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Vel watched the so-called golden boy disembark from his X-Wing, all light hair and blinding grin and bright eyes, and thought, impossibly, that the nickname didn’t do him justice. He’d come from literal nowhere (seriously, where even was Tatooine, anyway?), rescued the not-so-dead princess, delivered the plans that Cassian and so many others died for—no, no, don’t think about that, too much left to do before thinking about that—and managed an impossible shot that no one, not even their most skilled pilots, could dream of. And after all that, he was still standing? No, scratch that, he was still smiling?
Oh, Luke Skywalker was golden, alright. Happiness personified, pure hope distilled into a pint-sized body. He knew nothing of the sacrifices of the rebellion—Aldhani, Ghorman, Jedha, Scarif, Alderaan, Nemik, Cassian, Cinta! CINTA!—and Vel really wished she could find it in herself to hate him. Just a little.
“A new dawn,” a voice helpfully supplied from behind her. Vel turned toward her brown-haired companion and tried not to balk too obviously at the dark chasms under her eyes, the way her already thin frame seemed even more slight. The Kleya she knew two years ago would’ve never allowed herself to appear so weak. Then again, the Kleya she knew two years ago would’ve never imagined herself standing on a rebel base, watching the debris of her greatest enemy’s greatest achievement burn helplessly in the atmosphere.
They’d won. Somehow, despite everything, they’d actually won. Not the entire war, not to the extent that Nemik, Gorn, Cinta, Luthen, Cassian, Bail, and millions more had died dreaming of, but it was a start. And no matter how they spun it, they really only had one person to thank for that.
Vel looked back at the Alliance’s new savior. Droves of adoring rebels now surrounded him, obscuring her vantage. Even still, he glowed.
She nodded toward him before glancing back at Kleya. “Is he everything you and-” her companion tensed up slightly, an almost imperceptible motion, but Vel didn’t get this far without knowing how to read people, “-ah, you hoped for?”
She should’ve known better than to allude to Luthen. His presence—or lack thereof—haunted all of Kleya and Vel’s interactions lately. He’d been the only thing connecting them, and now that he was gone, they hadn’t come up with anything else to talk about. In war, getting caught up mourning the dead did nothing but leave you distracted enough to get yourself killed. Kleya knew that. Everyone did (well, except this golden boy, but he’d learn soon enough.) Even if they did have the time, no one on base besides the woman standing next to Vel would have much nice to say. And yet, improperly acknowledged, the ever-present ghost of Luthen Rael remained a touchy subject.
(Cassian Andor hadn’t been mentioned since… since. Vel still had a message to deliver to a child that would never know their father. But that was another day’s problem.)
Kleya tilted her head. She hadn’t put her hair up today, so it flopped against her face, its once silky brown sheen matted and dull. She’d probably been woken up along with everyone else at way-too-early o’clock with the announcement that they’d found the princess, the plans, hope at last, and hadn’t bothered wrangling it into something resembling neatness. It was a valid excuse today, but Vel suspected Kleya was using everyone’s distraction as a crutch, because it just hurt to style her hair in the way she used to when nothing so important was lost. Vel knew the feeling.
“He is what I hoped for,” Kleya suddenly answered, training her deep brown eyes on what little they could see of Luke behind the crowds. The former antiquarian spoke softly, her voice nearly drowned out by the continuing fervor of hurrahs from the relieved base, but she sounded more sure of herself than she had been since Luthen’s death. Her lips tilted upward. “Better than that. He will bring the galaxy’s sunrise.”
***
Leia insisted on a medal ceremony, after, and Vel couldn’t even be mad at the Golden Boy’s over-eagerness. After almost a week straight of daily unimaginable loss, his genuine optimism was an anomaly — and addictive. The celebratory spirit spilled over into the nearby mess hall, everyone apparently agreeing that the usual noise regulations and bedtimes need not apply, and Luke Skywalker, guest-of-honor, savior, a new hope at last, stood right in the center.
From her seat just about the farthest away from his brightness she could get without leaving altogether, Vel stared at the increasingly-numerous crowd around Luke. There was a sort of restlessness about everyone that she hadn’t felt on Yavin in years, or perhaps ever. It threatened to pull her in, too, if she wasn’t careful.
Unlike apparently the entire rebel base clamoring for a second of his attention, Vel had little else to say to their collective savior but a begrudging congratulations: she’d never been one for fawning, and the far-too-inexperienced Alliance soldiers (Luthen never would’ve trusted them, but of course, he didn’t trust anyone) who increasingly populated Yavin would likely get along better with the equally-inexperienced farm boy anyway. As it was now, even if she wanted to talk with him, she couldn’t possibly fight the crowds. Luke certainly wouldn’t have to worry about being alone ever again. If he was the type to want a casual fling (which, for the sake of the Alliance’s continued harmony, Vel sincerely hoped he wasn’t), he could probably get into the pants of just about any woman and quite a few of the men on base. He seemed to be taking his status change in stride, though, and by the third impassioned confession of love, he even had the decency to look a little bit bashful about the attention. Sometimes, so quickly Vel almost missed it, his eyes would dart to Princess Leia. Save me, they practically begged, wide and urging, or at least come confess your love to me, too!
(She did not get the hint.)
Vel had never particularly cared about strangers’ love lives, but she had a feeling the princess and the too-cool-for-his-own-good smuggler they managed to drag onto base would work far better together. In her—albeit limited—experience, a relationship required some tension to keep things interesting. Besides, there was something about the Luke-Leia dynamic that seemed almost… familial.
Now why said smuggler also received a medal, Vel wasn’t quite sure. Hadn’t he tried deserting as soon as he received his money? At least he came back after. Rumor had it he may have even killed Darth Vader during the final run. In any case, he certainly seemed to be staying now. Sure, he’d insisted in front of just about everyone that ‘I’m only here to pawn this medal, don’t get it twisted,’ but he was staring at the Princess when he said it, all soft and lovelorn. A guy like that blustered loudly, desperate to preserve whatever misguided image of cool nonchalance he thought he maintained, but when it came down to it, he would be more committed to the cause than anyone else. He reminded her, in the way a forgery of a Chandi Merle statue could unfavorably compare to its true magnificence, of a certain Ferrixian pilot from five years ago.
And that was the crux of the issue, wasn’t it? Because yes, the smuggler saved the golden boy, but.
But that Ferrixian pilot should’ve gotten a medal too. He should’ve been up there smiling golden, winking, roaring – anything to show that he was still breathing. He should’ve been the golden one they flocked to. Instead, he was so dead they didn’t even have a brick to remember him by. No one blindly celebrating would ever know what they lost. And no one, least of which the golden boy himself, would ever know the name Cas-
No.
No, she couldn’t think that way. She had no right to lament over the loss of- of that man. She was not Wilmon, now the last survivor of Ferrix remaining on Yavin. She was not Bix, who still had no idea she lost the love of her life. And she was certainly not his child, the one he never knew existed and now never would, the one who would grow up with a last name that wasn’t his on a planet he hardly knew.
Vel was his friend. Perhaps that entitled her to mourn him. But she wasn’t special: Cassian Andor had friends everywhere.
Vel hastily wiped her eyes of the brief mist that overtook them. It was a happy occasion. They won. And she would remind herself of that for as long as it took her to actually feel it.
She scanned the room for Luke and came up short. The crowd around their savior had somehow expanded, blissfully happy in the way only children or the naive could be in this day and age (most of the rebels crowding him, unfortunately, were both), and had blocked her view. Near the very back of the group, a particularly eager woman held a black voice amplifier in her right hand, practically vibrating on her feet. Vel watched in disbelief as the device passed from person to person, making its way to the crowd’s center with a speed these very same rebels couldn’t muster in actual combat.
“Speech, speech, speech!” the sea began chanting once it had reached the front.
“Ah, I couldn’t poss-” a surprised voice—Luke’s, presumably—stuttered.
“SPEECH, SPEECH, SPEECH!” The crowd parted down the middle with the startling efficiency of a Stormtrooper battalion assigned to protect the Emperor and revealed a wide-eyed, cherry-red Luke Skywalker. Vel narrowed her eyes at the man—or, who was she kidding, boy—now exposed to the entire hall. This was meant to be the new hope of the rebellion? He probably couldn’t even put together a proper sentence.
Gingerly, he reached to grab the mic. The rebel that handed it to him barely suppressed a squeal.
“Um, well, I want to thank-” he began, too close to the amplifier. Feedback roared, a whiney sort of screech that hammered at Vel’s eardrums, but Luke barely blinked. About a second too late to be natural, he cringed. “Haha, I guess I don’t know how to work this thing. We don’t need voice amplifiers where I’m from since there’s no one there to hear us, well, except the Sandpeople!” He laughed self-deprecatingly, but his sea blue eyes stayed bright, calm. Not embarrassed, then. Acting. But why?
The hall rang out in echoing laughter. It wasn’t that funny. Luke seemed to think so too, his smile freezing on his face, and all at once Vel realized: he doesn’t want to be the one they worship. He just wants to be human.
She’d almost forgotten it herself, but Luke Skywalker was human, too. He’d been close to that Kenobi fellow and likely watched him die, powerless like the rest of them. And of course no one else should have to go through that—watching Cinta die was the worst moment of Vel’s life—except with that thought came another, smaller, bitter part of Vel in the all-too-familiar brogue of Luthen Rael rationalizing it, for if more people were unjustly murdered, more survivors would become radicalized. Would Luke have saved them if he hadn’t lost someone first?
Luthen probably would’ve gone a step further, encouraging Luke to embrace the “savior” narrative—it made the rebels more efficient, gave them something bigger to fight for—and he would’ve been right to do it. But looking at their savior now, Vel only saw a lost orphan boy who gave up everything for that shot, forever cursed to be loved and hated and never normal again.
He’d chosen the galaxy. And he’d have to choose it again for the rest of his life.
The golden boy cleared his throat and everyone immediately fell silent. A frown flickered across his face, but he quickly replaced it with the same magnanimous grin Vel had grown used to seeing on him. He had a role to play, after all. “Well, I’ll keep this short, since I know we should probably all go to sleep soon. I just want to tell you how happy I am to finally be here serving with all of you. I want to thank everyone that got us here. I really couldn’t have done it without all of you, each and every one!” He spoke lightly, every bit the adorably innocent 19-year-old farm boy they all expected him to be, and didn’t know just how correct he was.
The crowd erupted in, frankly, unearned applause as Princess Leia stood up to grab the device. He handed it to her far too eagerly, practically melting into the background as soon as she gripped it. The awkward retreat wouldn’t have worked for anyone else, but, well. She was Leia Organa, last royal of Alderaan. Of course everyone’s attention turned to her.
With all the serene calmness that Luke severely lacked, Leia let her gaze drift languidly over each anticipatory face. Vel found herself straightening automatically. Damn senators and their expectations.
Finally, apparently sufficiently pleased with the state of the room, Leia nodded. “We have lost many this week. The brave soldiers of Rogue One,” (no, was she really going to mention-,) “the brave pilots of today’s battle,” she continued smoothly, “and. And Alderaan.” Her lips formed a line, but her voice didn’t falter. “We have lost far too many, and as we continue waging this war, we will lose countless more. We will keep being hunted, keep getting killed, and keep losing.”
The room was so silent Vel could practically hear Leia’s heartbeat. All the untapped excited energy of the room had vanished in one fell swoop, and Leia nodded at each shell-shocked face in turn.
And then, after they’d squirmed just long enough to really feel uncomfortable, she did a most unexpected thing.
She smiled.
“Yes, we will keep losing. In war, that is inevitable. But there’s one thing the Empire doesn’t understand about us: we will not stay down forever.”
The crowd began murmuring in confused agreement, thrumming with a boundless energy Vel couldn’t quite place, and despite herself, she swayed along with them. She felt like she was on a cliff’s precipice – mere steps from falling, but also from flying.
Leia seemed to feel it, too, voice climbing: “Today proved that the Empire cannot ignore us any longer. They thought we were a minor inconvenience, but with each battle, win or lose, people choose us”—nods and yeses from the crowd, but Leia wasn’t done—“we don’t need threats to get people on our side. We are the threat. And someday—someday, I think, very soon—we will be the ‘minor inconvenience’ that takes them down forever.”
A beat.
She tumbled off the cliff.
Then, she flew.
Down with the Empire, the crowd urged, entranced. Down with Palpatine. Long live the Rebellion.
And suddenly, it seemed that Leia, too, could glow, eyes bottomless pits of chocolate brown burning with electric fervor. She matched Luke in that regard. They were the twin suns that would burn the galaxy golden, beacons kindling the flame of their new dawn, and Vel…. didn’t need to be the one to light it anymore. A whole galaxy’s worth of rebels were waiting, and for the first time in a long time, Vel knew they were going to be okay.
She slipped away from the mess hall sneakily, but there was no need to. No one noticed a thing.