THE IMPOSSIBLE FLIGHT OF ASH ANGELS
Marieke Nijkamp
Life was easier, he thought, without the crushing weight of hope, responsibility, and anger. For years, the closest thing he had to faith or spirituality was the constant hum of the engines from the starfighters he’d made his own, from the grumpy rumbling of his Z-95’s retrofits to the smoother murmur of the A-wing’s sublight engines. It was the sharp, tangy smell of titanium and durasteel.
It was the rush of hyperspace. The first time he saw the stars change around him, he felt like he was one with the ship and the space around him, and he vowed he would never let anyone take that freedom away from him.
It was the slow path, too. He loved the jump, but equally, he loved to find the darkness between stars. Those empty pockets of stillness, where it felt like only he and his fighter could see the currents of space around them.
He thought it had been enough. He thought he wouldn’t get involved.
And yet he found himself in the Sullust system, surrounded by a fleet. Star cruisers. Gunships. B-wings. A-wings. Ready to jump to hyperspace. Ready to engage the Emperor’s new battle station, orbiting the forest moon of Endor.
He felt the countdown in his bones. He’d felt the sense of possibility ahead ever since taking off from Home One.
Arvel Crynyd didn’t believe in anything. And yet, here he was.
He wondered what had changed.
“Admiral, we’re in position. All fighters accounted for.”
It had to have been the spacedock, nearly four years ago.
An old, abandoned spacedock on the edge of the Western Reaches.
And Arvel should’ve known better. He should’ve kept his eyes on his own craft. He’d decided long ago his best chance of survival lay in ignoring the terrible pilots on either side of the war. Keep his head down, don’t get caught up in anyone’s attempt to change the galaxy.
He should have ignored the blundering amateurs who seemed intent on running their rebel starfighters into the structure and simply continued on his way. After all, he had a contract to fulfill. The Bacta Cartel paid him well to be a glorified messenger, and his Z-95 Headhunter deserved an upgrade. It’d seen him through tight spots. It’d helped him avoid many a confrontation, too. A good vessel could mean a pilot’s life, and a good pilot took care of his vessel.
Arvel judged people by loose bolts, oil smears, badly repaired laser damage.
Perhaps that was what gave him pause here. Not the pilots—judging by their practice runs, they wouldn’t be able to identify a hyperdrive motivator if it flew in circles around them—but their starfighters. Three A-wings. Scarred, bruised, more salvaged parts than original elements—and immaculate. Elegantly mended. Lovingly maintained. They looked too sharp for this forgotten corner of space.
Curiosity was a dangerous trait for a pilot. And yet—Arvel paused to watch them fly.
He scrambled his comm frequencies until he could listen in to the chatter from the spacedock: “—won’t impress the commander with those antics. Barely surviving a barrel roll won’t convince him you’re a pilot.”
The comm crackled. One of the rebels laughed. “I’ll settle for convincing my A-wing, Pieter.”
“Your A-wing doesn’t care about your antics, either,” Arvel said, before he could stop himself.
His words were met with deadly silence. A beat. Hesitation.
The A-wings drifted closer, approaching some semblance of battle formation, and Arvel marveled at the pilots’ vessels even as he winced at the pilots’ skills.
Then, the same voice from spacedock. Clipped. Confident. “Identify yourself.”
Arvel glanced at his nav computer, mentally plotting an escape if things got touchy. “Just a traveler, passing through.”
“Sightseeing in a snubfighter?” one of the pilots scoffed.
“Hush, Raf.” Spacedock. Pieter, was it? “Best to be on your way, traveler.”
Arvel wondered why he didn’t heed that advice. He kept his eyes on the fighters. “Your problem is that you’re easing back on your throttle halfway through your roll. It makes it harder to control the pitch rate.”
“And I suppose you’d know.” Raf might not have been much of a pilot, but she was confident enough to challenge him.
Arvel sniffed. “It’s a rookie mistake.”
He marked Raf’s fighter and reached for the throttle, accelerating directly toward the A-wing, before he barreled around her.
He felt the intricacies of the maneuver. He adjusted his path on instinct, leaning into the spin and easing back once he fell into the downward swing.
He followed the first roll with a second, tighter one, until he came to a sharp stop and lazily looped back to his original position. He’d passed by the pilots before they’d had time to react, and he savored their silence of a different flavor. Shock. Awe. Annoyance.
Of course Raf spoke up first. “Damn. Cool tricks. Why haven’t you taught us those yet, Pieter?”
The reply was frosty. “I’ll settle for making sure you can take off and land safely.”
A fourth A-wing had left the spacedock and was making its way toward Arvel. If possible, this fighter looked even more like it was held together with glue and string and care, but the pilot flew with intense determination. “Like I said, traveler. Continue on your path.”
“I will,” Arvel said, knowing the words were a lie as soon as he uttered them. “You have lessons to teach and I have places to be.”
He should go. He should…leave. The pilots would learn, or they wouldn’t. He’d never known the galaxy to be merciful, and the war wasn’t his purpose.
Arvel switched from open comms and hailed Pieter directly. “I have to ask, though. Are you responsible for the wings’ maintenance?”
“Why?” Pieter’s voice was softer, but no less wary. He’d circled Arvel’s Headhunter, forcing him off course and away from the others.
“It’s rather hard to imagine you could take out a Star Destroyer with this.”
“With courage and determination? With pilots willing to risk it all for a better future? It’s not all sim pods and Skystrike Academy defectors. Not every farm boy from some Outer Rim black hole turns into an ace fighter, and not every rookie has the chance to grow into one. Some of these pilots will never join up with the rebel fleet, but if we don’t make sure they get some training, they’re dead before they can try,” Pieter snapped, and the words sounded well worn, like it was an argument he’d had a hundred times before. Then he stilled. “I try to prepare them, as best as I can, because I always have. Out here, no one else will. I never know if it’s enough.”
Arvel opened his mouth to say something, anything, he didn’t know what, but before he could the other pilot continued. “No, that’s a lie. I know it isn’t. They know it isn’t. And still they fight. So as long as I have them here, I will protect them. From their own inexperience as well as suspicious outsiders, if need be.”
Arvel glanced out toward the spacedock. The three pilots hadn’t returned to their practice. The three A-wings were lined up close to one another, like silent spectators. They were built for reconnaissance, not for outright assault. “Do I look like an Imperial spy? Would I stumble into a practice run of three aspiring rebel fighters in a forgotten corner of the galaxy?”
“Are you seriously asking me if an Imperial spy would try to look as innocuous as possible?”
Arvel barked a laugh. “Fine. I prefer to keep a healthy distance between myself and the war, anyway.”
“So keep a healthy distance between us, too. We’ll consider your flyby educational and something that won’t happen again.” Pieter closed the remaining distance toward the Headhunter, a pilot’s equivalent of showing someone the door.
And really, Arvel should have left it at that. A singular, educational event. But the words that tumbled out of his mouth were, “I could teach them to barrel-roll, your rebels. Before I leave. They’ll be slightly better prepared.”
“Why?” He never knew one word could hold impatience, frustration, and curiosity.
That was the question, wasn’t it? Why had he deviated from his path? Why hadn’t he left yet? He looked at the A-wing’s cockpit, and Pieter stared back at him, eyes dark behind the visor of his helmet.
Arvel judged people by oil smears, starfighter upgrades, and welding burns. “Those blasted A-wings, they look like you raided a scrapyard, and by rights they shouldn’t be flying. The fact that they do is a small miracle. They’re stunning and they deserve pilots who can keep them intact, who can keep them safe.” He was never one to speak his deepest thoughts. He was a natural when it came to flying. He could feel the shape of space around him. He breathed easiest when he folded himself into a cockpit. He was…less comfortable with trust or vulnerability.
But Pieter responded immediately. “So they will keep the pilots safe.”
The third silence was one of understanding, of recognition.
Pieter breathed out hard. “One trick?”
“One trick.”
“I have my eyes on you.”
“I’m more worried about your laser cannons.”
This time, Pieter was the one to laugh.
“One trick,” Arvel assured him, and he wondered if they both knew they were lying. He wondered if they knew that one trick would turn into a dozen would turn into dozens. One spacedock would grow into a larger base, turn into another. Aspiring resistance fighters would become rebels.
One gritty pilot would turn into many, and many would not return.
Those blasted A-wings.
Those damn brave fools.
Arvel Crynyd didn’t believe in anything, but he knew how to teach a good barrel roll.
“Proceed with the countdown. All groups assume attack coordinates.”
It had been the tavern, too. A year later.
Or rather, the walkway outside of the tavern. He met Demms Ryx on Koda Station, outside The End of the World.
Arvel had entered the tavern to meet with a representative of the Virgillian Free Alignment—a Virgillian woman who’d introduced herself as Dagger. She was the one who’d asked him there, promising a message from one of his pilots. Arvel didn’t do glorified messenger runs anymore, but he’d made an exception for the invitation to come sightseeing in a snubfighter. After all, only one pilot had said those words to him, and he’d wanted to know how Raf was doing. He’d wanted to know, right up until the moment Dagger offered him a thin, burned sliver of durasteel and her sympathies.
Arvel hadn’t been a stranger to loss, but he hadn’t lost a pilot yet.
He’d stormed out.
Demms, ever the concerned, considerate bartender, followed.
The light streaming out from the door opening to the seedy tavern made the Volpai’s blue skin seem brighter, almost cerulean, and the stripes along his face and arms shone like stars.
Those were the first words out of Arvel’s mouth.
“You look like hyperspace come to life.”
He knew his pilots would’ve laughed and laughed at that. Raf would have laughed. They’d been the ones who taught him to speak his mind more.
Mercifully, the Volpai had laughed, too. He could have walked away. He could have scoffed at him. But he’d laughed and reached out a hand, drawn him in. He’d warned him Arvel would catch his death out there. He’d offered Arvel a drink. And then another. And then, when their paths not so accidentally crossed again, another.
It was habit before Arvel realized it was more than that. He still needed hyperspace routes and coordinates to navigate interpersonal relationships, and without them he felt lost.
But Demms found him. Every time.
A drink. A smile. A tender word. A comforting arm—or four.
That first night, Demms had gently sent Dagger on her way, had called in another bartender to take over his shift, and he’d sat down next to Arvel.
“Tell me about hyperspace.”
Arvel clung to the edge of the table in front of him, as though it was the only thing that kept him upright. He felt like the world was spinning with a vengeance. “It’s beautiful. It’s freedom. It’s…” He shook his head.
“Tell me.” Demms nudged him.
“Nothing makes me feel both so powerful and so insignificant.” He’d never admitted to that before. Not even to himself. “It’s impossible and somehow we make it work. If we can do such impossible things, why are we so intent on harming each other?”
“Careful,” Demms said with a soft smile. “That’s rebellious talk.”
“I’m not a rebel, I’m a flight instructor,” Arvel snapped, though he was quite sure the Empire didn’t differentiate between rebel and flight instructor. And the truth was, he wasn’t sure he could, either. Not today. Not anymore.
He tried to get up, but Demms put a hand on his shoulder. “Don’t go.”
“I have to.” He didn’t, but he couldn’t stay, either. It scared him.
“Tell me about her.”
Arvel hesitated before he downed his drink in one gulp. “I’d just taught her a Cru spin, right before she left.”
He placed the sliver on the tabletop in front of him. “Just one trick.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Yeah.” He was, too.
Demms considered him. “It mattered, even if it didn’t change the outcome. It mattered that you taught her. It’s an act of trust, to teach, to believe that we can be better than we were.”
“I don’t believe in anything.”
“I doubt that very much.”
Arvel managed a pained half smile. “That’s rebellious talk, too.”
Demms grinned and shrugged, four arms at once. His eyes sparkled. “I’m a bartender on Koda Station. I’m a rebel by definition.”
“It must be easy,” Arvel said, without thinking it through. “To know exactly who you are.”
A shadow crossed Demms’s face, and for a brief moment it was as if the deepest blue darkened further, as if his features sharpened. Then he smiled. “I thought we already determined, I’m hyperspace come to life.”
“I can see the stars in your eyes,” Arvel said, meaning every word of it.
Demms seemed to stare straight through him. “Then use those stars to plot your course, flight instructor. As long as you occasionally find your way back to me when you want to talk.”
Arvel promised, but still it was Demms who found him first. When Pieter dragged Arvel to Koda Station to negotiate a shipment of salvaged A-wing parts, Demms was there with a drink and a smile, like he’d been waiting.
He had been.
When Arvel returned to the old spacedock—and briefly considered that they should name the damn thing now that more aspiring rebel pilots found their way to it—Demms found his way there, too. Not immediately, nor confidently. He hitched a ride and showed up with a bag slung over his shoulder and a thousand questions in his eyes.
Arvel felt a pull at his core, the same rush he felt when hurtling through space. Fear and exhilaration, all at once.
“It occurred to me,” Demms said, “that plotted courses work both ways.”
Arvel glanced around the docking bay, at the pilots who adamantly didn’t look in their direction. “You’re not here to become a pilot?”
“I’m not. And I won’t stay if it makes you uncomfortable. It’s just—” Demms clenched and unclenched his hands. “You make a difference. I serve drinks. I want to do more.”
“You don’t,” Arvel said quietly.
Demms frowned.
“You don’t make me uncomfortable,” Arvel added, stumbling over the words. In fact, it was comfort before he realized it was more than that. “What would you like to do?”
Demms’s frown faded and a soft smile broke through, like the first starlight arcing over a planet. “I can cook. Quite well, actually. I like to make a difference, too. I want to feel like I matter.”
“To a cause?”
“Or a person.”
This time, Arvel reached out a hand and drew him in. “We could use a chef. If I have to look at another polystarch ration pack, I’ll fling myself out an air lock.”
“We couldn’t have that,” Demms muttered. “I just found you again.”
“You did.”
When the path was hard to navigate, it was so much easier to be found than to plow on. To reach for an outstretched hand. A strong arm—or two or four. Perhaps in that sense, they found each other. And they kept finding each other.
On a walkway outside of a tavern.
On a spacedock.
In a newly rebuilt RZ-1T A-wing, with Demms in the pilot’s seat and Arvel as backup, with Pieter on their comms, occasionally reminding them he’d never refurbished a trainer starship before, so it might just fall apart around them. It didn’t. They switched places halfway through and Arvel showed Demms the beauty of hyperspace.
On Hoth, where Arvel met with the Alliance High Command and other Alliance flight instructors for the first time. And after Echo Base fell, when Arvel left the still-unnamed spacedock, because it held too many names of pilots that would never return.
On a nameless asteroid, where Demms cooked for a small contingent of rebels and Arvel ran supply missions, until he got annoyed by new pilots messing up their barrel rolls and he taught them, too.
They found each other, and they kept finding each other, and it was love before Arvel realized the stars had never shone brighter. What was love became home, what was home became family.
One trick, one smile, one word at a time, Arvel Crynyd lost his heart to everything that was worth fighting for.
Those blasted A-wings.
Those damn brave fools.
That headstrong, rebellious bartender, who made the best rations in the fleet.
He understood what motivated them now.
Arvel Crynyd still didn’t believe in anything, but he saw the stars in the eyes of his daughter, too.
“All craft, prepare to jump to hyperspace on my mark.”
“All right. Stand by.”
Or perhaps it had, quite simply, been the birds, three days ago.
He’d passed by Sullust on the trade routes a hundred times. He’d never stopped to go sightseeing; he’d preferred stars over planets. But the fleet had assembled there, all courage and determination. All pilots willing to risk everything for a better future.
You could take out a Star Destroyer with this fleet.
With his eyes on the barren, volcanic planet below, Arvel let the hum of his A-wing overwhelm him. He should’ve known better. He should’ve kept his eyes on his own craft.
But Starr had wanted to know about the birds, because Demms had told her they were the only featherless birds in existence. “They’re impossible,” he’d told their toddler softly, when Arvel visited them on Cerea, where they’d made their home safely away from the rebel fleet. “And it’s exactly because they’re impossible that they’re worth holding on to.” Demms had looked at Arvel. “Because it’s creatures like these, my love, that make this galaxy miraculous.”
So Arvel plotted a course to far below the obsidian surface, found himself a Sullustan naturalist—a short woman who introduced herself as Fenna Lev—and went to see the birds.
Because it was easier to think of his daughter than of what lay ahead.
He’d dragged Pieter along. “For old times’ sake.”
“Watching featherless creatures stumble through flight? Nothing would delight me more.”
Fenna Lev rolled her eyes at them but didn’t say anything. She guided them to a small, raggedy shuttle that would bring them to the surface and listened to the two of them bicker, until they emerged from the subterranean city and toxic smoke surrounded the vessel.
A virulent lava river cut through the harsh landscape, hot bubbles of fire exploding from the surface.
“You should know,” she said in weary Basic, cutting through Pieter’s recounting the adventures of the most recent pilot trainees aboard the spacedock, “that ash angels don’t stumble or blunder. You flyboys may think your starfighters are so elegant, but you have nothing on these birds.”
She brought the shuttle to a halt above the lava river’s estuary, and the red glow from the molten rock lit up the landscape around them. On the rocky, obsidian outcroppings to their right, tall gray birds sat with their wings outstretched—like they were drying them in the heat of the volcanic fumes.
One of the biggest birds toppled forward, and Arvel barely had the presence of mind to reach his holorecorder and follow along as the bird skimmed across the lava, gracefully avoiding touching the surface. The wings looked odd, like they were partially incinerated and shouldn’t be able to sustain flight.
“They are impossible,” Arvel commented softly.
“No,” Fenna Lev said. “They are unlikely.”
Another ash angel followed the first, rolling around it, diving between the first bird and the lava and corkscrewing around it, like a young pilot who finds their wings.
The bigger bird squawked, a harsh, guttural sound, and as it made a sharp turn away from the other one, the thin strips of tissue that covered its body and wings shivered in the heat. It left a thin trail of ashes in its wake.
They watched a fledgling tumble down, too, narrowly avoiding angry bubbles of lava as it crossed the stream and stumbled onto an ash-covered ledge. It rolled around in the ash, big flakes clinging to its skin.
Arvel made sure to catch every moment of it. “All the rules of physics should stop these birds from flying. The fact that they’re up there…”
Pieter nudged him. “If I remember correctly, you once told me my A-wings shouldn’t fly, either, and look where that got us.”
Arvel shook his head. “Your A-wings obeyed the laws of physics.”
“And these birds obey the laws of nature.”
“What laws?”
Fenna Lev answered first. “Survival. Life continues, even when everything around it is deadly and dark, even when it has to adapt to ash or hunger. Life continues to find its path.”
Pieter looked at her and smiled. “Exactly. Though I wouldn’t call it survival. Survival is so crude and emotionless.”
He turned to face the ash angels again, and for the briefest of moments, Arvel saw two Pieters at once. The one he’d met in a patched-up starfighter outside a reclaimed stardock, and the one who sat in front of him now, in his Green Squadron flight suit. They were quite a lot more similar than the Arvel he’d been then and the person he was now.
“What would you call it then?”
Pieter shrugged. “Hope.”
“Ah.”
“Yeah.”
Arvel switched off the holorecorder and placed it to the side, looking out over the ash angels in the light of the lava stream.
He ran a hand through his hair. “Damn brave birds.”
“Blasted A-wings.” Pieter held out his hand to him. “One more trick?”
He nodded. “One more trick.”
Arvel Crynyd didn’t believe in anything, but it didn’t stop the birds from flying.
“All wings report in.”
Arvel Crynyd didn’t believe in anything.
Except in the pilots fighting for a better future—even if they couldn’t barrel-roll. He’d stopped counting how many he’d taught over the years, but he knew all their names. He saw them now, appearing out of hyperspace, with Endor ahead. With a Death Star, too. He felt them. The ones who were present. The ones who came before.
He believed in the beauty of the galaxy, and in the people who kept his galaxy in the palm of their hands.
He believed in hope, even in the face of cruel impossibility.
Arvel Crynyd believed in anything…much.
But this was enough.
He opened his comms and prepared himself for battle. “Green Leader. Standing by.”