Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The echo is tucked behind Bode’s Z-95.

Nearly lost to the bright, blinding light of Tanalorr, it’s a coaxing whisper like all strong echoes are. And even before he lets it play out; it’s already familiar to him. He both knows and doesn’t know this presence in the Force – a deep abyss under the surface of a placid lake; a dark horizon with the promise of a storm; sea salt tears on an ocean breeze, briny and unpleasant, and now recently familiar.

Cal hesitates.

Standing in the stream curling through the stone under his feet as he crosses his arms, tucking his hands to his chest so he can press his nails through his undershirt into his ribs until the pain is brighter than the echo, he lets out a shuddering breath. He shouldn’t be out here. Even with relocating the Mantis to the verdant gardens, the distance between the ship and here is far too wide to trek in his injured state. But he did anyway because he, he couldn’t. He just couldn’t stand being on the same ship as Bode even with the man unconscious, set up in one of the smaller cabins that got converted into medical three or four years ago.

Call him naïve, but he thought it would’ve been easy to avoid a man who is unawake and unaware but Bode, well, he’s a presence now when before he’d been a suggestion at best, an absence at worst. Now that he’s no longer suppressing his presence or hiding in the shadows, whether it’s on purpose because he’s finally given up or accident because of his state of true unconscious, it doesn’t matter, he’s flooded the Mantis with emotions Cal is in no state to handle with grace. He’s too raw around the edges, his own volatile emotions bubbling close to the surface.

So he slipped away with Merrin’s eyes burning the back of his neck.

And now he’s here. With an echo.

With one of Bode’s echoes.

Cal stares at the patch of soft purple ferns, glowflies dancing in the swirls of the echo only he can see, his gaze not quite focused as he thinks back and realizes…he’s never seen an echo from Bode before.

Of course. Several puzzle pieces click into place. Not all of them, but enough that his shoulders sag. The Force is unknowable. The abilities it grants even more so. It should make him feel better, knowing no one could’ve sensed him, but it doesn’t.

It really, really doesn’t.

Before him is the chance to know something of Bode. Something true and unfettered. Something not hidden behind a smile-that’s-a-lie and dark, dark eyes that Cal found himself getting lost in too often. The opportunity is almost overwhelming. The fear of what he might find is debilitating. It makes his hands shake, his heart rate kick up. It’s stupid but – Cal bared so much of himself to Bode. Casually. Thoughtlessly. Intimately, in the dead of night when nightmares chased him from sleep and he somehow found himself with Bode at his side, willing to listen, to wrap his arm around Cal and hold him close. And Cal fell for it. Every time. Would rest his head on his shoulder, drifting off to the sound of his warm voice, feeling safe in a way he hadn’t felt in a long, long time, wondering if there could be more to this. If he could have more than this.

( – lips press to his temple, and Cal does his best not to tense. For a moment, he thinks it's his imagination. It wouldn't be the first time he's imagined it and it's certainly on the tamer side of things, but the lips linger, and he's half slumped over the man's chest so he feels Bode's deep inhale like an ocean wave, rocking to and fro. Not his imagination. Maybe a dream?

The arm around his shoulders tighten, pulling him impossibly closer, and Cal melts.

"Tayala would've liked you," Bode murmurs and it sounds like it hurts. Cal doesn't respond because he's supposed to be asleep though he aches to do something about the grief holding fast in Bode's voice. "Oh, scrapper, what am I going to do with you?")

And he thought Bode was the same. Stories of his daughter, soft confessions of his fears and wants, the reverent way he talked about his wife for Cal’s ears only. The hints of his life dropped here and there, seemingly reluctant to trust, but learning how to do so all the same. Learning how to trust Cal.

But now he knows better, and he knows he probably never knew Bode Akuna at all.

He’d gotten a taste of him, of the Dark rooted in Bode’s soul on the mesa in Jedha. But when they fought – oh, when they fought  here on Tanalorr, the Force had been blown wide open, wailing with unimaginable loss and grief, rage and desperation, of a protectiveness and helplessness so intense it was consuming. It tasted like death. Like begging for an end to all this misery. That mask he held so close had been dropped, and it had been agonizing. A culmination of all those moments when you’re finally alone and everything bright falls away, and all there is, is a defeat, a deadness, a hole that can never be filled.

The thing is – Cal refuses to believe that’s all he is. There’s more to someone than their losses. It couldn’t have all been a lie. The best lies are based in truth, he remembers from some time, someone with no name or face. It comes down to picking them apart. What is true, what is a lie, what is too tangled up to properly tell. And Cal may not be the best with people at their present, but he's always been good at their past. 

He closes his eyes, inhaling slowly, and reaches physically and mentally.

The echo surges to meet him, desperate to finally have someone to share the pain.

And it’s –

four years later and everything is still an open wound that he thinks will never heal. It’s finally coming to the one place he thought could be a haven only to find it barren and empty and sad. It’s a grief that hits Cal like a blaster shot and he’s on his knees before he registers falling, catching himself on his hands before he can meet the ground completely, injuries wrenching. Something pops and warmth spreads across his abdomen. Water rushes over his hands, soaks through his knees, tinges pink as blood dripdripdrips.

He ignores it for the phantom sensation of tears on his cheeks and regret lodged in his throat, guilt eating him from the inside out, and a darkDarkdark whisper in the back of his mind that is worth if she can be safe worthitplease beworthit. And a low voice singing – show me your light. I’ve waited all night. He presses a hand to his face as the phantom tears become real and he tries to slow them, but they keep coming.

Bode’s emotions tear at those already raw edges, amplified by the odd Force nexus here and something, something else that is distant but present, twisted up and tangled and too much, too much, Kata is asleep in the ship, be quiet, be quiet, breakdown silently damnit, no sound, no witnesses. show me your light. I’ve waited all night. oh, Tayala, won’t you sing with me? please sing with me. Cal curls inward, wrapping his arms around his middle in the mockery of a hug, something between a wail of loss and a scream of rage trapped in his chest. unfair. how dare they. everything they took everything I had will take what I want can’t take must protect – The thoughts fracture and scatter, and they sound so unlike Bode but how can he think that, who even is Bode? Except that maybe this is Bode and maybe this also isn’t.

It had consumed him. Cal knew. He knew. But he didn’t actually. Cal has lost and he has mourned, but the grief he carries is a reminder, not a rumination. It powers him, it doesn’t ruin him. It took time and it took effort, and he had support even if they never realized. Prauf and Tabbers. Cere and Greez. BD-1 and Merrin. Bravo and Gabs, Lizz and Koob. Mosey and Moran. Even Bode. Even…Even Bode.

What did Bode have?

Nothing.

Fear. Paranoia. Grief. He was alone with a little girl to protect. The galaxy hated him and his kind. What was he supposed to do when the bounty hunters kept coming and the Inquisitorius loomed ever closer? Maybe there were better options, sure, but even now with hindsight and a different perspective, Cal can’t think of any. His head feels like it’s going to split open, his ears ringing. He wishes Bode had trusted him enough before it came to this. He understands why he didn’t. He just – well, he wishes for a lot of things, but he rarely ever gets what he wants.

Cal drags a wet hand over his face, stares blankly at the smear of red on his skin. He licks his lips and finds blood. Always blood. Bode’s tear-thick voice stays in his head as he sits up and back, not having the energy to move nor the willpower. To go back to the Mantis is to go back to the simmering presence threaded through the Force. To go back is to find himself at Bode’s side once again, staring at his slack expression, and trying to reconcile the man who nearly drove a lightsaber into his heart with the man who stood close enough to kiss, whose eyes had flickered down to Cal’s mouth and there had been a single moment of this is it only to lose it to Greez’s unfortunate timing.

( – is that a blush? Cal can’t help but think, delighted and endeared. Bode turns away as Greez starts talking, but he doesn’t leave. Instead, he coughs quietly, and when he turns back, he looks a little more composed, but Cal now knows what he looks like with a blush. The pink tinge that spread across his cheeks at being interrupted lingers ever-so-faintly, and Cal should be forgiven for staring, brain working overtime on ways to get him to blush again.)

He sighs as the splish-splash of footsteps start abruptly and then end next to him. Merrin is a smoke-fire at this side, her hand warm and solid on his shoulder. Cal leans into the touch, resting his temple on her thigh.

“You are bleeding,” she says softly. Her hand squeezes gently. Cal doesn’t respond even though he knows she wants him to, wants him to take the obvious bait and say something snarky in return. Oh, I hadn’t noticed. “Come. Back to the Mantis.”

Cal wraps an arm around her knee and her hand goes to his hair, threading her fingers through unwashed copper locks and settling. “We can’t stay here,” he murmurs. “This place is – it isn’t good.”

“Then we leave,” she says simply.

He nods, eyes on the patch of ferns, looking through not at, ghost star looping in his head. “Yeah. Sooner than later.”

Cal steps onto the Mantis and is nearly blinded as his vision is flooded with the bright haze of echoes scattered everywhere. On the potolli-weave cushions, on the counters, at the nav table, dripping off the mug Bode used over and over again during the early mornings in hyperspace. It never got put away. Even though Greez likes a spotless kitchen, no one ever got a chance to deal with it in the short time between Jedha and Nova Garon and Tanalorr.

These echoes – weren’t here before. He closes his eyes, exhaling slowly, his hands curling and flexing at his sides. Bode. Bode again. Always and always. What grief is he going to find here? What mechanisms of betrayal are tucked in the corners and creases of the only place he’s considered home since he left the Temple?

Merrin already ducked into the ‘fresher, leaving Cal to stumble to the mug sitting on the counter. He remembers…He remembers pulling out that mug and handing it over, Lizz pouring her patently awful caf into it before sliding it down the line to Bode’s waiting hand. Bode who didn’t know why the rest of them were avoiding caf this fine Zhellday despite being absolute caf fiends. Bode who thanked both Lizz and Cal for setting this up (and Gabs whispering her own gleeful thank you). Who took a generous sip, paused with the rim still pressed to his mouth, the corners of his eyes crinkling. Gabs nearly choked on her laughter in the background, knuckles shoved in her mouth to keep herself muffled. Bravo had a bucket ready. Koob silently filled his own cup and downed it in one go. But Bode only swallowed the mouthful, coughed, and declared with a smile it just needed some sugar.

And when the man told Cal about his daughter not even twelve hours later, all Cal could think was that explains so much.

Because he can’t not, Cal picks up the mug, cradles it between his hands. The pink and red Mister Mockwell (the only artist he and Greez could ever agree on) album cover is faded. In contrast, the echo is clear, though sleepy and amused, Bode keeping the warm mug tucked close as he watches Cal stumble around the cabin.

There’s nothing profound in this moment. No lightning bolt of realization. No debilitating brick of grief. It just is. Soft. Mundane. Layered over itself like it’s a moment that’s happened over and over again. And it has, because this echo is here and lingering.

Cal stumbling around swaps out for Cal bickering with Greez which merges with Cal tinkering with BD-1’s paintjob, and then it’s Cal on the other side of the counter, leaning in with his own mug in hand, mouth quirked in a smile, something sparkling in his eyes, again and again, one morning into another morning, and it’s always Bode, watching him with a sort of tender warmth that should hurt, but doesn’t, because he gets to forget, for a moment, with Cal’s eyes closing as he laughs, all his troubles.

(Guilt will come later. The fear will return. But not right now. Not here.)

Cal puts the mug in the sink then wipes his shaking on his shirt. Blood sticks to his palm and he thinks oh, right, but he doesn’t do anything but let his hand drop to his side as he wanders into the currently occupied medical suit.

It’s a relief he feels down to his very bones that the suite is void of new echoes. Bode hasn’t been conscious enough to make them, and he was never in here before.

He slumps into the seat next to Bode’s bed, ignoring the way it hurts, and scrubs his hands over his face, pressing his palms hard against his eyes until fireworks burst in the blackness.

Cal had told Merrin sooner than later, but unfortunately sooner is later.

The Mantis took too many hard hits in the Abyss and while Greez can repair the ship with what they have – easily and quickly, though quicker if he’d just let Cal lend a hand, but oh, yeah? Walk the length of the ship without having to stop for a breath, and we’ll see about you helpin’ me. See? Can’t do it, can you? Relax, I’ve got the little bogling here to help me out for now. – he also doesn’t want to leave until Cal’s healed up enough one bump in the Abyss won’t send him falling. Greez trusts Cal far more than he trusts the High Republic tech. On any other day, Cal would be flattered. But he’s too tired now to even muster up a smile and blush at the compliment. It’s been a long, long time since he’s felt this run down.

He peeks between his fingers. Bode hasn’t woken up in the three days since their fight. Cal is both pathetically grateful to avoid another confrontation so soon, knowing neither of them are even close to emotionally stable right now, and worried that, that maybe – maybe he did kill Bode. That now he’s just wasting away, dying bit by bit, and it’s all his fault. It’s always his fault.

The Force hasn’t felt right since they landed.

Maybe he is –

Cal grabs Bode’s wrist before the thought fully realizes, feels the flutter of a pulse that’s not nearly strong enough to make him feel better, but the rhythm soothes some wild part of him. Bode had always been good at doing that. Calming the itch under his skin to go, go, go.

The Force ripples outward, the mirror surface of a pond disturbed by a pebble. Cal blinks, frowning, as he cautiously expands his presence until it meets cool waters. He really shouldn’t but he does. He closes his eyes and dips beneath the surface.

It’s cold, is the first thing he notices.

Lonely, is the second.

Barren of life and even Light. The sun remains a distant, unreachable thing. Cal opens his eyes to nothing. He glances up where the surface glimmers, still rippling out, then down where the darkness is absolute. There’s a ringing in his ears. A droning keen of don’t, don’t, don’t – and he propels himself down, down, down.

What he finds is glittering red. Like blood. Like pain. Like rage and regret and fear. He finds screaming. He finds weeping. He finds Bode folded in on himself, a shade, a suggestion, willing himself to disappear even as he already fades at the edges enough Cal has to squint to see him in full. For all that his echoes lay at Cal’s feet now, Bode doesn’t seem to want to join them. To be illuminated by the light. To be found. Dark, dissonant whispers swirl in the dark waters.

“Bode,” Cal says, bubbles escaping his mouth and floating to the surface that beckons him. “Bode.”

Give him a reason. Give him a reason –

Cal moves closer. Bode curls in tighter on himself, fingers buried in his hair, face tucked to his knees. Ghost star, wonder where you are – it was my home – nothing is going to be same again – it’s changed you as well – stars, I miss her, I miss her so much – you’re lost – what have you done – betrayed by the one I trusted most – Kata, if something happens, call this frequency, my best friend – give him a reason please please –

“Get out,” it reverberates, not just Bode’s voice, but Dagan’s, layered over each other, the edges of the abyss glowing red and growing beyond dark into Darkness, the faded parts of Bode expanding and he just – lets it. Lets it eat away a little more of him with no resistance.

Panic grips Cal. “Bode, hey – .”

“Get out.”

He wrenches himself back, ascends to the surface without another thought, rageragerage snapping at his heels, barely covering the despairanguishexhaution. Underneath that, is resignation, is whywhywhy couldn’t you let me go. Tearing violently out of the Force, he slams back into his own consciousness with a sharp throb of pain all over until it gathers just behind his eyes and stays.

No, he despairs.

A moment passes as he presses his fingers against his eyes for some relief against this damn headache. Then –

No, he decides, conviction firm. He won’t let this happen.

Cal stands with creaking knees and heads out of the room, sparing one last look at Bode. His expression remains unchanged. Brows furrowed, mouth turned down, but now tears shine on his cheeks. Cal leaves, grabs what he needs from the engine room including the bomber jacket he’d picked up on Koboh, keeping his eyes averted from his bed, and doesn’t care that his side is still stained red, or how late it’s become, or that Greez and Kata have come out of the cockpit and the smells coming from the kitchen make his stomach rumble, he breezes right past it to the exit.

“Cal,” Merrin calls.

He stops at the threshold between the Mantis and Tanalorr, the dark, indigo night infused with warmth and peace. It makes him uneasy hearing no insects buzzing or wind through the breeze, but he’s also not used to quiet. There is life on this planet, the sensors say so, it just seems to stay away from this area.

“You need to stop. Come back and rest.”

He glances over. Kata watches him with wide, wide eyes, heels thumping against the edge of her seat, Mookie propped up on the counter next to her. She looks tired. The same kind of tired as him. She’s a muted spark in the Force, sunlight through storm clouds. He can’t tell if that’s Bode still hiding her subconsciously or if this is something she learned, was taught, but either way it’s unnerving.

“I will,” he says, voice cracking. “I just…I need to do something first.”

“Kid,” Greez sighs – enough exasperation Cal winces and looks away, shoulders curling. His left shoulder, still tender, still bruised as hell, protests the motion, and it sends a jolt of energy through him. Cal throws back a smile, catches Kata’s eye again. She’s frowning now, brows furrowed with a divot in the middle that reminds him so strongly of Bode he feels sick. Greez taps his favorite mixing spoon pointedly on the counter. “Cal, c’mon. Whatever it is can wait, right?”

“Nope,” he says, popping the ‘p’ and throwing them all off with how bright he sounds. BD-1 whirls and he crouches only enough for the droid to easily climb onto his shoulder, but it still hurts. Merrin’s eyes narrow. “I’ll be back.”

And he’s gone again for a second time that day, leaving a ship full of echoes behind.

But this time he’s not running.

BD-1 whirls in his ear, hanging off his good shoulder. Cal presses his mouth into a thin line and keeps going, gaze kept steadily ahead to ignore the ghost-fire watching him go and the sunlight-through-clouds that probes at him clumsily until he gets too far away even for Kata’s naturally long reach.

Once all he feels is Tanalorr, he slows down. BD-1 chirps. “I have to,” Cal tells him. “It’s just making things worse.” Another beep, his chassis tilting in question. “I don’t know if it’ll help, but it can’t not help.”

Cal unsheathes Dagan Gera’s saber.

He could hear the kyber before, but it’s so much louder here in the open. It screams. It weeps. It thrashes in the Force, all betrayal and rage and regrets that weren’t quite enough to stop anything but are there all the same. It quiets in his hand, just barely, now that Bode isn’t here for it to ricochet off of anymore.

Cal’s own kyber sings melodiously from his hip, radiating warmth and contentment even with Cal’s feelings in turmoil. For him, the Dark is a murmur, something from a dream. There but faded, ready to come back when he least expects it. It lost a foothold when Cal stayed his hand, when he turned away from it and dropped his blaster to the blood-stained ground, and then even more when Bode took his next breath, and another, passed out and a mess, but alive, alive, alive.

The bled kyber seems less powerful away from Bode. No longer amplified by his emotions. The light of the blade dimmer with no abyss as its backdrop. Cal stares at it, listens to its rage, and nods. Taking care of the crystal won’t fix everything, but it might help, like he told BD-1. It’ll no longer invade Bode’s psyche, drag up and make worse his fears and anger.

Cal has never purified a kyber crystal before, but he’s read about it, experienced it once even on Ilum. Not when he was still a lost padawan convinced he was only ever going to be a failure scrapper. But when he’d gone back to see with a clearer mind the full extent of the Empire’s depravity. It’d stoked a fire in his chest. Gave him the spark he needed to burn through what he could of the Empire – and of himself.

The Jedi in that echo had been an old Master from a long time ago, and she did not live for much longer, succumbing to injuries and the cold as the crystal that had belonged to her lost padawan sang bright and clear in her grip. Cal had left the crystal behind in that spot where love and loyalty still lingered in the Force and took only the memories with him.

It’ll take more than that, he knows, but he’s going to try.

Common sense tells Cal to avoid the audience chamber, but when has he ever had any of that? If he did, maybe he wouldn’t be needing to avoid it in the first place. The atrium should be enough. He would like it to be enough. It’s nice out here with the natural curve of rock blending in with the Temple entrance’s straight lines.

It’s not. The Force whispers you know better than that. And he lets his instincts guide him more than any of his physical senses until he’s in that damn audience chamber. The vaulted ceiling high and crumbling, the final battleground stained red with blood. Most of it is dried now three days later.

And there – a roiling fog of echoes that almost obscures it all.

He jumps down without any finesse, staggering to stay on his feet before he gives up and crashes to his knees in the mockery of a meditative pose, hands on his thighs, heart and lungs rattling in his chest. BD-1 bwoops quietly, but it’s less of a question and more of an idle comment, one Cal doesn’t know how to respond to, so he doesn’t.

Now that he’s not so focused on Bode’s…immediateness, he can sense echoes far older than either of them. The fog is chest height like this. A cool caress on his skin. A lungful of clarity. Dagan Gera, Santari Khri, various workers who helped construct the Temple before leaving back for Koboh, and…Master Oppo Rancisis, who Cal remembers to have been on the Council. They never spoke face to face, but he remembers eavesdropping on conversations about him and his psychometry, remembers finding echoes of the master in the deepest and oldest parts of the Temple, recognizes, now, his voice in the echo of the Nihil invasion. He had been impressed with what Dagan and Santari had done on this planet. More than impressed. He was the main advocate, behind Dagan and Santari, for creating an outpost here. Until the invasion.

The kyber song warbles in the face of happy memories. Dagan’s marvel and pride at the half-constructed chamber. Santari’s design, of course, because no one could do it better, he’d thought. His joy at the bright skies and turquoise waters. The excitement. The pride. Cal wishes he’d known that version of Dagan Gera. The lauded knight. The one who made Santari Khri soften and smile and laugh brightly.

For who knows how long, Cal is drifting in Dagan’s memories from before the madness and the hate.

Until he’s not

Until it’s okay. it’s okay weaves through the echoes of the High Republic Jedi. Too new, too fresh, too familiar to ignore for something less personal. The emotions are stronger than these faded ones. Cal’s eyebrows furrow. His grip tightens around the lightsaber hilt. it didn’t have to be like this, comes his own voice, exhausted and pained, thick with tears that don’t fall and he remembers thinking himself incapable of crying anymore, drained and wrung out. Bode slumps back, hand twisting at his side okayokayokay, but Cal won’t take the second shot why won’t he take the shot? and –

It’s like a dream, seeing his own face, bloodied and bruised, eyes glimmering bright from the sleepless shadows underneath and the bruises that hide his freckles – sanctimonious, arrogant, fuck BeeDee getoutoftheway. His knuckles ache. His shoulder stings. His lungs rattle in his chest, but that might just be his broken ribs shifting as he breathes heavily. Most of all, his heart hurts. Cal Kestis shouldn’t look like – that. So defeated. So, so tired. Desperate as he raises his blaster in a shaking hand, a tired slump in his shoulders, his voice cracking. For a brief, shining moment, Bode remembers him looking happy. A bounce in his step, a glint in his eyes he hadn’t seen in full before.

Of course Bode ruined that.

He thinks, maybe – He hopes that when this is all over, Cal can find that happiness again.

He thinks – He knows, it won’t be found with Bode in his life. Not anymore. Not like this.

please, Cal’s voice wavers. Bode shakes his head. ‘s okay, he breathes. Thinks, just do it please – I don’t think I can do this anymore. But the blaster slips from Cal’s hand, clattering to the ground, and Bode nearly sobs, nonono. He slumps back with a gasp as Cal drops to his knees at Bode’s side, putting pressure on the blaster wound just as he passes out.

Cal opens his eyes, eyelashes sticking, cheeks wet. “I hate him,” he whispers. BD-1 beeps. Cal chokes ona  laugh. “I want to hate him,” and even that’s a lie. “I don’t want to try here.”

Finally, a truth.

Guttural screams of desperation and insults ring in his ears. Half of them real, half of them just trying to piss Cal off even more.  give him a reason. give him a reason to put me down.

Bode had wanted to die.

He climbs to his feet, knees creaking and popping, and he wraps an arm around his middle to brace it as he heads towards the only door. The Temple is unfinished. He wonders if any blueprints still exist in the Central Manse and makes an absent note to check later.

The room he enters has large, open windows pointed directly to where the Abyss shines the brightest. It makes the room glow otherworldly oranges and pinks. Cal squints up into the darkness as a glimmer catches his attention and he doesn’t really think about it before he’s shoving up with the Force, tapping the edge of one mirror until it swings at just the right angle, the light it reflects bounces off another, and then another, and another. A zig-zag of colors until it hits a glass bauble and the light scatters, refracting and reflecting, casting the Abyss into the room. Like he’s standing in the center of it.

BD-1 chirps and Cal looks down, stepping back to study the lines carved in the floor, looking like star charts. He follows the way until he’s in the center, a starburst under his feet, where each color of the Abyss meet and mix at its closest perfection.

“Yeah,” he murmurs. “Here works.”

He kneels.

He fails.

Cal grits his teeth, digging his nails into his pants. The Dark mocks him. Glimmering in the light, the kyber blood-red laughs the kind of laughter that only comes at the inevitable end, and everything has been for nothing. Bode’s death wish rattles in his head, and it scares Cal how close he was to granting it. How could Bode ask that of him? Hells, he didn’t even ask. He just forced it onto him, this burden of taking his life, of taking Kata’s father away from her, and Cal would’ve never known his death had been the point. Because he was, is, tired. He’s done. He’d run out of hope the moment he stepped foot on Tanalorr and it turned out the haven he’d envisioned for his daughter was nothing. He failed her one time too many, there was only one thing left to do, and he knew Cal wouldn’t grant him his wish even though Kata would be happier with the Jedi, with Cal, and Cal could protect her in new ways, ways Bode himself was incapable of. And all Cal can think, instead of grief or flattered, is anger. How dare he?

How dare Bode – How dare Cal still love him after all this. And he knows he will keep loving him after all the echoes still left to find. What will he find on the Mantis? Oh Koboh? On Jedha? What’s in Nova Garon, if he dares to brave that station soaked through to the core with Darkness? Loving Bode Akuna after all this is so stupid, but Cal has never claimed to be a smart man.

He curls over, clutching the saber to his chest, as he lets out a sob. Why – it didn’t have to be like this. In the far distance, like hearing it across a vast ocean, he hears a plaintive I don’t how else it could’ve been. Cal shakes his head.

BD-1 bewoops sadly, nudging his elbow. “Failure is not the end. It is a necessary part of the path,” Cordova’s voice says. He peeks out from his arm to see the little holo flickering. Cal stares for a long moment before letting out a wet laugh.

“Good advice for many situations,” he says softly. BD-1 dances, practically preening.

He sits back in seiza and inhales slowly. It was never going to work on the first try, and it won’t work on the second. But he’ll try as many times as he needs to until it does. It has to work.

If anything, just to prove to Bode there’s no such thing as too far gone.

His headache is no better. Blood trickles out of his nose. Cal swears. How many hours as it been? He doesn’t ask BD-1 because he knows he’s not going to like the answer. He’s surprised no one’s come looking for him yet. Merrin knows he was bleeding before he left and just because there’s no wildlife around to maul him doesn’t mean he’s safe.

As if he summoned her, Merrin steps out of the shadows. Her skin aglow with the Abyss’s lights, her steps quiet and sure, though she makes sure he can hear them as if she knows his awareness is shot, narrowed down to the current in the Force and the screaming that’s died down to whimpers, the wails that is muffled sobs. Bode silent in the Force. That last, faint thought probably more wishful thinking on Cal’s part than a real thing from Bode.

“You keep running,” Merrin says. “What is he doing?” Not what has he done, because they both know what he’s done.

Cal sits back with a sigh. Dagan Gera’s ‘saber shines innocently in the reflected Abyssal light. He tilts his head back to study the pattern and angle of mirrors again, pretending he’s not avoiding Merrin’s question. She steps in front of him, blocking his eyeline, and he looks down, away from the weight of her concern. Instead, he focuses on her hand, her tattoos and the rings she picked up during their time apart. He hasn’t told her of the echoes on those rings. Of her adventures, her wonder, her sorrows, her laughter.

“Bode isn’t hiding anymore,” he says quietly. “I still can’t feel him properly, but I…I can feel him. Probably more than he wants. And it’s too much.” He blinks back tears. “Stars, Merrin, I don’t know how he managed to make it this long.”

Merrin huffs – half a sigh, half a scoff. “I do not believe he did,” she admits. “I think he lost himself a long time ago.”

He thinks back to the echoes he found. The grief in Bode’s voice when he said his wife’s name, the combined mourning of Kata and Bode as they sang together with the same reluctant certainty from them both that this might be the last time they get to sing together.

Cal is glad that’s not the case.

“…Yeah,” he says roughly. “It’s hard being on the Mantis with that.”

“So you came to…?”

“Purify Dagan’s kyber,” Cal explains, hefting the saber up for her to see. He doesn’t know what she feels from it, but she raises an impressed eyebrow.

“I did not know you could do such a thing.”

“I’ve tried,” Cal corrects helplessly. “I didn’t think it would be easy, but it’s definitely harder than I was expecting. There’s a lot of resentment built up. I think the kyber was absorbing his feelings the entire two hundred years he was in that tank.”

Merrin hums. “Perhaps you just need a little help.”

Cal blinks up at her in surprise. “What?”

She settles on the ground across from him, Dagan’s saber between them. “I do not know the process, nor do I quite understand the concept, but perhaps I can help…emotionally.” A blush appears on her cheeks. “You seem conflicted. I am less so. It could be what you need.”

There is no weakness in accepting help, Master Tapal’s voice whispers.

“Sure,” Cal says, voice thick with grateful tears. “Thank you.”

Merrin smiles and holds out her hands palms up. He takes them, tries not to think about how much his own hands shake, how there’s still blood dried in the creases. Her magick sparks and dances, and it soothes a wounded part of him, lets him close his eyes and sink deeper into the Force, into this weird nexus, tethered to the here and now instead of drowning in the amplified memories of those lost.

Cal treads water, head tilted back to bask in the weak sunlight. There are so many clouds, dark and angry as all ocean storms are. This is not where he expected to end up, but this is where he is. He fills his lungs and dives under the surface where it’s cold and dark, and swims until it’s beyond either of those.

Kata misses you, he doesn’t say.

I miss you, he doesn’t say.

Blood-red kyber bucks against the concept. Of something fixed. Of something better. It turns against maybe, against hope. And all Cal needs is a wavering moment. A crack in the Dark that will let the light shine through. And he pushes every single laugh, smile, and joke. Every battle where he trusted Bode to have his back. Every night when he would seek him out and they would watch the stars. Or they would fall asleep in a booth, woken up by Greez complaining that they had perfectly good beds (separate beds, he would tease just to watch Cal turn red) why are they down here ruining his daily opening?

This doesn’t have to be The Moment. The kyber doesn’t need to be healed and pure right here, right now, but Cal needs – He needs Bode. He needs him awake. He doesn’t need smiles or jokes, or that damn mask. He just needs –

Bode. As is he now. As he wants to be, not who he’s forced to be.

Please. If not for me, then for your daughter.

A single ray of sunlight filters through the surface to the depths.

They come back to the Mantis long after morning dawns. Cal drags his feet. Exhausted and in pain, but feeling lighter all the same even if Dagan’s saber is still red. It’s nearly silent now and that’s a relief. Merrin all but helps him up the ramp and sets him on the couch with stern orders to stay.

He doesn’t have the energy to do anything but listen, dropping his head back and closing his eyes. There’s an echo tucked in the creases of the cushion, but they’re soft, ignorable things. They’re probably not even Bode’s. He can’t risk finding something from his team here, so he thickens his shields and settles, headache kicking up in earnest because life would be too easy. Drop his shields and live the echoes? Get a headache. Fortify his shields and ignore the echoes? Get a headache.

Fun times.

Kata is nowhere to be seen. He frowns, and cracks open an eye to find Greez frowning at him in disapproval and concern. The latero doesn’t look any better than him and Merrin, and Cal winces, feeling guilty.  Greez sighs.

“He woke up,” is all he says and Cal is already moving, feet taking him to the half opened door in one blink it seems, time collapsing and expanding all at once and making him feel even more dizzy. He hears murmured voices, Kata’s low and thick with relieved tears, and then Bode’s, rough and hoarse, too tired to properly convey his emotions, but the Force is swollen with them. Cal presses a hand to his chest over his heart, and exhales shakily.  

Bode is awake – and Cal has no idea what to do with that. 

He turns around, the itch to runrunrun under his skin even though he’s physically, mentally, and emotionally incapable of doing that right now, and nearly runs into Merrin. She sighs and takes him away with a guiding hand on his elbow.

Instead of his room, though, he blinks and sways as they stop in front of Cere’s old cabin. He hadn’t let anyone use it after she’d left the crew. Lizz and Koob bunked up together. Gabs got Merrin’s old room. Bravo got Greez’s – and when Bode joined them, he bunked with Bravo since it was, supposedly, only for that one night. Afterwards, Bode slept in the one Lizz and Koob had.

As soon as the door opens, Cal slides past Merrin into the room, straight towards the bed where soft, worn echoes lay. He sits heavily on the mattress, feeling disconnected from his body, and tips over without thinking it through. Merrin catches him then eases him down.

“You have done enough, Cal Kestis,” she says softly.

That’s a nice lie, he thinks.

Chapter Text

The rest of their time on Tanalorr is spent in a haze. A persistent ache presses against the back of Cal’s eyes, making him sensitive to the light and loud noises, but it hasn’t tipped over to a migraine, and loud is a rare thing on this too quiet, empty planet – except for Bode.

He isn’t some hidden, silent presence anymore. No, he’s the loudest thing out there. A klaxon that only Cal seems to hear.

Every time he reaches into the Force, whether it’s for some innocuous use to help Greez or if it’s to sit in meditation with Dagan’s lightsaber still raging and mourning and oh-so bitter in his hand, Bode is always, always there. He’s the loudness of the sea at night. The waves unseen but still heard, still felt as they boomcrash against the hull, rocking him to and fro.

And he knows he’s the only one who feels him like this – it’s bone deep, this connection that stretches between them from point-to-point, soul-to-soul. It feels old enough Cal wonders how he missed it. When did it form? When did this nebulous bond appear and tie them together? Did, Did Bode know it was there and hide it away just like he hid himself away, hoping it would fray, twist, snap the moment he died and Cal would be none the wiser to it? Left to wonder where this empty part of his soul came from.

(He wonders…If he’d known it existed. Could he have prevented all of this before it ever started? Maybe. Probably. Doubtful. 

He shouldn’t be thinking about this. The what ifs will tear him apart.

But what if – )

Bode doesn’t leave the med suite at all due to his injuries – and also because he’s incredibly lucky he’s not cuffed to the cot with the only Force suppressing binders they have. It's unspoken, but everyone knows he’s too defeated to worry about him trying to pull something. 

Cal keeps himself busy helping Greez and Kata with the Mantis, pretending his injuries are getting better even though he knows his family sees right through him, but they know if anyone tries to stop him it’ll end up ugly. Everyone’s ready to get off this damn planet that’s too quiet during the day. The nights grow colder. The stars stopped singing and started screaming. An uneasy miasma seeps from the ground and is ever present.

If Cal were sleeping, his nightmares would be unbearable, but he’s not sleeping so he’s okay.

The nights wear on Merrin and Kata though. Kata more so, still so young and untrained, unguarded for all that she’s been taught to close herself off. She’s so much brighter already than she’d been on Nova Garon and Cal can’t wait to see how much she shines when they leave the Abyss. Greez is lucky to avoid the worst of it.

Bode is just as bad off as Cal.

He doesn’t sleep either. His presence spreads through the ship at night instead, like a rolling morning fog. He checks on Kata first, of course. Then – surprisingly or maybe not – on Cal…until he realizes Cal is also awake and aware of him and he pulls back like he’s been burned.

When Cal closes his eyes and slips under the surface of the Force, Dagan’s kyber reduced to whimpers and sniffling, snaps of teeth and performative snarling, Bode is there too. Always and always there. Refusing to acknowledge they’re sharing the same ephemeral space but never leaving Cal’s side.

Bode’s presence gives him strength to keep trying after countless sessions and three days. It gives him a tether to cling to when the echoes grow darker and deeper and somehow even more personal.

It’s his guiding light when, one night, Cal digs too deep, too fast, and echoes of Dagan lash out, agony and rage tearing through him as fresh and potent as the day Santari said with horror and dismay and fear in her voice, she’s afraid of me (no, Dagan, she’s afraid for you) Dagan, what have you done?

Cal rocks out of meditation, half blind to the physical world. The lightsaber rolls out of his weak grip to under Cere’s cot, metal on metal banging together until it’s out of sight, the pain in his head sparking at every connection. He braces a hand on the floor to stand – and then slaps his other hand down to steady himself, staying exactly where he is as the world moves in a nauseating swirl of colors. Kark. He sucks in a sharp breath. His stomach heaves. A sweat breaks out as his skin grows feverish. Fucking fuck –

Coolness drapes over him, seeping into his skin, wrapping around him tightly. Cal sighs in relief, his muscles turning wobbly, and he just wants to sink down into this embrace that feels like he’s floating in a peaceful late, dappled light aglow on his face, wind in his hair, laughter in the distance.

He tips over, pressing his forehead to the floor. “Bode,” he murmurs softly. The presence stays the same, soothing and comforting, prodding the cracks the last week have left behind in his shields. Not that his shields have ever been that good. He leaves himself too open to echoes on purpose, something Master Vos would surely have judged him for, but even if he were to try now, he would fail. He’s too tired. Worn too thin. He’s putting too much of himself into, well, everything, but he doesn’t know any other way. He doesn’t know how to stop.

A tear slips out as he laughs softly, wrung out and seconds from a full breakdown he doesn’t have time for. It has to wait until they leave Tanalorr at least.

Cal climbs to his feet and leaves the room instead, using the wall to keep himself upright. The closer he gets to the med suit the more Bode’s presence starts to fade away. It tucks behind his equally ragged, cracked shields – what a pair they make – but it’s too late by far, because Cal stands at the doorway, one hand gripping the frame so tight it makes some of the fractures in his fingers split a little more.

Bode stares at him, looking as hollow as Cal feels.

For a long, agonizing moment, that’s all they do. Stare silently at each other as the Force quivers on the edge of something, something, something. Is this all they’re going to do? Stare until Bode looks away because Cal refuses to be the first. Bode will look away and Cal will go back to Cere’s room. That will be it, and everything will be a little worse for it.

It seems like it because the Force gives nothing away. Bode is loud, but he’s muddled, too many emotions, too much chaos, a dam broke and he’s drowning in all the things he shoved away and locked down tight, focused so hard on Kata and keeping her safe.

But then Bode sighs a sigh that moves his whole body and holds out his gloved hand invitingly. The other hand is split and wrapped, bruises peeking between bandages to match the ones on Cal face. Cal swallows thickly, shaky with relief, and all but collapses into the chair next to the bed, taking his hand and squeezing tightly.

They still say nothing, but maybe, just maybe, this is a step in the right direction.

Cal falls asleep – and he dreams of the sea.

—

When he wakes up, he’s no longer in the chair with Bode’s hand in his, but on the bed, curled up against something warm and solid and very-much breathing. He keeps his eyes closed. If he’s still dreaming, he doesn’t want it to end, please, please. There’s fingers in his hair and voices above him. One soft and giggly, the other low and warm, a little raspy. Cal hums under his breath and burrows deeper into Bode’s side, ignoring Kata’s laugh. Bode shushes her gently, amusement and fondness rippling outward, and shoos her off to go get breakfast.

(  – and he remembers resting his head on Bode’s shoulder in the Saloon, insisting he wasn’t tired and was absolutely, one-hundred-percent ready to check on that raider encampment Mosey spotted, the lights are just a little too bright so he’s going to close his eyes for just a second. Then waking up to Bode shushing an excited Turgle, hissing at someone to shut him up before he woke Cal.)

He listens to Kata’s footsteps fade as he picks absently at a hole burned into Bode’s shirt, a bacta patch peeking through. It covers a blaster burn he couldn’t dodge in time, caught in the tail end of one of Cal’s Slows. He smooths his fingers over the edge of the patch, tracing the line between bandage and warm skin. Bode twitches under his touch as he sucks in a surprised breath, the hand in Cal’s hair finally falling away. He tries not to mourn the loss. Instead, he takes his own hand back and glances upward through his eyelashes, meeting Bode’s dark eyes, shadowed darker by the – light behind his head, most likely, but it’s more than that.

Bode lifts his hand. Cal watches him as he hesitates, a complicated series of expressions crossing his face, before he settles it on Cal’s cheek, thumbing gently under his eye where sleepless shadows sit. “Kata’s getting breakfast for all three of us,” he says, his voice sounds awful, like he’d been gargling priorite. “You haven’t been eating.”

Cal resists the urge to lean into the touch, but he doesn’t move away from it. “I have,” because Greez won’t allow anything otherwise.

“Not enough.”

He huffs and finally pulls away, gingerly unfolding from the warm space next to Bode, feeling every single one of his joints pop and all his injuries protest vehemently. “You don’t get to do that.”

Bode is silent for a long moment – “Do what?”

“Or that,” Cal says, frustrated. He sits on the edge of the bed, hands fisted on his knees, just so he can avoid looking at Bode all the easier. “You don’t get to care.” He’s being harsh, cruel even, he knows that, but he won’t lie that he gets some sick sort of satisfaction at the sharp noise Bode makes. The Force shudders, cloying and thick. “You tried to die. You tried to make me kill you.”

“I deserved it,” Bode says quietly.

There’s shame, in the Force, and guilt and regret – and a little bit of, of resentment too at Cal for being unable to go through with it.

Cal stands abruptly, hands still in fists, his heart in his throat. “I’m tired,” his voice cracks. He swallows thickly, throat burning, “of losing the people care about. What you – What you deserve?” He lets out a broken laugh that scraps out of him, turning around to face Bode. “And what does Kata deserve? Does she deserve to have her father broken and murdered in front of her?” Bode flinches. “Does she deserve being stuck with the man who killed him? This isn’t about what’s deserved. This is about you not being able to face the consequences of what you’ve done.”

Bode curls up small. Smaller than he’s ever seen him. “She’s strong. Stronger than me. She would’ve survived it.”

“What about me?”

“Cal,” he says softly, says like that’s enough, like he doesn’t understand why wouldn’t Cal survive just as well.

He scoffs then reaches into the Force and yanks on the bond between them, watches Bode flinch, his eyes widening as he sits up straighter, his lips parting around a gasp. Oh, so he didn’t know about it. Cal’s knees wobbly at the confirmation, but he stays standing. “I think it would’ve killed me too, Bode Akuna. Then where would Kata be? Your plan was a failure from the start because you made me love you.”

And I let myself fall in love.

Bode opens his mouth, but Cal doesn’t let him respond. He scrubs a hand over his eyes before tears can fall and he turns heel to stalk out of the room, his chest unbearably tight, his hands shaking.

He wants to disappear into Cere’s room, never to come out again, but, but, something drags him instead towards the main cabin, to the galley where Merrin and Greez are having a sharp conversation over simmering meat – and hat could either be about the meat itself because Greez still cooks it too much for Merrin’s liking or it could be able him – and Kata is determinedly balancing three plates.

She’s so focused on not dropping them and Cal’s vision is tunneling so badly, they almost run into each other at the doorway. He screeches to a stop just in time to avoid a collision and sidesteps to go around her, but she steps in front of him, eyes no longer on the plates but looking up, up, up at him with those dark eyes that remind him so much of her father. He steps to the other side – and she follows, the corner of her mouth quirking as she silently offers him a plate.

Cal shakes his head. “I’ll grab another from Greez.”

She narrows her eyes at him. “Will you?”

He laughs. “That’s where I was heading, but someone decided to dance instead.” He moves his feet in an awkward shuffle just to get her to laugh, and grins when she does, feeling lighter. “Give your dad my plate and make sure he eats it. Threaten him with Merrin if you have to, she’s getting restless.” It won’t be enough but freaking Bode out will probably make her happy.

Kata dumps the contents of the plate onto another with a firm not. “And after breakfast we’ll work on the hyperdrive like you said we would, right?” Her expression is hopeful as she hands him the now empty plate.

“Of course. I promised, didn’t I?”

Her smile dims. He wonders how many promises have been made to her, and how many of those fell through.

—

Koboh is alive in ways Tanalorr could never be.

Not just physically with the people and the creatures and plants and history and pure life, but also in the Force. there’s something warm in the center of it all, blazing brilliant hues that refract and reflect, pulsating with the beat of a million hearts of once was, what is, and what will be.

Cal wants to kneel in the center and bask in the glory of a living planet, but manages to keep himself centered and present, greeting the small welcoming party with a tight smile, a hand on Moran’s shoulder as the man squints in the bright sunlight and looks positively miserable. But he still gives Cal a nod and a mildly sardonic toast with his glass, and that he came out here at all warms Cal from the inside-out. Mosey hugs Merrin first of course, kissing her thoroughly before she throws herself at Cal hard enough he almost topples over. She squeezes him tightly, causing several of his injuries to flare, but he swallows down his grunt of pain and hugs her back.

Mosey leans away, both hands on his shoulder, and assesses him carefully before her gaze drift over his shoulder where Bode still stands on the ramp. Kata’s half hidden behind his leg, torn between her curiosity and the need to tuck herself small like she’s had to do for so long.

“You must be Kata!” Mosey says brightly, shuffling Cal to the side. “I heard a lot about you, little lady. Welcome to Koboh.”

Kata’s grip tightens on Bode’s pant leg before her father rests a hand on her back and steps to the side – Cal can feel his reluctance to do so in the Force, but no one else seems to catch it before Bode wrangles it away. “You’re Mosey,” she says softly.

“Right you are!” Mosey smiles brightly as her eyes flit up to Bode briefly before focusing back on Kata. “Someone’s been telling tales. Hear anythin’ else about me?”

“Papa said you watch over…nekkos. Can I see them?”

“Absolutely. C’mon. There’s a ma and her chick in the pasture right now.”

Kata’s eyes light up and her smile grows big enough to show teeth, squinting her eyes, It makes her look her age instead of the solemn, quiet child that haunts more than anything else. There had been glimpses of that brightness but never showcased as clearly as now.

Cal glances at Bode out of the corner of his eye in time to see the man’s expression soften, heartbreak and fondness fighting for dominance with the Force curled up small and weeping for the things that had been lost. He gently pushes her along when she doesn’t move at first. She has a bounce to her step as she takes Merrin’s offered hand and the three of them head towards to the barn, Mosey keeping up some good ol’ chatter.

 After that they scatter. More or less.

Bode obviously doesn’t know where to go from here, eyes fixated on the direction of the barn, right arm cradled in his left in ease the strain on his shoulder. If they left him to his own devices, he’d probably stay out here ‘til the nekkos came home, and then beyond that if Kata didn’t come with them, but Greez and Moran bully him to the cantina with Doma plodding after them as she plans out loud where to put father and daughter, and Merrin if she decides to stay.

Not that Merrin has a choice right now. When they came out of the Abyss there was a message waiting for them. One from Cere telling them to avoid Jedha for the time being and that once the Empire’s interest in the immediate area lessened, she would send them coordinates to their new (but temporary) base. Until then, stay safe and be careful.

(Besides, Merrin will just stay with Mosey. That much is obvious.)

Cal presses a knuckle between his eyes, the Koboh sun wreaking havoc on his light sensitivity – which isn’t really a good sign, honestly, but he hasn’t seen any auras so he’s dealing – and turns to go back to the Mantis where it’s cool, dim, and familiar, fully intending on updating Cere (We’re all alive. Something’s wrong with Tanalorr. I don’t know what to do.) but when he steps towards the ramp, BD skitters in front of him, beeping a lecture he’s heard a thousand times from a dozen sources. Turn around right now and go to sleep. There are no nightmares here, BD claims, but they both know that’s not true.

But he sighs anyway, leans down so BD can jump into his arms, and turns back around towards the side door so he doesn’t have to deal with anyone else.

A nap does sound pretty good right now, he admits.

—

He doesn’t get his nap.

Instead, Cal stares at the bottom of the bunk above for what feels like hours until he gives up and hauls himself out of bed. The Force is one big cacophony of everything after dealing with Tanalorr for even a short time. It gives him a rush like no other, not even comparable to a stim, and the urge to do something is getting too difficult to ignore.

After a quick shower that leaves him feeling like a new man, he grabs his saber, and leaves BD-1 charging, to venture out into Koboh’s wilderness alone. He takes a quick tour around the Outpost, checking on prospectors who haven’t gone out today, catching up on any rumors that may have developed while he was gone. There’s one, about some raiders getting brave and taking over the riverbed watchtower again, that seems promising.

But when he swings wide around the barn – so he can avoid Merrin and Mosey because they both for sure will stop him, throw in Kata’s disappointed yet resigned look as well and he won’t stand chance – he stops, stiffening with his hand not quite on his saber hilt, when a boot crunches on stone.

Then waves lap at his feet, rising gently to his knees, and he’s wading through warm sea waters. He turns to see Bode half off a stoop of one of the empty buildings.

Well, not empty anymore, he guesses.

“Just goin’ for a walk?” Bode asks.

Cal grimaces. “Sure, we can call it that.”

The corner of Bode’s mouth quirks up in a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes as he steps up alongside him. There’s not a single weapon to be seen, his holsters left behind, his torn and blood stain shirt traded for something priorite blue. It’s not his color. Bode shoves his hands in his pockets and waits expectantly. Cal starts…walking. A little slower than before, with less of a purpose. Bode keeps stride. Neither of them speak.

They head towards the barn. The watchtower can wait.

—

And then everything goes back to normal!

If only.

Cal wakes up aching. He wakes with grit in his eyes. He wakes with his joints locked up and a heaviness in his limbs. It takes effort to haul himself out of bed every time.

But he does anyway.

He smiles and helps out around the cantina, around the outpost. A day here fixing up rundown walls. Another day here planting someone’s garden as they nurse a broken arm. Nekko watch at sunset. Dam fixing at sunrise.

He turns a corner, spots Bode, and sometimes he joins him in whatever he’s doing. Other times he turns heel and walks in the opposite direction. He hears Kata’s laughter on the wind. He feels Bode’s open ocean presence, and he tries not to drown.

Greez keeps him from leaving the cantina most days, insisting on his help in the kitchen that usually involves Cal sitting and shucking yambles – way more yambles than Greez actually needs so most of them end up being thrown to the nekkos and boglings even though Greez complains that feeding the boglings just make them appear more. Kata likes them, though, and Cal doesn’t have it in him to point out Greez throws out more fodder when the girl is hanging around the saloon.

His fingers are stained purple when he finally gets around to hunting down the raiders that are too close to the outpost’s boundary lines. Cal takes a tour around the High Republic structures, checking that the Imp patrols there aren’t getting too interested in them.

Most of the time, he finds himself wandering aimlessly between outpost buildings, practically begging people to let him play handyman please, anything, just give me something to do, and his headache from Tanalorr persists, his ribs hurt. He rolls his weak ankle going from one roof to another and he just about screams in frustration. He can’t sit still, but he can’t take a step without hurting, and.

Cal is tired.

Tired enough that when he slouches in one of the booths on the second level of the saloon where no one really goes unless they want to be alone and Bode wordlessly slips into the seat across from him, he doesn’t get up and leave even though today is just kind of a bad day overall. He just drops his head back, knocking it painfully against the wall, and lets out a sigh that movies his whole body.

Doesn’t flinch when he feels a booted foot nudge the side of his. Doesn’t pull away when it stays.

“Those raiders sure can hold a grudge,” he says to the ceiling.

Bode snorts. “I think that’s underselling it.” tap-tap-tap, boot against boot. Cal grins. “You took out their leader twice over and several of their lieutenants. I’d hold a grudge.”

Cal rolls his head, tilting it to look Bode in the eye. The cantina is quieter than usual, just past midday. Ashe and DD-EC are taking their normal break, most prospectors are back out in the wild, and the echoes up here, especially in these booths, are less. There’s a wild cheer from the holotactics room; Zee sounds like she’s having a good time.

“Do you hate me?” Cal asks – as if he doesn’t already know the answer. As if the bond between them isn’t bright and clear and always there, a noose around his neck, the beat of his heart, the breath in his lungs, the void in his chest.

Bode chokes on his drink. “What the hell, Cal?”

“Do you – “”

“No, no. I heard you.” Bode wipes his mouth, looking everywhere but at Cal, finally dropping his eyes to the drink now clutched between both hands, knuckles paling. “Fuck – Cal, I should be asking you that.”

Cal rolls his head back to its original position, so he doesn’t have to keep watching Bode. “I want to,” he admits. “But I can’t.” That’s a lie, actually. He doesn’t want to hate him. It feels like he should. He thinks if Cordova actually died, if Vadar got what he wanted then this darkness inside him, this rage, would be so much worse. That he might’ve lost himself entirely. “Do you think we could go back to something like before?”

Bode is quiet for a long, long time. Long enough Cal finally lifts his head to look at him.

Then, eventually, he murmurs, “I don’t know.”

“Do you want to?”

Bode’s spared from answering by Kata’s appearance. She carries a stack of plates, the top one piled high with sandwiches.

“Greez said he’ll know if you don’t eat,” Kata says – and she’s definitely been spending too much time with the old latero because the look of mild disappointment she gives him when he doesn’t reach for a sandwich immediately is way too reminiscent of Greez. She puts a plate in front of him and adds a couple sandwiches pointedly. “I’ll tell him.”

“Tattletale,” Cal teases, making her stern expression crack and she smiles, hopping up on the seat next to her dad. She holds up a sandwich without looking and Bode takes it, looking fond.

Cal takes a big bite of his, maybe too big, and tries not to look like he’s struggling to chew. They eat in silence. He kind of wishes it were more uncomfortable than it actually is. Would that make this easier or harder?

Kata focused on the story BD-1 is telling her. Cal and Bode sneak each other glances, sometimes their eyes catching, other times Cal stares for a little too long at the shadows under Bode’s eyes and the grease under his nails and the welts on his arms from his own helping around the outpost.

He wonders if Bode suspects the true reason Cal avoids the ground floor booths. ( – gotta be another away. always an angle. Always. lost a family, looking for a new one. um…I can relate, Cal – )

Bode’s echoes lay scattered beyond the Mantis. More than just casual everyday ones that are easy to ignore. Those fade naturally, sticking around for only a little while. Unless they’re habitual then they start to build up on each other. Bode has those too. Thoughts about blaster maintenance, the weather, about Monk’s mixing skills, about Kata, about Cal, but there’s more. So much more. Like Bode – Like Bode felt so much about so many things it couldn’t help but spill over into the Force.

To think he was able to hide so well that the echoes only appeared after he stopped trying so hard – after he stopped wanting to.

—

I don’t know.

I don’t know.

I don’t know.

—

In the end, Cal is a coward.

He tried to stick it out. Tried to coexist with the echoes, old and new, and Bode’s Force presence that’s somehow becomes more every day. He threw himself into the wilds of Koboh, took up his blade against raiders and Imps and aggressive wildlife. Anything to keep himself from those echoes that glitter like sea glass under the sun, echoes as enticing as the stripe of skin bared between Bode’s gloves and his sleeves.

But, after weeks of basking in the sun and learning her way around the cantina’s kitchen and the nekko barn and being taught how to throw an axe, Kata makes an idle comment about school which slides into a quiet wonder about friends her age. Bode’s face gave nothing away, but the Force. Oh, but the Force spilled everything.

And then “Hey, Cal, can we talk?”

So, the moment Cere finally made contact and sent the coordinates to their new base, Cal asked Merrin to come with – and there must’ve been something on his face because she near as dropped everything to do so, and, and,

He runs.

He runs to Jedha. First to the new base but then is directed to the devastated Archive that has echoes of Bode still, of course, because it would be too kind to be anything otherwise.

There’s less in the backrooms that have dusted over and stagnated, where Bode never went because it was too far from Cere (too far from Cal maybe, hopefully, one could dream) then, well, no one needs to know. And it doesn’t matter that they already do. No one dares to bring it up. Not yet anyway.

The Archive Cere built is no small thing even after being ravaged by the Empire. They weren’t interested in the artifacts or the holobooks or scrolls, just the Jedi themselves, so many things were left untouched. Cal still hasn’t fully talked to Cere about how off Tanalorr was, but she agreed to wait until she was well enough, and everything was more under control before she would visit herself to decide if it truly was a good idea to relocate there. For now, they catalogue what they have and what they lost.

Cal puts everything he's got into it. Letting the thoughts and emotions that have been plaguing him fall away in the face of gauzy echoes of times long past and Cere’s rawka-scratch labeling for some of the more esoteric pieces.

Everyone’s worried about him still.

And it’s – he’s worried about him too. But he doesn’t slow down. Slowing down will just make him stop and if he stops then he’s pretty sure he won’t get started again.

Kata needs friends. She needs to go to school and live a good life. Koboh doesn’t have that. There aren’t any children in the Outpost – not anymore. Any families packed right up the moment a Star Destroyer showed up in the sky and never left. If they had stayed, Kata could be in classes with them, and, and Bode could be their teacher, like he had been back on Birren between harvests.

Bode needs – to not be around Cal.  

He’s still reeling from that conversation.

I don’t know who I’m supposed to be anymore. I’m afraid – I’m afraid that everything I do will be because of you. That I’m going to try to mold myself into something you want instead of what I need to be for myself, for Kata.

And Cal had been so confused, hurt even. I'm not asking for that.

You’re not. But, Stars, Cal, why wouldn’t I do everything I could to have you look at me like you did before? You don’t. It’s close, but you don’t. But I don’t want whatever I become to be some false version just for you. Neither of us want what was before. That’s not fair.

You –

I had nothing after Tayala, but now I have, I have the Path. I don’t have any right to it, but for Kata’s sake, I’m going to take Merrin up on her offer.. 

Cal gets it, but – If you go, you won’t come back. No one else has.

Bode had nothing to say to that. There were no interruptions this time. He’d opened his mouth, then closed it, pressing his lips in a thin line, and looked away. Which made it worse.

It’s not right for Cal to ask so much from him, but that doesn’t stop it from hurting.

So, he stays in the ravaged Archive, tucked in the rooms Bode never ventured so he doesn’t have to face any echoes. The good and the bad. Hidden from the main room where they planned, where they laughed, where Bode set off the grenade that nearly killed Master Cordova in his escape. There are other places Bode went, of course. But Cal has yet to run into one this deep into the Archive’s backrooms.

He sighs as he rolls an ornamental orb between his palms. It’s styled after the ones that control the doors and various holy sites out in the desert, but it’s too lightweight for that use. It’s light and fragile, admiration seeps into his skin from it, the sense of passing from hand to hand, mantle on a fireplace to a pedestal in a small display case to tucked in a trunk. It help up well after all this time, only a broken section someone fixed with gold. He thumbs over the web of gold before he packs it up, the last of the items from this small room. Cal marks the crate then stretches, spine popping.

Cal slumps as he rubs his eyes. He’s finished the room Cere assigned him, but he doesn’t want to be done.

The sound of BD trilling catches his attention, and he looks over just in time to see the droid scamper out of a small tunnel that leads to who-knows-where.

He offers a tired smile. “Hey, buddy. Find anything interesting?”

BD-1 had abandoned him a couple hours ago, claiming the room Merrin is packing away to be way more interesting than his. The little droid beeps and whistles, hustles back to the little tunnel to pull out one of those scrolls Sister Taske is so interested in and then proceeds to tell him everything as they make their way down to the next floor. Cal can tell by the shakiness in his hands and the weakness in…well, everything, that’s he’s neglected eating for too long.

—

And then, once again, he tries.

He tries to stay on Jedha long enough to miss Bode and Kata’s departure, offering up the Mantis to Merrin so she can head back to Koboh and deliver their future without him so he doesn’t have to, to say goodbye.

Cal doesn't know if he could look Bode in the eye and let him go when he so desperately needs to be let go. To be free for the first time since…when. Since the Order fell, since Tayala died, since he gave himself to Denvik. Cage bars stacking up in each other, the leash growing tighter. Nowhere to run. Nowhere safe. He hopes the Path can give him that security. A new name. A quiet planet. Kata some friends. Bode some way to heal. 

He tries. But the Force decides no.  

“Do all Jedi treat themselves as unkindly as you do?”

Cal hunches, hand curled into a shaking fist. Sweat cools uncomfortably between his shoulder blades. He can still hear the echo of Bode’s laughter in his ears, the ghost of the real thing. Maybe even more than that. Did he ever hear the real thing?

( – Cal trips over a bogling eating a yamble scraps. Kata giggles, Bode snorts. He uses sugar instead of salt and Bode laugh-chokes at the taste, at Kata’s expression, and Greez’s rant. He straightens up from fixing a roof, wiping his forehead, smearing dirt and crud. Bode laughs at him instead of throwing him a rag, doesn’t even tell him until later that night, hand on his shoulder, some brightness in his eyes.

It’s a natural progression, coming out of the fog, feeling like you can breathe again. It happens once, and then it happens again. 

So yes. Yes, he heard the real thing and it’s remarkably close to the same laugh Bode had before all this, when it was just the two of them and there was something so real about him in those small moments – )

Sister Taske is kind enough to not comment on his lack of response. “Master Junda is looking for you.”

He lets out a breath and nods, and tacks on a quiet, “Thank you,” because even with the turmoil in his head and his heart, he can still be polite.

Sister Taske turns to walk away, only to hesitate before they can fully commit. “Knight Kestis.” Cal straightens up, rolling his shoulders until something pops. “This is about…Bode Akuna, yes?”

“Is it that obvious?” he asks with a self-deprecating smile even as the tips of his ears start to burn, mortified that it might actually be that obvious. It’s one thing for his family to notice, but for anyone else? Force, he’s pathetic.

“Perhaps not to all,” Sister Taske says. He knows them well enough to hear the amusement in their voice. “But you have spent too long at my counter for me to not see through your mask. Why do you run?”

You keep running, Merrin had said.

Cal’s eyes are drawn back to the echo swirling on the countertop. Bode’s voice low and warm as he tells Cal a story about some time he spent freelancing. He laughed so hard he nearly tipped out of his chair, caught by Bode’s hand on his arm and yanking him upright with too much force and toppling Cal in the opposite direction, their chests pressed together, their nose tip-to-tip, and Bode’s low laughter sharing space with Cal’s.

“I don’t know,” Cal tells them.

I want to be the one who leaves first for once, he thinks bitterly.

If he goes back to Koboh and Bode is gone, then it doesn’t matter because Cal left him behind first. 

Sister Taske dips their head and says an “I see” that sounds more like I think you do know. Cal flushes as he rubs the back of his neck. “Master Junda is in the alcove on the ridge.”

Cal thanks them again before beating a hasty retreat. The Force dances in merry amusement that temporarily overrides the concern Sister Taske has for him, then both emotions fade in the background, taken up by the itch in the back of his mind that’s been his and Bode’s bond nudging at him since the Mantis reappeared in real space. For it to stretch this far and still be noticeable, the strength of it scares Cal, but he can’t help but be relieved by it.

—

Cere is exactly where Sister Taske said she’d be. Solid and grounded in the ever-shifting sands of Jedha.

“We haven’t had the chance to talk,” she says apologetically.

Cal shrugs as he sidesteps the long-cold fire – it looks like no one has used the pit since that last night before the Empire came – and joins her at the wall, leaning against it and looking out into the desert. The sun is setting, and the wind is cold, but Cere is warm, pressed shoulder to shoulder with him. It’s Cal’s fault they haven’t talked and Cere didn’t push. Now, though, she leans a little more on him, and says gently, “Talk to me, Cal.”

“I’ve been trying to purify Dagan’s kyber,” he says, blurts out past the emotions bubbling in his chest. He can feel Cere’s surprise. “It’s been both harder and easier than I thought it would be. I want…I want to give it to Bode,” he admits softly.

“A difficult feat, but an admirable one. How far have you gotten?”

Cal runs a hand through his hair. “Far, I think. I’m just stuck.”

“Merrin told me of Bode’s desire to walk the Path.” Cere reaches over and rests a hand on his forearm. “I understand what happened between us hurt you, but that never my intention. I always thought we would come together again. And we did.”

“I came to you,” Cal point out bitterly. “I came to Greez.. I didn’t even know Merrin was in contact with you until I came to Jedha. None of you – ,” he swallows down the ghost of anger and hurt, taking a deep breath. He understands why. He truly does. “I knew where you and Greez were. I had Merrin’s contact. Bode walks the Path and I’ll, I won’t know any of that. He won’t come back.”

“You don’t know that.”

“No one ever does,” Cal says, the words scraping his throat raw. “I lose everyone, one way or another, and I’m always left behind.” A few outpost residents have been making some noise about leaving Koboh, the Star Destroyer not helping anyone’s nerves. Cal has been working overtime to make the place safe and comfortable, but it’s not enough. It never is.

“Cal,” Cere says softly. “No one ever truly leaves us. They’re with the Force in all ways and the Force is with you.” She takes his hand, tugging it until they’re facing each other. Over her shoulder, he spots an echo – one he’s been ignoring since he stepped foot on the ridge. It glitters in the sunset, pretty and enticing, and he can feel the cool ocean breeze from here. She squeezes his hand. He looks back at Cere. “We both needed to go our own ways, but what you’ve taught me, what we had learned together, helped me keep going.”

 “I think that’s supposed to be my line. You’re the Master.”

She smiles. “A true master learns from those they teach or they else are no master at all.” Cere’s expression grows serious. “I’m truly sorry for how everything went down, but I think we both will be better for it in the end.”

It’s nice that she doesn’t say are better for it. There is no current, no present. Just the future.  

A future without Bode. A future with this bond between them anyway, one that won’t fade by distance or time.  

“What do I do?”

“Have faith,” she says, hands on his cheeks, eyes kind. “Trust in the Force.”

Cal blinks against the sting of tears and pulls back to wipe his cheeks. Cere lets him, waiting patiently for him to pull himself together.

“Do you want my help in the last step?” she asks after a moment, gesturing to the extra saber on his hip.

He rests a hand on it, the echoes soft and hazy, whittled down to the tender, happier memories before Tanalorr.

“I think I got it now,” he says. His eyes are drawn again to the echo on the wall, just a couple feet away.

Cere smiles proudly. “I’ll leave you to it.”

—

Cal finds Bode on the roof supervising Kata and Pili as the two of them decide which plants would be best for the girl to take with her. Koboh’s bright sun has brought out the undertones of Bode’s hair, browns and bronze like a deep, dark abyss, and Cal hooks a hand on his belt, the other in his pocket, to keep himself from running his hands through it.

His arrival isn’t quiet. Bode’s shoulders curl up, then drop, heaving as he takes a deep breath.

“I thought you were still out in the wilds?” Bode says easily, like the bruises under his eyes haven’t deepened from sleepless nights since Merrin and Cal came back to Koboh, Merrin holding Bode’s future in her hand.

“I was, but I found what I was looking for quicker than I expected.”

Bode doesn’t have a response to that. Any ease gained between them in the weeks since Tanalorr fell apart the moment the words “Hey, Cal, can we talk?” were uttered. Cal is content with the silence though, the awkwardness, it just means it’s real and that’s all that matters.

He watches BD-1 scurry around Kata’s legs as she bounces from garden plot to garden plot, asking rapid-fire questions about localized care for whichever plants she picked. Pili and Kata’s combined emotions infuse the Force with joy and delight, lulling Cal into a warm sort of security. He sways into it, eyes falling half-shut, and he glances at Bode through his lashes to see the man tense and uncomfortable despite his own presence in the Force meaning he can feel them too, he just won’t let himself fall into the cradle of it.

Cal sighs and straightens up, runs a hand through his hair before finally, finally – “Here.”

Bode stiffens, eyes on Dagan Gera’s lightsaber being held out for him. When Bode doesn’t take it, Cal huffs and reaches for his hand, ignoring the way Bode tries to tuck it behind his leg and away from him. He’s not wearing gloves, and Cal takes a selfish moment to admire them up close, something he hasn’t had the chance to do. Thick fingers, wide palms, small, faint scarring. They’re bigger than Cal’s. Rough from years of hard work even with the protection. Cal flips his hand over, and his palm has a large scar splashed across it, old and long healed, but gnarled and deep enough Cal wonders about the sensitivity. He places Dagan’s saber in Bode’s hand then gently curls his fingers over the hilt so they’re both holding onto it.

“I know you don’t want it,” he says before Bode can open his mouth. A muscle twitches in his cheek as he continues to stare at the saber in their combined grip. Cal doesn’t make him look at him, just keeps his voice low. “But I think you should take it. Who knows what you’ll run into. And it doesn’t matter if you never end up using it, if you just shove it into a box and never look at it again, just…take it. It’ll make me feel better.”

Bode lets out a shaky breath. “I don’t want that screaming…” He swallows.

Cal shakes his head. “No, listen. There’s no screaming.”

He presses his thumb over Bode’s, and the brilliant white light of stars sings to life as the blade ignites. Bode stares at it with a soft undercurrent of awe and fear rippling in the Force. Cal doesn’t look down at the result of his efforts. He just watches Bode with a small, soft smile that’s also undeniably a little sad. Does he hear Cal in its song? His hopes and wishes and wants for Bode’s happiness, his security, his future. His hope and wish and want for Bode to come back to him some day.

There’s tears in Bode’s eyes when he looks up and catches Cal’s expression. He blinks, and they don’t fall, but his eyelashes clump and stick together. “Cal,” he says, and it sounds close to shattering.

“When you’re ready to come back,” because he wants to believe in when not if, “you know where to find me.” Cal smiles brighter and lets go of Bode’s hand slowly until it’s only him holding onto the hilt. “May the Force be with you,” he offers sincerely and without expectation.

Bode’s chin trembles and he stays silent, tears at the corner of his eyes that Cal pretends he doesn’t see. He keeps his smile as he goes over and helps Kata choose her last seedpod.

—

A week turns into a month. Months turns into years.

Bode doesn't come back.

But that’s okay. Cal is willing to wait as long as he needs to.

—

—

—

And after three years, there is a call on a secure line.

No one is there to pick it up, but the notification blinks and blinks and blinks message waiting. Cal spots it immediately when he enters the Mantis, a cut on his cheek, a bounce to his step. Merrin and Mosey bicker good-naturedly behind him, sliding more into flirting territory as the seconds go by. BD-1 hops off his shoulder to boost over to the holotable and hits the button for them.

Everything goes still as the message plays, the voice on the other end familiar. It shakes, the words breathless and thick with suppressed tears.

“This is Starling to Mantis,” she says, pauses as she hiccups. She takes a deep, shuddering breath. “Ghost Star’s been taken. I repeat: Ghost Star’s been taken. Please help us. I don’t – I don’t know what to do. Merrin. Cal. Please.”