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The cold is almost a welcome distraction from the pain.
After crashing, being thrown around like a ragdoll, and fighting off that gigantic creature, all with a broken leg, Kallus will take whatever distraction he can get. The snow bites through the fabric of his uniform pants, which have never felt so thin, but at least sitting takes the edge off the angry throb radiating from his leg. Everything below the knee is one mass of burning, aching pain, letting him know just how much it resents all that movement.
Orrelios is another kind of distraction, one that has him on guard. He may not have killed him yet, but Kallus is very aware of how tenuous their truce is and how quickly and ruthlessly a lasat can turn. Even if Orrelios appears to have more honor than that mercenary. Then there are the accusations about Geonosis, and the damn questions… Well, Kallus will take the numbing sensation of the cold over such a petty inquisition.
“You know, you will never get out of here without my help,” he tells Orrelios, though for all appearances the situation is the complete opposite. But this is what Kallus knows how to do: bargain with a life in exchange for useful information.
Of course, in his line of work, it’s usually not his own life he’s bargaining.
Orrelios shoots him a dubious look, tinged with the same disdain he’s worn for the entire time they’ve been stuck together. “You’re in no shape to help anybody,” he growls, shoving the medkit at Kallus’ chest.
Kallus takes it easily enough—the lasat hadn’t put much force behind it, despite the dramatics—and gives Orrelios a look of his own. He understands Orrelios’ doubt as much as he resents it, seeing as he’s sitting in an ice cave, lame and defenseless. But though Orrelios may not be purely a brute, as fixing the transponder on his own goes to show, the warrior doesn’t exactly have a mind for strategic thinking. Not like Kallus does, at least.
“I can tell you exactly how to climb out of here,” Kallus pushes, setting the medkit aside. It’s more of a wager, but it’s still better than Orrelios’ plan. And it’s not like their chances can get any worse.
Orrelios seems to come to a similar conclusion. He heaves a sigh and kneels by Kallus, snapping open the kit. “Fine. We’ll try it your way.” He takes up Kallus’ bo-rifle and reconfigures it to staff mode in smooth, practiced movements, casting a curious eye over it as he lifts it for closer inspection. “I see you’ve modified it for close-quarters fighting,” he notes as he looks down the scope. “Impressive. But you shouldn’t have it. It’s not a trophy. Now hold still.”
There’s a retort on the tip of Kallus’ tongue, but it dies in his throat as the large, clawed hand of the lasat takes a hold of his injured leg, the other aligning the bo-rifle parallel to it. Orrelios’ touch is warm, very warm, even through his clothing. It takes a moment as Orrelios unwinds a small bandage roll to realize that it’s chasing away the pain as much as the cold, sinking deep into his leg…
Then something— shifts. It’s highly disconcerting, feeling bone snap back into place within the muscle and meat of his leg, but painless. Orrelios must mistake his gasp of surprise and relief for one of pain, because he pauses for a moment in making the splint, only to quickly resume his brute, but efficient work.
As the soothing warmth slowly fades back into harsh cold and his leg is left feeling as good as new, Kallus struggles to keep his breathing even. Confusion and dread roil in him, twisting his insides into knots. A healing touch can only mean one thing—but to come from a rebel, from a lasat, it’s not only improbable, it’s unthinkable, it’s—
It’s undeniable, Kallus realizes after Orrelios steps back and Kallus hauls himself to his feet, right leg taking his weight easily, as if nothing had happened.
Garazeb Orrelios is his soulmate.
Kallus keeps his head down for another moment as he adjusts his stance to favor his “injured” leg, schooling his features back into order. One does not show weakness in the Empire. And if the only way to avoid showing this… glaring weakness is to feign a lesser one, then so be it.
After this, it will make no difference. It doesn’t matter in the grander scheme of things. It can’t matter.
“It wasn’t a trophy,” Kallus says once his dry tongue unsticks itself. He lets himself look up and catch Orrelios’ green gaze, shields himself with his assertion: It doesn’t matter. “The Guardsman I faced, he… fought well… died with honor. He gave me the rifle… before…”
"The Boosahn Keeraw," Orrelios breathes with quiet reverence. Conflicted emotions flicker across his feline features—doubt, turmoil, understanding, and finally, grudging acceptance.
Kallus frowns. He knows he shouldn’t push, but he can’t help but ask, “The what?”
“The Boosahn Keeraw," he repeats, solemn. “The Lasat Warrior Way. When one is defeated by a superior foe, he gifts his weapon."
Kallus hadn’t felt superior that day. He had felt—dirty. “I was… I was only doing my duty… that day. It was… nothing personal.” Somehow the words, oft-repeated in the confines of his own mind, on nights when screams and explosions echo in his ears, are more difficult than ever to get out.
Orrelios sighs, shoulders slumping, for once showing the weight of the horrors he must too carry. “Yeah… well… what the Empire did on Lasan… I'll never forget it.”
Something bitter rises to the back of Kallus’ throat. “We all have things we won't forget,” he retorts. Though he has no need to, Kallus leans back against the pod, letting it take the weight off his leg. “I remember my first unit,” he begins, a story he hasn’t told since the initial report.
As he tells Orrelios of the slaughter of his men, he feels the phantom pains of the wounds the lasat mercenary gave him, of claws tearing off his armor and through his clothes, to inflict pain just because he could. Those wounds are long healed over, at least physically, but now Kallus can’t help but morbidly wonder what would happen if Orrelios turned on him. All the times they had fought face-to-face before, their blows had come from their bo-rifles, but lasats are naturally armed as well. Would this lasat even be able to hurt him that way, with fangs and claws, or would the wounds heal as soon as they appeared? Would they scar the same way, if at all?
Kallus doesn’t know. Perhaps the answers are out there, some grim research done on soulmates harming one another, but he doesn’t know—and doesn’t want to.
Orrelios is silent for a long moment after Kallus finishes his story. Then, with an edge, “Well, you can't judge all rebels as the same.”
Kallus raises an eyebrow and smiles mirthlessly. “Does that sentiment also apply to Imperials?”
Orrelios shrugs and unslings his own weapon. “All the Imperials I know,” he growls.
Well. Message received.
After chucking their few items out of the cave and into the blizzard above, there’s nothing left to do but enact Kallus’ plan, such that it is. As Kallus climbs onto Orrelios’ back, he comforts himself with the knowledge that they would be doing this even if he wasn’t feigning a leg injury. That he doesn’t have to feel guilty for relying on Orrelios still, for the faint warmth radiating from the lasat’s broad back.
Their escape from the cave is absolutely harrowing. Kallus will just have to count himself lucky that they managed it at all, and that only Orrelios heard his undignified yelling. An agent of the ISB does not panic— except, apparently, when precariously hanging from the roof of an ice cave above three giant, snapping beasts, relying entirely on an uncertain ally to save you from breaking your neck and/or being eaten.
To say he wasn’t trained for this would be an understatement. Then again, nothing about this day has gone as planned.
There is the briefest moment, with Orrelios dangling by the tips of his claws from the lip of the opening, where Kallus considers shooting him, or perhaps just… pushing him off the edge. It would fulfill his duty to the Empire and rid him of both a rebel and this little soulmate problem in one fell swoop.
But… Alexsandr Kallus isn’t that kind of man, he decides. Not today.
Kallus shoots past Orrelios’ head and right into the eye of the rearing creature. Even without his personal bo-rifle, his aim is true. He doesn’t truly deserve the look of relief Orrelios gives him as Kallus gives him a hand up. It makes something thick and bitter crawl up his throat, and he barely has mind enough to remember he’s supposed to be injured. Kallus leans against the lasat once he’s standing, perhaps more heavily than necessary, but Orrelios takes his weight without comment.
“Better activate the transponder,” Kallus says, handing back the other’s bo-rifle and watching him sling it back on his shoulders. “It’s a lot colder up here. We won’t last long.”
“Yeah,” Orrelios says, “but I think I'd rather freeze than be eaten.”
They can agree on that much.
With the transponder beaming out a signal, the pair of them strike out into the storm in search of shelter. Kallus has one arm over Orrelios’ shoulders, his other hand gripping the glowing meteorite. He concentrates on moving forward and making sure the movements of his right leg are stiff, instead of thinking about what the warmth of the rock now reminds him of.
Through the night huddling under the overhang, even with his other confession regarding the massacre on Lasan, Kallus keeps up the act of still being injured. It’s actually helpful to have the splint on; this way he can’t forget which one had been broken. He sticks it out straight while he holds the rest of himself in, surreptitiously angling the toes of his other boot to be in contact with Orrelios. He has no idea if this healing touch can prevent frostbite, but it seems worth a try. Neither of them intended to fall asleep like that, were supposed to stay up to watch for signs of a ship, but the day had been exhausting.
Kallus only stands straight when the Ghost takes off, carrying Orrelios—Zeb—to safety. He watches the ship fly into the atmosphere, shrinking until it’s only a dot in the stark sky, and then gone. He doesn’t realize how tightly he’s gripping the meteorite until his knuckles begin to ache.
He walks back to the overhang with a smooth, seamless stride. Once seated next to the transponder again, he delicately undoes Zeb’s work, unwinding the bandage and readjusting the misused bo-rifle. It would certainly need some maintenance and a good cleaning once he gets back to the Empire.
If he gets back to the Empire.
A thought from earlier resurfaces, now turned back on him. At least if he dies here on this frozen wasteland, all the pesky problems of the past day will be no more. He won’t have to answer for his failed duty to take out a rebel when the opportunity arose. He won’t have to wonder what happened on Geonosis. He won’t have to sit with the knowledge that he is soulbound to Garazeb Orrelios, when they’ve done nothing but chase and fight and hurt eachother, and will likely go back to doing just that, this little adventure only a brief lapse in deeply entrenched hostilities.
He always knew the galaxy was chaotic and cruel. That’s why he joined the ranks of the Empire, to help change that. But whatever greater power creates soulmates is out of anyone’s control. It is surely playing a spiteful joke on the two of them, giving them the ability to help and heal their mortal enemy, when surely they are destined to destroy eachother.
Kallus can’t think about how Zeb saved him, and kept saving him, even without the knowledge of their soulbond. He can’t think about how Zeb didn’t kill him out of a sense of honor and complimented his craftsmanship and listened to him and questioned him and carried him out of that hole and slept against him. He can’t think of deadly claws deftly wrapping his injury, of the miraculous relief that touch brought. How there was nothing spurning Zeb to do any of it, except that of a duty toward another living being that was at his mercy.
He can’t think of any of that, because if he survives this, none of it can mean anything.
Kallus hugs the meteorite close and closes his eyes, waiting for the sound of another ship or the cold to take him away.
Thanks to a passing trader, Kallus does make it back to the Empire, no worse for wear from his close encounter with the rebels.
His report contains no mention of Zeb being on the ice moon, Bahryn, with him. None of his peers give him so much as a glance to acknowledge his absence and miraculous reappearance. The only warmth he finds in the cold Imperial halls is the meteorite he carries with him still.
Everything around him is the same, down to the leg no one knew had shattered in the crash. Yet nothing is the same.
Because Kallus starts being honest with himself, with the doubts he had never let surface before. He asks questions and finds horrible answers. He dreams, and remembers a deep, soothing warmth, thawing him through the cold he hadn’t realized he had wrapped himself in, a cold that had been shielding his eyes and his heart. He takes on a new mission, and a new name: Fulcrum. Turncoat. Traitor. Rebel.
He does the most good he can.
In the end, it isn’t enough. Because when he gets taken down, he almost takes the rebellion with him.
Zeb finds Kallus huddled in the far corner of the crowded storage hull.
Kanan had told him where to find his “friend” and Zeb won’t admit how quickly and eagerly he rushed down, going as far as to slide down the ladder. But the conundrum that is Agent Kallus, ISB Agent turned rebel spy, has been bugging him for ages— and now the man himself is right here, safe at last, and ripe for questioning. Honestly, part of Zeb won’t believe it until he sees it for himself.
All of Zeb’s questions die on his tongue when he gets a good look at Kallus.
The human looks… rough. Gone is the man’s proud carry, the confident set of his broad shoulders, pure discipline and casual arrogance. Now they’re slumped with pain and exhaustion, making him look so unlike himself even in the Imperial uniform. A black eye and split lip are visible on his face, but no doubt his clothes hide much worse. The Empire doesn’t show mercy, especially to traitors, and he’s surely been under torture ever since his capture.
But for some reason, it’s the stray lock of hair that really bothers Zeb. Even on Bahryn, being hounded by beasties and tossed around, Kallus never had a strand out of place. It’s not right, seeing his golden hair in disarray.
Zeb isn’t the smallest guy, and he’s pretty damn hard to miss. He knows Kallus notices his approach, even if the human won’t look directly at him. So he doesn’t understand why Kallus flinches when he gets close and shies back like a cornered tooka. Kallus can usually stand eye-to-eye with Zeb, not an easy feat for a human, but right now he holds himself like he wants to make himself small, to disappear into a black hole.
Karabast. He doesn’t really think Zeb is going to hurt him now, does he?
“Zeb,” Kallus says, eyes flickering up before resting somewhere near Zeb’s shoulder. “I’m… glad to see that you’re alright.”
“Same here,” Zeb says and, damn, it hurts to see surprise flash across his face. “We weren’t sure what they did to you after that transmission.”
Kallus starts to shrug, then aborts the movement with a wince. “Torture. What else?”
Execution, Zeb thinks, but doesn’t say it. Kallus knew the risks, better than most. He’s not sure how to get across the fear he felt when he heard that interrupted message, the anger that surged through him because Kallus hadn’t gotten out when he had the chance, the unexpected sadness at realizing that they’d never get to finish… whatever it was that they started on Bahryn.
But against all odds, Kallus made it. He survived and he’s here in front of Zeb, beaten and bloody, but not broken. Zeb thinks that makes them both survivors of a sort.
Conscious of how Kallus reacted before, Zeb doesn’t reach for him like he wants to, instead simply gesturing back the way he came. “I can help with that, if you like.”
Immediately, Kallus shakes his head, that stray lock of hair swaying with the motion. “That won’t be necessary. I’m sure there are others who need medical attention more than I.”
Zeb sighs. For all that he’s changed, the man is still as stubborn as an eopie. “Come on. You’re with us now: a rebel hurt in the line of duty just like anyone else. Around here, we take care of our own.”
“Kind words. But I assure you, I can take care of myself.” There —there’s that stubborn set to his jaw, the proud tilt of his chin that was missing. Too bad it’s for a stupid reason.
“Sure you can,” Zeb says with a roll of his eyes. He remembers bandaging the man’s leg for him and carrying him out of that cave, all with much less complaining than he’s doing now. By the way Kallus looks away, he’s probably remembering it, too. Zeb fights the urge to fidget as he admits, “But I… well, I sort of thought we were friends.”
That clearly throws Kallus for a loop. He frowns, brow furrowing, but before he can speak, Zeb pushes on. “You know, because… we didn’t kill eachother, did we?” Out of context, it sounds like a stupid basis for a friendship. But it had meant something to Zeb, at least.
A flurry of emotions pass over Kallus’ face, too quick for Zeb to make out. But he does concede after a few moments, “I… suppose not.”
“And I’m not letting you kill yourself now because you won’t accept some help.” Zeb uses the height advantage Kallus has given him to stare down the human, hands on his hips and feeling stupidly like Hera yelling at the kits.
But, credit to the Captain, it works like a charm. Kallus’ proud chin lowers and he finally acquiesces with the smallest of nods. “Fine.”
Zeb smiles, victorious. “Great. You good to climb, or do I need to carry you on my back again? You know, like old times.”
Kallus shoots him a glare that makes Zeb grin even wider. Good, he’s getting some of his attitude back. “I believe I can manage a ladder,” Kallus says dryly.
“Come on then, Kal,” Zeb says, turning back to cross the hull. One of his ears flicks back to catch the soft “Kal?” muttered behind him before the limping footsteps start following.
Kallus does, in fact, make it up the ladder under his own power. Barely. It’s slow going, and when Kallus’ grimacing face emerges from the opening, Zeb doesn’t think twice about offering him a hand up. Thankfully, Kallus isn’t too proud to take him up on it.
Kallus still lets go immediately, putting space between them as he looks around the corridor and visibly tries to even his heavy breathing. Aside from the faint din from the hull below and the power humming through the ship, it’s quiet. “It’s… a bit surreal,” Kallus admits, “Being in the Ghost after spending so long chasing after it.”
Zeb snorts. “Not the circumstances you thought you’d be boarding us, I’m sure.”
“No,” Kallus agrees, a corner of his lips turning up, “But I appreciate being welcomed as a… friend. Truly.”
“Bah,” Zeb waves him off. They’ve been over this already. He pops into the ‘fresher to get the small medkit they keep there, then leads Kallus to his and Ezra’s bunk—luckily, it seems the kid has other places to be. “Sorry about the smell,” he says absently as he opens the case on the small side table.
Kallus gives him an odd look from where he’s still hovering in the doorway. “I didn’t complain about it before. And I’m certainly not about to start.”
Zeb only grunts, but he’s a little relieved. He knows how finicky human noses can be, shoddy as they are. “Sit down already.”
Kallus does, finally letting the door slide shut behind him. He sits on the edge of Zeb’s bunk, all tense lines, as if still prepared for battle—or to bolt. Zeb kneels in front of him, bacta patches and bandages in hand, effectively blocking his exit.
Amber eyes finally meet his, and Zeb’s startled to find fear there. “R-Really, Zeb,” Kallus says, smooth voice uncharacteristically stuttering. “You-you don’t have to— I can do this myself—”
“Kal.” Zeb puts a hand on his knee, squeezing lightly, and Kallus goes still. Some of the tension seems to seep out of him, though the fear doesn’t leave.
This is still—wrong. Not Kallus being here, though that’s strange in its own way. It’s Kallus being small and scared, when he was always—not bigger than life, but… big enough to put up a fight with a trained lasat warrior, to fulfill his role in the Prophecy of the Three, to be both a formidable enemy and ally. Always arrogant and headstrong and defiant and still honorable underneath it all, still brave and cunning and willing to do whatever is right no matter the cost. Zeb has seen him guilty and repetentent, yes, and had told him what he needed to hear to ease that, that Lasan was behind him.
But this fear, this bone-deep dread he sees reflected in those amber eyes, is not something he knows how to ease. Because he doesn’t know why it’s there. They’re friends, aren’t they? So why does Kallus look like he’s waiting for an attack?
Zeb’s eyes zero in on that lock of hair again, still dangling out of place. It’s so small but, karabast, it’s bugging him. That, at least, is a quick fix.
He just barely catches Kallus’ soft intake of breath as he reaches out and brushes a finger across his skin, smoothing the stray hair back into place. It doesn’t hold as tightly, but at least it’s out of the way.
He’s still staring into Kallus’ wide, scared eyes when he sees the bruise around the left one fade away. The same area that Zeb just touched. “What the…?” He does it again, as if it could be wiped back on, but the skin stays clear. His heart pounds in his ears, but his brain still refuses to catch on, to put words to what he’s seeing. He presses his thumb to Kallus’ split lip, and when he takes it away a second later, there’s no sign it was there at all except for the small stripe of red clinging to his fur.
“Garazeb—I am so sorry—” The shaking voice snaps Zeb’s attention back to Kallus’ pale face, and suddenly everything makes sense. Kallus knew and he’s scared of—not Zeb, not really, but this. And it’s not like he doesn’t get why, but… Kallus is looking at him like Zeb holds the galaxy in his hands and is moments from ending it. That just doesn’t sit right with him.
Zeb tosses the useless med supplies aside and grips the human’s shoulders, and there’s a split second of terror on Kallus’ face before Zeb drags him forward and crushes him into a hug.
Kallus is still in his arms, but as the seconds tick by his stiffness melts away. Zeb rubs his arms slowly up and down his back, paws curling around his sides, and pulls him as tight against him as he can. Kallus’ sigh of relief tickles the inner fur of Zeb’s ear, making it twitch, but that’s the only move either of them make for several long moments.
“Zeb…” Kallus breaks the quiet, finally sounding more relaxed, if confused as hell. “What are you doing?”
“Healin’ ya,” Zeb says simply. “‘Sides, you looked like you needed a hug.” He leans back, running a critical eye over Kallus’ body. He can only tell so much, but at least his face has regained some color and is looking more like the shade of a healthy human. Just to be sure, he pokes a claw just under his untucked uniform shirt. “It works through clothes, right?”
Kallus flushes as he shoves Zeb’s paw away. “Yes. As long as heat and pressure can be felt, the healing touch works between—between soulmates.” He stumbles over the last part, shooting Zeb an uncertain look. “You are… strangely calm about this. I thought you’d be… upset.”
Maybe he should be. The old him—angry, grieving, and deeply ashamed—certainly would have been. But right now, all he feels is relief and a strange sense of peace. Zeb rubs the back of his neck, trying to wrestle it into words.
“I can’t say I saw it coming,” Zeb says honestly. “But… The Ashla has been pushing us together for a while now. This—” he gestures vaguely between them, “—doesn’t seem that big a stretch.”
Maybe before seeing Chava and finding Lira San, Zeb wouldn’t have believed it. But after feeling the power flow through him as he used the bo-rifle in the way of the Ancients to guide them, seeing their original homeworld and the joy and pride in the old woman’s eyes… Well, he thinks he understands now that things are not always what they seem, and that some things need the right push to come to pass.
Ever since he and Kallus first clashed bo-rifles—or maybe even before that, at the fall of Lasan—their lives have kept crashing into eachother, for better and worse. The Ashla giving them a way to help eachother… maybe that means it was always going to be for the better in the end. Sitting here with Kallus, in the same place and on the same side at last, it certainly feels like it.
Kallus is still staring at him like he’s speaking Wookie. Zeb grunts softly and tries to explain. “I’ve gotten some idea of how you humans understand soulbonds—Kanan and Ezra at least, pretty sure Mandalorians have a whole other thing about it. But to lasats, it’s a connection through the Ashla, a way to channel it between two beings to ease their suffering. The bond it creates is like family, but more sacred.”
This time, when Zeb reaches for him, Kallus doesn’t flinch away. He lets Zeb take one of his hands and close it between his paws, slow and gentle. “I can’t say I know what that means for the two of us,” Zeb says. Familial, romantic, or the camaraderie of fellow warriors. Like the fractured rebellion, a lot of things are up in the air right now.
But Zeb meets Kallus’ amber eyes, no longer darkened by bruises or hatred, and says, “I just know I care about ya.”
Kallus visibly swallows, the bump on his pale throat bobbing. His cheeks redden but he doesn’t look away from Zeb as he takes in the lasat’s honest words. Then Kallus’ hand squeezes Zeb’s paw with a sure strength that had been missing.
“And I you,” Kallus says, a soft confession into the air between them.
Zeb smiles and gives Kallus’ hand a squeeze in return before releasing it. “Glad we’re on the same page,” Zeb says. He pats Kallus’ knee and rises to stand, stretching a little as he does. Now that the adrenalin has worn off, exhaustion is beginning to set in, and he’s sure it’s the same for Kallus. At least neither of them are injured (not anymore, and that’s still a funny thought), but bunk space is going to be scarce.
As Zeb is turning over logistics in his mind, a thought strikes him. “Wait a tick… You knew.” He narrows his eyes at Kallus, who tilts his head questioningly.
“Knew what?”
“Before today! You already knew!” Zeb pokes Kallus’ forehead, where there’s no sign of the healed bruising. He sees the realization hit Kallus as his face cringes. “When did you find out?”
For all that Kallus is a fierce interrogator, he crumples startlingly quickly, though he aims his gaze more toward the neglected medkit than to Zeb. He clears his throat awkwardly. “Ahem… well… I’ve known since… since Bahryn.”
It takes a long moment for Zeb to figure out what that blasted moon has to do with it, Kallus cutting uncertain glances at him all the while. Then it hits him, and Zeb doesn’t know whether he wants to smack himself or Kallus. “You mean to tell me…” he starts, voice slowly growing louder, “...that you weren’t even injured?!”
“I was injured, until you splinted my leg!” Kallus snaps. His face is quickly turning from a healthy human pink to bright red. “That’s when you first healed me. But I would have needed your assistance to climb out regardless— Stop laughing, Garazeb! This day has been hard enough on me already. Please leave me what little remains of my dignity.”
Zeb eventually gets control of himself, though he’s still wheezing a bit. “Kriff, I needed that. Thanks, Kal.”
Kallus crosses his arms petulantly, but the tension has left him. Eventually, when he can meet Zeb’s eyes again, he returns Zeb’s sharp-toothed grin with a small, cautious smile of his own.
That’s when Zeb knows that whatever comes next, they’ll be okay.