Thanks to gaialux for betaing.
"You believe me?"
The ashes of Jedha City recede behind them as the craft silently drifts through hyperspace, and Jyn finds herself wanting the reassurance of Chirrut talking to rather than past her. Should she be surprised that he was the one to vouch for her story? He had no way of trusting the fervency in her face, the tension in her neck, the fear and excitement that lit her eyes when she spoke of her father. But then again, perhaps he had made a life over decades of perceiving the lilt in people's voices when they spoke the truth, or keeping his distance from liars who hastily passed him by.
"Yes," he smiles, slowly turning towards her. "Baze tells me you are honest. He is usually right about these things."
"Oh."
"It must be difficult for you."
"Yes," she says curtly. All of it. Her father is alive, Saw is dead, the Empire is building a planet killer, even her so-called allies barely trust her story, the city they struggled to defend is in ruins and dust…
"Honesty," Chirrut clarifies with a grin.
"What?" Jyn tenses.
"You're used to living in secrets. Covers and codes. Names within names. Your honesty is very obvious because it is a new thing."
"If it's that obvious," she sighs, "you could try explaining it to the rest of the crew."
"Do not worry. We will journey to Eadu, we will find your father. They will be drawn to the truth, in their own time."
Jyn bites back the urge to ask whether the Force told him that. "Well, I appreciate the support."
"Gerrera was many things to the people of Jedha City," Chirrut says, which is an understatement. "He was another father to you, yes?"
"Sort of," Jyn admits. Some father he'd been. But had Galen been any better? Abandoning her in service of some unspeakable cause, assuming any explanation would sail above her childish head?
"It is hours yet until we land. Don't be afraid to mourn him, for all he was and could not be."
"Me? Afraid? Your city was..." Words fail her. She has not seen the weapon, watching the hologram in Saw's burrow, only heard its deadly name. "Annihilated. I suppose you've mourned enough?"
"Thank you." Chirrut glances down. "Jedha as I knew it was given a nearly-mortal wound many years ago, then received a thousand stinging cuts in the days that followed. I mourned it then as I mourn it still, as part of my contemplations, but so too do I rejoice that I may play some part in the living days to come."
"All right," says Jyn. "As long as you don't start thinking you can handle things on your own better than everyone else; if I wanted someone to trust me and lock all their emotions away I'd talk to K-2."
"You think he knows nothing of trust and camaraderie? The Force has its claim on him, as it does us all."
There it is. "Thanks for the advice. I think I'll go rest now so I'm ready when we reach Eadu."
"It is my pleasure."
She climbs back to the cabin, Bodhi raising his eyebrows inquisitively. "Everything all right?" he calls.
"As all right as it can be," she says, which is true.
Sleep is fitful, and she does not dream, despite the clash of memories jockeying and toying with her when she is awake and seeking out rest. Trust the Force, her mother had said, but the Force had never given her direction or guidance. Then again, it wasn't like most people had either, and those who did hadn't lasted long. Compared to that, she might as well follow a vanished hologram, placing her hopes in the image of remembered light.
Rogue One is a cramped ship and doesn't allow much room for quiet meditation or chit-chat. A few of the non-human members of the unsanctioned mission have sought out areas more appropriate to their appendages. Cassian and K-2 are bent deep in conversation, and Jyn doesn't want to disrupt them. She climbs down to the nominal cargo bay, where Baze and Chirrut are verbally sparring over something trivial, and tries to give them leeway before Baze waves her over. "Erso, tell this fool he's not allowed to try reprogramming Imperial droids with that staff of his. He won't listen to me, but he might accept it as an order from the mission leader."
"It's not reprogramming, it's a liberation to let them find their own path and discover what the Force wills—hello, Jyn."
"I'd hate to order you around any more than is necessary," she says. "But do you really want more K-2s on our hands?"
"They won't be on our hands, they'll be creating a diversion for the Stormtroopers out on Scarif."
"If they have a twelfth of the interest in the Force you do they'll be musing on philosophy and getting their circuits into a conundrum," Baze warns. "I'd be better off 'reprogramming' them with my blaster."
"Chirrut," says Jyn, "could I ask you a question?"
"Oh, don't start with him, you'll be pondering the mysteries of the Force of Others halfway into battle."
"Not about that. It's about your staff, actually."
"Gladly!" says Chirrut. "Most useful, is it not?" He thwaps it on the floor in front of them, a few other rebels clearing away.
"I suppose," Jyn says. "But I was wondering why you chose to fight with it? Is it something your temple taught?"
"Hmm." Chirrut pauses, then extends a sandworn hand. Curious, Jyn takes it, and he slowly guides her over to the weapon and runs her up and down its length, feeling its warps and notches. He taps her thumb as he releases her, as if orienting himself. "A staff can do many things. Support my weight in treacherous sand. Warn those in front of me that I will be walking slowly. Raised high above me, let Baze find me in a crowd. It serves in peace as well as in battle. A blaster, all it can do is shoot."
"That's why you use it, then? Because you don't like holding weapons?"
"No," he laughs. "I use it because it's useful! I can deceive my enemies and shift my balance to defend the area close to me. Much more useful than trying to take out an enemy off in the distance who might barely know how to aim."
"Don't sell yourself short." Baze cuts in. "He can still wield that lightbow."
"When we reach Scarif," Jyn says grimly, "we'll take any weapon we can get."
They use everything they have and then some—everything the rebel fleet has—and it's still barely enough. Barely enough to get the message out, when they've abandoned thought of survival and are clinging to the hope of one more step, one more level, one more link in the signal chain.
As soon as Cassian crumples to the floor in the database library Jyn is acutely aware she might not reach the bottom of the tower alive. K-2 remains inflectionless, but she can only wonder what the loss feels like to him, what it means to overwrite years of familiar patterns with solitude. They climb in silence, as she clutches the file close to her and he droops from the shelves, metal unfolding over metal. Krennic's shot burns her side, and once K-2 incapacitates him, she shoots the director again to make sure he stays down while K-2 wordlessly fiddles with the antenna.
"The fleet has the element of surprise," K-2 points out on the elevator, "but is heavily outnumbered here. I conjecture their odds of disabling the shield gate to be—"
"Not now, Kay," she stammers. Maybe not ever.
But then an Imperial ship glides towards them in-atmosphere, moving too slow to join the fleet and not bothering to fire, and opens its door. Pao hurriedly waves something armlike over, and they stagger onboard.
"I've been gathering survivors," he explains. "Our ship was destroyed, but there are a few..."
She barely has time to mourn for Bodhi as she processes the news.
"You're still in command," Pao stares up at her. "I'll keep searching as long as you think it prudent."
Like it's time to worry about ranks? He's limping at best, and nobody seems to have avoided wounds except perhaps K-2. In the corner, she notices Chirrut unconscious from blood loss. Who is she to decide between treating those she can help right there and perhaps finding more?
"I strongly urge we jump to hyperspace now," says K-2. "If we do not rejoin the fleet, the gravitational forces required to sustain an evacuation may be—"
He speaks with a high-pitched trill he had not mustered even at Cassian's death. "Do it," Jyn says, and slumps in a corner.
"Jumping," says Pao. "Forcing manual override, I hope you low-gravvies can take it."
They accelerate through the atmosphere. She catches glimpses of the ocean as the pain and darkness grow around her. They reach the void of hyperspace and she remembers thinking, If the Force has a will, it can't be like this. Chirrut can't have escaped both Jedha and Scarif just to die from g-forces in hyperspace, as hilarious as he probably would find it… They'd done just enough to send the data out; it wasn't fair that she had to fear for the life of her comrades, too.
But as fast as they jump, as excruciating as the whiplash is, she finds her necklace doesn't choke around her throat. It keeps time with the rest of her, the kyber resting cool against her skin.
The trip seems another dull eternity, like the terrifying climb that preceded it, but K-2's voice interrupts her pain. "You'll need to remind them that you captured Ramda's vessel. We seem to have a remarkable knack for repurposing Imperial property."
"Speak for yourself," Pao groans, but he must make contact with the base somehow because soon they're making landfall, amid the ziggurats of Yavin IV that Jyn had made peace with not seeing again. Well, there was plenty of the galaxy she'd consigned herself not to seeing again, but little of it worth missing.
Medi-droids make an officious stir over the surviving Rogue One crew, and too exhausted to wonder how much of a droid presence remained on base with their resources so recently committed to Scarif, Jyn lets herself rest.
When she comes to, she's still sore, and takes a moment to collect herself. They're at the rebel base, and the medbay is, while extremely full, not dissolving into chaos. "I'm going to assume someone received our message." A data file too big to memorize. Life had somehow been easier when it was only her father's hologram she had to talk people into believing.
"The reactor schematics? Yes, we can't thank you enough," says a thick-set nurse. "Sit now."
"Where's—" She glances around, neck still straining from the whiplash. My? The? "Our crew?"
"Everyone who was wounded during the battle is receiving appropriate triage as needed."
That was easy. Find the schematics, and instead of a dissenting criminal she's part of the fleet. Convenient, but she aches to be near Rogue One, or what remains of it. "Well, if K-2 gets new nuts and bolts, tell him I'm awake."
She doesn't mean it entirely seriously—he has other people to care for, after all—but someone must have paged K-2, because he lopes in a few minutes later. "Jyn. I am relieved to know that you are recuperating."
That counts as something approaching warmth. "How's everything coming along? Were the plans downloaded?"
"Everything is...coming along."
It appears the horrors of war have not improved K-2's lying skills. "And the plans?"
"I am under orders not to disturb your healing."
"Kay."
"Please try to rest. It would be unfortunate to take foolhardy risks at this hour."
What kind of bargain is this? More Force humor, to spare their lives only to thwart the data transmission at the last minute? Maybe it would have been easier to die there, in what should have been their moment of triumph, and not have to worry about failure.
No, she can't think that way. Even if the fear of another defeat has drained her, she can't put that fear into the mouths of her wounded friends.
"Then can you wheel me over to someone who can talk?" she snaps.
"I have that ability," he says.
"It'll help me rest if I'm not alone," she says.
Another lie, or something close to the truth? Liana Hallik and her other aliases have always been alone, even when they were part of a cell, or in one. But Jyn has taken to little spaceships that last only from one planet to the next, with the close quarters that come with them. When every flight can bring peril and possibility, such transports are better shared.
"Some emotional familiarity will likely bring you stability," he admits, and produces a wheelchair from the corner of the room. For a moment she doesn't know whether she'll make it in—is she hooked up to some cold tubes behind her, out of view?—but she collapses down, instead noting a few loose monibraces on her left ankle, as if someone had begun the process of transforming her into a cyborg and gotten bored after the first step.
K-2 shoos her away when she reaches for the manual controls and pushes her over to a curtain at the side of the room, adjusting it to reveal another set of beds and machinery. Chirrut's is the nearest form he knows well, and they maneuver over to it. Jyn is grateful for Chirrut's slow, steady breathing.
"They probably tell you everything that's going on around here," she mutters. "Not afraid you're going to panic?" Even if he was conscious, would he still be troubled by another setback, or face it with equanimity? "Don't suppose you can give me a hint of what's up? You know, so I can be useful around here."
She imagines him smiling; a frustrating, teasing grin that shatters his rest and drives her even farther up the wall. Of course she doesn't tell K-2 or anyone, they'll only think she's delirious and needs to go back to bed. But, she yawns, of course they're just going to send her right back anyway, so what did she really have to lose?
Chirrut awakens.
The plans are missing, the woman last known to possess them has fallen into Imperial custody, the planet-killer is still on the loose, and they won't let Jyn fight.
"How do we not have better systems for storing data than handing it off until it falls into the hands of who-knows-where?" she rages. The nurse lets her walk to Chirrut's bedside, at least, and he's willing to listen. "And I thought the Citadel was a terrible storage system."
"We?" Chirrut echoes.
"K-2 tried to compute the probability that a droid could have stored the complete set, but really—"
"So you consider yourself part of this rebellion already? That is well."
She pauses, parsing that. "We almost got ourselves killed for those files. The least I can do is stay here now." Just like that we becomes Rogue One, at least those that remain.
"Your sense of duty is commendable. But you need not neglect your freedom."
How long had it been since Mon Mothma offered her a new life? "When they say I'm free to hold a blaster again I'll consider it."
"There! Already you know the situation is not so dire. Even you are amenable to following orders."
"For now," she amends. "They want to make me a sergeant."
"And what do you think of that?"
"I don't know," she says. If there is a tomorrow, and a day after that, and another chance and another, she wants to belong. It's more than she's ever hoped to ask for, to believe in the cause she fights for and know that her name won't be held for or against her. But at the same time, no title will bring back the people she's lost. Isn't her place with those who trusted her before the alliance fell in line? If they scatter, why should she remain on Yavin? "The rank doesn't matter to me, not really."
"It is no easy thing, to change one uniform for another."
"Sometimes it is," she says, thinking of all the identities she's left behind, sometimes not a moment too soon.
"It is not easy," Chirrut repeats, "if you have much to carry with you. Sometimes pride is the heaviest load of all."
She's briefly amused by the mental image he conjures up. "Are you saying you're bad at disguises because you just can't help showing off your martial arts wherever you go?"
"After the temple was destroyed—" He breaks off momentarily, lost for words.
"You don't have to talk about it," she rushes.
"No," he says. "A moment. I...wish to share this, with someone. I am just...unused to speaking of it anew."
He and Baze must have shared countless conversations, unseen memories forging patterns that became rote, but everyone who could understand Jedha firsthand was gone. "Take your time," she said, "it's not like we're going anywhere anytime soon."
Chirrut winces, whether from his recovery or from his past it isn't clear. "There were times when I made my life day to day, in the avenues of the city. Bidding the Force of others to be with those I passed, that was not unlike my life before. Relying on the kindness, or the bargaining, of someone new each day: that was a change. Baze did not trust in the Force around him, and the adjustment was not as simple for him."
"Why did you go about the streets? Could you not find work?"
"I'm sure Baze believed his blaster could make positions open. For me it was a good way to notice many people without sight: civilians and soldiers, rich and poor. To continue my vocation as a Guardian, acknowledging the Force in the lives of all, how could I but find Jedhans where they walk?"
"So you're saying I should start trusting the Force more if I take the promotion?"
"It may ease your spirit," Chirrut says, "though I don't know if it will help your military leadership."
"You still believe all is as the Force wills it?"
"The Force binds together what is past and what is yet to come. What is now broken may yet be forged again."
"Or it could all fall apart again. Unless you think we're—prisoners, trapped to do the bidding of someone else's orders for us."
"You do not strike me as anyone's prisoner. Your father's least of all."
Jyn stiffens. "What does this have to do with my father?"
"You saw his message in Jedha, before it was destroyed. You had no need to believe him—the blood you shared is no proof of honesty—nor to seek him out on faith. Yet each choice you make reflects where you place your trust. Is my faith any stranger?"
"My father was just a man," Jyn tries to explain. "He didn't..." He didn't mean to die. He didn't mean to send nothing back to the Alliance. He didn't mean to leave me with so many questions unanswered. If the Force truly had a will, how could the plans have escaped their grasp yet again? Why spare so few when so many more were dead?
And was she drawn to Chirrut only because he had endured the same horrors she had and emerged, as if by chance? Surely he'd find it trivial to let some deep, synchronous common bond be subsumed by emotion.
"And I am just a man," Chirrut notes. "Could I wield the Force for my own purposes, it would not be much of faith, would it?"
"Standard-issue, pshaw. This would break at the slightest impact. Even a Stormtrooper could hit it!"
It's no battlestaff, but Chirrut has been issued a white cane for making his way out of bed. Jyn, meanwhile, is frantically trying to keep him up-to-date on the news from the rebellion. "Senator Organa is back, and her droid has got the plans. They were using the Death Star as a detention center, which I think is kind of a waste, but—Alderaan's been blown up, the entire planet—they've probably tracked her here, we need to attack now—do you know how to fly a fighter?"
"You flatter me sometimes. No, the Guardians were never trained in starflight, even when we were active."
"I don't know, I wouldn't have taken you for a martial artist either, I just think we're safer in space than with the Death Star coming at us."
"The Empire has starfighters too."
"Well, maybe I'll go ask K-2SO."
"Don't lose heart. We fought for those plans, now is the time we can put them to use."
"Who's 'we' now? Not much you and I can do about it if they're keeping us moonside."
"Well, if it's all the same to you, I'm confident your narration of the computer monitors will be much more—engaging—than their teletext."
Jyn isn't sure if she should be insulted. "That's why they're trying to promote me, so I can sit around and analyze holoships."
"Are they sending Organa into the fray? You can't say she hasn't done her part to get those plans back."
"I'm not sure," Jyn notes, pacing off to find what the senator's been up to, and whether there's been any word from Admiral Raddus.
It turns out very few of the Rogue One crew have been cleared for launch, although Pao is filling in for one of the fleet fighters. "They won't even give me a ship," K-2 complains. "Some human who helped rescue Leia wants one."
"That's probably good," she says, escaping him before he can predict his relative odds of survival in space versus on Yavin IV.
"The other one is evacuating," he calls after her, "which I think is sensible."
Jyn stomps back to the war room, where officers and droids are still milling about. One of Melshi's companions sits in a corner, his arm in a cast. She scans for Chirrut: no sign. More anxious than she wants to let on, she curiously shuffles over to the hangar, keeping her head down and making sure she doesn't look like she's there to fight.
He's perched on a crate against the wall, greeting the pilots who pass by with the same nonchalance he had in Jedha. "May the Force of others be with you!"
"Guy repeats himself more than Dodonna," one pilot whispers to another.
"Dodonna knows what he's doing," says his friend, "I'll take any help we can get."
She makes her way across the flight deck towards him. "May the Force of others be with you," he calls again, turning as he hears her approach. "Don't mind me," he says, "go see to your fighter."
Does he take her for a skeptic, itching to debate, or a seeker, yearning to hear more? "Chirrut," she just says.
"Ah." He passes the cane off to his far hand and reaches for her with his near one. She takes his hand, trying not to shiver from the fear the day has brought. "I hope high command was not plotting a rescue mission for me."
"Just me."
"So much the better. Your missions are better organized than high command's."
"We don't know that yet," Jyn says, and this time she can't help shivering.
Chirrut takes in the quiet of the hangar, as the pilots begin to depart. "Then let's go find out."
He holds on to her arm as she leads him back to the briefing room. Just out of unfamiliarity with the base layout, she wonders? Trying to support her, taking her mind off the battle? Or too proud to use the strange cane?
Jyn glances at the screens, taking in the onslaught of data and graphics. "We'll need to be quick. The Death Star is large and can't move too fast, but they jumped nearby."
"Understood."
The technicians give her inquisitive glances as she gleans what she can from the visualizations. "It looks like we'll be able to get off several quick shots before they realize we're staging an attack and presumably respond with their own fighters; I doubt it has the capacity to destroy a fleet moving in scattered attack. The issue is that we won't be close enough to get to the reactor core at first. That's only going to leave us a very narrow window of timing."
Her father's secret had been well-hidden from the Empire, yet also hidden sufficiently deep that the rebellion would need to commit everything that had escaped Scarif unscathed to buy enough time for the attack. What had he been planning?
"These commanders are shrewd—once they've committed to battle," Chirrut teases. "I trust they can find a way."
"All right," she breathes. "Starting an attack run...now."
"Good."
She pauses a moment, taking in the mess of the room, droids reading the blinking lights, the nervous politicians huddled together, and cuts off. "You can hear all the intercom chatter, can't you?"
"Well, yes."
"Then what am I doing here?"
"You seem more at ease when you're speaking," says Chirrut, "and I think the Empire is causing us anguish enough for a day."
She slumps against him. "You don't have to find makework for me to do."
"Oh? So it's just for my sake you're focusing on the screen, then?"
He knows her too well. Whatever comes, she will face it with clear eyes, together with what remains of the rebellion. "Some men like binary songs. I figured you like battle reports more."
"Very thoughtful." He turns towards the loudspeakers. They have minutes, if that.
"Chirrut?" she asks. What can she tell him at a time like that? "How did you know I was wearing a necklace?"
"What?" He tilts his head back at her, sounding genuinely confused.
"When—you met me in the streets. The Force didn't show it to you."
"Of course not. Baze told me."
She shakes her head. "Thank you for not showing me my future, then."
"It was nothing."
"I'm glad I didn't know all that was still to come. I don't know if I could have been strong enough to fight."
"You could have," he says. "But I never claimed to know the future. I just asked if you were willing to trade."
"There's a difference?"
"I wanted you to value that necklace of yours. Kyber was gone from Jedha, not to return. But it might still mean something to you, wherever your travels led you."
Her mother's words of trust. Chirrut, not claiming to touch the Force himself, but believing in its power in the lives of others. Baze bidding her good luck. Crystals at the heart of a dark star. "Thank you."
The intercom crackles again. They're living on borrowed time, but still they live. She holds on to Chirrut's arm and waits for the lights beyond the screen to engulf her. Voices continue to chatter across the waves, many unfamiliar.
Organa blinks, steps back from the screen, and they are still standing.
"Jyn," Chirrut is urging her, "listen."
Because she has been so tensed to the moment she has not seen the lights flicker and renew themselves, cascading in patterns of victory. Even the droids are rolling about in relief, the biologicals collapsing in their seats. Then she feels herself crying; her father named this dream for her even when he was too weak to remember her, and she is there to see it fulfilled.
Chirrut, of course, insists on wearing his ceremonial medal everywhere. "Very nice engraving," he says, running his hand over it.
Jyn has stashed hers away, not only out of grief and confusion for those who couldn't live to earn theirs, but also out of uncertainty as to where she's heading next. Mon Mothma is patient with her and hasn't followed up on the promotion idea, but the alliance chatter is that the base's location has been compromised and they will eventually need to seek a new one, even if the threat is not as urgent without the Death Star.
K-2's attitude about everything isn't helping. "You have routinely survived much more perilous tasks than inquiring after the itinerary of a friend and comrade. Unless you think the Massassi trees he meditates under are hazardous, I do not think talking to Chirrut is likely to endanger your well-being."
So before he can talk to Chirrut and give him the wrong idea, Jyn walks out to the Massassi trees herself. Chirrut has risen from his meditation and is practicing some sort of martial arts maneuver. She calls out to him so he stands down before she can get in range.
"You going to wear that medal all the time?" she teases. "It can't be good for your center of gravity."
"Neither was my staff," he sulks, "but I make do."
Cautiously, she says, "I heard Pao is staying in the squadron he fought with during the battle."
"The fleet may be spread thin, yes, but they can still find a fighter that fits him! Very good."
Of course, most of Rogue One were Alliance to begin with, so that doesn't help. "Have you given any thought to where you'll go?"
"Some thought, yes," he says. "The pilot who shot down the reactor core, Luke Skywalker?" Jyn remembers him from the award ceremony, a young man from the Outer Rim. "I have spoken with him, and he seems like a very curious fellow. I believe he intends to remain with the rebellion, and if all goes well, I would be happy to teach and learn from him in turn."
Learn from him? "Curious questioning or curious weird?"
"A little of each."
"And if all doesn't go well?"
"It is not urgent; all will be as the Force wills it, even if he and I go separate ways. What about you?"
"I haven't decided," says Jyn. "Maybe I'll become a sergeant after all, if I stay here. Just—don't leave without telling me, all right?"
"Of course," he says fervently, "and—I would ask the same of you."
She reaches out and embraces him, and he leans forward. For a moment they circle each other, their grips making up for silent fear. Whatever has brought them to this point, chance and faith and despair and hope, was a journey worth making in its own right.
Then Chirrut leans down, his mouth seeking hers, and she returns the kiss with new wonder. Between practiced echoes and new stratagems, his lips are rich and magnificent. She can only hope she brings him pleasure—there was not much time for practice amid Imperial labor camps—but his hums of delight suggest he does not mind.
"Uh," someone says. "Am I interrupting?"
Reluctantly, they break the kiss and take in the newcomer. It's Luke, holding an odd weapon in his hand.
"This some, er, Guardian of the Whills thing?"
"Not usually," Chirrut laughs. "You've met Jyn Erso."
"The plans, of course," Luke blushes, "you saved us all..."
"I mean, you were out there taking the shot, I was sitting here healing up..." Jyn says.
"Enough with the modesty," Chirrut demands. "Jyn, I think we shall have plenty to speak of and do together and plenty of time to do it in. If you do not mind, could I speak with Luke for a time?"
"It's fine," says Jyn.
"Is it private?" Luke asks. "She can stay."
"Of course," Chirrut says. "Though I respect that Jyn may be at times uninterested in discussing matters of the Force."
"The Force?" Jyn looks Luke over. "You look a little young to be a Guardian."
"I'm not," Luke says. "My father was a Jedi, and so was my friend, Obi-Wan Kenobi. I want to be one too, if I can."
"A Jedi?" she repeats.
"Using the Force. That's how I took down the Death Star."
"We fought and died to get those plans, and you think you could just blow it up with magic?" She glances up at Chirrut, suddenly ashamed. "I'm sorry, I can leave..."
"Perhaps you might want to stay," Chirrut suggests. "Luke, you say you carry a lightsaber?"
"Yes," Luke says. "This was my father's." He fiddles with the weapon in his hand, and immediately a bolt of light issues forth from it.
"It's blue," Jyn says.
"What?" Luke asks.
"The light, it's blue. I just—thought Chirrut should know. It's…" Not quite beautiful, but certainly powerful. A weapon, that could be used for purposes good or ill.
"Thank you," says Chirrut.
Luke nods at the base of the tree. "Throw some of those nuts at me."
Jyn hurries to pick some up, reaching for Chirrut's hand to give them to him. But he says "You go ahead."
Hesitantly, she hurls a handful at Luke, who flails awkwardly with the lightsaber. Despite his ungainly pose, he wields it well. He slices several in half, a few of them seem to zoom away from him entirely, and only one of them hits him, landing harmlessly on his foot.
"It seemed to just bend away from him," she says, "like it deflected off a gravity shield. And he wasn't even looking at it, he was attacking the one over his head."
Chirrut breaks into a broad grin. "The Force is strong with him."
"The Force?" Jyn drops her jaw. "That's the Force?"
"Ben—my teacher—said I should practice with a helmet on. Not really looking at them," Luke says. "It doesn't always help, but sometimes I can sort of sense where they're going to be."
Chirrut gives a satisfied nod. "Defending the space around you. You should practice with a solid weapon, if you have time."
"I'd love to learn from you. If you're sticking around."
"I think I may be," Chirrut says.
"But this changes everything!" Jyn protests. "Someone with the Force, right here? Now you have proof, you have to stay!"
"Ah. You remember little of the time before the Empire, don't you?"
"Yes," Jyn says.
"I was born near the founding of the Empire," Luke says. "Guards back home called it a good omen. Never knew what they were going on about."
"That explains much. When I was younger than I am now, it was no strange thing to hear tales of the Jedi and the Force they used. Trusting in their power was not a sign of faith, it was the mark of one who kept up with the news of the galaxy. When the Empire rose, many found it easy to bow their heads and pretend that had never happened, but even not sensing the Force myself, I learned that the Guardians' faith was by and large of a deeper sort. Now to meet a Jedi—if you tolerate an old man's ramblings, I would hear much of your doings and answer whatever I can about what I know, but your purpose is to serve the galaxy, not to bolster my convictions."
"Well, my convictions are a little bolstered," Jyn shrugs.
"Then perhaps they are still growing."
"I'll try to requisition some sparring weapons," says Luke. "And, uh, leave you to it for now."
He paces off, and Chirrut turns back to Jyn. "Still want to stay?"
"I think we should stay," she says, and this time there is no question what she means.