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In the end, it’s not a decision that just he and Chirrut can make, which is somewhat odd in and of itself because it has been so long since there was anything to them other than each other. In the before days, when the temple was still there, when they were Guardians, there was the order to think about, there was Jedha to think about. Even after the temple fell, there was Jedha to think about, though that consideration mostly fell to Chirrut because Baze’s heart felt burned out by then. Baze still thinks about Jedha, of course. He always will. It remains in his mind and his soul as a light shining, a place where the dearest memories that he has were made. However it was also the place where the greatest tragedies occurred, and that is something he cannot forget either.
The burdens that he strapped to his skin underneath the armor have only started to lift since Scariff, since the bacta, since this crazy notion of his to restart a temple that once breathed life and purpose into him, a temple that brought him and Chirrut together. His has lost the armor. The burdens are slower to fall away, but even their weight lessens, falters, gets left behind in the pad of his footsteps down the halls of the Rebel ship. They are shadows that disappear in the light of Chirrut’s smile and flee from the soft stuttering touches and kisses his husband presses to his skin almost daily now, a rediscovery of each other that has waited for so long while the world fell around them. Baze has never seen a burden of his that was so heavy it could not be lifted away by Chirrut’s comfort, Chirrut’s love. He just refused to let it for too long. He worries about his husband picking up those discarded pieces, though. They share too much, always have, through the tenuous Force link, and he worries about staining the only truly bright thing he has ever known. Chirrut is still fumbling his way in the Force, and Baze needs to work on that with him because he knows what it is to lose that, to feel the absence down to the core, and he will not let it hurt Chirrut.
The quest is helping, and working with Bodhi is helping, though Chirrut seems more at home in teaching the physical forms of their faith than the metaphysical these days. Maybe this is why the Force is shouting him down, making it harder for Chirrut to wander the ship even with the cane and the echobox and Baze always only a footfall behind. It overwhelms him. The lack of connection to ground frustrates him. Every passing day makes him more impatient and cross, clamoring for a fight that never comes, looking for something reckless to do and finding nothing, which just makes it worse. So they spar, and Baze remembers every injury that he has ever suffered over the years as Chirrut lights them up again with practiced hands. Baze thinks that he is too old for this, that there is a damn good reason he became a marksman, and debates telling Chirrut to spar with someone else, but no one else could even come close to matching him. Even Baze is a far cry from being able to best him, but he at least knows what to expect, the steady, repetition of blows faster than they have any right to be, the eventual shuddering in his husband’s shoulders when he finally stops, how to bring the smile back into those eyes.
Baze hates to see Chirrut thrown. It is like watching that wave of earth crushing NiJedha all over again. They ran from that. They abandoned their home and their lives to follow the spark of Jyn’s kyber. And it still lodges in his throat some nights, the fact that a city, so many people, so many children, who had been under their self-appointed care are gone. The fact that they did nothing to stop it.
Might as well try and stop the universe, though. Might as well try and stop the Force. He knows. He knows what happens when you try and control the Force. How many texts were there about just that thing in their library? How many times did he read the words, to himself, to Chirrut, always unsure which way he was trying to sway them? Until Chirrut kissed him in that library and it was decided. They could never be anything other than what they were. The Jedi did not allow attachments. And Baze could not fathom how to manage to draw breath without Chirrut beside him. Attachment, itself a word stripped of any emotion, was not big enough, and it was also something he was not giving up once he had found it.
Now they have more than just each other, though Baze is not sure what to call the small collective they have formed. He only knows that he cares, deeply, for Bodhi and Jyn. And Cassian as well even if the man hovers on the edge and never seems to dare draw close, perhaps concerned about getting caught in their wake, once again having the bars of his cage pointed out to him when he has spent so many years turning them into blinders instead. Baze wants to help these people in whatever way he can if they will let him. Chirrut, as usual, has started to tease him about taking in strays, the same way he did when they were Guardians. It is another sign that Baze is, slowly, steadily, returning to the man he used to be. Still gruff, still large and imposing, but too kind for his own good.
It broke him once before. It washed him up on a shore of sorrow that was too big for him to see the ends of, for him to even contemplate. The only way he managed it was by running away until he had perfected all the layers, all the defenses, until even Chirrut had trouble reaching him. Baze would take all of that back if he could. He would be stronger; he would be better. Yet the past cannot be changed. It can only influence the present, the future. Now he knows. He will be stronger. He will not retreat if it all falls away again.
These days he is working on building something outside of himself. That is surprising and thrilling, though it seems to be more difficult than he initially thought when it came to him in the snow. For one thing, how can he leave these people now that he has found them, but how can he expect them to leave a cause they seem to believe in just for his comfort? It is a quandary that he is not sure how to broach. Instead Bodhi and Jyn bring him small things, the information about the planet, the willingness to be taught, the company of others. And as much as he wants to show Chirrut new things, he does not want to leave them behind, but what words, what right does he have to sway them?
So it stretches out, and it is slow. That is fine. The best things take time. He has learned that. Baze Malbus is a man of infinite patience, and he can wait forever as long as slow, forward steps are being made, as long as something is happening. And as long as he has Chirrut to wait with. Of the two of them, Chirrut is the one who will need a decision sooner rather than later as he is sick of the ship, tired of space, and how it feels around him.
Their group tends to eat together when they can, always managing to find each other in the crowded mess without even saying a word. When they are together, the rest of the Rebels on the ship avoid them, unsure of what to say, how to interact with people who, by all rights, should be dead for the cause. They are ghosts walking, and perhaps that unnerves them. Maybe it is that. Or maybe it is the way that Chirrut smiles too big, too bright, all teeth and gums and his unseeing eyes that can be startlingly and entirely too blue if you’re not used to them. Perhaps it is the fact that Jyn puts her feet on the table and then glares at every single person who passes, daring them to comment or question her about how she was raised. It could be that Bodhi’s eagerness feels too open, too disarming, a trap waiting to pull people under the surface into a miasma of whatever lies beneath.
Baze supposes it could also be him, though he feels like his scowls melt away more with every passing day. His weapons are gone, his armor is gone. Now he is simply a large man, imposing in figure, with wild braided hair and a scar wandering across the planes of his face, but these things are not so uncommon here because he has seen a lot of the Rebels wear their own scars in public. No, Baze does not think it is him anymore. The Baze Malbus who could keep people away with just a look seems to have slipped beneath the surface of him, a passing figment, and he finds that he does not mind this fact. If anything it makes the world around him seem lighter, better; it helps make him feel more certain about this path they are working on taking.
Sometimes, rarely, Cassian will find them and slump down as though boneless at the table, saying little and barely looking at them, hardly eating. Something plagues him, drags him through the darkness even when he seems to try and surge up out of it. Hope was Cassian’s word before the rest of them took it up like a banner, like a prayer. Yet now hope seems to have deflated him, leaving nothing as buoyant in its wake. He sags, torn, and doesn’t say a word.
It is time for the evening meal, though they can only tell because of the chrono displays, but Baze and Chirrut have already navigated the halls and the crowded line to procure food and lay claim to a table. For Chirrut’s benefit, they sit as close to the door as possible since it makes it easier for them to leave. The Rebels certainly have an army’s view of food in that it is filling and nutritious and utterly without any semblance of variety or flavor. Baze eats it robotically, the same way that he ate during his years as a mercenary, quickly, completely, and without thinking. It is just a step. There is no time to savour, there is nothing here to savour. It is not like the meals they would make in the temple, fragrant and rich, full of ingredients that he is not sure they will ever see again. Chirrut complains about the food as much as he complains about the fabric, the ship, being in space. It is past the point of him just being snippy because it amuses him. Now it hints at the quiet terror of a man still adrift in his own world when he has always been sure of his footing before.
“This is a travesty,” Chirrut proclaims, pushing a utensil through a blob of something that is gray and slightly lumpy. “There is no joy in it.”
Jyn shrugs, all sharp elbows, taking up the same amount of space as three Rebels at another table despite the fact that she is so small it can be hard to remember she is not a child at all. “Could be worse. You should have seen some of the things that Saw used to make me.” As the weeks have passed, she has started to do that, interlace bits of her past into conversations, and Baze thinks this is a good thing.
Chirrut pushes the plate away gingerly as though it has offended him and needs to take a moment to contemplate what it has done before apologizing. “I’m less interested in comparing it to past tragedies than I am with the fact that it is inedible.”
Baze sighs and runs a hand through his hair, ready to start the conversation with Chirrut about how he needs to eat no matter how unsatisfactory it is, a conversation that is sure to drive everyone within hearing distance away, when they are joined by Cassian. One moment he is not there, and then he has arrived, dark eyes ringed with shadows, mouth drawn into a line, furred jacket still pulled close even though it is not cold on the ship. Cassian looks pale and tired. He has no food with him only a cup of caf, and Baze wonders how long it has been since this man took the time to eat anything, since he slowed down at all.
“We have a ship,” he says, words clipped, his Basic even more heavily accented when he is worn.
“Congratulations. Here I thought you had lots of them. Guess I was wrong. How’s it feel to have one?” Jyn’s voice is tight, clipped, and her words are as pointed as daggers. Baze isn’t sure what has happened between them since Scarif. It had seemed like they were getting closer and now everything seems strained again.
Bodhi shifts in his seat, opens his mouth but doesn’t speak, shifts again instead, weighing words, possibly flipping through them for the right ones to apply in this situation. Maybe he figures out that there aren’t words for this or maybe he just scares himself away from it. Baze isn’t sure because the younger man just goes back to pushing the food around, eating at the edges of it in small, mechanical motions that he recognizes. It’s the way that a lot of the children would eat in NiJedha after the Empire came, spreading it out, making it last longer to fool themselves into thinking it’s enough. It makes his heart clench like a fist, that rage at the Empire so forceful he can almost taste it in his throat again, before he wills it to recede. This will not continue to consume him.
Chirrut has tilted his side slightly, that incremental motion that speaks volumes, that indicates he is assessing and calculating and probably on the verge of meddling. The smile pulls at the corners of his mouth, and here they go. Baze sits back, hands folded on the table, and waits. “Cassian, have you had anything to eat?”
The sigh from the man is more than enough of an answer, and there’s a moment where it looks like he is just going to get up and escape from the lot of them. Captain Cassian Andor, put upon and beleaguered, with his hands in too many things, finding the time to settle with them for a moment and then to be faced with this. Baze almost feels sorry for him except that he knows the man has done so much of this to himself and refuses to relinquish his hold on it. Something in his face is always screaming, but he never allows himself to find the words to release it.
There are at least twenty words, twenty responses, that flicker across the other man’s face as Baze watches him, but it finally settles into a quiet resignation. “No,” Cassian answers. He sits like someone whose back hurts him, which would make sense considering what happened on Scarif.
Even with the bacta treatments, Baze knows that it would have been hard to treat the spinal injuries. Those are problematic things. He remembers a mercenary he worked with in the between days, the ones when he was running, who got shot in the back. The medic they had on board proclaimed that she could help him, but he would never walk again, not properly. She said that there might be prosthetics that could be used but they would be expensive and time consuming. And painful. The cell leader opted to shoot the mercenary in the head and called it a blessing. The way that Cassian shifts reminds him of that moment, and his head feels full of thunder again. Chirrut presses a hand to his temple, the smile slipping from his face quickly, head turning more towards Baze. They know all of each other’s stories, but this is one that Baze spoke of in general terms, fast, hoping that the quickness of the words alone would strip the meaning from it, leave it flat and gray. Now that he is lingering on those moments, it flares and hurts them both.
Chirrut lowers his hand, taps his fingers insistently on the table to draw attention to that instead. “It’s not the same,” he proclaims, which draws confused looks from their three comrades, and Baze makes a sound deep in his throat to acknowledge the truth in that even as he slides the memory back into the metal box in his mind. This is not the time for the war wounds that hurt more than any injury to his flesh. One day he will let all of them see the light of day, try and heal them so that they do not continue to run hot and sticky over his hands whenever he dares crack the lid. The blood of a life misused.
“What about a ship?” It’s Bodhi either purposefully trying to change the subject or just three beats behind because that’s how his mind works these days. The meditation and the lessons have been helping, but he still slips. Baze thinks that maybe he always will, but it doesn’t make him less or broken despite how some of the Rebels look at him sometimes.
Jyn is looking anywhere by at Cassian. She is looking at Chirrut, fingers pressed against her shirt again, which means the kyber necklace is there, resting. Baze wonders if Jyn can hear her crystal, if Jyn can hear the whispers of the Force. Would she ever let herself believe in something as big and unseen as that when so much of what should have kept her safe during the course of her life burned down around her? “What’s not the same?” she asks.
And now there are two conversations at odds with each other in the air. Baze would be the deciding vote, the mitigating factor, if this were a different situation with other people, but it is not. As such all he can do is sigh, world weary, and cross his arms over his chest. The mess is too big, there are too many people, and his brain feels raw from the unwanted recollections. Not only because of how they impact him but also because of how they filter, unbidden, to Chirrut. Chirrut who has never earned a modicum of the pain that life delivers his way. No, Baze is sitting this out. He will be the stanch, stoic, sighing uncle in the corner who would rather be anywhere else while the children squabble.
Chirrut uses his fingernails to locate the edge of the tray of food that he had, just recently, described as inedible, and then pushes it towards Cassian. “Eat something and then tell us about the ship,” he instructs taking care of two concerns in one smooth motion. Three actually because now Baze will not be able to scold him into eating something that he feels is beneath him. Baze sighs and makes a mental note to remind Chirrut to eat something later. Then his husband turns his attention to Jyn, the kyber once again making it easy for him to locate her and train his eyes almost on her face.
“Baze was contemplating the captain’s spinal injury and how it related to one that he encountered in his less,” Chirrut pauses for a moment, considering, and Baze hopes he will be gentle, breathes a sigh of relief when he is, “noble days. I was just reminding him that they are not the same.”
The reminder about the injury makes Jyn’s face go a little slack everywhere but the eyes. Baze has seen that look before, equal parts gratitude and terror, reflected in his own eyes on more occasions than he can count. “Oh.” Her judgement does not sit heavy on that word. Instead she goes back to her own plate, spreading the food around with the back of her spoon, drawing shapes in it until she nudges the tray incrementally toward Bodhi, an open invitation to take what he wants made between orphans who have learned to treat the exchange of food as the exchange of affection.
Cassian eats slowly, ploddingly, as though looking for something in each bite. Unlike the rest of them, his full attention is on the plate in front of him, though Baze is certain he is listening to them, watching them, taking stock of things like where their hands are, what weapons are nearby, how they could be a threat. Baze knows because he has been on the other end of a sniper blaster before, he knows how it all bleeds together, how you can have trouble separating friend from foe. Is this another reason why Cassian has been avoiding them?
The smile on Chirrut’s face is true again, though it has not quite seeped all the way into his eyes. Baze doesn’t know if that’s his fault or not, but he will accept it. He will always accept it. Chirrut settles his hands together in front of him, and his blank gaze shifts from Jyn to Bodhi. “When we were Guardians, Baze was one of the best cooks in the temple. You wouldn’t think it to look at him now, but he could spend an entire afternoon perfecting a recipe. He used to say that cooking was as much meditation as anything else, that it required insight, attention to detail, and knowledge. Also patience and the understanding of what flavors would work well together and which would not. He said that it was a different understanding of the Force because it was more,” Chirrut taps a finger against his lips as if the words have left him and then tips his head in Baze’s direction. “What did you say, dear?”
Dear. Chirrut has started using the term in public, and it makes the breath catch in his throat every single time he hears it. Baze is used to hearing friend, brother, even ward, when they are around others, unknowns especially. The lighter terms they started hiding behind after the temple fell, the ones that carried no overt expectations to those around them because you never knew who was listening in those days, how they would react. The temple had been safe. For them. Together. The rule of the Empire seemed so sterile that Baze had worried what love it would let itself see, if any at all, and he had bade Chirrut to stop. So many words were struck from their public discourse, and the ensuing fight was one of the reasons why Baze had started taking the jobs away from Jedha as much as the need for money. Chirrut had never been one to bow his head, hide in the sand, try and wait it out. Baze just wanted to remove yet another potential target from his husband’s back, especially when he refused to be known as anything other than a Guardian of the Whills.
“Mercurial,” Baze offers, a word that he knows Chirrut would not forget as it is one of his words for him, but he understands and appreciates the gesture to pull him back into the conversation, to ensure that he does not see himself as being outside of the circle. It is harder to let go of everything in public, especially when old memories press at him, heavy, blood stained, but Chirrut has long known how to draw him back.
“Yes,” Chirrut agrees, “that’s it. Mercurial. Hard to pin down. Baze was a master in that. Better at the Force of cooking than any of the other masters I ever knew. Is it any wonder I find myself unable to eat that,” his hand gestures towards the food that Cassian is still picking his slow way through, “when my mind and my palate can recollect the best made Jedhan dishes in the world?”
It is evident that both Bodhi and Jyn are listening, their eyes rapt like children being told the most fantastical stories. This is a piece of a normal life, Baze thinks. They are offering something that none of them, not even Cassian he suspects, really experienced much. “Tell them what happened when you tried to cook, Chirrut.”
That makes his husband laugh, and the sound is soft and true. Baze would wrap his body around that sound and keep it forever if he could. “Oh, they let me cook once. It’s boring. Terrible work. Not for me. I decided to mediate.”
“He was impatient,” Baze adds.
Chirrut frowns at him and knocks his cane into his foot. “You’re being impatient by butting into my story. As I was saying, I decided to mediate because there was nothing going on. I was merely waiting for it to finish cooking. The next thing I knew the kitchens were full of smoke and this great, lumbering bantha was rushing to my rescue, which I did not need.”
“The medics kept him in the infirmary for a few days due to smoke inhalation. The kitchen was shut down for several more while it was repaired. We ate nothing but hard breads and fruit for nearly a week. All because of this fool. Chirrut was barred from cooking.”
Bodhi is snickering at this point, his laughter hidden behind a hand, his eyes bright. Jyn is not so subtle about disguising her delight, and her giggles burst in the room, filling the air of the mess with a brightness that causes others to look over at them, startled to hear that noise from the dark and grumbly Jyn Erso. Even Cassian, who is looking nowhere but his food, seems to crinkle his eyes in amusement at their bantering. This has long been a way of theirs to cheer up themselves and those in their immediate vicinity, though not everyone appreciates the banter.
“All is as the Force wills it. This was its indication to me that cooking was not my strong suite.” Chirrut extends a hand in the air and it looks lost, as though he is not completely conscious of where Baze is sitting, and Baze reaches out to thread their fingers together.
Leaning forward a little to put himself back in the glow of company instead of on its outskirts, Baze looks from Jyn to Bodhi as if to ensure that they are paying attention because he has an important secret to tell them. “That was not the will of the Force. It was just this fool wanting to make sure that he was never assigned to a task he could not best again. If he had simply taken some time with it, he would have learned that anyone can excel in cooking. It’s not a mystery. It just takes time and focus. And patience. Some of these he is lacking.”
Chirrut pulls his hand away primly, a look of mock hurt and indignation on his face. “I am the pinnacle of those virtues. It was simply not meant to be. Who I am to stand in the way of a food artist? Once it was shown that the Force was not with me there, Baze got to bless us with his cooking even more.”
“He will never admit that it was on purpose.”
The only answer he gets from Chirrut is a hum as the man simply tilts his head away from him, towards where Cassian is sitting. By this point, Cassian has finished eating and nudged the tray away from himself. Baze notes that he looks a little better now, some of the color has returned to his face, his eyes look less shadowed. It is hard to say if this is because of the food, which really is dismal, or if it has to do more with the company, the light teasing and the laughter. Either way it does seem like Chirrut has achieved his goal. Not only has he gotten the man to stay with them, but he has gotten him to eat.
Bodhi notices too and shifts slightly in his chair, all his attention on Cassian, though he does not press about the mention of the ship again. Baze can see the eagerness in his eyes, the desire to know. Nothing lights Bodhi up quite as much as a ship, as the idea of flying through space. The Rebels have determined that he is not well enough to fly in their squadrons. They don’t trust his mind and its wandering even if they understand the risk he took, the sacrifice he made. Even knowing all of this, they only see him as a liability, someone who might slip back to his days as an Imperial pilot, who might give them all away without ever meaning to. It hurts him. Baze knows that it does because they have talked about it a lot in those hours during practice, after meditation.
It makes Chirrut click his tongue at them savagely to behave when they start to talk while going through the forms, but Bodhi talks when Bodhi needs to. Hushing him, not allowing him to follow the thread of his thoughts, is no help at all; it just severs him from them and makes it harder for him to gather it back together later. So they talk while showing Bodhi how to block, how to kick, how to breathe. Everything takes longer this way, but they are old men who have time enough to help a young man find the long road home.
Jyn is the one to finally break the small silence that has formed around them. “So. You came to talk about a ship.” Straight to the point, no care evident in those words, and her eyes do not even rest on him but linger on the table, on her hands in front of her, which twitch as though they need a knife in them to calm down. With someone else, with Bodhi, Baze would settle a hand over hers to still them, but he does not make the move.
Chirrut, however, does, his fingers pressing very lightly on her wrist, and the touch seems to go through Jyn like a bolt. She lets out a sigh and the steel posture of her shoulders appears to relax just a touch. Even her frown appears to have softened, though her eyes on Cassian are still hard and full of fire. Baze hopes that Chirrut does not decide to press on that particular thread right now because the mess would be a terrible place to have that conversation. Chirrut is not always cognizant of these types of things. Or, more likely, it is simply that he does not care.
“I did,” Cassian replies, looking at her for a moment, not about to cower from whatever accusations Jyn happens to be hurling. Then his gaze moves to encompass the rest of them as though he has no time to bother with Jyn. “We cannot detour to take you to wild space to see the planet.”
Until this moment, Baze had no idea that Cassian knew about the planet. He wonders whether it was Jyn or Bodhi who mentioned it. He would blame Chirrut except his husband has not been in the habit of wandering off without him since they have been on board this ship. Considering the evident amount of ice between Cassian and Jyn, Baze assumes it was Bodhi who mentioned it.
The captain shoves a hand through his hair and seems to retreat further into the fur lined coat as though he is chilled, another worrying sign. “This ship is garbage. We cannot use it. But it was decided that you could if you wanted to. Then you can use it to rendezvous with us. Even if the planet meets your exacting standards,” that description is meant for Chirrut and Chirrut alone, “we expect that it will be some time before any kind of actual settlement can be made there. We’re not saying you have to leave. It’s not that.”
Baze folds his arms over his chest and leans back slightly to look at Cassian and process the words. It sounds too perfect for both them and the Rebels, who he is sure would love to be rid of them, of the reminder that they serve not only of their heroics but of their unwillingness to be bent and twisted into place as desired. “We cannot pilot a ship.”
“I would be willing to try,” Chirrut offers. “If you let me borrow one of the droids, I imagine that I could learn quite readily.”
Instead of saying a word, Baze simply shakes his head no slowly but decisively in Cassian’s direction, which actually manages to pull a smile from the man. “My apologies. I had just assumed that Bodhi would be able to pilot it. Would that be okay?”
Chirrut hums again, the hand not on Jyn’s wrist settling on his chin in a moment of consideration. Bodhi is quiet, but the energy from him is practically radiating. Baze can feel him in the Force, a firework, a blaze, and if he can sense that, then he can only imagine what it might be like for Chirrut who has always sensed things keenly. “I suppose I could allow that. If it is okay with Bodhi.” The sightless eyes turn in the direction of the younger man.
Now that there are multiple sets of eyes on him Bodhi looks nervous, hesitant and on guard. “Well,” he says, fingers tapping, dancing over the table, fidgeting with his utensil and the edges of his and Jyn’s tray, both of which he has cleaned. “I am the pilot.”
“I could not think of a finer one to have,” Baze says, smiling slightly in Bodhi’s direction. This seems to catch Chirrut’s attention because he takes his hand off his own face to place it on Baze’s, his fingers tracing over the curve of his lips. Baze does not duck away from it, smiles further into the touch.
Jyn groans at the display of affection and pushes away from the table. “Tell me when we’re leaving.”
“You’re going?” Cassian sounds both interested and shocked to hear the news.
“Of course,” she says, arms crossed over her chest, chin pointed out and up defiantly, ever the soldier who will not back down. “I’m not just letting them go somewhere weird in some ship you guys are providing them. Send me the details about that ship. Bodhi and I will start going over it.”
Now Cassian stands, swiftly but it’s obvious that the sharp movement hurts him, and faces her, his eyes gleaming coals. Chirrut’s hand slips away from Baze’s face, coming to rest on the top of his cane as they listen to the exchange. “Don’t you trust me, Jyn? I thought we were past this point.”
Jyn licks her lips but does not back down from the challenge. “I don’t know that I trust your Rebels. Hope or no. I’m going. End of discussion. Send me those details or I’ll get them myself.” Without waiting for a response, she turns on her heel and thunders out of the mess, making more noise than a squadron of Stormtroopers.
Chirrut is frowning, the same look that he wore when he asked Baze what kind of face Cassian had on Eadu. Bodhi’s gaze is on his hands, and Baze can hear him shuffling his feet and shifting his weight under the table. So Baze is the only one to see the way that Cassian’s shoulders sag in the jacket, he is the only one to watch the look of defeat and sadness that plays across the man’s features, draws deep creases in his forehead and makes his eyes look haunted once again. “I need to go,” Cassian says after a beat. “I’ll send you all the details on the ship as soon as I can.”
“Cassian,” Baze says, which stops Cassian in his tracks but not does prompt him to turn. “Thank you. This effort is appreciated, and we do not think you have any ill intention in the offering.”
“Tell Jyn that.” The words are soft, barely above a whisper, but loud enough for everyone at their table to hear them. Then Cassian disappears, swallowed up by fur and his own footsteps.
Bodhi looks uncomfortable, a child who has just had to watch his parents fight in front of him, which has everything to do with his dislike of conflict. That is something else they have spoken about in great length during their sessions. Baze reaches out to him, lays a hand on his shoulder. The movement startles Bodhi, it always does, but he relaxes into it faster every time. Eventually it will be no surprise at all. Hopefully. “Shall we see you tomorrow morning for training?” Baze asks, trying to smooth away the worried lines on the younger man’s face. There is no sense in talking about the ship, about the plans, until they have more information. There is no use in worrying over the scene that just played out in front of them when they have no power to influence it at present
“Of course,” Bodhi says, then he pauses for a moment as though trying to remember something from earlier. His fingers fidget with the ends of his hair. “Will you tell me about some of the things you used to cook? The spices especially. I want to hear about the spices.”
“Anything you want to talk about,” Chirrut reassures him. The tone is light, but the fact that both of his hands are wrapped tight, knuckle white, around the cane does not escape Baze’s notice. The laughter and camaraderie of their dinner has been crushed under the heel of something much darker, much bigger, and now he will likely spend all night trying to smooth those wrinkles out of the Force so that they can rest. Or plotting something. One never knows with Chirrut. But then Baze would never ask for anything but this interesting, reckless life. “I think perhaps it is time for us to return to the room, Baze. It is taxing here. Goodnight, Bodhi.”
Bodhi nods and then shakes his head at himself. He’s said during their meditation sessions that it’s so easy to forget Chirrut is blind because of how much he knows, how much he seems to see even without his eyes. “Goodnight.”
Baze stands and waits for Chirrut, arms crossed behind his back. When his husband is in this kind of mood offering a helping hand would probably end with the cane being rapped across his knuckles, and Baze is not in any hurry to have that done in public. Chirrut, unexpectedly, offers his arm, which he takes readily and they navigate their way out of the mess and through the twisting halls to their room.
As soon as the door closes, Chirrut places the cane next to the door and presses himself against Baze, trapping him between his body and the door. There is an intensity in the set of his mouth that Baze has not seen much since the bacta. It’s nice to see that spark, but it’s also troubling. “Chirrut,” he begins, hands coming up to rest at his husband’s waist.
“We have to fix Jyn and Cassian.”
Of course they do. Nothing is ever as simple as it appears. Baze sighs but nods because Chirrut, as usual, is not wrong. It is just that this type of meddling has never been something he is comfortable with. When they were younger, Chirrut was the one making all the moves, and Baze was the one desperately pining while missing them all. This could be a disaster. Yet they have already survived so much, what is one more disaster, after all? “Yes, love,” he says, and it means anything, anything you could ask for, everything you could want. The smile on Chirrut’s face makes the kiss they share even brighter.