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Kanan folded his hands in his lap, trying to focus. Out of habit, he closed his eyes. He winced as the still-healing skin twinged, taut and warm under the bacta wrap. No, focus. He shifted from kneeling to a crisscross position, rested his hands on his knees. Breathe in, breathe out.
Images flashed quickly across his mind. The jagged towers of Malachor rising out of the planet's surface like teeth. The ashen bodies of Jedi and Sith, laying where they'd fallen untold centuries before. The inquisitors, crimson blades flashing before them.
Another blade. A gaunt and tattooed face, bloodshot eyes glaring out at him.
His breathing quickened.
Red.
He shook himself, trying to come back to the present. His heart pounded in his ears, and he took a long breath, forcing it to slow, ignoring the shakiness of his exhale. He could do this. He adjusted his arms slightly, trying to leach some of the tension out of them. Relax. Reach out to the Force. Let it reach out to you.
He let his posture ease, focusing his awareness downward. If he concentrated, he could make out the rumble of the ship beneath him, almost imperceptible during normal travel. He could feel the thin seams in the floorplates, the whisper of the air circulation system, the familiar sturdiness of the bunk at his back. His breathing slowed. Cautiously, he reached out with his mind. He knew Hera was asleep in the next cabin, and he sent out gentle, prodding tendrils in the Force. There she was, warm and steady as the ship beneath him. He could almost picture her lying on her side, arm half-off the edge of the bed, blankets crushed around her. The image made his heart ache, but he pushed deeper into the comforting warmth of her mind, letting it wrap itself around him, dear and familiar. She was here. Even if his sight was gone, she was still here, and that was a rock big enough to build a lighthouse on.
He disentangled himself from Hera's mind and reached out in the other direction. After a moment, he found Sabine. He lingered on the edges of her presence for a moment, reached further and felt Zeb. They were all here. He wasn't alone. They were there for him, had already been there for him. Hera's cool hands on his face, inspecting, cleaning, soothing. Sabine and Zeb, solid and dependable as ever, hand always on his arm or his shoulder – although whether to reassure him or them, it wasn't clear. Ezra had been quiet since their return, but that was to be expected. He had sobbed in Kanan's arms the whole ride back to the Ghost, and to his chagrin Kanan had found it a welcome distraction from the burning of his own eyes.
He reached out with the Force again, towards Ezra this time.
Almost immediately, a wave of dark energy crashed over him. He was back in the snowy forests of Kaller, breathing down the barrel of a rifle. Behind him, his master was screaming, and he was running, his coward legs were running, and she wasn't screaming anymore and he wasn't sure if he was just too far away to hear or if – keep running, keep running, you could have saved her, you could have saved her –
He jerked back to himself, sweating. Slowly, he pushed himself up from the ground. The guilt was still roiling in his stomach, but he swallowed it back. He flicked the switch for his door – he had found it in the dark many times before – and stepped into the hallway. Trailing his fingers along the wall, he moved down the hall until he was outside Ezra and Zeb's door. He could feel it now without the aid of meditation. Guilt pulsed from behind the door, swirling vacuums of darkness pressing against the edges of his mind. Strong – too strong. Kanan splayed his hand against the door, careful to keep his voice soft enough not to wake Zeb. "Ezra?"
No response. He tried again, slightly louder. "Ezra?"
The morass of darkness shuddered, drew back, walls clapping shut around the boy's mind. Kanan could hear quick shuffling sounds that froze just as quickly as he tapped his finger on the door. "Are you awake?" he whispered, knowing the answer.
Still no response.
He sighed. Using the door for support, he lowered himself until his back was against it. "Okay," he said softly, resuming his crisscross position. "I'm here if you need to talk." He placed his palms against his knees, absorbing the feeling of the rough fabric on his fingertips. Breathe in, breathe out. Reach out to the Force.
He didn't reach out to Ezra's mind – his passive perception was enough for him to know that the walls around it were still clamped tight. Instead, he concentrated on lowering his own defenses, letting his mind expand out in all directions, making contact with the living Force.
It wasn't your fault, he let it whisper into the blackness. It was never your fault. I don't blame you. Kaller flashed back across his thoughts – different now, the snow stained red with blood, a dark figure just visible beneath the drifts – but he kept himself firmly anchored to the weave of the fabric beneath his fingers, kept his breathing steady. No one blames you. He could feel the darkness seeping from beneath the door, saw the sky above Kaller grow dark and ominous, trees warping into pillars like teeth. Breathe in, breathe out. I am not angry. I am not disappointed. The sky closed in, and in the distance the figure shifted, raised itself to its feet as if pulled by an invisible string. It began running towards him, and he could make out the shifting pattern of tattoos against the red skin, the bloodshot eyes morphing into a snarling mouth as it leapt. The darkness was thick in his nostrils, threatening to choke him, but he tightened his grip on the leg of his pants, exhaled slowly. I'm just glad you're safe. We'll get through this. You're not alone.
The blade slashed down, and he was sitting in the hallway, his back against cold metal, listening to the quiet sound of sobs from the other side of the door. The darkness was still present, but it had wilted, turned liquid, and was running back on itself. Kanan pressed his back harder against the door, willing some of his own warmth to seep into it, to combat the unnatural cold. Mind still open, he conjured up his memories of the trip back from Malachor again, pictured the sensations as clearly as he could in his mind. The shuddering of the engines beneath him. The bite of the seatbelt into his shoulder. Chopper, warbling and whistling in the front seat. The smell of chalk that lingered on the inside of the mask. A screeching, stabbing pain in his eyes, the skin around them already swelling and oozing. And at his chest, pushing everything else so far into the background it was almost unintelligible, a shape.
He pictured it as clearly as he could, and held it there in the forefront of his mind. Ezra's head butted tightly under his chin, the growing damp patch against his clavicle. His hand carding through his padawan's hair, rough fingers working their way through the tangles and back to the top, again and again. Small fists balled in his tunic, the give of the fabric and the tightness around his shoulders and arms from the tension. His other hand, moving up and down his padawan's back in concentric circles, in infinity signs, in rounds that became flowers, steady despite the way the boy shook.
He held Ezra in his mind, and let every other distraction fade away.