Written pre-season 2 even starting to air; my first foray into this ship.
When Cara had been little more than a child – young enough to be spared the worse details of the accident but old enough for her curiosity to be considered inappropriate – one of her neighbours had lost her sight.
Even back then, she had thought that the expression had removed a good portion of the guilt from its original source. A much better way to describe it would have been said neighbour's father having an experiment go disastrously wrong – so disastrously, in fact, that it had started a fire that had left their home in shambles. The man's protective gear had spared him from the worst of it, but his daughter, one room over, had had no such luck. She'd undergone weeks of treatment, but they hadn't managed to save her sight and the next time Cara had met her, months later, she'd been eager to hear all about the changes her life had been put through.
Her name had been Niarla and she had loved to read. It had been the first thing Cara had asked about, of course, and the answer she had received had been even more mystifying than the initial lack of information – the new books that she'd been given had been blank, filled only with three-dimensional dots, each cluster of them representing a different letter until they formed words. She had been able to keep reading that way, but it had felt like an entirely new language and Cara had stood by her side the entire time, trying to see it all from her perspective. Nothing about reading had been as fun when she'd been on her own, and plus, she had never backed down from a challenge before. She hadn't given up that day either.
The whole ordeal had been an exercise in patience and restraint, but Cara had made it; she'd stood by her friend's side, eyes closed and fingers trailing over the new and yet familiar words in front of her, memorising it all bit by bit until she'd been able to read it easily. They'd gone back to sharing their books after that and it had all only ended when Cara had gone off to war and had never seen her homeworld again before its end, but the time they'd spent together had stuck with her, as had the new skill – finding patterns where some would see none; finding her way through touch alone.
It's what she does now as she navigates her way through the darkness that the Crest is plunged into – trails her fingers over every flat surface, trying to imagine it all as it would usually look. Her eyes would have long since accustomed to the new situation if only there had been the tiniest source of lights to accommodate to, but there isn't. They're in deep space, surrounded by endless night and distant stars, struggling to drift closer to the nearest system as the ship tries to heave itself out of the power outage from a few hours back. Cara assumes it's been a few hours, at least, but there's no real way of telling and that's just as frustrating, not knowing, even as she tries to ground herself into the fact that she's not as helpless as many would have been in her position.
There are steps sounding off behind her, purposefully loud, and Cara stops in her tracks. It's Din – of course it is, there's no one else on board who could make this much noise – but she appreciates the warning for what it is. Ever since they'd fixed the ship and started waiting for the damned machine to catch up with the repairs, he'd learnt not to approach her without announcing himself lest he ends up on the wrong side of her reflexes.
"Kid asleep?"
Her voice sounds so suffocatingly alone without the usual whirling of a thousand mechanisms around them that she has to suppress a shudder. Can't have him seeing her ruffled by this – he has a helmet to help him out with the darkness reigning over them. It makes her feel vulnerable to be the only one robbed of one of her senses, but not quite as much as she would have expected – it's him, after all. It's been a long time since she'd felt unsafe on this ship and she carefully fights off the instinctive irritation that her disadvantage brings to the surface.
"He is. He's less cold than we are, I think; it's probably got to do with his body temperature."
"Maybe." She's glad that someone here isn't suffering in any way. Makes one of them. "I brought all the blankets I could find back to the cockpit." Not that there had been many. The temperature on the Crest is easily regulated, most of the time, and can be changed independently from room to room, but with no power to speak of and all of the ship's efforts manually redirected to life support, it's growing colder by the minute. She'd have preferred a full-body armour now, no matter how inconvenient it usually feels, and Din scoffs when she says as much out loud.
"It has its uses," he allows, voice heavy with sarcasm, "as I'm sure I've mentioned before. Some unexpected ones, too, like protecting your body."
She is not having this conversation – again – right now. "Do you want a blanket or not?"
The air by hear ear shifts as he, Cara imagines, gestures forward. "Lead the way."
It's his ship and he can see, but she understands the intention all the same and her gloved hand finds his, pulling him along as she feels her way to the main control room.
It's a fraction brighter in there now, she notices as they come in, a star – somewhat larger than the others and slowly but surely approaching throwing faint shadows around the room. Cara swirls around. "I think we're being pulled into orbit."
"I certainly am." Din's hand lets go of hers to curl around her forearm; a welcome warmth and an invitation if she's ever heard one. She steps closer into his space, basking in it to her heart's content. "Is that your plan? We wait it all out here?"
"Better than your quarters – or mine," Cara shrugs. "If that ball of fire over there gets to us before the ship's power does, we'll feel it here first."
"Good point." She can hear him shifting closer to the controls, pushing the pilot's chair out of the way to get to her pile of scavenged fabric. It's soon followed by the distinct sound of his helmet coming off, followed by the rest of his armour, and Cara falters.
"What's that about?"
"Conserving body heat generally works better if we do it together." She'd been too wrapped up in her attempts to figure his intentions out without a visual to hear him approaching again, but before she can blink, his hands are on her shoulder plates, methodically clipping them off and dropping them to the floor and she helps him along with the rest of her top, too distracted to resist. "I assumed that was the point."
"It was." There's little they haven't seen of each other at this point and, even though Cara is too cold to feel up for anything more taxing than trying not to freeze, she had assumed it would be effective enough. Everything coming off hadn't exactly been part of the plan. "The power could come back on at any time."
"It could." His voice is carefully nonchalant, even easier to read than it usually is now that it's unfiltered, and Cara promptly resolves to drop it. Whatever point he's trying to make, to himself or to her, is his own to examine. His fingers linger at the edge of her belt once they'd rid her of her undershirt with collective efforts. "Are you joining me or not?"
"This better work," she offers in lieu of an answer, trembling hands peeling off the rest of her armour once she'd kicked off her boots. She and Din stumble over to the covers and she sighs in relief once they're finally under them. He runs hot and usually, so does she, but the extended deprivation from any kind of warmth makes her feel as if it's all been sapped out of her and she greedily soaks in his presence, trailing a finger down his chest, blindly learning every bit of his body that she knows so well in daylight. She finally settles in with her head tucked under his chin and holds her breath when he stops her hand mid-caress, pulling it up soundlessly to the side of his face.
It's not something she hasn't done before, but it makes her freeze in place all the same. On a normal day, this is a controlled scene: she's blindfolded, if he's even more eager to look at her than he usually would be, or the lights are off and not about to come back on without warning.
This is far from a normal day and none of it is under their control, and Cara welcomes it in easily. She's gentler than she usually would be without the frantic impatience that tends to surround their encounters and the comfort of the contact between them slowly seeps into her, ridding her of the anxieties and worries that the day had been riddled with. It's another process of learning and relearning that she's familiar with, when compared to that experience that feels like a lifetime ago back on her own world: getting to know someone without seeing them. Niarla had given her some insight when it had come to that, too, her fingers mapping out Cara's face carefully as she's frowned to herself.
"If I didn't know what you look like," she had said thoughtfully, hand lingering on every more prominent bit of Cara's features as if trying to match up the feeling to the visual that she must have still had in her head, "I wouldn't have been able to guess." She hadn't really understood back then, but it does make sense now – she would recognise him by touch even if all her other senses are taken away. It's been a while now since she'd first started that exploration, but by now, it's the easiest thing in the world, every little detail mapped out in her mind in a picture her eyes have no reference for. There's comfort in that, too – in knowing that she's in familiar territory now that she'd been left in the dark.
She shifts around in search of the most comfortable possible position in their temporary bed, careful lest her knees end up somewhere unpleasant, and Din huffs out an amused laugh as she pulls a stray blanket even further up over her shoulders.
"Better now?"
Cara doesn't bother to glare at him – he can't see her anyway – and nods against his chest instead. She knows she's a difficult bedmate more often than not, but falling asleep has felt like a chore since the day she'd joined the Rebellion; being as comfortable as possible seems to be the only thing that eases the hassle somewhat.
"Much better."
Everything is warm and dark and safe and, reluctantly, Cara lets herself relax into his arms.
~.~
Din is almost asleep himself by the time that he realises that Cara isn't.
"I'm sorry," she says, elbow brushing past his side as she curses and sits up again. He can't see and it's beyond disorienting when the warmth of her disappears in a rush, so he can't help the hazed, sleepy questioning noise that slips past his lips. "It's my hair."
"What about it?" He had been on edge all day just like her, his senses struggling to compensate for his ship's most recent malfunctions, and the non-sequitur isn't helping.
"If I leave it up, I'll have to cut it off tomorrow morning." He's just about to ask about the significance of leaving the braid in overnight when a much more mundane explanation follows. "It'll be a mess."
"I've seen you leave it in before." Has he seen her without it, really? No such memory comes to mind. In every place they've been that had required all of their clothes to come off – such as his quarters or the shower – they'd been in complete darkness so that he can honour his ways. The thought of seeing her undo it suddenly feels more illicit than anything they'd ever done together.
"Yes, when sleeping in the woods. There's nothing to mess with it there."
No, he supposes there isn't. "I can help if you want."
They're inching, ever so slowly, closer to the star that seems to be pulling them into orbit, and while it's still too distant for him to make out anything farther away than about two feet, with Cara backlit by its faint shine, he can just about make out her silhouette. It takes his breath away, the way she always does, but panic rushes in when she freezes in place with both hands raised to the side of her head, clearly startled into silence.
He backtracks before she's had the chance to speak. "Never mind. Never mind that. You— you go ahead."
It's too dark for her to see him cringe, thank the Maker.
Slowly, Cara drops her arms by her side and lowers herself back onto the blankets, effectively plunging what little of her he'd been able to see back into darkness.
"All right."
It's too short of a response for him not to be suspicious. Usually, she's far more talkative than that. "Cara," he begins weakly, fully aware that he doesn't really have it in him to try and act against his own best interest. "It was just an idea—"
"A good one," she soldiers on and Din can feel her hair whisper over his chest as she leans even further down. It had grown longer in the time they'd spent apart; it had been one of the first things he'd noticed about her when they'd met again. Now it falls in inky black waves over one shoulder, the braid on the other side thicker than before with even more colourful streaks threading through it. He's been itching to get his hands on it properly for weeks. "Go on."
He swallows heavily, hand reaching up without his input to brush a few stray strands out of her face. He can't see her, but it doesn't matter – there's no mistaking the view of her that he always has in his mind's eye, hair tousled by the wind or a fight or any of the ways they choose to amuse themselves while travelling together, face lit up by that devastating smirk that she's rarely seen without. Even now, as one of his fingers strays down to wander over her cheeks, he can map out her dimples, the curve of her full mouth when she turns her face into his hand, her affection as easy as it's precious.
"If you're sure."
"I am." She takes him by the hand, the amused lilt to her voice enough to make him smile in response, even if she wouldn't be able to tell. There's more to it than she's letting on even if he can't quite pinpoint what exactly it is, and Din hesitantly responds to her touch at long last, feeling around for where her braid is tied off on the back of her head. He pulls it free from its clip and valiantly tries to ignore the way she's – once again – gone still as stone in his arms. It's an elaborate hairstyle and she guides his fingers through the first few strands, but he finds it rather easy once it's loose enough to start coming apart on its own. It's soft as silk under his learning touch and, with no visual aid to speak of, it's even easier to get a feel for the texture of it; for the way it's all held up by itself with very little outside help, judging by the little wisps of hair pulling it up and down. He carefully tugs out the colourful decoration that she'd woven into the rest of it and puts it aside, focusing instead on working out how to finish untangling the braid at its root.
"Here," Cara chimes in, quickly releasing it from the final strands holding it up so that it falls down, loose and nearly unravelled. It's her turn to laugh, sharp and quiet and nervous in a way he's never heard before, and Din stops in his tracks.
"What is it?"
"Nothing." When he doesn't move to continue, she lets out a sigh. "I was just trying to imagine what my mother would say if she could see me now."
And just like that, he's at a loss. Her homeworld is a difficult topic on the best of days, given what had happened, but she'd never really mentioned her family before and he had thought it better not to ask. If there's anything Din understands, it's the reluctance to dwell on the past, especially when it comes to his most distant memories. He'd always strove to give her all the space she could need on that matter and now that even a sliver of it is out in the open, there's no knowing how to proceed.
By now, he knows her just well enough to know how to lighten the mood. When in doubt, tease. "See you how? Naked on the floor of a broken down ship floating in deep space?"
She shakes her head while he threads his fingers through the last remnants of the elaborate hairstyle. "With my hair in the hands of a man I've known for less than a year and whose face I've never even seen." As if unaware of his sudden realisation that she's offered him a privilege that no one else had ever been granted before, Cara continues in a tone eerily similar to her own if slightly higher-pitched and anxiously fast-paced, in what he supposes must be imitation. "You have no shame, Carasynthia. I don't know why I ever wasted my time trying to knock sense into you when you're clearly not cut out for it." Pretence over, she's back to the drawl he knows and loves. "I've heard it about a thousand times, of course, but she never got bored of it. This would've been my crowning achievement."
Din's about to let go and apologise and possibly not touch any part of her for the next hour or so while she figures out what this means for her, but stays put once it occurs to him that she already knows. This is Cara's way, roundabout as it tends to be, to say that she cares; that this is as big of a deal as it can possibly be and that she's allowing it because— because—
"What does it mean, exactly?" he blurts out before his common sense manages to catch up with him. "Letting someone else do this for you?"
She's silent for long enough for Din to assume that he's finally pushed too far. When her voice breaks through the tension again, it's uncertain in the way it only ever is when she knows what she wants to say but isn't sure if she should. "Well, you already know what the braid means."
He offers a sound of acknowledgment in response. They'd met another survivor of her homeworld not too long ago and, while Cara had been busy arguing with some merchant over a knife she'd apparently needed but hadn't been willing to pay the full price for, and her fellow Alderaanian had looked at her thoughtfully and had eventually buckled down to ask, "She was a soldier, wasn't she?"
"She was." The past tense had felt both entirely correct and a little like a lie – she no longer works for anyone but herself, and yet, "She's still a fighter, in a way—"
"Oh, I can see that." The woman had pointed to her own head and its entirely different hairdo, as if it would be enough of an explanation. To her, it probably had been.
Later, when he'd retold the conversation to Cara, she had scoffed derisively, though she'd been obviously pleased that someone had seen her in a way she had considered lost forever.
"Don't be so shocked." His confusion had likely been visible despite the helmet. "It can be like a whole separate language when you want it to be. She was nobility; I could see it straight away. Her hair was all a tribute to that. Mine is about the things you'd usually need in a fight – precision, balance, courage..."
He repeats it all back to her now, still smoothing out the waves of her hair where they've been held up for Maker knows how long, and Cara hums in agreement. "Undoing it for the night feels like being off-duty; like unwinding from all of the things I've needed to be through the day. Someone else doing that for me— it can be a show of trust." It is a show of trust, but he doesn't need her to say it to know. "It's leaving the responsibility of relief from my daily duties in someone else's hands."
In your hands, she doesn't say, and Din's heart stutters over itself for a moment, doing an odd little leap as Cara shifts in his arms once again. "And that's scandalous?"
"It's— intimate." Even the way she says it has the effect she had very likely intended and Din desperately tries to push past his body's – and mind's – initial reaction to stay on topic. There's another pause, as if she's bracing herself for something she's not too used to voicing, and then, "Thank you for letting me share it with you."
And then she's back to being sprawled over him, out like a light or at least pretending to be, and Din resigns himself to not figuring out this particular quirk of hers tonight. He had been the one on the receiving end here, or so he had thought, and the violent influx of emotion the thought had brought has nowhere to go now that she's unwilling to continue whatever it had been that she'd just offered him. With no other outlet to speak of, Din resolutely closes his eyes, too.
Finally, they sleep.
~.~
It's no longer dark when he opens his eyes again.
Din shivers, still half-asleep, and struggles up to his elbows. The light around him is a sickly yellowish mix of the approaching down and the Crest's already functioning illumination, and his body aches in the way it only ever does when he's spent the night on the ground. Cara's blanket hoard had helped somewhat, but with her on top of him, to say he'd got the worse end of the deal would have been an understatement.
Cara—
She's still asleep when he looks down at her, eyelashes fluttering madly in the clutches of her dream, her dark hair spilling over his chest and tickling one of his sides. Like this, tousled and undone, it feels even more inviting to sink his fingers into; get a proper grip on it like he tends to do, keep her anchored and lose himself in her, at least for as long as she allows it.
Wake up, he thinks, unexpected but so persistent that the sentiment takes his breath away. Wake up, look at me. See me, see me.
Cara wakes the way she always does – with a start and a sharp intake of breath, eyes fluttering to take in her surroundings but staying well away from his face; a habit that must be too deeply ingrained for him to try and dismantle on a whim.
"Din," she greets, voice scratchy and heavy with sleep. He wants to kiss it clean off of her and does just that, seeking her out in the self-imposed darkness of their closed eyes.
See me, he had thought – begged, demanded – and she does.