Four Times Plo Koon Hugged the Wolfpack, and One Time They Hugged Him

by archivewriter1

Summary:

War forges unbreakable bonds, ties between comrades that are as powerful as they are unexpected. Plo considers all of his men family, but his bonds are particularly strong with Wolffe, Comet, Sinker, and Boost, the three who survived catastrophe with him, and the shiny who joined them just after the tragedy. When they're hurting, he reaches out to comfort them as a father would his sons - and one day, they reach out in return.

Chapter 1: Comet

Notes:

prompt: "not to me"

“Do you ever think about after, Sir? After the war, I mean.”

 

Plo glanced up from the splint he was fashioning and let his gaze settle on the one for whom it was intended as he considered the question. 

 

It might be easier to come up with a quick answer, he supposed, if he weren’t preoccupied with the events of the past few hours. He had not anticipated an ambush here, and yet there had been one, and his lack of foresight irked him. Their comms were down after the crash landing, and Comet’s leg was still as bloody and misshapen now as it had been when he and the soldier had dragged themselves from their destroyed shuttle. A sheen of feverish sweat glistened on the young trooper’s forehead, more noticeable than when the Kel Dor had begun working on the splint, and that bothered him even more.

 

The Jedi felt his heart constrict at the sight. Comet was practically a shiny, having only shipped into the battalion a few weeks before, and already he had tasted the pain of battle.

 

Yes, he decided. He was all too eager to think about the after of this war.

 

“Periodically,” the Jedi finally replied. “I long for the day that this conflict will end, when the Jedi can return to peaceful meditation and begin helping you and your brothers navigate civilian lives.”

 

There was a long, hesitant pause before Comet spoke again. “You think we’ll have the chance, Sir?”

 

Plo looked up again, forgetting about the finicky material he was working with as he realized the root of the shiny’s concern. “Why would you not?” he asked, probing for the spoken confirmation he knew would come. His soul ached, just as it did every time he had this conversation with a soldier – and there had been many such conversations over the span of the war. Too many.

 

“Well...” Comet swallowed, his face gone pale, but the Kel Dor wasn’t sure if that was from the pain or from the thoughts swirling unwanted in his mind. The trooper’s brown eyes were wide and dilated – he was probably concussed, as well. “We’re clones, Sir. We were made for this, but when it’s over, there won’t be anything for us. So even if we survive the war, we’re…” He frowned at his twisted leg, searching for the right word. “Expendable. Disposable, I guess.”

 

Plo heard a strangled creak, and realized he was gripping the scavenged lengths of birch so tightly that he had clawed deep gashes in the wispy bark. He forced himself to relax, breathing deeply through his mask before he trusted himself to respond. 

 

“You are none of the above,” he said steadily. “Not to me.”

 

He tied off the last strip of fabric – he would need another robe when they returned to the warship, but thankfully, the climate was acceptable on this planet – and tried to avoid jolting the wounded leg anymore than he had to as he double-checked the splint’s integrity. As soon as he saw that it didn’t come apart, Comet was struggling to his feet, eager to be on the move and presumably to extricate himself from the conversation.

 

Plo helped him rise to his feet, but didn’t let go of his arms once the trooper was standing. “Comet,” he said softly. “Look at me.”

 

The soldier swallowed again, but obeyed. He raised his head until his gaze met Plo’s, and the uncertainty he saw in those chocolate-colored eyes broke the Kel Dor’s heart. 

 

“You are not expendable,” the Jedi reiterated, his voice not quite a rumble but something close. “You are not merely a unit, and I cannot allow you to believe that any longer.” He squeezed the young man’s shoulders gently, comfortingly. “Alright?”

 

Comet’s eyes were glistening now, too, and his voice was a hushed, struggling thing when he used it. “Yes, Sir.” A muffled gasp followed the words, as if he were choking.

 

Plo hardly heard it before he was in motion. He folded the soldier against his chest, careful not to throw him off balance on his injured leg, and tucked his chin over his curly head. He stared at the grass waving beyond their position, at the burning heap that was left of their ship, at anything but the trembling, hurt boy in his arms.

 

He wouldn’t let Comet stand alone, but he owed him enough not to watch him cry.

Chapter 2: Wolffe

Summary:

prompt: chronic pain

Wolffe was hurting today. 

 

Plo had been able to tell without even being near the commander. While he had heard from the other Jedi that Wolffe's mental defenses were quite strong, his shields never put up much resistance to his general’s gentle probing. Plo knew how to read Wolffe now, and could feel out the commander’s emotions through any of the variety of fronts he usually had up to prevent others from doing the same.

 

And what he had felt from his commander today, from the very moment he had seen him on the bridge close to dawn, was nothing but pain, weary and resigned .

 

Now it was past nightfall, the stars glittering in a sharp rainbow of light as the Hand of Justice glided through the black vacuum on her way to a new gap in the GAR’s fleets, but it had taken that long for the Jedi to convince Wolffe to slow down. To acknowledge the problem and rest .

 

So now they were here, in Plo’s quarters because he hadn’t trusted Wolffe to actually stay in his own if he were left to himself. His commander’s stubborn streak could be an admirable quality, and it was likely the only reason he was still alive after the close calls he had survived in just the last year.

 

It was also, in Plo’s opinion, going to be the death of him.

 

Wolffe was still being stubborn now, in a way. Even with his head resting on Plo’s shoulder and his body curled into his embrace as if he were a child, he remained silent and rigid, his jaw clenched so tightly the Kel Dor worried for his teeth. Plo had intended to put the commander in his own bed for the night and keep watch to make sure he didn’t try to get up, but the worsening migraine and accompanying nausea had forced the commander to the fresher. When he couldn’t seem to make it back to the cot, Plo had simply moved the pillows and blankets to the floor. It was closer to the fresher, anyway, and these headaches usually sent the commander there more than once. 

 

The Keld Dor sighed softly as he stroked his fingers through Wolffe’s short curls, massaging his scalp as the commander trembled against him. “When will you learn, ad’ika , that you have to take care of yourself?” he asked quietly, his voice lowered to a whisper so it didn’t echo in the soldier’s skull.

 

Wolffe made a sound in the back of his throat that was likely intended as a grunt, but came out as more of a groan. He pressed his face deeper into Plo’s robes, leaning his forehead against the general’s solid shoulder. Though he seemed to relax a fraction at the sound of the Mando’a endearment, his teeth still ground together and Plo expected to hear them break. 

 

“N’vr,” he admitted, his voice raw. A vein stood out in his forehead as he struggled with the word, the syllables going off like bombs in his head. His silver presence in the Force was tightly wound and throbbing, pulsing the same agonized beat over and over again.

 

Plo brushed his steadier, more peaceful soul against his commander’s and felt the tiniest flicker of respite, gratitude echoing back from the comfort. He smiled sympathetically when the trooper finally began to unwind, to lean into his chest like he knew it would be okay. He just kept carding his fingers through Wolffe’s hair, straightening out the curls to let them bounce back into ringlets but cautiously avoiding going anywhere near the long, angry scar on the right side of the commander’s face, the root of this entire ordeal.

 

Lightsabers didn’t often leave wounds like the one his commander bore – they were weapons to be used as a last resort, when ending a life was the only real solution, so they often didn’t wound at all. That Wolffe had survived the injury was nothing short of miraculous, since most who encountered a lightblade, be it Jedi or Sith, at close range didn’t live to tell of the experience. 

 

Because of the rarity of healing from such a wound, those who were not Force-users seemed to underestimate the damage left behind, to even forget about the severed nerves that sparked like fireworks beneath the skin and the muscles that no longer worked as they should because they simply couldn’t . 

 

Plus, just because Wolffe’s body had adapted to the cybernetic eye well enough didn’t mean it liked it. The migraines were regular at the beginning, and while they had lessened in number, the severity had only intensified as time went on. Anti-nausea medicine didn’t seem to alleviate the symptoms, nor did any of the hypos that Patch had found for that express purpose and now kept by the dozens in medical. All Wolffe could do about the pain, in most cases, was bear it.

 

That’s what he was trying to do now, but this particular assault had lasted the entire day, and by now he was so tired that the Jedi could feel cracks spreading through his soul. Plo sensed the fissures growing, splintering into tiny fractures that began to spiderweb the commander’s presence, and finally couldn’t take it anymore, no matter what Wolffe might think.

 

Plo had been weakened by Ventress’s attack when Wolffe had received the wound, but not so much that he hadn’t been able to lessen the commander’s pain. When he and the others had found Wolffe after the cave-in, he had been delirious with agony, lying in a pool of blood. Plo would have rather died than not do anything he could to ease the soldier’s suffering. 

 

And yet he had promised later, against his better judgement but at Wolffe’s insistence, not to do so again. The commander knew that the act had drained his strength and didn’t want Plo to weaken himself on his account again, but beneath that excuse was another, more personal one. 

 

Plo simply could not ease the pain or passing of every soldier in his battalion, no matter how much he wished he could. Wolffe held himself silently accountable for each brother he lost in his war, and if they had borne their own suffering, he didn’t see why he shouldn’t, no matter how mind-twisting it became. The very thought of accepting a comfort they had not made him feel as if he had betrayed them in some way.

 

The Jedi knew better, even though he hadn’t been able to convince the commander to see things the same way. And now Wolffe was breaking, fragmenting, on the verge of collapse…

 

Wolffe’s muscles suddenly tensed with a lurch, and his silver signature wavered, quivering beneath the weight of a phantom blade that carved its way through his flesh without resistance, without mercy. A low gasp ripped from between his teeth, and his hands shook as he fisted them desperately into the Kel Dor’s robe.

 

Plo couldn’t let this go on. His fingers stilled, and he pressed his palm gently against the back of Wolffe’s head, resolving to ask for forgiveness later. 

 

He concentrated on the pain he felt the soldier crumbling beneath, then narrowed his thoughts to just the worst fissure –

 

And it began to stitch itself back together, one slow, tiny thread at a time.

 

A soft groan escaped Wolffe’s lips and he melted into Plo’s chest, panting as if he had run a marathon. Plo’s own spirit warmed with relief even as he spent out his energy, trying to repair as much as he could before he had to stop. By the time he realized his breathing had changed to a more labored tempo and his muscles began to stiffen under the strain, Wolffe was practically limp in his arms, exhaustion showing dark beneath his tightly closed eyes as he tried to catch his breath.

 

After a few silent, long moments, the commander shifted against the Kel Dor’s grip. Fearing that he was already trying to push himself to his feet and past his limit, just because the pain wasn’t as severe, Plo wrapped his arms around the soldier in a fierce embrace and held him tight.

 

He realized belatedly that Wolffe wasn’t trying to escape. Instead, the commander let his head rest against Plo’s shoulder more heavily, ventured a deep breath, and sighed.

 

“Thank you,” he croaked out hoarsely. His voice didn’t sound any better than before, but then again, he hadn’t tried to use it for hours. When his dark eyes met the Kel Dor’s, they held no anger, even though Plo had broken that promise made in a pristine-white medbay not nearly long enough in the past. Instead, his drawn face was lined with weariness and gratitude, tinted pale with the embarrassment of needing such help to begin with.

 

Plo pushed away the fatigue that was attempting to work its way into his limbs and simply drew Wolffe closer, hoping the pain didn’t return for a long while. He knew it would come back, eventually – it always did – but maybe Wolffe could at least snatch a few hours of uninterrupted slumber before that happened.

 

 “It was nothing, ner ad ,” he answered simply. “Now, rest.” 

 

Wolffe knew it wasn’t nothing , but he didn’t argue. He settled his cheek against the soft-spun fabric of Plo’s robe and closed his eyes again. Within seconds, he was asleep.

 

Plo let his fingers drift back to the commander’s dark curls, where they resumed their stroking. He reached out to Wolffe’s soul in the Force, looking for any more deep pain that might require his help, but there was nothing left that wouldn’t eventually heal on its own now that the commander was able to sleep. Wolffe would be alright. He always was, stubbornness and all.

 

Plo took comfort in that, and finally allowed himself to drift off into a doze of his own.

Notes:

I've just been thinking a lot about lightsaber wounds and how the damage from a blade heated to sun-strength would stay with a person for their entire life... sorry Wolffe, but you were the perfect victim for these thoughts, my man. ❤️😭

Chapter 3: Boost

Notes:

prompt: family

 “Who knew Twi’leks were so touchy-feely?” 

 

Plo Koon glanced over his shoulder at Boost, a faint smile shifting the way his mask lay on his face. “They are an emotional people, to be sure. As they were thankful for the supplies that were brought, it is natural that they show their gratitude.”

 

Boost nodded absently, concentrating on knocking the red-orange dust from the charge chamber of his blaster. Plo was fairly certain that this was the first time he had seen the soldier sitting down all day – since dawn, most of the 104th had been too occupied organizing and executing the relief drop to take any kind of break. 

 

“I understand that, sir,” he replied. He brushed the rest of the sand out with the tip of one gloved finger, then turned the blaster over and shook it gently to dislodge any remaining grains before he replaced the charge magazine. “But why did they have to be so huggy ?”

 

Plo’s amusement grew, and with it his grin. Boost had been with the squad in charge of physically handing out the rations packs, blankets, and medical supplies, and to his discomfort, had ended up on the receiving end of far too many fierce embraces because of it. “You do not usually seem to mind being hugged,” the Kel Dor reminded him, a hint of laughter in his words.

 

“By my brothers,” Boost huffed, and slapped the charge mag back into the slot. “They’re…well, they’re brothers .”

 

Plo hummed in acknowledgement. “I am not your brother.”

 

“No, sir, but…” Boost glared at his boots for a moment, as if he were trying to wrestle the words from his overworked brain. He had been looking at charts all day, one of his least favorite things to do, and even his eyes looked tired. “You’re still family, sir. It’s…different.”

 

Plo saw the weary droop of the soldier’s armored shoulders, the way he tried to hold back a yawn as he reholstered his DC-17 and rose to his feet, trying to convince his body to keep going, and admiration pulsed with a vague kind of regret in the Jedi’s heart. He knew all of his boys were vigilant in their responsibilities and would never stop until their task was done – he just wished that they didn’t have to push themselves so hard.

 

Boost began to walk past him on his way out of the shuttle, carrying in one hand a new case full of medical supplies for the Twi’leks, but Plo reached out to him with one hand as he passed by. 

 

The Jedi had meant only to squeeze the trooper’s shoulder in encouragement, but he chuckled softly as Boost completely melted into the contact and wound up encased in his arms. “Weren’t you just saying you had met your quota for the day?” he asked lightly.

 

“Like I said, sir. You’re family.” Boost gave him one of his bright, knowing smiles and leaned into the contact for the briefest of seconds. “There’s not a quota for family.”

 

Plo smiled, and held him tighter.

Notes:

I didn't have a ton of time to write today, but I wanted to fill the prompt and write my chapter for my boy Boost! This one is thankfully a little fluffier than the angsty things I've done so far.

Chapter 4: Sinker

Summary:

prompt: compassion

Thirty-two.

 

That was the number of times that Sinker had forced himself not to cry since they had left Kadavo. Plo was certain, because he had kept count. Even when he was attending to their rescued passengers in another part of the ship and couldn’t physically keep an eye on the soft-souled soldier, he felt a ripple of pain from his presence in the Force each time the sight of the ill or exhausted Togrutas became almost too much, almost enough to break past the stubborn dam he had crafted around his heart that felt so much and so often couldn’t show it.

 

Thirty-two times, that dam had almost shattered. Sinker had almost given in to the need to weep over the pain he was witnessing, over the remaining evidence of cruelty that he would never be able to erase from his mind. The lash wounds and too-thin bodies stung and burned, but the missing names on their census roll created an ache that resonated from his place in the lifestream of the universe so strongly that Plo nearly staggered the first time he felt it, when Sinker had first begun the attempt to match the names of the captured with those of the Togrutas they had saved.

 

The sight of the children made him angry – so angry that the hot, rushing rage nearly succeeded in drowning out a tenth of his throbbing sorrow. Plo felt the ache grow worse as the white-haired trooper bent to spread bacta over a little scraped elbow or gently squeeze a tiny shoulder, trying to bestow some form of comfort as he spoke to the traumatized younglings in the broken fragments of Togruti he knew. His knowledge of the language was limited to mostly words and phrases picked up from little Ahsoka, nothing that he could have conversed in, but it was enough for these little ones who had already been through so much in the past weeks. Plo was fluent in the language and had no problem parsing what Sinker was saying, despite the ill-fitting accent that stumbled over a few of the vowels.

 

You’re safe. We’ve got you. You’re safe.

 

More than one little Togruta answered the trooper, using squeaking little words in tiny voices that had grown used to being quiet while they were captive.

 

Thank you.

 

The soldier must have understood, because he smiled sadly at them before going on his way to help their fellow citizens. 

 

And he did keep going, despite the heavy burden that weighed his soul down more with every person he helped, with every step he took that led him toward more suffering. Thirty-two times he faltered, and thirty-two times he regained his footing and pressed on.

 

The thirty-third time came when the Togrutas were resting and quiet in the rearranged hold, either asleep or processing the events they had been too intent on surviving to digest at the time; Obi-Wan and Rex were curled up together near the cockpit, a fierce pulse of protect-shield-protect radiating from both of their hearts as they slept fitfully; and Anakin and Ahsoka were meditating calmly in a corner of the shuttle’s cramped floorspace, trying to unravel the ropes of hurt and anger they had accumulated over their time in the slavers’ hands and give them to the Force. 

 

The rest of the battalion was dealing with their own responses to what they had seen that day. Comet was piloting their vessel, keeping his troubled thoughts to himself while Boost sat beside him and tried to untangle his own. Wolffe had been gruffer than usual, deeply disturbed by the state of their passengers. The commander had gone off under the pretence of writing a report, but Plo knew he would likely end up punching a wall instead.

 

With his patients looked after as well as could be for now and his brothers handling their own duties, Sinker had no one left to hold up.

 

So, he broke down.

 

Plo could hear the quiet sniffles from beneath the trooper’s helmet as he approached, but he could have found him without them – the sorrow in the Force led him directly to his little refuge among the empty crates that had recently held medical supplies, the only place he could be almost alone in the crowded ship. The rippling ache was worse now and the Kel Dor knew the man was crying, even with the helmet that had been shoved over his face to hide that very fact.

 

Plo didn’t say anything about the situation – he had no words, for once, that would help. He was usually careful about surprising his men, but a flicker of recognition in the Force told him that Sinker knew he was there, so he didn’t utter a word.

 

He only stepped up to where Sinker sat hunched over on one of the crates and wrapped him in a tight embrace, closing his arms around him and holding him close against his chest.

 

The soldier started at first, too preoccupied by the storm in his own mind to accept the peace offered by another.

 

Then he simply relaxed into Plo’s arms, and wept.

Chapter 5: It's Over (Now The Future Can Begin)

Summary:

The war is over, and Plo and his men can hardly believe it.

 

Plo could hardly believe it.

 

The war was finally, completely over .

 

In the past few days, Obi-Wan had killed Grievous on Utapau, Dooku had surrendered during the Battle of Coruscant, and Quinlan and Commander Fox, along with the combined forces of the Coruscant Guard and the Jedi who had returned from the field, had disposed of Palpatine, who they had revealed to be the Second Sith (or more accurately, Plo supposed, the original one of this saga). The Republic had survived the fall of her Chancellor with far more vigor than anyone had given her credit for, and as of two seconds ago, it had been announced that Senator Bail Organa had been chosen by both the Senate and popular vote to lead the New Republic into what so many were already declaring would be a golden age.

 

The Kel Dor chuckled as he ran those wild sentences back again in his mind, processing the sheer craziness of it all.

 

It had been a very, very busy week.

 

A bright, almost blindingly happy presence appeared behind him, rippling as a familiar voice rang out in a call. “General!” 

 

The Jedi was already turning, and that was the only reason he was able to absorb Comet’s frenzied hug without falling over. The youngest of the Pack had hardly grabbed him before Sinker and Boost, both laughing deliriously with glee, copied him and crushed in on their general from both sides.

 

Plo laughed with them, his breathing slightly, happily constricted by the tight embrace. He almost glanced for Wolffe, then felt two muscular, surprisingly unarmored arms encircle his chest as a curly head pushed past Comet’s to rest on his shoulder.

 

The Kel Dor smiled behind his mask and reached up with one hand to lay his palm on the side of Wolffe’s head and press him closer. His clawed fingertips brushed the sharp line between thick curls and the part of his commander’s head that had been recently shorn, just above his temple and a few inches back. Wolffe claimed he wasn’t vain, but Plo noticed that he had instructed Patch to make the other side of his head match the one that was the target of the operation.

 

He would have to thank Fives personally when they arrived on Coruscant. Without the ARC’s brave crusade to uncover the secret of the Sith’s plot, the clandestine operation to free the clones from the inhibitor chips would have never taken place, and there would have been a much different end to Palpatine’s war. Fox had taken plenty of risks of his own, as well, and shown incredibly quick thinking by redirecting Anakin and Rex so that he could falsify Fives’s death and keep him safe until Quinlan was able to gather the evidence required for a true overthrow. He would have to thank Fox, too, and all the Guard. They had not only saved the galaxy – they had saved his sons.

 

“It’s really over, Buir ,” Wolffe whispered into his shoulder. His voice was as awed as it was disbelieving, as shocked as Plo had ever heard it. “It’s over .”

 

The Kel Dor swallowed hard, and held on tightly to Wolffe as he wrapped his free arm around the other three Pack members to squeeze them even closer to him. “Yes, ad’ika ,” he replied softly, when he trusted himself to speak. 

It was truly over, and the future was shining brightly ahead.