—The Ship Manifesto:
K-2SO had run all the logical possible outcomes of this single situation. He should have expected the Erso girl to sway Bodhi Rook to her cause due to his current mental state. (Even out of it, she would have swayed him anyway. The pilot happens to have a large appreciation for the girl's father.)
Cassian found K-2SO in their room. A new holodisc drive on Cassian's bed contains K-2's most recent memories. (The captain chalks it up to the droid's paranoia, and he might not be wrong, but K-2SO would rather not kill Cassian Andor in case of systemic shutdown and reboot.)
The captain debriefs K-2 on the their new assignment. (With several warnings in between for Kay to not make any comments.)
"This decision is strategically unsound," K-2SO says as they walk across the stone floor of the ziggurat. And it definitely isn't, whether his own standards or anyone else's. They're only two people, with a direct relation to Operation Fracture. (Important in their own right, but analytically not worth this effort.)
Cassian smiles. It's a strange occurrence, to which K-2 has concluded as a small chance. "Tell that to Mothma and Draven, will you?" (His rebel superiors are not fond of him. It is the tragedy of his existence that his skills are theirs to disdain.)
"Affirmative," the droid replies, "Which is why I'm telling you." (Not that he won't rather be on this mission. Considering the present circumstances, with such a challenge as the Erso girl, his talents of manhandling, capturing, restraining and extracting are virtually required.)
"Let's just go, Kay-Tu," the captain tells.
Cassian's U-Wing is still in the hangar, thankfully. He scans the hull for any dents and scratches that didn't appear to be a scar from Jedha. Knowing Jyn Erso's criminal profile, he won't put it against her to sabotage them. (Perhaps, for once, Cassian will allow him the execution of underutilized procedures hardcoded into his system.)
The two monks are standing by the boarding ramp. The blind one, Chirrut Îmwe, is showing a smile against his partner's scowl. (The spectrum of human emotion is a strange, strange object.)
"Are you joining us?" Cassian asks them. This is where K-2's computations erupt slightly. (Decision also strategically unsound.)
Chance to retrieve Jyn Erso and Bodhi Rook successfully: 73.4%
They do not react visibly. "Of course we will," Chirrut replies. (They appear to be honest.)
Chance to retrieve Jyn Erso and Bodhi Rook successfully: 69.8%
"Let's go."
They all enter the ship; the two monks make for the passenger seats as Cassian ruffles through his duffel. K-2 stands by. "Where's my blaster?" He says with exasperation as he ravages the bag. (The missing blaster means nothing equipment-wise. It's Cassian that K-2 is worried about.)
Chance of mission success: 62.6%
The corner of Baze Malbus' lips tugs slightly into what is most likely a smile. Probability that Jyn Erso took the blaster: 82.9%
"It is most evident that your blaster pistol is currently in the possession of Jyn Erso." (K-2SO begins to admire her level of pettiness and aspire for it.)
The smile the captain has worn fades into a scowl.
Overall Report: In personal study, it would be most logical to decline the mission. Cassian is showing uncommon strings of sensitivity that are most likely to interfere with task at hand.
"Would you like to know the chances of her using it against you when we come face to face?" (It's high. Very high.)
"I really don't want to know, Kay," he snorts. Frankly, Kay too prefers ignorance.
He whirrs his internal hardware as the captain stares at him oddly. "Is there something wrong with your exhaust port?"
"I'm sighing," the droid corrects.
The Death Star aims on Lah'mu, the cave rumbling within her. There's a storm below them. According to Bodhi, there always is. It would be night, even when the chrono says it's day.
They're being forced to rely on the scanners once they make it through another layer of the atmosphere.
Up, they see nothing more than slate-gray clouds and flashes of light. It's almost peaceful. But the moment the V-wing cuts through the clouds, water starts to drum the viewport as winds batter the hull.
Jyn makes a mental note to inform Draven that impromptu co-piloting is now one of her talents. Of course, Bodhi seems capable enough to fly the ship on his own. "We need to go lower," he tells her as they angle downward at a strange slope. "They might have landing trackers or patrol squadrons here."
"Might?" She yells back as a crack of lightning splits the sky in front of them.
"I haven't been here in three years." The ship lurches against the wind. "And I've never really went this way."
A spire falls away beneath them, and they descend deeper into the canyon. The rocks are too close, coming closer too fast, but if they reduce speed any more they'll be at the total mercy of the storm.
There are floodlights in the viewport: a landing pad for Imperial spacecrafts. They're not on an Imperial spacecraft.
Bodhi has no time to release the landing gear when they strike the planet's surface. The V-wing careens forward on momentum only, screeching violently against stone and mud and large rocks.
The ship turns, and Jyn is thrown out. Her body hits right at the entrance of the cockpit and begins the ache. She closes her eyes and feels the hull shred under her.
And then the ship finally stops, cockpit cracked and hull thrown out altogether; a string of hope for the ship ever flying again is nil. She sees nothing but darkness under her eyes. The cave is gone, if not for the sound of thunder.
No. Not thunder. Stormtroopers. They're too close to the facility.
Jyn opens her eyes and tries to sit up, but the pain at her chest stops her from getting to far. Her hand drifts away to check on her ribs. They ache where pressure is placed, and there is a distinct seam on one. She's broken a few of her ribs.
The cockpit looks to be ripped out of the ship halfway, and Jyn's head rests right where the hull broke apart. The cockpit is half buried in gravel and Eadu's wet dirt, as if still deciding if it wants to die or not.
The sound of thunder approaches. "Bodhi!" She yells with her suddenly hoarse voice. Her voice is gone. Only an echo of her father's: "Run!"
"Bodhi!" She repeats the name over and over again, each getting softer and more painful as her chest heaves. Everything hurts. You're not soft. It's Saw, a memory of his voice.
The pilot runs to her side. There's a wound on his forehead. Most likely from the broken viewport, but otherwise, he's better than she is. Bodhi kneels over her, but the footsteps come closer to them.
"Run!" It's a chorus of her voice and her father's and Saw's.
His hands shake over her, looking at her like she's delicate and he's afraid to touch her. "I'm sorry," he whispers as he runs his eyes over her. She might be bleeding somewhere, but it's hard to distinguish the blood with the rain as they both drip on her.
"Just go, Bodhi!" Jyn hisses at him. The echo under her head gets stronger. Then another flash of lightning that lights up his face, and he nods and runs. She'd never tell him, but she was hoping this would happen.
Jyn moves her hand to her waist. Cassian's blaster is there at her side, and she reaches for it. The blaster is unfamiliar in her hands, but a weapon is a weapon. Jyn holds it over her head as the stormtroopers march closer to the ruins of their ship.
Cassian feels like he's well-practiced flying in Eadu. It's constantly dark, but he knows the way. They would have had to fly low in the canyon to avoid notice, but his U-Wing is registered thanks to Galen Erso.
"Cassian," Kay-Tu adds into his inner commentary.
His eyes don't leave the viewport, because registered on not, there is a storm. "Kay?"
"Would you like to know the chances that they've already crashed in this weather?"
They would have had to fly low to avoid the patrols. And there are low spires and rock forms. And Bodhi still seems a bit loopy. "Please don't."
"Well, it's very high."
From within the purple lights of the storm and the great whites of the facility beyond them, there is a slight shade of orange. A string of smoke is attaching to the sky. Dry fires would have died in the rain. It's a oil-fed flame. "Karabast!"
"I am highly positive that that's them," Kay-Tu says. It's closer to a confirmation of Cassian's fears than it is a side comment.
"You know how the landing works," he tells the droid. Kay-Tu releases the landing gear as he stands up to go to the two monks in the back. Cassian walks in on a strange conversation of theirs.
Chirrut looks to Baze to ask a question, "I've heard a lot about Jyn Erso's eyes. What are they like?"
"Wide. A well-practiced glare," Baze says and Cassian only agrees. "A shade of green you don't see on Jedha."
No. Cassian disagrees. Not just green. There's gold, blue and anger and need. Not that he actually replies. He won't grant anyone the glory of his responses.
"I don't see on Jedha to begin with, Baze," Chirrut chides.
Cassian slams on the bulkhead gently to tell them he's there. "We're going in for a landing. Can't promise it'll be nice, but it'll be better than theirs."
"What happened?" Baze and Chirrut ask this in unison.
"Well, Kay is dropping us off just by their wreckage," Cassian nods, "When we're down, we all check the grounds and the wreckage. Look for Jyn and Bodhi."
At that, the ship shakes and bounces as the landing gear makes contact with the surface. "Alright, let's go," he presses the button by the boarding ramp.
Chirrut holds down Cassian's shoulder, "She isn't down there, captain."
The monk has recently shown oddly extrasensory perception of things, despite being blind. "How do you know?"
Baze laughs again in his hollow comedy. "Never ask Chirrut that question. He never answers."
"Jyn Erso has certain atmosphere about her," he then explains. ("I stand corrected," Baze mutters.) "It isn't here. It's there." He points out the boarding ramp, towards the line of distant floodlights.
And Bodhi? Cassian wants to ask. But where Jyn is, so is Bodhi most likely.
"I suggest we look anyway," Chirrut sombers. "Baze and I will take the grounds around the wreckage."
Baze looks like he wanted to argue but didn't think it was a good idea.
The rain is everywhere, pattering on the broken remains of the V-Wing. The weather becomes to a cold, cruel drizzle as his gaze travels to the ship. Obviously, the ship is torn in two. A rock gashed into the bulkhead and shred the hull away from the cockpit.
The port engine was halfway underground and most likely pestered with rocks and beyond repair. The comms, both long and short-range look to be intact, but without the ship as a primary energy source, they won't be working anytime soon. The starboard engine is sparking dangerously, and probably already on fire.
Bodhi owes the Alliance two ships now.
A thunderclap runs down the ground, but instead of lightning is a constant flood of white on the ground. It's not thunder. It's an Imperial storm.
Bodhi was supposed to take Jyn to her father. She asked him as much. How many people is he supposed to fail?
A voice shouts, "Go check for survivors!" It must be the squad leader. Bodhi runs just as Jyn told him to, and crouches behind a rock. There are sounds of a scuffle under the rumble of the weather and a loud yell that is most likely Jyn.
Then, just below the lightning in the sky, Bodhi hears the sound of a blaster, and a loud thud. He closes his eyes and thinks. He's failed Jyn, and he's failed Galen. When he opens his eyes again, the troopers are carrying Jyn out of the ship. The rain distorts his vision, but she's unconscious.
And as much as he doesn't want to admit it, she could be dead.
Bodhi doesn't move away from the raining shelter of the rock he hides behind. This is all a lie. Bor Gullet made this for his broken memories. It can't be real. How can he have failed so many people?
He almost yells when a hand takes him by the shoulder.
"Bodhi, it's me." It's a voice he knows.
He's back on Jedha, in the cave. Cassian is shaking him at his shoulders. "It's me, Cassian."
"Cassian," Bodhi mutters. "I'm sorry."
The man shakes him again. "Yeah. You lied to me. I know."
Bodhi opens his eyes. This is real. Bor Gullet did not make this for him. Cassian is standing there under the rain, K-2SO holding an umbrella behind him. The view makes Bodhi laugh.
"What happened?"
He sits up properly and wipes his face. "I—uh… We crashed."
"We have deduced as much, Bodhi Rook," the droid with the umbrella snarks.
He shakes his head. "Jyn was thrown back in the impact. There was… she looked like bantha fodder. Then the stormtroopers came.
"She told me to run," he shivers as the rain drips chills down his back. "I did. Not as far as I could. Just here. I…" Bodhi doesn't stop stammering. "I heard a blaster shot, then the stormtroopers were carrying Jyn out of the wreckage."
Was she dead?
The message goes unsaid. Bodhi doesn't know the answer. "We'll get her later," Cassian pulls him up, "Right now, we need to dry you up."
Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow creeps in this petty pace of Eadu's day to day. It makes its near constant state of darkness almost worse.
Galen has two more weeks before Cassian returns. The Death Star is practically done, and so is its reactor module. By Cassian's next visit, the Alliance would have the plans.
"Make way!" A squad leader yells at the engineers in the passageway.
To say they're carrying this person is an understatement. She's practically being dragged. Young, around Jyn's age if Jyn had lived. She looks to have just been roused from unconsciousness. There is blood on her side.
"Watch it, target practice," she shakes against her restraints. Then their eyes meet and she stops. Galen watches her for a brief moment, studies her. Her mouth moves inaudibly.
Something flashes briefly in her eyes, before she's handled again by the stormtroopers. She doesn't argue with them after that.
Galen approaches one of the stormtroopers who remained at the entrance of the facility. He gives a salute. "Officer Erso!" Galen gestures for the trooper to drop his hand.
"Who is that girl?"
Perhaps, if Galen can see under the visor, the man would have shown him a look of confusion. "The prisoner, sir?"
He nods.
"They found her in a wreckage off the canyon, Officer. No identification; and the ship was beyond recognition. We don't really know who she is."
Galen nods at the information. While it's uncommon for people to crash unknown into Eadu, it isn't the first time it's happened. "Where are you taking her?"
"Interrogation, sir." Interrogation does not mean coercion of information. Not on Eadu.
He thanks the trooper and heads for the detention block in the eastern wing of the building. It's rarely used. Galen hears something short of yelling from beyond the doors.
"I'm not telling you anything, snowman!" The young woman declares, "Because I don't know anything."
Galen pushes the door open, and they're silenced. Once again, the girl's eyes watch him softly. The bloodstain at her side appears to still grow. Her chest heaves in the chair. She was limping a while ago.
"Get her to a bacta tank," he tells the guards, "She was injured in the crash, and she needs to recuperate. Not dealing with your questions. I will question her later."
They look at him oddly, but Galen only looks at them. He is the commanding officer of the facility. They'd have to listen to him.
"Yessir," one of the troopers replies. The girl doesn't stop looking at him while they usher her away.
She is in the tank for the next few hours, until morning. Of course, it doesn't look like morning, if not for the kind drizzle on the window by the side of the medbay. The weather gets worse by hour.
The view is somber, overlooking the canyons where this girl's ship crashed. The wreckage is still there. Galen shifts his gaze to the girl lying on the bed. There is a note on the side of the bed. Unknown patient. Concussion. Three broken ribs. Ankle sprain. Overnight bacta submersion.
Among the things on the bedside table are a few things. A blaster pistol relieved of its pack. A credit chip. One thing catches his eye.
It's a simple necklace with a stone pendant. Galen knows a kyber crystal when he sees it. He picks it up gingerly with both hands. "That was my mother's," her voice says, kinder than when he'd first heard her talk.
"Where did she get it?" Galen remembers Jyn, and Lyra. He gave Lyra a necklace like this. It's familiar to him. He chafes at the pendant; and he becomes familiar with the precise cut of the stone. It could be Lyra's. It can't be Lyra's.
The girl's eyes watch him from the bed. "My father gave it to her." Her eyes become sad. "She gave it to me." She forces herself to sit up.
"Who are you?"
Her face tightens.
"What's your name?" Not once, even in his time as a spy, has Galen ever learned that yelling works. It makes him feel worse, if anything.
She looks to try and say something, but her voice breaks. "Papa, it's me." Her hand reaches for the pendant in his hands. Galen can't pull away. "It's me. It's Jyn."
Galen closes his eyes and shakes his head. He tries to pull away from her hands, but her grip is unrelenting. "My daughter is dead," he denies. He denies it over and over again.
"Papa," she cries, "You know my name. Jyn. Your daughter."
He repeats it again, softer, kinder, "My daughter is dead."
"Papa, it's me. It's Jyn." She's sitting on the edge of the bed. "Stardust."
Galen's eyes whip to her face. No one knows what that name means to him. The danger the name can impose on the Alliance. "Stardust," he repeats in a silent cry. He's forgotten emotion entirely, that the name sounds empty and hollow. Galen places Lyra's necklace—Lyra's necklace—back on the bedside table.
And suddenly the girl earns a face. Lyra's face, and his smile and his eyes, and his daughter's everything. She earns a name. Jyn Erso, his stardust, his daughter.
Galen pulls close the image in his mind, of a nine-year-old girl with eyes of ink-drawn fire. He looks at this young woman in front of him, and she stares back at him with those flaming green eyes. Except, the green sear is no longer there, instead in embers and doused with tears.
He doesn't move. He lets the haggard young girl trap him in her embrace. An embrace he finds warm, loving, and familiar. Galen finds tears decorating the rim of his eyelids. "Papa."
He remembers a nine-year-old girl, who would smile and hold him tight in her hugs. Her loud voice—a voice that anyone would have had to listen to because that is the way it has always been—is replaced by something kinder. A tone that her mother used when the crackling leaves of Lah'mu attacked her window.
His hands hold both sides of her face. "My stardust, I thought you were dead."
The same green eyes. Staring. Crying.
"Papa," she says again. Her voice sounds like that of a child waking up in the middle of the night and asking for her parents. And he is there, holding her tightly in front of a gloom view in an Imperial Research Center.
She's light. A crumpled leaf of a girl. But warm, breathing, and alive.
Galen lets go of her for a moment. "I thought you were dead." There is reverence in his voice, as if this girl in his arms is the most important thing in the galaxy.
As it were, she is. Jyn Erso is his daughter, his stardust. By far, she is certainly the most important thing to him.
He looked straight at the green eyes that look so much like his own. "Not a day went by without me thinking of you."
"I know," she mutters, "Papa, I know." There's raw emotion in her voice, the constant passion, anger and sense of righteousness Lyra has always had. Galen remembers a nine-year-old girl who he left in the hands of the Rebel Alliance almost thirteen years ago. A little girl who he thought was dead.
The medical droids take her in, and she tells them who she is. They've prepared a test, because it's a story they don't trust. He looks out at the soft sunrise in the mountains, the light refracting and creating millions of rainbows against the soft drizzle. Galen closes his eyes, wanting to freeze the moment forever.
From this point, and the next two weeks until Cassian Andor returns, Galen Erso's life will be a mix of happy and sad. His daughter is back; his daughter is alive. Alive in the middle of a galactic civil war.
"Officer Erso," an engineer enters the room. "Director Krennic here to see you."