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He remembers the heat. The sand beneath his knees, the blast wave heading towards them, the warmth of Jyn’s body pressed solid against him. The pain in his back. Oblivion… almost welcome. Cassian Andor has never been a believer, but the woman in his arms made him hope for a life beyond death. If only he could hold her there too.
Not enough time, it was not enough time —
He blinks his eyes open in the medbay, silently staring at the gray ceiling. After the heat of Scarif, this place is chillingly cold. He longs for the warmth of Jyn in his arms. Has she made it out too? Have they all made it out? It seems too good to be true.
As if on cue, the familiar lilt of her voice calls his name. “Cassian?” He turns his head towards the sound and finds her sitting in a chair by his bed in this depressingly gray medical room. It doesn’t look like Yavin, but that’s not his concern right now. His gaze sweeps over her body, looking for any signs of a grievous injury, but she looks unharmed. Even the bruises on her cheek have healed. Has he been unconscious for so long?
When their eyes meet, a sound that he can only describe as halfway between a sob and a laugh escapes her mouth. The relief in her eyes is… staggering. Knocks the breath from his lungs. She reaches for him and frames his face in her hands — a gesture that surprises him, though it’s not unwelcome.
“Thank the Force, you’re awake,” she murmurs, her thumb rubbing gentle circles on his cheek. The tenderness of her touch is something he hasn’t experienced in… a long time. In this loathsome vulnerable state of his, it nearly makes him want to weep. “You had us worried.”
Us. So it wasn’t just them who made it out. What a strange thought, having someone — more than one someone — who gives a damn whether he lived or not. For years, his only companion in the world was Kay — but the thought of his friend, destroyed on Scarif in the data vault, is a painful reminder he can’t afford to dwell on right now.
Even if the rest of them survived, no miracle could have rescued Kay, he knows that
“How did we escape?” he croaks, his throat a little scratchy. He can’t recall anything after she wrapped her arms around him in their dying embrace.
But Jyn’s eyebrows knit together in a frown. “What do you mean?”
“The last thing I remember is the beach.”
“The beach…” She trails off like she doesn’t understand. There’s a pause. It’s longer and heavier than he would like. “It was Bodhi. Bodhi saved us,” she says at last, but her voice has gone numb, and it sets him on edge. What is she holding back?
“Then Bodhi made it out too?”
She pulls back from him, her mouth set in a hard line, and her eyes, which were so full of relief and warmth just moments ago, are now frighteningly blank. The pit in Cassian’s stomach deepens. Something’s not okay.
Jyn stands, and without any intonation, tells him, “I should get the medic.”
What follows is a series of tests performed by his medic and a meddroid while Jyn stands against the wall, arms crossed, silent, and stubbornly refusing to look at him. (She asked him if he’d prefer her to not be in the room, but a deep, primal part of him screamed no. Stay.) They check his pupils, take blood samples, run a cranial CT, and ask him all sorts of strange questions — what’s your name? What’s your age? How long have you been enlisted? What’s your rank? What’s your marital status? What’s the last thing you remember?
The spy in him resists this line of interrogation, but thankfully, the questions don’t get too invasive. They don’t ask anything he can’t answer, if a little reluctantly.
In the end, his medic sighs and throws a brief glance at Jyn before turning to him with a look that Cassian can only describe as pitying.
“Major,” he begins, and Cassian’s irritation grows, — hadn’t he just said he was a Captain? — but the medic doesn’t give him a chance to cut in, “I’m afraid you have post-traumatic amnesia.”
Cassian blinks. “What?” It slips out of him without thinking.
Jyn steps in, pushing away from the wall to stand by his bedside and finally meet his gaze. He’s surprised by how easily he can see through her wall of defenses to recognize the ache in her eyes. “Cassian, Scarif was three years ago.”
He splutters, trying to make sense of what she’s saying, barely aware that he’s shaking his head. “That’s — but I just — how?”
“We were on a mission. You took a hit to the head,” she says like she’s talking about the weather, but the nonchalance is forced. He doesn’t know how he can tell, but he can. “You were unconscious for a few days…” She trails off, glancing behind her shoulder at the medic for help.
“Post-traumatic amnesia is a side effect of the concussion you suffered,” he explains. “The good news is that there’s no permanent brain damage and PTA is almost always temporary. We’ll keep you in here for now, monitor your condition, but the memories should come back to you gradually.” He glances at Jyn with a smile that’s meant to be encouraging. “A familiar face often helps. I’m sure Captain Erso will fill you in on everything you’ve missed.”
After the medic leaves, Jyn brings him up to speed on the things he’s forgotten. They made it off Scarif thanks to Bodhi’s last-minute heroic rescue, along with Baze and Chirrut, but Melshi, Sefla, Tonc, and so many others who’d followed them had perished on the planet. K2, of course, had been destroyed, but Cassian still had a backup for him, waiting to be installed in a new chassis. There just never was time to find one. The Death Star plans had reached the rebellion, but not without cost — Alderaan had been destroyed, a revelation that left him sick to his stomach.
Yavin was quickly evacuated, and they eventually found a new base on some remote ice planet called Hoth. Ironic name, Cassian thought. It did explain the frigid temperatures in the room despite the heating. If it was this cold in the medbay, what was it like on the rest of the base?
And him… promoted to Major a year ago in spite of his insubordination at Scarif. According to Jyn, his only punishment for that little transgression was a stern lecture from High Command. Some of the councilors wanted to demote, maybe even court-martial him, but Mothma and Draven had stepped in on his behalf. He had a good track record of always following orders, they argued, and his disobedience now had, after all, saved the Alliance. As long as he avoided a repeat performance, they would look the other way this once.
But his injuries from Scarif have followed him. His back never quite healed right, and in cold weather, he sometimes walked with a slight limp. His body is not as agile as it once was, and now… even his mind has failed him. Three years. How could he have lost three years?
What benefit is he to the rebellion if he can’t even recall his own memories?
“I know what you’re thinking,” Jyn breaks the silence. His gaze snaps to her. She’s watching him with an inscrutable but intense look in her eyes that makes him feel strangely naked.
“What am I thinking?” he says, his voice mocking. He knows he’s being a dick, but it’s instinctive. A self-defense mechanism to conceal his true feelings. Tell me then, if you know me so well.
“That you’re a liability.”
Cassian lets out a small huff of laughter. It sounds bitter. She does know him so well, but it’s not comforting. The evolution of their partnership is just another thing he’s lost.
“Three years of my life,” he begins in a dark tone. “Three years.” He lifts a finger and taps it against his forehead. “There are names in my head that only I know. Intel they only shared with me. Contacts who depend on me. Who I don’t remember.”
“You heard the medic. You’ll remember it.”
“Maybe,” he bites out, perhaps a little petulant, and Jyn snaps at him with a force he hadn’t expected.
“Most likely.” She pauses, her anger burning out as quickly as it came. Gently, she reaches for his hand, covering it with her own. “Gotta have hope.”
Her words barely register. His eyes are glued to a small, silver band on her finger. It’s a simple ring. No gemstones, no engravings that he can see. Almost insignificant. Except that he’s wearing its identical match on his own hand.
His stomach swirls.
Jyn falls silent as her gaze drops to what he’s looking at. Her hand tenses on top of his, but when it twitches, as if she wants to pull away, he flips his palm up and curls his fingers around her wrist. Gently, without constraint. He’s still looking at the ring. When she goes still in his grasp, Cassian slowly runs his thumb up her hand until it comes to rest against the band. He strokes it, marveling at how cool and smooth it feels under his fingertip. An oddly familiar sensation. It’s as if though he’s done this a hundred times.
“I guess I did rather well for myself, huh?” he says, his voice gravelly. He glances up to find Jyn watching him with a wobbly expression. Tender, hopeful, heartsick. “Were you going to tell me?”
It’s not an accusation, merely an inquiry.
“It’s kinda awkward, don’t you think?” she begins, and it’s somewhat reassuring that her voice is just as shaky as his own. “To tell the guy who barely knows me that we’re married.”
He has so many questions. Tell me how how it happened. When did we admit it? Who reached out first? Was it hard? Did we make missteps? Did I love you well?
But he keeps it to himself because he hears the waver, the uncertainty creeping into her words. Here she is, the lone memory keeper of a marriage he can’t recall. Abandoned by her parents; now facing the possibility of abandonment by her husband.
Before any questions leave his lips, he needs to first put her fears at ease.
“I feel like I’ve known you for a long time,” he admits softly, and it’s the truth. I feel like I’ve known you since the first star was born in the sky.
Another revelation. She’s turned him into a poet, it seems.
Jyn doesn’t respond, but her lips curl into a weak, unsteady smile, and her hand tightens around his.
“Will you help me remember?” he asks, his voice almost reverent. Jyn nods.
“Anything.”
“Tell me our story.”