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Yuletide 2016
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Published:
2016-12-17
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Waking to the Sound of Wind Chimes

Summary:

Greer and Joph on Gatalenta.

Notes:

Work Text:

Boring was the word Joph had used to describe the planet where he'd been born to her and yeah, Greer imagined that at some point, it could get boring to live on a planet with a perfectly nice climate, with perfectly nice beaches and perfectly nice people.

After the excitement of the past five months, though, boring didn't sound like such a bad thing.

Be honest. This place would drive you crazy in a week. Less, possibly.

Greer had enjoyed arriving on a planet where nobody would be trying to kill her. She'd enjoyed being introduced to Joph's parents, and hearing them tease Joph about finally having brought home a girl. She'd enjoyed the way Joph had kept stealing glances at her throughout dinner, knowing that he'd been thinking the same thing: that later tonight, they could be completely sure that nothing and nobody was going to interrupt them in the middle of sex.

About the only thing Greer hadn't enjoyed was not being able to talk about the missions they'd been flying for the Resistance.

"They don't need to know," Joph had told her. "Besides, I don't want them to worry."

While Greer might argue with the first, she could understand the second. This wasn't Pamarthe, where telling stories of their missions would have been practically a requirement for Joph to be considered acceptable boyfriend material by her family.

This was Gatalenta, a pleasant enough planet to spend a vacation, but not a place to look for military support. Or any kind of support, really.

As of yet, few planets had openly declared their support for Princess Leia and the Resistance. That didn't mean that they all supported the First Order, of course.

People just don't want to pick sides. Greer knew that it wasn't quite as simple as that. When it came to sheer numbers, the First Order definitely had the upper hand - and while the Resistance might have the better minds, the better pilots, the better people, that didn't mean any planet was eager to risk drawing the ire of an organization with an army the size of the First Order's.

Greer still didn't know how that had been allowed to happen. Surely someone somewhere should have noticed something.

They hadn't, though, and now here they were.

If the First Order decided that they wanted to, they could probably wipe this place off the planet's surface without even working up a sweat.

At least, as long as nobody decides to step in.

Gatalenta was not a rich planet. Its planetary defenses were minimal, its militia so small as to barely earn the name. Declaring itself to be neutral was about its only defense against the First Order.

Too bad my planet doesn't have that excuse.

Greer knew that if they'd gone to Pamarthe instead of Gatalenta, they would have been welcomed just as warmly. And probably with a lot more alcohol. They could have shared their stories there, and people would have listened. Some of them probably would have even joined the Resistance.

If you were looking for some good people to back you up in a fight, there was no better place. Or so Greer had thought. It stung that, like Gatalenta, Pamarthe had declared itself neutral.

Surely it was obvious to anyone that the Resistance stood for what was right. Surely a planet like Pamarthe could not let itself be swayed by the bullying tactics of the First Order.

Surely I'm not an idiot for thinking my planet should be better than Joph's.

On bad days, she felt that it was a small miracle that the Resistance still existed at all. Things had not looked hopeful, those first few weeks. The First Order knew how to use the media, how to make an impression. How to best trade on people still reeling from the revelation that Princess Leia's father had been Darth Vader, once the most feared servant of the Empire.

Then some of Joph's pilot friends had shown up, seemingly out of the blue, although Joph had looked far too smug not to have known that they were coming, and Greer had used their arrival as an argument to finally convince Princess Leia that they couldn't stand idly by while Ransolm Casterfo was executed for a crime he hadn't committed.

Greer didn't want to remember how close they had come to losing everything on that mission. All that counted was that in the end, it had been a success.

There had been many more missions after that, and many more arrivals.

And yet it never seems enough.

The Resistance survived. The Resistance endured. The Resistance tried, but without allies, it could do little more than rely on the element of surprise, using hit-and-run tactics to cause what damage it could to the First Order and its troops.

Thus, Greer and Joph had been sent to Gatalenta for a bit of down-time.

Because even if a planet couldn't afford to openly offer its support to the Resistance, that didn't mean it couldn't still help the cause of the Resistance in other ways. Like the Rebellion, the Resistance could always use another place to establish a secret base, to store supplies, and ships.

Joph's parents didn't work for the planetary government themselves, but Joph's aunt was married to a secretary in the Department of Traffic, and every once in a while, she'd invite her boss to dinner.

The Minister of Traffic being deeply appreciative of Joph's aunt's sea-crusted redtail, he usually accepted that invitation. And while the Minister of Traffic might not be the most influential member of the cabinet, he still had ears to listen with, and a mouth to talk with, once he'd be done eating.

"You don't want someone like me for this mission," Greer had told Princess Leia. "You want a diplomat. A politician."

"If there's one thing we don't need more of, it's politicians," Leia had said. "I'm not sending a diplomat. I'm sending two people who know what's at stake, who know what evils the First Order is capable of if left unchecked. I'm sending you, and that is my final decision."

Greer hadn't been convinced. She wasn't convinced now, although she knew that she was going to try her hardest. It wasn't in her to do anything less, and she'd rather die than let Princess Leia down.

"Don't spend all of your time focused on the mission," Princess Leia had added. "Try to relax. Enjoy yourself for a bit. You've more than earned it."

Greer had thought that she wasn't the only one. Princess Leia had looked tired, worn down. A pity the only two people who might have convinced her to take a break herself were both missing.

Missing, but not presumed dead. That was something at least, even if Greer had no idea why Han Solo wasn't with his wife. She supposed that he might be on a mission of his own, something so sensitive that Princess Leia hadn't been willing to trust it to anyone else.

It wasn't as if she and Joph never were apart, either. Greer enjoyed Joph's company, enjoyed having someone there who knew her pretty well by now, someone she could talk to and rely on, but they both knew that the Resistance always came first.

She hadn't come here to meet Joph's parents, or to enjoy a lazy morning in bed with little chance of needing to get dressed in a hurry and start running, shooting or both at the same time. Those things were pleasant, but Greer knew that in the larger scheme of things, they weren't important.

Convincing a minister that supporting the cause of the Resistance was preferable to staying neutral and letting other people do all the hard work was.

Greer only hoped that she and Joph would be able to pull that off.