#five years on the winter soldier makeup routine kind of arc

[tiredassmage]

WIP Wednesday

And WHAT-IF Wednesday, ey? Ey? Sksksdfnl, this week’s donation brought to you by my brain being a goblin and @commander-krios and I having too many emotions over our silly boys who are very wholly in stupid love. (Thank you for the tag, for encouraging my shenanigans, etc etc x,D) This was hard to pick a segment from so weeee my habit of posting a whole giant chunk continues, lol.

Dash and Leo are part of our group legacy shenanigans, but uh. That wasn’t enough to stop my brain from doing (apparently it’s Thing TM) the “okay, but what if... KOTXX..??? pointing emojis??” So. Sniffs. Please send us tissues.

Gonna tag @captainderyn @kemendin @eorzeashan @sasslett if y’all would like??? And ofc, usual encouragement, if you see this and you want, I’m also tagging you. In my heart. Be ungovernable still, naturally, but. Also be obnoxious about your blorbos. It’s freeing.

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“Just ‘cause I’m here doesn’t mean I’m committing to anything,” the Voidhound growled carefully with narrowed dark blue eyes. “My fleet’s been harassing blockades just fine without official government oversight the last five years. I’m not risking grounding them if your ‘Commander’ gets cold feet, got it?”

Hylo Viz shook her head and shrugged her shoulders. “Yea, heard you the first couple of times. Look, Commodore, why don’t ya try talkin’ to the man himself, eh? Just hear out his offer.” She nodded across the docking bay to a trio approaching the commotion.

Leo frowned and bit back the sharp retort about ‘calming down’ that threatened to fire off his tongue. He held out a hand to signal the rest of the crew to stay back, for now. Better to get a good look at this Outlander everyone was supposedly losing their damn minds about.

Who was flanked by… a familiar Sith lord and ex-SIS agent, so long as the nearly decade or more of being an insomniac wasn’t finally catching up to him.

That would have been throwing enough. As if he wasn’t looking at a dead man walking.

Their eyes met across the room and Leo felt his breath catch in his throat. Theron Shan had trailed off behind him and Lana Beniko’s Force-tuned golden eyes narrowed slightly to mirror the thinning of her lips, but all of this went unnoticed for now.

Long as he wasn’t seeing shit, he would deal with them later.

Leo yanked down his mask as he sucked in another breath. And that was when he saw the first spark of recognition in dark brown eyes.

“You.” One hand curled anxiously into a fist at his side.

Wild Space. Darth Marr’s bastard fleet of Imperial and Republic vessels scouring for any last trace of their would-be former Emperor. Five years. Five incredibly cold, incredibly desolate years - some of the longest he’d ever lived all caught in the back of his throat.

“You!” He all but growled as he finally found his footing firmly back in the Odessen hangar, ignoring a quiet, “Commodore?” issued at his shoulder.

Before another breath consciously sawed through his lungs, he gripped Dash Felaeon firmly by the front of his shirt. “I thought you were fucking dead!”

“Leo?!”

“I thought you were fucking dead, you bastard!” His eyes stung. He wanted to hit something, shoot something, and he never wanted to let go. The words raced back at him over a suddenly quieted hangar. It didn’t matter - the entire galaxy had come to a halt for him the moment he’d laid eyes on him.

Dash’s hands squeezed gently around his arms as they moved up to his shoulders, maybe to steady him as he almost swayed. He blinked furiously against the tears threatening to blur his vision.

“Leo…” One hand cupped against his cheek. Leo closed his eyes tightly and leaned instantly, desperately into the touch - just as warm and steady as any number of quiet evenings he could never forget spent on Coruscant bathed in an orange glow as the sun set over the towering buildings and dappled across their floor with the passing speeder traffic.

Breathe. He stuttered another unsteady breath into his lungs. “I thought you were dead…” He’d quieted to almost a whimper.

“What are you..?”

“Shut the fuck up,” Leo all but growled, “You-!” He dragged Dash down by the collar of his shirt into a kiss that swallowed any of the poor words that would dare try to masquerade as an explanation.

This had to be real. He couldn’t- If it wasn’t…

Dash Felaeon had been declared killed in action by the Republic over five years ago. And it’d torn a hole through Leo’s life larger than any superweapon, any galactic power could ever hope to have recreated.

He still panted when they broke apart. Dash’s fingers wove into his hair as Leo pressed his forehead against his, hooking both hands around the back of his neck.

“You were…”

“I know,” Dash said quietly.

“And I-”

“I know.”

“It’s..?”

“It’s me, Leo. It’s me.”