Jyn Erso is no stranger to grief, especially not recently. She lost her mother when she was eight, Saw only a couple days prior, and now her father. Her father whom so many thought was a traitor but was only trying to protect her. Her, specifically. The grief freezes her veins, turns her green eyes to ice, tears freezing like snowflakes one her eyelashes, it holds her steady when she feels like she is falling apart.
Chirrut grabs her wrist, but pulls his hand away when frost spreads over his fingers like a frozen spiderweb.
She stops in front of Cassian, watching steam rise from his damp clothes, and her fingers curls into small fists. "You were never going to bring him back." She wants her voice to be sharp, hard, but it is brittle and fragile and she hates it. Her father just died and it wasn't at the hands of the enemy, but friendly fire, an absurd phrase.
Literally steaming, he can see it wisping into the air around him, and the physical manifestation of everything swarming inside him right now only serves to set him off more. He can feel his ever present sense of control cracking at the edges, gritting his jaw as he paces around the ship, slamming off his coat, gloves, preparing what he needs as Kay and Bodhi fly the ship.
Cassian doesn't want to deal with her now, not until he can get his emotions back in check, but the adrenaline is still rushing through him and his persuasion hasn't worked on her since day one. He's not going to get out of this, but he's still going to try and divert away from himself.
Aggressively he shoves his coat into the closet. "Now is not the time for this. You are going to freeze up the whole ship."
Jyn bristles, feeling the cold crackle around her before she shoves it down, reaching for another power. It's dangerous, more dangerous than the ice that comes so naturally to her, especially on a ship entirely made of metal. Her mind stretches out and grabs the zippers on his vest, hauling him back to face her, clenched fingers lifted between them but not close to touching him.
"You don't get to walk away from this."
He doesn't get to talk his way out of this either.
"Those weren't Imperial weapons. Alliance bombs killed my father." The 'Good Guys', the people she was meant to trust, the people that whisked her out of one jail to find herself in a worse one.
She taps into a power that hadn't been on her file and pulls him. It nearly makes him flare up right there, the urge heating up his fingertips, feeling so powerless. It's the zippers, the metal. Not only can she manipulate ice, she can tug at metallics too. She is much more dangerous than he initially reasoned.
"I was not the one who pulled the trigger. You are angry and looking to put the blame on me."
He exhales sharply and hopes it wasn't just more steam that came out of his nose. He needs to get himself back under control, but it's much more difficult now that he feels tethered to her in a way he can't break. He can't talk her down from it, she's been immune to that since day one.
He's just too warm, but his tone is more like steel, only one she can't command. "Let me go."
"You told them where we were!" Jyn finds herself quickly shouting but her temper has always been difficult to contain. It's not like her voice wouldn't have carried in the small ship anyway. Might as well invite everyone else to their discussion.
"They sent you to kill my father!"
She doesn't let him go, even if her hand falls. It serves to drag him forward a bit more, but her grip is like a vice, eyes flashing with accusation. He didn't kill her father, he brought her back to the ship and maybe that is what is setting her off the most. Grief mingled with the uncertainty of something she'd never experienced before: someone coming back for her.
He doesn't like this for infinite reasons. He doesn't like their audience, he doesn't like being beholden to her powers. "I told them to hold off too, but you would not know that from simply yelling at me, would you?"
He clenches his fists and struggles against the grip she has on him, hating every single second of it, feeling that frustration surging through him. How can she do this, how can she so easily break him down to eruption? Tiny little flames flicker between his fingers, against his palm, and he holds it down tight.
"Your father, as far as they knew, was an Imperial scientist. I did not touch him. I did not kill him. They were the orders that made sense at the time, and I still disobeyed them. Let me go."
"You'd follow orders you know are wrong? I told you! I told you what the message said and you still went there intending to kill him!" Jyn is horrified to find tears springing to her eyes, frustration now swirling into the grief and confusion. She'd already lost Saw, now Galen. She tries to blink away the tears but they turn to icy snowflakes on her eyelashes, fluttering down between them.
She can't say her Papa was innocent, but he'd tried...
"You knew. You knew." She does not let go, both hands curling into fists by her sides now, the ship making an odd groaning noise as if it wasn't just Cassian's jacket being clutched by her power.
"I had orders!" He isn't quite shouting back, but his tone matches hers for that anger anyway. "Orders I ignored!"
He knew a lot of things going into this mission, but none of it was enough to really understand this moment. He can't even blame her for being upset, she's just lost two of her fathers in too short a time, he can see the grief blinding her, but he isn't going to let her take this out on him.
Cassian is fuming and frustrated and he's going to burst, but it's the sound on the ship around them that sets him off. If she keeps her hold on him, she's going to freeze and wreck the ship from the inside out.
His hands light up with flames, licking faintly up his arms. "But you would not know a thing about what that means."
Jyn releases him immediately, without even realizing. The part of her brain that has always taken after her mother immediately has a thousand questions -- why aren't the flames singing his jacket? does he need a spark to create the flames or can he pull it from the oxygen itself? -- but it's so small and battered by all the other hurt and damaged emotions warring for importance.
She settles on no emotions, indifference washing over her like a familiar blanket. He doesn't know shit about what orders she did or did not ignore from Saw, the way he looked at her with disappointment when she refused to shoot anyone on her first mission.
Her voice quiets, but does not soften, as sharp and jagged as ice. "You'd better hope the Empire falls and the history books can be written in your favor."
If his lapse was good for anything, at least the ship is no longer in danger of being ripped in two. He personally just feels that way.
The indifference slides onto her face just as his own snaps, expression nearly snarling as he moves into her space of his own volition this time. His fingers are still faintly alight, almost like a candle.
"You don't get to do that. You do not get to write off every single thing I have done since I was six as something to be turned into more propaganda. I lost everything. You are not the only one here who has."
"No, you're right." It's like his burst of anger brought some semblance of calm to her, the ability to rationalize again. Bodhi and Baze and Chirrut lost their entire city and she can feel that like a physical presence looming behind her, a reminder that the weapon they're seeking to destroy was only powered by her father's desire to protect her.
It's on her shoulders, Jedha City, all those people that died. Saw, the little girl, an entire city dead because her father was desperate to keep his daughter out of the grip of the Empire.
She knows she has no room to talk, but it doesn't stop her. Cassian will fight back and maybe she wants his fury directed at her. She certainly deserves it.
"I'm not the only one. But I'm the only one that lost everything because of you."
She's gotten into a calmer anger while his feels like it's growing, warming up from kindling to a bonfire.
The fire flickers to life again at his fingertips, spreading quickly up his arms in a burst of near blue. It's hot enough that she can feel the heat of it from how close they're standing, even if it doesn't come close enough to catching her. She might have broken his control keeping it down, but he refuses to let her draw out anything further.
It's on purpose. She is trying to set him off with the comment, he knows this and yet he reacts anyway, already bristling and on edge.
"Don't you dare blame me for that. Your father, as far as anyone knew, was an Imperial scientist working to destroy the galaxy." Even though he isn't shouting, his tone has become as hot as his literal arms. "You don't get to put that on me when I have given my entire life to fighting the Empire, the people who took everything from me. I am not responsible for your losses."
"My father gave us the only way to destroy the Death Star and you let him die," Jyn hisses out, feeling her temper rise again. She'd spent her whole life imagining her father as a traitor but damn if she would let anyone else say that about him.
It's more infuriating that she still feels drawn to Cassian, how easy it was for him to cut through the fog to spurn her into action not once, but twice. He is everything she despises, the only part of the Alliance near enough to take out her anger on, but it feels... hollow.
Hurting him isn't going to bring her Papa back. It won't bring back Saw or her Mama or the entire life she lost to war. It will only hurt him and how does that make her any better than what they are fighting? It is a logic she understands, but she can't quite put into action, not yet.
Her fingers stretch out again and his blaster flies across the ship, narrowly missing him before it flies right into her hand. Without moving, the blaster cracks entirely in half, broken, and she drops the pieces at his feet.
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ohnofeelstho2019-01-15 08:50 pm
some say the world will end in fire, some say ice
Chirrut grabs her wrist, but pulls his hand away when frost spreads over his fingers like a frozen spiderweb.
She stops in front of Cassian, watching steam rise from his damp clothes, and her fingers curls into small fists. "You were never going to bring him back." She wants her voice to be sharp, hard, but it is brittle and fragile and she hates it. Her father just died and it wasn't at the hands of the enemy, but friendly fire, an absurd phrase.
As if fire could be friendly.
no subject
Literally steaming, he can see it wisping into the air around him, and the physical manifestation of everything swarming inside him right now only serves to set him off more. He can feel his ever present sense of control cracking at the edges, gritting his jaw as he paces around the ship, slamming off his coat, gloves, preparing what he needs as Kay and Bodhi fly the ship.
Cassian doesn't want to deal with her now, not until he can get his emotions back in check, but the adrenaline is still rushing through him and his persuasion hasn't worked on her since day one. He's not going to get out of this, but he's still going to try and divert away from himself.
Aggressively he shoves his coat into the closet. "Now is not the time for this. You are going to freeze up the whole ship."
no subject
"You don't get to walk away from this."
He doesn't get to talk his way out of this either.
"Those weren't Imperial weapons. Alliance bombs killed my father." The 'Good Guys', the people she was meant to trust, the people that whisked her out of one jail to find herself in a worse one.
no subject
"I was not the one who pulled the trigger. You are angry and looking to put the blame on me."
He exhales sharply and hopes it wasn't just more steam that came out of his nose. He needs to get himself back under control, but it's much more difficult now that he feels tethered to her in a way he can't break. He can't talk her down from it, she's been immune to that since day one.
He's just too warm, but his tone is more like steel, only one she can't command. "Let me go."
no subject
"They sent you to kill my father!"
She doesn't let him go, even if her hand falls. It serves to drag him forward a bit more, but her grip is like a vice, eyes flashing with accusation. He didn't kill her father, he brought her back to the ship and maybe that is what is setting her off the most. Grief mingled with the uncertainty of something she'd never experienced before: someone coming back for her.
no subject
He clenches his fists and struggles against the grip she has on him, hating every single second of it, feeling that frustration surging through him. How can she do this, how can she so easily break him down to eruption? Tiny little flames flicker between his fingers, against his palm, and he holds it down tight.
"Your father, as far as they knew, was an Imperial scientist. I did not touch him. I did not kill him. They were the orders that made sense at the time, and I still disobeyed them. Let me go."
no subject
She can't say her Papa was innocent, but he'd tried...
"You knew. You knew." She does not let go, both hands curling into fists by her sides now, the ship making an odd groaning noise as if it wasn't just Cassian's jacket being clutched by her power.
no subject
He knew a lot of things going into this mission, but none of it was enough to really understand this moment. He can't even blame her for being upset, she's just lost two of her fathers in too short a time, he can see the grief blinding her, but he isn't going to let her take this out on him.
Cassian is fuming and frustrated and he's going to burst, but it's the sound on the ship around them that sets him off. If she keeps her hold on him, she's going to freeze and wreck the ship from the inside out.
His hands light up with flames, licking faintly up his arms. "But you would not know a thing about what that means."
no subject
She settles on no emotions, indifference washing over her like a familiar blanket. He doesn't know shit about what orders she did or did not ignore from Saw, the way he looked at her with disappointment when she refused to shoot anyone on her first mission.
Her voice quiets, but does not soften, as sharp and jagged as ice. "You'd better hope the Empire falls and the history books can be written in your favor."
no subject
The indifference slides onto her face just as his own snaps, expression nearly snarling as he moves into her space of his own volition this time. His fingers are still faintly alight, almost like a candle.
"You don't get to do that. You do not get to write off every single thing I have done since I was six as something to be turned into more propaganda. I lost everything. You are not the only one here who has."
no subject
It's on her shoulders, Jedha City, all those people that died. Saw, the little girl, an entire city dead because her father was desperate to keep his daughter out of the grip of the Empire.
She knows she has no room to talk, but it doesn't stop her. Cassian will fight back and maybe she wants his fury directed at her. She certainly deserves it.
"I'm not the only one. But I'm the only one that lost everything because of you."
no subject
The fire flickers to life again at his fingertips, spreading quickly up his arms in a burst of near blue. It's hot enough that she can feel the heat of it from how close they're standing, even if it doesn't come close enough to catching her. She might have broken his control keeping it down, but he refuses to let her draw out anything further.
It's on purpose. She is trying to set him off with the comment, he knows this and yet he reacts anyway, already bristling and on edge.
"Don't you dare blame me for that. Your father, as far as anyone knew, was an Imperial scientist working to destroy the galaxy." Even though he isn't shouting, his tone has become as hot as his literal arms. "You don't get to put that on me when I have given my entire life to fighting the Empire, the people who took everything from me. I am not responsible for your losses."
no subject
It's more infuriating that she still feels drawn to Cassian, how easy it was for him to cut through the fog to spurn her into action not once, but twice. He is everything she despises, the only part of the Alliance near enough to take out her anger on, but it feels... hollow.
Hurting him isn't going to bring her Papa back. It won't bring back Saw or her Mama or the entire life she lost to war. It will only hurt him and how does that make her any better than what they are fighting? It is a logic she understands, but she can't quite put into action, not yet.
Her fingers stretch out again and his blaster flies across the ship, narrowly missing him before it flies right into her hand. Without moving, the blaster cracks entirely in half, broken, and she drops the pieces at his feet.
"Tell yourself whatever you want."