Project Boussh: Boy's Night In
by Majick

Elassar had christened them 'Bantam Squadron' on behalf of the feathers
that they continued to shed after more than an hour in the shower. The five
males wandered aimlessly along the corridors of the palace, cracking jokes,
flicking each other's ears, comparing belches, all the things men do when
there's no women around to act as civilising influences.
As they passed one of the bedrooms set aside for the New Republic/Terra
Group personnel, the door opened, and Corran Horn, Jedi, pilot, and former
cop, backed out with his clothes badly creased and his hair messed up.
Bantam Squadron paused to watch as Corran leaned inside the door to kiss a
hidden figure, then grinned as the renowned warrior actually giggled, before
the door shut. He turned to find five Cheshire Cat smirks aimed at him.
"Oh, Sithspit," he groaned.
"Commander," Face Loran said with a flash of his pearly white teeth. "I see
one of us is having no trouble winding down after the battles and trials of
the last few days."
"Come on Corran," Pash said, stepping forward and throwing an arm over the
shoulder of his friend. "We're all going to get drunk. You can come too if
you promise to tell us the secret of your success with women."
As they walked away, Face stopped for a second to pull a feather from the
pocket of his coat.

The six men of Bantam Squadron walked down the steps into the wine cellar.
Face spotted the bottle of tequila he'd been downing earlier, and snatched
it up with a triumphant cry: "This'll make me happy!"
Elassar picked a bottle of mexical, and looked dubiously at the worm
floating inside it. Looking around, he held the bottle up to Mike, who
shrugged at him.
"What's up?"
"Why is there a worm in this drink?" Elassar asked, not unreasonably.
"It shows how strong it is? I don't know."
Elassar sat the bottle down again, before picking up a bottle of gin
instead.
Mike homed instinctively on the section of vodkas from around the world. He
gently slid a bottle of Starska from the rack, noting that the label was
printed in Cyrillic lettering. He felt confident in his choice.
Corran hung back, unwilling to join in the scene of debauchery that was
sure to greet the next person to walk though the door. While he was no
prude, his mind was on the upcoming mission, and he didn't want to
jeapordise
it. Plus, his mind was still partly in a bedroom three floors up, where
right about now Mirax would be getting out of the shower... This lasted
until
Pash slapped him on the back and stuck a beer in his hands.
"Come on, Corran. Loosen up," Pash giggled. Corran could tell that the Ace
was already somewhat inebriated. "Time for you to be a man," the red head
added with a smile.
"Though I guess you already did that tonight," Face added, taking a swig
from his bottle. "Now, sit down, have a drink, and tell us all about it."
"Loran, Face, what's up?" Corran asked.
"Pfff," said the sixth man, an Australian, Corran thought. "The bloke's got
women trouble. Don't take a genius to see that."
"And you are?" Corran said, setting his beer down.
"Name's Russell, mate. Russell Crowe. And Face is right about one thing. If
you want to be down here with the boys, you're going to have to drink some
beer, at last."
Reluctantly, Corran sat down next to Russell, and sipped his beer. It
wasn't too bad. He looked at the label, processing the Roman characters into
the Aurebesh flawlessly.
"Guinness," he read. The holograph of Obi-Wan Kenobi that Leia had had made
for Luke on his wedding day sprang into his mind. He wondered why.
Then he pulled a feather from the sleeve of his jump suit, and grimaced.

Elassar tilted the gin bottle upside down, draining the last few drops of
the foul smelling liquid. He dropped the empty bottle to the ground, and
looked around, his head swimming.
"Steady it," he thought. "Yeah. Steady it." He grabbed his left wrist with
his right hand and, after a few attempts, balanced his left arm on his left
knee. Then he tried to get his chin into the upraised hand. Missing, he
toppled forward and out of his chair, landing chin first on the cold stone
floor. His mouth shut with a click of teeth, and he began to snore.
Mike looked over at the prone Devaronian and giggled. Lifting his own half
full bottle of vodka, he took a swig, and set it down. Getting unsteadily to
his feet, he staggered over to Elassar and checked his friend over.
Satisfied he wasn't dead yet, he hauled the unconscious Devaronian back into
his chair, before tucking his horned head between his knees. In doing so, he
dislodged a feather from Elassar's collar.
"He'll be fine," Mike announced, before sitting down heavily next to his
comatose friend.
"Don't wanna do that too often," Corran said. "You'll bruise your bum -hic-
bone."
"Pash, what did you give this guy?"
"Guinness. Vickie said it was the only drink that people who like green
should drink."
Mike sighed as he saw Pash's reaction to his own mention of Vickie.
"Damn. When did that happen?" he thought to himself. Then Pash crawled over
to Mike on his hands and knees.
"Mike, maybe you can help. You got to know Vickie while you were in New
Hampshire, right?"
Mike shifted as a pang of guilt hit him in the gut. Because of an order
he'd given Vickie, she'd been aboard the Red Home when it was shot down. She
was on board the Admonitor because of him. He looked at Pash warily, before
replying.
"Yes, I was. But people like Nick and Kristy probably know her better. Why
do you ask?"
"She spoke of you sometimes. When talking about the Jedi life she'd been
chosen to lead, she spoke of emulating the leaps and bounds you made in only
a few hours experience to the Force. are you okay?"
Mike had groaned on hearing of Vickie's thoughts. He cursed himself for not
telling her what himself and Corran has suspected about the nature and
duration of his 'Force abilities'. Now long gone, they'd been a reflection
of Corran's own and had sprung fully grown into Mike's possession. If he'd
only mentioned that at the time.
"She'll be right," Russell said loudly, deep in conversation with Face and
Corran. "No worries!"
As the trio burst into laughter, Mike grinned, self consciously. Apart from
being a gorgeous, Oscar winning actor, Russell had just summed up Mike's
approach to life: If you can't change it, don't worry about it. Mike
certainly couldn't travel in time, so he had to move on.
Maybe along the way he could help out this self conscious, fumbling, out of
sorts deadly, skillful fighter pilot.
"How do you feel about Vickie?" Mike asked, bluntly. Tact was beyond him at
that point.
"I think I love her," said Pash. Mike looked over at where the redhead had
been kibbitzing with Corran about life. There was a half-empty whiskey
bottle. Still, beyond a certain amount, alcohol tended to decrease the
amount of crap a person was capable of talking. He looked at the older man,
who was staring blankly at him, and sighed. Again, some drunk had singled
him out to chat about the state of his love life.
"Why do you... no, wait. Pash, have you ever been in love before?"
"I... I guess so"
"Eeeehh!! Wrong answer, bub," Mike said, jabbing Pash in the chest with a
finger. "You know when you're in love, believe me. Would you have died for
the girl?"
"Well..." But Mike cut him off.
"The first word out of your mouth should have been 'yes'. That's what love
is. Being prepared to die for a person, to do whatever it takes to make them
happy."
"I'd die for Vickie. I would!" Pash protested, his temper flaring. "Don't
tell me I'm not in love with her!"
Mike dead-eyed the redhead with a stare so cold it was as though Mike had
taken it from the freezer with the ice in the men's drinks.
"Calm down. Now, tell me, when you are reunited with Vickie, and you're in
love with her, and you say what to Rich?"
"Rich... Of course... I keep forgetting she's married."
"She chose him. She loves him, we talked about him, occasionally. When she
talks of him, she comes alive. When she talks of you..."
"Yes? How does she sound when she talks of me?"
"Excited. The same way she sounds when talking about..." Mike thought
quickly.  "Shalla. Or Kirney. Or Mirax. I'm sorry, Pash. She's not in love
with you. I know she enjoys your company, but as a friend. In truth, she's
embarrassed, I think, that you saw those stories of hers. She didn't want
you
thinking she harboured any feelings towards you. That's just my opinion,
though, of course." Mike shrugged.
"Jesus, listen to me. I must be sobering up," he added. He cast his eyes
around, and they alighted on an unopened bottle of whiskey.
"You know, we all fall for the wrong woman, at the wrong time," he said,
vaguely, reaching for the whiskey bottle.
Picking it up, he snapped the seal on the cap, and opened it, before taking
a long, long swallow of the contents. Looking back towards Pash, he nearly
jumped out of his skin.
Sitting in front of him now was Face, swaying slightly as he waved a near
empty bottle of tequila at Mike. Mike took the bottle, and put it down out
of Face's reach. Even by the standards of the gathering, Face had probably
had enough. Looking around, he spotted Pash sitting over behind Corran and
Russell, staring blankly into space. Mike took it as a good sign, that he
was thinking over what had been said.
"What can I do for you then, oh Captain my Captain?" he asked of Face
"You could start," Face announced regally, "by not coming across as a sub
par Elassar," he finished in a low growl. Mike swayed back at the menace in
Face's voice. After a few seconds fighting to regain his balance, he leant
forward again, nearly head butting Face as he over shot his target.
"Face, you have woman trouble too? What's that about?"
"About five nine, well built and a bloody good fighter. Or did you mean the
one that's five nine, well built, and a bloody good fighter? Oh, and one of
them has head tails."
"You've spent too long with PK's lust bunny," Mike said, waving vaguely at
Russell. "You're starting to sound like him. That'll get confusing. You'll
have PK and Ali confused. Not that Ali's not already confused if you're
saying what I think you're saying."
Mike stopped babbling, and looked at the bottle in his hand. Finest Scotch
whiskey, and it was half gone in just a couple of swallows. That couldn't be
good.
"Oh, God. I think I need some fresh air. Come on lover boy. You and me are
going to go look at the sea."
"What for?"
"Well," said Mike, as he dragged himself uneasily to his feet.
"Well, if we're very lucky, then Kristy is only going to have a little
shout at me for polluting the ocean. Either that, or..."
That got through to Face, and he hurriedly helped the Englishman up the
stairs and out towards the outside of the palace. Bundling into the lift,
they raced up he floors until they ejected themselves onto the battlements.

Russell watched as they staggered past. He turned to Corran and said,
"That's the trouble with today's kids. They don't have the stomach for he
good stuff like we had in the eighties. Right, Corran?"
Corran slowly toppled backwards, his beer held out in front of him as his
back muscles dissolved, temporarily.
Russell looked around the remaining members of Bantam Squadron. Elassar was
comatose, Corran was staring vacantly at the ceiling, and Pash was, well,
elsewhere.
"Christ," he said. "Poms, Yanks, aliens, it doesn't matter. No-one can
top an Aussie when it comes to drinking. Ah, maybe I'll go find that Kristy
girl. She was pretty hot, and I do like a girl with long hair..."

Up on the battlements, Mike and Face stared out to sea, ignoring the view
directly below them. Mike shifted uncomfortably, and pulled a feather from
his jump suit.
"Bloody things," he said vaguely, before releasing it onto the wind.
On the horizon, black cloud gathered, and Mike strained to hear the faint
roll of thunder.
"So," he said, turning to face Face. "Your story. In sixty seconds or less,
preferably. I think the wind is about to change."
"With the separation from Dia, and Retsim's work... I don't know... I got
confused."
"Ah. is that confused 'I want Alison rather than Dia' or confused 'I want
Alison, *then* Dia', or confused 'I want Alison, *and* Dia'?"
Face wouldn't look at Mike. Instead, he stared out to sea, watching as two
X-Wings drew a lazy circle around the island.
"I'm married to Dia, sort of. Did you know that? Under Twi'lek law, at
least. We were going to have an official ceremony on Lorrd as well. Then
this happened." He shrugged.
"And now?" Mike asked.
"I don't know. I can't tell Dia about Alison. She'd hate me."
"Really? She struck me as one of those rare people who understand life. I
might be wrong."
Face looked at Mike curiously. "What do you mean?"
"I mean, you have feelings for Alison, fine. It happens. Go the whole of
married life without noticing another person, and you're not human, or, for
that matter, Twi'leki. You went through some seriously bad stuff with
Retsim, then the battle with Atner. Hell, a fair amount of that was my
fault."
"'Dia, I kissed Alison because Mike almost died.' I don't see it working."
"I mean what you said earlier. Alison and Dia are quite alike. Same
aggressive temperament, same fierce loyalties, same passionate nature.
You've spent a lot of time with Alison, you've been on her team virtually
the whole of this campaign. It's only natural you should feel close. Alison
probably feels worse than you, let's not forget. You're used to war, Alison
isn't. The same qualities that made you and Dia like each other make you and
Alison like each other.
"How did Alison and Dia get on when you were working together?"
"Fine. Why?"
"They'd probably make very strong friends, like Emily and Alison do. Now,
are you going to tell Dia about you and Alison?"
"I don't know."
"I would, if I were you. Better the clean, quick admittance then the messy,
prolonged war of lies."
"You may be right."
"There's a scary thought. Be honest, Face. You didn't come to me asking for
advice. You came to me because you had something you wanted to hear, and
figured I'd say it. Corran would have said the same. What you have with
Alison is heat of the moment. What you have with Dia is worth working at."
"I still have to talk to Alison about all this. There's a lot to discuss."
"Yeah. Especially as the Red Home must be nearly ready to come over by now.
With Dia on board. Hint, hint."
They looked out to sea, watching the storm brew, growing stronger.
Occasionally, Face would fidget as he thought about what would happen in the
next few hours. Eventually, Pash appeared with mugs of extra strong coffee,
and the three men stared out to sea together, anticipating the storms they
would face together.