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2017-03-29
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2017-03-31
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Heart of a Rebel

Summary:

Some choices, once made, are irrevocable, but sometimes it takes a while for circumstances to force a recognition of that. There's no going back after Zero Hour. Kallus grapples with that and Zeb, once again, forces clarity.

Notes:

Another, slightly more serious angle on post-Zero Hour. I, ah. I have actually watched more of the show now. I just keep circling these two. Also Thrawn's 'heart of a rebel' line, and Kanan's 'thank you for risking everything'. And Zeb is ... the whole crew, but especially Zeb ... this is why I love enemy mine and redemption.

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Chapter 1

Chapter Text

Kallus tilted his rank bar back and forth in his hands. Watching it, studying it. Several of the battered rebels sharing his little stretch of corridor eyed him warily for it. Angrily, some of them. Verging on hatred here or there. He could hardly blame them. Especially not today. Of all things he could be doing, in this time and this place, fiddling with imperial insignia really should be among the last. He couldn't ... help it, though. He really couldn't.

It wasn't regret he was feeling. He didn't think so, anyway. At least not for that. This. This thing in his hands, this career laid out in little squares along a bar. Blank. Empty. Hiding horrors. Not very well, maybe. Those around him weren't fooled. They never had been. They didn't need those coloured squares to state the massacres behind them openly. They knew. They'd always known. It was, after all, the reason they were here.

Here on this ship. Here in this rebellion.

He didn't know if he could say the same. That was it, that was the problem, the reason he kept turning the thing in his hands. That was why he dared their hatred even now, why he compulsively examined the evidence of his sins in front of them. He was an imperial. He had always been an imperial. Even after becoming Fulcrum. Even after acknowledging what a part of him had always known, the monster the Empire had made him and that he had near-casually become. Even after remembering honour and turning on the Empire that had betrayed him as much as he it. Even still. He hadn't left it. He had betrayed it, but he hadn't left, not even when granted the opportunity. He'd stayed. He'd worn their uniform all the way to the end, and he wore it still.

He had, he thought, planned to die wearing it. Inasmuch as he'd ever planned anything. He'd planned to die an imperial. An imperial traitor, yes, but still, nonetheless, an imperial.

And now ... now what? What could he honestly say he was now?

A rebel, in theory. In practicality, too. There was no going back from this now. He'd made his choice the moment he'd set foot in that escape pod. He didn't regret that. Didn't, couldn't. He'd wanted to live. Whatever else he was or might have been, he was a survivor first and foremost. Had been since Onderon. He'd wanted to live. He'd made his choices accordingly. He didn't regret them.

And, if he was honest, for more reasons than just survival. If survival was all he'd wanted, he'd never have become a spy in the first place. No. The rebellion was more than that. Damn near the opposite of it. Never had he seen any group of people flirt more often with death than this lot. Signing up with them was a death sentence perpetually deferred, never a death sentence denied. And yet, despite that, he still didn't regret. He couldn't.

Part of it was that they'd come for him. More than once. They'd let him live, time and again, and actively tried to save him several times. He was alive now because of them. They'd come for him. With all a battlefield between them, with no more reason and no more value to saving him, they'd come anyway. He'd called, and they'd come. For the survivor in him, that alone was more than enough.

And the other part, of course, was what Zeb had returned to him on that stupid, icy moon. The other part, that ragged, half-remembered thing, was honour. Was right. He'd lost it, so long ago. Had never really been very good at it. Order had always been an easier fix, and the Empire had offered it in spades. Peace at the point of a las-pistol. It was easy. It always had been. And it wasn't ... it wasn't right. Some part of him had known. The Lasan massacre. Hadn't he always known it was wrong? At the time it had been ... not easy, exactly, but easier, part order and part vengeance. For Onderon, for ... for everything. But he'd known, despite that. He had known.

He'd beaten that lasat guardsman fair and square. He'd accepted the bo-rifle in the spirit it was offered. Though he'd misled Zeb afterwards, used the horror of what he'd done and the implication of something he hadn't as a weapon, he'd always known the difference. He'd had a right to that bo-rifle. He hadn't had a right to ... so many other things. Zeb had reminded him of that. Zeb had forced him to face it.

So he'd become Fulcrum. So he'd betrayed his uniform. So he had aided and abetted the rebellion at every available turn. So he had ... prepared himself to die. An imperial monster. An imperial traitor. Turned against them, and destroyed for his treachery, as perhaps was only fitting. He hadn't planned to live. He'd wanted to, but he hadn't planned it.

It had been instinct. All of it, everything from that hidden meeting of Thrawn's, that trap. Everything he'd done had been pure instinct and nothing else. He'd tried to warn the rebels, because at some point since that moon doing so had become the only reasonable thing. He'd defied Thrawn, fought Thrawn, because he'd already known he was going to die and damned if he did that on his knees. If they wanted an imperial monster they could have one, and choke on it too! He'd watched Atollon die, as once he'd watched Lasan, and this time he hadn't bothered repressing his horror or his guilt. And then, when it came to it, when it came down to the last gasp and he'd seen a chance to live, a chance to join up with those he'd been willing to die for ...

He'd taken it. Instinctively. Without any thought at all.

And now here he was. No longer an imperial, traitor or otherwise. But not ... not quite a rebel either. He didn't think. He didn't know. Could anyone really be a rebel after ... after being what he had been? He'd killed so many of them. Hunted more. Everyone in this corridor, looking at him with weary, wary hatred, could he ever truly call himself one of them? Surely the bar in his hand, surely that record of oppression, said otherwise.

He clenched his hand around it. Curled it into a fist, and he didn't know if it was to hold onto the thing or to try and crush it. Maybe both. He didn't know what he was anymore. He'd made a choice, made it on nothing but instinct and some vague longing for ... for what he'd lost on Lasan, what he'd regained, if only in part, on Bahryn. He hadn't thought. It had happened too fast for thinking. There'd only be fight or die, and he had never in his life willingly chosen death. The risk of it, maybe, but never the thing itself. He'd leapt, hoping if not really believing that someone would catch him. And he didn't know what to do, now that someone had.

A hand closed around his. Rank bar and all. Someone's hand (Zeb's hand, huge and purple and unmistakable) wrapped around his own, and Kallus jerked backwards in startled shock, nearly slamming his head into the bulkhead in the process. Which wouldn't have done him any favours. Thrawn had knocked his head against enough things already today. He blinked up at the lasat crouched in front of him. He stared in dazed bewilderment at his ... his ...

"You should stop that," Zeb told him. Gently. Sort of. Not as gruffly as he might have, at least. "Put that away, yeah? You're making people nervous. You don't need it anymore, anyway. Stick it somewhere nobody's gotta see it. The day everyone's had, I think they'll all be grateful."

... You don't need it anymore. You don't need it. How easy they all made it sound. Zeb. Thrawn. The rebels and the imperials both. How easy and how certain they all seemed to think it was. As if it was already done. As if his choices had already been made long ago.

And, yes, admittedly they had, admittedly his choice was made the moment he became Fulcrum, and again the moment he stepped into that escape pod and cried out for rebel aid, but still. But still.

"I don't know how to do this," he said. Thinly, distantly. To Zeb. To a man whose entire race Kallus had helped kill. Sitting in a corridor full of people wounded on a battlefield he had led Thrawn to. I don't know how to do this, said the imperial to a ship full of rebels. The irony of it was desperate. The irony of it burned.

Zeb blinked at him warily. For the idiocy of it, probably. He didn't know how to what, exactly? Put a rank bar away? Put a uniform away? Put a life away? He knew how to do all of that. He'd done each and every part of it a hundred thousand times. A hundred thousand lives. The Empire's peace. And what? Now the monster needed help tying his shoelaces? For pity's sake!

The lasat didn't comment on that, though. Zeb didn't mention any of that. Whether that was cruelty or kindness, Kallus didn't know. He'd always had a hard time telling those two apart.

"... You're shaking," Zeb ventured at last. Cautiously. Still gently. He reached out, eased Kallus' fingers apart. "It's the adrenalin. The crash is hitting. Battle's over. You didn't die. Close, but you didn't. It's hitting you now, that's all. Just let go. It'll be all right in a while. You just gotta let go."

"It's not adrenalin," Kallus snarled back. Low and fierce, clenching his fingers back around the bar. Regretting it, almost instantly, and not just for the hostile stir around them. He flinched, and dropped the bar into Zeb's hand. Again, without a thought. Again, on nothing but instinct. He opened his hand around his past, and watched it fall into Zeb's hand.

Zeb dropped it. Like it was nothing. It bounced off his claw and dropped to the deck like nothing at all. Zeb caught his hand instead. Gripped it, just on the edge of painfully, and forced Kallus to look at him.

"I know, all right," the lasat hissed quietly. "I know. You lost everything, I know. It's hitting you all at once, I know. Everyone on this ship does. Everyone's been there. Everyone's there again right now. And, look, maybe you regret it, I don't know, maybe you're having second thoughts, but it doesn't matter. It's done now, it doesn't mat--"

"I don't regret it," Kallus interrupted. Suddenly. Emphatically. Without thought. Always, without thought. Zeb fell silent, eyeing him uncertainly, and Kallus scrambled to explain. "It's not ... it's not regret. It's not that. I don't regret a single thing I've done that brought me here. It's just ... I didn't plan for this. Being here. I don't know what to do. I never planned on ..."

His throat closed over, clenched itself around the words, strangling them. It didn't matter. Zeb heard them anyway. Or guessed them. He knew, either way. He softened, and relaxed his hand around Kallus'.

"On making it this far," he finished, and it was gentle again. They were back to gentle. "You never planned on surviving. I did wonder."

Kallus grimaced. It wasn't ... No. Not quite like that.

"I didn't plan on dying," he corrected, pride needling him as much as anything else. "Believe me, I had no plans to die today. I wouldn't give Thrawn the satisfaction. I just ... I just didn't plan this, that's all. I thought if it came to it ... I thought when it came to it that I wouldn't have a choice. I know what happens to imperial traitors. Better than most. I thought if he found me at all it wasn't going to matter what I had planned. So I didn't. I didn't plan beyond Fulcrum. I ... I don't know what to be, if not that. I can't go back. I don't know what I am."

Zeb was silent, for a long second. So was the entire corridor, Kallus realised abruptly, with more than a twinge of alarm. Everyone was listening. Every eye in this cramped bit of ship was on them. Kallus swallowed. And Zeb spoke.

"I never planned beyond Lasan," the lasat said softly. Gently, even still, even while Kallus cringed. "I never planned beyond the Guard, beyond rising through the ranks, beyond bringing honour to my post. I never planned on what happened, on what you and your Empire did to us. I never planned on surviving it. For a long time, I didn't. Not inside. Not where it mattered. I lived, but a part of me died then. And I didn't get it back. Not until much later. Not until I found people worth fighting for again."

Kallus closed his eyes. Clenched his hand, as much as he could around Zeb's grasp. He turned his face towards the floor, all the horror and all the guilt he had so long ignored flooding back again. This. Yes, this. Here was the absurdity of it. Here was the cruelty in their endless, damnable kindness. For all of them. For him and for Zeb both, and the rest of them as well. Here was the reason it couldn't work, the reason he would never be a rebel. Here was the reason it had been wrong. From the very start. He'd always known it to be wrong.

"... What were you doing, when you sent that message?" Zeb asked. Softly. Pointedly. Kallus opened his eyes and blinked at him. Zeb gripped his hands more firmly. "When you tried to warn us, knowing you were going to die for it. What were you doing? You were fighting. For us. And it cost you everything. And you did it anyway. And you would again, wouldn't you? If you had to make that choice again in the morning. You'd do it all again."

Kallus nodded. Wordless, bewildered, but he meant it. Instinctively, apparently. These choices he made without any thought at all. He knew what he'd choose again tomorrow. He knew he wouldn't regret it. Bleed for it, maybe, inside and out, but not regret.

"Right," Zeb said, nodding as well. "That's what you do, then. That's what you are. And, hate to break this to you, but you've been that for a while now. Since that moon, I think, but since Fulcrum definitely. Yeah? You've been one of us for a while. You ... You lost something, I think. The way I lost something. You lost it a long time ago, like me, and you put something else in place of it. Became something else. But then you found it again. And when you had to choose between what you'd lost and what you'd become ... you chose it. You chose us. You chose right. And, I don't know, maybe I'm just saying this because we need all the help we can get, but ... I think that counts for something. What you chose, when you knew you had the choice. Not sure how much, but I think that has to count for something."

Kallus ... stared at him. Just stared. It wasn't ... it didn't make sense. None of it did, none of ... None of them ever had. Zeb, helping him on that moon, after everything he'd done on Lasan and after it. Bridger, coming to pull him out when he hadn't known he needed it. Syndulla, flying to his rescue across a battlefield when he couldn't possibly be of any more use to them. Kanan, thanking him earlier, as though he'd done anything beyond fall into a trap and drag them all in after him. They didn't make sense. He didn't make sense, not around them, not in the face of them. He did things without planning, without thinking. Did things for no better reason than that they seemed right. What sense did that make? What hope could it possibly have?

And he was going to do it anyway. Because they did it, because they had done it first. Because they had spared him when he hadn't deserved it, and given back to him something he hadn't even realised he'd lost. It was done. It'd been done all along. He'd made his choices long ago.

He wasn't an imperial anymore. He wasn't an agent, wasn't a traitor, wasn't a spy. The only thing left to be was a rebel. Whether he was designed for it or not.

"... He said I had the heart of a rebel," he managed. Distantly. Dreamily, almost. Zeb blinked at him, his face a picture of wary confusion. Kallus almost laughed, but made an attempt at explaining instead. "Thrawn. When he caught me. He said I had the heart of a rebel. I, ah. I said I'd take it as a compliment."

Zeb blinked again. And then ... then he laughed. A rich, delighted chuckle. He pulled Kallus up, tugged him forward into a rough, desperately warm embrace. Kallus latched onto him instinctively. Returned the gesture, without any thought at all.

"As well you should," Zeb growled, his voice a rumble under Kallus' cheek. "Bastard wasn't wrong either. Might as well take your compliments where you can, even if it is your enemy giving them. 'Heart of a rebel'. Hah! I like that. Yeah."

... Yes, Kallus thought. Leaning into the lasat, the rebel who'd saved him. Yes. He rather thought he liked it too.

And past a certain point ... was it really worth denying it anymore?

Chapter 2: Honest Welcome

Summary:

Kallus faces the rest of the crew, and does better than he might have expected, even with the failure he has to report.

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

Zeb sat with him for a bit after that. Some of it was adrenalin, after all. He had come within a hair's breadth of execution. Death, not in battle but on his knees. The exhaustion of that swam up through him, the shaking relief, and Zeb nudged him over and sat with him through it. Side by side, warm and heavy. It was almost like being back on that moon. For a few moments, Kallus missed his meteor fiercely. Of all things he had lost, that and the bo-rifle were the ones he truly did regret.

Not enough to go back for them, of course. Well, not unless a relatively safe opportunity arose. They weren't worth dying for. Not on their own.

The only things worth that were on this ship beside him.

So they sat there for a little while. The Ghost was warmer than Bahryn, at least. Not that that was difficult. Zeb smelled somewhat more heavily in the warmer, closer quarters, but that really was the very least of all possible worries right now. The lasat was warm. He was ... steady. Comforting. The closest thing Kallus had had to a friend in ... in a very long time. That was worth a smell. That was worth death, if it came to it. Kallus was perfectly happy to sit and let that knowledge wash over him, the lasat's shoulder warm against his own.

It couldn't last, though. Of course it couldn't. A pair of feet appeared in front of them, and Kallus looked up sleepily to meet Kanan's blank, sightless eyes. Zeb snorted resignedly, tugging Kallus in against his side, and the Jedi grimaced apologetically.

"I'm sorry," he said. "Everyone's tired, I know. Hera and General Dodonna were wondering if they could talk to you though, Kallus. They're trying to figure out what happened back there, and you're the only one who knows it from the imperial side. We were wondering if you could fill us in?"

... Ah. Kallus winced, a bit, resisting the urge to close his eyes. He'd known this was coming, too. A report on what had happened. How the Empire had found them, they meant. Yes, he'd known this was coming. And they did ... deserve the answer. They did deserve the truth.

"... Of course," he said, and there must have been something odd in his voice because they both looked at him. Well. Whatever equivalent of looking blind Jedi used to fight their way through the galaxy, anyway. He shook his head, ignoring that, and levered himself awkwardly to his feet. Zeb helped, pushing him gently upright. Kallus tried desperately not to grimace. He held down a hand, instead, and pulled Zeb up after him, turning to face Kanan with the lasat once more at his side. For a little while, anyway. For just a little while longer.

Zeb stepped in close behind him. Looking odd. Looking concerned. Kanan frowned at him a little too. That wasn't surprising. Guilt wasn't a hard thing to sense, even for non-Jedi. Kallus shrugged uneasily at them both, and gestured down the corridor.

"Shall we?" he asked, voice carefully bland this time. It didn't fool either of them, but they at least allowed the distraction. Kanan nodded, turning to lead the way, and Zeb put a careful hand on Kallus' shoulder, steering him gently after him. Kallus lifted his chin as he followed. Straightened his spine. It wasn't the worst he'd faced, not even just today. Different, but not worse. He had answered for failure, even treason before. They couldn't possibly take it any worse than Thrawn.

Not that they were going to execute him. That wasn't the problem. But he had lost so much already today. He wasn't sure he'd be able to handle losing this again on top of it. Nonetheless. They deserved to know the truth. They deserved to know he had betrayed them, whether he'd wanted to or not.

Kanan and Zeb led him up to the cockpit, where Captain Syndulla and General Dodonna waited for them. It was an odd inverse of earlier, when General Dodonna had found him climbing out of his escape pod and willingly brought him up to witness their shared fate. It was only his fate, now. And, too, there were a couple of extra faces this time. Bridger and Wren to be precise, wedged in against the walls. Both seemed surprisingly content to see him, all things considered. They didn't object when Zeb steered him into a seat, anyway.

"Kallus," Syndulla said, standing to meet him with a tired smile. "Sorry about this. I know it's been a long day for everyone. Did Kanan tell you what we were hoping for?"

Kallus blinked at her. He had the near-irrepressible urge to stand up again, to come to attention for her. Only the weight of Zeb's hand on his shoulder kept him in his seat. He still stiffened to attention regardless. He nodded carefully at her.

"You wanted a report," he said, and though it came out a bit flatter than he'd intended it still sounded willing enough. "You want to know how ... how Thrawn found you."

His voice did crack a bit on that. Syndulla didn't immediately seem to notice. Kanan did, though. He saw the Jedi straighten out of the corner of his eye. Thought he heard a faint stir from both Zeb and Bridger behind him as well. He was rather neatly surrounded, he noticed. He didn't think they'd intended it that way. As far as he knew, reports of failure in the Rebellion didn't generally involve Inquisitors and/or Jedi circling around to cut you down from behind. Still. He braced himself instinctively anyway.

"... Yes," Syndulla went on, glancing curiously at the others before focusing back on him. Her voice was rather soft. Gentle. He really wished they wouldn't do that. "You tried to warn us. We assumed ..." A pause, to gentle her voice further. "We assumed from the way the transmission was interrupted that you were captured in the attempt?"

Kallus nodded mutely. He saw sympathy in her expression. Felt Zeb's hand squeeze his shoulder a little. He wished they wouldn't. He really wished they wouldn't. It wasn't what they thought. And he was going to have to tell them what it was.

"I'm sorry," Syndulla said again. Genuinely. "I know you took a great risk for us, Kallus, and we are grateful for that. Thanks to you we knew he was coming. Your warning gave us a few minutes to prepare that we wouldn't otherwise have had. You may well be part of the reason as many of us survived as we did."

And that ... No. No, he couldn't allow that. He couldn't let them think that. Not when the truth was so very much the opposite. He shook his head. Harsh and rapid. He found his voice again.

"No," he said, looking up at her. "No, you don't understand. I wasn't trying to warn you that he knew about Atollon. I was trying to warn you that he knew about the attack on Lothal. He didn't ... he didn't know where you were. Not until after my transmission."

The room froze. He could sense everyone in it slowly straightening. Leaning forward, or leaning back. Syndulla blinked at him, eyes narrow and confused. Zeb's hand had tightened near-painfully on his shoulder. Both of General Dodonna's eyebrows had drawn down.

It was Kanan that asked, though. It was Kanan who prompted him, oddly gently, to clarify.

"It was a trap," Kallus admitted, still looking at Syndulla, meeting her eyes, because he couldn't help it. "He knew I was Fulcrum. He knew I'd overhear his meeting. He wanted me to warn you about Lothal. I didn't notice until I realised that the transmission was being jammed, that was why it cut off, but he'd followed me. He wanted me to send a warning so he could use the signal to triangulate your position against the trajectory of General Dodonna's fleet. I ... I'm sorry. That warning didn't save you. It led him right to you instead."

There was a long silence, then, while they digested that. Or almost silence, rather. He could hear Bridger muttering fiercely under his breath behind him. Given how much might have been avoided had he simply left with the boy when Bridger had come to extract him before, Kallus supposed he couldn't blame him. Bridger's ire wasn't directed at him now, though. Or at least not directly. No one's was. The first response wasn't anger at all.

"They were tracking my fleet?" General Dodonna asked quietly. "We led them here too?"

Syndulla grimaced. "Thrawn," she growled softly, clenching her fists in dismay. "But how did he know about Atollon? We removed it from his charts."

Well. At least that was a question he could answer. "Art," Kallus told her tiredly. "Apparently Atollon appears in ancient artwork from this sector. Thrawn probably realised his charts were tampered with, cross-referenced them against older sources. Or he's been cross-referencing them all along. It's possible he was never fooled by my deception with Lyste. He may have been planning this for ... for some time."

"You mean all that work was for nothing?" Bridger asked in dismay. Looking at him, edging over into Kallus' line of sight. "I knew we should have pulled you out. You were in his trap from the start!"

Kallus flinched, but nodded. He had to concede the point. He'd taken a risk, wanting to stay with the Empire and work to redeem himself a little longer, and in doing so he had damned them all. He really couldn't blame Bridger for being angry. He couldn't blame any of them.

"Leave off him!" Zeb growled, flexing his claws around Kallus' shoulder. "Thrawn played us as well, and at least we weren't already in his hands when we found out about it! Kallus was trying to warn us. It's not his fault that got turned on him!"

"What do you mean, the transmission was jammed?" Kanan interrupted. Quietly, curiously, but it cut through the argument regardless. The others blinked at him. Kallus did too, and the Jedi leaned forward to clarify. "You said the transmission was cut off because you realised it was being jammed. That's why the warning was incomplete. But if he wanted you to send it, why was it jammed? Wouldn't a whole transmission have been better? Especially if it was warning us of the wrong thing. Why bother jamming it? Why didn't he just let it go through?"

"Hey, yeah," Wren said, leaning forward as well. "That was bugging me too. Did he jam it to cut off the end of the message? Why bother, if it was the wrong warning to start with?"

"... No," Kallus said. Slowly. Trying to work it through himself. "No, it was jammed from the start. The start of the warning was recorded, but it didn't go through, not until I ..." He paused, a vague, horrible idea beginning to dawn. "He showed me the jammer. He came in alone and he showed me the jammer. I tried to get it away from him, to break it. It was only after I'd managed that he ... stopped holding back. He could have put me down at any time. He didn't have to let me get anywhere near it. He let me destroy it. But ... but he wanted the transmission to go through all along. It was all a charade, but it couldn't have been pointed at you. You're right, it would have been the wrong warning regardless. So why ...?"

"It was you," Zeb realised, low and dangerous while he curled both hands around Kallus' shoulders. "He was testing you. He wanted to know if you'd fight."

Kallus ... Kallus shook his head. "That doesn't make sense," he argued. A little distantly. "He already knew I was Fulcrum. Even if he hadn't, the act of sending the warning itself was enough of an admission of guilt. He had me. He already had me. What could he gain from ...?"

Zeb shook him. Gently. "You're not listening," he growled. "I didn't say it was a trap. I said it was a test. Of you. What kind of man you are. Thrawn likes to know that kind of thing, right? He wanted to know if you'd fight. If you weren't getting out either way, and you thought your job wasn't done. He wanted to know ..."

"... Heart of a rebel," Kallus breathed, clenching his fists on his thighs. "That's when he said it. After I broke the jammer. Dammit. Dammit, it was a double trap. One for you and one for me. He wanted to see what I'd do. He wanted ..."

"To know how much of a rebel you really are," Syndulla completed for him, and when Kallus glanced up at her she was smiling warmly at him once again. She leaned over across the cockpit, touched her hand lightly to his fist. "Which is, apparently, quite a lot. By Thrawn's standards, and I'm pretty sure by ours as well. You did well, Agent Kallus. You did the best you could for us, and you almost died for it. Thank you."

Kallus stared at her. He ... He was too tired for this. He really was. He couldn't handle this twice over, once from Zeb and once from her. Not to mention Kanan earlier as well. He nearly wished for Thrawn. At least the ever-present threat of execution was something he knew how to deal with. This ... This wasn't. It really wasn't.

It was ... better, though. Warmer. Better. It was ... something worth dying for. Every time.

"... I'm sorry it wasn't enough," he managed eventually, holding up a hand when they threatened to interrupt. "I'm sorry about Atollon. And ... thank you. For rescuing me." He'd said it to Kanan, he might as well say it to her. She'd been the one flying, after all. She was the one who'd crossed a battlefield for him. "Thank you, Captain Syndulla," he said again, and meant it as fervently as he knew how.

Syndulla smiled at him. "Hera," she said, leaning back to watch him contentedly. "It looks like you'll be sticking around for a while this time. You should call me Hera."

"... Hera," Kallus allowed. Ignoring the other part, the implicit invitation, the warmth it offered him. Or trying to, at least. "Thank you, Hera."

Zeb snorted. Rough and warm, squeezing his shoulders again. "You could thank the rest of us as well, you know," he said, leaning over to peer down at Kallus. "You're what, two down? Maybe the rest of us might like to hear some words as well."

It was a joke. Mostly a joke. Teasing, Kallus knew that. The lasat had a point, though. A very good one too.

"Thank you," he repeated quietly. Seriously enough that Zeb stilled a bit, and the rest of them too. Kallus nodded to himself, and kept going. "Thank you for coming for me." Looking at Syndulla and Bridger in particular, the first of whom smiled and the second grimaced reluctantly. "Thank you for giving me a chance." Looking at most of the rest of them, gaining a nod from Kanan and a raised eyebrow from Wren. "Thank you for helping me out of that escape pod." Looking at Dodonna, who mostly looked bewildered, but nodded anyway.

And, then. Looking at Zeb. Tilting his head back into the lasat's chest, looking directly up at him. Thinking of things lost and things found again. Looking back on everything that had happened since that moon, and regretting none of it at all.

"Thank you, Zeb," he said softly, while the lasat stared back at him. "Thank you for ... for everything."

And even if several young rebels made disgusted noises at him for that, and several older ones looked him askance, Kallus thought it well worth it.

Just to see Zeb look down at him and smile.

Notes:

I honestly have no idea what Thrawn was doing with the jammer, and it's entirely possible I've completely missed the actual explanation. I, ah. I kind of ran with this anyway?

Notes:

Again, apologies for any mistakes while I catch up -_-;