The Rogues drilled hard for another five days in the Skyhoppers.
Luke and Wedge ran the Rogues through all the pairings, practiced maneuvers, and then ran all the pairings again.
The results often weren’t what they expected.
After reviewing the telemetry from the Independence ambush, Luke had thought he had a good grasp on how the pair dynamics would shake out, but he was rapidly proven wrong. Wedge’s initial notes on who he’d expected to work well together were similarly worthless, forcing them both to conclude that they’d drawn conclusions prematurely.
Luke and Wedge had agreed that putting Wes and Puck together in a wingpair would be chaos incarnate, but they tried it anyway to see how effective it would look in the two-vs-three doctrine. Wedge suspected they’d end up separated and picked apart, given that both pilots flew aggressively. Instead, as a pair, they flew far too conservatively to be effective. Wedge had been entirely flummoxed by the results, and it wasn’t until after Luke had slept on it that he’d understood the issue: both pilots knew the other was aggressive and didn’t trust the other would stay together. Lack of trust killed their effectiveness.
On the other hand, when paired with one of the steadier veterans, like Zev Senesca or Hobbie, both of them were happy to take the aggressive approach, knowing instinctively that they could rely on their wingman to be where they needed to be, allowing them to lean fully into their instincts without fear.
At the Independence ambush, Luke had pointed out to Wedge that Cesi Eirriss was reluctant to take lead (and Janson reluctant to yield it), limiting their ability to operate as a pair; but in training, Cesi had unflinchingly overridden Wes in simulated combat when she had the better line or yielded when Wes had the better shot. Wedge had offered the observation that the Independence ambush had been a high-stress, unexpected fight with a brand-new doctrine, and training was allowing better pairings to emerge. In other pairings, Cesi was unflinching under fire as both lead and wingman, flying like she understood what the galaxy was demanding and determined to provide it.
After more evaluation, Luke and Wedge also agreed the three greenest pilots needed to fly with veterans. Karie Neth was the best of them, having survived some actual combat minutes, but in the heat of the moment tended to fall back onto her instinct and forget her new training. Luke was certain more repetitions would help integrate her training into her instincts, but until she was more reliable, she’d do best staying in the wingman position. Kit Valent, on the other hand, tended to overthink instead of trusting his instinct, slowing him down; he needed a partner he’d trust until he trusted his own instincts. Samoc Farr was the most precise flyer of the trio and was doing well in simulation, but Luke wanted to see how she’d respond to actual combat flight. He hoped she’d be aggressive enough to push one of his conservative veterans, like Hobbie, out of a default defensive posture.
Wedge grumbled at length about Tycho Celchu after every evaluation. “He flies like a droid,” was the sentence Luke had heard the most often from his executive officer, and to be fair, the telemetry did little to disprove it. Among all twelve Rogues, Tycho was the most mechanically correct pilot, taking absolutely correct lines in almost every situation. He lacked the conservative, defensive flying of Hobbie or the aggressive edge of Puck; he simply was. Luke suspected they’d end up putting one of the rookies with Celchu, because he’d keep a wingman alive, but Luke fervently wished he could find a way to crack the man’s shell. He was withdrawn, seldom smiled, seldom frowned, and showed all the emotional range of a flight computer. I don’t want him to break in the cockpit in the middle of a mission, Luke had privately despaired.
And then there was Mara. Luke supposed she should be included in the list with the green pilots, but she flew far more like a seasoned veteran than her age would imply. In training, she flew at least decently well with everyone, though Wedge had observed that she tended to fly like her wingman. Pairing her with Zev resulted in a highly conservative pair that could survive almost anything but with few kills to show for it; pairing her with Cesi or Wedge led to a lot more kills but increased risk; putting her with the rookies was three times over a disaster, with none of them producing anything approaching combat chemistry.
Luke suspected he knew the optimal solution, but outside the cockpit he wasn’t ready to trust his instincts.
Wedge was waiting in their shared quarters when Luke ducked inside, out of the blazing suns, carrying a tray of food.
“If Wes and Puck can manage to behave for another two days, they’ll finally be off kitchen duty,” Luke remarked. “I’m not sure who we’ll put in charge of cooking.”
“I wouldn’t be in a hurry to pick out the next person for the mess,” Wedge deadpanned, not looking up from his datapad.
“Probably.” Luke set the tray down before seating himself across from Wedge. “Training notes?”
“Is there anything else to do on this rock?”
“You could take up moisture farming. It’s lucrative here.”
“Or I could move to a planet where the water lets itself out of the air.”
Luke nodded and poked at his food with a utensil, finally setting it down. “How close are you to finalizing pairs?”
Wedge frowned, looking up for the first time to meet Luke’s gaze. “Me? I thought we were doing that together.”
“We need to talk,” Luke said bluntly. “About all of this.”
The datapad went down on the table. “Talk about what?”
Luke took a deep breath. “Okay, I’m going to talk, you’re going to listen.” Keep it coherent, Luke. “The training run, five days ago. You sabotaged my comms.” He leaned forward, meeting Wedge’s hazel eyes. “You did that deliberately, and it wasn’t part of the training for that stage. I’ve read through all the training curriculum you wrote, and we’re not doing simulated comm failures for at least another week. You deliberately tried to undercut me, didn’t you?“
Wedge sat for a moment, clearly thinking it over. “I did,” he admitted. “You made a stupid bet with Janson.”
“That wasn’t your call to make,” Luke said, striving to keep his voice even, though a little anger slipped in anyway. “Wes needed to be fully committed to the engagement for the lesson to sink in.”
“Luke, you’ve never trained fighter pilots before.”
“You’re right, but I did grow up in a Skyhopper cockpit with a lot of braggarts who hated owning up to their own shortcomings. I wasn’t publicly humiliating Wes; I was making sure he remembered what was about to happen.” Luke leaned forward. “If you have a problem with how I’m doing something, you talk to me, you don’t try to undermine my authority. You’re my executive officer. I can’t run the squadron without you. But I also can’t run it if you pull that sort of stunt again. The squadron won’t follow me if you don’t have my back.” He shook his head. “I’m not asking for an apology. Just don’t do it again.”
Wedge’s expression was mixed as he worked through Luke’s rebuke.
That’s good enough for now. “The other topic we need to discuss: Mara.”
This time Wedge’s expression hardened. “What about her?”
“Wedge,” Luke said, his voice becoming more gentle, “you have to stop worrying about Syndulla.”
Whatever words the Corellian had been expecting out of Luke’s mouth, that statement clearly wasn’t it. “What?”
“You’ve got a blind spot the size of a Star Destroyer, Wedge. I think Hobbie does, too. You both served under Syndulla in Phoenix Group, and you’re both terrified something is going to happen to Mara because of it.” Luke shook his head. “She’s a combat pilot, and a good one. You can’t coddle her because you’re afraid of a Rebel general outside your chain of command.”
Wedge found his voice. “You’ve never seen an angry Hera Syndulla.”
“You’ve never seen a Tatooine sandstorm,” Luke replied with a shrug. “It doesn’t matter. Do you remember what Mara told us when we interviewed her back on Yavin?” When Wedge shook his head, Luke supplied the answer. “If I’m in your squadron, I follow the orders you give me and no one else’s. She was afraid of this exact thing.” He held up his hand to forestall comment. “There’s history I don’t know about, I know. But Wedge, we’re building a squadron. She’s earned her place here several times over. If you coddle her because you’re scared of Syndulla, you’re sabotaging the squadron and doing everyone a disservice.”
“Anything else I’ve been wrong about?” Wedge asked sardonically.
“I’m sure I could come up with a list if I asked Hobbie,” Luke replied. “Next subject. Pairings.”
“Like I said before, I thought we were doing that together,” Wedge said, letting a breath escape.
Luke was already shaking his head. “No. I’m turning it over to you.”
Wedge studied him for a moment. “Because of the promise you made to Jade.”
“That’s one of the reasons, yes.” Luke didn’t need to elaborate, and Wedge didn’t push; they’d already had that argument the day after Luke had talked to Mara about the Force after Wedge had drawn conclusions from combat telemetry. “But also because I think you’ll do a better job of it. I operate too much on instinct, and this isn’t instinct work – it’s datapad work.”
“And if you don’t like the roster I come up with?” Wedge asked, a bit of edge in his voice. “You’re already questioning my judgment, Luke.”
“Then I learn to live with it,” Luke said simply. “I just told you to talk to me if you have a problem with a command decision I make. I have told you where I have a problem with the command decisions you have made. And now I’m extending trust again.” He met the other’s eyes, expression steady and unflinching. “You’re still my executive officer. Draw up the roster.”
The twin suns setting was usually a signal to the Rogues to fall into their racks and sleep. Morning flight hours in the Skyhoppers, afternoon classroom instruction, and constant maintenance to keep the airspeeders flying, along with camp maintenance, cooking, and even regular checkups on the X-wings to ensure the starfighters were ready to fly at a moment’s notice, filled the day to the point of exhaustion.
Tonight was different, though. After the afternoon classroom session, Commander Skywalker had ordered a stand-down for the next day. No flying, no training, no classroom, just rest.
Janson had told Mara, “Straight west of camp when the second sun hits the horizon,” while ladling protein slop onto her tray at the evening meal, and against her better judgment she found herself walking out with Cesi Eirriss.
Over a small dune, in a sandy depression just outside the nominal perimeter of the training camp, Wes and Puck had been busy.
A pit had been dug and lined with stone, now filled with burning scrub brush and bushes common in this particular stretch of Tatooine. Camp chairs were stuck in the sand in a circle around the fire, and most of the Rogues were already present.
Wes raised a flask. “Jade! Eirriss! Come join us, ladies!”
Mara snorted as they descended into the hollow. “Please tell me that isn’t the poison you were brewing on the Independence,” she said.
Wes sniffed, mock-haughtily. “Poison? Hardly. Also, this is Puck’s batch.”
“Please tell me you have something other than jet juice,” Cesi said with a raised eyebrow.
Hobbie spoke up from a chair on the far side of the fire. “They do. It doesn’t mean it’s better.”
Puck was already rifling through a crate. “What kind of savages do you think we are? We’ve got a couple of bottles of Corellian whiskey, for one.”
“Whyren’s Reserve?” Cesi asked, a note of hope in her voice.
“I’m a Rebel pilot. I don’t have the credits for Whyren’s. It’s Double Worlds.”
Cesi made a face. “Better that than your homebrew. Unless you have anything else.”
“We’ve got a couple bottles of lum,” Puck said helpfully. “And two bottles of Tatooine wine.” He frowned. “I have no idea where these came from.”
“That was from me,” a familiar voice said from the top of the ridge.
Mara turned and saw Skywalker and Wedge descending into the hollow.
Wes and Puck exchanged guilty looks.
“You’re off-duty, Rogues,” Wedge said with a wry smile. “I would have been surprised if you weren’t out here drinking.”
“To hangovers,” Wes said, lifting a battered metal cup in the air.
The Rogues gathered around the fire, all present now. Mara glanced between them: Karie and Kit, both already flushed; Samoc nearby with a wicked smile; Zev and Tycho, deep in a private conversation; Hobbie sitting and staring into the fire; Wes and Puck rummaging through bottles of spirits; Cesi content to stand near the fire for the moment with Mara; and now Luke and Wedge joining them. Mara frowned at the last pair, clocking a bit of discomfort in Wedge’s posture and masked strain around Skywalker’s eyes. Not my business, she decided after a moment.
Wes came up with more battered cups, passing them into empty hands, including Mara’s, before Puck came around with one of the bottles of Tatooine wine. “Calwell Farms,” the latter man announced as he filled cups in turn. “The finest of Tatooine beverages.”
“Cheapest,” Skywalker corrected. “Moisture farm teenagers don’t exactly have a lot of credits. Calwell tastes okay and never cost much.”
When everyone’s cup had been filled, Wes lifted his in the air. “To the planet that water abandoned,” he toasted.
Mara peered at her cup for a moment, hesitating. Alcohol of any form wasn’t really a part of her life; the Ghost crew seldom imbibed, and before that, a clouded head wasn’t conducive to survival. The rest of the Rogues were all drinking the sweet-smelling wine, though. Hell with it. I’m a combat pilot. How bad could it be? She lifted the cup and drank, swallowing fast.
It burned going down, and she barely kept from coughing.
To her surprise, several of the Rogues actually did cough.
“This is your good wine?” Zev asked.
Skywalker smiled. “For Tatooine? Yes.”
Wedge shook his head. “Puck, Wes, get us something good to drink.”
The fire burned as the Rogues sat and the sky grew darker. Mara let the conversation wash over her, not eager to speak but finding some strange contentment in the presence of the squadron and the warmth growing in her chest as some of the Corellian whiskey made its way around.
It was Janson who threw out the challenge. “Best piloting story. And by best I mean funniest. Let’s not be boring and heroic here. Looking at you, boss. No one wants to hear about blowing up a Death Star.”
Skywalker smiled, but to Mara it looked distant, like his mind was elsewhere. Or maybe it was the alcohol.
“You first, Wes,” Wedge said.
Wes was more than happy to share with a captive audience. “Tierfon Yellow Aces,” he said, “because all my best stories start there. We were training on Y-wings. We had a bombing range setup with multiple targets on a low-gravity moon. Our usual training configuration was a set of dummy free-fall bombs with minimal guidance.” He smiled, cheer and alcohol evident on his face in equal amounts. “Jek Porkins and I were supposed to fly a run with our training officer. We showed up, preflighted, and took off for the range.”
“Pretty dull so far,” Cesi commented. “Come on, Wes, amuse us.”
“I’m getting there. We get to the range, and the training officer leads us through a couple of simulated passes, safeties on, no bomb drop. Just to get a feel for it. We set up for the fourth pass, and he tells us to go safeties-off and we’re being scored based on our accuracy.” His face grew even merrier. “We’re over the range and hit the releases. And way too late to do anything, we found out our Y-wings had been loaded with live proton bombs, not dummies.” He flared his fingers out in a simulated explosion. “Turned the entire target range into one big smoking crater. Our trainer was not happy, chewed Porkins and me both out for requisitioning the wrong equipment for the training run…until he realized he was the one who’d ordered the ground crew to arm the Y-wings.” His grin stretched ear-to-ear. “Porkins and I both got full marks for accuracy. There wasn’t a target left standing.”
Chuckles spread around the fire.
Puck told a story next: an early training mission in an R-22 Spearhead, coming in to land on a frozen lake and accidentally hooking the throttle control on the sleeve of his flightsuit as he set down, sending the fighter skidding across three hundred meters of ice before it ended up buried nose-first in a snowbank. His flight instructor hadn’t said a word but handed him a shovel and told him to report for debrief once the Spearhead was parked in its designated slip.
Kit volunteered a tale from his first trip off Huulia. All of fifteen years old at the time, he’d hired on as a crewman on a tramp freighter. At their first port-of-call, the captain had told Kit to talk to the customs official. Kit, knowing some of the freighter’s cargo, had tried to bribe the man, only to be informed later he was the captain’s second cousin once-removed or some such. He never got his credits back, with the captain calling it a tax on stupidity.
Hobbie spoke next, just a few words. “A few weeks after Wedge and I jumped ship, General Syndulla had me on a training rotation on Atollon in a Spearhead. I overshot the landing zone when we were doing touch-and-go practice runs and crashed the trainer. Had to walk half a klick back to base. The next day, Syndulla had me on the combat roster. She told me if I was lucky enough to survive a crash like that, I was lucky enough to survive a combat.”
“That’s a Syndulla story, not a Klivian story,” Janson protested.
Hobbie had shrugged and retreated into silence.
Tycho Celchu offered his own misdeeds at the Imperial training academy at Prefsbelt IV. A night of drinking with his fellow cadets, including Skywalker’s Tatooine friend Biggs Darklighter, had led to spectacularly bad decision-making that ended with the academy commandant’s personal TIE decorated with a ludicrous number of fighter kills. Celchu maintained that the kill tallies had been calculated based on the commandant’s bragging about his combat exploits. His instructor, one Imperial captain Soontir Fel, had officially been unable to ascertain which cadets were responsible and had privately told Celchu to make sure nothing so stupid happened a second time.
Mara thought, for the first time, she saw a crack of real emotion on Celchu’s face, but she couldn’t identify it. Grief? Anger? Some odd bit of fondness for his instructor and fellow trainees? It was impossible to tell.
Karie Neth’s tale involved transposing coordinates on a navigation drill in flight school, leading her flight of Z-95 Headhunters hundreds of kilometers out of position. She maintained her own innocence, however, suggesting it was her instructor’s mistake and he refused to fess up.
Wedge told a brief story about a smuggling run he took for the Rebellion after his defection, hauling a cargo of blaster rifles on a stolen Imperial shuttle through a blockade to a resistance cell on the surface. He was intercepted by a customs patrol on his inbound route and convinced the inspector, who was on his first tour without an immediate supervisor, that the cargo was for the Imperial garrison on the surface.
Zev volunteered his own memory of gunrunning; his cover cargo included Corellian whiskey and, unbeknownst to him, it was subject to local tariffs. The Imperial port inspector completely missed the hidden cargo of A280 blaster rifles, but fined him for failing to declare the whiskey. The resulting fine had eaten up the entire profit from the smuggling run.
Samoc’s misdeeds dated back to the tender age of fourteen, when she’d crashed an airspeeder on Chandrila into a private beach house owned by the Mothma family. Mon Mothma herself had accepted Samoc’s apology and restitution for repairs to her property, and had paid for a year of piloting lessons for the young woman to ensure it didn’t happen again.
Cesi volunteered her own tale next, though it wasn’t strictly a piloting misadventure. “My doctoral thesis was on the fragility of Imperial governance and the inevitability of rebellion. My advisor told me my research was thorough, my citations immaculate, and my conclusions well-supported. He also explained to me, in exquisite detail, what Imperial powers-that-be would think of it when it came to some government official’s attention in the Imperial Education department. And he offered me, quietly, a name and office on Alderaan I should contact if I wanted to put my thesis to work in the real galaxy.” The Twi’lek shook her head. “The contact and the office are both gone now, of course. But she put me through an aptitude test and I was as surprised as anyone to score highly on all the prerequisites for starfighter combat. I can’t say pilot was on my list of aspirations, but here I am.”
Mara unconsciously fingered the pendant, which had slipped out from under her shirt. Her hand gripped it tightly when eleven heads turned toward her, and she realized it was her turn.
“Yavin Four,” she said aloud. “After I officially certified on the X-wing thanks to Wedge and Hobbie, General Merrick asked me if I’d be interested in joining Blue Squadron. When I said yes, he took me for a check flight in orbit.” A small smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. “We ran a skirmish against some Red Squadron pilots. I scored one kill during the dogfight. I got so target-fixated I completely ignored my astromech screaming at me and shot down Merrick.”
Laughter rolled around the campfire, and Mara couldn’t keep the smile completely in check. “Afterward, he told me it was very fine maneuvering, but he was glad the Empire didn’t use X-wings because he’d hate for me to accidentally mistake him for an enemy.” She shook her head. “He put me through a whole week of target identification drills.”
“What about you, Commander?” Puck asked.
Skywalker looked down in his cup, then at the mostly-empty bottle of Tatooine wine. He’s the only one drinking the stuff, Mara noted with amusement.
“I’m not sure I’ve drank enough to tell any of the good stories,” he said wryly after a moment. “Most of my stories are about people who aren’t here anymore. Doesn’t feel right to tell them.” He looked up, around at the Rogues, and then raised his cup. “To absent friends,” he said after a moment. “To those who came before us, and those who will come after us.”
Cups raised in response to the toast. Rogues drank. Wes and Puck heckled him about his lack of story, but Skywalker didn’t relent. The stars were out now, the twin suns long asleep over the horizon. The fire had burned down to embers. The Corellian whiskey was gone, the two flasks of jet juice were empty – even Mara had risked a swallow of it and regretted her decision – and the Rogues were slowly settling into companionable quiet as exhaustion crept over them.
In twos and threes, the Rogues began to head back to their quarters, where sleep awaited. Karie and Samoc first; a few minutes later, Zev and Tycho and Kit; Wedge and Hobbie after, Puck right behind them, with Wedge pausing just long enough to exchange a look with Skywalker that Mara didn’t quite understand; then Wes and Cesi, which struck Mara as odd. And then only Mara remained with Skywalker, the fire nothing but embers.
“You didn’t tell a story,” Mara said at length.
“No.” Skywalker looked down in his cup, then tossed the remaining contents into the sand. “Didn’t want to ruin the mood. The squadron needed the relief tonight.”
Mara studied him for a moment, deciding. “Thank you,” she said.
He looked up, meeting her gaze and raising an eyebrow. “For?”
“Not asking.”
Skywalker nodded, his expression a complicated mix. “You’re welcome.” He kicked sand over the coals; it took only a minimal effort before all trace of the fire had been extinguished. “Get some sleep. Tomorrow is a day off. But after that, we’ll be moving into the next stage of training.”
“Permanent pairs?” Mara asked before she could stop herself. This is why I shouldn’t drink, she chided herself.
“Wedge is drawing up the roster.” Skywalker’s smile was genuine. “Though knowing him, it’s probably already done. We don’t know how much time we really have before we’re called back to the fight, and I want Rogue Squadron to be ready when the moment comes.”