Poe Dameron [One-Shots]

# 10 Silent Crushing [Part 1]

Sign Language

Lipreading

Thoughts

Normal speech

Lilli is pronounced "Lill-aye"

Lilli Benn Asto was deaf. She was also part of the Resistance. When they had actually let her join she had been really surprised. She didn't really know how to do much that she thought would be useful, but somehow they found out that she could read lips pretty well, and had stuck her in communications, to translate intercepted holo-messages that had corrupted sound sequences. Which was like almost all of them.

Lilli spent most of her days just watching the holo recordings. If anything that was actually important came up, she would write it down, and log which recording it came from. She had to deliver a daily report to General Organa, but she didn't mind. Most days she just walked past the doors, caught the general's attention and signed, "Nothing today."

The General had begun picking up some sign language just by being around her so often, and she became one of Lilli's closest friends. Though whenever Lilli really wanted to have an important conversation, she still needed C-3P0 to translate for her.

And this is why Lilli didn't have many friends. She felt like people would get tired of trying to figure out what she was trying to say and so when she did try to make friends she would always stop 'talking' after a while. Because Lilli could really talk. It just sounded really confusing since she learned how to talk without having ever heard what sound was. Needless to say, she screwed up a lot and made people laugh. Which also didn't help her in the friends department.

Anyways, she was currently on her way down the hall towards the command center, where general Leia usually was at this time of day, to deliver her report. She walked in and over to where Leia was, waving to get her attention.

Leia looked up and smiled, "Anything today?" she asked out loud. Lilli shook her head no and handed her the report.

"Not much." Lilli signed and turned to leave, when the room exploded in activity. Lilli could see people frantically calling back and forth trying to work through something. Leia placed a hand on Lilli's shoulder to keep her from leaving and Lilli turned back to look at her.

Leia mouthed silently, interspersed with the signs she knew, so as not to distract the people hard at work, "Intercepting a high level transmission. Stay just in case." Lilli nodded and found a place to sit out of the way and watch.

More people came rushing into the command center and Lilli, who lacking her sense of sound processed everything by sight, noticed were pilots, and seemed particularly worried about what the transmission might hold. After several minutes of waiting they finally finished recording the transmission and began to play it back. The equipment that they had, couldn't process the sound fast enough and so a lot of the sound was cut out.

Lilli was the only one who could get anything from the holo, and her face had gone pale. The recording ended and Lilli looked around for General Leia, and found her already staring back, waiting for a translation. The rest of the eyes in the room turned to look as well. Lilli didn't think that she could go paler, but she did. It was a last second transmission sent out from the Hosnian System Authorities moments before The First Order had destroyed them.

Lilli quickly signed the message to 3P0 and left the room, feeling a little sick.

The next day she was feeling better, and trying to forget the event of yesterday. She was on her way to the mess hall when she crashed into someone she hadn't heard coming around the corner. She fell back. Someone reached out to catch her before she hit the ground, but they missed and Lilli landed on her butt anyways. As always, she looked up, smiled, and took the hand that was offered to help her back up.

It was one of the Pilots from yesterday. He wasn't wearing a bright orange flight suit anymore, but the brown leather jacket worked for him too. Lilli smiled again, more nervous this time, and tried to step past when out of the corner of her eye she saw the man say something. Not quite being able to catch the full meaning, and not having fully seen what he said, she sighed and faced him again, gesturing to her ears. She tried to convey the message that she couldn't hear him, and she couldn't speak.

The man looked really confused for a second, but he caught on quicker than most, breaking out into a grin and nodding, "Okay." he said clearly. "Sorry." he ran a hand through his curly black hair and sent her another smile.

Lilli shrugged it off, and waved dismissively, then signed, "You ok. Me fine." Maybe he would know some sign language, she hoped. But no, he didn't know any.

His mouth opened into a confused smile, and he shrugged, "Sorry." he said again, scratching the back of his neck feeling awkward.

Lilli shrugged it off again and smiled, waving goodbye. Someday I'll run into someone who knows sign language. Of course there are droids though. The only problem with droids is she couldn't hear them reply. 'Well so much for that one.' She thought to herself, and continued walking to the mess hall. Leaving the man behind.

Said man was left behind, trying the rest of the day to stop thinking about the woman he ran into in the hall, and kicking himself for not figuring out who she was.

He decided then and there to discover who she was and how to talk to her.

A/N

I'm actually learning to speak sign language because my little brother is almost deaf. So one day I was thinking, there would probably be deaf people in Star Wars too! And then this happened. :) Hope you Like it!