#ignore that medkit has his right eye just pretend he has a fake one in

[code1necowboy]

couple eye trend, inspired by this song

[deadpanprincess]

Sins of Believing Chap 2

Chapter Two: Pride and Wrath

Read on AO3: http://archiveofourown.org/works/12510504

Draven stands at attention as Cassian ushers in his team. The general’s hands twine together behind his back and his arms flex with the effort. He even refrains from blinking too quickly, keeping his eyes on Rogue One for as long as possible. Cassian has only seen Draven like this once before: after the destruction of Alderaan. Draven had found Cassian in the medbay. His best operative lay trapped by a shattered spine and their only hope for survival was lost in space. Draven may not have blinked at all when he relayed the news. Cassian was too fuzzed out on painkillers to remember clearly.

The general's current stillness is not hopelessness, though. It is the calm of thought that endears Draven to the Council. Contingency after contingency forms in his mind's eye. Around him, Intelligence Command hums with restless energy. Every officer takes their designated space and watches their screens. Some have dropped one ear of their headphones to better listen to the incoming report. Others prefer to ignore Rogue One completely. They still have not forgiven Cassian for their losses.

Jyn, beside Cassian, is a riot of motion. Her fingers drum against her visible blaster, her weight shifts from one braced leg to the other, and her mouth constantly reshapes with anger. Grief tries to press the restless movement out of her, but fury keeps her fidgeting. She is supposed to be done with war rooms and councils and fear too abstract to contain. When Skywalker destroyed the Death Star--the first one--she should have been free of guilt. Jyn takes on the sins of the Rebellion, but she should no longer carry her father's. Yet she is still here, paying for him again.

"Report," Draven commands.

Cassian answers, like he always has. "Rogue One approached Sergeant Erso's contact with no resistance. Both the sergeant and myself were able to engage without issue. Under cover of engaged couple Tanith Porta and Castor Willix, we convinced the target that we had information for her. Target believed our intel and offered information."

"And?" Draven knows, but he asks to the benefit of the other Intelligence officers' attentive ears.

"There is a second Death Star," Cassian says. Intelligence does not stop working, but they complete their actions more quietly.

"And why did the target offer this information?" Draven asks.

Cassian is fairly sure the general has already figured at least five scenarios where such intel would be imparted, but Draven never accepts assumptions. He wants Cassian to confirm his suspicions, but he underestimates how the captain cares for his crew.  

"The target believed it important to our covers," Cassian hedges. Draven stares him down. He hears the hesitance, the lie cloaked in truth. Neither man moves, and total silence filters over Intelligence Command. Every officer puts down their work to watch the insubordination of Draven's favorite operative. The quiet highlights the rattle of Jyn's zippers as her leg jiggles. She wishes they would just fight it out.

"Obviously it was me," she says, exasperated. Cassian closes his eyes as Draven looks to her.

"Explain, Sergeant Erso."

"I was the one who told the target that there was a rebel base on Yavin IV," Jyn clarifies. She holds Draven's gaze, but her leg bounces more aggressively. One or two of the surrounding officers freeze. It is their only indication of anger.

"That was not the false plant you were ordered to give," Draven says.

"Well, your original plan would have allowed the target to pass along information without consequences," Jyn defends.

"That was not your call to make, Sergeant." Draven enunciates her rank, calling attention to the disparity of power between them. Jyn does not care if he is named the supreme ruler of all the galaxies, though. She shoves forward, her chin thrust up so she can keep meeting his eyes. Cassian and Bodhi do not even try to stop her. They eye each other before simultaneously agreeing to let the situation play out.  

"This is the woman who had me thrown in prison! You knew that and you still sent me to Utapau! Don't pretend like this is a surprise," Jyn says.

"Back up, Sergeant." Draven tries to intimidate respect by looming over her, but Jyn just rests her fists against her hips and digs in her heels.

"This is a game to you. Our lives are forfeit in service to your ideal Rebellion. But you don't get that people who are fighting need to be just as human as those they're trying to save!"

"I said back up.” Draven’s voice drops with the threat.

"I took an opportunity and it led to more intelligence. Important intelligence! Don't tell me that it's not as good as the death of some random Imperial officer."

"Jyn--" Cassian tries. She whirls on him, keeping Draven in her peripheral.

"You're practically giddy! No wonder no one on Alderaan survived when this is how you care for the members of your Alliance!" Jyn storms out of the room, sweeping past the shocked rise of Cassian’s eyebrows. Her words echo behind her. Bodhi follows, as if he can escape her accusation by leaving. A moment of complete quiet settles on Command, and then a heavy slam of bone hitting durasteel reverberates through the room.

The sound restarts Intelligence Command. Officers return to faking their attention on work. Draven and Cassian do not bother to move. They still stand across from each other, but now Cassian's eyes burn fire.

"Say it," Draven waves him on, almost drolly.

"She's not wrong," Cassian says.

"She disobeyed orders for petty revenge." Draven stays even. His hands clasp behind his back again.

"It doesn't make her wrong," Cassian says more firmly. Draven examines him, a quick brush of his eyes over the soldier he knows. The body language gives away nothing, but Draven can see the tension in his jaw and how Cassian's neck cranes forward. He almost looks like Erso from a moment ago. They share the same rage, a well of passion that Draven prefers deeply buried in his agents.  

Draven dismisses Cassian with an abrupt nod. Cassian does not return the salute as he leaves. The automatic doors whoosh gently closed behind him.

He finds Jyn in his room, the impersonal neatness disturbed. Jyn has thrown their lone blanket on the ground and obviously punched their pillow with the fist not cradled against her chest. Thankfully, she left the rest of the room alone in preference of curling over herself on the mattress.

"Let me see," Cassian demands as he walks in. There is no reason to pretend she is anything other than hurt. He heard the crack of her fist. Jyn only glares and pulls her injured hand further into the hollow at her clavicle. The furious color of her cheeks pops against the dingy grey of the room.

"At least let me reset your knuckles," he sighs. She does not lose her angry scowl, but Jyn scooches closer to the edge of the bed. Exhaustion duels with humor as Cassian offers his own palm as a resting place. She lays her hand down upon it. His legs bracket her on either side so he can better probe her injury. Three of her knuckles swell, and her harshly lined skin almost seems new as the internal bleeding pulls the dermis tight. Cassian hisses in commiseration. She has definitely broken two knuckles and possibly fractured a finger. He will have to play doctor because Jyn will never go the medbay, even if they could spare resources.

"The wall punched back," he teases. His voice does not change in tone, but lilts with the joke.

"Kriff you," Jyn says. She is equally tired and toneless and uninvested in a fight.

Cassian huffs in amusement while reaching for his medkit in the nightstand. He cannot waste bacta on such a minor injury, but he can wrap her knuckles in the bandage she usually tapes on for sparring. Carefully, he winds the cloth from her finger joint to her wrist. Each jerk of the wrap pulls tighter and tighter, pushing the blood back to where it belongs. Jyn lifts a bare smile at the sight of her comically swollen, bandaged fist. She now has a fabric anvil at the end of her arm.

Cassian stays silent as he tucks the end of the cloth into itself. The material seals nicely at her pulse, and he keeps his fingers pressed there as he situates himself next to her. Jyn sits stiffly as his weight shifts the bed. She tenses when he cradles her hand, but she does not pull away.

"Don't lie to me," she says suddenly. Jyn does not look at him when she speaks. She keeps her eyes focused on where she feels his thumb rubbing circles on her palm. Cassian swallows as he rejects potential responses. His thumb never ceases.

"Have I?" He asks.

"You have too much hope." Jyn seemingly changes topic, but Cassian catches the thread of her logic. His belief in the Rebellion is something she will never share. Jyn believes in Rogue One, in the Pathfinders, in the people around her. The abstract idea of revolution cannot hold her. Especially when that revolution is threatened by a danger she knows too well.  

"We're prepared for them this time," Cassian says.

"What about next time? Or the time after that?" She challenges.

"They won't have a third one, this one surfaced too quickly. It must have been built simultaneously with the first," he explains. He had K2 run the data to ensure accuracy. The droid had commended his foresight.

"There's no guarantee that the flaw exists in this one. Or that they're not building a third one right now. Don't be short sighted." Jyn stands, her anger propelling her again. Cassian stays seated. His eyes follow her from corner to corner as she paces.

"So what would you have us do, Jyn?" As if he does not know. The urge to run crackles along the fine hairs of her arms. Jyn radiates with flight.

"I'm always going to be Galen Erso's daughter," Jyn evades. Cassian keeps his mouth shut. More lingers on the tip of her tongue. "Saw Guerrera's Partisan. Rogue One's sergeant."

"I only see Jyn Erso," he says. Jyn stills and regards him sadly, but a fondness keeps a pinprick of light in her eyes.

"You will always be the Alliance's captain," she releases. The idea shocks him. He, like his long lost blaster, belongs to her. Cassian gives himself to her freely, but maybe a thief never owns what is not taken.

"I haven't been. Not for some time," Cassian says to his hands as he cradles them in his lap. Scarif, Eadu, Jedha; they all lay thick in the unsaid. Jyn freezes. Her shoulder blades bunch and release. She turns slowly with her weight in her heels.

"Cassian?" Jyn prods. An eerie reminder of Draven's need for assurance steels his spine.

"I'm yours, Jyn." It is a declaration more real than any. Cassian has said "I love you" to informants, marks, lovers, but he never relinquishes himself. Wind rushes past his ears, cutting off his oxygen. He falls thirty stories all over again; and all he can see is Jyn, her green eyes dark like the leaves of Fest, like blaster bolts at night, like how she looked at him in that turbolift.

Panic claws at her throat and threatens to spill from her lips, but she grounds herself in his expression. She has seen Cassian physically naked and has fucked him in every corner of this room, but never did he let her see his heart. He reveals everything now in soft words and an even gentler look. He shares her fear, but Cassian can reconcile himself to the inevitable.

Jyn pulls roughly on her bun. A pin clatters to the floor. They stay fixed on one another, damn the disturbance.

She licks her lips in preparation. "I don't know how to do anything but fight," she warns. Cassian smiles at that and his dimples materialize in his beard. This is his Jyn, kind enough to threaten before tearing him apart.  

"I know," he says. The honesty of that throws her. Jyn opens her mouth to argue, just because it feels necessary, but Cassian cuts her off.

"Let me fight with you." He says both a question and a promise.