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i. Massassi Base; green
Somewhere, tucked away in the catacombs of the base, a chorus of voices are singing praises to Han Solo, Leia Organa, and Luke Skywalker, drinking to their fresh-eyed eagerness. Rogue One has been forgotten and buried; Jyn and Cassian have become footnotes in Alliance history. Jyn doesn’t mind, because it means she won’t be missed at the party. She knows that the Alliance deserves to celebrate their win, but that doesn’t mean she wants to join them; it seems wrong to rejoice, given what transpired, and the cries of victory ring hollow in Jyn’s ears. She suspects, or maybe hopes, that Cassian shares her sentiment, and so she raises a fist and knocks four times on his door.
She’s still not entirely sure how they both lived. She doesn’t really remember how they got back, only that when Cassian, bleeding and breathless and broken, was taken away from her she had screamed and had to be sedated. And while he rested in a bacta tank, Mon Mothma had informed her they had lost the plans, that K-2 and Bodhi and Chirrut and Baze had died for nothing, and Jyn had screamed and lunged ferally at Mon Mothma had to be escorted away. When Cassian had finally woken up, the doctors had said he was lucky to be alive. That they were both lucky to be alive.
Jyn doesn’t agree with them.
Even though the Alliance had recovered the plans, making sure Scarif wasn’t in vain, even though Jyn had watched the last reminder of her father explode into space, she still feels out of place. Stranded. She had been prepared to die on that beach, listening to the waves crash against the sand, watching as the world exploded in a beautiful pink, simply holding Cassian. She had been ready to greet death with open arms and a smile before the opportunity had been snatched away.
Dying, she has come to find out, is easy; living, on the other hand, is a much taller order.
Several heartbeats later, the door opens. Cassian wears loose gray pants and a thin white shirt, a marked difference from his typical beige uniform and large, fur-lined parka. Without the layers to hide in, he seems diminutive and unthreatening, and Jyn can see the outline of bandages poking through his top. A crutch rests under his arm and there’s still a gash across his nose from when he fell, and fell and fell and—
No. Jyn digs her fingernails into her palms and blinks.
“Jyn,” Cassian states, and there’s only a little bit of surprise in his voice. He winces as he talks. She’s surprised he can even stand.
“Can I come in?” she asks, and he answers by drawing the door further back and stepping aside.
Crossing over the threshold, Jyn supposes she should feel embarrassed, sneaking into a man’s room in the middle of the night, but she thinks that she’s gone through too much with Cassian to allow such trivial shame to prick the back of her neck. Her head is high as she studies the space around them. His quarters are bigger than hers, but still small; the walls, floor, and ceiling are all gray concrete, with the white sheets on the bed and the ivory table shoved against a wall providing the only breaks in the monotony. It feels suffocating. Cassian has no personal effects. In that, they are alike.
“I’m sorry to disturb you,” Jyn says mechanically as the door shuts, though she knows Cassian has not been asleep. The bed sheets are rumpled, like their occupant has been tossing and turning, unable to rest.
Cassian knows she knows, because they’ve been able to read each other like books ever since they met, but small talk is normal, and normal is sane. Normal is good. If Jyn squints, she can pretend they’re somewhere else, far away from this base, far away from this rebellion, tucked in a safe corner of the galaxy. But they aren’t. Her eyes are wide.
“It’s okay,” Cassian responds automatically, the words scratching his vocal chords on the way up, causing him to cough slightly to clear his throat. Jyn walks further into the room and he follows her, leaning heavily on his crutch. She stops when she reaches the edge of his bed and trails her fingers along the thin comforter, feeling Cassian’s gaze pierce the back of her neck.
“I didn’t want to be alone,” she mumbles to the mattress. Cassian knows without having to be told, and Jyn knows he knows, but she feels like she has to explain why she has come crawling to his room when she should be celebrating. She feels small. Now she does feel embarrassed as she voices her vulnerability; somewhere, in the back of her mind, she hears Saw warning her against revealing her true self.
A loud, joyous roar rises from deep within the temple. Cassian shifts his weight. Jyn wants to fold in on herself and shrink, because this was a mistake, you shouldn’t have come here—
“Let’s go outside,” Cassian suggests suddenly.
Jyn turns to face him, confusion flitting across her face as her brows knit together. “It’s quiet,” he explains quickly, glancing down to stare at his boots. “Quiet and peaceful.”
And far away.
Jyn understands.
Her eyes flit down to Cassian’s injured leg, then his bandage, then back up at his face, but he is not a rash man; he knows the effort it will take to go beyond the base walls. So she nods.
“Here, let me help,” she finds herself offering, and she crosses over to him without thinking. Cassian’s eyes narrow and he starts away from her, prickling at the offer of assistance, but then Jyn says in a low voice, “We help each other now.”
It sounds almost like a question, like she’s trying to convince herself. The words feel strange rolling off her tongue; once again, she feels Saw’s voice pricking a hidden corner in her brain, telling her to only look out for herself. Looking back, Jyn supposes he was trying to warn her, give her some notice of her impending abandonment.
But Saw is dead now, so Jyn pushes aside the whispers in her head.
Cassian’s features soften and settle into something Jyn can’t quite put a finger on. Surprise, maybe. A surprised-grateful look. He looks younger. He looks like how she imagines he would look if the war had never touched him, and as Jyn reaches this conclusion, he allows himself to lean on her shoulders.
And so they shuffle out, each step causing Cassian to grimace, but they march onward, a strange, lumbering, five-legged creature. The walk to the entrance to the base typically takes little more than five minutes, or three if Jyn sneaks through the command rooms she is mostly barred from, but now fifteen minutes pass before they finally reach the guards near the doors. Jyn opens her mouth to explain, but the guards wordlessly open the entrance; though the base is usually locked down at night, they seem more than willing to let Jyn and Cassian pass. Maybe they recognize their faces and have gawked at them from across the mess hall, or maybe they have just relaxed tonight. Maybe they just feel sorry for them. Jyn wonders if they wish they were at the party.
The cool evening air hits Jyn’s face as she steps outside, causing her hair to flutter as the doors slide back together behind her with a whoosh. The guards posted outside glance at them only once, just long enough to discern their identities, and face front again, their limbs relaxed and easy without the threat of the Death Star hanging above their heads. Jyn breathes in the scent of the forest, damp and mossy, and exhales slowly, feeling the tension leave her shoulders just a little.
They begin to limp towards the treeline, the only sound their boots and Cassian’s crutch crunching the ground beneath them. When they reach the edge of the forest, Cassian, panting, throws his crutch to the ground and they lower themselves to the leafy forest floor, the foliage shifting loudly under their weight. As Jyn looks out into the forests of Yavin IV, with the temple behind her, she can almost imagine that the Rebellion is a distant memory, and it’s just her and Cassian, listening to the sounds of the trees rustling in the gentle breeze.
“I always liked green,” she finds herself admitting. Small talk again, but at least it’s truthful now. Yavin IV might be the greenest place she’s ever been; the trees and shrubbery are practically untouched except for the occasional Massassi temple dotting the landscape.
Cassian positions himself so he can rest his back against a mossy tree, and his breathing slowly returns to normal. “Why?”
She shoots him a sideways look, frowning. “I don’t think people normally ask why someone’s favorite color is what it is.”
A brief look of annoyance crosses Cassian’s face, but then Jyn decides it’s pain, and not from his leg. “You can just say there’s no reason.” He picks up a leaf in his hand and begins to methodically shred it, letting the remnants float gently to the ground. “I don’t have a favorite color.”
Jyn frowns again. She thinks his voice sounds quieter, not softer but smaller. “You don’t?”
Cassian shrugs and scoops up another leaf. “I don’t have a reason to.”
Jyn falls silent, watching the demolished leaf drift from Cassian’s hand. He glances sharply at her and Jyn looks away, hoping that the pity doesn’t show on her face.
“It reminds me of home,” she finally answers.
Cassian stops ripping up the forest floor.
“Where?” His voice is gentle and inquisitive, back to its usual strength; they are two normal people, sharing normal things about each other, like where they grew up and what their favorite color is. If Jyn repeats that enough, she can almost believe it.
Except no normal person should experience a childhood devoid of a favorite color.
Then again, no normal person should watch their mother die at the age of eight.
What a strange and tragic pairing we are.
She replies, “Lah’mu.” The word sticks in her throat. “In… in the Raioballo sector. I wasn’t born there, but I remember it the most. It was…” She pauses, deliberating what to say. That it was misty and damp, but her parents always had a fire burning, so their house was never cold. That she would write words in the volcanic soil to practice spelling, finding it more entertaining than a pen and paper, and her mother would scold her afterwards for tracking dirt into the house. That the water from the ground tasted so strongly of minerals that drinking water had to be distilled from the air. “It was beautiful,” she finishes softly, her voice barely audible.
Cassian has started staring at her. Not just looking, but staring. His gaze goes through her skin, to her vulnerable and naked center. But his eyes don’t wound. They are, inexplicably, kind.
Jyn bows her head to avoid his gaze and shivers; she isn’t used to this—being treated with kindness for the sake of being kind, without something expected in return, and she feels almost unsettled.
He reaches out a hand and puts it on her knee. Jyn doesn’t look at him because she’s afriad of what might happen if she does, but she feels warmth radiate from where his hand rests on her leg, and she instinctively grasps his fingers, feeling rough callouses on his palm that mirror her own. She can’t remember the last time she held hands with someone, or the last time she touched someone for no reason at all. His skin is reassuring. It reminds her that he’s still there.
“I’m sorry,” Cassian murmurs, and Jyn knows that he is expressing sorrow for much more than just the loss of her home.
“Me, too,” whispers Jyn. She doesn’t say any names, but Cassian can hear them laced through her voice nonetheless. Jyn moves to sit next to Cassian by the tree, bark scraping her back as she positions herself beside him, and she doesn’t let go of his hand.
They sit quietly until true nighttime begins to settle over the forest, and the green is replaced by varying shades of black and gray. Then they stand, Cassian hissing in pain as he hoists himself up with his crutch, and turn to go back to the base. The guards let them in with silent nods, and Jyn and Cassian wind their way back to their rooms, Cassian gritting his teeth as they walk. Jyn is surprised the doctors have allowed him out of the med bay, but she supposes that he didn’t give them much choice in the matter. Compared to climbing the comm tower on Scarif half-dead, this must be simple.
They reach Cassian’s room first. Jyn has noticed that the rooms of those higher up in the chain of command are closer to the entrances to allow them to evacuate quicker. Sergeants are located further away. The new title still prickles Jyn; it fits her poorly, like an itchy shirt that’s too tight, but she grew tired of looking down and running, so the placard outside her room reads Sergeant Erso. Captain Andor flashes in the light as she opens the door for Cassian, and he breaks away from her and hauls himself to the bed.
Jyn hovers by the doorway, deliberating. She can still feel his phantom fingers on her palm.
He looks beautiful, bruised but breathing.
He looks exhausted.
So she finally says, “Goodnight.”
Something flashes in Cassian’s eyes. Disappointment, so brief that Jyn barely notices, and would not have noticed if she were anyone but herself. She begins to pull the door shut before she can be drawn back in.
“Goodnight, Jyn,” Cassian calls after her. His voice pulls her back, and Jyn turns to look at him and sees him smiling; it’s close-lipped, but his eyes have crinkled around the edges. Jyn decides a smile suits him. “Thank you,” he says simply.
Jyn feels something in the pit of her stomach, not dread or fear, but something light and airy, and she smiles back at him before shutting the door.
ii. EF76 Nebulon-B frigate Redemption; red
They stand a hairsbreadth apart, pressed in on either side by the narrow hallway they have escaped to, so close that Jyn can count Cassian’s eyelashes. A great clamor swells from the nearby hangar as mechanics give finishing touches to the ships and pilots shout their goodbyes as they board, but Jyn pays the commotion no attention, trying to soak in Cassian for as long as she can.
She can feel his breath on her face as he says, “It’s eight days only, just gathering intel on Bothawui. And it’s my first mission back, so it’ll be simple,” and flashes her a smile, a forced kind of lazy that makes her uneasy. The kind of smile her father gave her when she caught him late at night, huddled guiltily over plans, or the one her mother would carefully arrange when Jyn asked too many questions on Coruscant. Jyn has inherited that smile, and she recognizes it with ease. Nothing is ever simple.
After the celebrations on Yavin IV had ended, the Alliance fleet had split up, biding their time as the rebels attempt to find a new base, and Cassian and Jyn had landed together somewhere in the Pantora system. But now Cassian has to leave, and Jyn doesn’t think she has ever wished, or allowed herself to wish, so fervently for someone to stay. He was only cleared for duty two days ago—Jyn thinks it’s too soon—and it has only been seventeen days since Scarif.
Not that she’s counting.
“Don’t make any stupid decisions,” Jyn mutters, and she means it as half a joke, but the request carries more weight than she intends and hangs heavily between them.
Luckily, Cassian plays along. “How can I if you won’t be with me?” he asks, a smile dancing on his lips.
Under different circumstances, Jyn might have smiled too, but she finds her jaw has suddenly locked and her heart has leapt up into her throat. As she stares at him, struggling to form words, Cassian’s warm hand reaches out and presses her head against his chest.
It’ll be easy, she tells herself, but even that simple lie rings hollow and false in her mind.
“Jyn—” Cassian begins, but his tone is too gentle and sounds like a goodbye, like he’s going to say something she can’t come back from, so Jyn cuts him off.
“Just make sure to come back, okay?” she whispers into his jacket.
He wraps his arms around her, pulling her in tighter against him, the fabric of his clothing rough against her cheek. She can feel him rise and fall underneath her as he breathes; his embrace is warm and tight, trying to convey what they can’t speak aloud, and as he releases her a heartbeat too late, Jyn fights the urge to tug him back and feel his arms around her again.
“I will,” Cassian finally murmurs, but Jyn doesn’t believe him. Promises are a dangerous thing, because they represent a future she can’t afford to believe in. “You be safe,” he adds softly. He reaches up to brush a lock of hair behind Jyn’s ear, and his fingers leave a trail of stardust where they brush against her skin, making Jyn’s heart skitter across her chest. They linger like that, Cassian’s palm against Jyn’s cheek, warmth spreading from her stomach throughout her entire body, until they can no longer ignore the shouting from the hangar. Cassian parts his lips as if to say something, then decides against it and sets his slim shoulders before marching towards the cargo bay. He still has a limp; he’ll probably have it forever, that’s what the medics said. His footprints echo unevenly as Jyn stares at his retreating back, which grows smaller and smaller until he turns a corner and disappears.
He comes back six days late, and he comes back battered and bruised and bloody, limp as a rag doll on the stretcher that wheels him to the med bay.
When Jyn, having sprinted out of a debriefing, finally lays eyes on him just as he is being wheeled into an operating room, her heart nearly stops. The breath rushes out of her, and her hungry eyes threaten tears behind the fiery rage burning in her pupils, and—
“My apologies, Miss Erso, but you do not have permission to enter this room.” The tinny voice of a med droid makes Jyn look up. She hadn’t even realized she was following Cassian, she had just moved without a second thought, acted on instinct. Blinking and dizzy, she slowly takes a step back from the droid, which quickly goes behind the doors Jyn is barred from. She feels elsewhere, like she is removed from her body, floating in the ether.
And then she begins to pace. When she blinks, she sees red spots on the inside of her eyelids flashing in front of her as her heart slams against her ribcage, waiting for something, anything; she feels as if she’s suffocating, choking, drowning in a sea of fear that presses down on her chest until she can’t breathe. He was red, so red—red spiraling out from his abdomen, on his forehead, caked beneath his fingernails, seeping out from his thigh. If she stops moving, she thinks she might collapse, sink to the floor with her head between her knees and tumble into the dark depths of sorrow and self-pity. But she’s stronger than that, so she doesn’t pause until he is wheeled back out—how long that was, Jyn doesn’t know; it was long enough for Draven to stop by and tell her to go to bed, but after Jyn gave him a terrible, bloodshot glare, he gave up—and then she stalks him to the bed they set him down in, where he looks small and fragile, his chest rising and falling shallowly, his skin pale.
“He should wake in approximately three hours,” another med droid tells her (or maybe it’s the same one?), as miffed as a droid can possibly sound; no doubt it doesn’t want her interfering with the patient, but Jyn wordlessly settles into the chair by Cassian’s bedside and ignores the droid, so it moves out of the room and slams the door as it leaves.
She doesn’t know when she falls asleep, only that when she wakes up, her neck hurts from the chair and Cassian is staring at her.
Jyn sits up quickly—a little too quickly, judging by the sharp pain in her neck—but she brushes the twinge aside as she takes him in, alive and breathing and looking like a miracle.
“Hi,” she finally whispers, afraid to say anything else.
His skin has regained most of its color, and his eyes are sharp and alert; she wonders how long he has been awake. “Hi,” he echoes, a bit raspy.
Jyn’s eyes are drawn to the bacta patch on his upper arm, where dried blood is still visible around the edges. Cassian follows her gaze and shifts his medical gown so that it covers the bandage. “I’ve had worse,” he reminds her wryly, but Jyn can feel the fear creeping back up her throat, constricting her airway, and the possibility of having lost him hits her so suddenly that the words tumble out of her mouth before she can stop them.
“I was so scared, Cassian,” she blurts tremulously, the pent-up fear and anger and loneliness she feels pouring out all at once, and Jyn finds herself half-sobbing, heart racing as her emotions bubble out. “I was so scared you weren’t going to come back and-and-and I just—you were so red, I thought I could lose you, everything was so bloody—”
“Jyn,” Cassian cuts across her, firm but gentle, “it’s okay. I’m not going anywhere.”
She meets his eyes, brown boring into green, and takes a deep gulp of air to steady herself.
I’m not going anywhere.
Promises are a dangerous thing, but Jyn allows herself to keep this one, at least until morning, because he has come back for her every time: on Jedha, on Eadu, on Scarif. Come back when everyone else has gone. So she takes Cassian’s words and folds them next to her heart as she slows her galloping pulse, letting deep breaths of air settle into her lungs. And then she reaches out to clutch his hand, their fingers tangling together, and she lets herself relax.
“Thank you,” she breathes. “For… for always coming back.” Her voice still quavers, her lips still tremble, and though the words seem woefully inadequate for the depth of gratitude she is trying to convey, he gives her a quiet smile; in that moment, an unspoken something passes between them, and Jyn knows he understands, and his words echo in her mind: welcome home.
Then Cassian’s smile widens into a grin, and with a mischievous glint in his eye, he asks, “So, I take it you don’t like the color red?”
Jyn laughs, a sound she hasn’t heard since Cassian left, and gently slaps his arm. “I hate you,” she grumbles, and out of all the lies Jyn Erso has told, this may be the biggest one.
iii. Echo Base; white
Her mother is dying.
This is not unusual.
She’s had these dreams before; they’ve followed her since she was eight years old, so she knows what happens next.
Krennic laughs as he kicks Lyra’s head with his boot, and it lolls to one side, revealing unblinking, unfocused eyes.
Her mother is dead.
This is nothing new.
Jyn, hiding in the grass, launches herself at Krennic, howling, trying to gouge out his eyes, but he swats her aside effortlessly and continues to laugh as he points his blaster at her.
And then she dies—
But this time, when Jyn falls, she doesn’t hit the damp earth of Lah’mu. She finds herself on the comm tower.
Something twinges at the back of her mind. This isn’t right. No, no, nonononono—
But she keeps dragging her broken body towards the satellite, choking from sand and blood and fear, and the dream keeps going. She knows she should wake up but she can’t, the tips of her fingers are bleeding from the effort of crawling along the path, and then a boot steps on her hand, and she feels her fingers break under the weight, and she screams, screams until her voice gives out and her throat bleeds raw. Krennic tsks at her and shakes his head from side to side. “Galen would be so disappointed in you,” he chuckles. A shot rings out and Jyn looks up to see Cassian, he’s come back for her, he’s shot Krennic—except, no, that’s not right, it’s the other way around; Krennic smiles as Cassian falls, and Cassian is Bodhi and Baze and Chirrut, and Jyn wants to tear Krennic’s face apart, but she can’t move as he leers over her and kicks her off the tower—
The lights switch on and Jyn sits bolt upright in bed, her heart racing. Her shirt clings to her back, and her sweaty hair is plastered to the nape of her neck even though the sheets have been kicked off the bed. She can feel the goosebumps that cover her arms, contradicting her sticky palms. A knot begins to grow in Jyn’s stomach as she blinks to adjust to the sudden influx of light, and she spots Cassian standing by the switch at the door, concern evident on his face. She hadn’t even noticed him getting out of bed.
“You were screaming,” he says gently, even though they both already know that.
Jyn swallows. “How loud?” she whispers. The walls between the rooms are thin; someone else could easily have heard her. Usually she wakes up on her own, shivering but silent, and Cassian slings an arm around her and she can go back to a listless sleep. But the longer the Alliance has stayed in Hoth, the worse her dreams have become, egged on by the frosty air; the bags under Jyn’s eyes could swallow an ocean. She thinks Cassian can’t sleep, either, or at least not well, but he just wears it better. He had only pretended to be sleeping when she had first crawled into his bed during a mission to Takodana, and soon it had become a habit, so they had quietly settled into the same room at Echo Base, though Jyn technically has quarters right next to Cassian’s. She knows he requested them specifically, even if he has never said so.
“I think I’m the only one who heard,” Cassian responds, and silently moves back to the bed. Jyn positions herself with her back to the wall, knees drawn up to her chest, and he joins her. The motions are completed with a practiced ease, a familiarity that only comes from many repetitions. Her mother used to say that repetition was the only way to become good at something. They are very good at this.
Whatever this is.
Their shoulders knock together as Jyn shifts her weight, and the touch of Cassian’s skin begins to slowly warm her up. She wears only a thin shirt and shorts, and Cassian wears no shirt at all, revealing the patchwork of scars that lace his back and chest, but embarrassment over skin seems tedious, like a waste of energy. They are beyond that. She distantly wonders how many rebels think that they’re sleeping together. The whole base, probably. Technically, Jyn supposes, they’re not wrong.
“What was it?” Cassian asks softly.
Sometimes Jyn can’t answer, because the only thing she remembers are flashes of intense, scalding emotion: fear, anger, sorrow, powerlessness. This one is different. She considers for a moment before replying simply, “White.”
Cassian doesn’t press. He waits for her to continue of her own accord, letting her mull over her next words so that they do not rip open a fresh wound, and she is grateful for it.
“I hate this planet.” Sometimes she has to go in circles before arriving at the source. Cassian is all patience. She wants to trace the outlines of his scars: the blaster wound from Scarif, a jagged ridge that slices across his navel, two matching silvery lines down his back, smaller marks around his collarbone. “I hate how you could go to the other side of it and it would look the same. It’s blinding.” The next words get trapped on their way up and she swallows, unable to speak.
“It reminds me of Fest,” Cassian murmurs absentmindedly, filling the silence. “Fest had more citizens and cities, but it was cold and harsh. Like here. I can’t remember much, just snatches of memories.” He scratches at the mattress distractedly as he talks. “A cup of hot chocolate warming my hands, Stormtroopers crawling around the industrial cities, my father teaching me how to aim a gun… He always said that if you could shoot decently in a snow flurry, you could shoot anywhere.” Cassian smiles at the memory, his face momentarily taken over by an untainted happiness Jyn has never witnessed before, and she watches his delicate lips with fascination, wondering at the man he could have been.
They have all lost in this war. Family, friends, allies. The people they could have been, the possibilities. They have become bound on either sides by the walls of the Alliance and the Empire, only one long path stretching out before them. Sometimes, Jyn lets herself imagine the door at the end of that hallway, what it might lead to. Never for long, though. Too dangerous.
“I was born on Vallt,” Jyn admits slowly. Still circling. “It was similar. Cold. Harsh. I don’t remember it, though.” She chews her bottom lip as she searches for what to say before she finally settles on, “This planet is too white.” She takes a deep, shuddering breath and tries to steel herself. “It reminds me of emptiness, the kind you feel when you have nothing left. I look outside and I see Stormtroopers, and… I see Krennic and his white cape.” She locks her jaw, feeling her carefully constructed walls beginning to crumble even further. “White reminds me of fear.” Cassian’s smile has faded as he listens to the words unsaid. “And…” But she can’t continue. Jyn feels like a child, like when she would have a bad dream and sneak into her parents’ room and slither in between them, cocooned by their warmth and comforted by the rise and fall of their chests against hers, but they aren’t here anymore, just like Bodhi and K-2 and Chirrut and Baze—
No, she tells herself. Stop it. Stop it, stop it, stop it.
She presses her nails into her palm, trying to ground herself, but the images keep coming, this time not dreams but memories: Lyra crumbling onto the ground, Galen choking on his own blood, K-2’s fading voice over the intercom, the green laser from the Death Star swallowing Jedha and Scarif, and somewhere very far away Cassian’s voice says, “Jyn,” but she cannot see in front of her because her eyes are swimming with tears that pool but never fall, and panic begins to rise in her chest, her breath coming in quick, short gasps as her throat constricts. “Jyn,” comes Cassian’s voice again, more urgent. She feels a pair of steady hands grab her arms, trying to pin them to her sides, but she throws him off, flinching at his touch, something primeval and feral awakening in her as she kicks out at him and her foot connects with his side.
“Get off of me!” she growls, heaving herself off of the bed and stumbling blindly across the room, great sobs heaving in her chest, and she can’t breathe, her vision is crowded with the dead, with all those who left her, all those she killed, the world spins—
“Jyn.” Strong hands take hold of her arms again and she is whirled around to face Cassian. She tries to slide out of his grip, but her limbs have gone limp, the tears have started to spill down her cheeks, she can taste salt, and they drip down her chin and fall onto her collarbone and roll beneath her shirt, and she can hear Cassian telling her to breathe but she can’t, her lungs are collapsing, her throat is closed, all she can see is the white walls, the white floors, the white bed, and he tells her, “Focus on me. Focus on my voice.” He sounds calm and collected, like he’s done this a thousand times before. “Try to breathe. In through the nose, our through the mouth.”
Focus on my voice. Jyn claws herself towards the noise, steady and low, soothing, and Cassian slowly begins to come in focus, his dark eyes framed by crow’s feet, his slightly crooked nose. She feels herself shivering, her muscles shaking, but she manages to gasp in one breath and exhale shakily. “In through the nose, out through the mouth,” he repeats. Over and over and over and over until Jyn’s heart rate has slowed to a fast jog and the sobs have stopped coming, though she keeps crying, crying like an infant, her lower lip trembling. “Just breathe,” Cassian instructs, and Jyn follows shakily. “You’ll be fine.”
She presses the heels of her palms into her eyes to stem the flow of tears, feeling more exhausted than she has ever been in her life. Cassian pulls her in gently, and she lets her arms drop, her head resting on his chest; he strokes her hair, his breathing slow and stable, and murmurs, “You’re okay, Jyn.”
She can’t speak, just buries her face deeper into his skin, breathing in the scent of him, feeling his heartbeat. They remain frozen like that until the warmth from his body has spread over Jyn, and she can breathe steadily again. Her eyes have cleared, and she pulls away from Cassian, unable to meet his gaze.
“Jyn,” he says quietly, “you’re okay.”
She presses her lips together and continues to stare at the ground.
“We help each other,” he reminds her, tilting up her chin and meeting her green eyes.
We help each other. Jyn opens her mouth to respond, to tell him thank you or maybe I love you or how are you so kind to me, but then he kisses her.
A simple kiss, though they have been building up to it for an eternity, dancing around each other, pulling close and pushing away. As their lips meet, Jyn feels her skin tingle, though their mouths barely part, and he pulls back too soon.
He starts to shake his head and say, “I’m sorry, that was—”
But Jyn cuts him off as she wraps her hands around his head and bends him closer, and their lips crash into each other this time, hungry and ferocious, tongues slipping inside each other’s mouth, insistent and starving, and he tastes like home, and he tastes like kept promises.
iv. Bright Tree Village; green
The morning air is still cold, and its tendrils brush Jyn’s face, raising goosebumps on her skin as she steps onto the platform outside the hut they had been put in for the night. She feels like a phantom; the reality has not sunk in yet, although the charred branches from the bonfires last night and scattered remains of food on the ground informs her that yes, the Emperor is dead, Darth Vader’s body has burned. Yet this moment just feels like a short pause, a collective breath by the Alliance before they wade back into the fray.
But she will try to enjoy this respite while she can.
Below her, Luke and Leia sit on the forest floor, heads bowed. They are still wearing their clothes from last night—Leia in a simple beige and gray dress, Luke dressed in all black—and she can just make out their mouths moving rapidly. Trying to make up for lost time, she supposes; they must have a lot to catch up on. Shara Bey and Kes Dameron run after their son, who is sprinting around as fast as his tiny legs can take him. Seeing as he is not very quick, his pace allows Shara and Kes to sneak kisses before they have to pull him back, and as Shara scoops Poe up into her arms, laughing despite the bruise on her collarbone and the dark circles under her eyes, Jyn allows herself to smile. Kes wraps his arms around Shara’s waist and kisses Poe on the cheek, grinning at something his wife says in his ear.
She hears Cassian before she sees him, the wooden boards groaning unevenly under his weight before he appears in her peripheral vision. He stands by her side, hair mussed up, with a shallow cut on his left cheek, and reaches out to lace his fingers with Jyn’s, each ignoring the dirt still caked into the palms of the other. Cassian inhales the fresh air, drinking in the view from among the trees that stretch far below them and far above them, their green tops disappearing into the pink- and orange-streaked sky as the sun begins to filter in through the leaves. The lines seem to momentarily disappear from his face, and for once, he looks his thirty years.
Beneath them, Han Solo has joined Luke and Leia, gently kissing the princess after he sits down on the pine straw-strewn ground. Others have begun to trickle down from their huts, bleary-eyed but cheerful as they greet their comrades with lingering hugs and wide smiles. Several Ewoks have joined and begun to clean up their village, darting in between the legs of the rebels to pick up trash. Poe squeals with delight as he sees one, causing Kes to shush him hurriedly and shrug apologetically at the Ewok.
Cassian and Jyn stand like that for a while, clutching each other’s hands, watching the peaceful scene unfurl below them. They have the luxury of leisure now, at least for the moment, and they want to relish in it; forks have appeared in their path, and each split brims with possibility.
Their path.
They have always been a we, Jyn supposes, ever since he handed her a blaster before they left for Jedha; their webs have always been tangled together, even when they were at a distance. It used to frighten Jyn, but now she only squeezes his hand tighter.
“Where will we go?” Cassian asks eventually, his voice still sleepy and scratchy. This is probably the first decent night’s sleep he’s had in years, save for the times he lay unconscious in the med bay.
Jyn shrugs. “Probably Coruscant. I’m sure Draven wants us to do some cleanup—”
“No,” Cassian interrupts her. “I don’t mean tomorrow or whenever we’ll ship out.” He grips the bark railing in front of him with his free hand and looks out to the sliver of horizon he can make out between the trees. “I mean after.” He relishes the words, daring and bold and brimming with opportunity.
Jyn sucks in a breath. “We might not—,” she begins on instinct, trying to stop him before his words get too dangerous.
“Don’t,” he says softly, letting go of her hand and turning to face her, pushing a stray strand of hair behind her ears. “Don’t say that. Not now.”
She understands. Not now when, for once, everything has gone their way, not now because they thought they would never make it this far and they deserve a future, or at least to imagine one, not now because they have earned a little bit of hope. So Jyn chews her lip and considers, trying to rack through all the planets she hasn’t been to, through the ones her parents had told her about, until she answers, with finality, “Naboo.”
Cassian nods, pensive, and then he smiles. “My parents went there once, when they were first married,” he recalls. “Whenever there was a particular cold day, my mother would always grumble and say she wished they had settled there, where green things could actually grow.”
“My father said it was the most beautiful planet he had ever laid eyes on,” says Jyn, remembering vivid descriptions of rolling hills, clear water with no bottom in sight, red roofs shining as the sun’s rays hit them, trade stalls with a variety of goods, each different from the last, and a happiness that seemed to invade the air, making the streets ring out with laughter.
“Lots of green,” Cassian remarks, a playful light dancing in his eyes.
Jyn gently shoves him with the palm of her hand and he rocks back on his heels but never loses his balance. “Maybe after we go there, you’ll learn to appreciate colors more. Might even get a favorite one,” she teases, grinning at him.
“I already have one,” Cassian says easily, smirking, but a hint of color creeps up the back of his neck and seeps into his ears.
Jyn raises her eyebrows. “What is it then, you lying bastard?” she demands.
Cassian throws his hands up in mock submission. “Easy there, I didn’t lie. I didn’t have one before, but I do now.” Jyn’s eyebrows continue to move further up her forehead until he admits, “It’s green.”
“Green?” asks Jyn, almost offended. “Did you just steal from me?”
Cassian laughs, and Jyn is startled at the sound; without other troubles lying in wait in his mind, his laugh is easy and light, like a gentle breeze playfully wheeling through the trees. “No. It’s not forest green, like yours.”
“What’s it like, then?” Jyn prompts.
He shrugs, the smirk disappearing. “It’s like home,” he murmurs.
Jyn frowns, bemused. “But Fest—”
“Not Fest,” Cassian interrupts, raking his gaze over her dark hair, her viridescent eyes, like he’s trying to memorize her, every line and scar and bump. “You.”
Jyn feels her breath catch in her throat. The sounds of morning below have vanished, and she can only hear the beating of her own heart hammering against her ribcage. She instinctively reaches out towards his face, tracing the outline of his jaw, and smiles a watery and trembling smile at him, and she feels safe.
Like she’s home.
He catches her hand and presses it to his skin, closing his eyes and leaning into her palm, and breathes in slowly. Jyn cups his other cheek and kisses him gently, just once, before she pulls back and they rest their foreheads against each other, simply there, reveling.
Someone clears their throat behind them.
Jyn releases Cassian and turns to glare at Draven, who looks like he hasn’t slept at all or is nursing a bad hangover. Possibly both. “Sorry to interrupt,” he begins drily, “but there’s work to be done.” He glances over them, and Jyn expects to see some sort of disgust and sourness in his expression, but he seems as if he’s about to smile at them, or maybe he’s just in a lot of pain from last night. “We need you to go to Coruscant,” he informs them, “to help stamp out loyalists hiding there. Report to me in two hours.” He looks at them once more, then turns on his heels and leaves, crossing over a rickety bridge to another hut.
“You were right, then,” Cassian says mildly as he watches Draven’s retreating back. “Coruscant.”
Jyn rests her head on his shoulder. “Then, Naboo?”
“Naboo,” Cassian promises.
As the sun’s rays begin to shine down on them, Jyn wraps her fingers around her kyber crystal and allows herself to smile at their future.