Chapter Text
Jyn didn’t trust easily, especially when it came to strong people with weapons claiming they wanted to help her. Her rescue from Wobani felt like another lifetime ago, but she still knew the sharp tang of adrenaline she’d felt hefting a shovel, knocking Melshi over the head with it, and fleeing - or rather, attempting to flee - directly into Kaytoo’s chokehold. That instinct to run was still there, but it was less persistent now - sedated and docile beneath the warm glow of her kyber crystal and her mother’s voice in her head telling her, Trust the force. It ran through her head, strong and steady, in time with her heartbeat.
She, Cassian, and Kaytoo had followed the Jedi at a distance in their speeder, wary of what they could be stepping into - but when their only known options for aid were a band of pirates who’d just as soon kill them as sell them into slavery, or a pair of old Jedi, Jyn felt safer with the women. They at least had common enemies, though Jyn had known all her life that that would hardly make them fast friends.
As the speeder bike in front of them slowed at the foot of a cliff face nestled at the edge of the forest, Jyn saw a structure in the rock, almost hidden from view - a metal door stuck into the side of the craggy rock, half-covered in moss and lichen. A knot formed, heavy in her gut as she realized it reminded her of Saw’s secluded base on Wrea.
In front of them, Reeva Trace swung one leg over the side of the bike, disembarking with a fluid grace that Jyn had never seen in a human before. She stepped over to the door, poked at a small, ancient keypad, and it retracted with a low groan and hiss of pistons. In the front seat of their speeder, Cassian reached for his blaster. Behind him, Jyn fingered the release of her folded vibroblade.
Reeva turned toward them, then, her pale head tilting in consternation. “I know trust does not come easy to you, Captain - to any of you,” she said, gesturing to Jyn, and to Kaytoo as well, Jyn noticed with faint surprise. “But trust me when I say that if we planned to kill you, you’d already be dead.”
“What happened to not posturing?” Jyn snapped, fingers clenching on her knife as she pulled herself to a standing position in the speeder’s seat, leaning her weight against the side panel.
“It’s not posturing if it’s true, is it?” said Min Windu, who ignored Jyn’s movements and instead powered down the bike and casually began guiding it through the open door.
“We are not a threat,” Reeva said. She clasped her hands in front of her and leaned forward slightly, as if prepared to bow. Jyn couldn’t see any sign of her lightsaber, but she knew it was somewhere within the folds of the Jedi’s long cloak. “You clearly need aid and we are willing to provide it.”
Jyn knew a stalemate when she saw one, and she also knew that the woman was right. They did need help - medical aid, transport, plus food and water, she realized, as she recognized the growing ache in her gut after 72 hours of nothing but the odd bite or two of a ration bar and sips of tepid, stale water. She reached down into the speeder for her crutches and moved to climb out.
Out of the corner of her eye, Jyn saw Cassian move and she expected him to fight her, to tell her to stop, but when he didn’t say anything she looked over and met his eyes. They were wary and clouded - something uncertain moving behind them. It reminded her of their days on Jedha, reaching out for allies in a tumultuous war zone where the enemy of your enemy was just as likely to shoot you in the back as save your skin. This wasn’t Jedha, she thought. This wasn’t a war zone, but what it was, they had yet to understand. Cassian hopped out of the speeder and held out his hand to her.
She wanted to refuse, to say that she could do it herself, but she knew that this was more than a simple hand. She nodded to him and held his gaze, grasping his hand tightly and hoping he could see the understanding in her gesture, feel the trust in her grip. We are in this together , she thought. We have to be . As her foot settled on the grass, Cassian blinked down at her. His eyes had cleared, his face had smoothed, and suddenly he was Cassian the spy again, all trace of turmoil buried.
He stepped forward, moving a couple of meters away from the speeder, and Jyn followed. Kaytoo exited the speeder silently and walked at Jyn’s six, leaving her oddly comforted for his protection. Though Jyn was willing to put a modicum of trust in these people, it went against every instinct she had to enter the dark cave. Before her, Cassian stilled. Every line of his body was tense, coiled and ready to spring if necessary. Reeva stood, equally still, but posture radiating calm - a peace offering.
“After you,” he said to Reeva, and his voice cut like a knife in the heavy silence between them. Reeva turned without a word to a panel inside the door and flipped a switch. The dark space lit up and Jyn could see they were in a makeshift hangar of sorts - a space for the speeder bike in the center and along the wall hung assorted tools and junk parts. The makings of an amateur trading post, Jyn thought. As she moved closer, never straying far from Cassian’s shoulder, they stood warily in the entrance. She could see a strange metal staircase in the center of the room - it coiled around a support strut like a screw and disappeared through a hole in the rock ceiling.
Before Jyn could protest, Reeva and Min climbed the spiral staircase and disappeared into the room above. Behind her, Kaytoo shifted and met Cassian’s eyes over Jyn’s head. As the droid took a hesitant step onto the metal stairs, he lifted his gaze and took in the structure and the space above.
“Do you have a bad feeling about this?” Jyn murmured.
Kaytoo turned back to Jyn, the soft sound of his servos whirring filling the silence around them. “I do not have enough data to support that claim,” was all he said. Jyn thought that sounded like an evasive way of saying yes , but said nothing else. She hoped she was wrong to worry because she was still utterly useless to them if they had to fight their way out of there.
Kaytoo ascended first through whatever silent agreement he and Cassian had made in their shared gaze, and she followed along behind him at a distance, Cassian close on her heels. He watched as Kay reached the top without a struggle before turning to Jyn, placing a hand on her elbow, a question in his gaze.
“I can manage,” she said softly, and as he pulled away, she reached out and clasped his hand.
Cassian’s years of experience told him that climbing those stairs would be a rookie mistake - regardless of what Kay’s data said. The hole in the ceiling was large enough for a human to fit through, but not by much. He didn’t like having Jyn in front of him - he’d have preferred to case their surroundings before leaving her exposed to whatever their supposed allies might have lying in wait for them. But he also liked being at her back for once, liked that she trusted him enough to hold her crutches while she hopped awkwardly up the stairs, using the railings as her support.
Above them Kay remained quiet; there was no sign of a struggle. Usually that would have put Cassian at ease, but these were Jedi they were dealing with. He’d long given up trying to understand their skills and had spent the majority of his childhood feeling hostile to them. When the Empire had risen, his anger had turned to indifference and his attention had shifted. There’d been no point spending his energy on the dead.
In front of him, Jyn stilled, hands gripped tight to the railings. Cassian tightened his own grip on his blaster.
“What is it?” he breathed as quietly as he could, little more than a whisper against her ear.
She turned her head and Cassian realized that they were at eye-level, practically nose to nose. In the darkness Jyn’s eyes were dark, pupils wide. She tilted her head, listening. In the background, Cassian could hear shuffling and clanking of wood on metal. In front of him, Jyn turned and took a long slow breath through her nose.
“Are they... cooking ?” she whispered.
Jyn reached the top of the stairs, and as soon as she steadied herself, she slid the vibroblade down her sleeve to land in her palm. The tableau in front of her was so far from what she’d grown used to that it took her a moment to take it in, to recognize what she was seeing. Reeva stood at a basin sink, where water ran in a steady stream over something green and leafy. To her right, Min held a large wooden spoon in one hand and a pan in the other. A pot sat at the back of a stovetop, where water was beginning to simmer.
“They haven’t eaten in days,” Min was saying to Reeva, mouth pulled into a grimace. “Why would they want a salad? I ate this morning and I don’t even want it.”
“Fresh greens are high in minerals and vitamins--”
“So’s meat!”
“Just because you have the palate of a rancor--”
“ You have the palate of a nerf!” Min snapped, pointing the spoon in Reeva’s direction, lips pursed in annoyance. When she caught sight of Jyn standing at the top of the stairs, she turned and lowered her spoon. Jyn blinked and willed her grip on the knife to ease. Min eyed her for another moment before turning away to place her pan on the stovetop.
“Please, make yourselves at home,” Reeva said, and gestured behind her, where Jyn saw a wooden slab table surrounded by an assortment of mismatched stools and chairs. Beyond the kitchen Jyn could see a low sofa and worn, squishy armchair next to an ancient dejarik table. Kaytoo stood by the far wall, observing a shelf of holobooks.
Jyn didn’t move until she felt the heat of Cassian at her back. He was silent for a long moment and she knew that he was also surveying their surroundings.
“You built this place yourself?” he asked. As Jyn continued to look around she noticed the rough-hewn windows, fitted with transpariplast. Beneath layers of carpets, she could see the stone floor peeking through.
“We’re not without allies,” Reeva said. “We’ve had some help over the years, but yes, we built Ashla’an Point almost twenty years ago.”
Twenty years, Jyn thought. That would have been the tail end of the war. Lyra had taught her about the purge and the clone protocol as part of her homeschooling as a child on Lah’mu. Her mother had always looked so sad when she’d spoken of the Jedi, and she’d spend much of the day after their lessons meditating with her kyber crystal in hand.
“You fled Coruscant?” she asked.
“It was that or die,” said Min. Her eyes were hard and unreadable. It struck Jyn that they must have left everyone they’d known behind - either dead or dying. Jyn lowered her gaze and swallowed the hard lump that suddenly rose in her throat. She sat down at the table and willed away the roar of tidal waves pounding in her ears.
Jyn sat while Cassian continued asking questions, suddenly feeling more exhausted than she had in a very long time. Something about sitting in someone’s kitchen, watching them cook and interact where war wasn’t looming over their heads, made her feel small, but also safe. She looked out the window, where the midday sun streamed in through the trees below, catching on silvery green leaves. They were tall and pale, like those among which they’d crash-landed. Jyn realized she had lost her bearings - she had no mental map of where they were - and wondered if they were on the edge of the same forest.
“You should elevate it.”
Jyn blinked, and realized she’d been staring, lost in her thoughts. Reeva stood across the table, a cup of something steaming in one hand. “Your ankle,” she said, gesturing with a willowy hand to Jyn’s leg. “So it won’t swell.”
Jyn nodded, pulling a bench closer to her to set her leg up. The dull throb she’d all but been ignoring for the last couple hours slowly began to seep away.
Reeva sat the cup down in front of Jyn, and she realized it was caf. She eyed it ravenously. Jyn couldn’t remember the last time she’d had caf - and this smelled like good caf.
As Jyn reveled in the scent and taste of strong, fresh caf, Cassian sat down next to her on the bench, careful to avoid her ankle. She noticed that he still laid a hand nearby, as if he wanted to touch her leg.
“Where do you get your supplies?” Cassian asked Reeva, back straight, ever the intelligence officer. Before she could speak, Min pulled a pan from the stove and carried it across the small space between the oven and the table.
“As much as I love this little interrogation, Captain,” she groused. “I’m hungry and I’m sure you’re hungrier. For the love of the Force, take a breather.”
She sat the pan down with more force than was necessary, Jyn thought, but she couldn’t help the small smirk that tugged at her lips. Cassian eyed Min with a stubborn glint in his eye that Jyn recognized from the first time she’d met him, when he’d loomed over her in the sitroom on Yavin IV. That look that said he’d rather starve than stop asking questions, not until he’d gotten the answers he needed.
Min returned his stare with her own, an eyebrow cocked and an equally steely look in her eye that said she could do this all night. Reeva sighed and sat down a stack of plates and utensils and a basket of bread before sitting down across from Jyn.
Jyn looked at the pan in the center of the table. Reeva and Min must have compromised, as there were large chunks of meat as well as braised greens enveloped in a rich brown sauce, spiced with scents Jyn couldn’t identify, but which made her mouth water nonetheless.
Next to her, Cassian hadn’t even blinked. Instead, he watched Min expectantly. Jyn respected his caution and his determination, but she was kriffing hungry and her gut and the warmth of the kyber crystal at her chest told her they were not under threat. Jyn reached for the serving spoon at the center of the table, ready to serve herself if Cassian was going to take all night. Reeva followed suit and served two more plates before serving herself.
But when Jyn lifted a fork to her mouth, Cassian’s hand whipped out and stilled her wrist, gentle but firm. He met her eyes briefly before turning to Reeva. Silence hung still in the room until both Reeva and Min had taken several bites. When Cassian remained silent, Min opened her mouth and flapped her tongue around in a way that reminded Jyn of a Gungan.
“Happy?” Min growled, before prodding at her food again.
“Was that really necessary, dear?” Reeva asked, voice as calm as ever, with just a hint of sarcasm. Jyn vaguely wondered if the woman had ever raised her voice.
“Was that really necessary?” she asked back, gesturing at Cassian. Jyn looked to him once more, and he gave a minute nod and released her wrist. She immediately tore into her food, relishing the warm spices and honest-to-Force meat and vegetables, not the wretched, grainy protein cubes she’d been eating since Wobani. Another silence fell, but this time it was less oppressive and something that could almost be peaceful.
Cassian was hungry. It had been several days since he’d had more than a few spare bites of crumbly Imperial protein bars, and even longer since he’d eaten in the mess at Base One. He’d gone longer without real food, certainly, and growing up with military fare made food, like sleep, merely something he needed to keep fighting. It did smell good - buttery and spicy, scents he vaguely recognized from some of his undercover work in the Core. But he’d have been throwing away all of his training if he’d taken the first bite with no knowledge of what might have been in it.
He watched the others eat in quiet observation for a few moments. Jyn, who was always as cautious as he was, if not more so, had not so much as paused before devouring what was on her plate, and she made no signs of slowing. He wanted to trust these people. They needed allies if they were going to get off this planet.
When he finally lifted his fork and took a tentative bite, he immediately understood Jyn’s behavior. It tasted even better than it smelled - far better than most of the greasy street food he often ate on assignment throughout the Core and Mid Rim. Cassian let himself eat - like a starving animal who didn’t know when his next meal would be, or where it would come from. He needed the energy, if only to gain more intelligence.
When his plate was half empty, he returned to his mental list of questions, this time to one he’d let go earlier.
“How did you really know who we were?” he asked.
“Despite your friend here, you’re obviously not Imperial,” Min said with a glance at Kaytoo, who stood sentinel several meters away. His eyes were dark, but Cassian knew he was alert for anything suspect. “You don’t have the look of smugglers, but you’re clearly not civilians.”
“How do you know we’re not Imperial?” Jyn asked. “Half of our clothes are Imperial, as are our weapons.”
“The Empire can’t get here,” said Min, dismissively, sitting back in her chair.
Before Cassian could speak to such an absurd notion, Jyn cut in again. “Please, I’ve heard that line before,” she scoffed, voice bitter. “But it’s just not kriffing true. Everyone always thinks they’re safe, thinks they’re too small or insignificant - ants hiding from a boot.”
“That metaphor is suspect,” said Kaytoo. Jyn raised an eyebrow at him but said nothing.
“You can hardly be considered ants, though, right?” Cassian said, eyes turning to Reeva, who had been silent for several minutes. “You’ve been hiding from the Empire for twenty years now.”
Across the table, Min sat forward again, teeth bared. “What the fuck do you know about it?” she growled. “We were plotting against Palpatine before you could lift a blaster.”
Reeva moved a hand to sit beside Min’s, not touching but simply close by. It seemed to calm Min, who sighed, slouched back in her seat again and crossed her arms, letting her dark hair fall into her eyes, which fixed on a distant point on the far wall.
“You’re right,” Reeva said softly. “The Empire could reach us here if they wanted. But as I’m sure you noticed, finding the planet is one thing. Landing here, surviving, is another.”
“Besides,” Min said, brushing her hair back out of her face, eyes still far away. “Their priorities are elsewhere.”
“You seem to have enough other problems on your hands,” Jyn said. “Even without the Empire breathing down your neck.”
“That’s where I’m not convinced,” Cassian said, looking between Min and Reeva. “You say the Empire’s not here, but if the Black Sun is here, then the Empire surely knows about this place.”
Min scoffed and rolled her eyes, attention snapping back to their guests. “That was not the kriffing Black Sun.”
“That man - their leader --”
“Turian, yes,” said Reeva.
“He wore the symbol of the Black Sun on his jacket,” Cassian pushed on. “I saw it.”
“Look, that sack of bantha shit only wishes he were Black Sun,” Min said, raising her cup of caf to her lips, a grim smirk on her face. “Ever heard of the Binayre Pirates?”
“No,” Cassian said.
“ Seriously? ” Jyn said, eyes incredulous as she looked at Min. “Since when have they moved out of the Core?” At Cassian’s silence, she added. “They’re a sort of off-shoot of Black Sun, but even greedier and more bloodthirsty, if you can imagine.”
Cassian could easily picture Jyn - or was it Lianna - getting into scrapes with space pirates. She’d clearly held her own if she was here to talk about it, but the thought sent his stomach churning.
“They use Giaca as a sort of test,” Reeva was saying. “For new recruits and business partners. If you can make the dangerous hyperspace journey and get past their obstacles on the ground, then they consider doing business with you.”
“Brilliant,” Jyn muttered irritably, taking a bite of her bread.
“What sort of business?” Cassian asked. His thoughts were already racing ahead, wondering at what sorts of transport they’d have.
“Spice, munitions, forgeries, bounties,” Min listed off. “You name it, they’ll do it. Like she said, pretty much no limits.”
“And you let them get away with it?” Cassian remembered the way they’d held their ground earlier. They hadn’t used their lightsabers, but something about the way Turian had eyed them made him suspect they weren’t just bluffing.
Min raised an eyebrow. “We’re not sheriffs. That’s not why we’re here. We do what we have to do to get by. Surely a Captain of the Alliance would understand the need to protect his own, no matter the price.”
Cassian gritted his teeth but gave nothing away. Just because he was tired of playing that game didn’t mean he wasn’t just as guilty of it as anyone else. But hearing the words from a Jedi was more than a little disconcerting.
“What other factions inhabit this planet?” Kaytoo asked, breaking the tense silence as everyone swiveled to look at him. He had moved from his earlier spot by the window to examine an old transceiver gathering dust in a corner. “My readouts noted various signs of life and high energy usage to the north and south.”
“Don’t worry,” Reeva said. “They’re friendlies.”
“To us --”
“It’s been over a year since the Shorak attacked Tallpeak.”
“Pretty sure that just means they’re overdue,” Min muttered.
“These friendlies have transport?” Jyn asked. “Sounds like an easier plan than stealing from Binayre.”
“The Shorak do,” Min said. “Their station is a few hours north of here. You can get that leg looked at. Your ribs, too,” she added, gesturing to Cassian.
Cassian sat up straighter. He wanted to ask again how they knew so much about them, but he knew now that he’d have to chalk it up to Jedi and their so-called Force. He was a skeptic through and through - he had been for as long as he’d known the term Jedi, since he’d learned of the Force as a child - but lately, he was less sure. The memory of Chirrut’s voice in his ear was still fresh, yet he was left with no explanation for what he’d heard. Cassian could practically see Chirrut’s cryptic smile as he realized the best source of information sat in front of him.
With every question answered, there arose yet another to take its place. In others, he thought, the endeavor might sound overwhelming, but Cassian was used to that game, to filling in gaps in slow meticulous sweeps.
Next to him, Jyn grasped her kyber crystal in her hand. Cassian realized that she looked relaxed, an expression he’d rarely seen. He laid a hand on her leg, running his thumb across the rough fabric of the knee of her trousers. She turned and saw him looking at her, and she smiled.
He wasn’t sure how much he wanted to trust these Jedi, but he would take their help - for now. If it made Jyn smile, he’d do whatever he could to keep that look on her face.