The first morning after … everything, Jyn wakes up in an unfamiliar room. Everything is durasteel gray, hard and cold, and for a moment she thinks she's dreaming, or worse, the last week (or was it two weeks? She lost track of time at some point while running and hiding and fighting for her life) was just a dream and she's still in the prison camp the Empire put her in.
But when she looks to her side, it's not her old cell mate she sees, but Cassian Andor. He's still asleep, leg bandaged and his right eye and interesting shade of lilac, but he's breathing. She can see his chest rising and falling. He's not restrained, either, so it's pretty clear that they're not in captivity of some kind.
Quiet so she doesn't wake him, Jyn sits up. Looking around, she finally recognizes the room as the one people had ushered her and Cassian in during the chaos that was yesterday evening.
Yesterday evening. Jyn stops, closes her eyes. Alderaan. The capture of Princess Leia. The loss of the plans they fought so hard for. All the pain, all that death. Was it all for nothing?
"There's still hope." Cassian says. Jyn opens her eyes slowly. She hadn't heard him wake up, but she's not surprised that he knows what she is thinking about. She's always worn her emotions on her sleeve.
"You think so?" She asks, but she can read the answer in his eyes. He simply can't allow himself to believe anything else. If everything is lost, they fought for nothing. So there has to be hope. Simple as that.
"Thanks to you and your father, we know there's a weakness in that monstrosity. We can do a lot with that knowledge. It's not nothing. Maybe the princess got a copy of the plans out, or we could possibly save some of it from the computers we recovered. There's a reason we're still fighting."
Jyn smiles. Cassian looks like hell, but he's in no way ready to give up. Neither is she, now that she thinks about it. She's not even an official part of the rebellion yet, but she already feels like she belongs here.
"Should we go out and help?" She asks. Jyn's not sure how thy could help, if at all, but now that she's awake she's itching to do something. She wants to get back into the fight.
"Officially, I'm on medical leave." Cassian grimaces. His leg had been injured worse than it had first seemed, and yesterday he hadn't really been able to walk, much less run. "But given the situation, I don't think anybody will turn us away."
"Good." Jyn grins. They can find Bodhi and Chirrut and Baze as well, probably. It's a big ship. But she knows that they were fine yesterday, and Bodhi was already making noises about helping, so it shouldn't be hard too get an update on them.
Jyn grabs her shirt and moves to shrug of her nightshirt when suddenly, she looks at Cassian. He meets her eyes awkwardly, clearly unsure of what to say. Should Jyn just change here? There wasn't any privacy in the Imperial prison camp, so it's not that Jyn is ashamed or something, but somehow Cassian is... different from the people in the prison. The thought of undressing in front of him is... strange.
"I'll take the 'fresher." Cassian mumbles, after a long moment, eyes firmly on his own cloths, lying next to his bed. How had they changed last night? Jyn can't remember. She knows that both of them were dead tired, so possibly they were just to exhausted to care.
"You shouldn't walk any longer than absolutely necessary on your bad leg. I'll take the 'fresher." She tells him, getting up quickly. That's a mistake, her whole body protests. Her left ankle stings angrily, and her should burns. She hadn't even realized she had gotten injured there.
"That's like, ten steps." Cassian says. Jyn grins, and moves to finally get changed.
They find Bodhi in a small meeting room, surrounded by a group of intelligence officers and pilots who want to know all about the Imperial shipping system, and also their adventure on Scarif. Jyn can see the barely disguised hero worship in some of their eyes, and she smiles to herself. Then those people are looking at her and Cassian the same way, and suddenly she can feel herself blushing.
Cassian moves into the room comfortably, greeting the officers by name, asking for their status and generally distracting them from Jyn. She's incredibly grateful for it. Quietly, she sits down next to Bodhi. Up close, he doesn't look much better than Cassian, tired and bruised, but there's a small smile in his eyes, so that's something. His shoulder is bandaged, and he's holding his arm in a way that suggests he is in pain, but when she asks him all he says is that he is ready to work.
While Bodhi turns the question back to her, Cassian is ushered into a seat besides her. He sighs when he finally gets the weight of his injured leg, and Jyn feels guilty for not having thought about that. But then Cassian smiles at her, the real smile, the one that makes Jyn feel kind of floaty, and she thinks it's okay.
"So, is there anything we can actually do?" Cassian asks, sounding like nothing is wrong in the world. The intelligence officers exchange a few looks, clearly uncertain of what to say or to do, when a woman steps in behind them. It takes Jyn a moment to pull her name from the mess that are her memories of the last days. Mon Mothma, senator, who is definitively a member of the high command ranks.
"All three of you are on medical leave." She says, but there is a hint of amusement in her voice. Her eyes are shadowed, though, tired and grieving. Mothma hasn't had the luxury to forget about Alderaan for even a moment, Jyn thinks.
"I get medical leave from the Alliance?" Bodhi asks. "Does this mean I'm officially a part of the rebellion now?" He almost seems scared of the answer, and Jyn kind of wants to laugh. Bodhi was part of the rebellion from the moment he left Jedha with them, but maybe he didn't really realize that until now.
"Yes. I took the liberty to fill in all the paperwork, Lieutenant. I hope you don't mind." There's that amused undertone again, and Jyn smiles. Bodhi seems genuinely happy with this development, grinning brightly.
"I also put in the prepared the paperwork for you, Miss Erso. If you wish, you may start as Sergeant here." Mothma tells her with a smile. For a moment, Jyn forgets to breathe. She's never been part of something, not really. Sure, the last few days she felt like part of this rebellion, but... military status is more than that. It's proof she belongs here. It also means that she will have to answer to the people in command. No more looking out only for herself, no more independence. But then again, she wasn't exactly independent in the prison camp, either.
She realizes suddenly that everyone is staring at her expectantly. Bodhi looks hopeful, as does Mothma, though the senator is more dignified about it. The rebel officers all look curious, and Cassian... Cassian smiles again, and then he puts a warm, comforting hand on her knee.
"I'd... I'd like that." She stutters finally. Mothma allows herself a full smile, and Bodhi claps her on the shoulder awkwardly. Cassian just grins even brighter.
"Well, then, Captain Andor, Lieutenant Rook, Sergeant Erso, all of you are on medical leave. If you, however, insist on working, it would be quite helpful to have the as much of the layout of the Imperial station on Scarif as possible. The Empire isn't known for being creative, so there is a chance other stations will be build quite similar."
Quickly, one of the intelligence officers, Jyn thinks her name is Wren or something, gets out a couple datapads as well as a holo projector, and soon Cassian, Bodhi and her are going through their memories for every little detail they can remember.
It's only when Mothma has already left the room that Jyn realizes that the senator didn't say a word about the situation they are in, or about Alderaan.
Chirrut and Baze show up sometime in the afternoon, both tired and uncomfortable but alive. Chirrut is limping rather obviously, and Captain Wren insists on giving him her chair, while Baze is quite obviously missing the huge gun he carried throughout the entire mission.
They already have made quite some progress at that point. As it turns out, Captain Wren is somewhat of an artist, so they have a very good visualization of the station on Scarif, which helps with the memory. Of course, Chirrut can't see it, but he still tells them everything he remembers, while Baze provides a running commentary
"Are you going to join up?" Jyn asks them. She's only known them for a few days, but she can't really imagine them leaving. Then again, she doesn't exactly know Cassian much longer and she shares a cabin with him, at least for now, so maybe that's not too strange.
"No. We're not meant to be part of a military organization like this. We're guardians of the Temple, that doesn't change just because the Temple is gone." Chirrut says, absolutely calm as always. Baze shakes his head, but he doesn't seem to disagree.
"So you're going to leave?" Something ugly steers inside of Jyn's stomach. She doesn't want to be left alone, not again, not after her mother and her father and Saw and...
"You're not alone. You've got Bodhi, you'll find friends, and Cassian will look out for you." Baze says. Jyn can't help but look at Cassian, who's discussing some detail of the hangar they had landed in with Bodhi. He won't leave her alone, she knows suddenly. He's there to stay.
"You're going to be okay." Chirrut says with utter certainty. Jyn can only nod.
That evening, when Jyn and Cassian get back to their cabin, they're both exhausted, but not like yesterday, when they were dead on their feet and didn't actually know what was going on around them any more. They spend the whole day alternatively working with Captain Wren and being stared at by rebel officers, and while the latter was really weird, Jyn does not feel too bad. Having told intelligence officers all she can, receiving a military rank, being part of this whole thing officially... it feels like fighting on. The opposite of giving up.
Next to her, Cassian sits down on his bed with a groan. His leg is still hurting, the old bacta patch they had slapped upon it not nearly enough to truly heal it. That Alliance desperately needs resources is something Jyn learned today, too.
"Are you okay?" She asks him. She's not sure if she expects a truthful answer. It would be nice, but Cassian is a spy, and even though she trusts him and he trusts her, it wouldn't surprise her if he lied.
"Mostly. Hurts like hell, but that's to be expected. How about you?" He looks at her as he says it, brown eyes boring into hers. He is really attractive, Jyn suddenly realizes. The thought wipes her mind blank for a moment. She hadn't truly looked at him before. Sure, she had tried to get a handle on him, find out if he's lying or anything, but still... somehow she'd never realized just how good he looks.
"Ah... fine." She mumbles finally. Cassian raises an eyebrow at her. Jyn kind of wants to hide. What is she even supposed to do with the fact that he's attractive? He's the first friend she's had in forever. She doesn't want to... ruin it? She's not even sure what she's thinking anymore.
"I... I'm just tired. And sore. I'll be fine." She says, and is proud she doesn't stutter. Cassian seems satisfied. He smiles, and Jyn feels floaty again. She feels a blush creeping into her face and quickly hides behind her hair.
Cassian misinterprets the gesture. "Captain Michl'or told me that they were able to evacuate Alderaanians that were off planet before the Empire could arrest them, and a few of the ships we thought we lost in the battle above Scarif turned up, too. They'd just ended up in the wrong place." He looks at her. "We're not beaten yet."
"I know. Otherwise I wouldn't have signed up for this whole thing." Jyn says, and Cassian grins. Jyn can't help but smile, too, remembering the moment when Captain Wren had handed her her official rank insignia.
"I don't know. The odds on the Scarif mission were pretty damn suicidal, and you went anyway." Cassian says, a spark of amusement in his eyes. Jyn grins.
"You went, too." She shoots back, leaning against the cold wall. It feels good to joke about it. Makes it less real, maybe, that they could have died so many times in the last few days. She's gotten by so far by ignoring that part, but this... feels better.
"Well, nobody ever pretended that I have a good self preservation instinct or anything like that. I was kinda expecting differently from you, though." Cassian says, relaxing as well.
"Oh well, so we're both crazy. The whole galaxy is crazy. I don't think we stand out too much." Jyn tells him, and suddenly Cassian is laughing, and then Jyn is laughing, too, and it's not even that funny, but Force it feels good to laugh.
When they get back to work the next morning, a dark mood seems to have fallen onto the space ship, the electric business of yesterday almost completely gone. Cassian says it's because it's only now truly setting in that they truly lost Alderaan. It makes Jyn feel guilty for smiling when Captain Wren refers to her as Sergeant Erso.
The meeting is tenser than yesterday, everyone is one the edge. At some point Cassian gets in a fight with some intelligence officer about something Jyn doesn't eve truly understand. Afterwards he is irritable and angry, and not even Baze and Chirrut bringing them some caf can truly lighten his mood. That evening, there is no laughter in the cabin.
Cassian is looking at her when Jyn wakes up the next time. She thinks it's morning because she feels somewhat awake. There is some sort of unreadable expression in Cassian's eyes, dark and deep and mysterious, but before Jyn can say anything he's already looking away.
"Sorry for yesterday." He mumbles after they got dressed, not even truly looking at her. She wonders if he regrets letting her get this close to him, or if it's just the general mood on board. She hopes it's the latter, but a part of her mind tells her to cut her losses and get out before he can leave her. Firmly, she tells that part of herself to shut up.
"Nothing to apologize for. Yesterday was just kinda shite." She tells him, and there is a hint of smile. Jyn considers that a victory.
That afternoon, they're sitting in their meeting room again when suddenly, a wave of noise buzzes through the corridors around them. Excited voices are talking loudly, somebody mentions the Death Star. Immediately, Jyn gets up to ask what that is about. Captain Wren is faster. She stops one of the officers, a young Torgruta, and demands to know what's going on.
"Haven't you heard?" The young woman asks with a high pitched voice. "They shot down the Death Star! Some of our people did it! And they freed Princess Leia!"
For a moment, none of these words register in Jyn's mind. Then they do, and she has to sit down. They're still in the game. Cassian has told her this for days, she has told herself this for days, but this... this is huge. She looks at Cassian, who is staring at her, mouth open as if to say something, but nothing comes out.
"You're the ones who got the plans, aren't you?" The Torgruta realizes suddenly, and then there are dozens of officers in the room, congratulating Jyn and Cassian and Bodhi, clapping their shoulders and calling them heroes.
It's the strangest thing that Jyn has ever been part of, and that means something. At some point, Mon Mothma shows up, officially thanking them. She says something about medals and commendations, too, but Jyn doesn't really hear it.
Then, Cassian is next to her, impossibly close. She looks him in the eyes, and she can't breathe because he's so close and this is so impossible and then...
Then he kisses her. And Jyn kisses him back, and for a moment they are in their own world. Cassian's hands are around her waist, her's on his back, and this feels like heaven or something damn close to it.
When they break apart, Jyn realizes that they are still in a crowded room, that people around them, strangers, allies, maybe soon enough friends, are cheering on them. Bodhi awkwardly smiles at them, and Jyn has to laugh. Cassian is laughing with her, but he's not letting her go, and she thinks that this might just be a good start of a new life.