Author's Notes: This fic was heavily inspired by one of my all-time favorite episodes of a tv show ever: Burn Notice's season seven episode titled "Psychological Warfare". I watched it three times while writing this. It's not necessary to do the same, but the main character in the show is a spy, so I've got a lot of feelings about him and Cassian and what they do. Of course this has some Rebelcaptain in it - because I'm weak - but I really wanted this to be centered almost entirely on Cassian and his very complicated relationship with the Rebellion, along with his past. It's also finished, so I can update this daily. I decided against posting it as one long thing since it's 27 pages. Sorry for the gajillion tags: I just didn't want people to walk into this unawares of the mess that this is. Also, are there a bunch of plotholes? Yeah, no doubt. Do I care? Meeeh, kind of. But I really did love writing this.

Disclaimer: I own neither Rogue One/Star Wars or Burn Notice.

"It doesn't matter how many times you leave,
it will always hurt to come back
and remember what you once had and who you once were.
Then it will hurt just as much to leave again,
and so it goes over and over again.
Once you've started to leave, you will run your whole life."
― Charlotte Eriksson

They're going to kill you.

The black bag hanging over his head was ripped off and Cassian's eyes snapped open. He was kneeling in the middle of a very bright, crisp, white cell, his hands no longer tied and completely uninjured. Two men stepped through a door on the other side and shut it behind them, locking him inside. He was alone in the silence and made no attempts to move or try to escape. There wasn't a point.

He blinked placidly as he searched the room with his eyes. No handle or keycode panel on the inside. No windows on the walls. Six strategically placed speakers, perhaps so he could be spoken to by his captors. But why so many? There was one camera as well high up in the corner, trained on him, like an ever-watching eye. The room was almost deadly silent, but if he focused, he could feel the gentle movements of the ship that he was on as it cruised through space, so he knew they hadn't landed on planet or gone to their base.

As far as anyone outside of here was concerned, he'd vanished, a blip off the radar.

Suddenly, piercing warning sirens began screaming through the speakers. He pressed the heels of his palms to his ears to block out the sound, but it could only dull them marginally. It wasn't long before the sirens drilled their way into his head and the light became too bright. All he could do was close his eyes, kneel in place, and hold his ears, as if removing any of his senses might help with the pain, but it was always there. The sirens, the lights, the hard metal against his knees.

Every time he tried to force his mind to drift, the sirens would either pull him back or his eyes would flicker open briefly and he'd snap back into the room. The light washed out everything. The two mixed together until the light was screaming and the sirens were burning. He lost track of time without meaning to and everything began to crumble.

But he didn't move and he didn't flinch. His only consolation was that they hadn't started physical torture. Of course, the fact that he didn't know if or when it would happen hung over him like a threat. This, he told himself, he could handle. He'd gone through it before; he'd done it to others before. The surest way to break someone was not with the body but through the mind. For men like him, his mind was his greatest weapon and worst liability.

Maybe they would kill him, but they wouldn't break him. He wouldn't allow it.

The room they'd dragged him to afterwards was completely different. He'd been able to walk there himself, but the ringing in his ears caused him to stumble if they rounded a corner too sharply. He said nothing and neither did the men walking at his sides. They'd bound his hands again, but in front of him. Careless, considering what he was, but he didn't make a move to grab either of their holstered blasters. He kept his eyes forward until they reached their destination and sat down in the empty seat.

Only when he was sitting down did Cassian allow his eyes to roam. They were in an office, not the main one on the ship, but perhaps the second-in-command's. It was nicely decorated, clean, and orderly. A hologram of a lush planet played tranquilly against the wall to the left, like an intimate peek into someone's world. He very much doubted that this room belonged to the gentle-looking man sitting before him.

"You put on quite the welcoming party," Cassian said, his voice rough from disuse after spending hours locked away in the cell. At least he thought it had been hours. It could've been less than that. It was impossible to recall, but then, that was the point.

The man smiled, looking all to the world as a pleasant human being. He was modestly dressed in nondescript clothes with short, brown hair and almost kind blue eyes. He was good-looking in an average sort of way, the kind of person your eyes would catch one second and then slide away from the next when something more interesting popped up. Cassian had never seen a more dangerous person in his life and he stared at a dangerous person every time he looked in the mirror.

"It's not every day that we're visited by a top Rebel Alliance spy," the man greeted.

Cassian didn't blink. Yes, that was what he was. "I gave almost my entire life to the Rebellion."

"Almost?" The man tilted his head. "I read your file. You gave them everything."

No, not everything. Cassian squashed the thought away before it could transform into something more concrete.

"I have to wonder what a man like you is doing here," the man continued. "I would expect infiltration from you, as it is your expertise, but you came here under your own name. That's either very clever or very stupid."

"My name is all I have left," Cassian replied. "They stripped me of everything else."

"Oh, is that so, Captain?"

Cassian's eyes flickered to the datachip twirling in the man's fingers. "You read the file. That's the first thing they took, the easiest. A rank is just a word in the end. I never had much use for it besides getting my own room."

The man chuckled. "No, the Rebellion doesn't pay very well, does it?"

"I didn't join it for the money," Cassian pointed out mildly. He'd never really had any money to begin with. After the death of his parents, anything was better than nothing. The Rebellion had offered that. A chance to fight, a place to rest, a plate of something to eat. He'd learned to not be picky early on in life.

"It is interesting to see what's become of you," the man said, "if it's true."

He paused, his eyes roving over Cassian's face, but Cassian didn't react. It was true. He had been cast adrift. He felt aimless and alone. Most of his ops had always been like that, but this was different. There was no one he could contact now. He was cut off. He'd been alone plenty of times before, but being lonely was a different sort of wound, one that he hadn't anticipated to sting so sharply.

"You're a spy with only your name left to you," the man sighed, "when a name is the one thing a spy is supposed to never have."

"I'm not the only one," Cassian said. "When your group managed to hack the Alliance, you exposed more than just one person, more than one spy."

The man held out his hands, palms up. "And yet you're the only one here."

"I'm the only one in the field left alive ," Cassian corrected. "Everyone else went into hiding in fear of what you'd do with your newfound information or are already dead."

A smile crossed the man's face again, but this one wasn't so pleasant. It had a more vicious angle to it, a relentless hunger gleaming in his eyes. "That you are. And that's why we're here today. I must admit: I'm very curious. Before I can make any decisions, I want to know why. I want to know how."

"You know how," Cassian countered. "If you truly have read my file, you'll know that I'm good. Better than good. I would have died years ago if I wasn't."

"Confident, are we?"

"I know my record."

It was impossible to forget. He saw the dead at his feet, enemies, friends, informants, people he didn't know, their blood on his hands, their faces imprinted in his memory. He pictured lying on rocky ground, cold rain pelting him, his eye peering through the scope of his rifle as his finger sat on the trigger, waiting, always waiting, not for the right feeling in his gut, but for the right time. He thought of climbing, his body screaming at him in protest, his bones trembling under the pressure, his mind alight with fire and stardust.

He knew what he was capable of.

"I don't care about the record and I don't care about the name," the man told him. "I care about the man behind all of that. I care about you. Isn't that a comforting thought? To be cared for? Can you recall what that's like?"

Yes. No. He didn't want to recall. It was gone.

Screaming light. Or was it the sirens? He couldn't tell.

He'd started sitting up straight on his knees, but found himself doubled over with his forehead pressed against the floor now. There was little he could do but lay there and take it. If he so much as opened his eyes to squint, the light would hit him so hard that it shattered his last attempt to concentrate. His head throbbed, demanding release, but he knew that it wouldn't come. Sometimes he was only in here for minutes, sometimes half a day, but it was all beginning to feel the same in the end.

It had been nearly a day since he'd last eaten. They fed him well when they did, but then kept him away from any food or water after. He'd sweated through his shirt, the painful strain of the psychological attacks starting to turn psychosomatic, and he really couldn't afford to lose anymore water. One or two glasses a day wouldn't cut it much longer. His body was beginning to revolt.

How long? How many days? He tried to think, but the sirens cut through any attempt at precise thinking.

Unable to lay still any longer, he jerked upright and opened his eyes wide. The light burst through his retinas, practically burning him, but this time he didn't close his eyes. Instead, he gritted his teeth and forced himself to look at the walls. The tips of his fingers dug into his hair, pressing hard against his skull, until it hurt, just to bring a new sensation.

Sensory overload technically wasn't torture, according to the rules. Try telling that to someone experiencing them. Laughter bubbled up his chest, but he bit his lip to keep himself silent, biting even after it started to bleed. Try telling him that.

"You served under who first as Joreth Sward?"

Cassian rubbed the side of his face with a hand. "I told you. It's in the file." The man patiently waited for an answer, one that Cassian knew he already knew. He'd said it once before; it was listed in a few briefings. "Grendeef, an Imperial Admiral in the naval branch."

"And what did you do?"

"I was his assistant. Followed him around. Took memos. Made calls."

"You did a little more than that," the man pressed. "Sward was one of your deepest and longest covers. In fact, you continued to use it after the op, didn't you?"

Cassian's head lolled and his eyes rolled to the ceiling, like they were trying to catch a glimpse of something just barely out of his line of sight. "Yes, he was never compromised. Grendeef was sensitive and prone to impulsive decisions when drinking. Sward made a minor error and was fired."

"How many times did you use that cover?"

"Seven."

"You said nine last time. Which one is it?"

He forced himself to look forward again. "It was...seven official times, plus two unofficial." Or had it been three? He had trouble remembering. Sward had been difficult to slip into, so different from his actual personality, but it had always worked, perhaps for that very reason. "His scandocs were the best, his Imperial connections well-known. If I needed to be someone else quickly, he was who I went to."

"You speak like he was a completely separate person."

"He wasn't me," Cassian said, and it was true. All his true cover identities felt like entirely someone else.

"And yet you were the man behind the name, weren't you?"

"He wasn't me," Cassian repeated, quieter this time.

The man sighed, almost like he pitied Cassian. It had an unsettling effect. "I wonder: how many times have you told yourself that after an op? The Alliance prides itself on its honor and moral high ground, but there's always something insidious underneath all that shine."

Cassian closed his eyes. It was him and beings like him. They were the darkness the Rebellion desperately tried to ignore. A much needed and necessary darkness, festering like an untreated wound.

He couldn't stand to be in the center of the room anymore. Unable to stay on his knees, he'd found himself sitting down with his back pressed against the wall, his knees curled up to his chest. It made him feel like a child. He sat there, practically huddled in a ball, his hands pressed hard against his ears, his eyes shut tight, as the siren sounds and light washed over him. It didn't matter how hard he closed his eyes; the light burned through his eyelids.

Eventually, he couldn't take that any longer either. His muscles ached from the strain of holding himself together so tightly. His knees slid away from his chest until his legs were sprawled out before him. His hands fell away from his ears, dropping limply at his side. Even his eyes drifted open, not fully, but he was too tired to close them. The back of his head cracked against the back of the wall, but he didn't even wince. He was already in too much pain.

How much longer could he take? How much longer would they put him through this?

He wanted to scream, but he didn't have the strength.

You're going to die in here.

Would it be so bad?

(Yes, he wasn't ready to die. It was almost a shameful thing for him to admit.)

"You're holding back, Cassian."

His head throbbed intensely, but Cassian managed to gesture with a hand, shaky as it was. "How can I hold back? You've got- you've got everything in there."

"No, I've got the notations. I've got the missions. I've got the reports." The man sat down across from him and idly hooked an ankle over one knee. "What I want is the man."

Cassian pressed a hand to his face. "It's in there. It's- it's in the scandocs you hacked."

"It's in your head," the man told him, using a finger to tap his own. It was like he was talking to a child. Cassian blinked, tried to concentrate. He wasn't in the sensory overload cell anymore, but his mind felt like it was still there somehow. "I know you're not used to talking about yourself. It's uncomfortable, isn't it? No one asks a spy to be open. It's not in your nature. It's not in the job description."

No one ever did and so he didn't. It was the opposite of who he was. He'd been closed off for as long as he could remember, but he was having trouble remembering anything. Things wouldn't come to him in linear thoughts. How long after his parents died had he joined the Rebellion? He saw people that he'd met just a few years ago kicking a ball to him on Fest. No, no, that wasn't right. He had to think. He didn't talk about himself. Maybe one day he had been an open book, but that time was long gone.

A stray thought wiggled in the back of his mind. There was something - someone. She'd never asked him to be open with her - never expected it of him, never pushed him - but he'd wanted to be. He'd been willing to try, even though she didn't require it of him. He hadn't done it though, had he? Not enough. It was never enough.

"I need you to be honest," the man told him.

Unexpectedly, a bark of laughter spilled out of Cassian's lips. He cut it off quickly, not sure where it had come from or why. He refocused on the man in front of him.

"Can you do that?" the man asked. "Can you be honest? With me? With yourself?"

"I've been honest," Cassian mumbled. "I've answered all your questions."

The man smiled. "You didn't answer that last one." Semantics. It didn't matter. He'd done what had been asked of him. He was here. He was talking. That was more than he'd ever done before. "Who are you? Are you a spy for the Rebel Alliance?"

"I'm no one," Cassian answered, "not anymore."

"I've never met someone that's no one," the man replied, standing up and moving to his desk. "Intelligence is meant to bury the true person until they no longer exist, but we will exhume the man again." As he walked back to Cassian, he held a syringe in his hand. "This will help. It'll bring you back to the surface. Of course, it won't be all that pleasant. You might experience some nausea, overheating, elevated heart rate." His eyes flickered away from the syringe to Cassian. "Hallucinations. They'll feel very real. And that's what we need: the real you."

Cassian shook his head weakly, shying away from the syringe. "The files-"

"Are not you," the man interrupted as he crouched next to the chair. "You wrote very detailed, precise reports that fully lacked any emotions or depth. Even most seasoned spies let those bleed through sometimes, but not you. You were hiding. But from what?" He edged the needle against Cassian's forearm. "I think we know who. Now we need to find out the why."

He stuck the needle in a vein and pressed down on the syringe. The air was sucked right out of Cassian's lungs. He immediately clambered for something to hold onto, the arms of the chair, but it felt like he was spiralling. In his chest, his heart began to race so wildly that he swore he could hear it.

"This will hit you hard, Cassian," the man's voice said. He was close, but he sounded so far. Cassian couldn't find him. He couldn't see right in front of him. "Don't fight it."

That wasn't in his nature anymore. Someone had changed it.

He didn't even attempt to block out the sounds or light anymore. Instead, he laid on the ground on his side, his back against the wall, his legs tangled, his arms flopped out before him. Sweat poured down his face, his hair wet and pressed against his face. Dark patches had soaked through his shirt, causing it to stick to his skin in places. Dark circles hung like sallows underneath his red eyes.

No broken bones. No beatings. No pulled out nails. No physical torture. He tried to latch onto that, spin it into something hopeful, but it was next to impossible to do when every gasping breath he took made it feel like he was pumping the hallucinogenic drugs through his bloodstream even faster.

It didn't matter how hard he tried to grasp onto something in his mind. It always slipped away from him, dancing along the peripheral, just out of sight. Flashes came to him instead. Some from not too long ago, some that he had thought that he'd forgotten. His mother's face. Setting his first explosive charge under an Imperial ship, the space too tight and small for anyone but him. Grease staining spark-burned fingertips as he rewired a security droid. His first drink of Corellian gin. Blood spurting onto the front of his jacket. Falling, falling, falling.

Nothing but stardust.

A dark shape comes into view before him. Nothing but a blur at first, but when he blinks his eyes a few times, the figure becomes more solid until it turned into a person. The sirens are gone. It's still bright, almost too bright behind them to see their face, but he knows who it is in a second.

She's wearing her old outfit, the one he saw her in when they first met. Wobani didn't have prison clothes. You worked in what you'd been brought in. The vest hangs on her like her shoulders carry the weight of the galaxy. He expects a blaster to be at her hip, his blaster, but it isn't there. She's dirty, covered in the mess of her past.

But she's beautiful. She is the most beautiful thing he has ever seen. In fact, she's too beautiful to be here, so much so that a part of him wants to tell her to leave, but he can't get the words to come out of his mouth.

The only thing he can think of is her name, and so that's what he says. "Jyn."

She walks towards him, her steps heavy in her boots. He bets there's a vibroblade tucked in one. When she reaches him, she bends down to sit on her knees and helps pull him back up to lean against the wall. She is close enough for him to see the flecks of gold in her sharp green eyes. Flecks of stardust. He reaches out towards her, but it's so hard to move. He wants to hold her, pull her against his chest. Instead, she presses her hands flat against the floor and leans in, so close her hair brushes against his face.

"Jyn," he says again, this time close to a sob, his voice flooded with shame. "I can't- I can't do it-"

"You have to," Jyn tells him. "You have to be strong."

"I can't," he gasps. He hates that she sees him like this. It's worse than Scarif. Worse than Hoth. "I'm too weak."

She moves back slightly so that she can gaze into his eyes. "They'll kill you if you don't. We'll all die."

"No, no," he mutters, shaking his head. "You can't."

"Then you have to fight this," Jyn says. "If you tell them, you won't be able to come back."

He clenches his hands into fists and digs his nails into his palms. "I can't. They're too strong. I can't- I don't know how much more I can take. You were always better at fighting."

She lifts a hand and brushes his hair gently back from his face. She is never gentle with anything, save for him on rare occasions when the mood strikes her. It has been a long time since anyone has ever been gentle with him. He forgot what it felt like. He craves it now, leaning forward into her touch. "If you tell them, you die. You have to beat this."

"I can't, I can't-" He closes his eyes and tries to press his forehead against hers, but she's just out of his reach. "Please, Jyn, I need you."

Jyn jerks away from him. He opens his eyes to see her frowning at him. There is anger in her eyes. She gives him that look often, but this is different. It isn't the anger that he knows will go away soon. It is betrayal and something like a hot knife twists in his gut.

"No, you don't. You don't need me."

"I do, please, Jyn, please-"

"Then why did you leave me, Cassian?" Jyn demands.

He flinches. "I didn't… I didn't…" But he did leave, didn't he? It wasn't in his plan. It wasn't what he wanted. "They made me go. I didn't have a choice. Please, Jyn, I would never leave you. I need you."

Pain and anger are written all over her face. "You always leave in the end, Cassian. It's who you are."

She pulls herself to her feet and begins to back away from him. He claws at empty air where she once was, struggling to pull her back to him, but she keeps moving back into the bright light.

"Jyn, stop!" he shouts, his throat burning, his voice raw. She turns on her heels, takes one step, and is no longer there. His head swiveled around the room, but there was no one there but him. The door hadn't even opened or closed. She'd vanished into nothing. "Come back! I can be better! Don't leave me!"

But she was gone.