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The first time Finn caught a glimpse of it, they were running for their lives.
"Keep up, BB-8," Poe shouted as he took a sharp left into an alley. "You too, Finn."
"Here, I'm right here," Finn said, and BB-8 piped up with what Finn assumed was an affirmative.
They were on Ord Mantell. Not the nice, glitzy parts of the planet designed to trap tourists, because of course not. Finn wasn't that lucky. No, they were in a seedy industrial area full of warehouses, whorehouses, junkyards and cantinas, populated by migrant workers, spacers, hookers, unlucky gamblers, and as it turned out, easily riled up bounty hunters.
Poe pushed past an opening in a wire fence that cut the alley in half, cursing as the back of his shirt snagged on it. Once on the other side, he pulled on a section of the fence to make it easier for Finn and BB-8 to get through.
"Are you hurt?" Finn asked.
"No, I'm fine, I'm fine," Poe said. "Another left, across the junkyard on the right, and we're back at the ship. Go!"
BB-8 crossed over to them with a disgruntled little noise and they were running again. There was a shout behind them and a bolt of energy hit the wall right as they turned a corner, plaster flying everywhere.
"You were wondering if they wanted us alive or dead?" Poe took the lead again. "I think you just got your answer."
"Could have lived without knowing," Finn said, speeding up as they hit the junkyard. For a veritable graveyard of speeders and spaceships, there was remarkably little cover. They were almost all the way across when another blast hit the husk of an old fuel truck they'd just passed. "Definitely could have lived with not knowing!"
Finn fired his blaster blindly at their pursuers. It bought them a few extra seconds to get clear as the bounty hunters dove for cover, and then they were out of the junkyard and sprinting to the ship.
The second BB-8 was in, Finn hit the button to close the ramp and followed Poe into the cockpit of the small ship. Poe threw himself into his seat, rushing through the pre-flight protocols to get them in the air.
"Ha," Finn said, falling into the co-pilot's seat as they left the bounty hunters in the dust. "Take that, outlaws. Take it and eat it!"
BB-8 said something that made Poe snort.
"What?" Finn asked.
"Technically speaking, we're the outlaws," Poe said.
"Details," Finn said. Another look at Poe made him frown. "Your shirt."
"My jacket," Poe countered. "I can't believe I lost another one."
"The first was found," Finn said, tugging at the hem of the jacket in question. "Technically speaking."
"Yeah, but it's yours now," Poe said. The statement was accompanied by a quick appreciative glance that Finn was probably misinterpreting. "Still looking good."
Or maybe not.
"Thanks," Finn said, hating the way his cheeks heated up. "No, but I meant, your shirt. It got caught on the fence."
"Oh. Right." Poe reached over his shoulder with one hand, finding the tear along his shoulder blade. "Doesn't feel too bad. I can fix it up when we get back to base."
Finn frowned, because there was something off with Poe's skin where the fabric was torn. "You're sure you're not hurt?"
Poe shook his head as he took them into hyperspace. "Not even a scratch, Finn, seriously."
BB-8 beeped at them, and Poe pressed his lips together. Was Finn imagining it, or did he look a little flushed?
"He's telling you to stop fretting," Poe said in response to Finn's raised eyebrows.
The whirring noise BB-8 made at that left Finn suspicious of the accuracy of the translation.
"I'm not fretting," he said, just in case. He really needed to learn Binary.
-
The second time was on a nameless Outer Rim planet sitting at the edge of the Unknown Regions. The Resistance was looking to establish a new base at a secondary location, and after promising results from an orbital survey, a team had been sent down to take a closer look at the areas most likely to be suitable for their purposes.
Once on the ground, they paired up. Absolutely no one seemed surprised when Finn ended up going with Poe and BB-8, and Finn was mildly disturbed to realize that the occurrence really was common enough to be entirely unremarkable.
It had been a blow to find out upon waking that Rey was gone, but both Poe and General Organa had assured him that she was safe, and while they hadn't been able to give him anything concrete, they seemed certain that she'd be back. One of these days.
Finn didn't know what he was expecting to happen when Rey did come back. Mostly he just wanted to see her, to make sure she really was okay. In the meantime, he couldn't sit around waiting for her, at least not once the medics had finally cleared him after a grueling recovery period. More to the point, he didn't want to sit around and do nothing.
Not everyone at the base had been immediately on board with having a former stormtrooper in their midst, but getting along with people had never been a problem for Finn, and it certainly didn't hurt to have Poe Dameron on his side.
Most of Poe's missions were to do with reconnaissance. Often that meant taking BB-8 and his X-wing and disappearing for days at a time. Sometimes he was accompanied by a few others from his squadron. Finn had found ways to be useful around the base, sharing what information he could and demonstrating the tactics and training the First Order had instilled in him to anyone interested in learning from it, but he was still glad each and every time Poe came back, especially when he, his X-wing and BB-8 were all undamaged.
More often than not, on those days, the ever-present sadness in General Organa's eyes rose to the surface. She came to take Poe's mission report, and her smiles were as genuine as her gratitude, but that sadness – Finn tried not to think about it, not the least because it made him think of Solo, which he tried to avoid doing around the General. He liked her, okay, and while he still wasn't exactly sure how the Force worked, he knew that if it was talking, she was listening.
The only thing better than seeing Poe come back safe and sound was being able to join him on his missions.
Even when those missions included a speeder malfunction that dumped them into a river.
Finn dragged himself out of the water, saw Poe doing the same twenty or so yards downstream, and then went back into the water, because BB-8 was having serious trouble navigating its way up the muddy bank.
"I can't decide if you're exactly as heavy as you look, or if you got your name because you ate another droid," Finn said when he and BB-8 were both on dry land, Finn on his knees, kind of winded by the unexpected exercise, and BB-8 rolling back and forth in the grass in an attempt to clean off some of the mud.
When BB-8 kept rolling around, making forlorn noises and completely ignoring Finn, he turned to see how Poe was doing. It was a huge mistake. Maybe not on par with accidentally releasing rathtars on a freighter, but still. Huge mistake.
Poe's jacket was on the ground, and he'd shrugged out of his shirt, wringing water out of it. His wet hair was hanging over his forehead, obscuring his eyes, and – ridiculous. Poe was ridiculous. How was he even real.
Poe bent down to pick up his jacket, and – huh. What was that on Poe's back? The thought was cut short when Poe made his way over to Finn and BB-8. Finn did not need a closer look at Poe's ridiculous good looks right now, thanks ever so much.
Poe dropped his jacket back on the ground. "Everyone okay here?"
Thank the Sith, Finn thought reflexively as Poe pulled his shirt on, only to immediately feel betrayed by the wet, clinging fabric.
"We're fine," he said, because Poe was starting to look concerned. "Totally fine. No problem. Actually, I think BB-8's having some trouble, but I'm not risking getting electrocuted when I'm dripping with water."
Poe transferred his concerned gaze to BB-8, and Finn breathed out in relief.
"BB-8 wouldn't electrocute you," Poe said, dropping to his knees in front of the droid. "Would you, buddy?"
"Yes?" Finn said, because extenuating circumstances or not, he still remembered Jakku. Vividly. His comment went unheeded.
"Oh, man, look at you," Poe was saying, lifting the hem of his shirt to wipe clean BB-8's lenses. "How'd you get this much mud on you?"
BB-8's tiny beep might have been the most pitiful sound Finn had ever heard.
"I know you didn't mean to," Poe said, sitting back on his heels, one hand resting reassuringly on top of BB-8's dome. "I'll scrub you clean when we get back to the ship, okay? You'll be shiniest droid in the Resistance, I promise."
BB-8 seemed to cheer up at that, but then, who wouldn't? Finn pressed his palms against his thighs. Ridiculous.
"About that," he said. "How are we gonna get back to the ship? Seeing as our speeder's at the bottom of the river and all."
Poe pushed his hair back from his forehead and gave Finn a rueful smile that did absolutely nothing to Finn's heart rate. Nope. Not a thing.
"I guess this is as good a time as any to test exactly how waterproof the new comlinks are," Poe said.
Finn nodded in mute agreement. Think about electronics. Yep. That was the ticket.
As it turned out, the comlinks were waterproof, and the three of them were picked up before Finn could get completely weird about being around Poe and his wet hair and soaked clothes and damp skin and his everything, really. There was some ribbing from the rest of the team about their impromptu dip in the river, but overall the mission was considered to be a success.
Poe, of course, kept his word: by the end of the day, BB-8 was the cleanest, shiniest, happiest droid in the entire Resistance.
-
"That went well."
Poe rewarded Finn's words with a tired laugh and tilted his head back against the wall he was shackled to. He was sitting on the ground, same as Finn, with his wrists held up by durasteel chains, same as Finn, and his shirt was half torn off, unlike Finn's.
"Could have been worse," Poe said. "They didn't get BB-8."
They'd been in the Bothan system on a recruitment mission when everything had gone pear shaped. As a result, they were now the unwilling guests of a local crime lord. Poe had a point about BB-8, but still. Seriously.
Finn rattled his chains. "We're in a dungeon, Poe. A dungeon."
"I noticed."
"Who has dungeons these days? No one, that's who. A nice, brightly lit cell is the way to go."
"I don't know, this kinda reminds me of the room they had me in on the Star Destroyer before you got me out. The walls were sleeker. They had a chair…" Poe craned his head to catch a glimpse of the small barred windows high up above them. "The lighting was about the same."
Poe didn't sound upset, but Finn still wanted go back in time and not remind Poe of his time on the Finalizer. "I didn't spend a lot of time in interrogation," he said. "Or any time, really. Guess they didn't think I was suited for that kind of thing. I wasn't exactly paying much attention to the decor when I sprung you out."
"It's a good thing. That you weren't suited for it, I mean." Poe slanted a small smile at Finn. "I'd probably like you less."
If Finn had been the sort of recruit to be A-Okay with torture, he wouldn't have bothered to save Poe and become a deserter. But that probably went without saying.
"A good thing," Finn echoed. "I like that you like me."
As soon as he heard the words coming out of his mouth, Finn closed his eyes and thumped his head against the wall. I like that you like me? Smooth. Real smooth.
"One thing I can't figure out is why they'd put you on sanitation duty," Poe said, mercifully ignoring Finn's words. "You're a good shot, a good fighter."
Finn took a deep breath and opened his eyes. Sanitation. Okay. Better than drawing more attention to his – whatever it was that only happened to him around Poe. "Someone's gotta do it. Luck of the draw. I was good, I did well in training and simulations, but I wasn't exceptional. It took a while before they moved me up the ladder, and my first battle – you know what came out of that."
"Yeah," Poe said. "The two of us, chained up in the wine cellar of a Bothan thug with delusions of grandeur."
That got a laugh out of Finn. "You always do that. You always know just what to say."
"Trust me, I don't," Poe said. "I really don't."
"Well, you keep getting it right anyway." Finn sighed. Being locked up in a dungeon could almost be considered a step up from being stuck in the medbay back at the base, but it was still pretty boring. Poe's presence was the only thing that made either situation tolerable. "Tell me something about your childhood. Something stupid. Something normal."
Poe thought about it. "I guess… there was this thing I did with my mom," he said.
"When you were little?"
"It's my only excuse," Poe said. "I did this over and over, so my mom knew how to play it just right. I'd say 'A-wing', she'd say 'B-wing' – you had to go alphabetical, that was crucial. So, A-wing, B-wing, X-wing…"
"Y-wing?"
"Because flying!"
"…That's terrible."
Poe cracked up. "I know. But my mom always went along with it, and I remember thinking the whole thing was hilarious…" Poe's voice got softer. "I remember her laughter. I'm glad about that."
Finn's heart was tender in his chest, and greedy. "Tell me something else."
"Along the same vein?" Poe was quiet for a while, his eyes faraway and dreamy. "There was this tree. It was right by our house on Yavin 4; my mom planted it before the house was even built. The settlement was tiny when I was a kid, but there were a few other families, a handful of kids. One of the games we used to play was seeing how many times we could run around that tree. The other kids would chant A-wing, B-wing, X-wing, Y-wing four times in a row, faster and faster, and if you didn't break the record by the time they got to the end, out came the TIE fighter, and you lost. It was kinda pointless, but I spent a lot of time being dizzy as a kid."
Poe shrugged, the movement made awkward by the whole chained up thing. "If I add it all up, I must have spent weeks of my life laying under that tree, looking at the sunlight dancing on the leaves. Months, maybe. Sometimes the only thing that made me happier was flying."
"It sounds great," Finn said. He couldn't quite keep the wistfulness out of his voice.
Poe hesitated. "It's still there," he said. "The tree. We could go visit some time, if you want."
"Really? That would be amazing! You'd be okay with – with showing me that?"
"I wouldn't have offered if I wasn't okay with it," Poe said.
"No, of course not. But really?" Finn couldn't help himself. "You're sure?"
"I'm sure, Finn," Poe said with a soft laugh. "It's not a long trip. We'll find the time."
"Yeah! Okay. Let's do that." Finn frowned, reality asserting itself in the middle of his excitement. "If we ever get out of here," he added, tugging at his cuffs for emphasis. "Because this is a thing that's still happening."
BB-8, with an impeccable timing, chose that moment to chirp at them from the outside of the building. The droid unerringly found the window Poe was sitting under and dropped in a stolen datapad, which Poe caught, because of course he did.
"Guess we're getting out of here," Finn said.
Poe smiled, and Finn thought that maybe he did know, a little bit, what it felt like to lie under a tree and watch the sunlight through the leaves.
-
There was a pattern on Poe's back. Deliberate. A tattoo. Finn knew the word for it, knew what it was, but he didn't think he'd ever seen one in real life before.
Up until the moment he'd become a deserter, he'd lived his whole life among other stormtroopers, and a stormtrooper had no identity, only unity. Everything was provided for. Everything they wore, everything they ate, it was all identical, practical, purposeful. There were no tattoos, no decorations. Nothing individual. Nothing so… primitive.
He'd caught glimpses of the tattoo thanks to Poe's wardrobe malfunctions, but he'd never seen the whole thing, never quite gotten the whole picture, so to speak. Sometimes, at night, he lay awake in his too-quiet room and thought about the lines on Poe's skin, dark and abstract. He wondered what it would be like to trace them with his fingers.
The one time he could have gotten a good look at the whole thing, he flaked out.
Finn knew he got the little things wrong sometimes, made comments that he only realized were unusual when people gave him funny looks. He knew his upbringing had been messed up, okay? He knew. But there was still comfort in the familiar, and one of those things was communal showers. He'd lived and worked and slept and showered in near proximity with other people his entire life. It was bad enough to have his own room now, so when he'd been offered one with a private bathroom, he'd politely declined.
Poe had no such hangups. He had his own quarters, his own bathroom, and Finn didn't know what he used to wash his hair with, but it wasn't the odorless stuff freely available around the base.
What it all came down to was that up until he and Poe came back from a mission covered in green goo and were promptly pointed at the showers, Finn had never seen Poe naked before. Technically that was probably still the case, because basically, after a lifetime of showering with other people, Finn freaked out and forgot how to act natural. It had been impossible to avoid Poe entirely, seeing as he was right there, rinsing muck out of his hair and making good-natured jokes about their ill-fated mission, but Finn had tried. He'd tried really, really hard, which meant that at the end of the day, when he was trying to sleep, he still had no idea if there was any meaning or significance to Poe's tattoo, or if it really was just an assembly of random lines.
He did have a head full of quick flashes of wet curls, the curve of a shoulder, the curve of a thigh – it was almost worse having all these stolen impressions from the corner of his eye, illicit, accidental, than if he'd taken one good look and been done with it. Not that he expected to be done with Poe's general existence or his specific… anything… any time soon, no matter how long or hard he looked.
Finn grabbed his pillow and attempted to smother himself with it. He was a disaster of a human being, and the dreams he had that night? Didn't help.
-
Finn didn't like the word obsession, but if he was honest with himself, then yeah, after missing the perfect opportunity to satisfy his curiosity, he got kinda obsessed with Poe's tattoo.
Around the time Finn admitted this to himself, the universe got over whatever grudge it had with Poe being properly clothed, which was remarkably unfair and inconvenient. So maybe Finn hadn't, in the past, appreciated the opportunities provided for him enough to take proper advantage of them, but he knew better now. Poe's jacket had caught fire once, in the middle of a bar, and Finn still wasn't sure how that had happened. These days? Nothing. Not a single rip, tear or cut.
Finn felt like he was going out of his mind and didn't know what to do about it. It wasn't like he could just march into Poe's quarters one evening and ask him to take off his shirt and show Finn his tattoo.
Actually, why not? He could do that. He could totally do that. One look, that was all he needed. Nothing weird about it.
Except then he actually went ahead with this brilliant, well thought out plan, and – no. He was in Poe's room, and Poe was looking at him, and it was weird.
"I was going to ask you something," Finn said, his mind coming up empty on excuses. "But I changed my mind. Sorry. Don't know what I was thinking. Wanna go grab something to eat instead?"
It was kind of late, and Poe's hair looked damp, like he'd just showered. There was always a lingering scent of metal and ozone around Poe, but it was fainter when he'd just washed his hair. The fragrance around him was more herbal then, heady.
"Hey, no," Poe said, guiding Finn away from the door with a hand on his arm. "You can ask me anything. I want you to trust that."
"I do. I do, it's just, it's weird." Finn palmed the back of his head.
"Anything," Poe said, his eyes earnest, kind, and Finn had no defenses against that.
"Your tattoo," he blurted out, cringing inside when Poe blinked in surprise.
"My tattoo?" Poe said. "What about it?"
"I've never seen one before." It was true, and it occurred to Finn that maybe capitalizing on that would make this whole thing seem less weird to Poe, who usually responded strongly to the implication that Finn was missing out on something, no matter how insignificant. It was something Finn had tried not to take advantage of after realizing, but desperate times and all that. "I was going to ask if you could show me yours. Your tattoo. A closer look at your tattoo, if it's not – if that's okay."
Finn was lucky Poe was apparently immune to his more intensely awkward moments by now.
"Sure, yeah, of course," Poe said, easily enough, only hesitating for a moment before taking off his shirt. "All of it?"
Finn was alone in a room with a shirtless Poe. He really hadn't thought this one through. He swallowed, trying to work up some moisture back into his mouth. "How far down does it go?"
"Not that far," Poe said with a quirk of his mouth. He seemed to come to a decision, his shoulders relaxing almost imperceptibly.
Wow, okay. Finn tilted his head back, studying the ceiling instead of watching as Poe worked open his belt. It wasn't until Poe turned around that Finn could see why it had been necessary. Poe's pants normally sat pretty high on his hips, and the tattoo started low on his back. Even with his pants and underwear pushed down pretty damn far, it was barely enough to show some of the lines that dipped downward.
It wasn't abstract, at least not the way Finn had half expected it to be based on the glimpses he'd gotten. It started at the small of Poe's back with two overlapping X-wing schematics that almost looked like roots, the design flowing upward from there like a stem, spanning across Poe's shoulders. On his left shoulder blade was a tree, or the idea of a tree, odd and beautiful. On the right was an A-wing, and along Poe's spine where the two met, the lines melded together, seamless, one and the same.
It was amazing.
Finn reached out as if in a dream and followed a branch of the tree with his fingers, keeping his touch light, as if there was a danger of smudging the ink. Poe's breath hitched. Finn heard it, but he didn't, at first, realize that he was the reason for it.
"Finn," Poe said. His voice was soft, low, but it didn't sound like a warning, and it didn't sound like stop, either.
"It's amazing," Finn said. "You're amazing."
He hadn't quite understood why he'd wanted to see this so badly. Now that he did understand, he wasn't sure what to do about it. Poe's skin was warm under his hand, and he didn't want to stop touching.
He wasn't a virgin. The First Order had discouraged emotional attachments, not fleeting sexual encounters that were more akin to eating or sleeping than anything meaningful. Finn knew what to do in the dark, how to be efficient, but none of that seemed to apply here. He didn't want it to apply here.
He was out of his depth. He'd never wanted something so much while simultaneously having no idea how to go about getting it.
Poe turned around. He must have seen something in Finn's expression, in his eyes, because his lips parted, but no words came out. He cupped Finn's face with one hand, his gaze searching, questioning, and Finn thought that maybe he'd been wrong. Maybe he didn't have to figure out a way to get what he wanted. Maybe he already had it.
"Tell me you don't want this," Poe said. When Finn said nothing, he lifted his other hand and brushed his thumb up along Finn's jaw. His pants slid further down, and Finn's hands found his hips.
"Tell me," Poe said again, closer.
"I want this," Finn said.
Poe kissed him. It was gentle, almost sweet, unlike anything Finn had experienced before. The aftershocks of the kiss moved through him like an electrical current, his lips and fingertips tingling. The second kiss started out the same, except this one lingered. Poe's mouth was just a little bit open, and there was something almost indecent about it, about the unspoken promise in it. Finn dove in for the third one, and when Poe kissed him back, it was like a dam breaking: like they were both hungry and thirsty and had found an oasis in one another.
Finn tightened his grip on Poe's hips and pulled him in, rougher than he'd meant to be, but judging by the way Poe moved with him, pliant, and the way he groaned against Finn's mouth, Finn figured it was okay.
"Finn," Poe said as they stumbled to Poe's bed. Finn sat down when his shins hit the edge, heavy and graceless, and Poe, after kicking off his pants and underwear that had already all but fallen off, straddled his lap. "Finn. What do you want? Have you done this before?"
Not like this, Finn thought, overwhelmed, because he had a lap full of naked Poe Dameron, and that had definitely never happened before.
"Yeah, I'm not – I've done this before," Finn said, distracted by Poe's, uh, everything. "I've been with tons of people." He hadn't been with tons of people. "Some people." Finn frowned as his brain slowly started catching up with his mouth. Maybe he was giving Poe the wrong idea. "Not too many, obviously. A few. I've been with a few people. A normal amount." Whatever that was.
Poe leaned back, which, again, was distracting, what with the whole naked lap straddling situation. When Finn got around to meeting Poe's eyes, Poe had kind of a daft look on his face that nonetheless made Finn flush.
"It's okay if you have, and it's okay if you haven't, with as many or as few as you'd like," Poe said.
Finn dropped his head on Poe's shoulder. "I'm a disaster of a human being," he said, because it was something Poe should probably know going in.
Poe laughed and tightened his arms around Finn's shoulders.
"You're perfect," Poe said, loosening his hold and urging Finn's head up. "Come on. Kiss me again."
Disaster or not, Finn wasn't stupid enough to pass that up. He moved his hands along Poe's thighs, which, it bore repeating, were hugging Finn's hips at the moment.
"Take this off," Poe said, tugging at Finn's shirt. "I wouldn't usually mind being the only one naked for the occasion, but I wanna see you."
Did Poe have to keep saying and doing things that short-circuited Finn's brain? Finn struggled out of his shirt, flustered, because there was no way anything about him was deserving of the sort of look Poe was giving him.
Poe drew his fingers over Finn's chest in random patterns, as if following the lines of a tattoo only he could see. "What do you want, Finn?"
And yeah, Finn hadn't answered that yet. He didn't quite know how to answer it now.
"I want to do this again. After we're done. With whatever we're gonna do." Disaster. Of. A. Human. Being. Finn pushed forward regardless, because this was important. "I want to go see that tree of yours. I want you to always come back from your missions. I want you to come back undamaged. I want to…" Finn slid his hands around to Poe's back, spreading his fingers to cover as much of the tattoo as he could. "I want to be the only one who gets to see you like this."
"Okay," Poe said, quiet and a little bit hoarse, his thumbs gentle against the hot skin over Finn's cheekbones. "Yeah, okay. We can do that. I'll try to always come back to you, and you can – you can have all of me."
"What do you want?" Finn asked after swallowing a few times.
Poe ran his tongue over his lower front teeth and gave Finn a measuring look. Finn went still under the scrutiny. Slowly, watching Finn for his reaction, Poe skimmed his fingers down Finn's stomach and opened his fly. He wrapped his hand around Finn's very interested erection, feeling the weight of it, testing it out. Finn was pretty close to hyperventilating.
"We probably shouldn't get into everything I want," Poe said. "We'll have time later."
Anything, Finn thought. His dick gave a little jerk in Poe's hand. I'll give you anything you want.
"Yeah?" He asked, his voice breaking when Poe gave him a long, slow pull.
"Yeah. For now…" Poe kissed Finn once, twice, like he couldn't help himself. "I know you're a sweetheart, Finn, but you don't need to be careful with me, okay? I like it when it hurts a little. Hold me down, yank at my hair – I want it. I want to feel you when I wake up. To be reminded of this."
"I want to still be here in the morning," Finn said, in case that was still in question.
"That too," Poe said. "I want that too."
"And I'm not that sweet."
Poe smiled at that, something a little bit challenging in the shape of it. He leaned in, almost close enough for another kiss.
"Prove it."
Finn probably should have seen that one coming. He secured a grip on Poe's waist and thigh and lifted him off his lap and onto the bed. Poe's back met the mattress with a thump, and the grin he gave Finn was pleased. When Finn kneeled between Poe's legs, they fell open so easily for him that Finn had to take a moment to get a hold of himself.
"You gonna keep your pants on?" Poe asked. There wasn't censure in his voice, just curiosity.
"Yeah," Finn said, remembering what Poe had said about nudity earlier. "Yeah, I think I will."
He was also, not that he was going to admit it to Poe, a little overwhelmed, and staying at least partially clothed was familiar, made him feel more secure. He didn't want to treat Poe the way he'd treated his previous partners, but maybe it wasn't an entirely black and white situation. It was Poe. Finn was about to have sex with Poe, and that alone changed everything.
He gave Poe a quick kiss. "Turn over."
The command got him raised eyebrows but no protest, and after some wordless negotiating they managed to rearrange themselves of the bed. Poe pushed a pillow under his hips and spread his legs again.
"Like this?"
Finn meant to say something intelligible, but what came out was a choked sound that Poe, correctly, seemed to take as agreement. Finn could see a smile in the curve of his cheek.
He'd told himself it was mostly about the tattoo, and only a little about the way Poe kept looking at him, but maybe it was the other way around. He couldn't bring himself to regret the decision now; he was nervous enough without Poe's eyes on him, and the tattoo really was incredible. He loved it. He loved… he loved it.
He ran his hands up Poe's thighs, stopping just shy of his ass, and kissed Poe's spine at the high point of the tattoo. There was that warm, herbal, heady scent again, and Finn wanted to bury his nose in Poe's hair. Later, he told himself. He kissed his way down Poe's spine, tracing some of the lines with his tongue. Poe shivered and shifted under him, making little noises of approval at the back of his throat. Finn closed his eyes, just for a moment. There was something intoxicating about seeing how his touch affected Poe.
Instead of stopping where the tattoo ended, he dug his thumbs into the cheeks of Poe's ass and spread them open, dragging his tongue down to Poe's exposed hole. Poe made a shocked sound that turned into a moan.
He gasped Finn's name into the sheets and spread his legs wider.
"Wanna stop?" Finn asked. He didn't want to stop.
"No," Poe said with what sounded like some difficulty, pushing back against Finn's hands. "Please get back to it."
Finn grinned and went back to it. Maybe he was being too careful, but Poe wasn't exactly complaining, and more than anything else, Finn wanted to take his time, make it good for Poe.
But he'd also been hard pretty much since the moment Poe had started stripping in front of him, and he was afraid that if he really took his time, he wouldn't last all the way through to the end.
He pulled back and brushed his fingers against Poe's saliva-slick hole, feeling the heat of it, the tip of one finger sinking in with a dizzying ease. Finn stared down at it, light-headed with need.
Poe made an incoherent noise and reached under a corner of the mattress, holding out a bottle of something clear and slick that made it even easier for Finn to sink his fingers in. The visuals combined with the sounds Poe was making were almost enough to push Finn over the edge. He closed his eyes and tugged at his balls, because no, nope, his dick could at least wait until it was inside Poe. And hello, that thought did not help.
"Finn, come on," Poe was saying, and Finn opened his eyes in time to see Poe getting up on his hands and knees. He looked at Finn over his shoulder, his eyes dark and needy, his mouth bitten and tender. "I want it, I can take it. I can take you. Finn, come on, please."
If Finn had thought Poe was kind of noisy before, it was nothing compared to how loud he got when Finn placed the head of his dick against Poe's slick entrance and pushed in.
"I'm not – I'm not hurting you, am I?" Finn asked, and Poe groaned and pushed his hips back in response.
"No, I like it, I want it," Poe said. "You, your cock, all of it, it's – ah, like that, keep doing that, you feel so good, you're so good, Finn, come on, don't be nice to me –"
Finn's thrusts were tentative at first, cautious, shallow, but Poe kept talking, kept asking for it, kept praising Finn like no one ever had before, until Finn forgot all about being careful. He grabbed a handful of Poe's curls and pushed his head down, gripped his hip with one hand and bent over his back, giving it to him, just like he was asking.
"– harder, like that, exactly like that, you're so good to me, Finn, you're in so deep, I can almost taste it, don't stop, don't stop –"
Finn had intended to be gentle, to go slow, to take his time, but he was too desperate for it now, his vague plans utterly destroyed by the abandon with which Poe gave himself to Finn, holding nothing back, wanton need in every line of his body.
"– make me feel it, make me remember this tomorrow, bruises on my hips so I can take you with me wherever I go, you're so perfect, Finn, you're so good –"
The way he spoke, the way he moved – it drove Finn out of his mind until there was nothing left but animal need and Poe, Poe, Poe.
He came before Poe did, his balls drawn up so tight it was almost painful, pleasure building at the base of his dick until it spilled over. He came for what felt like a long time, Poe tensing and shuddering and clenching around him when he found his own release.
Finn had a hard time catching his breath, and once his wits started to return to him, along came a flood of doubt. He pulled out slowly, carefully, and Poe all but collapsed on the bed, breathing hard, his tattoo moving with the rise and fall of his back.
"You okay?" Finn asked. He found himself hesitant to touch Poe now that they were done and the sense of immediacy was gone, but he wanted to be sure, and Poe, still kind of out of it, just hummed in response to the question.
Finn didn't think there would be bruises on Poe's hips, and he wasn't sure if that was a good thing or not. It was confusing. Poe was confusing. Finn spread Poe open again and pressed his thumb gently against the rim of his hole. It looked slick and used and tender, the skin radiating heat under Finn's touch. Come was leaking out, and Finn felt a frisson of shame when his dick twitched at the sight.
"Don't tell me you're ready for another go," Poe said, sounding half asleep, and Finn snatched his hands back.
"No! Of course not, I wouldn't – I just wanted to make sure you're okay. Are you?"
Poe groaned and stretched, languid, visibly gathering himself before turning over. Somehow it wasn't any easier to have Poe looking at him now that they were done than it had been when they'd barely started.
"I'll do better next time," Finn said, seized by a sudden certainty that Poe was about to tell him that he'd changed his mind, never mind the morning after, or going to see the tree, or any of it.
"If you do any better, I might die next time," Poe said.
"I'm sorry," Finn said. Poe didn't sound disappointed.
"What are you sorry for?" Poe beckoned at him. "Come here, lie down. I'm getting tense just looking at you. This isn't how afterglow usually works."
"Sorry," Finn said. He was still half expecting to get kicked out, but lying down next to Poe did make him feel somewhat better.
Poe rested his head on Finn's chest, his hand coming up to tap against Finn's breastbone. "I'm fine, Finn. I'm a bit sore, yeah, but I told you, I like that. If you weren't freaking out, I'd feel absolutely incredible right now."
"I'm not freaking out," Finn said. It wasn't very convincing.
"Have you…" Poe trailed off, going still. "It's okay if you changed your mind. About staying."
"What? No, no, what, I thought you might – want me gone."
Poe pushed up on an elbow, giving Finn a bemused look. "Why would I want you gone?"
"I was selfish. With you." Finn licked his lips. "I wasn't sure if, I thought, maybe my performance wasn't satisfactory."
Poe looked expressionless for a moment before coming alive with a spark of anger in his eyes. His fingers dug into the muscles of Finn's chest nearly hard enough to hurt.
"I'm not going to dismiss you, Finn. Even if the sex was bad – which it wasn't – I'd never dismiss you. I meant everything I said. Every word before, during and after. I'm yours, and you did good."
"Okay," Finn said, something inside him relaxing, ever so slightly. "Okay. Good. I did good. You're… you're mine?"
"Yeah, Finn," Poe said, pressing a quick kiss against the corner of Finn's mouth. "I'm yours, for as long as you want me." He grinned, brash and a little bit cheeky. "As often as you want me, too."
Finn flushed and put a hand on Poe's head to push him back down. The knot of anxiety in his gut was unraveling fast.
Poe settled against Finn's side, and since he didn't say anything about it, Finn didn't bother removing his hand from Poe's hair.
"Lights, ten percent," Poe murmured. "Go to sleep, Finn. We can have another go in the morning, if you're still worried about being selfish."
"Okay," Finn said, running his fingers through Poe's ridiculous hair. "In the morning."
-
It was a good plan, a great plan, except when morning came, Finn woke up to find BB-8 staring at him from less than a foot away.
Finn yelped and possibly flailed a little, Poe made a sleepy noise from where he was draped over Finn, and BB-8, seeing that they were more or less awake, started beeping at them.
"Okay," Poe said, reaching over Finn to give BB-8's dome a clumsy pat, his eyes still firmly shut. "All right, buddy."
BB-8 didn't take the hint, and eventually Poe groaned and sat up, making a doomed attempt to straighten his riotous hair. Despite being an absolute mess, Poe somehow managed to look dashing.
"I'm awake, I'm awake."
BB-8 let out a series of beeps ending on a longer note, almost like a question, and a faint rush of color bloomed across Poe's nose and cheekbones.
"What's it saying?" Finn asked, curious.
"Nothing," Poe said, shaking his head and smiling. "We overslept, that's all."
BB-8 made a whirring noise. Finn let out a heavy sigh as Poe clambered out of bed and went into the bathroom.
"We had plans, you know," Finn told BB-8. "Plans that don't involve nosy droids."
The droid in question beeped at him, unmoving.
Finn glanced at the closed bathroom door. He really did need to learn Binary some time soon. BB-8 wasn't going anywhere, and neither was Finn, if he could help it.