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mostthingskenobi · 9 months

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CASSIAN'S RECKONING - Chapter 6: The Detritus

CHAPTER SUMMARY: Tarkin pushes Cassian too far…and all the rebel can do is think about Jyn.

Here's a nice long chapter for you. I hope you enjoy reading it :)

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THIS IS A WHUMPY FIC W/GRAPHIC DEPICTIONS OF VIOLENCE. PLEASE HEED THE TAGS ON AO3.

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CHAPTER 6: THE DETRITUS

Cassian was freezing, his teeth audibly chattering in his head.

Why is it so damn cold in here? he thought, his brain feeling slow and frozen like the rest of his body. Aren’t they cold too? he wondered of his captors. Tarkin paced back and forth, seemingly impervious to the iciness. The death troopers shifted their weight. He could hear their gear creaking.

The temperature had dropped so low that blood was beginning to freeze in Cassian’s hair and along the edge of his right eye. His skin was burned under the electrobinders. His lungs ached. He could barely see. Whatever the IT-O droid injected had practically blinded him, retracting his vision until he could only make out blurry images directly in front.

But the pain.

The pain was beyond anything he could have imagined.

And it was constant, a never-ending barrage that flooded every nerve, every cogent thought. He lost consciousness several times, but the droid instantly revived him, showing no mercy. At first, he had been cataloguing each scratch, trying to rationalize his way through the agony. It’s only a chemical reaction. They hadn’t needed severe tactics; the injections multiplied the smallest cut into fire that bloomed across his nervous system. He tried to reason away the pain, trick his brain into believing it was an illusion.

But that didn’t work.

Eventually he had vomited on one of the death troopers. Cassian wanted to laugh every time he remembered it. The trooper had practically yelped before punching him; it was a small price to pay for something so deeply satisfying. Cassian allowed himself to laugh out loud when Tarkin ordered the soldier from the room. “Sorry to spoil everyone’s fun,” he snorted.

The Grand Moff hadn’t found the incident nearly as amusing as Cassian. His response was to increase the interrogation’s intensity. The droid used a razor-thin blade to pepper the rebel’s body with small half-inch cuts. Nothing significant in an of themselves, but together, and combined with the droid’s relentless injections, they became excruciating. His neck, his chest, his face, his hands, his fingers, his feet; there was nowhere to retreat from the pain.

Tarkin kept asking him to identify everyone who had been with him on Scarif, showing him one hologram after another. When Jyn’s face appeared, Cassian had made a strange sound, somewhere between a gasp and a croak, that he managed to cover up with a coughing fit. Jyn’s smokey eyes, her mocking smirk, almost undid him right then and there. He knew he should stuff that part of himself somewhere deep and dark, cover her up and convince himself that she was nothing.

If he didn’t, he would break.

If he broke and gave the Empire what they wanted, Jyn would be next on Tarkin’s list.

The thought of her enduring the Grand Moff’s sadistic interrogation techniques made him sick to his stomach. He would endure this pain so she and the other members of Rogue One wouldn’t have to.

By now, Cassian was in a stupor. His head fell back as he struggled for air. Every breath burned.

For the first time, the IT-O droid spoke. “A suspension of interrogation is recommended.” Its voice was monotone and deep.

“Whatever for?” Tarkin replied, annoyed.

“Subject’s core temperature is dangerously low and continued hyperventilation of cold, dry air has put the prisoner at risk. If we carry on, his lungs will fill with blood and he will be useless to you.”

“What do you suggest?”

“Allow the room’s temperature to rise above freezing.”

The Grand Moff did not hide his irritation. “Do it,” he said, moving toward the door. “We can’t have him dying on us. We have far too much to discuss.”

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He didn’t know how long they left him alone. He could feel warm air blowing into the room and he forced himself to focus on how it felt against his skin. Eventually, he stopped shaking as his blood and lungs returned to normal temperatures.

He wanted to sleep or cry. He wasn’t sure which urge was stronger. But he was afraid to do either.

For now, he focused on tangibles. He knew the warmth wouldn’t last, so he drowned himself in it, letting it permeate every sense.

It reminded him of something.

A warm breeze on a curved shoreline.

And orangish-pink sky.

Sand under his knees.

Scarif.

That hellish mission haunted him like no other.

All of this, everything Tarkin was doing to him now, was because of Scarif. Cassian’s heart tightened in his chest. He hoped the sacrifice was worth it. He hoped the Death Star plans were with the right people, people who were smart enough and brave enough to blow these imperial bastards to hell. He had already lost so much; anyone he ever cared about had disappeared like smoke.

Except Jyn.

The thought hovered in his mind, frozen on the threshold as he tried to decide whether to welcome or banish it.

Cassian clenched his teeth and swallowed thickly.

He let her in.

He didn’t care about the risk, didn’t care if it made him defenseless. He needed her strength.

So, he permitted himself to think about her.

She was unexpected. Wary, damaged, and bitter when they first met.

Just like him.

But, over time, as they proceeded through Operation Fracture’s labyrinthine twists, something came alive in her, something truthful, vulnerable, and determined. As Cassian watched her transform, something inside him began to change as well. She turned the mirror back on him, forced him to see how far afield he’d strayed. He had become so committed to the Rebellion that he’d forgotten how to listen to his conscience. He believed in the greater good, the cause as they called it, but he had allowed the ends to justify the means for too long. Jyn had not so gently nudged him back on course.

And he had begun to love her for that.

He hated that word.

Love painted a target, put everyone involved in jeopardy.

Plus, how could he love someone he hardly knew?

But ever since they met, Jyn was right alongside him, matching him step for step. Or perhaps he was trying to keep pace with her. He liked that about their friendship. She blazed her own trails; she didn’t need him, but she wanted him, sought his camaraderie, his advice, his laughter, and he did the same with her.

He couldn’t put a finger on how it happened. All he knew was that they trusted each other, had complete faith in each other, and treated each other with equal respect. He knew he could put his life in her hands and vice versa. Is that love? He wondered if there was a better word to describe his feelings for Jyn.

When had the shift from strangers to companions first started?

Perhaps on Jedha. He could have left her to die in Saw Gerrera’s hideout; he found Bodhi, who could have brought him to Galen Erso, negating the need for Jyn. But Cassian couldn’t leave her behind. In fact, he hadn’t been able to stop worrying about her the entire time he was trapped in that small, dark cell. After seeing Bodhi’s condition, Cassian worried Jyn might suffer a similar fate at Saw’s unpredictable hands.

Why had he cared?

Just days prior to meeting her he had shot his own contact in the back on the Ring of Kafrene. Why did he suddenly want to protect a resource with which he had no established history?

Cassian finally admitted it wasn’t all that sudden. He’d had his doubts about his own morality for a long time. The Rebellion had made a habit of asking him to kill, like it was an automatic given despite the toll it took on Cassian’s soul. The more lives he took, the more he thought of Clem and Maarva. Not that they would have opposed his joining the Rebellion; they both suffered cruelly at the Empire’s hand. But Cassian found himself thinking about what he wished life had been; something quiet and safe where Maarva and Clem laughed and were happy and grew old together. And every time he pulled the trigger on his blaster or sniper riffle, that dream slipped a little further away. By the time he’d met Jyn, he no longer had the refuge of daydreams. All he had was a waking nightmare that he desperately wanted to escape.

In Jedha’s holy quarter he watched a broken, angry young woman put her life at risk for a child she didn’t know. She took out an entire squad of stormtroopers with nothing but a truncheon—Cassian smiled at the memory. She fought desperately to save her father on Eadu. Then she faced death on Scarif, willing to give her life for something bigger than herself.

If that wasn’t worth loving, he finally decided, he didn’t know what was.

After Eadu. That’s where it changed.

They had been standing in the stolen ship as K-2 and Bodhi navigated them to safety. Jyn was frozen with shock, her clothes dripping with the acrid Eadu rain, staring at him from across the compartment. Cassian could feel her eyes on him even though his back was to her. Jyn’s rage was palpable; he understood it, but he was dealing with his own demons. She lit into him right there in front of the others, called him a murderer and a stormtrooper. He flared with anger, almost shouting in her face. They both had their righteous fury, their personal pain, their justifications. Even though he had been livid, he respected Jyn for giving him hell, and, more so, for not backing down when he gave it right back to her.

After that argument, he didn’t think she would ever forgive him, especially since his mission had been to kill her father. But somehow, she’d seen past her grief and judged him by his actions rather than his orders. Now that he knew her better, it didn’t surprise him that she’d forgiven him. Jyn was raised in battle and had an uncanny ability to sift through emotional detritus and get to the root of things. Ultimately, it made them closer, gave them an instant loyalty that could only be made through scorched egos.

When they arrived back on Yavin 4 Jyn still despised him. But when he’d backed her plan for Scarif and recruited a team of thirty soldiers willing to die by her side for the greater good, the anger fell away allowing them to finally understand each other. Up to that point Jyn and Cassian had been surviving their lives, moving from one moment to the next, never really landing anywhere stable. When Cassian leaned in and whispered, “Welcome home,” he wasn’t welcoming her to the Alliance, he was telling her that he was sticking with her all the way to the end. Jyn’s gentle smile proved she understood.

They set off for Scarif, ready to die together. The entire ordeal had been like a horrible dream, bluffing their way into the citadel tower, deeper and deeper into the belly of the beast until they crossed a point of no return. When K-2SO died, Cassian knew their fate had been sealed. His droid, his friend, was the latest in a long line of losses. It was the catalyst that forced him to let go of any hope for survival and allowed him to fully commit to their mission, no longer worrying about protecting himself. He would protect Jyn for as long as he could, giving her a running head start to transmit the plans.

Then he fell.

Hard.

Well, first Krennic shot him and then he fell, hitting two durasteel beams before smashing into a grated platform. He broke four ribs and fractured parts of his hip and left leg. He lay inside the databank for what felt like ages; the pain was delayed but when it came it overwhelmed him. As he fought to breathe, he was startled by a banging sound and realized her could hear Jyn climbing the tower. He also knew Krennic wouldn’t give up until he killed her. So, Cassian forced himself to move, dragged himself off the metal grate and into an access vault where he found the lift to the spire’s top. Adrenaline dulled his physical suffering just enough for him to reach the data dish platform in time to see Krennic, his blaster fixed on Jyn, standing between her and the transmitter. Cassian didn’t hesitate; he shot the bastard that had ruined his friend’s family, who had taken her childhood, her safety, her parents. He wasn’t about to give Krennic the chance to take Jyn too.

Cassian would never forget the look on Jyn’s face after she initiated the transmission, sending the Death Star plans into the chaotic battle above before stepping to his side and grasping his arm, relieved that he was still alive.

He remembered the anger that entered her eyes and roughly pulling her away as she lunged for Krennic, their foreheads touching as he said, “Leave it. Let’s go.” She had leaned into Cassian and allowed him to guide her away.

They got into the lift and headed down to the beach. The long ride was a momentary respite, an unexpected quiet fraught with emotion as Jyn and Cassian held on to each other. She had looked up at him with large, open eyes, an expression on her face he had never seen, as though no one had ever come back for her, as though she didn’t know what it was like to matter to another person. He tightened his grip as Jyn held him up; in that moment, nothing existed but her. All the pieces of his life fell into place; every heartbreak, every mistake, every victory culminated here in Jyn Erso’s arms. The understanding gave him calm. He wanted her to know that she mattered, that he cared, that he was with her.

When they made it to the beach, they saw the radioactive plume rising out of the ocean, recognizing the work of a planet killer. Their steps slowed as realization set in. Poetic, he had thought, to be killed by the very weapon we’re trying to destroy. They fell to their knees on the shoreline, watching certain death rushing head on. As Jyn had said, their chances were spent. They were both afraid. What would this death feel like? Would they even feel it at all? They wrapped their bodies around each other, together all the way to the end. Jyn tried not to sob. Cassian shook with fear, whispering, “I’ve got you,” in her ear over and over. Then, out of nowhere a ship dropped in over the water, the side hatch open with Baze and Chirrut visible inside. Jyn hauled Cassian up and they sprinted, dumping into the shuttle before the hatch slammed shut. The sudden relief made Jyn burst into tears while Cassian’s wounds finally got the better of him. The last thing he remembered was Jyn cupping his face in her hands, begging him to stay with her. He woke a week later in a hospital cot, in a long room lined up and down with injured men and women. Jyn was there, right by his side. And she stayed every day until he was able to walk again.

After Scarif’s intensity, Jyn and Cassian were closer than ever. But they had not yet been able to cross the barrier where that closeness dissolved a life’s-worth of fear.

As Cassian sat now, covered in his own blood in an imperial cell, he wondered, if he had the chance to do it all again, would he tell her? Would he have the courage to tell Jyn that she mattered to him, that he cared about her, that he was hers, if she wanted him, all the way to the end?

He looked down at himself, wrists raw from pulling at his binds, skin burned by shock cuffs, blood running down and dripping from his fingertips onto the floor. His reality, as Tarkin put it, was setting in. This cell and pain and blood was all he would know until he took his last breath. Jyn was out of reach forever. He had to accept that. Cassian closed his eyes against the tears that rose to the surface, forbidding them from spilling over and running down his face.

He knew what he should do, but after Jedha and Eadu and Scarif, Cassian Andor could never let go of Jyn Erso.

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END NOTES

NEXT CHAPTER IS CALLED “THE SALT" - Jyn is ready to launch her rescue mission but all she can do is think about Cassian. Tarkin has no more mercy for Cassian and uses a brutal tactic for personal gratification.

Thank you for reading!

Likes, comments, and reblogs are very welcome!

Much love!

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READ IT ON AO3 - Kudos and Comments Welcome :-)

READ CHAPTER 1 “The Razor”

READ CHAPTER 2 “The Scythe”

READ CHAPTER 3 “The Cold”

READ CHAPTER 4 “The Expendable”

READ CHAPTER 5 “The Truth”

READ CHAPTER 6 "The Detritus"

READ CHAPTER 7 “The Salt”