Chapter 4: Bourbon
Attention all crew, this is Captain Kirk speaking. As some of you may already know, on their mission to Jalta 5, Officers Jyn Erso and Cassian Andor experienced difficulties when beaming back. I am deeply sorry to report that, as far as we're aware, they did not survive the trip.
The malfunction in the transporter beam resulted in two alternate-universe inhabitants to materialise on the ship instead, as during the Mirror Universe incident a year ago. They are not considered to be dangerous and every crewmember will receive a debrief on how to handle the new passengers. Needless to say I expect everyone to read it and be aware of the situation.
A memorial service for the officers will be held in the mess hall at eight o'clock standard time. Everyone is welcome to attend.
Captain Kirk out.
Jyn had heard of the phrase 'Like a fish out of water', but she had never imagined it would apply to her.
Back home, the entire universe was Empire or Resistance, danger and temporary safety. She could infiltrate any planet, make her way out of any prison and, as it turns out, turn her life around and join a universal cause against a great evil and even (dare she have ever hoped) make friends.
This was new. This was alien. This strange, non-hostile cold-shoulder of a world that she didn't belong in made her wake up shivering, gasping for breath with images of her companions lying empty-eyed on the sands of Scarif. She would calm herself by replaying in her mind her training, Saw's strict and occasionally cruel regiment, ways to quickly assemble and take apart various types of blasters and finally, her breathing would still in the cool, sterile air of the medbay.
They spent their first two days on the alien ship in a strangely relative peace, due to the craft's commanders wanting them to recover from their injuries. Cassian spent most of that time asleep, since his injuries had been a lot worse than hers and Jyn was soon treated to a brief introduction to Captain Kirk, Commander Spock and Scotty, the red-shirted man they'd first met who was apparently head of Engineering (You gave us a right fright there, lassie, put me back on the scotch for the last few days).
She refused to allow Spock into her mind for an explicative meld, If there's one thing I can still hold onto that's mine in this world, it's my head and I won't be letting anyone in if I can help it.
The doctor that had knocked her out the first time with what she later learned was a sedative administered through an object called a 'hypo', skirted around her like a terrified animal. She learned his name was Bones, or Dr. McCoy, and whenever she saw him and his caution, she'd follow him with a defiant and threatening gaze until he was done with his ministrations, because while she didn't think he'd go for knocking her out again, there was definitely a satisfaction in keeping him on edge.
However, it was Bones who surprised her out of the dream-like state of recovery on the third day.
"Here, have some."
He held out a glass of a clear, golden-brown liquid that she could only assume to be alcohol as he nursed another one in his other hand. She eyed it suspiciously before looking up at him. No, her look said, you don't get to make peace offerings after the shit you pulled.
Bones sighed, taking a long swig of his own drink. He winced and turned his eyes back to hers, frowning and insistent.
"You don't have to accept a drink from someone you don't know, kid, but I'm offering you some of my best bourbon and after the crap you two've been through, trust me when I say you'll need it."
He kept his arm stretched out stubbornly and she sighed before accepting the offering. She sniffed the liquid. Its odour was powerful, something that reminded her of Flameout, which she'd once had the pleasure of trying in order to stay warm when Saw took her to some god-forsaken ice planet outpost.
"What is it?"
"You ain't ever tried whisky before?" Bones looked like a mix of offended and amused. "It's my number one prescription for a shitty life, first on the list of doctor's orders. Keeps the throat burning and the bad memories from turning. And gets you drunker than Scotty on Burns' Night when the going gets too tough."
She tried a tiny sip and coughed as she felt the burn of alcohol run down her throat. The taste wasn't all unpleasant though and she clung to the glass a little tighter, eyeing her newfound companion as he made his way to the visitor's chair and collapsed into it.
"So, a parallel universe, huh? Must be a rough time trying to get your bearings around here. You and your companion are real good at healing up though, I've never seen anyone recover from that level of burns and broken bones that quickly."
Jyn considered ignoring the doctor, her pent-up anxiousness and resentment still snaking around her like chains, but the need for conversation and understanding of this world won out. She needed a person she could talk to, even if it was not necessarily someone she could trust. Cassian was just as confused and lost- and out cold- but this man had held out a helping hand and she wasn't stupid enough not to take it.
"It might be bacta. Both I and, I'm guessing, Cassian have been immersed in it and it might leave a residual healing effect. Your universe doesn't seem to have anything like it."
"Bacta, huh. Is this something to do with that Force thing that Spock keeps raving about?"
"The Force…"
I am one with the Force and the Force is with me.
Jyn suddenly felt like a speck of galactic debris, floating in an endless vacuum of stars, nothing to stop it and nothing to turn it. How did she end up in a universe where she would have to find the words to describe what the Force is, what it means? Where the Empire is nothing but a story only two people can tell and everything she's ever known is gone, as though it had never existed?
"Bacta doesn't directly work through the Force, but the Force runs through every living being. Many have forgotten about it - and the Jedi - but I keep the lessons of my family." She said, lightly fingering the Kyber necklace on her chest, adding "It's not something I can explain."
"Well it sure makes my life easier to have you guys out of woods this quick." Bones shrugged, downing the rest of his glass of whisky and pulling a bottle out from under the visitor's chair to refill. Jyn wondered briefly if there were bottles of the stuff hidden throughout the entire infirmary. "I didn't mean to hypo you that time, you know. We ain't some kinda animals, we treat people right whether they're our friends or not."
He looked her straight in the eyes at this and she felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up.
"I know you've been through tough times and you don't owe us a thing. But I'll be damned if you harm anyone on board this ship. Now you two don't strike me as the kind of people who go around causing pain for the hell of it, but consider this my own personal precaution: I've got hypos that do more than just help you sleep."
Jyn listened in silence and sipped her whisky. She had no incentives to threaten the good doctor and it felt necessary, almost obligatory, to sit through the lecture. Bones looked relieved after her lack of outright hostility, his shoulders visibly relaxing.
"Anyway, you'll be getting your own quarters on the ship soon and you'll have to face the reality of being stuck here for now. There'll be people that want to know where our Jyn and Cassian are and there'll be those that won't leave you alone no matter the official instructions are. You'll look like friends to them and it won't be easy for anyone." The doctor leaned over and poured her another dram. "My point is, if you ever need to just sit away from it all and have a numbing whisky-induced binge, you can come to me. Doctor's advice. You too."
He nodded to someone behind her and Jyn turned to see Cassian's awake and amused eyes meeting hers. Bones nodded again.
"We'll be leaving Jalta 5 in a few hours, their government were less than helpful. I believe that after the botched political meetings, Kirk's just about ready to punch the warp button and disappear from the system. We'll be on a mapping mission for the next week or so and that'll give you guys a bit of time to settle in without imminent danger to your lives from some unseen force." he chuckled darkly "Though God knows a 'simple mission' is never what we end up getting."
"Is there any chance we could talk to Captain any time soon?" Cassian asked, frowning.
"Oh Jim's eager to chat to you two. He's just not too sure on how to approach the damn elephants and cows sitting in the room. He said he'll be having a proper sit-down once you two leave medbay, which I'll be sanctioning in about three days. Meantime, we've been keeping out visitors that want to see you with their own eyes, but you're allowed to decide whether or not you want to deal with that while here or whenever you move out into your own quarters."
Jyn thought about Baze and Chirrut and Bodhi and her father and how they would have felt if she'd been replaced with an identical non-Jyn. She shook her head.
"No, I think introductions can wait." She looked around and saw Cassian's agreeing nod. Strange, how they'd become symbiotic in the space of a few days. She found herself wanting to curl up beside him, to physically hang on to what little sanity she could still find in the universe. Her fingers twitched.
"Yeah I figured." Shrugged Bones. "Just remember, you can't avoid this forever. Everyone on this damn ship is messed up."
Three days meant learning. Jyn poured over the history and cultural documents concerning the new universe, delighted in previously untasted foodstuffs and lost herself in conversations with Cassian. The sharp feeling of caution never fully abandoned her, but with every calm, passing day, she felt herself relax a little more.
She learned of Cassian's childhood with the Rebellion, the burnt down and decimated home he'd found one day on his home planet, Stormtroopers marching around looking for survivors. She could feel, as he must have done, the sheer terror and the singular thought that repeated in the six-year-old's mind, the need to get away, the pain of seeing his parents' bloodied bodies. She found out that his parents had been helping the Rebellion by secretly shipping supplies and medical aid and that Cassian had not even been aware of this until the Empire took everything away from him and the Rebellion took him in, frozen and hungry, two days after he'd run out of tears at the body of his mother.
She learned of the Federation from info pads, their mission of peace and the obstacles in its way. She devoured pages on the Romulans and the Klingons, on various species and histories of planets. There was something that made her giddy, every time she realised that nowhere was there mention of Death Stars or Empires or Stormtroopers, even if their galactic history was by no means spotless.
She shared her own stories with Cassian. She told him of her mother as she held the still-warm Kyber crystal in her palms. She spoke of Saw Guerrera and how she wished she'd have more memories of her father's kisses on her cheeks and her mother's hugs than hiding in dank alleys waiting for a target to shoot down. She spoke of Saw's loud guffawing laugh before he'd turned colder and harder than the frozen wastelands on Hoth.
She wanted to tell him what it had meant for her to have Cassian on that beach on Scarif, to know that for once she wasn't alone and even death didn't scare her anymore. She occasionally noticed his eyes soften in a way she'd only ever seen on that day and wondered what that meant. She wondered if the Rebel Captain was better off in a world where he was no longer a rebel or a captain. Then Jyn would recede back into herself and try unsuccessfully to forget those eyes.
She learned of dilithium crystals, attempted to understand a little about their spacetravel and the warp drive. Cassian shared her curiosity for the construction and performance of spacecrafts, which were seemingly not particularly different to those back home apart from the lack of manoeuvrability and militaristic capabilities, which made sense in a space-battle short world. Their ships were mostly large, powerful and rarely engaged with each other.
Jyn soon decided she liked the fact that their weapons could be set to 'stun' instead of 'kill' and she told herself it was for tactical reasons and not because it may have become too much to always see the light leave someone's eyes so immediately, so uncontrollably after her finger pulled the trigger.
On the fourth night of their rescue, she'd curled up at Cassian's side, in his bunk and felt the tears she knew would never fall linger in her mind. She knew she could control it and she did, but there was a hollowness left behind by Rogue One that even Saw's cautions, ringing in her ears, couldn't fill. So she listened to Cassian's heartbeat and felt his arm around her frame and dreamed of walls of fire and strange gateways between universes.
She heard him whisper something and though she didn't hear what it was, she knew it was important. She was glad to not be alone.
Are you with me?
All the way.
He'd really meant it, then.
Then one day, Jim came in and handed them clothes made of soft fabric and said:
"Let's go, I'll show you where you'll be living. And then we'll have a talk."