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It starts in the ‘fresher. A great big crushing weight resting on his chest he can hardly breathe through.
Cal thinks the term might be ‘overwhelmed’.
He hasn’t allowed himself to be overwhelmed in a long, long time, and he can’t start now, except he can’t stop his thoughts from racing, around and around his head like a train stuck on a circular track.
He’s not on Bracca anymore.
He’s not on Bracca and Prauf is gone.
He’s not on Bracca, Prauf is gone, and he’s got the Empire after him.
Around, and around, and around they go.
Hands shaking, Cal grips the sink and presses his head to the nearest wall.
Don’t fall over. Do not fall down. And definitely do not cry.
Breathe. He needs to breathe. He’s just got here, just met these people and has no idea if he can trust them. And if he can’t, he’s in a lot of trouble, because he can’t set foot on Bracca ever again. He’s got nothing except the clothes he’s in and the lightsaber hanging from his belt. He doesn’t even have this week’s wages.
He worked so hard for those credits.
A strange, hiccuping laugh escapes him.
Oh no, no, no, no, no. He absolutely cannot lose it now.
Eyes closing, Cal breathes. In and out. Nice and slow. He reaches for the Force, finds it slightly more present than it’s been for the past five years. That nearly breaks him too.
It’ll do more than break him if he goes any deeper. Now’s not the time or the place to risk losing control.
Pulling back, eyes opening, Cal sees he’s left a bloody stain on the wall. He reaches up, finds his skin split above his eyebrow, blood oozing. He reaches over and uses the heel of his hand to wipe the wall down.
Prauf hadn’t bled. Lightsaber wounds tended not to.
Cal needs to do something. Refocus. Calm down. He reaches for the medkit the woman, Cere, had thrust into his hands and starts rummaging. He can fix the cuts, fix the bruises, dull the physical pain. This is the place to start stitching himself back together.
Face whatever’s coming next.
Cal looks up, catches his reflection in the mirror. He sees himself through the dirt, blood and exhaustion. He looks away before the tears swimming in his eyes start falling.
He can do this. Whatever’s waiting for him, he’s going to get through it.
There’s no other option.
Cal holds it together through Bogano and Zeffo and Kashyyyk. It’s not hard when he feels like he has a purpose again, his actions driven by something more than basic survival. He feels good about that. And BD-1’s with him every step of the way, listening and comforting when Cal needs to offload some of what he’s carrying. He likes to call it his invisible kit belt: all the things he carries that no one else can see. Some days the kit belt is light. Other days it’s so heavy he just wants to let someone else share the burden. BD-1 doesn’t judge, doesn’t offer platitudes or Jedi wisdom or even life lessons dressed up as random stories. No, BD listens, comforts, and makes him smile.
And today he’d almost lost him.
Cal is not losing anyone else. He can’t.
He tears Ordo Eris apart to find BD-1 when they;re separated, not caring that he’s dizzy and he can taste blood at the back of his throat from the blow he took back on Zeffo. So he stops to throw up a couple of times, so what? None of that matters. Pain and weakness can’t stop him. He’s not leaving this place until he has BD-1 back.
A Jedi-trained voice at the back of his head whispers about attachment and possessions and the dark side and Cal appeases it by not letting anything but sheer determination drive him.
When he’s found BD-1 and they’re together again back aboard the Mantis, pain in his head exacerbated by the bright lights and Cere still lying, Cal can’t keep his mouth shut. She lied to him. She lied and lied and what for?
She’s not the only one with secrets.
He can’t be near her right now. Can’t be with Greez either who looks and feels so guilty it eats away at Cal too. He’s just so, so tired. Cal retreats to his bunk, BD-1 close behind. His friend worries, and Cal reassures. Yeah, he’s alright. Just tired and aching. It’ll pass.
Everything passes if you’re determined enough.
BD-1 needs to recharge and he tells Cal to do the same. Cal knows he needs to. He’s got that heavy, dragging feeling of doing too much with too little. Hoping to drift off, he stares at the ceiling as they return to Kashyyyk to finish what they started. He loses track of time, aching head refusing to shut down. Cal rolls onto his side just to check BD-1’s still on the workbench, safe and recharging.
Cal should be recharging too. He’d promised BD he would. It’s not happening. He doesn’t know how long he’s been trying to sleep. That pleasantly drowsy feeling he’d had has abandoned him, leaving him wide awake. Normally he’d get up, head to the galley. Not tonight. He doesn’t want to deal with Greez trying to apologise or Cere…
Well, he just isn’t ready to deal with Cere.
Today has been a lot, and now he’s not fighting for his life or learning galaxy-shattering truths, the close calls are punching him in the gut, one after the other. He curls in on himself. He’s going to lose it. He is absolutely going to have a sobbing breakdown here at the back of the ship while Cere’s out there spewing anguish and sorrow and guilt and anger into the Force whether she knows it or not and Greez might just come back and grab him because he has no concept of personal space.
Using the Force, Cal grabs his headphones from where he’d hung them above the workbench. He slides them over his head, tuning into the heaviest bassline he can find on his playlist. The louder and faster the track, the better. Music always got him through a rough day on Bracca. He had tracks for just about every bad mood he needed to work his way out of. No place on a rigging crew for self-pity no matter how tired or sore or sick he felt that day. Music will help now, keep everything quiet and inside instead of messy and spewy for all to see and hear.
He has to get through this.
There’s no other option.
He has to build another lightsaber, and he just came way, way too close to completely falling apart. If Cere hadn’t distracted him when she did, finally told him her whole truth, he’d probably still be crying. A lot. Loudly.
No one needs that right now, least of all him.
There is hope. Cere’s right. She has to be. They can rebuild the Jedi Order. He just needs to stop himself getting in the way of that.
It’s a long, long flight to Ilum. Greez insists on feeding him, and Cal’s too hungry to turn it down. Greez shoos him, tells him to get changed first because he can smell the Dathomir Swamp Gas on him, food will be waiting when he’s back. BD-1 sticks close, never straying from his side. Cere’s hovering too, although she’s slightly less obvious about it. Her words are gentle, encouraging, and Cal swears if she tries to tell him one more time he can do this he will lose it. She means well, or at least she intends to drive him onward to the end of the mission, but he really can’t do this right now.
A good Jedi would’ve saved their master.
(Cere was a Jedi Master. She couldn’t save her Padawan.)
(If he hadn’t dropped his lightsaber. If he hadn’t hesitated at the escape pod. If he’d known sooner that something was wrong…)
He needs to meditate, release some of this tension before it chokes him. Except he can’t. Not here. Not in hyperspace where he might blow them out the ship and into space if he loses control again.
He settles for a shower instead. And if he does a little cliched crying under the loud water spray, at least no one else can hear it. The pressure drops a little, stops the alarms screaming. He needs to get his shit well and truly back together before he sets foot on Ilum.
There’s no other choice.
After Ilum, Cere comes to find him when Greez gets them back on route to Dathomir. Cal’s in the galley because he isn’t exactly sure what he should do or where he should go. He can’t seem to think past the fug in his head now that Ilum’s behind them and his lightsaber is repaired. He’s picked himself back up. He’s moving forward.
Okay, maybe he’s not moving forward right now. Right now, he can’t stop staring at the terrarium and waiting for… something…
BD-1’s made a few suggestions, all of them excellent, but Cal can’t quite get himself to move. Fortunately, Cere knows exactly what he should do. Before he’s really processed it, she’s dragged him to his bunk, ordered him out of his soaked (and literally frozen) clothes and into something dry. Then she sits him down and throws several thick blankets over him. BD-1 jumps onto Cal’s blanketed lap, patting the blankets down as though tucking Cal into bed.
Cere doesn’t stop there. She drops a towel over his hair and rubs vigorously. Bitterly cold water runs down the back of his neck. He shivers so hard he nearly sends BD-1 flying.
“We need to warm you up,” she says.
Cal’s not sure he wants to. He’s numb inside and out. That feels pretty nice. Everything’s feeling distant, like he’s on one planet and everything else is on a moon orbiting overhead.
“Hey, stay with me.”
Cal stirs, forcing his eyes open. He looks up at Cere, sees her concern. “’m fine,” he mumbles.
Her expression says otherwise. “We need to warm you through. BD, stay with him. I’m going to make some tea. If he falls asleep, shock him.”
BD-1 whistles an affirmative.
And prods Cal immediately.
“Ow!” Cal sucks in a breath. “Not asleep, BD.”
He wants to be though. Let this numbness soothe him into a dreamless sleep. It’s strange. He thought he’d be happier. That he’d feel something. Maybe he’s just too tired. Too cold. Because he is happy, deep down. He’s proud of himself. He didn’t give up.
BD didn’t let him give up.
Cal faced himself. Trusted himself, maybe for the first time in five years.
He’s just so tired.
He frees a hand from the blankets and rests it on BD-1’s head. BD gets it, nuzzling against Cal’s hand. That makes him smile.
“I couldn’t do any of this without you,” he says.
BD-1 knows and proceeds to tell Cal exactly how dead he’d be without him. Cal isn’t sure if he’s amused or affronted, so he chooses to slump onto his side and close his eyes. This earns both a shrill shriek in his ears and a hefty jolt.
“Quit it, BD. I’m tired.”
BD-1 does not, in fact, quit it.
Cal digs deeper into his blankets. At least this way BD can’t zap him and all his hollering is slightly dulled.
Cere returns. She tells BD to stand down before unwrapping Cal from his blanket fort. “Tea and then I promise you can sleep,” she says.
It’s a fair trade and Cal accepts the tea. BD-1 is already back on his lap, making threats to shock him again if he tries anything.
“How are you, really?” Cere asks.
Cal looks at her and doesn’t miss a beat. “Fine. Honestly. Just cold. And exhausted. I remember being worn out like this last time. Guess it’s all that ice.”
She draws breath. “It’s alright to not be fine. I’ve put a lot on your shoulders and what you’re doing is nothing short of remarkable.” She waits for him to look at her. “But even remarkable needs a rest now and then.”
That invisible kit belt of his is too heavy again. He wants to hand it to Cere. He can’t drag it any further today. Words punch at him from the inside. They try and claw their way out.
He can’t. Not yet. They aren’t finished.
Besides, Cere has her own troubles. He can’t add his to hers.
He’s held on for years. He can keep going.
Cal adjusts himself. He frees a hand from his blanket pile, placing it over hers. “I’m okay,” he says. Really.”
“You’re freezing,” Cere points out, tucking him into the blankets once again. “So, can I see your lightsaber?”
He nods to the workbench where it sits. “All yours.” And then he laughs. “Half yours anyway.”
“Oh no, not anymore,” Cere says.
Cal drinks his tea as Cere lifts the lightsaber. He watches her assessing its balance, sees her expression when she realises one lightsaber can become two. She looks at him. He grins.
“They look good,” he says to her unasked question. “And they’re more functional as a pair. They… this feels right.”
BD-1 agrees.
Cere raises an eyebrow. “You, Cal Kestis, are a lightsaber nerd.” She can’t keep the amusement out of her tone, no matter how hard she strives to sound like a wise Jedi Master.
Smiling, Cal puts his empty mug on the deck and leans back against his bunk. “Guilty as charged.”
“How many designs did you go through when you built your first one?”
Padawan, your lightsaber!
“Felt like hundreds.” He can see it, clear as any echo. Hours spent sketching, researching, designing, almost to the exclusion of everything else.
“You’ll have to share your talents with the children when we find them.”
He yawns. “I will.”
She puts the lightsaber back in its cradle and returns to his side. She scoops his mug off the ground and rests her hand on his shoulder. “Get some sleep. Just looking at you is wearing me out.”
“Rude,” Cal mutters.
BD-1 whistles his agreement with Cere as Cal settles himself. He’s already halfway gone. He doesn’t even need to use music to quieten his mind. That numbness hasn’t quite left him. He feels BD-1 settle near his chest and then he’s gone, sleeping and thawing out on the way back to Dathomir.
There’s no other choice.
They’re a few days out from Nur when it finally happens.
Cal doesn’t expect it. Not this way at least. There’s not some grand reckoning. He’d had that under an ocean facing a monster in a mechanical mask. He doesn’t snap out of some horrifying nightmare. He isn’t levelled by a powerful echo. There isn’t some immense realisation mid-meditation. It’s not even something obvious like tweaking the wound in his side. He’s had his music on almost non-stop, finding reasons to be alone so he can pound the sadness out of him with rapid beats and powerful lyrics, making himself hold it all together until the immensity of everything calms down back into the old familiar grooves.
Except nothing fits like it did before.
This isn’t Bracca.
Prauf’s still gone.
He cannot rebuild the Jedi Order. Master Cordova, and the Zeffo, have shown him as much. It was arrogant to assume he could.
Maybe Cal’s accepted his past, but he hasn’t stopped long enough to simply sit with it. Feel it. Mourn what it has taken from him. What it has shaped him into. It does not define him. He is more than his pain.
Nonetheless, it is a part of him. He could not be the person, the Jedi, he is without it.
In the end, all it takes is Cere coming to find him when he’s at his workbench staring into nothingness. She waits for him to slide his headphones off, and when he does, she looks at him and asks “Are you okay? You’re looking a little lost.”
“Oh,” he says. His eyes fill before he can stop it. He laughs shakily even as he feels his dubious foundations finally crumbling. “Oh, no.” He presses his hands to his face. He’s already losing the ability to speak, his words choked off by tears. “Why did you have to ask me that?”
She closes the engine room door with a tiny application of the Force. “Talk to me,” she says.
Except he can’t talk because now he’s crying so hard he can hardly breathe. Cere is there, pulling him into her arms. And when his knees give out, she guides him to the deck. Cal sits, trying to stop, except he can’t now, it’s all gushing out, and this is why he didn’t let it happen before. This is why he never let himself really think and feel.
He knows what he lost and there’s no escaping it now.
Prauf is gone. He’s gone. He’s dead. The guy who kept him alive, who looked out for him even though he didn’t have to, who showed him kindness when no one else did, who taught him how to survive on Bracca. The one who told him to go out and find his destiny.
He’s dead. He died so Cal would live.
He feels BD-1’s familiar weight on his back, one foot tapping gently. Cal tries to match his breathing to the BD-1’s taps. It’s hard when he can’t stop crying.
Cere sits with him, waiting him out. Her hand rests on his cheek, fingers brushing tears away. “You’ve needed to do this for a long time,” she says. “Let it all out. Let yourself release it. You’re safe now. You’re allowed to feel all of it.”
He falls forward, his head resting on her shoulder as great, heaving sobs escape him. It hurts like hell and even that can’t stop him. Cere wraps one arm around him, the other brushing over his hair. He sinks into her embrace, letting her hold him, hold everything, while he lets himself feel. It’s everything he’s held onto, everything he’s drowned out and pushed down until he ran out of space. He lets himself feel it. Mourn it. Even be angry about it.
And Cere lets him. This time, she says nothing. She doesn’t distract him. She doesn’t try and teach him. She’s the only thing left holding him up. Her and BD-1, who never leaves him either.
For a while, Cal loses himself. And then, somehow, he finds himself calming. There’s a fine line between catharsis and self-indulgence. Cal shifts. Cere releases him and he sits back, wiping his eyes even though it’s a lost cause. He feels BD-1 shifting to his lap, the reassuring weight of his head butting against his stomach. Cal reaches down, running a hand over BD-1’s head. He has to press the other to his aching chest.
Cere sits at Cal’s side. She rubs his back. “You needed that.”
Cal nods. It’s about all he trusts himself with right now.
“No more carrying it all by yourself,” she tells him.
“Same to you,” he says, voice hoarse.
“That’s kind of you, but let’s focus on you for a while. Trauma isn’t a ranked on a sliding scale, Cal. You don’t have to compare yours to others and think you have to carry on alone. Some days you can manage, and other days, like today, it’s too much. You’re finally ready to share it,” Cere says. “I’m just glad you let it out before you combusted.”
He pulls in a deep breath, wincing at the pain in his chest. It takes a surprising amount of effort. A heavy feeling settles over him. It’s not the numbness or shock. It’s… relief. Even though his head hurts, he feels lighter. His kit belt is lighter. “Thank you.”
“You’re exhausted, you’re mourning and you’re hurting, and it’s alright to just sit down and do nothing for a while.”
He laughs. “How do you do nothing?”
BD-1 demonstrates.
“Boring,” Cal says.
BD-1 agrees.
“No, it’s necessary,” Cere says. “Especially for Humans who nearly died a few days ago.”
Cal huffs. “So did you.”
She nudges him in his good side. “Only one of us got themselves skewered.”
He sighs. He really can’t argue with that.
“You’re going to rest,” Cere tells him. “Sleep. And if you need to talk, you’re going to come and find me.”
A voice in Cal’s head tells him he can’t go dumping everything on her when Cere’s got her own things to work through. For once, he silences that voice. He is going to take a day. Maybe two. He told BD when he wasn’t okay. He can let Cere know that too. Maybe Greez and Merrin too.
“Okay,” he says. “Sleep. That’s doing nothing.”
“We need to work on your relaxation skills,” Cere says, helping him settle on his bunk. She grabs his blankets while BD fluffs the pillow.
“Relaxation? What is this strange concept you speak of?” Cal asks with a smirk.
“Hush.” She throws the blanket over his head. “Get some rest. Do nothing. And when you’re ready, come and find us. There’s no need to rush.”
Under the blanket, Cal closes his eyes. He’s sinking into his exhaustion. He barely feels BD-1 moving around, getting himself settled. “Cere?” he calls, right on the brink of passing out.
“Yes?”
“Thank you.” And then, because he’s half asleep, he adds, “Kit belt’s lighter.”
Cere, being Cere, understands. He can feel it. “Sleep well.”
She steps out, leaving him to drift off.
Finally, he has a choice.
He chooses to let go.