Chapter Text
Fives walked in the quiet apartments following a long day on duty. Usually the small space was full of life, cozy and at least had some noise going. But today silence greeted him. Frowning he put his bucket on the entry table and allowed the door to close behind him. You hadn’t told him you were going out, would be working or anything and he knew you would be home studying. As your usual routine the last two years.
Not long after your relationship had become official, Fives had stood by you as you took the steps to go back to higher education and get a degree and not one, but two new certifications, in healthcare nonetheless, a nightmare field to him. Give him a blaster, battlefield and plan of attack any day compared to anatomy, physiology (of various different species) and the subspecialties that you had specialized in. Administration Data and Mutative Disease Data specialties to be exact.
Two years later you had graduated your program, passed the first certification exam in the Administration Data and now you were preparing for the Mutative Disease Data specialist exam. You had been stressing about it due to the vague direction of study the certifying body had put out, it covered a wide range of knowledge area but not pinpointed in a direction that the Administration Data test had. You had spent the last year doing nothing but studying, making flash cards, quizzing yourself, quizzing your friend you had made in the classes, being supportive to them and them to you, but now cruchtime neared.
The test was in two standard days.
Fives had stood by, helping quiz you, read areas and break areas down in the categories and even had gotten Echo and Kix in on the studying. Kix was amazed that you had taken only two years to get this far, he knew much about a humanoid body but only vague passing of Mutative Diseases. The stress of it was starting to wear you down, Fives knew, you hadn’t been sleeping well for the past few nights and he knew your stress dreams had started when you woke up two days ago and looked at him and asked “You have no plans of buying a watercraft, right?” While amusing and puzzling Fives had hugged you, kissed your forehead and assured you that no, while he enjoyed swimming recreationally (sometimes) he had no plans of buying a boat, as if the Republic would allow him to.
Walking further into the apartment Fives went down the hallway to your small office and found the reason there was no sounds coming from anything, you were at your desk, head propped up on books, flash cards, computer monitors blazing and sound asleep in it all. He could tell you were exhausted, while he admired your dedication and drive for this, he knew that beyond a doubt the past two years of stress, anxiety, and all the other mental calisthenics that went along with this field had caught up to you.
Moving across the room, Fives turned off the monitors and then carefully went about picking you up and carrying you to the bedroom. He needed to figure out a way to keep you from panic studying anymore. You knew everything you could possibly know he just needed you to relax.
As Fives headed for your room you didn’t even wake, just nuzzled your face closer to his body as he carried you. Moving aside the covers he set you gently on the bed and then went about removing his gear, dinner and the rest of the evening could be sorted out later. After clearing down to his bodysuit he moved to lay down on the bed, above the covers, he moved to hold your hand, whispering a prayer to whomever was listening that you would stay asleep.
Four hours later.
You came awake, slowly and softly, wrapped in warmth and curled into the big warm arms of Fives. Smiling softly you went to snuggle back down and fall back asleep when you realized you hadn’t made the decision to get into bed yourself. Ignoring the warmth you found yourself cloaked in you bolted up and tried to bound out of bed, but the arm that had been simply cuddling you had turned from soft and pliable to a clamp that couldn’t be moved. “Oh let me go, I have to study!” You said beginning to struggle against the arm that was currently dragging you back into bed.
“Nope, mine.” Fives murmured not even opening his eyes.
“Fives, c’mon you know thats not fair, you know how much this test means to me and how I feel about it. I need to finish studying, I have less that two days before the test now and I just need to make sure I know it all.” You plead, putting up a failing struggle against the arm that was now pinning you against a solid chest.
“No, you need to relax. You haven’t slept properly in five days, I need you to take a moment and just lay here with me.” He says against the crown of your head.
“I just need one more hour, please.” You begin thinking, more like spiraling about how this could be the difference in time that you could know the answer to the question that pushes you over the top to pass. The frantic way you were starting to breathe and anyone with any knowledge in humans would be able to tell you were in the beginning stages of your anxiety attack.
Not that it was exactly a knowledge of passing or failing, you didn’t even know the target number to shoot for, they just told you that it would be two standard hours worth of memory test and two standard hours of open resource test. Everything would then be graded on a curve and you had approximately 50 standard days before you would receive knowledge on if you were awarded the certification or would have to retest.
Fives relaxed his hold enough for you and him to sit up in bed. “Sweetheart, you have been over that information backwards, forwards, sideways, and upside down. I’m extremely confident that you know more about the information that you have been studying the last two years than the people who wrote the test. Let’s take a break until the test, let me take care of you and allow you to go in less stressed, scientifically proven to be a better outcome.” He looked at you, gorgeous warm eyes lighting softly in the dim light of your room.
“I just need to study, this test was so expensive, over five hundred credits, and it would set me up for the next steps in my career, and it would set us up nicely for the future, should there be one, and….” you continued rambling on for a few more minutes before Fives just leans over and kisses you silent.
Pressing his lips to yours silencing you momentarily while you’re sit in stunned surprise before he traced his tongue upon your bottom lip, begging you to let him in, and when you acquiesced to him he dove right in like a man deprived of oxygen. Distracting you but also enjoying himself, he wasn’t going to tell you but he had felt deprived of you for the last few weeks while you started cramming even harder. As the days ticked closer to the calendar, the more consumed in books, manuals, standards, and tables you became.
While your tongues stroked, delved and reacquainted themselves, Fives moved his arms to cradle you and pull you closer. You hadn’t realized it until now but you had missed Fives, the feel of his hands on your, the weight of his lips and his divine taste, that unique Fives-ness that he had.
After pulling apart, grasping for air, Fives rested his forehead against yours, just sitting there with you. “I know the test is important, I know you want to study more, but you know everything and I have full faith in you that you will pass this certification, in fact I bet a night out on the town that you will pass this test. Now, less than two days to the test right?”
“Right, could it just..” you say, and he puts his finger against your lips to silence you.
“Shhhh,” he says as he removes his finger and places a quick kiss where his finger was. “I know its exhausting for you, that big beautiful brain of yours with so much knowledge needs a rest.”
Knowing you were about to argue with him he goes “no, now what do you have to do when you install new software onto a computer?” He asks, knowing the basics but again, battlefields and blasters was his area, you were the one who was able to finesse computers with ease.
“You typically have to install everything and then it has to do a reboot before the program will perform correctly, typically.” You say, wondering what he is getting at.
“Exactly, what your brain needs right now is a reboot, you’ve installed all this knowledge over the years and I promise, it won’t disappear over the next two days. But you, you need to rest.” He says.
Knowing that he’s right, you had promised your friend from the classes that you were both going to stop studying you kept going, determined to review everything one more time. But, you knew you could trust in Fives and that he had your best interest in all this.
After a few more silent moments, you nodded and he pulled you to sit in his lap as he leaned against the headboard. “Fine, but I want a night of dancing and dinner, after this.”
He laughs while stroking your hair, “of course, anything you say, if you want drinks and dinner and dancing, even if it's at 79s you can look forward to it. After all this you deserve it.”
Less than two days later.
“Breathe, you’ve got this, you know the information, you’ve studied more than I’ve ever known anyone to study. You’ve got this.” Echo said as he stood outside the building where the testing center was.
“Hey, you know more about the Mutative Disease process, index, and manuals than I could even begin to tell you about. You’re going to ace this thing.” Kix says smiling his brilliant smile at you. He knows how tough it is having been tapped as a medic and training for it for many years, your knowledge rivals his, he’d have to ask you questions now he thinks to himself, not that he would let any of the rest of the guys know that.
“You will do fine, we all have faith in you, and General Skywalker says ‘let the Force guide you’, whatever that might mean.” Rex said. You were surprised to see the Captain this morning but grateful for the presence of all the friends you had among the group as you had walked to the testing center this morning.
“I believe in you, you’ve got this. I’ll be waiting and we will begin the count down towards results when you step back outside. See you in about five hours.” Fives said as he kissed your forehead quickly and stepped back. “Go kick that tests ass.”
You smiled up at Fives and stepped back and looked at the friends and Fives one more time. Nodding and psyching yourself up for the test. Turning you walked into the building and took the lift to the floor the testing center, determined to do the best you possibly could on that test.
Watching as you walked into the lift, turning around and smiling at him one more times Fives smiled back and just nodded towards you for encouragement. Once the lift doors shut and the numbers started to rise, he allowed his posture to sag and finally let his worry show.
Echo, being ever observant, noticed first. “She’ll do fine, she studied with you, me, Kix, her friend, and I’m pretty sure she broke a computer or two. She’ll be fine, if anything I would worry for the other test takers, she’s going to blow the curve on that test beyond belief.”
Kix and Rex nodded along, Fives stood silently for a moment allowing his brothers words to sink in. “Yes, she will, but there needs to be a contingency plan in case she doesn’t. When she passes, and I firmly believe she will, she wants dinner and dancing, you’re all on the hook for that. Though should things not go well….” He started to say when Kix interjected.
“Why don’t you plan something for if the news goes right and if the news goes wrong. Tell us and that way we know and can help any way possible.” Kix offered, knowing its what he would offer should he ever have someone who was as integral to him as you were to Fives.
“Good plan, so here’s what I’m thinking…….”