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“And you still need to do your baselines before we leave, Lieutenants,” Leia reminded them.
“Yeah,” Wedge sighed. “We will. Don’t worry about it.”
Wedge and Luke left the debriefing room. It was early morning after the Death Star and already the Alliance was already planning their departure from Yavin, getting ready to set off to some destination Wedge didn’t know about and had a pretty good guess Leia didn’t either.
Luke cleared his throat. “Um, uh, Wedge? What’s a baseline?”
“You know,” Wedge said, distracted, still wondering where they were going to go and when the next battle would come, “the cognitive test. The one to make sure we’re ready to jump into a cockpit again after we see something big. You took one already, remember? They give you one when you just join as a,” way to compare how quickly your score goes down, “baseline.”
“Yeah, uh, I didn’t do that? I was here on Yavin for one hour before we went up against the Death Star?”
Oh. Right. “They just want to mentally assess us,” Wedge said. “You know, like a debriefing.”
“What happens if we fail?”
“You get to see more medics. So don’t fail.”
“Um, uh, well, uh, I’ll try. I guess.”
Wedge might have laid that one on a bit thick. It was easy to forget after everything that had happened that Luke was still fairly new to all this. “You’ll do fine, Luke.” And then he added, with only a small dose of cynicism, “Everybody does fine the first time.”
Wedge took a seat in the small windowless room, trying not to bounce his leg or show any sign of nervousness, while the medic in front of him took his sweet time getting his datapad set up.
“All right. Now, I know you’ve done this before, but let’s start with a few preliminary questions. Name?”
Wedge resisted the urge to roll his eyes, knowing this very information was sitting in front of the medic and that this was just as much a part of the test as anything else. “Wedge Antilles.”
“Rank?”
“Flight Lieutenant.” For an illegal military organization some would term an extremist group, he did not add.
“Birth, when and where?”
“Corellia. Three years before the Empire.”
“Joined the Alliance?”
“Two years ago.”
The medic said nothing more, just plugging this into his datapad. Then he looked up and smiled.
“All right, we’re now ready to begin. I want you to remember that this is not a test; there are no right or wrong answers.”
Yeah, but there sure as blazing hells were answers that would keep Wedge out of a cockpit. In ideal times (read: peace times in the old Republic) the test was meant to score 85 or higher out of 100 before a pilot could get back in the cockpit, but with fewer pilots going into consistently more horrific battles with higher casualties the pass rate had gotten lower. He thought it was 50 or somewhere thereabouts, perhaps the hypothesis being a pilot should be at least slightly less screwed up than not in order to pass. And so far he’d managed to pass every single time in these lowering standards. He had no plans of changing that today.
“We’re simply looking for the truth. Nothing more. Nothing less.”
Wedge nodded his head in case the medic was looking for confirmation.
“Okay, so we’re going to start off with something relatively easy. I’m going to say a word and you’re going to say another word, whatever this first word makes you think of. Just the first thing that pops into your head.”
Wedge nodded again.
“Okay. Something simple: Wedge?”
“Me,” Wedge said easily enough. They always started with this.
“Corellia?”
“Birth.”
“Mother?”
“Fighter.”
“Father?”
“Pilot.”
The medic didn’t glance up for any of this, simply typing it into his datapad, quickly enough that Wedge thought it fair to assume his answers weren’t a problem.
“Alliance?”
“Friends.”
“X-wing?”
Wedge smiled at that one. “Home.”
“Space?”
“Stars.”
“Yavin?”
“Protect.”
“TIE fighters?”
“Enemy,” Wedge said. And then he started to think about how he had been that enemy only a few short years ago. And then he started to think about how many of that enemy had killed his friends in the time since.
“Empire?”
“Killers.” He knew as soon as the word was out of his mouth that he’d made a major mistake. The medic didn’t give a large expression but there was now a tic pulsing in his jaw. He spent a long time writing into his datapad, more time than all the other questions put together.
And if even that hadn’t convinced Wedge, the medic’s next question of “Sun?” sure made him think it. A non-sequitur. A harmless word. Like the medic was trying to reorient him. Or—Wedge could think a bit more pessimistically—like he was prodding him to screw up again.
“Bright.”
“Snow?”
“Cold.”
“Stormtroopers?” the medic said, looking right at him, waiting. Waiting for Wedge to make the same mistake.
Killers, some part of Wedge’s mind said. “Enemy.”
“Death Star?”
Wedge tapped a finger on the table, the sound echoing in the small room. “That’s, uh, that’s not one word.”
“Answer, Lieutenant.”
He hesitated. They’d lower his score for hesitating because they knew just as well as he did that hesitating meant substituting a far worse word for something only slightly better.
“Antilles, I need you to answer.”
A smirk started creeping into Wedge’s face which he knew was completely inappropriate and only furthering the likelihood of him never seeing the inside of a cockpit again.
“Gone,” he said.
“So, uh, just to be clear: this is not a test?”
“No,” the medic sighed. “Which I have already explained. Three times.”
“I know,” Luke said, feeling terrible for making the medic irritated, and having no clue what to do, and still unsure whether this thing was really such a bore as Wedge made it out to be. “I know, it’s just that my friend said that this was a test.”
The medic scrolled through his datapad. “Wedge Antilles?”
“Yeah, that’s him.”
“All right, well, he’s misinformed. This is not a test. There are no right or wrong answers. You just say whatever word comes to mind.”
“Okay,” Luke said, still not entirely trusting the medic. Or Wedge, for that matter. Though he knew both of them were only trying to help.
“Luke?”
“Uh, yeah?”
“That was the word. That’s the word you’re supposed to respond to: Luke.”
“Oh, sorry.” Apparently he was already failing this unfailable test. “Uh, that’s me, I guess.”
“One word, please.”
“Sorry!” Great. Just great. This was sure to convince exactly no one that he was ready for a cockpit again, no matter how many medals they were apparently planning to give him. He couldn’t even complete a simple exercise. “Me. The one word is: me.”
“Tatooine?”
“Sun. Two suns, to be exact.”
The medic sighed again. “This is meant to be one word responses, Lieutenant.”
“Sorry! But there isn’t a word for two suns. It is, by definition, a two word word.”
“I will write down that you said ‘suns’. One word, remember?”
“Yes. I remember.”
“Uncle?”
They must have put in his file that he had lived with his aunt and uncle. “Dead.” He hoped that wasn’t too morbid.
“Aunt?”
“Love.”
“Father?”
“Dead,” he said again, remembering immediately what Ben had told him only days ago. Well, great. If not being able to respond to his name in one word didn’t show his incapability, using death as a metaphor for his entire family most certainly would.
“Mother?”
“Distant.”
“Alliance?”
“Hope.”
“X-wing?”
“Difficult,” Luke said, puzzling a moment, “to maneuver. I’m sorry. I’m trying to find one word which sums that up.”
“It’s all right. Sometimes it’s—”
“Unmanageable.”
The medic blinked at him.
“That’s a better word. That’s what I was thinking. You know, in my head.”
The medic apparently didn’t have any response to this beyond putting it down in the datapad.
“Yavin?”
“Green.” Even though he’d only been here less than a day, Luke still could not get over how green it all was. He wanted to ask the medic if all planets were as green as this one, or if this was a particularly green planet, but then he looked at the medic’s increasingly pinched face and thought better of it.
“Empire?”
“In control. Sorry, you want one word. Controlling. They’re controlling.”
“Stormtroopers?”
“White.” Luke started smiling and then realized in horror what he was doing. “I’m sorry, I don’t think Stormtroopers are funny. I’m just remembering, um, my friend and I had to go undercover as Storm—”
“I understand,” the medic said, looking like this briefing (test?) was the most difficult thing he had ever endured. “I do have the debrief from your trip to Yavin. Your consistent explanations are not necessary.”
“Okay, sorry. I’m sorry.”
“Death Star?”
“Sorry,” Luke muttered. “I’m sorry about that, too.”
“Let’s move on to the next part,” the medic said, and Wedge gave no response beyond glancing at him. They were, at the very least, a step closer to finishing.
“I’m going to tell you a scenario, and I want you to tell me what you would do in that situation. You can take your time and use however many words you like, but I want you to be honest. What I said before still applies. This is not a test and there are no wrong answers.”
Him continually saying that didn’t make it true, but Wedge wasn’t about to tell him otherwise.
“This is the first event: You and a friend are walking through a city. You forget something at home, but you trust your friend so you leave your credits with them as you go back to retrieve what you’re missing. By the time you come back, you find a good portion of your credits missing but your friend denies spending them. What do you do?”
Well, nobody said these baselines were poetry. Wedge sat back. “I don’t know. Maybe there’s nothing I can do. I want my credits back, but if my friend says they didn’t take it then I’m not sure what else I can do.”
“You trust your friend?” the medic said in a voice like Wedge shouldn’t believe anyone, least of all apparent friends.
“They wouldn’t be a friend if I didn’t trust them.”
“So you’d just let the credits go? Accept the loss?”
What in the galaxy this had to do with getting inside a cockpit was anyone’s guess. Wedge said, “Yeah. For the sake of my friend, I would.”
“All right.” Writing stars knew what in that datapad. “The second event: You have a friend who’s been acting secretive lately. You come to their house one day uninvited and find a symbol stamped on one of their datapads. You know this symbol belongs to a group made illegal by the government and it makes you feel uneasy. What do you do?”
Here was a prime example of the conundrum Wedge found himself in. Was he supposed to say what this friend was doing was good because it mimicked how the Alliance went underground? Was he supposed to say that what they were doing was bad because it showed Wedge was trustworthy with information and beliefs imparted into him?
“I wouldn’t do anything,” Wedge said. “If they’re a part of something, and it isn’t hurting me in any way, I’m not sure it’s my place to do anything about it.”
The medic nodded his head. “That’s what you’re like, it seems. You’re willing to let things go if you can.”
Ugh, this was exactly why Wedge hated these things. Tell a medic a few thoughts and the man would try to tell what Wedge’s life ambitions had been from the age of three.
“Yeah,” Wedge said. “Sure.”
“All right. Here’s the third event: You’re arrested for holding treasonous beliefs against your government. After several months in prison, you’re set free by a family member who says they’re the one who reported you to the authorities but now want your forgiveness. What do you do?”
“Do?” Wedge said. He crossed his arms. “There’s nothing to do, if they’ve reported me to the authorities then they’re not a part of my family anymore. End of story.”
The medic looked up, seeming somewhat surprised by this response. Then, like a holo switching off, he moved back into that impassive face. “I forgot, Antilles. You’re from Corellia. Corellians have a deep sense of family, don’t they?”
“Doesn’t everyone?”
“One of the worst acts in Corellian culture would be the betrayal of your family, would it not?”
Ugh, now he was going to be lectured not just about his personality but also his planet. “I guess.”
“So, say, if your loyalties came down to it, between your beliefs and your family, you would choose your family every time, correct?”
Wedge didn’t like where this was heading. And he didn’t like the smug little look on the medic’s face, either. “My family’s dead, sir.”
“But hypothetically. If you found a family member whose beliefs were the opposite of yours, wouldn’t you feel the need, as a Corellian, to put them above your own beliefs?”
Well, they all knew what this thinly veiled reference alluded to. Like some magical cousin was going to come out of the metalworks and say they were a part of the Empire. “I don’t see why we can’t just go our separate ways.”
“You’d leave them be?”
“Well, I guess I’m just willing to let things go. If I can.”
Here was another prime example of things he shouldn’t say.
But, damn, if it hadn’t felt good.
And he could get used to that medic sliding his glance away. “Fine. That’s fine. Let’s move on to the fourth scenario: You know someone—”
“A friend or a family member?” Wedge interrupted.
“Let’s say, in your case, a friend.”
Which was to say, a family member.
“So, uh…” Luke was totally confused. “I have a friend who stole credits from me?”
“That interpretation is entirely up to you.”
“So they didn’t steal my credits?”
“Again, it’s…do you think they stole your credits?”
“Maybe? I don’t know all that much about this person. How good friends are we?”
Another deeply resentful sigh. “It doesn’t say, Lieutenant. You’re supposed to draw your own conclusions from the story.”
“Am I poor in the story? Because losing credits wasn’t great where I was from.”
The medic just blinked at him as if he was failing to come up with responses to Luke’s foolishness any longer.
“Maybe my friend and I could report the crime to the proper authorities together?” Luke offered.
“All right, fine. Let’s go with that.” The medic read out the second story which sounded even more ludicrous than the first.
“Why would I report my friend to the Empire? That sounds like a terrible thing to do.”
“The story doesn’t say that the government is necessarily the Empire.”
“But it’s the implication. No, I wouldn’t ever report them. That’s not right.”
For no reason that Luke could possibly discern, the medic started to laugh. Then he quickly swallowed it. “Sorry about that. Where did you say you were from again?”
“Um, Tatooine?”
“I’ve heard that’s one of the worst places in the galaxy.”
“No, it’s not!” Luke said, indignant in defense of his home planet. “I mean, well, yeah, it actually kind of is. But parts of it are nice! Well, okay, not really. But I still sort of like it! Well, okay, fine, that’s not entirely true. I’m sorry, what does this have to do with the test again?”
“Nothing,” the medic said, immediately going impassive. “I’m sorry. I apologize. That was inappropriate. And it’s not a test, Skywalker.”
Right.
“Let’s move on. Here’s the third event: You’re arrested for holding treasonous beliefs against your government. After several months in prison, you’re set free by a family member who says they’re the one who reported you to the authorities but now want your forgiveness. What do you do?”
Luke sat back. Oh, this was a hard one. How would he feel? Well, he’d feel angry at first, he was sure of that. But then…
“I’d forgive them.”
“Why?” the medic asked. “You’d know now that they were untrustworthy.”
Luke nodded his head. “Perhaps. But they want my forgiveness, and I could hardly deny them that. Besides, if they’re telling me about what they did, then doesn’t that mean they’re willing to change? That there’s some hope for them? That there’s something good still inside them?” Luke stumbled over himself. “I’m sorry. I’m sure that doesn’t make any sense.”
But for once the medic didn’t reprimand him. Instead, he smiled. “No, Lieutenant. Believe me, that makes perfect sense.”
“Let’s move on to the last part, then.”
This. This was what Wedge had really been dreading. All that stuff before this, no matter how useless or frustrating, would pale in comparison to this.
“So,” the medic said, folding his hands neatly on the table, “tell me about the assault on the Death Star.”
“Well,” Wedge said, stalling for as much time as he could, “we knew it wasn’t going to be good.”
“‘We’?”
“Yeah. Biggs and Jek and Theron and—”
“So you knew basically everyone who went on this flight.”
Not basically. I did know every single one. “Yeah,” Wedge said. “Basically.”
“That must have been hard.” Just even the way he said it made it sound so insincere. “You must have known as the assault continued that it was your friends who were dying.”
“It’s different when you’re out there. You can’t think about that if you want to survive. That’s why they use code names, I think. You can’t think of them as people.”
“Does it help?”
“Yeah,” Wedge said, surprised by the genuineness in the response. “I think it does.”
“I mean,” Luke said, “it’s horrible that all those pilots died. And I felt terrible even when it was happening. But I didn’t know them. None of them, except Biggs. And Wedge, sort of.”
“And how did you react to Biggs’s death? That must have been a hard moment: never having been in battle, seeing your friend die, realizing everyone was counting on you.”
“It was, but then I—” Luke stopped, realizing he couldn’t actually explain to the medic that he’d felt this strange hope grow in his chest, and then he’d thought he’d heard Ben’s voice, and it was like he could see exactly what needed to be done, like he wasn’t afraid of anything, and suddenly he could use what he’d thought was the Force, and what he was fairly certain was the only thing that had saved them.
He realized, of course, that saying this to the medic would probably result in him not only never getting to fly again, but also many, many questions which he would probably be unable to answer. He didn’t even know if he really had heard Ben’s voice, maybe it had just been the stress and grief of losing Biggs.
“Skywalker?” Luke was jerked out of his thoughts by the medic’s voice. “Lieutenant, were you going to finish that sentence or…?”
Luke tried to smile. “I guess I just realized that everyone was depending on me, and I did what needed to be done.”
“But this isn’t the first time you’ve done this.”
A vague observation. Wedge said, “Been in combat or done a baseline?”
The medic gave a wry smile. “Well, both. But I was referring to your baselines specifically. You’ve done three since joining the Alliance.”
Yes, one to start, one after the battle over Atollon, and one after he crashed into that volcano. All with three different medics staring him down, all of them now dead.
“Yes?” Wedge said, because there was an implicit question in there, and he wanted to get it over with.
“I was specifically curious about something you said after what occurred over Atollon. You were asked almost the exact same thing about the difficulties of knowing your friends were dying in combat, and you answered almost exactly the same—with one caveat. And I quote…” The man scrolled through the datapad, cleared his throat, and repeated Wedge’s old words in a disorienting monotone, “‘I can think of all of them as codenames. All except Commander Sato. I watched what he did, his sacrifice, and I can’t bear to think of him as anything but what he was: a man who gave up everything for our cause. I can only dream of doing something as brave as what he did over Atollon. I hope the Alliance never forgets it.’”
Wedge remembered that baseline. He’d been shaking, which he’d found odd after being so calm in the cockpit. But he’d never seen anything like it. He’d seen death before, he’d killed before, but not like this. He’d never seen desperation so clearly in the face.
In truth, he hardly remembered what he’d actually said during the baseline. He’d been rambling, he knew that. But he thought he’d kept his thoughts about Sato to himself.
The medic said now, “So sometimes, it seems, you do have trouble separating yourself from the battle.”
Wedge said, “Not anymore.” But even in his own ears it sounded defensive.
“There’s nothing wrong with grieving for those lost, Lieutenant.”
Except for the fact that he’d been completely implying otherwise. “I know that.”
They stared at each other for a moment. Then the medic cleared his throat, glancing down to the datapad once more. “Let’s move to the end of the battle. Your snub was injured and Lieutenant Skywalker told you to move out of the line of fire after you told him that you were hit.”
Wedge nodded his head.
“Why do you think he did that? You were still capable of fighting.”
It was inevitable that Wedge was going to be asked about this, certainly everyone else was asking the same thing.
“Someone needed to survive for another run.”
“If Skywalker hadn’t succeeded in his run, Yavin would have been obliterated. You would have been the only one left alive.”
Like Wedge hadn’t thought about this.
Like he hadn’t had nightmares last night about this very thing.
Like he hadn’t envisioned an exact scenario in which the Empire managed to capture and torture him for weeks on end to find the last remnants of the Alliance.
“I had a plan.”
He shouldn’t have said. He realized instantly that this was not the thing to say when he felt barely in control of anything in this conversation and he had no idea what he might say next.
Damn this medic for mentioning Commander Sato.
“A plan?” the medic asked, giving his full attention to Wedge now. “What was your plan, Lieutenant?”
Wedge didn’t respond.
“What was the plan, Antilles? What did you hope to accomplish?”
Wedge buried his face in his hands. But he could still hear the medic plying softly, “What was the plan, Wedge? Hmm? What were you going to do?”
He wondered how much this medic knew of his history, of his time spent at Skystrike. He wondered if this man knew that the Empire also used this very same test, except there when they said things like, “TIE fighters?” Wedge had said, “Ally,” and when they said things like, “X-wing?” he had said, “Killers,” and they would all nod their heads in approval.
“I…” he said now. “I was going to do my own run. No matter what.”
“Even though you knew the success rate would be low and that the rebel base on Yavin would already be gone?”
And Wedge knew that he had him, that he was going to get away with this when he really shouldn’t. “Yeah. No matter what.”
“So I look okay?” Luke said, nervously tugging at his collar.
Wedge barely even spared him a glance. “You look great.”
“But everyone is going to be looking at me, and—”
“You’re a hero to them, to all of us. Nobody is going to be looking at what you’re wearing.”
“All right.” Luke broke into a grin. “And you were right, by the way. About the baseline. It wasn’t that bad.”
“See?” No cynicism. Not as much as before, anyway. “First time’s always easy.”
“So…so when do we know if they’ll let us into a cockpit again?”
“Well, if Leia isn’t getting medics on us after the ceremony, it’s a pretty safe bet we passed.”
“I’ll bet you passed,” Luke said, elbowing him good naturedly. “You’re always the best at these kinds of things.”
Wedge really wasn’t, and he was starting to wonder when Luke was going to figure that out. Not too soon, he hoped. Not until he got used to this feeling of someone looking up to him.
And he realized then that he couldn’t tell Luke about his plan, either. Maybe no one. Maybe never. He couldn’t tell any of them that the moment he pulled out that of the trench, he knew that the only way Luke could complete his mission was if the TIE fighters behind him were destroyed. And Wedge knew he couldn’t shoot them all down with his broken X-wing.
But even a broken X-wing can be slammed into a group of TIE fighters, and be in and of itself a fairly useful weapon.
I can only dream of doing something as brave as what he did over Atollon. He’d thought that the moment he’d seen what Sato had done, been nearly dazed with it. Would he ever have the guts to do something like that?
And Rogue One Squadron. When they’d done what they had, blindly gone out regardless of the risks, was that not the very definition of bravery, of sacrifice?
He’d even grown up with these types of stories on Corellia, a place teeming with pilots and legends. There were plenty of tales of brave pilots against insurmountable odds who decided to do the unthinkable to save all. A paragon to live up to.
But when he’d been there, been inside that moment, he hadn’t been thinking of being brave. He hadn’t even been frightened. All he’d felt was this all-consuming panic that he needed to hurry, that he needed to get back inside that trench, get enough speed, and…
He’d never know if it had worked. He hadn’t thought about that then, but he thought about it now. Sato, Rogue One, every reckless Corellian pilot he’d ever looked up to, none of them had known if their sacrifice had been worth it.
But he didn’t regret it, then or now. It had been the only option available, the only thing he could have possibly done to save them all. Because none of them had known then that the Falcon would come back and blow those TIE fighters with ease before Luke destroyed the Death Star.
Wedge had just sat there in his cockpit at the end, watching the Falcon, watching the expanding arc of the disintegrating Death Star. Breathing. Dazed.
Because he was still alive.
Of course, if he told anyone this he’d probably never be allowed near an X-wing ever again. This was the sort of thing the Alliance would praise after the fact, to their own and to all the galaxy, but were less likely to be understanding if he started spouting it while still alive and kicking.
“Yeah,” Wedge finally said now. “I’m good at these kinds of things. I guess you better go find Han or else he’s going to start to wonder if you’re planning on getting that medal without him.” He placed a hand on Luke’s shoulder, grinned, and then went on his way.
“Wedge?” Luke said when he had already turned around. And when Wedge looked at him he said, “You’re a hero too, you know.” Like he’d just been reading Wedge’s thoughts.
“I’m not a hero.”
“Well, you are to me.” And Luke smiled in that irrepressible way that was so unique to him. “You saved my life out there. I’m not going to forget that.”
And Wedge smiled too. “Well, how can I argue with that?”
They were all buzzing around her, demanding this or that or everything in between, and she somehow had to find a way to accommodate them all. Yes, they were leaving Yavin after the medal ceremony. No, they couldn’t bring everything with them. Yes, she was well aware of the fact that the debris from the Death Star would probably cause issues with evacuation. No, they didn’t need any extra light for the medal ceremony, the place looked properly imperious enough as it was. Did she know where they were planning to evacuate to? Well, er…she had that under control. Now, leave her alone!
With all of them now gone, Leia discreetly stretched her neck. It looked to be another long day upon a lot of long days, but still the activity showed no signs of letting up. With her mother and father dead she was now tasked with filling their shoes, and she was finding out just how much they’d done now that they were gone.
“Princess?” One of the medics was waving at her.
How she hated that address now. “Yes?” she said pleasantly enough.
“I’m sorry, I know you’re busy, but I thought you’d want to see the evaluation results for Lieutenants Antilles and Skywalker before we’re to evacuate.”
Leia immediately straightened. “Yes, I very much would. Thank you.” And as the medic handed her the datapad she murmured, “I don’t like surprises. Just tell me now: did they pass?”
“Yes.” The medic hesitated, then said, “They had…varying results. You’ll see in my conclusions to the evaluations.”
“Yes, all right, thank you.” The medic turned in the opposite direction, and Leia went to find some forgotten corridor in here where she could hope not to be disturbed for a reasonable period of time. She clicked on the datapad and scrolled down to the conclusion of Wedge’s baseline.
57/100
That was skin of the teeth kind of results, but it was a passing mark. Honestly, Leia hadn’t expected anything better. Wedge had just lost nearly his entire squadron, not to mention those he’d already lost on Scarif. And this was hardly his first combat situation, either. He was one of the Rebellion’s best pilots, but she had realistic expectations of what toll that would take on his mind. The fact that he was so affected was perhaps the entire reason why he had joined the Alliance in the first place.
Lieutenant Antilles is troubled to say the least. He is evasive and short-tempered. He rarely makes eye contact, and it’s fairly clear he views these tests as a waste of time. He seems to spend a larger than usual time on violent imagery and appears to make snap decisions he views as fact with limited information.
I largely suspect that if Antilles had been completely honest he wouldn’t have passed this exam but seeing as how this shows he has an ability to control his emotions to the task at hand, this lends to the idea that he would be fine in another combat situation. Quite frankly, we can’t afford to lose another pilot.
Lieutenant Wedge Antilles is cleared for flight duty.
Ah, poor Wedge. Leia was starting to wonder how long he could last like this. But the medic was right, they couldn’t afford to lose another pilot. For now, Wedge would have to stay on duty.
Leia moved to the file on Luke. As worried as she’d been for Wedge, at least she knew what to expect. Luke? Especially after the Death Star and the loss of Kenobi and his aunt and uncle?
Leia scrolled to the conclusion.
98/100
She blinked.
Truthfully, I have a hard time believing that any pilot could be as well-adjusted as Lieutenant Skywalker here, but I see nothing in his demeanor that suggests he’s lying. He’s bright, optimistic, and continually empathetic to others while also remaining realistic.
Lieutenant Luke Skywalker is cleared for flight duty.
Leia stared at the datapad a moment more, tapping the side. After all the horrors she’d endured in the past few days, here was at least one thing that brought a smile to her face.
“Princess?” One of the rebels was standing before her. “Princess, we’re ready to begin.”
“Yes, of course.”
And so she went, to this grand ceremony of triumph before they would have to run and hide and fight all over again. There was Luke, walking forward, a smile dancing in his eyes. And Han…well, she could think about Han later.
She spared a glance to Wedge who was standing with the gaggle of remaining pilots, worried as to what she might see, but there was no jealousy there, no resentment etched on his face. He looked genuinely happy to see his friend and fellow pilot about to be honoured. And if he wasn’t, if there were other emotions hidden that he didn’t care to share, well, then he hid it well.
What would happen to them all? Leia wasn’t sure. Certainly many of the people standing before her were soon to fall in their endless fight against the Empire. In her weaker moments she had to admit that she knew that maybe they wouldn’t win, that maybe this had all been for nothing.
But she also knew this: because of what her pilots did for the Rebellion yesterday, their sacrifice, they would all at least get the chance to try. And a chance to try wasn’t everything, but for now it was good enough for her.
So she smiled, for herself and the Rebellion and even all of the galaxy, as she leaned forward and put the medal around Luke Skywalker’s neck.