Fic: What’s Said Can’t Be Unsaid

[mosylu]

This was written for captainandors on Tumblr. Happy May the 4th! They asked for “when the two characters who don’t realize they’re in love are in a fight and one of them shouts “BECAUSE IM IN LOVE WITH YOU” and they’re both like wait”

Also, I’ve never read Rebel Rising, so please excuse any differences between that and this.

What’s Said Can’t Be Unsaid

Jyn woke in darkness.

For a moment, she was eight years old again, crying and trembling in the dark, haunted by the hours-old visions of her mama falling and her papa taken away by the man in white …

No. No, that was years ago. It was far behind her. She had woken in the dark before. She was waiting for Saw to come back and retrieve her. It shouldn’t be too much longer.

Although she’d been saying that to herself for the last several hours …

She put out a hand, patting around herself until her fingertips brushed the glass of her ‘pad’s screen. She pulled it toward herself and switched it on to check the time.

Eighteen hours, thirty-two minutes since Saw had left the message for her to wait here, in this hidey-hole.

The truth washed over her in a cold wave. He wasn’t coming back.

He’d left her here, on Tamsye Prime, with a battered weapon and an elderly datapad and the clothes on her back, and he’d … he’d just left.

She was alone.

The datapad’s screen went black again, and the dark closed in around her. “But,” she said into it. “But I kept up.


Six Years Later

They staggered up the gangplank together, Cassian shouting out, "Bodhi, get us out of here!” He angled toward the bench and shifted so Jyn could sit down, not missing the way she winced as she settled into place.

He reached for the medkit in the locker above his head, and her face went from wincing to stony. “I’ve got it,” she snapped at him, pulling the medkit out of his hands. “I’m fine.” She turned away from him, tugging her shirt up and craning her neck to peer at her midsection.

Cassian gritted his teeth. She was always like this when she got hurt. Worse when he turned back for her or waited for her. It was massively frustrating, when all he wanted to do was make sure she was all right.

Which he would for any one of his team, of course he would.

It was just that it was … different with Jyn.

The U-wing lurched, and he sat down hard on the bench, grabbing the bar over his head so he wouldn’t just fall into Jyn and hurt her more. He didn’t know if that was possible, because he didn’t know how badly she was hurt, because she wouldn’t kriffing well tell him.

As their ride bumped and rattled its way out of atmo, he stared at the hunch of her shoulders and the set of her neck, trying to read in them the things he wanted to know.

She was a whole new language for him, with no translation bot.

With a jolt, they jumped to hyperspace, and he got up, making his way to the cockpit.

“What happened?” Bodhi asked him, hands busy over the control panels.

“She got hit,” Cassian said. It played out in front of his eyes again, Jyn running alongside him, then her body jolting from the blaster bolt, collapsing, going down -

He’d been running so hard he was ten feet away before he could turn and go back for her.

“I could tell that much,” Bodhi said. Cassian could tell he was trying to sound light and buoyant, but his voice was weighed down with unspoken worry. “How bad?”

“She won’t let me look at it.”

Bodhi peered over his shoulder. “I’m sure it’s not that bad, if she wants to take care of it herself.” A question trailed off the end of his sentence.

Cassian shook his head, trying to figure out a way to say That’s not the point, without being an ass about it.

“We got everything?” he said instead.

“In and out.”

"Good.” He turned and went back, plotting how to get Jyn to let him look at her injury.

Baze was kneeling down next to her, squinting at her side. “Bacta,” he rumbled, and rooted around in the medkit on the floor next to him.

Cassian stood in the doorway, battling the stupidest feeling of hurt. She would let Baze look at it but not him?

It was fine, he told himself as she pulled her shirt down over the new bacta dressing. As long as someone looked at it, someone who wasn’t her and wouldn’t pretend it was less serious than it was. Baze was stoic but blunt. If he thought it only needed a bacta dressing, it was no more than a surface injury. No organs nicked or arteries cauterized.

Baze looked at Jyn narrowly. “Anything else?”

“No.”

“You were limping,” Cassian said.

She shot him a look. “I just bashed my knee when I went down.”

“Which knee?” Baze asked.

“It’s nothing.”

“The right,” Cassian said.

Baze tapped one large, square-tipped finger on her right knee, and she clamped her lips shut around a grunt that they all still heard.

“Doesn’t sound like nothing,” he said, and commenced prodding and poking.

He made her pull up her pants so he could see the knee. The skin was dark red, already deepening into what would surely be a lurid bruise, but still unbroken. He prodded some more, got her to extend her leg, walk a few steps.

“Ice,” he said finally. “And compression.” He wrapped her knee and handed her a cool pack.

Through all of it, Jyn steadfastly ignored Cassian’s presence. But when Baze finally let her tug her pants down over the lump of the compression bandage, she finally looked up at him. “See? I’m fine.”

“Good,” he said.

“You didn’t need to come back. I could have got up and made it back on my own.”

He shrugged. “I did anyway.”

“You didn’t need to.”

Exasperated, he turned around and strode into the galley where Chirrut was filling up the hot-water kettle for tea.

She came after him, limping a little. “You were almost safe. Why did you turn back?”

“What else was I supposed to do?”

“I told you, I could have managed!” She whipped around, wincing as she wobbled in place. “Baze, tell him, I would have been fine.”

“No,” Baze said. “I’m not getting in the middle of your squabble.”

“Squabble,” Jyn seethed.

Cassian snapped, “I didn’t know that at the time.”

She swiveled to glare at him again.

“For all I knew,” he added, “you’d broken your knee and gotten shot in the spine.”

“Then you should have left me.”

“I’m not going to do that!”

“No, you never do, do you?”

He gritted his teeth. “Why is that a problem?”

“It’s a problem because I don’t need to you come back for me!”

Forget language. She was an entire new terrain, unmapped, with death traps lurking for the unwary. He kept his voice even. “All I’m doing is making sure the whole team gets back safe. Again, why is that a problem?”

“Because you’re always looking after me,” she shouted. “Not anyone else, just me!”

“That’s not true.”

“No? You don’t think I’ve noticed that when we go out in the field, we’re always partnered together so you can pick up my slack?”

“It’s not about slack, it’s - ” He wanted to be with her. Somehow that didn’t feel like the right thing to say. “We work well together. We make a good team.” Yes, exactly. That was it. That was what he meant.

She snorted loudly. “And this way you can look after me.”

Arrrrrrrrggghhhh.

She went on. “If you don’t think I can keep up, than just tell me so.”

“It’s not that I don’t think you can keep up - ”

“Then why else would you be always swooping in to rescue me?”

Somehow it all came out of his mouth at once. “Because I’m in love you with, is why!”

She went white.

He suspected he did too, because he felt the sick feeling of utter disaster draining from his face all the way down to the pit of his stomach.

A very small voice murmured, “Oh, boy.”

It wasn’t Jyn’s.

He felt his neck creak as he turned his head to see the entire rest of the team in the tiny galley. Chirrut, placidly drinking tea. Baze with his arms folded, leaning in the doorway. Bodhi looking from Cassian to Jyn and back again. Kay stationed next to the table.

Somehow, he hadn’t even noticed the rest of them come in, which was unlike him. To say the least.

Kay said loudly into the silence, “As I understand these things, that is a common if illogical human impetus.”

Uneven footsteps made him look back toward Jyn, just in time to see her limp out of the galley as fast as she could toward the berths along the back of the ship.

With a heartfelt groan, he turned on his heel, pushed past Baze, and strode in the other direction.


One door slammed. Then another.

Kay said, “That was unprecedented.”

Chirrut held out his hand. Baze looked at it. “What?”

“Pay up,” Chirrut said. “I won. The captain said it first.”

Baze gave a small humph. “Didn’t say it. Yelled it. And I don’t think he meant to.” He frowned even more than usual. “I don’t think he even knew.”

“Bodhi, will you tell my husband to stop weaseling out of his debts.”

“I don’t know,” Bodhi said. “I’m with Baze. I don’t think he knew he was going to say that. Doesn’t it invalidate the bet?”

“The terms of the wager would seem to be predicated on their knowledge of their own feelings, and a reluctance to speak those feelings aloud to the other,” Kay put in. “Although how you could feel something and not know you’re feeling it - ”

Chirrut waved a hand. “Whether he meant to or not, he did say it, and he said it first.”

“Jyn didn’t say it at all,” Kay noted. “So it’s inaccurate to say first.”

“She didn’t say it yet!” Chirrut said. “Anyway, now Baze owes me ten credits.”

“Put it on my tab,” Baze said, meandering toward the tea kettle.

Chirrut snorted. “Tab,” he muttered, picking up his teacup. “Your tab would reach from here back to Jedha.”


It was a long way back to base - fifty-two hours in hyperspace. Most of the way back, they avoided each other, with astonishing success considering the size of the U-wing.

Cassian spent the bulk of those hours mired in his own thoughts, hearing his own blurted confession over and and over again, seeing Jyn’s frozen expression before she almost ran away from him.

Because I’m in love with you.

He didn’t waste a lot of time trying to deny it to himself. While he didn’t have much experience with love, he’d known the truth the moment he’d heard the words.

The real question was what he wanted to do about it.

Up until now, he had been satisfied with fleeting connections, brief and intense relationships in between missions, where both parties understood that it had a time limit and a low priority.

Being with Jyn would be intense. But it wouldn’t be fleeting, or limited, or low priority. He should be worried about that, perhaps, but he wasn’t.

Mostly, he worried about what Jyn might want to do.

Hopefully not leave the team.

The notion sent his stomach lurching with panic. She already thought he was - what? Coddling her?

As if he would ever dare.

He said, “Kay, will you tell me something?”

Kay, quietly charging a few feet away, turned his head. “I can tell you any number of things, Cassian. You will need to specify.”

“About Jyn.”

Kay paused. “I can tell you rather fewer things about Jyn Erso.”

“Do I treat her as if I don’t think she can keep up?”

“That is not a question about Jyn, that is a question about you.”

He sighed. “Will you please answer it, anyway.”

Kay’s servos hummed softly, usually an indication that he was considering his answer carefully. A rare occurrence.

Finally, he said, “You are thorough and conscientious, regarding both the success of your missions and the safety of your team. You would not include anyone who you didn’t think could keep up. Jyn has a number of skill sets and areas of knowledge that have been crucial to the success of all your missions since our team’s recent expansion.” He paused, and a peevish note entered his voice. “And she has many weapons, which she is most proficient at using.”

Cassian pinched the bridge of his nose. “Then why would she think that I don’t trust in her abilities?”

“There is a 97.6% chance that Jyn has significant abandonment issues.”

“What makes you say that?”

“The large number of files I have downloaded over the years regarding human psychology, with a particular focus on the experience of childhood trauma.”

“No, I mean what made you say that right now?”

“The psychological research files tell me that humans can react to a deep and terrible fear by doing their utmost to make it come true.” He sounded annoyed. “Organics are very puzzling.”

So … Jyn feared being abandoned, left behind, and that was why she’d shouted at him that he should have done it?

Cassian rubbed his hand over his mouth and stared unseeingly at the surface of the table.


A few hours before they were due to exit hyperspace, he had retreated to the cockpit. Not retreated, he told himself. It sounded as if he was hiding. He was just .. .  being discreet. Circumspect, possibly.

Anyway, it was a good place to write his mission report. Which had already been written, but could be gone over again, for the third or fourth time.

In regards to the whole issue of leaving her behind, he would speak to her on base. Part of the mission debrief. Making it clear that leaving her behind wasn’t an option, no matter what happened. Stating unequivocally that she was useful and valued and necessary. That ought to take care of the matter.

In regards to … the other thing.

He’d decided to wait for her to broach the subject. He’d blurted it out, so the next move was properly hers. If she wanted to hear more about that, then she would come to him.

If she didn’t …

Well, she didn’t, that was all.

He sighed and scrolled through his report. Maybe he was hiding.

“Cassian,” Bodhi said, and he jolted.

“Sorry, yes. What?”

For a moment, his friend could have been smiling, but then he said briskly, “I’m going to check something in the back. Will you be up here for awhile?”

Cassian waved his hand, turning back to his datapad and adding an unnecessary note. “Go on.”

Bodhi nodded and climbed out of the seat. it was only after he was gone that it occurred to Cassian to wonder what he could possibly have to check in the back.

A few minutes later, footsteps alerted him to someone coming up into the cockpit, and he glanced over his shoulder, expecting to see Bodhi returning. But it wasn’t Bodhi.

Jyn gave him a little nod and settled into the pilot’s seat.

He stared out at the mottled expanse of hyperspace. His neck felt hot and something buzzed in his ears. Say something, idiot.  "How’s your injury?“

"Fine,” she said. “Still bandaged.” She scratched her side. “It’s at that itchy stage,” she added.

“And your knee?” He sounded like he was checking off a list or something.

She flexed her leg. “Still stiff. But better.” She propped her foot on the dash. “I’m supposed to keep it elevated,” she added.

“Right,” he said. “Yes.”

They both stared at hyperspace for awhile.

He thought, I should probably talk to her now. It’s as good a time as any. Words circled around his head, but for the first time in a long time, he couldn’t pull them together into any kind of coherent statement.

She spoke first, her voice abrupt and a little too loud. “Chirrut talked to me.”

He looked over at her. “Oh?”

“I mean, the way Chirrut talks.”

“All nonsense until you realize he’s just skewered you like a womp rat?”

“Mmmm.” She rubbed her hands against her knees again. “Anyway, I - I don’t really think you should leave me behind.”

“Neither do I,” he said, dry as dust.

Her mouth quirked for the briefest of moments, then she looked away again. “I, um,” she said. “That bolt hit me, and I went down. I - ” Her fingers worked on the material of her pants, crumpling them up, smoothing them. “I caught myself on my knee, so I was still sort of half-up, and I could see you. Ahead of me. I thought maybe you haven’t seen.”

“I did,” he said.

“I know,” she said. “You turned around and came back for me. It’s just that moment, when all I could see was your back, running away from me.”

“Did you think I was leaving you?”

“I - ” She tapped her fingers on her good knee. “I had a bad moment. And even when you came back, it was still - ” She pushed her fingers into her breastbone. “Just sort of sitting right here. I didn’t know what to do with it, so I shouted at you and said stupid things. I’m sorry.”

“And the - coddling?”

She shook her head, her mouth wry. “I know you’re not. I know my value. I - ” She huffed out a breath. “You are always looking after me, though. It feels like.”

He shifted uneasily. “Do you - do you want to be paired with someone else on missions?”

“No,” she said quickly. “You were right. We do work well together. And I - ” She swallowed. “It’s good you look out for me, actually. For all of us. Good for the team. I’m just not used to it. Not the way things always worked for me.”

He studied her profile. “Did the Partisans leave people behind?”

A second passed.

She nodded.

Another second passed.

“We would help them get up, though, if they could get up,” she said. “If they could keep up, even injured, then they kept up. If they couldn’t, we left them, because they would slow all of us down and then we’d all get captured or killed. The cause was more important, we had to be efficient and ruthless and - ” She looked at her fingers. “I didn’t always, though.”

She looked ashamed. Whether it was of going back for people, or not going back for people, he wasn’t really sure.

“I’ve left people behind before,” he said. “I had to.”

“Yeah,” she said. “I understand. Sometimes you have to.”

He set the ‘pad aside and leaned forward, bracing his elbows on his knees. “I won’t leave you behind,” he said.

“If you ever have to - ”

“I won’t,” he said again, firmly.

“Even if we’d both be killed?”

“No.”

“Even if we’d both be captured?”

“No.”

She stared at him a moment, some unfathomable emotion filling her eyes, before she looked away and started picking at her pants again. “I guess I knew that,” she mumbled. “I just - don’t always remember it.”

The muffled confession made something strange happen in his chest. “I’ll remind you sometimes,” he said. “If you need me to.”

She shrugged a little. “All right, yeah.” She looked over at him with the smallest of smiles. He smiled tentatively back.

At least she hadn’t announced she was leaving.

Her gaze drifted past him, and her mouth tightened for a moment. She got up and went over to the door that separated the cockpit from the rest of the ship.

He thought she was about to walk away and thought, Let her go, don’t push, when she smacked the button and the door swished closed.

From behind it came cries of indignation.

“Kriff off!” she yelled back.

“That is not possible, Jyn Erso,” Kay said loudly.

She made a rude sound with her tongue and came back to plop herself in the pilot’s chair,  bracing her foot on the dash again. He was starting to think she just liked doing that.

“About the other thing you said,” she said, slouching into the back of the chair. “That you, um. That you’re in love with me.”

He cleared his throat. “Yes. That.”

“Did you mean it?”

His stomach clenched with nerves, but he kept his voice level. “I don’t say that kind of thing for no reason.”

Her jaw worked briefly. “Is that why I’m here?”

“No,” he said. “You’re here because you belong here. With us. Your skills and your knowledge and your - ” He smiled briefly. “Your weaponry. Rogue One needs that. The way that I - uh. That I feel about you is separate.”

She took that in, her face unreadable. “What if I preferred never to talk about it again?”

He swallowed. "Then we wouldn’t talk about it.”

“Would I still belong here?”

“Yes,” he said without hesitation. It would hurt, to be this near her and not with her. But he had hurt before.

She took in a breath through her nose, then let it out. “Good,” she said. “That’s what I wanted to know.”

He felt stiff and cold. Right. All right then. Now he knew. Now he could -

She got to her feet, reached out and pulled his chair around ninety degrees, and leaned over, bracing her hands on the armrests. He looked up into her eyes, and realized what she was doing a split second before her mouth covered his.

But he knew well how to adjust to split-second changes, and he tilted his chin up, kissing her back with elation bubbling under his skin. She leaned into him, her mouth moving on his, and he put his hands to her waist, trying not to put any pressure on the slight thickness of the bacta patch on her left side. That small encouragement was all she needed to twist her hips and slide into his lap.

He wrapped his arms around all the way around her, deepening the kiss, and she returned it, hands twisting in his shirt. She kissed as fiercely as she fought, storming his battlements, taking new territory with every movement of lips and hands.

He surrendered with barely a peep of resistance.

Some eons later, she lifted her head, her breath soft and fast against his lips. “That was good,” she said.

It had been more than good, but he couldn’t think of any other adjectives either. He traced the line of her spine and enjoyed the slight pleased squirm she gave. “Does this mean you love me, too?” he asked softly.

“I might,” she said, sliding her fingers through the ends of his hair.

It made him smile. She might be a whole new language to him, but he was starting to learn the basic grammar. “Kiss me again and make sure,” he suggested.

She did.
FINIS

crossposted from Tumblr
Tags:Cassian Andor, Jyn Erso, rebelcaptain, rebelcaptainmay4, mosylufanfic lives up to her damn name, captainandors, oh these two goobers, words are so HARD, star wars, crosspost