notallofus | (no subject)

Entry tags:

(no subject)

The last of the refugees have been escorted off the Ghost and onto Gatalenta, along with all the belongings and supplies that Hera and Kanan could muster for them, too. There were handclasps and some weeping, and children that seemed reluctant to step out onto a new planet after all the troubles that happened to them on the old, or on the hyperlanes. Slavers have never been anything but ruthless. Fortunately the Cloud Riders can be ruthless, too, and they'll see to it that these refugees are well-protected, at least for a while.

It's something.

There's an ache in Kanan's shoulders from hauling things around, along with a faint line of tension reflected through the Force, as no one on the ship was particularly happy most of the time. He understands, but it's . . . hard to keep all of that out, not in such close quarters.

(Time in the cargo bay with the boy was a blessing on several front, honestly.)

"Do you want me to get some caf brewing while you get us into hyperspace?" Kanan asks Hera, one hand resting lightly on her shoulder.

They could all use some time to gather themselves, it seems to him. But he wants to check, just in case he's wrong.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"They sound like they were good at the job. The parent job, I mean. It seems . . . Nice."

Nice is a mild word for it.

"Was your mother part of the Free Ryloth movement, too?"

"They started the Free Ryloth Movement," she says. "And the Twi'lek Resistance before it. My father was always the face of it, but she always ran missions with him, developed strategies, recruited fighters. They sometimes talked about when they were younger and things weren't as – chaotic, they'd sit with each and read, stay up and talk about politics and history."

Again, a smile flutters over her face, but this time only briefly.

"In the movement, they all knew her. But outside it – they didn't talk about her. She avoided anything too public, especially with off-worlders."

"Did she not . . . like being seen like that? Or was it because of . . . "

Hera.

" . . . something else? She sounds great."

"Because of us."

She goes quiet, then, her eyes flickering down, her shoulders suddenly tensed, and tight, as she holds her breath.

It had slipped out. 'Us.'

Hera closes her eyes, swallows, and makes herself roll through it.

"One of them would have to be visible. And anyone connected to them, if others knew about them -"

"I -- "

Us, she said. Which means -- something. And he could ask, but . . . it doesn't seem much like she wants him to. Not now, anyway.

"It'd put you in danger. They were trying to let you have lives, to grow up . . . without having to lose anything. Or at least, as much as she could keep that loss away?"

The plural isn't an accident, but he's still not asking.

Her breath catches, in a sharp exhale that could be a mirthless laugh. Hera opens her eyes, and shakes her head.

"There was no way to do that."

Low, but not bitter. It's only the truth.

"But I'm sure they didn't want to make it worse."

Edited 2018-09-11 01:51 (UTC)

"Yeah, well."

Kanan matches her mirthless laugh with a wry and tired smile. He knows what he doesn't know, especially about things like this. Not from the inside, anyway.

"Everything I've ever heard about parents suggests they'd probably want to try. Even if there wasn't a point. But -- that's all just stories. But you seemed to like your childhood? At least when you talk about it, sometimes. I -- "

"It's what I had," she answers, with a small shrug.

"And before the war, I must've felt safer."

Hera can't really remember that feeling. But she remembers more climbs up along the mountains, and the canyons. Her parents even coming along, sometimes, instead of always pulling them back inside.

"But they didn't hide things from me. They always told the truth, about Ryloth, about our history. About what a war meant."

Kanan's quiet for a minute, watching her.

"They didn't really tell us, you know? Even when we were in the field, they didn't give the larger context, not -- not like that. In hindsight, I don't think that was wise. Kind, maybe, but not wise."

"They didn't tell you your history?"

That surprises her, but then, "Or - the histories of the places where you..."

Fought? Traveled to? She's not sure how to describe a Jedi's work.

"We got some precis on the current conflicts, but history was for our Masters to tell us or not. Mine was fond of history, and if we'd had more regular missions and fewer battle-oriented ones, I'm sure . . . but no. I'm . . . I was thinking more about war, and what it really costs, and what it really means. I remember we all thought it was a kind of adventure, in the crèche. Ca -- I thought about it like that for a long while after, too. Until it was too late."

He doesn't smile.

"I wonder if they thought about it that way, too, somehow. But it doesn't seem likely."

Her eyes fall again. She watches the light along the metal floor, her boots against it.

She wouldn't have - well, Hera doesn't know what she would have thought of the Jedi. Of how they would have taught war, or seen it. They all had to make their own power in it, and strength in it, from anything they could. And she'd never experienced like what the Jedi had.

In a different time.

"When things were really bad, if the bombings were close, if we hadn't eaten in days - my father used to say these words. In Basic it'd be something like, they can only kill us, they can't break our will to be free."

Hera takes a breath. "We'd repeat like it mantra. Somehow, it worked." She glances back up. "It used to help me sleep."

Edited 2018-09-11 02:58 (UTC)

"I feel like that might sometimes help me sleep now," Kanan says, very quietly. There's a softness to his face, a weariness and a sadness for the child Hera was, for all the children on Ryloth, and elsewhere.

"Like maybe the war didn't really end, but here we still are. Does it still help you, or do you need something . . . something else, now?"

"It doesn't comfort me the way it did then."

Defiance in the face of death weighs heavier when it's not just your life that you're responsible for. Hera had learned that, too.

"But sometimes it still helps keep my focus. It's easier when the stakes are clear."

Edited 2018-09-11 14:48 (UTC)

"I hear you on that," Kanan says, voice still a little weary.

"There's always so much potential for collateral damage, every time we do something. Well, almost every time."

Hera stays silent, at first, eyes low again.

She knows he didn't ask. But it's a loud current, running beneath their words.

"When I was thirteen, they ran this mission to break into an Imperial prison. This was the early years of the Empire, when they were still taking over. But on Ryloth, they didn't waste any time hunting down any dissidents. Orn Free Taa wouldn't complain, and no one else would care."

Her mouth curls into a bitter smile at that, but this fades quickly.

"My mother managed to recruit a Twi'lek working in the prison. It was almost impossible for a group of them to sneak into an Imperial compound, but with unlocked doors and knowledge of the guards' rounds, they managed it. The alarm didn't sound until they were escaping. They made it to the outer fence - it was a stun fence, but they'd deactivated a section of it. My father led the way, climbing up and over it. My mother stayed behind to ensure all the prisoners got out."

"Is that when you lost her?"

He's not sure he was supposed to say that out loud, but --

"My father said she was climbing the fence, and a sniper hit her."

Her voice has has grown soft, her eyes still down. "And that was it."

"I'm sorry," Kanan says.

He's not sure whether it helps to have seen it, or if it's better not to have.

So he says nothing, instead.

She glances back at him, and then away, with a small nod.

"You can't control the damage."

"No," he agrees, shaking his head in an equally small gesture.

"You really can't."

Hera takes a breath.

"And it's not the only kind of loss."

They both knew that. And they saw it again today.

"No," Kanan says, exhaling heavily.

"But we can at least give people room to get something back."

Some of the time, anyway.

"We can," she agrees. "We have. I just -"

Hera glances away again, deciding whether to say it.

"I think about that. Being taken before you have a name."

He's quiet for a second, watching her. Then --

"And having to choose a name that's always going to remind you that . . . that it happened."