Jyn imagines. It is an indulgence, a luxury - something which belongs to another young woman from another time and another place, one who has never experienced what Jyn Erso has had to experience. That woman (whoever she is) can afford to be young, to dream, to wonder. But Jyn…no. Jyn can only indulge in it briefly, occasionally, after she has gone over every other thing in her mind.
She tries to imagine him not scowling. She has seen him smile before, of course - the thin, hard-to-read smile of a spy. But she wonders if they had been real smiles. Like the ones he wore when he was little, before all of this began. Like the ones he shares in private with Kay-too. Who else has made him smile, she wonders? And can she make him…one day?
She thinks about what makes him laugh. What gives him joy. What makes him angry. What makes him sad. Six years old, that's what he told her. What happened? He has lost everything like she has lost everything. But does he feels the same sense of bitterness? The same rage? The same self-hatred?
She imagines what books he reads. What goes on in his mind. What his opinions are on everything - the war, the galaxy, even the way he fights and the way she fights. She wants to sit and talk and pick his brain. Uncover and unravel everything. Strip away the mask.
But now, as she stands there in the lift, her body resting against his and the world going to hell all around them… they have no time. She will never know, never understand, never get to see any of it. This unfulfilled need, this desire, this want…it is ripping her apart, making her chest explode with the pain of never knowing….
She looks into his eyes and it hurts, hurts, hurts…
She can imagine, but it will never be enough.
Cassian imagines. It is not an indulgent. Rather, it is a need. A strange, desperate need that he has never experienced before. It comes and goes, every time as briefly and brightly, but as distant as a speck on the horizon. He is a spy; he deals in absolutes, not make-believe. But somehow, she has lodged herself in his brain, stirring up dreams and hopes as foreign to him as a life he thought he's forgotten long ago.
She is always hard and unyielding. A fire constantly burning. But he wonders what can soften her. Make her smile, or laugh, or cry. When she is not watched by anyone, when she is not always on edge…what calms her and brings her peace? He likes to imagine her somewhere warm, with the sun and the sky and the breeze gently whipping through her hair. Maybe there…wherever there is…her demons (and maybe his) can be laid to rest.
He thinks he can sit for days and listen to her stories. Of course, he has seen her records, but he knows that it must be a different thing entirely to hear her tell them herself. To go through it, to live it, to understand it…all through her eyes. That pain…he thinks he understands it too, but does he?
He wonders about the men she has loved, or about the ones that had made her smile. Is her solitude precious to her? Or is it a form of self-exile, like his? Has she ever wondered about him? Thought about him? Pictured them together after all this is over? It does not have to be anything grand; he would take just sitting with her, letting her explain something…anything…
But now, as he stands with her in the lift, leaning against her as he struggles to stay upright…they have no time. He will never get to do any of the things he's pictured. Never get to find out the truth to any of the things he's imagined. But as the world crashes down all around them, he realises that it does not matter. Not really. Just by getting the chance to not know her…to even get the chance of never knowing…
He looks into her eyes and she is glorious, glorious, glorious.
He can imagine, but this is almost enough.
END