Wedge waited in the prefab briefing room as the Rogues filtered in, feeling oddly nervous. He chided himself internally. You flew against the Death Star, Antilles. Why are you nervous about handing out the new pair assignments?
But he also knew the answer. Because I don’t want a bad wing assignment to get someone killed. The worst part about trying something new is knowing you’re going to make mistakes along the way.
Luke was the last into the tent, walking in with Tycho. He said something to the Alderaanian that Wedge couldn’t hear before they parted ways, with Celchu seating himself in the last open seat in the briefing room while Luke walked to the front.
“I hope you’ve all slept off your hangovers,” Wedge opened, “because we’re ready to move into the next phase of training.”
“Does that involve someone else getting kitchen duty?” Puck asked.
“That remains to be seen.” Wedge picked up his datapad and turned the screen on. “Commander Skywalker and I spent the first ten days of training observing how all of you worked together, and we’ve finalized our roster.” He cleared his throat. “Before I begin, I want you all to understand something: your assignment is not a reflection of your skills or our opinion of your ability. Rogue Twelve is not a less prestigious position than Rogue Two. Understood?”
There was a general murmur of assent. Good enough. They should already know Rogue Squadron isn’t a normal unit and the old expectations don’t apply.
“Commander Skywalker is Rogue Leader,” Wedge started.
Wes Janson sighed theatrically. “My leadership skills are once again overlooked. Here I had hoped…”
“For more kitchen duty, I know. Rogue Two is Mara Jade.” Wedge spared her a glance. The Rogues’ youngest pilot looked apprehensive, but not surprised. He risked a look around the briefing room, and was satisfied that the expressions ranged from curious to nods of understanding. Good. No one thinks I’ve lost my mind yet, except maybe me.
“Rogue Three is Derek Klivian. Rogue Four is Puck Naeco.” Puck’s smile stretched from ear to ear. Hobbie rolled his eyes.
“I’m flying as Rogue Five. Rogue Six is Samoc Farr.” The Chandrilan woman had a small smile, apparently satisfied with the assignment.
“Rogue Seven, Tycho Celchu. Rogue Eight, Kit Valent.” The Alderaanian looked sober, but that was a step up from his usual stone-faced expression. Valent looked relieved.
“Rogue Nine, Zev Senesca. Rogue Ten, Karie Neth.” Zev nodded as though expecting the assignment; Karie’s smile was genuine.
“And finally,” Wedge concluded, “that leaves Cesi Eirriss as Rogue Eleven, and Wes Janson as Rogue Twelve.” He set his datapad down. “In any given pair, the leader is the odd number, and the wingman is the even, though that needs to remain fluid in combat as an engagement unfolds. When we break into four-ship flights, Luke leads One Flight, I lead Two Flight, and Zev leads Three Flight. Questions?”
Cesi’s hand was in the air. “Can I requisition a different wingman?”
“You can try, but if High Command had a better one, you’d already have him.”
“In my defense,” Wes said, “the captain pointed out Rogue Twelve is no less prestigious than Rogue Two.”
“Rogue Two doesn’t own a copy of Fifty Shades of Ryloth,” Cesi retorted.
“You don’t actually know that,” Wes shot back. “And I told you before, that wasn’t me.”
Wedge cleared his throat. “Your days of kitchen duty are certainly coming to a middle.” Chuckles rolled around the Rogues, but their attention was focused forward again. “Now that we have pairs assigned, we’re on to training. Commander?”
Luke stepped forward to take the center, allowing Wedge to step back. “The first phase of training was about drilling basics into everyone. If something goes wrong, any of us should be able to fly with anyone else in the squadron. But from this point forward, you’re going to be training with your wingman. We’ll be doing more skirmishes, yes, but we’ll also be drilling comm failures, wingman loss, improvising a rejoin, and any other potential failure Wedge and I have nightmares about. If you think of a scenario we’re not drilling, talk to me so we can come up with a plan.”
“On the subject of comm failures,” Tycho spoke up, “how do we prevent the comm overload we had during the Independence ambush? Is that what the comm failure drill is about?”
Luke shook his head. “Wedge and I have built out a more comprehensive comm protocol. All Rogue pilots will be set up to listen to three channels: fleet, squadron, and flight. In combat, you’ll be talking on squadron or flight channels. If comms get too noisy, your astromech can cut the fleet channel from your comm. We’re prioritizing hearing each other, though as we get better flying as pairs, we’ll need less voice chatter to work together.” He looked around at the squadron. “We were lucky that no one died last time. We’re not going to depend on luck the next time.”
“Are we still flying the Skyhoppers?” Samoc asked. “Or are we back in the X-wings now?”
“Skyhoppers for most of our flight hours, but we’ll start taking the X-wings up for limited drills, too. The maintenance overhead on the X-wings is far higher than the Skyhoppers, so don’t expect a lot of stick time there yet.”
Hobbie grunted. “Last thing we want is an X-wing down for repairs if the Empire finds us.”
We may be far from the eyes of the Empire, Wedge thought grimly, but all it takes is the wrong glance in our direction and we’d be running again.
“Any more questions?” Luke looked around, but no more hands raised. “All right, then. Wedge has the new training schedule ready, so let’s get started.”
Eight days of training passed, and Luke proved to be an even harder taskmaster than Wedge.
Wedge laid out a training plan; Luke enforced it. New drills were demonstrated, and then Luke required pairs to fly them until perfected. And then he’d have the Rogues run them a day later, after they’d completed the newest set of exercises, to prove they had learned the lesson completely.
Wedge entirely approved.
They started with variations on the same exercises they’d already run: breaks, split-and-reform, defensive turns to provide offensive opportunities, brackets, all run repeatedly for pilots to adjust to flying exclusively with their wingmen, each exercise increasing in speed and requiring ever-increasing precision to complete successfully. And then they ran all those exercises again, layering in simulated equipment failures, comm blackouts, and lost pilots. With only five flying Skyhoppers, Luke ran the exercises as two versus one, two versus two, and two versus three, pointing out to the Rogues that any combination was possible.
Rogue Squadron could very well be the first squadron in the war to adopt the two-ship element, but Luke pointed out, repeatedly, that there was every chance some Imperial ace was drilling his squadron in the same tactics.
Luke didn’t exempt himself from the drills, either; as near as Wedge could tell, Luke was pushing himself harder. Outside of his wingpair drills with Mara, he flew more in the aggressor role than anyone else, pushing each of the Rogues to their limits. Once he found a failure point, he’d stop long enough to help pilots correct mistakes, and then he’d be back to pushing each of his people to become better.
Wedge found Luke’s single-minded drive disconcerting.
Through it all, Wedge spent his downtime reviewing telemetry, specifically Luke and Mara’s data. He wasn’t surprised to see Mara’s telemetry continue to look normal; Luke had explained, more briefly than Wedge would’ve liked, that Mara deliberately kept the Force at arm’s length. But more surprising was Luke’s telemetry; he, too, was flying less like a Holostar and more like the rest of the Rogues during drills, albeit with the instinct of an Outer Rim bush pilot who’d spent his formative years in a Skyhopper.
The schedule was grueling; the Rogues ate and slept and maintained the Skyhoppers, but the rest of their waking hours were in the cockpit or the classroom reviewing tactics and telemetry. Even Wes and Puck’s nonsense fell away, with Puck’s good cheer fading into a tired grumble over supper one night. “We’re drilling like TIE pilots.”
Tycho had disagreed. “The Empire drills TIE pilots into obedience and discipline. Commander Skywalker is drilling us to survive.”
Wedge had kept a close eye on the newer pilots. Samoc was nearly unflappable, and while she looked exhausted at night, her flying on Wedge’s wing had been crisp and predictable in the way he needed. Kit’s nervous energy had bled off, though Wedge had observed him more than once staring at the gold chain and medallion that usually lived in his pocket. Superstition isn’t always a bad thing. Sometimes it keeps pilots climbing back into the cockpit. And Karie had grown more confident in her flying, occasionally pushing Zev Senesca in ways that surprised Wedge.
But it was moments outside of training where Wedge saw unexpected progress. He saw Hobbie and Puck playing cards, and Hobbie legitimately smile. He saw Kit talking to Tycho about crewing on a tramp freighter, and Tycho, for just a moment, smiling at something funny. He saw Cesi volunteering to help Wes clean up after evening mess one night. They were small moments, but those small moments were demonstrations that the Rogues – tired, pushed to their limits – were beginning to look after their wingmen.
Which is why he shouldn’t have been surprised about what happened on the eighth night.
The twin suns had slipped over the horizon, and Mara told herself she should be in bed. The squadron had retired to their barracks, and snores were audible from both of the prefab shelters. And yet Mara sat inside the deeper shadow of the mess, cup of caf in hand, contemplating the days of training.
Visibility is death, Mara. The familiar mantra echoed in her mind. She ignored it this time. I don’t have to justify it. I can be a pilot.
She set her datapad down on the table and looked up just in time to catch a flicker of motion through the open door.
Mara froze; her only motion was her right hand dropping to the grip of her blaster.
Her brain caught up a moment later, registering the motion was a person, walking quickly and quietly through the camp. The gait was familiar. Skywalker?
She waited until he was out of sight, then rose to her feet and headed to the mess hall’s door.
Tatooine boasted three moons in addition to its twin suns, and there was plenty of light from the rising moons to spot Skywalker, dressed in civilian clothing with a blaster conspicuous on one hip and lightsaber on the other, walking out past the camp perimeter. His step was quick without rushing, suggesting he had a destination in mind, but wherever it was, it wasn’t inside the training camp.
Mara hesitated. Skywalker was the one who gave the order. No one goes anywhere alone. And there he goes. Alone. She chewed on her lip as she considered, briefly, whether to rouse Wedge. Then she shook her head. No.
Against her better judgment, she followed Skywalker across the perimeter, out of the camp, and into the desert.
His pace was brisk, and he moved with the earned confidence of a native. He didn’t walk a straight path, instead meandering north and south to pick easier climbs when the terrain rose and gentle descents where it fell. He never looked back.
Mara, to her mild annoyance, found her best approach was to follow his path. She tried cutting short his gently curving trail to catch up to him, but found the extra effort it required slowed her, and she fell further behind. He wasn’t running, but he didn’t seem inclined to slow down to let her catch up, and she wondered whether he even knew she was there.
The night grew brighter, but the shadows deeper, as the moons continued a complex dance across the sky. Two of them were bright and clearly visible; the third, on a far more elliptical orbit, was barely more distinctive than a star. Kilometers began to stretch behind them, and the desert air grew colder and more biting. At least the exercise is keeping me warm, Mara thought sardonically. If I had known Skywalker was heading out on a death march across the desert, I would have woken Wedge.
Wouldn’t I have?
She wasn’t sure. She was certain, however, that she regretted not bringing a canteen of water, and her muscles were protesting the pace. She’d been tired before they had left the camp, and the long walk was doing nothing to alleviate that.
The desert noises were not comforting, either. The occasional gust of wind lifted sand and blew it in her face, stinging her eyes and drowning out other noises. Fauna grunted and groaned, and it was difficult to tell how near or far away wildlife was; she was certain the nearest bantha was at least half a kilometer distant, but many other creatures were clearly closer and, she hoped, much smaller.
None of it seemed to disturb Skywalker from his steady march.
Hours rolled past, and Mara’s limbs grew heavier with every passing kilometer. She no longer held any hope of catching up to Skywalker, but she forced herself to match his pace; losing sight of him altogether could be a death sentence for both of them. Or at least me. Damn farmboy would probably wander back into camp just fine.
She lost sight of him when he dropped over the top of a dune. She forced herself to pick up her pace, muscles screaming for rest, hurrying up the slope, but when she crested, she found Skywalker had stopped a hundred meters away.
It was a small Tatooine farmstead. Mara had seen a handful of them during training exercises, from a distance in the air. Skywalker had talked about them, briefly, when asked by Kit. They were small, permanent homes, usually housing only one or two families. Most of the homestead was below ground, away from the oppressive Tatooine sun. They were usually self-contained, providing their own power, sewage, and ventilation systems, with carefully controlled, indoor hydroponic systems to minimize moisture loss while still providing food. Many locals had their own machine shop or garage as well, relying on themselves for survival on the harsh planet.
This farmstead, though, was distinctly different; the walls bore the char of an old fire. A nearby tech dome over the garage was cracked and crumbling, no doubt from internal damage. Sand had begun to reclaim the homestead, pushed by brutal Tatooine winds, but the process was incomplete. A small dome, made from baked local materials of some sort, or perhaps fused sand, had been breached by whoever had burned the homestead.
We’ve flown near here on a training flight, Mara realized. On one of the exercises Wedge led during the first week, when Skywalker was back at camp. Skywalker never led us out this direction.
He was standing in front of the dome, and she could hear that he was speaking; but the distance was too great, his voice too soft, for her to understand what he was saying.
Mara forced herself to think through the implications. This was his home, she concluded. Before the Empire came and burned it down and killed his uncle and aunt while looking for droids. Which means he came back here to…
She sat down on the top of the dune and waited, deliberately choosing not to intrude. Her hand strayed to the Alderaanian pendant around her neck as she watched; her fingers fiddled with it unconsciously as she observed, feeling like an intruder even from her distant vantage point.
Skywalker stood down in the ruins of the homestead for perhaps thirty minutes, occasionally moving, but never far. When he spoke, it was never loud enough for Mara to understand. Whatever pain he was wrestling with, he clearly was keeping it to himself.
It was a decision Mara could understand entirely.
At last, he turned and started up the dune to where she sat, her muscles having eased from pleas for mercy to mere grumbles for sleep. When he reached her, his face was damp, and the dust on his face was streaked with clean lines. His voice, however, was steady. “You didn’t need to come,” he said after he studied her a moment.
“‘No one goes anywhere alone,’ Skywalker,” she admonished him gently with his own words. “That’s the rule. And I am your wingman.”
He offered Mara a hand, and she took it; he helped pull her up to standing. “This isn’t a combat engagement or training exercise,” he said wryly.
“So?”
Skywalker studied her for a moment. “Let’s go,” he said at last, leading back into the desert. This time, however, his pace was slower, and Mara fell into step beside him.
As they walked, he fumbled under his poncho for a moment before withdrawing a canteen of water. He passed it to her without comment. Mara took it, unscrewed the cap, and was rewarded with a stream of cool water that eased her parched throat. Wordlessly, she drank until it was half gone, then passed it back to him. Skywalker took a few swallows, far less than she’d drunk, then screwed the cap back on and returned it to wherever he had clipped it out of sight.
The walk back was both easier and harder. Easier, because Mara wasn’t straining to keep up with Skywalker’s desert-native pace; harder because she was exhausted. They’d flown a full day of training exercises before this impromptu hike across the sand; Mara’s reserves were running low. She suspected Skywalker wasn’t doing much better, but his face was a mask that didn’t seem to acknowledge the pain and weariness he had to be feeling. Nonetheless, the desert felt less terrifying now that she was actually walking with him.
Skywalker didn’t talk much on the long walk back. Occasionally he said something to adjust their route back to camp, and once he stopped her and silenced her, whispering to her after a few moments that there were Sandpeople half a kilometer south and that they wanted to avoid any confrontation. Mara had no idea who the Sandpeople were, but it wasn’t the first time Skywalker had altered his plans to avoid them, and she had no reason to believe he was exaggerating. He was clearly wrapped up in whatever emotions the destroyed homestead had evoked.
The night sky had begun to lighten when the training camp finally came into view. We spent the entire night walking across the desert, Mara thought tiredly. Sunrise is half an hour away or so. Barely time to eat and clean up before we’re going to be back in the cockpit. Her legs ached, her throat was dry, and she wanted nothing more than to crawl into her bunk and sleep.
They were perhaps a hundred meters away from the camp when Mara realized, to her chagrin, there was someone waiting at the edge of the perimeter.
Skywalker never slowed, leading the way straight to where Wedge was waiting with arms crossed. He finally came to a stop, face-to-face with Wedge, but neither man spoke.
Wedge’s eyes flicked over to Mara. He looked her up and down for a moment. “Get some sleep, Jade.” He looked back at Skywalker. “Luke. Kitchen duty.”
Mara blinked at that. The executive officer is assigning his commanding officer to kitchen duty? That can’t be right. She looked over at Skywalker.
He merely nodded.
“Jade,” Wedge repeated. “Sleep.”
Mara looked between the two men for a moment longer, but the only thing she could conclude was, I’m missing something. Maybe it’ll make sense after I sleep.
The barracks was quiet and dark. Her bunk was blessedly warm and comfortable, and she fell asleep almost immediately.