[ she nods slowly, her head starting to ache, probably from dehydration, she should drink something and licks her lips. ]
I'm always angry. [ but she could feel a difference, shivering under the surface. maybe they didn't bite her hard enough, maybe using her power while they were biting her pushed it out of her, maybe fury is so natural to her it didn't cloud her judgement.
maybe survival is too ingrained in jyn. ]
I'll ask them, I think they were there last time. [ she knows daisy was there at least. ]
[ he tries not to laugh at what she says, but his mouth does twitch with amusement. it's never hard to tell when jyn is angry, because most of the time she is some form of angry, if not a little grumpy. ]
[ he cleans off her face with very careful hands, finding only a scratch on her chin, another at her temple. it isn't anything serious, but he gets out the disinfectant anyway. ]
You have time. I suspect you will all be sleeping well tonight. [ he cotton balls at the cuts, frowning when he realizes it still looks dirty even after the wipedown. ]
[ and the cut on her temple is still bleeding, or at least... he thinks so? it looks like her blood is dirty. every time he wipes at it, he doesn't see red - just murky discolored liquid. ] Jyn. Why are you bleeding dirt?
[ that is not an explanation, but she is working up to it. she is tired, she is sore, despite clarke's blood she was already sunburned and the slight pink is making her skin feel tight and dry and feverish, she'd had a headache for days and she doesn't doubt she is dehydrated on top of her many tiny injuries. ]
She gave Prompto and I transfusions. Her weird blood is black.
[ it had probably definitely kept them alive without any protection, but it's still weird. ]
[ he almost gives her a Look with that reply, so it's a good thing she explains a little bit more, even if it's still very lacking. he'll likely ask for more detail (about everything) after jyn gets a good night's sleep, but right now he just wants to make sure she's well enough to sleep. ]
So you used her blood to help with the high sun. [ he doesn't know if it works like that, but apparently?? it does?? he cleans up her temple wound entirely, wiping it down until he can stick a little bandage on it. no blood on the sheets, especially when it looks like that! ] Temporarily?
Blood transfusions don't last forever, [ jyn agrees. to really fuck themselves up they'd need the bone marrow to make the black blood themselves, but jyn prefers her own blood as a general rule. ]
I know. [ does he know it stings or does he mean about the blood fusions?? maybe both. despite basic first aid knowledge, cassian never got the bedside manner training! no time for that in the field!! ]
[ still, he does wrinkles his nose when she says it hurts. ] It is going to sting for a little while.
[ no apologies tho. ] Maybe the radioactive blood is making it worse.
[ maybe jyn is grumpy from pain and the admittedly mild discomfort from the disinfectant was the straw that broke the bantha's back. who knows what caused the crack, but tears are pooling in her eyes before she realizes and she lifts her hand to smack cassian's hand away from her face, only to barrel forward and curl her arms around him, burying her face against his tee shirt.
it smells like him -- dirt and laundry powder and soap -- and it grounds her in the present. she isn't crying, not really, emotions leaking out because there were too many and they needed to escape. she feels the press of her mother's crystal through his shirt, call feel the warmth of it through the fabric, and it steadies her some, though it may be having cassian's arms around her. ]
I'm tired. [ it's not emotions, it's exhaustion. that is what she is going with. ]
I am not any kind of doctor, technically. [ first aid is not a medical license! ]
[ the teasing dies as soon as he realizes she's started crying, and he has about two seconds of visible, wild concern before she's hugging him. it takes him another two seconds, but he does set aside the cotton balls and medicine and settle his arms around her instead. ]
[ he's careful with his hands, trying to avoid brushing over her skin for too long even if there's very little means to avoid it. he can feel her exhaustion, and it only makes sense. she's probably only touched the service of what was out there, and that was only the physical more natural aspects. ]
[ it's exhaustion, but he knows it's not just physically tired. there's a big jumble of her feelings he won't try to analyze out of privacy. ] I think I got the worst of it all, if you want to put pajamas on and go lay down.
[ cassian is always a comfort, he has been for quite some time now. even before they woke up in new amsterdam. if she was braver she would do something about it but she is not and she will not. instead her arms stay curled around cassian and she holds on to the warm feeling that has always been present between them like gravity but can now be felt. ]
I want a bath first, [ she mumbles against his chest. she doesn't want to bring this dirt and blood into their bed. their bed is like a haven.
it probably would make her sore body feel a little better too and she wouldn't smell like sweat and blood. there are a lot of upsides to a bath, really, probably more she can't think of at the moment. ]
[ it continues to be strange to him that he can be a comfort without even trying. he knows how to provide that sort of shoulder as a machination, or for a purpose, but it's always so genuine with jyn. it's just weird that she finds comfort in him. he likes to hoard that warmth between them as much as she does, too afraid to think about it in case he somehow ruins it. ]
Okay. [ that checks out. jyn loves baths, she wants to relax in one. as soon as she's ready to let go, he'll start the (too hot) water. ]
Do you want anything to eat? I can get some snacks too, or make a sandwich.
jyn sits back on the toilet when he starts drawing the bath, watching him fuss with the taps to get the right temperature. she knows he thinks it's too hot, but he is making it that hot anyway. for her.
she could tell him, right now, what she feels. what she thinks she feels. it's too foreign still for her to know exactly, but it's there. humming under the surface of everything and aching to spill out only she doesn't know what it is. cassian is very dear to her, very important to her, and she wants to know everything about him because he's had a whole life, a whole story, and she came in late, the last chapter. practically an epilogue.
no matter how much she knows about him, she wants to know more. maybe that is simply a very close friendship. she is lacking experience there too. ]
No. [ she fiddles with one of her cuts, picking at the dried blood. ] Will you tell me about your mother?
[ he lets go when she slips away, immediately drawing the bath once his arms are free for it. he's a little surprised she doesn't want food, but she might after the soak, so he just starts contemplating what kind of food he can bring her anyway, even if it stays on the night stand for a midnight snack. ]
My mother? [ he looks over at her in surprise for the topic shift, but maybe she just... wants to get away from the camping trip for a little while. ]
[ he tries to figure out where to begin. he doesn't often talk about his mother, and he was so young when he lost her that sometimes he wonders how much of his memories are real and how much of it was hopeful fill-in-the-blanks when he was lonely. ]
Her name was Carina. Did I tell you that already? [ he frowns. the dreams were so hazy, but he does remember jyn seeing fest and his tiny little house. ] She was born on Fest, just like my father. I remember she used to make me hot cocoa, every time I would come in from the snow.
[ any tidbit of information is hoarded and tucked away like a magpie bringing shimmery, shiny things back to its home. a nest built from tiny stories they both keep hidden, memories too precious to share with just anyone.
it's a warm feeling. ]
You lived on a snowy planet, wouldn't that be every time you came in?
[ half teasing, half genuine. is there a snowy season on planets full of snow? ]
[ he lets himself grin, a tiny bit. ] When I went out to play in it. I assume she just automatically started boiling it up as I went out the door.
[ like how the bathwater is clearly boiling now, the steam rising and fogging up that little corner of of the bathroom. ]
She taught me how to sew. I think. [ he's not sure if that one's real or a hope. sewing was just a necessity across the rebel cells, but he always liked to imagine his mother taught him. ] All our hats were homemade.
[ it's a sweet image, one jyn can clearly envision: tiny cassian, short and chubby, dimple hidden beneath the perpetual few day's growth of his beard visible when he offers a toothy grin as he gambols through the snow, snowflakes sticking in a mop of messy brown hair, probably too long because he couldn't sit still to have it cut.
she isn't going to ask so apart from a holo of him as a child falling from the sky, her image of him is unchangeable. ]
Papa taught me to sew. Mama taught him.
[ back before jyn, on espinar where they met and fell in love in the span of six months, all while surveying the crystals in the cave system. galen had taught jyn on lah'mu while carefully undertaking difficult surgeries to repair her wounded stuffed toys.
saw had taught her later on, retooling stuffed toy care into utilitarian purposes, first aid and clothing. ]
[ she seems to be in a much better mood talking about this, and cassian finds he doesn't feel anything sad bringing up lighter things about his mother. it's not like he talks about her much anyway, and he doesn't mind doing so with jyn. it doesn't feel dangerous, like he's giving away any weaknesses - more like just parts of him he wants to share, for once. ]
It is a very useful skill! You would - or maybe you would not - be surprised by how many people I encountered in all my years who could not sew.
I remember she always insisted I try to repair my own clothes first, once she taught me the basics, but she still went through and fixed them after. [ there's a pause, because does he actually remember that? ] She must have. I was terrible at it until I was probably about ten.
You're good at everything, [ she counters decisively. he doesn't get to contribute to that fact, jyn has decreed it. she hasn't found a single thing he is bad at and while it is infuriating, she also finds it very attractive.
[ like HIMSELF he's so bad at himself. she literally kissed him ten minutes ago and he doesn't know what it means. he is clearly not good at everything when he can fail so spectacularly at that! ]
[ he didn't fail at being kissed, he reacted exactly how jyn wanted him to. it was a success. ]
Can you put bubbles in?
[ not because she particularly likes bubbles -- they are a novelty though -- but because she wants cassian to keep her company while she's in the bath and she thinks he might be uncomfortable if there was nothing keeping her covered up. if it was an emergency she knows that they could both compartmentalize, but this is simply comfort.
and she doesn't relish watching the bathwater turn grey-pink with blood. ]
[ no reaction at all does not seem like a wanted reaction for a kiss, jyn erso. ]
[ if this was shortly after they first moved in, there would be no supply of bubbles, but cassian has since gotten them. jyn likes to take baths, and he thought maybe she would want to try them one day - and there was no reason not to in a place like this. he reaches up and over into a little basket near the bathtub and dumps some of the bubbles inside while it continues filling with water. ]
These are unscented, but I would not want the others to potentially irritate any wounds.
[ again for cassian's benefit because jyn honestly doesn't care and she strips down the moment he turns away, making quick work of her underclothes before she steps around him and into the bath, sinking down into the hot water with a decadent sigh of relief.
[ he doesn't remark on the thinking comment, he can hardly refute it. but then he turns around without thinking, only realizing what she's doing once he hears the water shifting as she climbs inside. ]
[ he thinks about the fact that she kissed him and tries not to think about her now in the bath, barely a few feet away. ]
[ he is not thinking now because he is awkwardly standing there at a loss of what to do next. ]
You could have just asked me to leave. [ which is what he's going to do now, clearly, because it's only polite! he shuffles a little, like he's going to do just that. only cassian andor can overthink thinking. ]
jyn's hand darts out from the bath, bubbles sliding down her arm, to catch cassian's hand, grip like a vise. ]
No, stay. [ she's sunk down so far in the bath only her head and one bent knee are visible through the bubbles, despite being able to stretch all the way out. it is perfectly modest. ]
[ he knows there are bubbles and he knows what she is asking but part of him feels like this is towing the platonic war buddy line. ]
[ she can probably feel some of those flaring nerves from the grip she has on his wrist, but he doesn't fight her, even if he still hasn't quite brought himself to turn back around yet. ]
Can I at least sit down? [ there, because making light of it is much easier. ]
[ that was a stupid question, it deserves a stupid answer. she lets him go, ignoring what she felt through the bond because she doesn't want to think about why he is uncomfortable.
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I'm always angry. [ but she could feel a difference, shivering under the surface. maybe they didn't bite her hard enough, maybe using her power while they were biting her pushed it out of her, maybe fury is so natural to her it didn't cloud her judgement.
maybe survival is too ingrained in jyn. ]
I'll ask them, I think they were there last time. [ she knows daisy was there at least. ]
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[ he cleans off her face with very careful hands, finding only a scratch on her chin, another at her temple. it isn't anything serious, but he gets out the disinfectant anyway. ]
You have time. I suspect you will all be sleeping well tonight. [ he cotton balls at the cuts, frowning when he realizes it still looks dirty even after the wipedown. ]
[ and the cut on her temple is still bleeding, or at least... he thinks so? it looks like her blood is dirty. every time he wipes at it, he doesn't see red - just murky discolored liquid. ] Jyn. Why are you bleeding dirt?
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[ that is not an explanation, but she is working up to it. she is tired, she is sore, despite clarke's blood she was already sunburned and the slight pink is making her skin feel tight and dry and feverish, she'd had a headache for days and she doesn't doubt she is dehydrated on top of her many tiny injuries. ]
She gave Prompto and I transfusions. Her weird blood is black.
[ it had probably definitely kept them alive without any protection, but it's still weird. ]
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So you used her blood to help with the high sun. [ he doesn't know if it works like that, but apparently?? it does?? he cleans up her temple wound entirely, wiping it down until he can stick a little bandage on it. no blood on the sheets, especially when it looks like that! ] Temporarily?
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This stings.
[ he is a terrible nurse, make it less stingy! ]
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[ still, he does wrinkles his nose when she says it hurts. ] It is going to sting for a little while.
[ no apologies tho. ] Maybe the radioactive blood is making it worse.
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[ maybe jyn is grumpy from pain and the admittedly mild discomfort from the disinfectant was the straw that broke the bantha's back. who knows what caused the crack, but tears are pooling in her eyes before she realizes and she lifts her hand to smack cassian's hand away from her face, only to barrel forward and curl her arms around him, burying her face against his tee shirt.
it smells like him -- dirt and laundry powder and soap -- and it grounds her in the present. she isn't crying, not really, emotions leaking out because there were too many and they needed to escape. she feels the press of her mother's crystal through his shirt, call feel the warmth of it through the fabric, and it steadies her some, though it may be having cassian's arms around her. ]
I'm tired. [ it's not emotions, it's exhaustion. that is what she is going with. ]
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[ the teasing dies as soon as he realizes she's started crying, and he has about two seconds of visible, wild concern before she's hugging him. it takes him another two seconds, but he does set aside the cotton balls and medicine and settle his arms around her instead. ]
[ he's careful with his hands, trying to avoid brushing over her skin for too long even if there's very little means to avoid it. he can feel her exhaustion, and it only makes sense. she's probably only touched the service of what was out there, and that was only the physical more natural aspects. ]
[ it's exhaustion, but he knows it's not just physically tired. there's a big jumble of her feelings he won't try to analyze out of privacy. ] I think I got the worst of it all, if you want to put pajamas on and go lay down.
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I want a bath first, [ she mumbles against his chest. she doesn't want to bring this dirt and blood into their bed. their bed is like a haven.
it probably would make her sore body feel a little better too and she wouldn't smell like sweat and blood. there are a lot of upsides to a bath, really, probably more she can't think of at the moment. ]
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Okay. [ that checks out. jyn loves baths, she wants to relax in one. as soon as she's ready to let go, he'll start the (too hot) water. ]
Do you want anything to eat? I can get some snacks too, or make a sandwich.
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jyn sits back on the toilet when he starts drawing the bath, watching him fuss with the taps to get the right temperature. she knows he thinks it's too hot, but he is making it that hot anyway. for her.
she could tell him, right now, what she feels. what she thinks she feels. it's too foreign still for her to know exactly, but it's there. humming under the surface of everything and aching to spill out only she doesn't know what it is. cassian is very dear to her, very important to her, and she wants to know everything about him because he's had a whole life, a whole story, and she came in late, the last chapter. practically an epilogue.
no matter how much she knows about him, she wants to know more. maybe that is simply a very close friendship. she is lacking experience there too. ]
No. [ she fiddles with one of her cuts, picking at the dried blood. ] Will you tell me about your mother?
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My mother? [ he looks over at her in surprise for the topic shift, but maybe she just... wants to get away from the camping trip for a little while. ]
[ he tries to figure out where to begin. he doesn't often talk about his mother, and he was so young when he lost her that sometimes he wonders how much of his memories are real and how much of it was hopeful fill-in-the-blanks when he was lonely. ]
Her name was Carina. Did I tell you that already? [ he frowns. the dreams were so hazy, but he does remember jyn seeing fest and his tiny little house. ] She was born on Fest, just like my father. I remember she used to make me hot cocoa, every time I would come in from the snow.
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it's a warm feeling. ]
You lived on a snowy planet, wouldn't that be every time you came in?
[ half teasing, half genuine. is there a snowy season on planets full of snow? ]
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[ like how the bathwater is clearly boiling now, the steam rising and fogging up that little corner of of the bathroom. ]
She taught me how to sew. I think. [ he's not sure if that one's real or a hope. sewing was just a necessity across the rebel cells, but he always liked to imagine his mother taught him. ] All our hats were homemade.
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she isn't going to ask so apart from a holo of him as a child falling from the sky, her image of him is unchangeable. ]
Papa taught me to sew. Mama taught him.
[ back before jyn, on espinar where they met and fell in love in the span of six months, all while surveying the crystals in the cave system. galen had taught jyn on lah'mu while carefully undertaking difficult surgeries to repair her wounded stuffed toys.
saw had taught her later on, retooling stuffed toy care into utilitarian purposes, first aid and clothing. ]
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It is a very useful skill! You would - or maybe you would not - be surprised by how many people I encountered in all my years who could not sew.
I remember she always insisted I try to repair my own clothes first, once she taught me the basics, but she still went through and fixed them after. [ there's a pause, because does he actually remember that? ] She must have. I was terrible at it until I was probably about ten.
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who knew competence was a turn on.
literally everyone but jyn. ]
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No, not everything.
[ like HIMSELF he's so bad at himself. she literally kissed him ten minutes ago and he doesn't know what it means. he is clearly not good at everything when he can fail so spectacularly at that! ]
I just have to be good at a lot of things.
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Can you put bubbles in?
[ not because she particularly likes bubbles -- they are a novelty though -- but because she wants cassian to keep her company while she's in the bath and she thinks he might be uncomfortable if there was nothing keeping her covered up. if it was an emergency she knows that they could both compartmentalize, but this is simply comfort.
and she doesn't relish watching the bathwater turn grey-pink with blood. ]
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[ if this was shortly after they first moved in, there would be no supply of bubbles, but cassian has since gotten them. jyn likes to take baths, and he thought maybe she would want to try them one day - and there was no reason not to in a place like this. he reaches up and over into a little basket near the bathtub and dumps some of the bubbles inside while it continues filling with water. ]
These are unscented, but I would not want the others to potentially irritate any wounds.
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[ again for cassian's benefit because jyn honestly doesn't care and she strips down the moment he turns away, making quick work of her underclothes before she steps around him and into the bath, sinking down into the hot water with a decadent sigh of relief.
this is platonic af. ]
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[ he thinks about the fact that she kissed him and tries not to think about her now in the bath, barely a few feet away. ]
[ he is not thinking now because he is awkwardly standing there at a loss of what to do next. ]
You could have just asked me to leave. [ which is what he's going to do now, clearly, because it's only polite! he shuffles a little, like he's going to do just that. only cassian andor can overthink thinking. ]
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jyn's hand darts out from the bath, bubbles sliding down her arm, to catch cassian's hand, grip like a vise. ]
No, stay. [ she's sunk down so far in the bath only her head and one bent knee are visible through the bubbles, despite being able to stretch all the way out. it is perfectly modest. ]
Keep me company.
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[ she can probably feel some of those flaring nerves from the grip she has on his wrist, but he doesn't fight her, even if he still hasn't quite brought himself to turn back around yet. ]
Can I at least sit down? [ there, because making light of it is much easier. ]
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[ that was a stupid question, it deserves a stupid answer. she lets him go, ignoring what she felt through the bond because she doesn't want to think about why he is uncomfortable.
but... ]
You don't have to stay.
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