nextchance | crash sites keep me up at night

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cassian andor

crash sites keep me up at night

In the dream — and it was a dream, although she didn't know that —

Jyn was a little girl in the cave on Lah'mu, not knowing when it was or how long she had been there, only that she was waiting, always waiting, always left alone. The lantern was burned out, the small space dark and damp, somehow seeming to get smaller still, a grave and a prison cell and the only home she had. When, at last, the door swung open overhead, it was an unfamiliar figure overhead (a new variation on an old theme), a young boy with dark hair and eyes, and Jyn didn't really know him except that she felt like she did anyway. Wordless, he held out a hand, and she began to climb.

She climbed, and climbed, and climbed, until her bad shoulder ached and her hands slipped on the ladder's rungs, but she had to keep going, even as she got nowhere, the cave getting deeper now, except it wasn't a cave at all. It was the data tower, getting taller, not deeper, and no longer a little girl, she kept climbing, desperate to reach the top where no one was waiting for her anymore, because when she looked down — so far down, it hadn't really been that far, had it? — Cassian's body lay bent and broken at the bottom, and she knew he wasn't getting back up. Stupid, to think she could reach him, that she might be able to hold onto him this time.

Finally she stepped up and out of the cave that was also the data tower and onto the beach, alone again, except for all of the dead. It had been a while since she'd dreamed of Scarif, and somehow there were more bodies now, her father's weapon overhead, her inescapable legacy. Past the shoreline was forest, and she knew it to be Yavin 4's even though she had barely seen it while she was there, and knew that it held the house she'd once lived in. The house burned — the fire she'd set — and the forest burned with it. The world glowed green with the Death Star's kyber-light, only it wasn't coming from the sky above but from her. Surrounded by bodies, she sat on the sand and waited for a death that didn't come, one which would have been, she supposed, too kind. Hard as she'd always fought to survive, a death that meant something in the arms of someone who cared about her was worlds better than surviving alone, left to bear the weight of so much destruction.

She looked up at the weapon that shared her name, a grim mirror in the sky, and with the fire and the dead around her, she knew that they were one and the same, and this was always going to be where she wound up.

— With a sharp gasp, Jyn lurched awake in the dark, her limbs clammy with sweat and her face damp with tears. Nightmares were nothing new to her, but it had been a long time since one had rattled her this badly. In her addled state, trying and mostly failing to get air into her lungs, she couldn't think of what might have caused it... Until the sound of breath that wasn't her own reminded her that she wasn't alone in the room. Through the haze of everything else, the events of the last day began coming back to her.

It should have been reassuring to remember that Cassian was here and alive and safe. At any other time, it would have been. Instead, in the moment, her panic intensified, her chest painfully tight. It was a good thing, not being alone anymore, except that she still felt like she was and knew she would be again. Close as he was, he felt impossibly far away, and yet he was too close, too. The last thing she wanted was to be seen like this, a panic-stricken, crying mess, unable to calm herself down after just a stupid dream. All she could do — one of the only coherent thoughts she could hold onto — was try to stay as quiet as possible, pressing a fistful of blanket against her mouth to try to stifle any gasps or sobs, and hope she hadn't made enough noise to wake him. He needed the rest. She needed to pull herself together, shoulders shaking in the dark as she tried to breathe.

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Still, all of this was so surreal. Time passed almost in a haze, with Jyn intermittently trying to retain every detail and getting lost in her own thoughts. She ate, always hungry, and put away the few things she'd picked up for around the ship, but all the while she was thinking about him and what this meant and what might happen next. She didn't know any of it; all she did know was it wasn't something she would be able to figure out anytime soon.

That wasn't nothing, though. She hadn't pretended otherwise, either, or at least she hoped she hadn't. Anyway, he was here, and that was the most important thing. Everything else could follow that, if they had time. More and more, she hoped they had time.

As she had promised earlier, she was washing the dishes from earlier when she heard him call to her. Drying her hands, she came around to the bedroom, smiling at the sight that greeted her. Like so much else, it was the kind of good that made her chest ache and prompted an expression that was earnest rather than wry.

"Of course," she offered, taking a seat, cross-legged, on the floor. "Although, really, she'll probably be happy with any attention."

Edited 2025-05-18 02:43 (UTC)

By then, Cassian had discovered the metaphorical switch behind Sprinkles's ear that had her flopped over for belly rubs, legs and tongue lolling. "So it seems," he said, eyes flashing to Jyn. He was also now seated across from her. It came to him that he could never have imagined this with her just a few days ago.

…Maybe it could have. Once over Scarif, in the shuttle, when she grabbed his arm, and they looked at each other, startled, because all of a sudden, invading each other's space felt completely different than it had every time before. They hadn't been able to afford the feeling, then…

And then, of course, on the beach. What hadn't he imagined with her…

In the present, he forgot to ask questions: all of this was going through his eyes.

There was such weight to that gaze. Jyn would never in a million years have described herself as shy, but it was difficult not to feel something along those lines when he looked at her like that, her chin ducking slightly with it. Then again, since the first moment she saw him outside the ship, it had felt like the air was charged with electricity, just as dangerous and liable to shock her as to revive some part of her that had been dormant since she lost him, that she'd had every intention of keeping that way. This was just another element of the same sort of thing.

She wanted in equal measure to chase that feeling and to run from it. To climb into his lap and kiss him, and to keep her distance to protect herself. To tell him everything she hadn't yet, and to never again mention the history that was no longer his.

There was, she was already certain, absolutely no way she was getting through this emotionally unscathed.

"See? You don't really need me to show you."

Cassian blinked, looked down, and realized that Sprinkles had painlessly taken his hand in her little jaws and was growling and tossing her head in her joy. He returned the grip just enough to play, carefully of the tiny skull, before disengaging and resuming the scratches.

"This seems too easy," he said. "Is it because dogs like everything? Or because… she thinks… I'm…?"

Either he should never bring up the subject of his other self, or they would have to stop dodging around it. He wasn't sure which of them needed to take the lead on that. His impulse was to let Jyn, but the last time he felt that, it turned out she needed him to.

"I don't know," Jyn answered, feeling she owed him honesty on that front. On all fronts, really — she was a convincing enough liar except when it came to him — but especially as pertained to his former life here. She couldn't help wishing that weren't the case, or even that she hadn't said anything about it at all, but it wouldn't have been fair not to. He had the right to know, and she would never be able to just pretend it all away. "She definitely doesn't like everything, or everyone. But... I don't think it would just be because of that, either. Not after so long."

Or maybe she was really just talking about herself. What she felt for him wasn't, couldn't have been, just because of what she'd had before with someone who was him but also not. She'd been without him longer than she had ever known him. (So had Sprinkles.) There was no way it was just the result of memory.

Cassian looked down at Sprinkles, who was again wrestling his hand as if it were a bone. Something about that image made him set his jaw and look up at Jyn.

"I'm starting to see when it hurts you not to say things. Is there anything you just… want to? That will only get harder as time goes on? We could just go ahead. Get it out of the way." The faintest smile. "There are no rules."

Of course, Jyn thought. Of course he could see when there was something more on her mind; he'd always been able to read her uncomfortably well. She wished it were as simple as what he was saying. The things it hurt to hold back, it might hurt even more to give voice to. She didn't know what she wanted (him, just him, always him) in nearly every aspect of this, her heart and mind in total opposition. And, whatever he was saying, however patient he was with her and graciously willing to wade into chaos left in another lifetime's wake, she didn't think it would be fair just to lay it all on him, potentially unburdening herself by burdening him.

He was asking, though. Her memory of last night was hazy, but he'd asked something similar then too. The least she could do was try to say a little of what she was thinking.

"I don't know," she said again, apologetic as she looked up at him. "I can't tell if talking about it would help, or be harder. For either of us. If I should tell you about things that happened here, or if that wouldn't be fair." She bit her lip for a moment, hoping that he would at least see that she was trying. "What do you think?"

Looking into her face, her stardust eyes, he nodded slowly. She made sense. Of course she did. He trusted her judgment, sometimes more than his own. Cassian pet Sprinkles more calmingly in order to think. He wanted to answer as openly as he was asking of her.

"I think you're worried about what's fair on me," he said. "I worry what's getting lost is what's fair for you.

"What if we both thought of… him, as being someone else? If you needed to talk about them, I'd hate if you couldn't do that with me.

"If I'm wrong, and you really don't want to, then I'll stop second-guessing. I just really want you to be able to."

He kept talking so much. The phrase early negotiations sprang to mind. He wasn't sure that was a bad thing. He just hoped Jyn didn't get sick of it.

Edited 2025-05-18 04:37 (UTC)

Jyn might have laughed, if the subject were a different one or if she were talking with anyone else. At least from her perspective, what was fair for her stopped being part of the picture a long time ago, and that was hardly unexpected when nothing in her life had ever fit that description anyway. It wasn't fair that she'd built a life with someone and had it ripped away from her. It wasn't fair that he didn't remember any of it, though through no fault of his own. If that unfairness was already a given, and it was, then it seemed like the least she could do was try to make things a little fairer for him.

But, more and more, it seemed like her reticence wasn't fair in its own right. None of that was because of him, specifically. Even now, with his acquaintance with her having lasted about a week, she felt as if he knew her better than just about anyone; there was no one she would have been so willingly vulnerable with. Everything about this was just so unclear, a situation that ought to have been impossible and that she didn't know what to do with.

Keeping it in was apparently not the answer. And maybe she should have expected as much. Years ago, with him but not him, she had asked him more than once not to shut her out. To tell her things. However good her reasoning and understandable her uncertainty, it probably wasn't all that helpful for her to hold so much back.

"It's not that I don't want to," she offered. "And... as strange as it is, that's the one thing that does make sense to me. That you're... you... but also not the person who was here before. I can't really explain it. It just does. And that was all so long ago now, I think if you had been him, and shown up remembering all of it, this would be just as strange in a different way." She had no idea if any of what she was saying was at all comprehensible. Hopefully, though, the fact that she was making an effort would count for something. "I've been without you for longer than I ever knew you. Or him. Either way."

It was comprehensible. It did count. The look on his face hopefully showed both.

"I'll stop pushing," he said quietly. He slid his hand from the dog over to Jyn's. "The invitation's open."

Jyn took his hand and squeezed it gently, appreciative, the same apologetic look on her face. This wasn't what she wanted, she thought — but then, the one constant, or at least the one constant that wasn't Cassian, about all of this was that she didn't know what she wanted. That still held true now. She had a feeling it wouldn't be changing anytime soon. All of this was too complicated, too impossible.

"Thank you," she said, just as quietly. "And I don't... want you to have to, but... I think sometimes it helps. You reminding me that it's all right to say things."

He squeezed her hand back, then gave a crooked smile. “Well, you know I can handle sensitive information.”

"Really? I never would've guessed," Jyn deadpanned, grateful for something that provided a little levity. Still, she didn't want to leave it just at that, either. With her hand still in his, she gave him the tiniest of smiles. "I trust you, you know. There's no one I'd sooner tell... well, anything."

Their smiles met, of perfectly the same substance. Cassian’s thumb ran over her hand… then he lifted her hand and kissed it. “I believe you. Thank you.”

Jyn's own smile grew just a little at that, warmth spreading through her hand where his lips met it and along her cheeks. It was a rare unguarded moment for her, and she didn't even mind that much, absurd as it might have been for such a slight gesture to have such an effect on her. But then, they were starting over, in some capacity, which meant this was new. So maybe not that absurd after all.

"I think I'm going to shower," she decided. She didn't want to be away from him, but she probably could use the chance to try to clear her head a bit. "Would you mind making sure there's water in the animals' dishes? They're out by the dejarik table."

"Of course."

By the time she got out of the shower, the water bowls would be filled, and Cassian would be sitting at the dejarik table studying the English alphabet primer—working to keep Beany in his lap rather than on the book.

Jyn didn't intend to linger. It would felt been unfair to, as things were, and again, she thought that something was going to have to give if they were going to effectively be roommates. Of course, there was every chance that it was just in her head, given the context that she had and he didn't. Were he anyone else, it wouldn't have fazed her in the slightest, changing clothes and otherwise existing in the same space. She had grown up a soldier, with little in the way of privacy; she would always take what she could get in that regard, but she wasn't prone to excessive modesty.

It was different with him, feeling about him the way she did, wondering how he felt about her, not wanting to seem at all presumptuous. Better just to keep some distance there and dodge any awkwardness. So, as quickly as she could, she grabbed clean sleep clothes and a fresh towel. Before heading to the lav, she did what she had initially asked him to leave the room for: she set on his bunk the pair of house shoes she'd bought earlier.

In the shower, she spent as little time as possible, scrubbing herself down under the hot water. She dried and dressed in the steam-filled room after, and emerged again in short order, wet hair hanging loose around her shoulders. "He's not giving you too much trouble, is he?" she asked with a crooked smile, taking a seat across the table from Cassian. "He doesn't really understand the idea of personal space."

He looked up to the sight of her with hair loose and wet, and somehow this squeezed his heart as much as anything else that day. It felt unguarded, and he felt so grateful.

'He' what? …Oh, right. "No, no trouble. He's helping me study." Cassian scratched under Beany's chin and was rewarded with a purr. Cats made more sense to him than dogs. He couldn't help wondering if this was a difference between him and former-him, or if this had still been true but Sprinkles had chosen him regardless.

"Good," Jyn replied, unconcealed fondness in the way she took in the sight in front of her. It was just nice, seeing Cassian begin to fit into the life she'd rebuilt in his absence, sitting on her ship, bonding with her pets. Beany tended to be affectionate anyway, so it was no surprise that he'd quickly taken to Cassian, but she was still glad for it. The littlest things like that were the ones that let her think that this — whatever it was going to be — might actually work.

"How is the studying going?"

Giving Beany an affirming scritch with one hand, Cassian used the other to flip to a blank page. He picked up the ~~stylus~~ pencil and wrote out, in a column, the Aurebesh alphabet, then beside each letter, its corresponding English letter, and slid the page to her. “How’d I do?”

"Looks good to me," Jyn said, giving him an approving nod as she looked over his written alphabets. "You're a quick study. I'm sure you'll have the hang of it in no time." She wasn't surprised by that. Given his previous line of work, it seemed to make sense that he would pick such things up without much trouble. She had different context for that now, too, idly thinking back to something he'd said yesterday — about his first time on a new planet, not knowing the language or having anyone who knew his. She wanted to ask more about it now; she wasn't sure if she should broach the subject.

Instead, she went back to something else from yesterday, leading with a fact rather than a question. "I started learning different languages pretty early. I don't know if it was the people I was around, or too much time with just a datapad, or both. But I always liked that." Languages made sense to her. Using words in any language to express herself was far more difficult.

"Thanks." He took the book back, sliding it beside another book he'd picked up. Next he'd try reading from that. (Perhaps aloud, with Jyn?) "Not having to do it in a stone hut all in one night is nice." And it wasn't a different language, essentially just a textual code.

(The fact that this supposedly different Galaxy still spoke Galactic Basic Standard was another question he was storing up for some other time. For now, he was just grateful to be with Jyn.)

The image of little Jyn with a datapad was both a sweet and bittersweet one. He knew her family had moved often and been solitary, so maybe she hadn't had a chance— "Did you have friends your age?"

Maybe Jyn's childhood had only been populated with adults, as opposed to Cassian's childhood which had been utterly devoid of them.

"Never," Jyn answered, shaking her head. Of all the myriad, probably objectively sad facts about her early life, this one didn't particularly bother her. Maybe it was just that she didn't know what she was missing, or that by the time it would have mattered to her, she had already effectively closed herself off. Letting people in was too dangerous. Before that, when she was younger, it would just have been one more loss after her life was uprooted. With a wry slant to her mouth, she added, "I never really had friends, full stop. That didn't change until I wound up here."

It still was something that didn't come easily to her, too, an underdeveloped muscle from a skill she'd never had a chance to learn. She cared about people fiercely and intensely, even when she tried not to, but showing it — being actively engaged in friendship — remained an adjustment.

Tucking a stray, damp strand of hair behind her ear, she shrugged. "Did you? After you left your home planet?"

"Yes," he said, with new appreciation for how amazing that was—and how "They somehow stuck with me despite my… absences. Every time I ran away, sometimes for years, they greeted me when I came home. Wil, Brasso, and Bix."

He didn't mean for his expression to change at all, but the fact that it went a little blanker on each of them was probably telling.

Jyn wanted to ask about them, rendered more curious by the shifts in his expression. That was the same reason she didn't. There was clearly some kind of a story there, and she hoped he knew he could tell her anything, but it wouldn't have felt right to press at something too sensitive.

"Was that something that happened a lot?" she asked instead, equal parts gentle and interested. "You running away?"

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