#dramatic posing

Jay opened his eyes, and slowly released his grip on R5, wincing a bit at the indents left on his hands. He realized gradually that his face was pressed to the floor, and, shaking a bit, he pushed himself up and gave himself a quick mental once-over. Nothing hurt any worse than it had before – not significantly worse, anyway – so it seemed that by some miracle, he was indeed okay.

He opened his mouth to declare as much when his eyes found the unconscious Jedi facedown on the floor a few feet away.

“Tim!”

Without another thought, Jay scrambled forward to roll him onto his back. Tim didn't stir at the movement, which only served to fuel the panic buzzing behind Jay's eyes. A different buzzing alerted him to R5's presence, hovering just above his head, and distantly, Jay noted that that meant they were back on solid ground.

The crash landing had been proof enough of that, though.

At the sound of footsteps behind him, Jay moved aside to let Jessica approach, keeping his eyes locked on Tim. Despite how still he remained, his chest rose and fell steadily, and Jay let out a relieved breath of his own.

He allowed himself to relax a bit more as Jessica checked Tim's pulse and turned his head to survey his injuries; her movements were quick and methodical, clinical almost, and Jay was comforted by the knowledge that at least one of them knew what they were doing.

Oddly, he wanted to hope that the spark of concern he could see in her eyes wasn't purely selfish, that she was worried for Tim not just because he was the object of her mission, but he shook off the thought as irrelevant.

“He'll be alright,” Jessica stated after a moment. She stood up and turned her attention to the ship's condition instead, with a heavy sigh. “What a mess.”

“The fire spread to the power core,” Jay said, fully aware that he was stating the obvious. “Started in the hyperdrive, but I'm guessing you knew that already.”

Jessica responded with an absent nod as she pried open the slightly charred casing of the hyperdrive in question.

“I've got some experience fixing Corellian ships, if you need any help.” Jay took a small step forward, wringing his hands, as R5 hummed softly in agreement. “Although I've... I've never seen the inside of a VCX model up close like this. Not in person, anyway. No one has them this far out, and anyone who does never sticks around for long.”

“Well, you're not missing much right now.” Jessica swept the hair out of her eyes with a frustrated exhale. “It's all fried.”

He shifted his weight from foot to foot. “We're stuck here, then?”

Jessica shook her head and brushed past Jay to frown at a flickering display on the wall behind him. “Getting the ship up and running again won't be hard. Everything that was damaged by the fire can be patched up, at least until we get to the base for actual repairs. We'll need a new power core, of course, but that won't be an issue, it's pretty generic. It's the regulator that's the issue.” She rubbed her temples with one hand. “Without a new one, we won't make it very far without running into the same overheating problem that brought us here.”

“So...what do we do?”

She took a deep breath and cast her eyes downward for a long moment. “Can I trust you to stay with the ship?” she asked by way of reply, and Jay could hear the unspoken question beneath the words. Can I trust you to keep him from leaving?

With a glance at the unconscious Jedi between them, he nodded once, twisting his face into an expression that he hoped resembled confidence.

Jessica didn't look wholly convinced, but accepted his answer nonetheless. “Shouldn't be too much to ask, anyway,” she said with a quick shrug as she disappeared around a corner. “The air here isn't what I would call breathable.”

Jay blinked and shared a quick glance with R5 before following. “Wait, uh...” He paused at the bottom of the ramp to the cargo deck; now that they weren't in a mad rush to take off, he had a chance to take in the sight more thoroughly. The bay was mostly empty, with only a few large crates stacked and fastened in place a bit haphazardly on the far side. Momentarily, he wondered whether Jessica had already left the ship, but the sound of rummaging behind one of the crates answered the question for him.

“Where exactly are we?” he asked as he approached, craning his neck in an unsuccessful attempt to see what she was doing.

“Ishanna V.” A smaller crate slid out from behind the one Jessica was digging through, along with a slowly growing pile of equipment, most of which Jay didn't recognize. “Not exactly the most civilized place in the galaxy, but in our case, that's probably a good thing. Empire's hard to hide from, even all the way out here,” she paused, then grumbled, “especially after all the theatrics on Saqqar.”

A strange guilt twisted in Jay's stomach at the mention of his home planet. He quickly shook it off; none of that fiasco had been his fault. If anything, his knowledge of the terrain had helped them escape, hadn't it?

Although, if it hadn't been for him, Tim would have been long gone before the Empire had closed in on him. Or the Resistance, for that matter.

Lost in his thoughts as he was, it took Jay several seconds to notice that Jessica was no longer in the cargo bay. In the same moment, he caught a glimpse of golden light flooding into the ship from the direction of the exit ramp.

“Stay on the ship,” Jessica ordered as he approached, her voice muffled by the oxygen mask now strapped to her face. And without another word, she punched a button to her right, sealing the airlock between them and blocking his view.

He had to fight the sudden, intense impulse to disobey, to open the airlock and follow, consequences be damned, if only for a momentary glance at the world outside, a planet that was completely new and alien and undoubtedly dangerous to him.

Instead, he scrambled back up the ramp to the cockpit, barely even noticing the curious trilling of R5 following closely behind him; he was too focused on what he could see as he approached the viewport, the view mostly obscured by a large formation of dark gray rocks several meters from the ship, until he got close enough to see the sky above.

“Whoa,” he breathed.

The golden rays of the sun – Ishanna, he assumed – poured into the cockpit from over the rocks, casting long shadows that were softened by the reflections bouncing off of all the inactive control panels. It felt solid, almost, too dense to be nothing more than light, like a liquid filling the space around Jay, heavy and blinding, and he let his eyes drift closed, drinking in the sensation.

And the warmth! He pressed a hand to the transparisteel; it was cool to the touch, still, likely a residual effect of space travel, and yet he could feel a hint of the heat that was pressing into the ship from the other side. The warmth was intoxicating; he let it spread up his arm and into his chest, like a cluster of glowing embers, radiating into his lungs and his veins, yet not setting him aflame.

The sound of footsteps pulled him out of the trance, and he turned to see a disgruntled Tim stumble into the cockpit next to him.

“Hey!” Jay exclaimed, too loud, ashamed suddenly of how easily he'd forgotten about the unconscious Jedi he was supposed to be looking after. “Are you alright?”

“Great,” Tim grunted. He squinted against the light streaming through the transparisteel, its mesmerizing effect apparently lost on him.

“We're on Ishanna V,” Jay said, to a quick beep of confirmation from R5. He fidgeted a bit as Tim took in the sight of the otherwise empty cockpit, then added, “Jessica went to get some parts for the ship.”

“Great.”

Jay glanced out the viewport, then back to Tim. “Apparently the air here isn't breathable,” he stated.

Tim let out an annoyed sigh. “Great.” He turned and walked away.

“Where are you going?” Jay called after him.

“Nowhere.” Tim disappeared into one of the cabins and slammed the door.

R5 beeped softly, and Jay nodded in agreement. “Yes, very grumpy.” He turned back toward the viewport and closed his eyes again, letting the warmth roll over him once more.

“He'll come around, though.”