looook it's chirrut and baze 3 next chapter is saw!
Ch 10
Chirrut sits on an abandoned crate, staff between his fingers, and watches.
The fact that he is completely blind and therefore cannot truly 'watch' anything has occurred to him; like all untruths, however, he dismisses it. He does not have sight, but he has the Force, and thus he watches every swirl and eddy in its neverending current.
Once, he could have touched that current, molded it to his satisfaction-although he was not strong enough for the Jedi Order, he was attuned to the Force in all the ways that mattered, and his connection only grew when he lost his sight. The Guardians of the Whills gave him a home when the Order would not take in a sickly, pale, blind boy.
And then Order 66 came, and one by one the brightly burning minds sustaining the flow of the Force dimmed and went out, and the shining light of the Force faded and darkened into shadowed twilight, and suddenly Chirrut was alone, and he could do little more than compensate for the sense he had lost with the barest traces of fire that remained. He was-still is-alone in an unlit river that once gleamed with pure light, and every ripple and eddy echoes with loss.
And, as the Empire continues to strip Jedha of kyber, the light falls ever lower, like the setting sun.
(he cannot stop himself from fearing that it is dusk, now, that with the loss of the jedi the force fell into evening, and now the last vestige of sunlight is fading, fading, and night is so very close now)
But the Force has one last gleam left, yet, a single ray of light and hope, and the warmth of it gladdens him, and he dares to hope that sunset might last a little longer, that the coming night will not be everlasting.
There is a star coming to Jedha, and she burns brighter than any he has seen since the sunset began.
(and beyond her, perhaps, there is an inferno so glorious he can feel the heat of the ghostly flames even now)
(but only perhaps, and he does not dare to hope for anything greater than this)
Chirrut Imwe shakes his head at his own sentimentality, feeling rather like his husband with the gesture (Baze often shakes his head, at Chirrut and at sentimentality), and lets a smile spread across his face.
"May the Force of others be with you," he calls out, and if there's a tinge of self-satisfaction in the words, well.
Baze isn't here to scold him, is he?
[=|=]
Those people unfortunate enough to be citizens of the Holy City of Jedha are either cautious, careful, eyes flickering around for the smallest sign of trouble, or they are like the man who's just slammed into Jyn. Very much not on accident.
"Hey, you just watch yourself," he snarls, eyes flashing and fists clenching.
Jyn stiffens, starts to turn-ready to fly into a fight-but Cassian's hand on her arm stops her.
"No, no," he tells the man quickly, tugging on Jyn. "Tourists, we don't want any trouble, sorry. Come on," he hisses, yanking Jyn's arm hard enough to send a twinge of pain running up her shoulder. "Come on."
Jyn makes a face, but lets him guide her through the crowd. "This place is ready to blow," she murmurs, watching a handful of stormtroopers march through the street near them. "What's your plan?" she adds, after Cassian makes no response beyond a quick look at her.
He sighs. "I had a contact, one of Saw's rebels, but he's just gone missing."
He hesitates before 'missing', and Jyn frowns ever-so-slightly and studies him more closely, but there are no clues to be found in his face. So she shrugs, and files it away for future reference.
"His sister will be looking for him," Cassian continues. "The Temple's been destroyed, but she'll be there waiting. We'll give her your name and hope she'll get us a meeting with Saw."
Jyn curls her lip slightly. If this is the plan Draven's thought up, well, the Alliance has gotten more desperate than she'd realized. "Hope?" she echoes, raising an eyebrow.
Cassian shrugs. "Rebellions are built on hope."
It sounds like something Lyra would say. Jyn shrugs, then tracks a stormtrooper as he grabs some unsuspecting citizen and holds them against the wall. "Is this all from your pilot?" she asks through gritted teeth, every muscle tight with the urge to intervene.
Cassian doesn't answer.
Up ahead, a voice calls out, "May the Force of others be with you. May the Force of others be with you."
The voice belongs to an obviously-blind man sitting on a crate, holding a staff. His blank eyes are focused onto Jyn, locked on her as though he can see, and she hardly notices when Cassian softly tells her to wait there.
"Would you trade that necklace for a glimpse into your future?" the monk-or so he appears-asks abruptly. Jyn tenses, tries not to react- "Yes, I'm talking to you," he continues serenely, and her eyes fly to him against her will. "My name is Chirrut Imwe."
"How-" Shock closes her throat for a second, and she swallows thickly, tries again. "How did you know I was wearing a necklace?"
Chirrut smiles mysteriously. "Ah, for that answer you must pay." Then, a spark entering his voice: "What do you know of kyber crystals?"
No matter who he is, Chirrut has no business prying into her life and mind. She blanks her face, hiding everything behind a mask-not that it would do anything for a blind man, but just in case anyone's watching her, anyone close enough to hear. "My father said they powered the Jedi lightsabers," she says casually, injecting as much meaning into her voice as she can without outright giving anything away.
Asking him, silently.
Chirrut laughs, then, showing white teeth-startling in his tan face. "The strongest stars have hearts of kyber," he says, amusement thick in every word.
And then Cassian is back, his hand curling around her elbow once more. "Jyn, come on. Let's go. We're not here to make friends," he adds, following her gaze to Chirrut.
Reluctantly, she lets Cassian pull her away. "Who are they?" she asks softly, glancing back over her shoulder one more time.
"The Guardians of the Whills," he answers in a similarly quiet tone. "Protectors of the Kyber Temple. Only, there's nothing left to protect, so now they're just causing trouble for everybody."
Something's different about him, now, something subtle but all-too-real in the tightness in his lips, the wall in his eyes, the barely-there increase in his pace. Most people wouldn't see it.
Most people are not trained Intelligence agents for the Rebel Alliance, either.
"What's wrong?" Jyn whispers, darting another look at his face. "Cassian, what did you see?"
"You said it earlier," he mumbles back. "This city's ready to blow. We need to get out of here."
"And the mission? Do we have a backup plan?"
Before Cassian can answer her, a squadron of stormtroopers marches into the square, blasters at the ready, in formation around a large armored vehicle. He swears under his breath-barely loud enough for her to hear-and his grip on her elbow tightens.
That's when the grenade lands in the center of the square and goes off.
Chaos ensues, and Jyn laughs.
"I think we found Saw's rebels," she says with a grin as he yanks her into the shelter of a doorway.
(a part of her mind registers how close they are. the rest of her mind does its best to ignore that)
Cassian swears again, and starts to speak, but Jyn's eyes are captured by a horribly familiar sight-
There's a child, no older than four or five solar years, dirty and ragged from the explosion, tears streaming down her face-
Without thinking, ignoring Cassian's shout, Jyn flings herself through the stormtroopers and the smoke, catches the girl and rolls away just as another grenade goes off. A young woman-the girl's mother, Jyn realizes-steps forward, chokes out a hasty "Thank you," and snatches the girl from Jyn's arms, vanishing down a side street.
The stormtroopers return fire, and swearing, Jyn ducks into the dubious shelter of the armored vehicle containing what she'd bet are kyber crystals and watches for just a second-and then Cassian's moving, just a little, and she realizes abruptly he's adding attachable parts to turn his blaster into a sniper rifle.
She pokes her head out just in time to see the man on the roof, the Partisan throwing the grenades, fall dead to the ground.
And then the stormtroopers turn their fire towards Cassian.
(that won't do at all)
(she can't just allow that to happen)
Jyn pulls out her blaster-well, Cassian's, but it's hers now-and fires off three shots as she rolls out from behind the shipment vehicle.
Three stormtroopers hit the ground, smoking holes in their helmets.
She holsters the blaster and pulls out her batons instead, snapping them out to their full lengths. Another roll beneath several blaster shots, and she comes up to her feet in the midst of the remaining troopers; before they can get their blasters trained on her once more she moves.
Faintly, she sees Cassian leaning against the doorframe, staring at her in utter shock; he's seen her fight once before, but it was a scant five stormtroopers that time. She winks at him when she gets the chance then whirls away, and everything fades into the rush of the fight.
Jyn ducks beneath a blaster, brings her baton down over the trooper's helmet, cracking the plastoid, and he falls to the ground; she spins and kicks another in the crotch, drives a baton into the gut of the trooper behind her, and whirls with batons extended to take out another two.
The fight is over in a matter of moments.
Cassian shoves away from the doorframe, a stunned look on his face; he closes his mouth wordlessly, almost as though he'd been gaping (and maybe he has been, she wasn't exactly watching). "That was… impressive," he says, then shakes himself and beckons to her. "This way!"
She follows him down a narrow sidestreet, staying just behind and to his right, and then a hulking black shape appears and without hesitation she shoots the droid in the head.
"Did you know that wasn't me?" a mechanical voice asks, and K-2 appears from behind the broken droid.
She smiles blithely. "Of course."
She knows K doesn't believe her.
She also doesn't really care what the droid does and doesn't believe.
Cassian shoots her a warning look, then turns back to K. "I told you to stay on the ship with Lyra," he says.
"You did, but I thought it was boring, and you were in trouble," K answers, and Jyn has the feeling he would roll his eyes if he could. "There are a lot of explosions for two people blending in," he continues, "and Lyra Erso is worried. She says the Empire is transmitting a lot of level one encrypted messages to and from the star destroyer. She is working on decoding them now."
Before Cassian can do more than exchange a worried look with Jyn, there's the sound of boots, and then-
"Freeze right there!"
"You know," K says, almost conversationally, "I think you're right. I should just wait on the ship."
"Where are you taking them?" one stormtrooper asks K, then, coming forward with his blaster out.
The conversation that follows would be considered comical under any other circumstances; Jyn has only interacted with K a few times, and thus had no idea that the droid is such an abysmal liar. An interesting choice for a spy.
And one that ended with the two of them in binders, surrounded by stormtroopers.
(if she glares hard enough, maybe K will short-circuit? it's a long shot for sure, but, well…)
Just as they're marched to the end of the alley, a familiar voice echoes out.
"Let them pass in peace! Let them pass in peace."
Jyn shifts a little to see Chirrut standing relaxed and confident, blocking the troopers' path, and a tiny smile slides onto her face.
"The Force is with me, and I am with the Force. And I fear nothing, for all is as the Force wills it."
And the, quite suddenly, he moves.
The staff whirls in his hands like a living thing, striking out at the troopers with a will of its own, and the ground is littered with bodies in white armor before Jyn can do more than take a single breath.
They hardly have time to relax before there's another squadron approaching, and then suddenly a massive hulk of a man appears and tears the stormtroopers to pieces with what looks like a repeating blaster cannon-Jyn practically drools at the sight of it-and then everything is silent.
Into this silence, Chirrut announces, rather annoyed, "You almost shot me."
The very large man walks over to them, slinging his gun over his shoulder, and says in a deep voice flecked with gravel, "You're welcome."
The man, who Chirrut introduces as Baze Malbus, walks over and opens the binders, casual and silent.
"Go back to the ship," Cassian tells K sternly. "Keep me up to date on what Lyra Erso finds out. And wait for my call."
K turns without a word and clanks away.
"Is he a Jedi?" the spy asks Baze after a moment.
Baze shakes his head, a half-smile curving one corner of his lips. "There are no Jedi here anymore. Only dreamers, like this fool."
"The Force did protect me," Chirrut protests.
"I protected you."
And then they are surrounded by soldiers, and Jyn with a start recognizes one or two of them, and sucks in a sharp breath.
"Anyone who kills me or my friends will answer to Saw Gerrera!" she calls out.
"Any why is that?" one man asks.
She smirks, sharp and cold. "Because I'm the daughter of Galen Erso."
"Take them!" the same man shouts, and then there's bags being thrown over their heads.
The last thing Jyn hears is Chirrut's annoyed, "But I'm blind!"