Chapter Text
Dantooine has got two moons, which is two too few, in Max’s humble opinion, thinking back to the Coruscant sky he grew up under. The bigger one shines a light purple, a weird, metallic contrast to the greenish tint of the lesser one. Max doesn't remember their names, although he knows that the sun they're orbiting around is called Dina. He needs to brush up on his Outer Rim star charts, clearly.
It’s cold in the dead of the night, and wet, and miserable no matter how much Max tries to cast the discomfort out of his mind, to work through the familiar steps of keeping his consciousness in control of his body, above it. Behind him he can hear Liam’s feet trailing after, slowly padding through the thorny undergrowth of the forest, his flashlight shining with Max’s.
“Almost there.” Max turns around, giving Liam a tight-lipped smile, hopefully encouraging. The life of a Jedi is not rainbows and roses, no, Liam is probably finding out. Sometimes it’s dragging yourself through the mud in the middle of the night to find a sap farm on a planet in the middle of nowhere.
But that's good, that's why they're here. Nobody bothers dropping by Dantooine these days. Well, almost nobody.
“Can you feel it?” Max stops in his tracks, facing Liam, pointing the light at his feet so he doesn't blind him. Liam frowns, just a little, his Padawan braid hanging ridiculous over his right shoulder.
“Feel what?”
“The people, on the farm. Where are they?”
At the question Liam closes his eyes, shutting them more gently than Max himself ever did, when he was tested like this. Out of habit Max reaches out as well, gently calling for the Force, expanding his awareness outwards.
It takes a few seconds, but eventually Liam points his flashlight east. “That way.”
Max nods, satisfied. “How many?”
Liam’s brow furrows. He tilts his head like he’s trying to hear something that's far away, like that's going to help him. “Three?”
“Close. There's four people.” He won't berate Liam for the slipup, although they're both aware that he’s still got a lot to learn. Max signals to keep moving, then starts making his way east. “The fourth one is faint. An elder, or perhaps someone sick.”
It’s not a big farm. Clearly family-owned, their business is probably restricted to the few traders that travel through the Myto’s Arrow, if weather allows. That, and the credits they get for smuggling information for people like Max, of course.
It’s a couple, their kid and the woman’s mother, unassuming in their simplicity. The man comes up to the door scared and armed, until he sees the robes both Max and Liam are wearing, the lightsabers strapped to their belts. Then they're hurried inside and served tea, fussed over, Max pulled aside for adult conversation while Liam entertains a very sleepy three-year-old. The whole family is roused by their visit.
It goes smoothly. Max gets the encrypted holovid and in return the farmer receives a decent amount of chips. It’s a boring mission but a successful one nonetheless, and intel is getting more and more valuable as time moves on. He just doesn't expect the old woman to shake him off balance.
She is old, her lifeforce tenuous and soft – no wonder Liam had trouble picking her up. But the fact remains that she’s in the living room watching her grandson when Max walks in to collect his own padawan, even though it’s still nighttime, even though two Jedis crashed their home and they should all be asleep. She looks at Max with kind, tired eyes when he steps inside the rooms and says, “Oh. That must hurt.”
Max’s first instinct is to stop, to feel himself for anything out of the ordinary. He finds nothing he wasn't already aware of. “Ma’am?”
“It looks painful”, she says, pointing at her own chest with a frail hand, a delicate crooked finger, “Here.” Max’s mouth opens to respond, but his voice gets stuck in his throat. He can feel Liam staring, the mother collecting her son and scooping him into her arms.
She gets up, bends down a little in front of Max in the ghost of a vow. “Please, don't mind her, my mother is not quite there in the head anymore. Mom, let’s go to bed, yes?”, she tries, balancing the kid on her hip and beckoning for the old lady to follow as Liam helps her up. She goes along but keeps talking, looking only at Max.
“Surely it must hurt, it’s so stretched out. You’re so far away, oh my. That’s so sad.”
“Please, mom. Let’s go.” And then to Max, “I’m sorry.”
It’s not until they're out, walking back to the outpost, that Max realizes he hasn't said a word since they left. The farmers had offered them to stay the night, but - Max needed out of there. Now he feels a little bad that he’s making Liam walk all the way back without a break.
He swallows around the knot in his throat. “I’m sorry about the trek. I’ll get you a nice bed at the outpost, I promise.”
“It’s alright, Master. I’m good”, Liam says, but Max can feel uncertainty curling around him in big swirls, curiosity in the Force that passes through him. “Can I… Uhm. Can I ask what that was about?” When Max doesn't reply right away, he adds, “With the old lady, I mean.”
Max keeps walking. He should talk to someone back in the temple, ask for that kid to be added to the list and have someone check him for force-sensitivity. Max didn't get to.
To Liam, he says, “Nothing, I don't know what she was talking about. Time isn't forgiving on the mind.”
Inside him, the Force-bond throbs, sore and jaded. Aching.
—
Max wasn't surprised when he bonded with Daniel. It happens often, between Master and apprentice, so that, in itself, was nothing out of the ordinary.
In time, Daniel became a constant presence in the back of Max’s head, at first uncomfortable, sometimes intrusive, but usually warm and reassuring. By the time they were talking about cutting Max’s own Padawan braid off, he couldn't imagine not feeling Daniel through the Force. How empty that would be.
And then Max became a Jedi Knight in his own right, sooner than the High Council wanted him to, and the bond was supposed to fade. Not to disappear completely, unless they broke it on purpose, but to dim, at least.
Except it didn't. Except as he grows older the Force pulls tighter around Max’s chest, harder towards Daniel. Except he realizes at some point that he can feel Daniel all the time: where he is, his mood, static pictures and images taken through his eyes and popping into Max’s, even when they’re stretched across light years.
And then one night Max is nineteen, Daniel gets drunk on shitty canteen ambrostine and then leans towards his ear, making every hair in his body stand on end. It’s dark and they're sitting in the corner of the bar, dressed in civilian clothes. Nobody’s paying attention to them. Max can feel Daniel’s breath, warm on the shell of his ear as he whispers:
“I can feel you. Every fucking thing you feel, Max, I can tell”, he confesses as Max’s body overheats. His frame goes rigid, his muscles ready to spring into action as the thread pulls, bond opening up and blossoming, calling, broadcasting in full color all of Max’s want for Daniel to see.
Daniel makes a quiet noise, a tiny gasp. The hand not occupied by his drink sinks into the folds of Max’s loose cotton shirt, gripping hard, desperate. “Tell me you can feel me too, Max.” Max can.
He knows Daniel has sex, often, in their downtime between missions. It can't be hard for him to find someone willing, looking the way he does, smiling the way he smiles. And he also drinks. Sometimes in excess, although he knows he shouldn't. But it’s not like Jedi aren't allowed to – they are, as long as it doesn't become a problem. As long as it's casual.
Max has always been on the chaste side of the Temple, he knows. He doesn't like the way alcohol makes him lose control over himself, and he’s never felt the need to go out of his way to stick his dick in someone. Except. Well.
That night, gasping and coming into Daniel’s fist, he realizes that it might become a problem.
Because Max knows what's normal and what isn't. He knows it’s not normal for their bond to be so strong, for them to live in each other's minds like this. And Max also knows what's allowed and what is not.
The air is thin in the room when he admits to himself that it is not, in fact, casual.
“Attachment? That's it? You’re sending me away because Max and I get along?” Daniel can sound so mean when he’s angry. Standing next to him Max keeps quiet, feeling the current of the Force wrap around himself and then curl out towards Daniel, moving faster in time with his disbelief, slowly morphing into anger. Into fear.
“Daniel”, Christian starts, and it’s his tone more than anything that keeps Max’s mouth closed. He’s never been afraid to speak his mind, but…
Daniel and Max, Max and Daniel. They can’t be.
At least they were kind enough to bring them into Christian’s quarters. It would've been worse if the entire High Council had shown up to sneer at them. Public, humiliating. A favor to Max’s dad, maybe, to keep this behind closed doors.
Christian remains calm throughout, the vivid picture of a Jedi Knight, if it weren't for the growing gut. “Look, there’s nothing wrong with friendship or… Love, you both know that. Lust, trust, admiration – these are emotions we cannot help having, after all. Our minds and bodies reacting. They keep us alive, and strong”, he says. Then, “But we absolutely cannot give into them.”
“We are not - We’re not giving into -”
“Attachments lead to feelings of possession, and possession leads to fear of losing what you think is yours. More than one good knight has been lured into the dark side out of fear.”
Slowly, Daniel nods. “I know.”
“Then you’ll be okay with the reassignment, Daniel, will you not?”
Daniel closes his mouth, right hand curling into a tight fist where Max can see it. He reaches out silently to Max through the bond, pulling, asking for reassurance. Instinctually, Max tugs back.
Ossus. They’re keeping Max in Coruscant, but they're sending Daniel to Ossus. To the Outer Rim, pretty much as far as humanly possible while still in Jedi territory.
Christian follows, “Attachment is the inability to accept change as a fundamental characteristic of life. To let go.”
The words spring to Max’s head, years and years of half-listened lectures pulling them up to the surface. He quotes, “Passion, yet serenity.”
In front of them, Christian looks at Max with a satisfied expression. “Exactly, Max. Emotion, yet peace.”
Max’s stomach feels like lead, or perhaps it is Daniel’s. He’s not sure who’s feeling exactly what, at this point.
Why me? Why me and not Max?
That's Daniel though, for sure.
“This will be good for you, boys, to be apart for a while. Think about it as training.”
Max will try to; Daniel will fail.
—
When Daniel asks Max to leave the Order and run away with him, he sees in his mind what Daniel imagines for them: a simple existence on a planet far, far away, a house big enough for them both. Ancient spare parts that they could wrangle together into racing speeders and a little farm to grow food to eat and trade in town.
It would be easy, to say yes. But the life of a Jedi is anything but.
Max says no.
—
Max doesn't quite notice the bond growing back, or perhaps a part of him chooses to ignore it. It was already painful enough to have it severed when Daniel… Left. For his own good, he tries to put it out of his mind.
It’s a tentative thing at first, one that settles somewhere deep within Max’s head, his soul, perhaps, and then digs its claws in. The Force yearns for Max, and Max yearns for Daniel despite everything, and so they are made one in everything but body.
Max won't know for years that the bond was his fault, whether intentionally or not. Daniel will guess at the fact, knowing the Force always liked Max better than himself.
—
Something wakes him up in the middle of the night. He’s not sure what it is at first, swimming through a second of disorientation before his training kicks in and his senses reach out. There's someone in Max’s tiny cruiser cabin: he can hear them move about. And yet the door is still locked.
Slowly, he turns his head to watch Daniel undress in the vague emptiness of wherever he is. A base somewhere, perhaps, or a ship. He can’t tell.
Max stays silent as Daniel unbuckles his belt and places it on top of a non-descript dresser, utilitarian Imperial issue – at least the furniture Max can see seems to be in a better state than his own here in his ship. Daniel’s movements are a little slow, half-hearted in the dark. He looks tired.
Daniel doesn't bother looking at him, but Max knows he knows he’s awake. Instead he removes his lightsaber from the belt, then puts it down too. Max can't see the hilt very well, the edges of Daniel’s surroundings blurring around him and blending into Max’s own, but it’s always a shock to see it so different to the one he used to carry strapped to his hip, years ago.
It’s not always like this. Max is used to ignoring Daniel when he feels the bond acting up, to simply go about his day, trying to minimize what Daniel can see. The less interaction, the safer it is. But, like this, half-asleep and alone, at night, it feels – different. Dangerous.
So Max keeps watching the familiar bend of Daniel’s body. Breathe in, breathe out. Watch.
Eventually, Daniel breaks. “What time is it where you are?”, he asks. “It’s rare for us to be asleep at the same time.”
“You’re not asleep”, Max replies, avoiding the question. He has to clear his voice, after, words gravelly and sticky in his throat.
Daniel’s mouth twitches. “No, but I’m about to be.” The robes go next, black and dark gray now. Secretly, Max thinks that they don't suit him at all. He was made for color.
“So are you gonna tell me where you are?” The boots get tossed off to the side, carelessly forgotten, and then Daniel grabs the edge of his skin-tight undershirt and starts peeling it off.
Max turns in bed to lay on his side, facing away from the shaky image of Daniel, the miles of lean muscle and tan skin being revealed inch by inch. He doesn't reply.
He’s tried to keep the bond closed for a long while now, to wrap layers and layers of mental barriers around it so he can keep himself and his people safe, his secrets inside. But somehow the bond refuses to give in completely. Maybe it’s because Daniel’s end is always wide open, calling.
“If you think not looking will do you any good, then good luck, mate”, Daniel says. And yeah, it’s probably useless. He wouldn't be surprised if Daniel had already felt the pull of arousal tug hard at Max’s belly just from watching him undress, the insistence of the Force trying to push them closer to each other. But Max can still refuse to acknowledge it if he so wants, so he shuts his eyes closed and endures the ache.
Eventually he hears the sound of bedsheets rustling – Daniel getting in bed. Max can almost feel the ghost weight of him making the mattress dip, the phantom warmth of his body forcing him to shiver.
Minutes tick away in silence as Max tries very hard to meditate himself into sleep. It doesn't work.
“I hear you’ve got your own apprentice now”, Daniel says, and Max’s eyes snap open. “Time really flies, huh?”
A curl of anger stabs at Max’s chest. Liam. “What, are you watching me now?”
“Oh, like you’re not keeping tabs on me”, Daniel replies.
“I don't know where you are. Who you're training with.”
“You could know, if you just looked. I’m a whole bunch of walking intel just here waiting for you to do something about it.” Daniel’s staring at him, Max knows, even if he can't see it. He feels the weight of it at the back of his neck. “Do they even know about the bond?”, he asks, and then when Max doesn't reply, “Right.”
Daniel takes a deep breath, then lets it out slowly, weirdly reminiscent of the meditations they used to run through in the mornings, a lifetime ago. When he speaks next his words are quieter, almost whispered.
“They're not all so bad here, you know? Some of the other Knights. They've had difficult lives.”
Max lets out one short chuckle, a disdainful single breath. “Right. Tell that to the corpses.”
“If you think the universe is better under Jedi rule, you’re blind. What do they do for anyone, Max? Do they deal with criminals? Are the streets safe?” Distantly, Max recalls stories about Daniel’s childhood, and about growing up skinny.
Daniel continues. “Do they care for children, Max? Oh yeah, right, only if they're force-sensitive. Otherwise sure, let them starve to death.”
Max wants to play into the argument. He wants to turn around and yell at Daniel’s face, to find exactly where he is and then beat him to a pulp with the blunt hilt of his lightsaber. To make him apologize for leaving.
Still behind him, Daniel spits, “Get off your horse, Max. It’s so high you can't reach.”
The silence is more tense this time. They let it bleed out, little by little, until Max has run through enough mental exercises that he doesn't feel that angry anymore, just tired.
After that it’s weirdly intimate, this whole thing. Here, in the dark of the night, Daniel’s breath right there, mixing with the whirring of the ship, the climate control kicking in in irregular starts and stops.
“I don't know how you pretend you're above it, Max. Not when I know you're lying through your teeth.” Because Max is attached too.
He thinks about saying something back. Talking about how Daniel wasn't good enough to join the High Council, about how quickly he spiraled out of control – corrupting him must’ve been child’s play. He doesn't say anything. He would've, years ago, but not anymore.
It’s a long time before Daniel speaks again. “We’re encouraged to do as we want, here, you know? As long as we fulfill our orders. Not just sex, but like. Anything. Anything that will make you feel. Through passion I gain strength”, he recites, like he’s reading off an Imperial manual book.
“So what, do you fuck all of them? Your dark side buddies?” Max doesn't want to know. He already does. “Do you like being their plaything?”
“Yeah. It’s good. Easy”, Daniel says, and then, “Not as good as it was with you though.”
Something gets stuck in Max’s throat, an involuntary sound he’s able to stifle right at the end of it.
He needs to shut up. The bond needs to stop the connection, because on top of being mad now Max is thinking about Daniel’s body heavy on him, and about how it probably wouldn't feel as heavy now that he’s grown bulkier. How he could flip Daniel over if he wanted. His hips give one involuntary twitch before he can stop them.
“Fuck, Max”, Daniel groans, sounding like he feels it just as much as Max. Like he’s got his hand around himself already, zero to a hundred in an instant. “I fucking miss you, baby”, and Max has to bring his forearm to his mouth and sink his teeth in hard enough for the pain to clear his head a little.
It’s stupid. But still Max finds himself peeling away the first layer he placed around the bond, then the second one, then another and another until it’s enough to glimpse Daniel’s feedback loop of arousal, to sense what he’s thinking.
He’s thinking about fucking Max. Not remembering, but rather imagining a new scenario, one that they haven't lived yet: Daniel pressing Max against the walls of his ship, mouth on messy mouth and desperate for it, ripping his Jedi robes off. He lingers on the clothes for a second, distracted by a new thought – and then Max is not dressed in brown and beige anymore, but rather in full black, perfectly matched to Daniel. Curled in bed, Max gasps at the image.
The new Max in Daniel’s imagination is fierce, confident. He doesn't bother using his hands: instead he just force pushes Daniel to the floor and then sits on his hips, grinding slowly but surely and making make-believe Daniel gasp and groan. Real Daniel does as well, and then Max.
This version of himself looks so sure of himself as he rides Daniel’s cock, like he knows he’s good at it. That Daniel enjoys it; that he’s his. That they could burn the whole galaxy down if it meant keeping each other.
Max can't help it when he presses a palm to himself. He’s as hard as he’s been in months, already wet inside his underwear, half-delirious with it as he strokes himself. Behind him he can hear the wet slide of Daniel’s fingers around his own cock, the gasps of pleasure that echo in Max’s ears and then in his belly like they're his own.
“Max. Oh, fuck, Max. You’re so good. So good, always.” Daniel moves, turning onto his side to mirror the bracket of Max’s body. His hips are moving, trying to fuck themselves into Max, and –
He presses his lips to the sweaty back of Max’s neck.
The wave of fear that runs through Max at the realization is enough to shock the bond closed, and in the next instant he finds himself alone in his shitty old ship cabin again, throbbing and aching and miserable. Scared, because what just happened isn't possible.
When he presses a hand to the other side of the tiny bed, he finds it still warm.
—
“Have you ever heard of people being able to touch through a bond?”
It takes Charles a few good seconds to process the question. Processing. Still processing.
“What?”
Sitting in front of him, Max shakes his head and looks away.
“Nothing.”
“No, no. Tell me. What do you mean?” They're traveling somewhere along the Corellian Trade Spine, crossing the Inner Rim at this point, probably, Charles guesses. They've been awake for far, far too long, and Charles’ brain is running on pure adrenaline and some kind of hope to find a bed soon.
Max is clearly hesitant to give up any more information about this, his chin still facing away and his mouth pursed into a tight line. So Charles will have to dig for more.
He tries to recall what he knows about force bonds, which is honestly not that much, and mostly obtained through personal experience. “I mean, I still feel Seb through our bond, a little, even years after being his Padawan. They can be pretty strong, I hear.”
Max still doesn't look at Charles, but he does tilt his face towards the viewport he’s leaning against. The flashing currents of hyperspace light him up from behind, casting him in shadows. “Enough to touch someone through it?”
“Uh, actually I don't know? I think that some people can even exchange thoughts, if they're very strong in the Force. Very connected. But with Seb I could never do more than vaguely sense his mood.” Weird, weird question. “Was it like that for you with Daniel?”
Charles regrets the question as soon as it leaves his mouth. Max’s face pinches, and yeah, Charles should know better than to ask about him.
He takes a breath. “I mean, why do you ask, Max?”
“Forget it”, he replies, already getting up. Even sleepy and tired, Charles recognizes avoidance when he sees it.
“I’ve never heard of anyone touching through a bond. I mean, the connection there would have to be absolutely crazy. But maybe you should take a look through the Archives, if you wanna know whether or not it’s possible”, Charles says, and feels good when Max’s expression shifts like he’s considering the idea. “If it’s ever happened, then it must be written there.”
Max nods, acknowledging him. A bond, huh?
“Why do you ask this?”
“No reason. Just curious.” Then Max looks Charles in the eye for the first time since this conversation started, and smiles. Charles doesn't believe him for a second.
—
When the bond opens, it’s like taking a hammer to the skull.
Daniel freezes in place, trying very hard to stay still and not make a single noise as he processes Max bulldozing his way into Daniel’s brain, bringing a tsunami wave of emotion and thoughts. He can't restrain a gasp, but hopefully the mask will be enough to cover it up.
He’s in pain. Physical pain – he’s wounded.
Help.
Daniel takes a breath. Then he turns around.
It takes him a while to realize that his steps are not the only ones echoing down the cold shiny floors of the base.
“Lord – My Lord –”
Ah. Right. Pyry was talking his ear off about rerouting patrols.
“Pyry.” Daniel stops dead in his tracks, his voice coming out garbled through the mask, cape swaying lightly. Pyry stands straight. “I need an emergency medical kit delivered to the hangar, right now.”
“My Lord?”
“Now, Pyry.”
Pyry squares his shoulders and salutes, then runs off. Daniel doesn't linger to watch him go. He goes to the hangar.
—
He doesn't input any coordinates into the navigation system – he just follows the bond. The familiar drone of the engine is almost enough to pull him under and calm him down, to distract him from the pain. Almost.
Max. Max, are you there?
The response he gets is non-verbal. A vague sense of acknowledgement. A tug on the bond.
Max, what happened? Where are you?
Nothing. Daniel flies faster.
—
He damn almost crashes the ship, landing way too fast to be safe. Under any other circumstances he would be embarrassed about the performance, but not now.
He spares a moment to check the vitals outside – the atmosphere is breathable, although the temperature is almost enough to roast a lowly human like him. Two out of the three suns are high in the sky, burning down on the desert Daniel seems to have landed on. No matter where he looks, everything is just sand, sand, sand.
Except there. A little further south there's some kind of ratty building, not bigger than a hut. There.
Max. Max? I’m here.
Max’s end of the bond is confusing. A mess of jumbled colors and sounds, images amalgamating into nothing. Daniel doesn't think he’s conscious. He’s also not alone.
He unclips the cape from his shoulders and cuts off a strip wide enough to tie around his head like a hood. Anything to protect himself from direct sunlight, even if the black fabric won't serve him as well under these circumstances. Then he grabs the medical kit and goes.
The outside really is as bad as he thought it would be. It reminds him briefly of his childhood, of being a skinny kid running through the sand in Jakku, hungry and sunburnt. He pushes the thought out of his head as soon as it pops in, focusing on the pull of the Force, relentlessly driving him forwards.
Is it bad, that every step he takes feels good? That Daniel hasn't been this physically close to Max in years, and that the bond aches in a satisfying way as he nears the hut? It’s like a muscle that's been pulled tight for too long, sighing in relief as it finally relaxes.
He focuses on that as his boots sink in the sand, his body starts to sweat and the hot wind blowing through the dunes kicks sand in his eyes, making them sting and water. It doesn't matter, because Max is right there.
The hut is stood in the literal middle of nowhere, semi-protected from the winds by some kind of bulky trees with thick trunks and thin, blade-like leaves. There seems to be an abandoned structure built behind, which Daniel wants to identify as a farm, although he’s not quite sure whether or not his intuition is right.
When he pushes open the door to the hut, he’s met with the end of a bright green lightsaber.
Daniel doesn't give the kid any time to even start to make threats. He just waves his hand.
The boy flies through the hut and crashes into the opposite wall with an audible grunt of pain, his lightsaber deactivating by itself after losing its wielder. Daniel calls it to himself as an afterthought, making sure to disarm the Padawan.
But the most important thing right now isn't that. It’s Max, laid down on a bare old mattress, and pale as a ghost. His robe is dyed a deep red.
“Max”, he calls, both out loud and in his mind, walking over to stand next to him. No response comes forth. Daniel takes his face slowly in his hands, feeling Max’s pulse still beating faintly in his neck, the rush of his blood still traveling through him. He’s clammy and cold.
More blood flows out of Max as Daniel examines him. Slowly, gently, he finds the ruptured veins and arteries and presses into them with the Force, trying to minimize the bleeding. Then he gets to work.
It’s a mess under the clothes. Daniel’s seen a lot of injuries in his life, but never on someone he – well, loved. It’s like something took a clean chunk out of Max’s middle. If they were back at the base he could put Max in the tank, but as things stand, they will have to make do.
He manages to start an IV after three tries, silently apologizing to Max for mangling his forearm. Once the bacta has started flowing in, he gets started on dressing the wounds, dumping the fresh bandages too in bacta cream and then applying dry ones on top. He moves Max gently, using the Force to hold him steady and to minimize bleeding until the medication starts kicking in and regenerating all the lost bits.
He tries again when he’s done, all of his medical training exhausted. Max? Still no reply. He wants to give Max painkillers as well, to help mute the chaos on the other side of the bond, but he doesn't know if it’s okay to shoot them in through the IV with the bacta. He’ll wait until the baggie is done, he decides, just in case.
When Daniel looks around, Max’s Padawan is standing to the side, quietly watching him work. Daniel can sense worry coming off of him. Confusion, frustration, distrust.
“Will he be okay?”, he asks, shyly. Daniel hates him viciously for reasons beyond the kid’s control.
“He can't stay here. He needs rest, food and water, and time.” Daniel straightens up to his full height, both his and the kid’s lightsabers strapped to his belt. Daniel knows his name, even if Max never mentioned it. Liam. “What the fuck happened?”
Liam retreats from Daniel’s stare, instead fixating on the shabby floor. “There are creatures in the sand. They took us by surprise.” Daniel wants to ask ‘What were you doing here anyway?’ and ‘How did Max not feel them coming?’ Instead he looks at Max’s pale face, at the blood darkening his Jedi clothes.
Emboldened by Daniel’s silence, Liam continues, “Who are you anyway? And how did you get here?”
“Do you really want to be asking those questions?” He can see Liam look at his own stolen lightsaber, then at Daniel’s clothes. Maybe he should've changed into a disguise – he’d look great in a smuggler’s getup –, but he didn't think about it in time.
Instead of waiting for Liam’s reply, Daniel starts stripping off his robes, leaving only his undershirt underneath, and covers Max with them as much as he can. He hopes the bacta will repair any damage done by the sand and the wind.
To the room he says, “Follow me if you want to. Or not. I don’t care.” That being said, Daniel lifts Max carefully into the air with the Force, then steps out back towards the ship. When he looks behind, the boy is following.
The TIE he (basically) stole is fast as all hell but small, meant for combat more than traveling long distances, and accommodating a grand total of one pilot. Three people are a bit too much for the ship’s capabilities.
Still, Daniel floats Max carefully into the tiny utilitarian bedroom, barely bigger than a small bed, then settles him on the sheets. After making sure that the IV hasn't moved, he sets to cleaning Max up as well as he can, dousing him in more bacta cream where the sand has irritated his skin beyond the realms of reasonable.
He can’t help himself when he whispers, “There you go, mate. Can't have you risking your good looks, can we now?” When he’s done he sets the kit on the floor next to the bed and searches for painkillers, ready to administer them when the medicine is all in. Already it has started to work – when Daniel releases the mental push pressing on Max’s wounds, the bleeding has stopped.
He takes another look at Max’s pale face before he goes. “I’ll be back.” Max stays passed the fuck out.
Just as he thought, the boy is sitting at the navigation control, fiddling with the buttons and the levers, like an idiot. He jumps a little when Daniel says, “Ship’s locked onto my vitals, so you should probably stop wasting your time.”
The Padawan turns slowly in the chair to stare at Daniel, looking called out. Daniel sighs. He really doesn't want to babysit.
“Here, catch.” Before giving him any time, Daniel throws over the vial of cream. The kid catches it (good, otherwise it would've reflected quite badly on Max’s tutelage). He looks over at the simple label and his eyebrows travel up his forehead, like he wasn’t expecting it.
“Oh, uhm. Thank you”, he says, like he’s not sure if he’s supposed to be nice or not. Out of the corner of his eye Daniel sees his own mask, forgotten in a rush to the left side of the navigation panel. Damn it.
The kid eyes it, then the bacta, again. Then Daniel, like he’s coming to some kind of conclusion. “My name is Liam.”
“I know.”
“What’s yours?”
Daniel hesitates, his throat moving up and down.
“You can sleep in the chair if you want”, Daniel says, ignoring him. Then he turns around back towards the bedroom.
“Wait! Shouldn't we start the ship? I told you, there are – things. In the sand.”
Daniel stops for a moment. He doesn't feel any other life signs for miles.
He turns back towards the boy. “Where's Max’s lightsaber?”
“What?”
“The lightsaber. Max’s. He doesn't have it with him.”
“Oh, uhm. I’m not sure. I think it fell when we were fighting?”
“You think?” Daniel represses the urge to sigh again. He turns his back to the kid, then goes back to the bedroom to get his robes back. Max’s breathing is a little more steady now.
The Padawan stands back when Daniel opens the ship’s access door, revealing the burning desert on the other side. The heat blasts Daniel on the face, so he hurries to cover up as much as possible.
“Where are you going?”, the boy asks, like he’s genuinely baffled that Daniel would choose to walk back out there voluntarily.
“I’ll be back”, Daniel calls, and then for good measure, “Stay away from the navigation console.”
The heat is still as bad as before, even a little worse now that the third and final sun is making its way up the sky. Daniel steps out to look for the lightsaber.
—
“Fuck. Seriously, what the hell, Master, fuck.”
Liam stands by the bed, watching as his Master breathes in and out, eyes closed and face still pale. His presence is tenuous in Liam’s mind – not that their connection is that strong anyway.
There are medical supplies messily strewn on the floor: bandages and scissors, and a little clear vial that looks like painkillers. There’s a needle stuck in Max’s arm, connected to a half-empty bag.
Distraught, Liam sighs and rubs his eyes. He regrets doing so immediately: his face is still irritated from the sand. He retrieves the bacta vial reluctantly, the one the dark knight gave him. The dark knight – his Masters’s master. What a clusterfuck, honestly.
“This won't end well. Not for him nor for you, I don't think.”
The words echo in the tiny ship bedroom. Liam decides to swallow his pride and apply the cream to his own face, using more than it’s probably required.
“You were right though, Master. He didn't hurt me”, Liam says.
Defeated, he decides to scavenge the ship for food.
—
Daniel’s pleased to discover that he still remembers the feel and give of Max’s lightsaber, the shape and weight of it, even if it now carries new scratches that Daniel doesn't know.
He finds it when the first sun is already setting, much, much later that he had intended to. But he just – he couldn't leave the damned thing behind.
It’s buried in the sand, not too far from the hut but difficult to find when Max and Liam’s footsteps have been long erased by the wind in the dunes. Still, when Daniel feels it he recognizes it immediately.
It lights up bright blue in his hand, with an odd particularity: the edges of Max’s lightsaber vibrate almost jaggedly, like the beam is unstable. Defective, even. Max told him ages ago that he accidentally chose a cracked kyber crystal when he was sent into the caves with the rest of the younglings. To this day, he’s refused to change it.
Daniel deactivates the lightsaber and adds it to his growing collection at his belt. He does feel something alive in the sand, but it’s far away and it doesn't seem very interested in making a quick snack out of him.
He turns and returns to the ship.
—
It’s thirteen hours after Daniel’s flies the TIE back to orbit that he feels Max’s end of the bond stir awake.
Liam’s been camping out by the console, napping in the pilot chair and tiptoeing around Daniel every time he wants to check in on Max or use the fresher. Daniel stays by Max’s side.
His whole body lights up when he feels the first glimpse of consciousness in Max’s mind, heart kicking into overdrive despite himself. He uses the time it takes Max to open his eyes to wrestle himself back into control.
Daniel watches as Max blinks several times, looking at the ceiling. Thoughts jumble in his head, still confused and a little slow. Disorientation, danger, pain. What – where am I?
Then he tilts his head and sees Daniel standing on the side. Daniel wants to – he needs to be in Max’s head for this. Their first moment of closeness in so long.
But then Max dims the bond. He doesn't close it all the way, but he does push the door halfway shut, creating a barrier to hold off most of his emotional load. Daniel retaliates by projecting his displeasure.
In response, Max groans. “I just woke up. Could you give me some privacy at least?” His voice is even scratchier than usual.
Daniel taps his own forehead, making sure Max can see the gesture. “I’m not the one who came barreling in like a madman.”
“I thought you’d be happy to have the bond opened.”
“I don't think it’s very fair to have me feel your pain only”, Daniel responds, and that seems to mollify Max. The door of their bond opens a little, just an inch.
Still, Daniel will take what he can, he guesses. Slowly, he uncrosses his arms and sits on the side of the bed, close to where Max’s body rests under the sheets. He takes a deep breath before he asks, “How do you feel?”
“Like shit.” He can’t help it: the plain honesty startles a laugh out of Daniel.
“You smell like it too”, he replies, and something in him lights up painfully when he sees the corner of Max’s mouth lift up.
“Very romantic of you to say that.”
Daniel lifts an eyebrow. “Since when do you want me to be romantic?”
Something flashes through the bond, an ache quickly buried on Max’s part. If Daniel could look inside –
“How long have I been out?”, he asks, trying to sit up and grimacing with the movement. Daniel puts a hand on Max’s bare chest, above the bandages, to keep him down.
“Careful now, mate. You lost blood, yeah?” Max doesn't fight Daniel’s touch much, settling back down. He eyes his bandages with a critical eye.
“Fuck me. Is it bad?”
Daniel takes his hand off. “Nothing you won't be able to live without. Although you still have some regenerating to do on your left side.”
Max’s chest fills deeply on a big breath that he lets out slowly, slowly, before repeating the process, his eyes fixed on the bare ceiling of the room. Daniel waits patiently for him, recognizing the pattern of his breaths as basic pain management.
Eventually, Max settles, and Daniel gets a weird sense of déjà vu: alone in a bed inside a ship, with nothing but the climate control as background noise. Well, that, and the Padawan dozing off over the navigation panel.
He looks Daniel in the eye when he asks, “Why did you come, Daniel?”
The answer is simple, falling easily from Daniel’s lips. “You called.”
Max nods. Now it’s time for Daniel to ask instead.
“And why did you call, Max?”
“I knew you’d hear me.”
“I could've left you to bleed out.”
“You could have, yes”, Max acknowledges. Inside his head, he hears what’s unsaid.
You’re still too good to do that.
They both know that Daniel would've always come running. It’s palpable in every throb of the bond, more impatient now than it’s ever been before. Daniel thinks that it’s probably happy to have them be so close.
He doesn't get to voice that thought out loud though, at least not before the Padawan is at the door, eyes wide open and fingers gripping the threshold. “Master?”
“Hi, Liam”, Max greets, and Daniel bleeds his own emotions out of his face and retreats into himself.
There’s still a hole in Max’s side when Daniel peels back the bandages to check, but it’s less bloody and gory now. He drowns the new dressings in bacta as he works through the motions of disinfecting everything again. Max stays carefully still throughout, every point of contact a pinprick of awareness for both of them.
“I see they give you the good shit”, Max jokes, eyeing Daniel’s ravaged bag of medical stuff. It is better than what most troopers get – Pyry must’ve looked for a complete kit. Be that as it may, Max grunts in pain when the bandages are tightened, even though Daniel shot him up good.
“What, do you want to buy?”
“I couldn't afford it. Kinda running low on funds these days.”
“I’m sure we could work out an arrangement”, Daniel says, biting off the edge of lewdness he wants to imprint into the words. Still, back under the threshold, Liam shuffles his feet awkwardly.
He hates the way banter still feels easy, just as much as he fucking loves it. Control yourself for once in your life, he thinks, and maybe Max hears it, because a loopy smile draws itself on his face. Maybe it’s just the drugs. Daniel wants to eat it up either way.
He turns towards Liam. “Go make yourself useful and find rations for him. The paste, not the bars”. It irks Daniel that the kid looks to Max for approval before actually following the order. He goes like a puppy following his owner’s commands, happy to please.
Brat.
“He’s a good kid. He’s got potential.” Max is looking at him, eyes lidded. The bond is open a little further now, although not all the way. There are things Max is still keeping hidden.
“I didn't say the opposite.”
“You don't need to be jealous. My bond with him is not the same as my bond with you.”
“I know.”
“Okay”, Max says, and once again Daniel feels like he’s being condescended to. Like Max is just agreeing so they won't have to argue. He swallows the feeling and stands, watching as Max sits up with obvious pain. He looks at the walls of the tiny room and asks, “What is this? A TIE? SF model?”
Daniel nods. “How did you know?”
Max shrugs, then flinches. “You obviously have a hyperdrive, if you got here this fast. And you’re one of the very few pilots in your little club decent enough to handle one of these things.”
Daniel ignores the part about the ‘little club’. “Only decent?”
Max smiles. “Take the compliment, old man. You can fly, just not as well as me.”
“Oh, I’m not sure we wanna go there, mate. You haven’t seen me fly in ages.”
“Too important these days to handle your own ships?”
“I guess so, yes.” Daniel’s got his own vessel now, a bigger one with crew and tinier ships in its hangar. It’s a good-looking gal, even if he can’t pilot her.
Which just reminds everyone of the fact that they are on opposite sides of the spectrum now. That this tiny peace they’ve found here is only momentary.
“Max –”
“We can talk about it tomorrow”, he says, cutting Daniel off. “I feel fucking awful and I know you're tired, I can feel it. Let’s just – tomorrow we can talk about it. About what happens next.”
Daniel reads Max’s determination in every line of his face, expression going blank. He knows defeat when he sees it.
“Okay. Tomorrow, then”, he relents.
“Thank you.” Daniel ignores the fact that this is the first thank you he’s gotten so far. He gets up instead.
“I’ll go get the rations myself, since apparently your Padawan can’t get his head out of his own arse. Rest.”
“Where are you sleeping?”, Max asks, and before Daniel has time to make up an excuse, he feels Max’s disappointment in his head. He starts scooting over to the side of the bed, cringing as he does so. “We can both fit here.”
“Max, the bed is barely made to fit one human being, much less two.”
“It’s fine, I can make room.”
“Give it to your stupid Padawan, then. His neck is going to break if he keeps sleeping on that chair”, Daniel says, but Max shakes his head.
“He’s young, he’ll be fine.”
“Max, he’s literally right there. What do you guess he’ll think if –”
“He already knows”, Max says, and Daniel’s mouth snaps closed.
“Knows what?” Knows how much?
Max is still looking straight at Daniel. “About the bond. That we were… Involved.”
Involved. What a word. Daniel hates it: it leaves everything to the listener’s interpretation.
“And the High Council? They know about the bond too?” Max nods.
That’s fucking crazy. And incriminating as hell for Max, too. He – hid a bond with a Commander of the enemy, and now they know. Christian knows, his father knows.
“How are you still a Jedi?”, he asks, more to himself than to Max. He knows Christian would forgive pretty much anything from Max. Still, this is cutting it close.
Daniel can't read Max as clearly as he’d like to, but he does sense a cold hard resolution from him, tinted with shame and sadness. He swallows on a dry throat.
“Max. Why did you call for me?”
“I wanted to see you. To talk to you”, he replies, as simply as that. His eyes leave Daniel’s and settle on the stiff bedsheets. “But we said tomorrow. We can speak tomorrow.”
"If you think I'm gonna be able to sleep after this –"
"Just shut up, Daniel."
Daniel's mind spins in circles, tracing a wide orbit around his own head, round and round we go. It gets to a point that he has to be the one to dim the bond a little, because he's pretty sure he's giving Max a headache, at least judging by the way he keeps flinching while he swallows down his portions. He has to excuse himself to the fresher.
It takes him a good minute to identify the feeling wrapping its claws at the bottom of his ribcage, because he's grown to be a stranger to hope in the last few years. It's such a terrible one too, the kind that leaves you hollow and exhausted when proven pointless. He's felt it before, and he doesn't want to feel it again.
Asking Max to run away with him once was enough. If he doesn't – now, then –
He murmurs to his own reflection in the tiny fresher mirror, taking in the bags under his eyes and the ghost of an uneven tan from his lightsaber search. "Through passion I gain strength. Whether it be hope or disappointment, it is feeling that fuels me."
By the time he goes back, Max has finished eating and Liam's face seems a little strained. Max looks towards Daniel as he walks in, then carefully swings his legs over the side of the bed. "Daniel. Help me to the fresher", he says, with the ease of someone who knows his demands will be met. The worst of it is that Daniel does move in to support his weight, carefully staying close as Max crowds them in the tiny room and uses a damp cloth to wash some of the dried blood and grime off, then awkwardly close as Max takes the world's longest piss.
Daniel finds himself wanting to apologize for the lack of amenities, even though they both know this ship was not made for long stays. "I don't have any other clothes, sorry."
"It's fine", Max replies, eyeing critically his own pants. Everything else is off: no robes, no socks. He does have underwear on, though. Daniel saw when he applied the bandages. After washing his hands and gurgling water, he looks back at Daniel through the mirror and simply says, "Bed, now." Daniel finds himself agreeing. Liam is not in the bedroom anymore when they walk back in, probably already perched back in the pilot chair – whether actually asleep or only pretending to, Daniel doesn't know.
When the moment of truth arrives, Max motions for Daniel to get in bed first. "I think it's better like this. So I can turn on my good side." It takes Daniel a moment of hesitation before he's stripping down to his undershirt and kicking his boots off, before climbing into bed. Looking up at Max from the flat of the mattress makes something twitch inside him, but he tries his best to ignore it as Max gets in too.
It's impossible to – Daniel keeps still as a statue when the heat of Max's body pressed to his overwhelms him. He doesn't know what's worse: the slide of his skin, the warmth, or the familiar smell of him, there even through the generic scent of Imperial bodywash and dried blood. The bed is far, far too small.
He shuts the door further on his own end of the bond, which makes Max huff.
"You tell me over and over to open the bond, and now that it is open you keep closing it on your side", he says, turning to look at Daniel. "I thought you'd be better about this."
"Not until I've heard what you want to say, Max. If you want to ask for something." The words come out too loud in the half-silence of the bedroom. "Forgive me for having some trust issues here, yeah?" Max doesn't take the bait, but Daniel can feel him on the edge of the bond like he's prodding at it with careful fingers, trying to pry it open. Daniel groans. "Max."
"Daniel", he whispers, as his left hand comes over to rest over the side of Daniel's face. Daniel just barely manages to suppress a gasp. "Open up for me. Please." And this time, Daniel does gasp. Max's mind is right there, asking to be let in.
Despite his better judgment, he yanks the door open. He's pretty sure both of them make a noise this time.
Fuck. The full unfiltered current of emotions running through Max is hard to take in all at once, pulling Daniel in a thousand directions at the same time. He feels Max's sore side, dulled by the medicine and the drugs but still tender; he sees Liam in Max's mind and feels a stab of responsibility, but also pride. The burst is worse when he sees himself: there's the ache of longing and the giddy relief of closeness, followed by a hot curl of want and need, but mostly – guilt. So much so that it shocks Daniel still for a moment.
The images flash rapid-fire in his head: being called to the High Council; his secret out for everyone there to see; the cold disgust in his father's eyes.
You're gonna have to redeem yourself if you want to have a shot at one of these chairs, Max, someone says. Someone whose voice sounds familiar, but Daniel can’t quite place. You know what you have to do.
"No. Stop." Daniel tries pulling himself free, shutting the bond. But it's too late. The guilt on Max's side intensifies, eating at both of them like an infection.
"I'm sorry, Daniel. I'm so sorry."
Daniel's mind is overridden in a split second, forcefully replaced by Max. An instant later, he's swallowed by the darkness.