Wayfinder on it but even though C-3PO was able to read it, they can't translate Sith. Something about being against protocol so maybe there's something to be done there. Oh! And did you know that stormtroopers can fly now?" He said, trying to make her smile at least a little.

"They fly now?" She asked in disbelief.

Poe chuckled a bit at the sense of deja vu. "Yeah, they fly now. Jetpacks and everything. How're things on your end?"

"Well," Kat let out a small huff, "Rose and I have been working on these memory banks of sorts to try and see if there's anything useful on it since the Tantive IV was kind of a big deal before Vader took it out of commission. Leia said there should be plenty of old holos on here with information stolen by our parents, essentially."

"Sounds like you've got your work cut out for ya."

She laughed a bit. "Yeah, sure is." Silence fell over them, not really wanting to say goodbye but knowing they both needed to return to what they were doing. "I think going back to see Lando would be the best plan right now unless you find some other way to get Threepio to translate what was on that dagger. Just be careful going back. They probably still left a few guards there to patrol the festival."