#casuel

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Lemuel:

3. After-Action Patch-Up: How does your F/O react when they see you got hurt? How do they tend to your injury?

It completely depends on the injury.  We are soldiers in the Lions of Mercy that are constantly moving, drilling, sparring, and training—you’re gonna get banged up.  He’s seen me get black eyes, cut lips, a busted nose, scrapes, cuts, and gashes.  So long as the injury is sustained within the limits of the barracks and the training grounds, he isn’t concerned.

Sure he’ll make the cursory “You all right there, Theron?” and “Oof, I’d hate to see the other guy” comments, but if he fretted over every bruise and cut, there’d be no sleep for him.

In battle, however, is another story.

Cresce is notorious for various nasty pymaric traps and weapons—all that make for rather horrific injuries.  He knows I can handle myself on the field, but being a captain for an airborne division means he doesn’t have much sway over anything going on for the ground troops (which I absolutely am a part of).  Seeing me in one piece is only enough to allay a portion of his fears, and any injury received in battle he oversees the tending to himself.  

Well, not himself, since he’s not a medic/healer by any means, but he paces like a caged tiger as whatever poor sap that happened to be walking by is ordered to treat the wounds.  

He barks various questions (”How deep is it?” “What about shrapnel?” “What about poisoned blades?”) until the medic is all but shaking from the pressure to ensure this one lowly female private is not going to die on his watch.

Lem’s seen a lot in the nearly twenty years he’s been in the army, and has probably lost twice as much as that.  He can’t do much in such a situation, but he will do damn well whatever he can to ensure that he doesn’t lose anyone else.  Especially since it’ll take a blade to the heart to get me to be taken off the line.

6. Bodyguard Crush: How does your F/O make you feel safe?

Lem is very, very good at cheering people up and easing their anxieties, especially when it comes to any battle related fears.  He’s been in the army since he was twelve, he knows every horrific thought that can cross a person’s mind.  For those moments when the action at the front is getting to be more than I can handle, or a friend of mine loses their head or whole-ass torso to a mine, he’s quick to offer a distraction.  It may just be a really bad and probably off-color joke, maybe quick grasp of my hand, or even a quick and discrete kiss—but he makes a point to do something.

But being the only woman under his command brings its own problems.  It’s isolating enough as it is, leaving me with few friends to turn to in a time of crisis.  He at least had no shortage of camaraderie when in the Council Army, and he is charming enough that he won himself friends within the Lions of Mercy rather quickly, but me?  Few want anything to do with the semon woman who probably slept her way into the esteemed Lions of Mercy.

Lem doesn’t just do his damnedest to ensure I am safe from Crescian blades, his very presence acts as a barrier from whatever vitriol would emerge in the high tensions of battle.  Soldiers will look to anyone to place the blame for a fallen comrade or a mission turned FUBAR, and Lem will go as far as physically put himself between me and any soldier who dares look to place that blame at my feet.

12. Post-Kiss Catatonia: How did you and your F/O react to your first kiss together?

Woof.  It’s weird.  We’ve danced around that veritable elephant in the room for months, maybe even over a year before it comes to a head.  It undoubtedly happens when we are alone and with nary a prying eye to be seen, otherwise we’d probably both be kicked out of the Lions of Mercy, but that leaves the aftershocks… overwhelming.

I undoubtedly avoid him as much as I can for days.  Both fear of being found out and doubt that his feelings are real a motivator to keep him at arm’s length.  Were anyone to catch wind that their playful flirtations at morphed into something very real and tangible, I would be back on the streets and at the mercy of Alderode’s ruthless caste system once more.  At least within the Lions of Mercy, I am guaranteed a roof over my head, food in my belly, and a steady pay—I can’t afford to let a hopeless and forbidden romance to jeopardize that.

And the idea that Lem has no real feelings and just wants the prestige of bedding the woman who wormed her way into his ranks?  Too devastating to think too hard about.  Best just pretend it never happened.

Lem is undoubtedly upset about my cold-shoulder routine.  Maybe even angry.  He doesn’t do Emotions well, and the concept that he could have somehow overstepped boundaries and ruined the friendship he had with me?  Unthinkable and heartrending.  But he can’t broach those feelings.  He’s experienced heartbreak and agony so many times, and he can’t let that well open over something so trivial.  Anger is better.

There will probably be a fight at some point where he accuses me of being a frigid bitch or something.  He wouldn’t be wrong, as I avoided him for awhile after we had spent so long hiding behind teasing jibes and flirtatious smiles, but he hasn’t considered what this would mean for me.  A soud broaching this very delicate code of conduct they have established for her would be bad enough, but he has enough friends in high places that he’d likely be fine.

But me?  I’d be ruined.

I explain as much, and work in there my fears that the kiss meant nothing to him, where it meant everything to me—especially since it could not mean anything.  Soud and semon could not be together.  His ghers would never allow it.  His holy man brother would never allow it.

How would this resolve?  It would not.  We are doomed to live out our romance in secret.

Until, of course, our dear Rector meets his end on a snowy night on the streets of Durlyne.  And we all know what Alderode expects of a widow’s brother-in-law when her husband meets an unfortunate end.

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Bucky:

7. Caught In The Rain: How does your F/O react if a sudden rainstorm interrupts your date with them?

GRUMPY BEYOND ALL REASON.  He has a METAL ARM.  That shit CHAFES when it is not properly dried after a shower, let alone a surprise rain storm that neither of us was prepared for.

It doesn’t ruin the date, but it sure means that there’s a lot of bitching and moaning when we make it back to his apartment.  He spends fifteen minutes wincing in the bathroom as he applies aloe cream.  I call after him multiple times to ask if he needs help, but he’s the Winter Soldier.  The Fist of Hydra can apply a bit of aloe to a sore rash all on his own, thank you very much.

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Finn:

13. Sickeningly Sweethearts: Do you and your F/O engage in PDA? If yes, how do the surrounding people react?

PDA is limited.  As you know, I am Mandalorian through and through, which means that 98% of the time I am out and about, I am wearing my full beskar’gam.  That doesn’t leave much room for smooching in the War Room as we plan our next raid on a First Order supply depot.

But there is the keldabe kiss, the forehead touch Mandalorians use when in full armor and wish to express physical affection for their significant other, a stand-in for a kiss when you have a helmet on your head and don’t have the time or inclination to remove it.

Those happen a lot, but unless you’re in the know, it could be a platonic expression between comrades.

But when you’re in the know, you know that it is an intimate gesture between between cyare'se.

But, of course, there will be the few times where we can actually be gross and cute and really kiss.  People don’t really pay attention, honestly.  We all have people we love on base and steal whatever small moments we can.  No one begrudges us that.

15. Zip Me Up: Does your F/O help you get dressed for the day? Do you help them?

I am the lifelong Mandalorian.  I have plenty of practice getting my armor on as I prepare to face the day.

Finn, however, is new to this lifestyle.  He’s had no practice getting his armor on.  He has no idea that the bracers and shin guards should be put on dead last, that you need to ensure the safety lock is securely on for all of your various hidden gadgets and weapons so you don’t accidentally wind up skewering yourself or others as your fiddle with the heavy beskar, or that you need to learn how to control your blink patterns without even thinking about it or you might wind up making your HUD activate your jetpack while you’re still in your dressing chambers.

I help Finn every single morning after he gets his first set of beskar’gam.  He’s embarrassed that he is absolutely hopeless with it at first.  He was a Stormtrooper!  He’s worn armor before!  He knows how this goes!  Why is this so hard?  Why do we have to carry an entire arsenal with us just to head to the docking bay for a practice run?