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Things could have been worse, but they could have been much better.
Hiding in an air pocket between the standing wall of one house and the piled remains of another, Jyn waited for the gunfire to stop while pinning an unconscious Cassian to her chest. She had managed to give the Rebellion their coordinates before her communicator was smashed, and with a mangled ankle she was going to need all the help she could get so they could both leave this hell hole alive.
Blood trickled from Cassian’s scalp and carved thin creeks along his pale cheek. Jyn wiped it away with her sleeve and pressed down on the tiny cut hidden in his hair. She didn’t know if it was the force of the grenade blast that brought the house down or the shrapnel that grazed his scalp that knocked him out, all she cared about was that he would open his eyes and look at her again, and the longer he laid limp in her arms the colder the fear chilled in her stomach.
“Cassian,” she dared to whisper. “Cassian, you need to wake up.”
He remained still. The dull pain in Jyn’s lower back webbed out and into her lungs, making it even harder to breathe in the thick, dusty air. She leaned back on the thick slab of concrete and readjusted Cassian so his head was pillowed on her chest instead of her bicep. The blood from his scalp finally started to clot, leaving a dark, sticky mat in his hair. The firefight outside was also beginning to die down.
“We’ll get to go home soon, Cassian, just hold on a little longer,” she whimpered.
This was bad. Jyn pressed her fingers against his throat and counted each slow beat; no wonder he felt so cold. She cupped his cheek and lifted his face so he could breathe a little easier, but there was also a childish desire to kiss him in the hopes that he would open his eyes again and everything would be okay, and she could finally tell him the feelings for him she had been nurturing since they left for Scarif months ago.
Jyn closed her eyes when she kissed the corner of his mouth. When she opened her eyes, he was still unconscious.
It was near dark when the firing finally ceased, and the silence was peppered with Cassian’s coughs. For a moment his eyes opened, but they were glassy and unfocused, as if he were staring into a completely different universe than the one they were stuck in.
“Cassian! Cassian, stay awake,” she pleaded as his eyes drifted shut again.
His hand moved up to his chest that now heaved as he wheezed between his teeth. Jyn adjusted him to sit up a bit higher, but then he coughed again, speckles of blood spotting his lips and her cheek. She recognized when a body threw in a last ditch effort of energy to save itself.
She hated it, she’d probably regret it, but she leaned Cassian on her slab of concrete and hobbled on one foot to the nearest air hole she could to call for help. Whoever was up there and responsible for their extraction probably thought they were dead when their communicators went out. The locals, as far as she knew, were neutral towards the Rebellion and the Empire, and preferred to profit off of both. Not the best odds of a rescue, but she’d take it.
Jyn swallowed down the mud of spit and dust down her throat and whimpered, “Help?”
Pitiful. She hacked out a cough and tried again.
“HELP! IS ANYONE OUT THERE?”
She screamed and yelled and banged against the rock as the last light of the day was swallowed by the night, but no one answered.
When her voice threatened to give out, she crawled back to Cassian by following the sound of his wheezing, like he was breathing through a straw. She found his cool hand and held it tight. His fingers curled over hers, too weak to even squeeze back. He was the only one that stuck around when things got bad, and now he was going to die because of it. How long did he have? Minutes, maybe seconds?
“I remember, on Scarif, when you shot down Krennic. You looked like the most beautiful man in the world. I promised myself I would do something about that if we survived, and we did, but I was too afraid to do anything. I didn’t want to break the one really good thing I had.”
She realized she was crying and that her words wavered from high to low pitch so quickly that she didn’t know if he could understand what she was saying. She sniffed up her dribbling snot and gasped for what little air was left in this pocket in order to calm the thrumming in her ears down.
That’s when she heard the far away call, “Did someone need help?”
Hope reignited in Jyn’s broken heart. She released Cassian, crawled back to the air hole, and called out, “We’re in here! He’s dying! Come quick!”
Two bright white streams of light from a headlamp pierced into the night, and mercifully turned towards Jyn’s direction. At first Jyn thought that she was a human woman like herself, if just a little on the short side, but then got close enough for Jyn to see her clearly: she was humanoid, but the skin on her chameleon-shaped face was orange. She looked ancient, but she moved across the field like a sprite.
“There you are!” the old woman said, “How many are there?”
“Two, but you have to hurry and get us out, he’s dying--”
The woman squeezed Jyn’s outreached fingers. “It’ll be all right, child. Let me just call in the cavalry and we’ll get you out and get you to safety.”
“Thank you,” Jyn sniffed.
The woman made the call from her headset, then informed Jyn that the crew would be there in forty-five seconds. Jyn didn’t know if Cassian had forty-five seconds, but there was an underlying strength in the old woman’s hand and a cheeriness in her weathered voice that soothed her.
“Are you willing to share your name and where you’re from, so we’re not perfect strangers?” the old woman asked.
Even in her shaken state, Jyn remembered their cover of being a pair of bone smugglers looking to make a few credits by harvesting parts of Takodana, but something in the back of her head warned her not to lie to this woman, because this woman would know it was a lie.
“I...I can’t tell you that,” Jyn manage to mumble out.
“That’s fair. I’m Maz Kanata, and if you want my help and a stay in my castle, I need a name, and who you’re working with.”
Again, the voice in the back of her head warned her not to lie, but she didn’t need it to tell her that. She knew Maz Kanata, or rather knew of her through her legends that spanned across the galaxy. She had secretly hoped that on this mission they’d be assigned to visit her infamous castle, but she never expected to get an in this way.
“I’m Jyn Erso,” she answered quickly, hearing the hum of approaching speeders, “and we’re from the Rebellion.”
“Who’s the one that’s dying?”
“Cassian Andor.”
Maz simply nodded, then waved her team in to excavate them out. They were going to get out. They were going to get out! Jyn crawled back to Cassian and found his hand, but it was clammy and cold. She couldn’t hear him wheezing anymore. Her hands flew up to his neck and she pressed down hard to find a pulse, but in the handful of minutes she had left him, he had left her.
Somehow, in the thick of her overwhelming panic and grief that threatened to break her down, she remembered her brief emergency medical training in cases of cardiac arrest. With hands that didn’t feel like her hands anymore, she laid him down, wiped the blood out of his mouth, and gave him two breaths before she started compressions. If he wouldn’t breathe on his own or get his heart pumping, she’d do it for him until Maz’s crew could get them out.
Her back ached from leaning over him, her ankle throbbed, her arms were stiff, and the scent of his blood coated the inside of her mouth, but she couldn’t let herself stop. If she stopped, then she would have to accept the fact that he was dead, and she could not let that happen. That’s why she screamed when large hands tried to pull her away, and a needle bit her neck that made the world cloudy, and her last thought was that Cassian Andor was dead.
Cassian Andor was dead for approximately fifteen minutes, until a certain combo of stims and electric shocks jump started his heart again, or at least that was what Maz told Jyn when she finally woke up from her drug-induced slumber the day after the fact with a stint on her injured leg. Two aggravatingly slow days later, Maz explained more as they made their way to visit Cassian in one of the private rooms in her labyrinth of a castle, like how he was breathing on his own but was given oxygen to speed the healing process. He had not only suffered a couple of cracked ribs, but a nasty pulmonary contusion that caused a collapsed lung.
“So you will both be staying here for at least a couple of weeks to patch up, but there’s plenty to do, plenty to do,” Maz chuckled.
“But I’m sure if I contact my superiors, we can be extracted without taking up more of your time.”
Maz nodded her head, a sly smile on her face. “True, you could do that. Here we are.”
Cassian slept despite the rhythmic clank-clank of the square oxygen generator doing its work at his bed side. Color had returned to his face as he breathed long, slow breaths. In two strides Jyn was at his bedside in the earthen room that looked like it belonged in a dungeon, but through the window she could see that they were high above the forests of Takodana. She slipped her hand under his, which was thankfully warm. Peeking out from under his thin brown robes was a fresh scar that ran down his sternum.
“Is he medically induced?” Jyn whispered.
Maz shook her head. “No, we took him off those meds once we were certain that he was free and clear of any major brain damage. He’s probably concussed though, as you were. He’ll wake up on his own.”
Maz brought a chair for Jyn to sit on, and ordered them fragrant, flowery tea for them to drink by the small table by the window. It came in a black metal tea pot and couple of thick clay cups so big that Jyn needed to let go of Cassian’s hand so she could lift the cup.
“So, how long have you been pining for him?” the wizened old woman asked.
Jyn scalded her throat from swallowing the tea to fast. “Sorry?”
The older woman cackled softly to herself. “I’ve seen those eyes before, many times. Myself included, so there’s no shame in it.”
“I’m not ashamed,” Jyn said, feeling the heat rise in her cheeks. “And I don’t see how it’s any of your business.”
Maz shrugged. “I know Cassian. Well, I’ve known him by another name. I’ve always seen him running around with that Imperial droid of his, so I was surprised to find that you instead of the droid.”
“He still has the droid, but we didn’t bring him along.”
“Hmm, I see. Then maybe he pines for you?”
Jyn huffed and drank her tea. She was grateful that she saved their lives, but she wasn’t going to reveal everything about their lives, especially with Cassian within earshot, sleeping or not. So Jyn kept silent by slowly sipping her tea until it was dry.
Putting her cup down, she said quietly, “I’m going to sit with him now. Could I have some water in case he wakes up?”
“I’ll get someone to run some up,” Maz said as she left the table and walked to the door. “Give a yell when he wakes up, won’t you?”
“Sure,” Jyn said, pulling her chair next to Cassian so she could hold his hand again.
Just before Maz closed the door, she observed the girl name Jyn look over the sleeping Cassian. They were not the first couple she had brought here to heal together, of course, but usually the better half would blubber over their tea and entertain her with their lovesick tale. But not Jyn. She barely said a word about her true feelings, and in truth, she didn’t need to say a word. Her actions spoke for her.
Maz could only hope that he felt as fiercely as Jyn, and that he’d be willing to entertain Maz with his own tale.
Looking out the window, it was tempting to want to stay the next few weeks at Takodana with Cassian. The view of the lush forests and shining lakes under a cobalt blue sky was something out of a dream. Jyn leaned back in her high backed chair and squeezed his hand again, but he didn’t stir. Her eyes drifted shut, in spite of the noisy generator, and fell asleep.
Jyn’s consciousness shifted out the deep black of sleep and crumpled in a net of ivy. The unfortunately familiar taste of Cassian’s blood filled her mouth, but she couldn’t spit it out. She tried to grasp the leaves to regain her foot, but she grabbed Cassian’s cold, dead hand--
“Jyn,” she heard him whisper, but she couldn’t see where he was.
The ivy wrapped itself tight around her wrists so she couldn’t jerk away from the stench of death. Cassian’s pale face rose up next to her, eyes wide and dull gray. She tried to look away by staring up into the sky, but his face was in the sky, bulbous and huge and threatening to fall down and crush her.
“Jyn!”
Her eyes snapped opened and met with Cassian’s, their pupils so wide from worry that his brown irises were nearly eclipsed. He sat up in his bed, his oxygen mask hanging over the bed frame, one hand still grasping hers while the other wiped the tears away from her face. That’s right. He survived. He survived and now he was caring for her when she was supposed to be helping him. Get it together, Jyn! she thought as she inhaled sharply enough to cut the flow of tears.
But then he said in a voice both soft and stern, “What happened, Jyn?”
Her fragile dam broke, and she hid her face in her free hand. “You died.”
“In the dream?”
“No, on the field. You were hurt by the explosion. We were trapped in the rubble. It took ages for help to come, and when it finally did come, you...you...”
She couldn’t say it again. Cassian let go of her other hand, and she shielded her face with it to help muffle her sobs. His long hands rubbed up and down her biceps, but slowed up by her shoulders. Gradually his arms wrapped themselves around her, pausing with every inch as he gauged her reaction. With every inch gained, Jyn leaned forward until her forehead touched his collarbone. By then he had completely enveloped her, and she wrapped her arms around him and clung to his warm, living muscle. With her ear pressed against his chest, she heard the music of his heart drumming steadily on and the air practically singing as it filled his lungs.
Her heavy bun hung loosely on her shoulders, and she let out a little sigh of relief when Cassian pulled out the remaining pins out of her hair before cradling her aching head.
“I remember a little of what happened,” he murmured. “I remember you holding me, and I knew I would be safe.”
Well, at least he felt more confident in her abilities than she did at the time. She clutched the back of his robe and pressed down on the front to soak up her remaining tears. Then it hit her: if he remember being held, could it be possible that...?
“Jyn, look at me,” he asked gently.
She sighed before she turned her face up at him. Her neck pinched uncomfortably from it, but she preferred it to having to let go of him. There was a ghost of a smile on his lips and in the shimmer of his eyes. His intense gaze was all engulfing, like she was the only thing in the galaxy that mattered. She remembered that look when he hustled up a small army for her on Yavin, on the ship just as they managed to slip through security over Scarif, at the top of the Citadel Tower after he shot Krennic, the elevator...and now.
Then maybe he pines for you? Maz’s words echoed in her mind, and Jyn was starting to believe it.
“I wanted to try to ‘do something about it’ after Scarif also.”
Jyn swallowed. “But?”
“But, I was afraid. I was afraid that if I let myself love you, and you died...well, there’s a reason why I have K-2SO as my partner.”
“Joke’s on you, then, because the opposite happened,” Jyn sniffed, but she didn’t look away.
Cassian brushed her bangs away with her thumb, “I know, and I’m sorry.”
He pressed his lips against her forehead, then pulled back to look at her eyes again, which she hoped showed the bursting happiness she felt bloom in her chest. He kissed her between her eyebrows, which made her turn her lift her face to properly kiss him back. His fingers combed through her hair, making her scalp tingle from his touch.
When he broke away, he panted, “So, is it true that I’m the most beautiful man in the world?”
Jyn felt the color drain from her face. “Shit.”
Cassian laughed so hard that it triggered a coughing fit until Jyn managed to get his oxygen mask back over his face. He drew locks of her hair and let them slip through his fingers as he inhaled deeply, his eyes always on her as the last of his coughs rattled out of him. She took his hand when the last string of hair fell from his fingertips, and crawled over him so she could lay next to him without getting tangled in the mask’s tube. It took some fumbling around, but they managed to squeeze together close enough so they could share the pillow and be covered by the thin white blanket. Exhaustion fell over Jyn the moment she felt comfortably snug in his arms.
“You know what I thought when I saw you on the top of that tower?” he groggily asked.
She grinned as she closed her eyes. “What?”
A light snore was her answer. Ah well, now that they were safe and together on Takodana, they had time before being picked up by the Rebellion for him to ‘fess up.