["Still in recovery, Miss Tomaz. Their injuries were extensive, but they should start coming around soon."]
Good. We were cutting it a little close so things were touch and go.
[Zari has a tablet in her hand as she perches on a chair nearby the two cots, quietly browsing through the communication feeds while she waited. Using the jumpship to slip on to Skariff and pull out what was left of Rogue One hadn't been a decision sanctioned by the rebellion, but the Legends also weren't sanctioned by the rebellion, so it didn't really matter to them. All they knew was that they were close enough to make a difference so they took the chance.
Firestorm wound up taking the brunt of the blast, absorbing whatever energy they could while Jyn and Cassian were loaded onto the jump ship, and after that, they flew out to where the Waverider was waiting as quickly as they could.
Now, all that's left was to wait for them to wake up. However long that happens to take.]
[ jyn wakes up with a jerk and an aborted shout, feeling like her throat is on fire. everything hurts for a moment before she realizes it's not truly pain she is feeling. her body is sore and exhausted, but the pain is minimal. which is
strange.
the death star... scarif... she'd had too many injuries to be only sore. she'd had too many injuries to be alive. ]
What...
[ her eyes open, squinting against the light and groaning, trying to bury her face back in the small pillow. she breathes heavily through the actual pain of the bright light on her sensitive eyes. ]
[ as the light dim, jyn's eyes squint open again, finding the fuzzy form of zari tomaz before she turns her head to look for cassian. oh, he's right there. okay. her body relaxes for a moment. ]
The rest..?
[ bodhi and baze and chirrut and melshi and tonc... ]
[Not a time ship, like in canon, but it's flown by a crazy pilot so they were able to swoop in and just barely outrun the Death Star blast. But unfortunately Jyn and Cassian were the only ones they could save.]
And I'm sorry, but you were the only two we could get to in time.
[ her eyes close, slumping back in defeat. poor bodhi... he'd done so much, lost so much, only to-- her eyes squeeze shut, pressing away the tears that threaten to fall. she doesn't have time for this weakness, she needs to shut it down. ]
We got them. Leia's transporting them back to base now. You succeeded.
[She doesn't know yet, about Leia getting captured, or what's to come with a boy from Tattoine, but that wasn't their objective. Their objective was to get as many of Rogue One out as they could, and unfortunately, that number was two.
Zari would have greatly preferred more but she also is well aware that two is far better than expected.]
[by now, one would have supposed that he had settled into this new life of his, but despite having handled this one-way trip into the future well enough — the 24th century had nothing on the multiverse — peter still managed to look haggard and a bit like a homeless bum. the mismatched shoes and threadbare coat did little to discourage that snap interpretation, nor did his propensity to hurriedly inhale meals in the communal kitchens.
today was shaping to be another day like the one before it. and the one before it. and the one before that one: working on his summer bod (just like his winter bod but with more pop-sickles), trying to build a new set of web shooters, grabbing a sandwich.
at least he would've grabbed a sandwich. turns out his carefully wrapped and labeled pressed and grilled assorted meat and cheese was missing.]
That's weird. Could've sworn I left it in this fridge.
[was it possible that he ate it in his sleep? maybe. was it more likely that one of the various other people sharing refuge in the safehouse was the guilty party? probably. a quick peek in their communal eating area gives him just one possible culprit: a small woman whose appearance says she would rather be left alone. not that there's any evidence. best to play it cool before accusing people of eating his food.]
Hey.
[now that the super cool, monosyllabic greeting was taken care of, peter casually sat down across from her. hopefully that wasn't too much of an invasion of space.]
You look like you're an observant person. Have you seen any sneaky sandwich thieves around?
[ jyn looks directly at the gangly man in front of her. if he is asking about sandwich thieves then he is probably missing a sandwich. it is probably (definitely) the sandwich in her hands and in her stomach.
that is entirely besides the point. ]
Haven't seen anything. I'm blind.
[ she is literally making eye contact with him but that is the story she is going with. ]
[peter resists the urge to blurt out 'sounds fake, but okay' like someone easily half his age — miles, gwen, peni (okay maybe not her) — might say but that doesn't stop his face from reacting with raised eyebrow and slanted mouth. blind. he can roll with that.]
Hear something?
[he taps his foot, half expecting her to try and say that she's hard of hearing too somehow. who does she think she is?]
[ her head tilts slightly as she takes another bite of her sandwich. ]
Heard a lot of things. Heard you by the fridge, sure you didn't take your own sandwich?
[ that seems likely, sure.
but wait for it. she picks up the other half of her (his!) sandwich, and offers it out to him. out of the kindness of her heart, obviously. ] You're welcome to have half of mine.
[errrk. that sound? peter's jaw metaphorically hitting the floor. his head darts from her to the fridge and then back to her.
wow. she's eating his sandwich and has the audacity to share. his stomach grumbles in reply. hangry would be an appropriate adjective right about now.]
We're gonna put a fork in the whole part where you just asked me if I took my own sandwich because I've heard some crazy things before but that's gotta take the cake. [not strictly true but she doesn't need to know that.]
But your sandwich looks a whole lot like mine. [his acusatory tone doesn't stop him from reaching back out for her (his) sandwich.]
[she must know that this is tantamount to a declaration of war. no more mister nice spidey.]
There's over a thousand different combinations of sandwich I could make with as few of the options we've got. It's pretty unlikely that you've managed to make a roast beef on wheat with just a hint of pesto and those little crunchy onion things.
[logic. he has it. let's see her try and refute it.]
[ because people suck and they're both impossible gremlins. they only like each other bc they got paired up freshman year as roommates and didn't kill each other. perfect basis for a friendship. ]
[ it's not jyn's fault she accidentally made friends with her blind professor and his husband like a cool kid and collected two idiot misfit boys and a sullen dog that is also a boy! ]
i really talk a lot of shit about men when i'm surrounded by them.
[ rey likes professor organa and finn and that's... it, pretty much. the grizzled adjunct who comes in and teaches exactly one class in order to serve as an advisor is okay but he's honestly kind of an asshole, and rey's not really sure if she likes him or not, but he does make her papers better so maybe that's something??? who knows. ]
[ for as long as rey can remember, family has been an intangible concept, some fleeting memory beaten out of her by the relentless sun on jakku and the neverending ache of hunger under the thumb of unkar plutt. what had family been, when she'd scavenged to survive? only some far-off dream, a child's desperate motivation to keep surviving, a reason to tack off day after day in a line of endless rows in the underbelly of an at-at.
now, rey has a family. broken, tired, and healing from loss and pain — but still a family. poe and finn held tight in either hand, chewie's warmth always there to lean on, bb-8 and now d-0 to join the droids. there were memories, too: of luke and leia and han, each draped over her like warm blankets through the force, their voices an echo of hope in each new day.
but it's not the family. not the mother and father she sought out for so long, the ones that left her alone on jakku either by choice or by force, not the birthright of happiness she was denied for so long.
it isn't family that sends rey to endor. it's a clue, a hint at some mystery left behind in the margins of notebooks leia left behind, the possibility of rumored legacy and family shrouded in question marks. something protected by the force, hidden from the sith by a mystery even luke and leia did not understand — or rather, someone. a pair of someones.
they should have died, in leia's neat penmanship, but the force provides. look for a woman with a kyber crystal, and ask her what rebellions are built on.
so rey looks. she searches. she follows leia's request in blind faith, focusing on the mission in the desperate, unrelenting way she has always done, and makes her way through forests and jungles and mountains, always climbing and searching.
until now, when she stands at the foot of an impossibly tall clutch of trees, peering up at the sprawl of wooden houses held tight in the canopy, wondering... ]
[ endor is something like hiding in plain sight, despite there seemingly being no need to hide at all. whatever had kept them alive on that beach so long ago also made them untraceable. they had become one with the force and in the aftermath of the death star's strike seemed to stay that way. the twins couldn't feel her when she was standing right in front of them.
endor has become home now, lush and green and simple, a solace that she doesn't deserve. the ewoks are kind to her, a kindness she also doesn't deserve. they are still rebuilding after the empire razed parts of the forest for their outpost, jyn helps as a kind of penance.
she is returning home from a day at the market when she hears the young woman speak, not looking up from her data pad. ]
Ask the tree politely and she will let you climb her.
[ this is, of course, absolute and complete bullshit, but jyn delivers it with a kind of distracted yet noble solemnity that makes it sound very real. ]
[ rey trained under former hermit luke skywalker. she is unfortunately quite used to bullshit being delivered with the dry gravitas of someone who knows what the hell they're talking about, so when the woman offers her solemn advice, rey takes it without blinking.
it doesn't work, though.
no matter how politely rey asks, no matter how sweetly she clasps her hands together, no matter what she places at the rootline of the tree, nothing happens. no branch descends, no bark solidifies into clumps, no rope bridge drops from the skies. it's only rey, her staff, and a giant tree just staring her down.
and the woman, still staring at her datapad, acting for all the world like nothing out of the ordinary is happening at all. ]
Maybe I have the wrong tree. [ a hand twists around the top of her staff, nervous energy wiping sweat onto the hilt. ] I'm supposed to be looking for a woman with a —
[ force, what was it called? why hadn't she written it down? ]
A crystal of some kind. Have you seen anyone like that?
[ jyn doesn't stop walking but she plods along so slowly as she listens to this girl politely ask the tree for permission that she might as well have stopped walking. she won't make it home before nightfall at this rate. it isn't until the next question is out of the girl's mouth that jyn even looks up, arm stretching out as it to indicate where the rope for the doorbell is.
her arm falls, mouth falling open as well.
jyn's memory is patchy in some places -- her childhood, the beach, experience and memories and propaganda warring together so she doesn't know if what she remembered was completely accurate -- but in other places her memories are so clear they could be great crystallized statues commemorating her grief.
she remembers tiny, thin arms clutching her tightly, tears down dirty cheeks, the cold, hollow feeling in her chest that no desert heat could warm. sorrow, guilt, loss, the curdled sick of shame that still remained, clinging to her like a perfume. she remembers the trio of buns, the only hairstyle capable of containing such fine, silken hair off a rambunctious and active little girl's face.
Rey, be brave. You'll be safe here, I promise.
jyn remembers rey.
she swallows, licking her lips to chase away the cotton in her mouth, forcing the shame and guilt and fear down deep, even if the grief-stricken expression doesn't fully manage to fall away. she looks like she has seen a ghost but the only ghost in these woods is jyn erso herself. ]
[ rey's memories are foggy, patchwork pieces, a fact she has always attributed to the stress of abandonment, the necessary steps to cope with a childhood of loneliness and a complete lack of self-worth — only to find out that, perhaps, that wasn't the case. leia's theories and luke's whispers, scrawled into notebooks and left behind in garbled data entries, suggest that perhaps it was the force itself, scouring her memories so as to cover her parents' tracks.
they hadn't abandoned her. they'd left her behind to protect her. she knows that now. she just doesn't know who they are, or what they look like. all she knows are flashes: the shaky embrace of a parent trying desperately to peel away, the choked whispers and promises of someone who has so much to say but cannot get it out. be brave comes a whisper in her memory, and rey's cries always answer in return.
come back, she'd screamed, but nothing had come back. only unkar plutt's tight grip on her small arms had stayed, and the unrelenting heat of the sun a consistent reminder of her fate.
but here, there is no sun beating down. there is only the humid damp of the forest, the gentle light filtering through the canopy. and a voice, now audible, offering an answer to her question. ]
Yes. Right. A kyber crystal.
[ but just as jyn is stunned with grief and memory, rey's voice calls back stilted, uneasy. her question comes uncertainly, hesitantly, the puzzle pieces of why leia might have sent her here beginning to click together in a way that makes her stomach churn with anxiety.
[ the question hits her in the gut, thinking of the way the council room rang quiet for only a brief moment after she'd declared, echoing cassian: rebellions are built on hope.
she wishes he was here now, wishes she hadn't stopped despite the fresh rush of guilt that crashes over her. she had never wanted to leave rey behind, had tried desperately to search for another way, any other way, but the truth of their heritage was too powerful, too dangerous. rey needed to be safe more than jyn needed her daughter in her arms. ]
[ she stumbles over the words, half-mouthing leia before her brain course-corrects to something more formal, less telling. people know of princess leia of alderaan; they know how the legacy of her father's turn to the dark side cast a dark cloud over her political aspirations. but it's only the rebellion that knows the identity she chose to take next, dropping the royalty for rough work and the losses that came with it. ]
She said the woman who knew the answer would be able to help me.
[ and there, in that moment, rey knows what she's been sent for. not the secrets to the death star, no stardust datatape tucked away in a hidden nook. this is not war she's winning. it's the answer to a mystery far more profound than palpatine's grandiose claims for world domination.
it's rey, and the blood in her veins, and the answer to a question that's still carved into every nook and cranny of her being: who am i? where do i come from? ]
Is that you?
[ are you my mother is not a question she is prepared to ask. ]
[ jyn can't answer the other question because the guilt is overpowering. all she needs to say is yes, but the word gets caught in her throat. she doesn't want rey to be disappointed that she has traveled so far only to find jyn erso.
it doesn't surprise her that her own daughter found her way to the resistance after being hidden away for so long, hadn't jyn done the same thing? leia would have looked after her, she knows that, the way baze and chirrut had looked after her and cassian. the rebellion had built a family for jyn, the resistance would have built a family for rey. ]
[ for a moment that feels like an eternity, all rey can do is stare. she tries to blink, but her eyes feel heavy, pin-pricked with something that could either be tears or tree sap fallen into her eyes. she wipes at them, a stubborn gesture, but doesn't look.
she doesn't want to know.
all she wants is to hear an answer that makes sense of her life, that finally puts the puzzle pieces together. is this the woman whose voice rey has heard her whole life? is there someone else, the man whose face she cannot even recall, only the solidness of their hands and the slight smell of cloth and polish?
would this have been her life, hidden amongst the trees? or is this their life only in her absence, hidden away from her? she has so many questions, so much she aches to know, but none of them come.
only one, the same one, echoed out again in different words. ]
[ they had hidden rey away on a junk planet full of dirt and sand that people only stopped at long enough to refuel and drink, not long enough to for anyone to discover the power that ran deep through the little girl's veins. leia only would have sent rey to find her when it was safe, when she had nothing to lose.
jyn has no sense of the force. she knows it exists, she knows it is the reason she exists, but like her mother, jyn had no access to it nor did she want access to it. the force had only brought her trouble. so she hadn't sensed anything, had no feeling one way or another, if she and rey are all that remain in her family line...
it's good to know. ]
I can tell you about your family. [ a beat, she looks up at the canopy, at the darkening sky, and sets off again, trusting rey will follow. ] The one you were born into, at any rate.
[ of course she follows. stubborn, determined, she was born with these traits from a woman she barely knows (and a father she wonders if she'll ever meet, now) even if she does not know where they come from. they walk through the trees until the woods get thicker around them, the sky above blotted out by canopies that close in on them.
even still, the woman's steps do not falter. rey's hand trembles around the hilt at her side, but she does not draw it. not yet. not now. ]
I want to know.
[ she has always wanted. she has never believed she was anyone special, and still doesn't know if it was true, but she wants to know her family more than anything else. wants to know, and wants to belong. ]
I know your father. He is a good man, the best man I have ever known.
[ it is only a handful of words, but it is impossible for jyn to disguise how much she loves him. maybe if they had stayed in the rebellion with their little family, if they had had a chance, she would still be able to force her voice into the same neutrality that had kept their romance secret on base, but that neutrality had been left behind with their daughter. ]
He was a rebel. That is what first brought us here. He was closer to Leia than I was. [ lies. jyn and leia were very close, but cassian and leia were more alike so over the years jyn has turned that into a deeper friendship. ]
[ the history of the resistance — what was the rebellion, what has now blossomed into something more steadfast, something with a symbol and a purpose and a bonafide collection of generals and leaders — has never been something anyone has spent much time on. no one has sat down to teach rey the history of what came before. there simply hasn't been time.
so she doesn't recognize the name, but that doesn't mean anything. that doesn't mean the name doesn't mean anything, either. she just doesn't know enough to decide either way.
besides, it doesn't much matter, does it? he means something, by virtue of being her something — her father, an idea that still socks her in the gut, leaves her momentarily speechless, as if trying to fit that reality into her worldview is like relearning how to breathe. and maybe it is, because if going off the way the woman says his name (like a prayer, like a confessional, like the best word she knows) then that connection ought to be more obvious still. ]
And you?
[ what are you, rey wants to ask. but she settles on something else. ]
Were you a rebel too?
i know star wars has other curse words but this is eliot.
[There are a number of things in Eliot Spencer's life that he can trace back to Jyn Erso, and almost all of them have ended with him being very unhappy. Today just seems to be a culmination of all of those things.
Firstly, he was happy and content on his ship, with his crew, doing things that had nothing to do with the Empire, when he gets a call from Mon Mothma saying that they did a stupid thing and sent Jyn Erso back to Jedah in the hands of a spy. Please be helpful and go have said spy's back in this trying time.
(Point of clarification: Mon Mothma did not actually say she did a stupid thing, this is just Eliot's interpretation, because who in their right mind, after having met Jyn for more than five minutes, thinks that anyone, let alone a spy, can actually keep her in line?
Eliot grew up with the girl. He knows better. The Rebellion leaders clearly do not.)
Secondly, he calls Saw because if Jyn is going to Jedah then that's likely who she's going to see. Eliot's not married to any particular side in this war so long as it's not the Empire, but he knows, he knows how explosive it can be to put two loaded powder kegs in the same room, and that's the kind of explosion that's coming for Jedah if the two of them aren't careful.
(Saw doesn't seem to be surprised. Says some cryptic bullshit about having a message for her. Eliot doesn't care, because he's done his due diligence, interfered in all the minimum ways he needs to interfere, and is washing his hands of it.
Only he doesn't, borrowing a smaller ship and making the trip to Jedah on his own - whatever this is, he's not getting his team involved, but apparently he can't quite get his hands as clean as they may like.)
Thirdly, Jyn punched him in the face.]
Damnit, Jyn.
[He stumbles backward, having followed the team back to the rebel base, where no one seems to stop him when he enters, aside from the one person who isn't a rebel, and he shouldn't be surprised that this is how she's greeting him after all this time.
Doesn't mean it doesn't hurt - physically, at least.]
[ give her twenty minutes and she'll figure out a reason for punching eliot that doesn't sound childish, but it does come from a childish place. he left her with saw, going off to do his own thing, living his adult life, a teenage girl was probably not on his agenda. a year later saw had left her too and five years later jyn is an adult in her own right and still angry at being left behind.
(even though had eliot actually taken jyn with him, saw absolutely would have killed eliot. saw only trusted himself to look after jyn.) ]
Your face irritates me.
[ shouldn't have helped her practice sparring all those years ago. ]
[While younger Eliot might have taken her, gone off to do things that needed doing for the Rebellion, older Eliot knows better. He knows that the places that he went and the things that he did and the blood that sits on his hands is not what he would have wanted for anyone else.
Maybe it should have been Jyn's choice, but Eliot Spencer would rather spare her and have her angry, than have her see him at his worst. And he didn't think Saw would ever leave her behind.
He is, however, currently regretting teaching her to punch so well.]
Can't change that.
[Whether he's referring to his face or the past, both are likely accurate.]
There's the technology, [ she points out pettily. while fully aware she is being a stroppy, childish cow, jyn continues to be a stroppy, childish cow. he could change his stupid, irritating face but he would still be eliot and so jyn would still be mad. ]
Why are you here?
[ he'd left her! he had no right to come back for her. what was the point when he had abandoned her in the first place? ]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
["Still in recovery, Miss Tomaz. Their injuries were extensive, but they should start coming around soon."]
Good. We were cutting it a little close so things were touch and go.
[Zari has a tablet in her hand as she perches on a chair nearby the two cots, quietly browsing through the communication feeds while she waited. Using the jumpship to slip on to Skariff and pull out what was left of Rogue One hadn't been a decision sanctioned by the rebellion, but the Legends also weren't sanctioned by the rebellion, so it didn't really matter to them. All they knew was that they were close enough to make a difference so they took the chance.
Firestorm wound up taking the brunt of the blast, absorbing whatever energy they could while Jyn and Cassian were loaded onto the jump ship, and after that, they flew out to where the Waverider was waiting as quickly as they could.
Now, all that's left was to wait for them to wake up. However long that happens to take.]
no subject
strange.
the death star... scarif... she'd had too many injuries to be only sore. she'd had too many injuries to be alive. ]
What...
[ her eyes open, squinting against the light and groaning, trying to bury her face back in the small pillow. she breathes heavily through the actual pain of the bright light on her sensitive eyes. ]
Cassian...
no subject
[She puts herself in Jyn's line of sight. "Shall I turn down the lights, Miss Tomaz?"]
Yes, please, Gideon.
[Then she turns back to Jyn.]
My name is Zari Tomaz. You're on the Waverider.
no subject
[ as the light dim, jyn's eyes squint open again, finding the fuzzy form of zari tomaz before she turns her head to look for cassian. oh, he's right there. okay. her body relaxes for a moment. ]
The rest..?
[ bodhi and baze and chirrut and melshi and tonc... ]
no subject
[Not a time ship, like in canon, but it's flown by a crazy pilot so they were able to swoop in and just barely outrun the Death Star blast. But unfortunately Jyn and Cassian were the only ones they could save.]
And I'm sorry, but you were the only two we could get to in time.
no subject
The plans?
[ did they get out, was someone listening? ]
no subject
[She doesn't know yet, about Leia getting captured, or what's to come with a boy from Tattoine, but that wasn't their objective. Their objective was to get as many of Rogue One out as they could, and unfortunately, that number was two.
Zari would have greatly preferred more but she also is well aware that two is far better than expected.]
how's about some meadowlark adjacent-y stuff
today was shaping to be another day like the one before it. and the one before it. and the one before that one: working on his summer bod (just like his winter bod but with more pop-sickles), trying to build a new set of web shooters, grabbing a sandwich.
at least he would've grabbed a sandwich. turns out his carefully wrapped and labeled pressed and grilled assorted meat and cheese was missing.]
That's weird. Could've sworn I left it in this fridge.
[was it possible that he ate it in his sleep? maybe. was it more likely that one of the various other people sharing refuge in the safehouse was the guilty party? probably. a quick peek in their communal eating area gives him just one possible culprit: a small woman whose appearance says she would rather be left alone. not that there's any evidence. best to play it cool before accusing people of eating his food.]
Hey.
[now that the super cool, monosyllabic greeting was taken care of, peter casually sat down across from her. hopefully that wasn't too much of an invasion of space.]
You look like you're an observant person. Have you seen any sneaky sandwich thieves around?
[wow. way to be subtle, peter.]
no subject
that is entirely besides the point. ]
Haven't seen anything. I'm blind.
[ she is literally making eye contact with him but that is the story she is going with. ]
no subject
Hear something?
[he taps his foot, half expecting her to try and say that she's hard of hearing too somehow. who does she think she is?]
no subject
Heard a lot of things. Heard you by the fridge, sure you didn't take your own sandwich?
[ that seems likely, sure.
but wait for it. she picks up the other half of her (his!) sandwich, and offers it out to him. out of the kindness of her heart, obviously. ] You're welcome to have half of mine.
no subject
wow. she's eating his sandwich and has the audacity to share. his stomach grumbles in reply. hangry would be an appropriate adjective right about now.]
We're gonna put a fork in the whole part where you just asked me if I took my own sandwich because I've heard some crazy things before but that's gotta take the cake. [not strictly true but she doesn't need to know that.]
But your sandwich looks a whole lot like mine. [his acusatory tone doesn't stop him from reaching back out for her (his) sandwich.]
no subject
There are only a finite number of sandwich options available here, that's not surprising.
[ this is the hill she will die on ]
no subject
There's over a thousand different combinations of sandwich I could make with as few of the options we've got. It's pretty unlikely that you've managed to make a roast beef on wheat with just a hint of pesto and those little crunchy onion things.
[logic. he has it. let's see her try and refute it.]
idk like a college au or something
no subject
no subject
at least this one bought us cheeseburgers
no subject
no subject
[ because people suck and they're both impossible gremlins. they only like each other bc they got paired up freshman year as roommates and didn't kill each other. perfect basis for a friendship. ]
no subject
i really talk a lot of shit about men when i'm surrounded by them.
no subject
yeah but the girls we meet are equally obnoxious
[ do they have names? no. one girl per timeline ]
no subject
no subject
[ this is a fact. ]
we should steal her
no subject
he'd be so mad
Chin updates, space kid
SPACE ADULT
you know, the thing and the place
now, rey has a family. broken, tired, and healing from loss and pain — but still a family. poe and finn held tight in either hand, chewie's warmth always there to lean on, bb-8 and now d-0 to join the droids. there were memories, too: of luke and leia and han, each draped over her like warm blankets through the force, their voices an echo of hope in each new day.
but it's not the family. not the mother and father she sought out for so long, the ones that left her alone on jakku either by choice or by force, not the birthright of happiness she was denied for so long.
it isn't family that sends rey to endor. it's a clue, a hint at some mystery left behind in the margins of notebooks leia left behind, the possibility of rumored legacy and family shrouded in question marks. something protected by the force, hidden from the sith by a mystery even luke and leia did not understand — or rather, someone. a pair of someones.
they should have died, in leia's neat penmanship, but the force provides. look for a woman with a kyber crystal, and ask her what rebellions are built on.
so rey looks. she searches. she follows leia's request in blind faith, focusing on the mission in the desperate, unrelenting way she has always done, and makes her way through forests and jungles and mountains, always climbing and searching.
until now, when she stands at the foot of an impossibly tall clutch of trees, peering up at the sprawl of wooden houses held tight in the canopy, wondering... ]
How am I supposed to get up there?
no subject
endor has become home now, lush and green and simple, a solace that she doesn't deserve. the ewoks are kind to her, a kindness she also doesn't deserve. they are still rebuilding after the empire razed parts of the forest for their outpost, jyn helps as a kind of penance.
she is returning home from a day at the market when she hears the young woman speak, not looking up from her data pad. ]
Ask the tree politely and she will let you climb her.
[ this is, of course, absolute and complete bullshit, but jyn delivers it with a kind of distracted yet noble solemnity that makes it sound very real. ]
no subject
it doesn't work, though.
no matter how politely rey asks, no matter how sweetly she clasps her hands together, no matter what she places at the rootline of the tree, nothing happens. no branch descends, no bark solidifies into clumps, no rope bridge drops from the skies. it's only rey, her staff, and a giant tree just staring her down.
and the woman, still staring at her datapad, acting for all the world like nothing out of the ordinary is happening at all. ]
Maybe I have the wrong tree. [ a hand twists around the top of her staff, nervous energy wiping sweat onto the hilt. ] I'm supposed to be looking for a woman with a —
[ force, what was it called? why hadn't she written it down? ]
A crystal of some kind. Have you seen anyone like that?
no subject
her arm falls, mouth falling open as well.
jyn's memory is patchy in some places -- her childhood, the beach, experience and memories and propaganda warring together so she doesn't know if what she remembered was completely accurate -- but in other places her memories are so clear they could be great crystallized statues commemorating her grief.
she remembers tiny, thin arms clutching her tightly, tears down dirty cheeks, the cold, hollow feeling in her chest that no desert heat could warm. sorrow, guilt, loss, the curdled sick of shame that still remained, clinging to her like a perfume. she remembers the trio of buns, the only hairstyle capable of containing such fine, silken hair off a rambunctious and active little girl's face.
Rey, be brave. You'll be safe here, I promise.
jyn remembers rey.
she swallows, licking her lips to chase away the cotton in her mouth, forcing the shame and guilt and fear down deep, even if the grief-stricken expression doesn't fully manage to fall away. she looks like she has seen a ghost but the only ghost in these woods is jyn erso herself. ]
Kyber. It's called a kyber crystal.
no subject
they hadn't abandoned her. they'd left her behind to protect her. she knows that now. she just doesn't know who they are, or what they look like. all she knows are flashes: the shaky embrace of a parent trying desperately to peel away, the choked whispers and promises of someone who has so much to say but cannot get it out. be brave comes a whisper in her memory, and rey's cries always answer in return.
come back, she'd screamed, but nothing had come back. only unkar plutt's tight grip on her small arms had stayed, and the unrelenting heat of the sun a consistent reminder of her fate.
but here, there is no sun beating down. there is only the humid damp of the forest, the gentle light filtering through the canopy. and a voice, now audible, offering an answer to her question. ]
Yes. Right. A kyber crystal.
[ but just as jyn is stunned with grief and memory, rey's voice calls back stilted, uneasy. her question comes uncertainly, hesitantly, the puzzle pieces of why leia might have sent her here beginning to click together in a way that makes her stomach churn with anxiety.
she wasn't prepared for this. ]
Do you know what rebellions are built on?
no subject
she wishes he was here now, wishes she hadn't stopped despite the fresh rush of guilt that crashes over her. she had never wanted to leave rey behind, had tried desperately to search for another way, any other way, but the truth of their heritage was too powerful, too dangerous. rey needed to be safe more than jyn needed her daughter in her arms. ]
Who told you that?
[ that isn't the answer but jyn needs to know. ]
no subject
[ she stumbles over the words, half-mouthing leia before her brain course-corrects to something more formal, less telling. people know of princess leia of alderaan; they know how the legacy of her father's turn to the dark side cast a dark cloud over her political aspirations. but it's only the rebellion that knows the identity she chose to take next, dropping the royalty for rough work and the losses that came with it. ]
She said the woman who knew the answer would be able to help me.
[ and there, in that moment, rey knows what she's been sent for. not the secrets to the death star, no stardust datatape tucked away in a hidden nook. this is not war she's winning. it's the answer to a mystery far more profound than palpatine's grandiose claims for world domination.
it's rey, and the blood in her veins, and the answer to a question that's still carved into every nook and cranny of her being: who am i? where do i come from? ]
Is that you?
[ are you my mother is not a question she is prepared to ask. ]
no subject
Hope. Rebellions are built on hope.
[ jyn can't answer the other question because the guilt is overpowering. all she needs to say is yes, but the word gets caught in her throat. she doesn't want rey to be disappointed that she has traveled so far only to find jyn erso.
it doesn't surprise her that her own daughter found her way to the resistance after being hidden away for so long, hadn't jyn done the same thing? leia would have looked after her, she knows that, the way baze and chirrut had looked after her and cassian. the rebellion had built a family for jyn, the resistance would have built a family for rey. ]
no subject
she doesn't want to know.
all she wants is to hear an answer that makes sense of her life, that finally puts the puzzle pieces together. is this the woman whose voice rey has heard her whole life? is there someone else, the man whose face she cannot even recall, only the solidness of their hands and the slight smell of cloth and polish?
would this have been her life, hidden amongst the trees? or is this their life only in her absence, hidden away from her? she has so many questions, so much she aches to know, but none of them come.
only one, the same one, echoed out again in different words. ]
Why did she send me to find you?
no subject
jyn has no sense of the force. she knows it exists, she knows it is the reason she exists, but like her mother, jyn had no access to it nor did she want access to it. the force had only brought her trouble. so she hadn't sensed anything, had no feeling one way or another, if she and rey are all that remain in her family line...
it's good to know. ]
I can tell you about your family. [ a beat, she looks up at the canopy, at the darkening sky, and sets off again, trusting rey will follow. ] The one you were born into, at any rate.
no subject
even still, the woman's steps do not falter. rey's hand trembles around the hilt at her side, but she does not draw it. not yet. not now. ]
I want to know.
[ she has always wanted. she has never believed she was anyone special, and still doesn't know if it was true, but she wants to know her family more than anything else. wants to know, and wants to belong. ]
Did you know them?
no subject
[ it is only a handful of words, but it is impossible for jyn to disguise how much she loves him. maybe if they had stayed in the rebellion with their little family, if they had had a chance, she would still be able to force her voice into the same neutrality that had kept their romance secret on base, but that neutrality had been left behind with their daughter. ]
He was a rebel. That is what first brought us here. He was closer to Leia than I was. [ lies. jyn and leia were very close, but cassian and leia were more alike so over the years jyn has turned that into a deeper friendship. ]
He's called Cassian.
no subject
so she doesn't recognize the name, but that doesn't mean anything. that doesn't mean the name doesn't mean anything, either. she just doesn't know enough to decide either way.
besides, it doesn't much matter, does it? he means something, by virtue of being her something — her father, an idea that still socks her in the gut, leaves her momentarily speechless, as if trying to fit that reality into her worldview is like relearning how to breathe. and maybe it is, because if going off the way the woman says his name (like a prayer, like a confessional, like the best word she knows) then that connection ought to be more obvious still. ]
And you?
[ what are you, rey wants to ask. but she settles on something else. ]
Were you a rebel too?
i know star wars has other curse words but this is eliot.
Firstly, he was happy and content on his ship, with his crew, doing things that had nothing to do with the Empire, when he gets a call from Mon Mothma saying that they did a stupid thing and sent Jyn Erso back to Jedah in the hands of a spy. Please be helpful and go have said spy's back in this trying time.
(Point of clarification: Mon Mothma did not actually say she did a stupid thing, this is just Eliot's interpretation, because who in their right mind, after having met Jyn for more than five minutes, thinks that anyone, let alone a spy, can actually keep her in line?
Eliot grew up with the girl. He knows better. The Rebellion leaders clearly do not.)
Secondly, he calls Saw because if Jyn is going to Jedah then that's likely who she's going to see. Eliot's not married to any particular side in this war so long as it's not the Empire, but he knows, he knows how explosive it can be to put two loaded powder kegs in the same room, and that's the kind of explosion that's coming for Jedah if the two of them aren't careful.
(Saw doesn't seem to be surprised. Says some cryptic bullshit about having a message for her. Eliot doesn't care, because he's done his due diligence, interfered in all the minimum ways he needs to interfere, and is washing his hands of it.
Only he doesn't, borrowing a smaller ship and making the trip to Jedah on his own - whatever this is, he's not getting his team involved, but apparently he can't quite get his hands as clean as they may like.)
Thirdly, Jyn punched him in the face.]
Damnit, Jyn.
[He stumbles backward, having followed the team back to the rebel base, where no one seems to stop him when he enters, aside from the one person who isn't a rebel, and he shouldn't be surprised that this is how she's greeting him after all this time.
Doesn't mean it doesn't hurt - physically, at least.]
What the hell was that for?
no subject
(even though had eliot actually taken jyn with him, saw absolutely would have killed eliot. saw only trusted himself to look after jyn.) ]
Your face irritates me.
[ shouldn't have helped her practice sparring all those years ago. ]
no subject
Maybe it should have been Jyn's choice, but Eliot Spencer would rather spare her and have her angry, than have her see him at his worst. And he didn't think Saw would ever leave her behind.
He is, however, currently regretting teaching her to punch so well.]
Can't change that.
[Whether he's referring to his face or the past, both are likely accurate.]
no subject
Why are you here?
[ he'd left her! he had no right to come back for her. what was the point when he had abandoned her in the first place? ]
no subject
[Translation: Mon Mothma didn't think Andor could handle her and asked Eliot to back him up. That being said, he leans back against the wall.]
And Saw was being his usual cryptic self on the phone so I figured I would check in in person, just in case.