Chapter Text
After the warmth that the showers and Cassian provided, being back out in the hall felt like stepping onto Hoth itself.
Din’s never been, personally. But he figures this is pretty close, with his flight suit still wet from his hasty washing job.
There was also this deep chill to his bones, though less from the temperature and more from the situation at hand. The lingering feeling that something was about to go terribly, horribly wrong was only intensifying with each step forward. Din knew the feeling all too well.
Cassian must’ve felt it too, because he’s lost the composure he had on his way down to the showers. Now, his shoulders are tensed up and his head moves in quick glances around. They’re out of time, and their hands are quite literally tied.
Din was completely lost when they were being taken away from the cell. Now he feels like he has a better sense of where they’re at, or rather, where they’ve been before.
They were being taken back to the cell, for now. Unless they were split up last minute, this might be their chance.
He wants to signal Cassian somehow, but they’re single file again, and Cassian doesn’t have eyes on the back of his head. If he spoke up, he would be shocked by one of the troopers behind him. If he didn’t do anything, they might miss their only opportunity of escape. The odds were bad for them either way.
He coughs.
And then he really starts coughing, so much he stops and hunches over. Cassian and the two troopers ahead of him stop and look.
“Keep it moving.” One barks, but Din doesn’t stop. When he takes a breath and coughs some more it sounds wet with phlegm, and that's even better because it sounds convincing.
He’s not usually one for acting, it’s just not his style. He’s never needed to be someone he's not to get the job done. Being a wall of metal with a reputation usually gets the job done. But this seems to work, because even Cassian looks concerned.
When he lets up, he exaggerates catching his breath. Had his hands not been bound he’d have one pounding at his chest. “ We gotta go now.” He rasps out.
Cassian’s eyes widen, but he steels himself quickly. Din would’ve missed it had he not been looking for it.
“What was that?” A trooper asks from behind. It's an accusation followed by the sharp zapping of a shock baton activating.
“I said we gotta go.” He says, turning to stare at the trooper. He spits out his next words with emphasis, mostly for Cassian, but definitely a clear fuck you to the stormtrooper. “ At the cell . There’s water.”
“Well then keep it moving! ” A trooper pushes at his shoulder, and he stumbles a little. He glares over at him, but compiles. When he turns back around Cassian is already walking.
Cassian flexes his hands in the binders. They’re too tight on him, and he’s acting like it. He splays out his fingers, then clenches his fists. Then one hand flashes a quick ‘OK’ and it's all Din needs to start walking with more purpose.
~
Cassian is maybe three steps ahead of him, loitering just inside the cell’s open door. He’s uncuffed, standing only just far enough in to not look too suspicious. When he turns around and meets Din’s eyes, he looks determined.
His heart is racing, and that dread from earlier is at full force. The trooper behind Din is fiddling with his cuffs. The second he’s free of them, all hell is going to break loose.
He recognizes the dread in him now, because he’s felt it before. It was back at the old covert, the one he spent much of his childhood at. It was remote, a tiny little moon in the Outer Rim. It was always strange to Din how such an idyllic little planet could go so long without a notable population. The woods were old and full of wildlife. The prairies were vast seas of grass and wildflowers. There were high, picturesque cliffsides looming over the moon’s single ocean. The ground was rich and fertile, perfect for just about any sentient form to lay down roots. Only there was nothing, just abandoned villages, and a secret covert of Mandalorians tucked away in a cave system.
He felt this dread standing at the edge of one of those cliff sides, looking down at the angry waves. The weight of the jetpack on his back was unfamiliar, and the back of his calf wasn’t yet healed from his last experience with one. The only thing keeping him steady was the Alor standing beside him, gripping his arm with force.
“You can do it this time. Do not disappoint me.”
Leaping from the cliff was sink or swim, or rather, sink or fly. He was so afraid. When the jetpack left the burn on his leg, he was over land. Crashing the twenty feet into the grass was certainly rough, but that was twenty feet. This time it was hundreds of feet, with the sea and harsh rocks to break his fall. If he messed up here, he wouldn’t walk away with a nasty scar and a broken arm. He wouldn’t walk away at all.
He flew, in the end. Shakily and unskilled, but that’s what the practice was for. The knowledge that he could’ve died that day haunted him for weeks, leaving a dark pit in his stomach. He would get over it eventually, steeling himself back into being a good and proper Mandalorian. There was no room for fear when he had to keep up his training.
He would have the feeling again, two years later. On the night that the covert was attacked, he had been unable to sleep. Something was coming and he knew it, but he didn’t know what it was until it was far too late.
They lost many warriors that night, Yenna and Ashara included. He would’ve died defending the covert with them, had they not told him to escort the foundlings. He wants to think things would’ve been different if he stayed, that maybe they would’ve lived. But he also questions what would’ve happened to the foundlings without him.
Realistically, they would’ve never made it to Nevarro.
He was barely any older than they were at the time. Not a boy, but nowhere near being a man either. He managed, that’s what mattered. He was strong when the other children couldn’t be, and his actions that night earned him the title of beroya later on.
He’s learned to trust his gut on many occasions, to trust that the dread meant something. This is one of them. Just like the other times, he has no options. Jump from the cliff, do as he's told and take the foundlings, fight alongside Cassian. There is no choice, and no room for doubt or for fear. Doubt and fear is what made him falter. He can’t make a mistake here. He refuses to make a mistake here.
The cuffs are off, and he swings around hard enough to knock the trooper’s helmet off with his vambrace. He grabs the dazed trooper by the shoulders and hits him with a sharp kov’nyn. Without the plastoid to protect him, Din’s helmet crushes his nose with a sickening crack.
The other three troopers are quick to start fighting back. Two activate the shock batons, and one reaches for his blaster. Cassian charges that one first, grabbing the blaster by the barrel and holding it up and away as he starts grappling with the trooper.
Din keeps his focus on the trooper struggling in his grip. He snarls under the blood streaming down his face, reaching for his own blaster. Din grabs the arm before it makes it far, twisting it at an odd angle and swinging him around just in time for him to catch the shock baton coming for Din’s flank.
The trooper screams, convulsing in Din’s grip. He lets go, and the helmetless trooper drops to the floor shaking. Din focuses on the one with the baton, dodging a lunge in his direction. The next time the trooper makes another prod at him, and he only nearly misses it.
There’s blaster fire, and a quick glance reassures him that Cassian is okay. He’s still grappling with the trooper, the blaster firing uselessly up at the ceiling.
Then Din has two troopers on him, one trying to get him in the side while he’s distracted. He turns just in time to miss it, then grabs at the trooper’s wrist, twisting until the baton clatters to the floor. He kept twisting, forcing the arm back and back. After he hears the bone snap and the trooper howl in pain he makes a move towards the discarded baton.
A shot rings out down the hall, and Cassian cries out. Din loses his focus, glancing over as Cassian stumbles, clutching at his leg. The trooper aims the blaster at his chest, and Din fears the worst.
Miraculously the trooper doesn’t fire, and gives Cassian a hard shove into the cell. Cassian falls, trying and failing to get back up on his feet in time. The trooper slams his fist on the cell controls and the door seals.
Din’s outnumbered three to one, backup surely already on the way, but at least he has a weapon of his own.
The sharp crack and hiss of the baton activating doesn’t make him afraid when he's the one holding it. If anything, it's reinvigorating. Powerful.
Each trooper falters, even the one trying to get off the floor. They all stare at each other, glancing back and forth to see who would make the first move. Din twirls the baton and takes a defensive position. They’re afraid, and fear makes them stupid.
A trooper makes a move towards him, and a side step and baton buried into the man’s leg leaves him on his knees. Din doesn’t hesitate to turn towards the others, rearing back to plunge the baton into someone else.
Then a blaster fires, and each and every single shot pings off his chestplate, going in different directions. The blasts don't hit anyone, but they get the message. The trooper drops his blaster on the ground and readies his own baton.
The next time Din dodges an attack he leaves himself open, a trooper aiming for a spot where the armor doesn’t cover. He misses, and the baton slides over the beskar plates. Din can still feel it in his thigh, but not nearly to the same extent as it would if the baton hit home and buried into his skin.
He whips around, hitting the offending trooper over the helmet with the baton, and it snaps. The trooper falls back, clutching at his head, but Din’s weapon is too damaged to function.
Worse, there’s the pounding of boots in the distance. Backup is close, and things aren't looking up.
He tries wrestling a baton from one of the other troopers, but this one is strong , getting the upper hand and digging the baton into Din’s side. The shock is just as bad as it was before, only this time he’s getting pressed into the wall while it happens. He grits his teeth, shaking, but remains on his feet.
There's shouting, only it's not from any of the troopers, it’s Cassian’s muffled voice trying to get his attention.
“ RULT--! ” he shouts, and Din understands. He’s held up against the wall with the controls.
The backup has arrived with blasters drawn, five other troopers. There's even more shouting now, but no one is shooting, and Din gets enough control over himself to blindly pound his fist into the wall before it makes contact.
A cell door releases, only it's the wrong one, because it’s Cassian who flies out, not Rult. He makes a dive for the discarded blaster, and fires at the trooper holding Din down. When he falls, Din grabs the blaster from his hip and starts firing back at the crowd. He tries to make himself big, hoping that any returned fire would hit him and not Cassian. As long as they hit his armor, and the beskar alloy held up, he was happy to be used as cover.
Another trooper falls, and Din focuses on aiming. Every time he's hit, the momentum of the blaster fire throws him off, and readjusting in time to not get shot somewhere exposed is difficult.
“The controls!” Cassian shouts, and he nods, the two of them shuffling up to the next control panel. Cassian slams his fist on the big red button, and when the door opens, he throws his own blaster in at Rult.
Rult is just as described. Red and huge, bigger than anyone in the hall. He’s shooting at the troopers fast and accurate. They start dropping like flies, and it gives Cassian a window to pick up another dropped blaster. He leans on Din, keeping weight off the injured leg.
“You okay?” Din gets out between shots. Cassian ducks back behind him just in time for a blaster shot to ping off Din’s pauldron.
“Had worse, just grazed me. Stings like a motherfucker.”
Din gets it. His side is fried again, the muscles tensing up just like before. Only this time he was only zapped once, and not for very long. The adrenaline is winning the battle over the pain.
With one final shot over Rult’s hulking form, Din drops the last trooper. He doubts they’d be alone for long, though. “We gotta move.”
Rult turns to face them for the first time. “Yeah, we--”
He stops, and his eyes go so wide Din half expects them to bug out of his skull. It would be comical, if not for the situation at hand.
“Mandalorian.” He huffs, scowling at the two of them. Din still has his blaster raised, pointed off to the side. He’s prepared for anyone to round the corner and start firing at them, not to shoot Rult.
“Rult, we need to move.” He says, keeping his voice even. “We need to get out of here, then we can discuss--”
“I’m not discussing shit with you.” The devaronian shouts, taking a step forward. Din holds his arm out, shielding Cassian behind him. Only Cassian doesn’t comply, pushing Din’s arm down to lean around him.
“We need to go,” Cassian says. “Right now.”
Rult looks between the two of them, then back over his shoulder. He looks down to the blaster still held in his hands, and grits his teeth.
“Fuck this.” He says, and raises the blaster, and Din really shoves Cassian behind him then. Only Rult doesn’t stop raising the blaster, and it goes up and presses up to--
With a single shot Rult’s form crumbles to the floor amongst the troopers, dead.
Both he and Cassian recoil, taking two steps back, just staring before what just happened really dawns on them.
“Shit.” Din says.
“ Fuck-- Mando, your bounty--”
“--Was dead or alive, now we need to run.”
“Won’t you need proof?”
“No, the puck deactivates on it’s own, now let's go--”
“Hold on.” And then Cassian moves towards their cell, but hisses and stumbles into the wall as his leg gives out. Din is quick to steady him.
“I’m alright, just-- fuck--” Cassian shakes his head, then disappears into the dark. He reemerges with the cape bundled up in his arms, then tosses it at Din. He catches it with a thanks, then works it back around his neck and attaches it to his chestplate. Then Cassian moves into Rult’s cell, and returns wearing a coat. It was brown, and far too small to be Rults-- oh.
“Really? Your jacket?”
“Had it a long time, I wasn’t just going to leave it when I thought I lost it for good. Now let's go. ”
They make it maybe twenty steps down the hall when Cassian stumbles again. He catches himself without Din’s help, slapping away Din’s outstretched hand. “...’m fine.”
“You’re not.”
“I said I was fine Mando. Lets go dammit --!” He’s eager to leave, so is Din of course, but he can’t have Cassian being a liability.
“Cassian…” Din gets a good look behind them, and realizes there's a trail of blood following them. He may have been able to play it off as them dragging the trooper’s mess down the hall if it weren't for how red Cassian’s pant leg was. “Cassian, you said it grazed you!”
Cassian pushes him aside, and keeps limping down the hall, looking both ways at the junction. “Looks clear.”
“Let me see your leg.”
“For fuck’s sake Mando its just a graze. I’ve had them before, and I’ve worked with worse in the past. I’ll be okay if we keep moving.” It’s the first time Cassian has ever sounded genuinely angry with him, and it’s a bit like a slap to the face. Just like a real slap, it throws him back into gear.
“Fine. We’ll see.”
“‘ We’ll see’?”
“I’ll carry you out of here if I have to. We’ll see .” He turns around to look at where Cassian has stopped in the hallway. He’s met with Cassian wide eyed and lips parted, like he's about to say something. Cassian truly looks dumbstruck, then snaps out of it. He stares, watching as Cassian leaned up against the wall. He undoes his laces on his singular boot, and tosses it aside.
“You--” Cassian’s got his brows knit together, a look to his eye like he's fighting some deep internal battle. “You sound like Kay.”
Din isn’t sure what to say about that. Kay is very smart. Or maybe you should never leave his side ever again if this is the kind of trouble you get in without him around. Instead he settles for something simple, but with enough bite to it to let Cassian know just how serious he is.
“We’ll see.”
“Yeah, we’ll see.”
~
They duck from cover to cover through the hallways, Din keeping the lead. Cassian is making an admirable effort at keeping up. Din isn't making any comments, trying to find any hint of an exit. There’s no signs, no markers, no nothing to go off. Their current situation consists of moving in one general direction without getting caught. Eventually they’d find an exit, a window to the outside, anything, right?
Cassian is slowing them down, and they both know it. He’s limping, quick, but not fast enough for Din’s taste. The good news is that he’s not bleeding as bad as Din first thought. The ‘graze’ was somewhere just above his ankle by the looks of it. When he first laid eyes on Cassian’s wound he had bled a steady trail down the hall. Now, it was the occasional smear left by his sock.
It was a trail nonetheless, and Din was moving with the presumption that someone was following them.
Only the halls were eerily quiet. Earlier Din heard footsteps ahead, and tucked the both of them into an alcove until it was clear. After that, they’ve only had a run in with a mouse droid, who didn’t pay them any mind.
“What time do you think it is?” Cassian asked, leaning in close to Din and keeping his voice down.
When they were woken up to go to the showers, he assumed it was morning. But maybe that was part of the facade? The officer said she wanted them clean by 2100. Was that just another mind game?
“I’m starting to think it’s either very late, or very early. Between a shift change maybe?” He replied, stopping where there was another juncture in the halls. He leaned over, glancing both ways, and was met with the same thing. Absolutely nothing at all. “I don’t like it.”
“Neither do I,” Cassian said, watching their six. “A building this big wouldn’t be this empty, would it?”
“You’re the Imperial expert, not me.”
“Okay sure, in that case, a building this big would never be this empty.” Cassian snarked.
“ Mir’sheb …”
“You didn’t teach me that one! I’m going to assume it’s a swear.”
“It means smartass, mir’sheb. ”
“So I’m allowed to know what but not mesh’la? ”
Din stops in his tracks so abruptly that Cassian nearly runs into him. His face burns hot under the helmet, and with a shake of his head he keeps moving.
“I bet it’s something really nasty then--”
“Shh!” Din stops, holding up a finger. Cassian stops talking and doesn’t move a muscle other than to click the safety off on his blaster.
“I hear them,” Cassian says, directly into Din’s ear. There were voices from the left, down the hallway. When Din leaned around the corner, he saw the first real landmark they’ve encountered since the cells. There was a wide open entryway, into what looked to be some kind of mess hall. There couldn't be any more than a few people inside, if Din had to guess. He couldn’t make out what anyone was saying.
This was the first break in the facility’s monotony. Either they could go for it, and see where it led them, or they could turn the other way. They’d made it this far by avoiding people, but he didn’t want to start leading them away from the exit, either.
Cassian made the choice for the both of them, passing around Din to sneak down to the opening. He kept himself hugged up to the wall, blaster at the ready. Din followed up behind him as quietly as he could, his footfalls far louder than Cassian’s socked ones. Cassian was already taking a peek around the corner, taking stock of the room before retreating.
“Open windows,” He said, perking Din up immediately. “Looks like a mess hall, five troopers sitting in the corner, two officers directly to our left. Doesn’t look like anyone knows two prisoners are loose.”
“Any way we could sneak by?”
“Absolutely not. A distraction maybe, but I don’t know how we could pull that off.”
“We’ll fight, then. Shoot when they aren't expecting it.”
“On three?”
“Sure.”
When they both whipped around the corner with their blasters at the ready, three of the five troopers were up from the table. Each one had a tray in their hands, which clattered straight to the floor when they went to draw their blasters. Din got a good four shots in before there was returning fire, and he had to go back into the hall for what little cover it provided.
Cassian was still inside, squatting behind a trash can. He was too big for it to be sufficient cover, so when he leaned out to aim a blaster shot only nearly missed his shoulder.
There was so much shouting, and so much blaster fire. Din’s head buzzed, the adrenaline making his entire body hum. Cassian was looking at him, shouting something Din couldn’t hear, tucking into himself more as a shot went over his head.
Din leans around the corner, takes a few shots, then rushes back in.
He’s running straight for one of the troopers, knocking him into the floor with his momentum. The next trooper gets a backhand made up of mostly vambrace, and the third is shot by Cassian.
He finishes off the troopers on the ground with his own blaster, then turns to face the rest of the mess hall.
The two remaining troopers and officers have tipped over a table, the officers barking commands over one another. The troopers are focusing fire on Din’s legs, and it's working , because the shots knock him off balance. The two troopers take that as their opportunity to get the upper hand on him, vaulting over their cover. Cassian fires at them from behind him, but only one of his shots land. The trooper grunts, holding his shoulder, then fires.
There's a surprised shout from behind him, then the sound of Cassian’s body hitting the floor. Din doesn’t even look back to see if he’s okay, he just moves.
Anger has never been his most reliable tool. He gets stupid when he’s angry, makes mistakes that he should’ve avoided. Though sometimes, his anger works in his favor.
Ripping the helmet off one trooper and using it to bash in his skull felt better than it should’ve. Turning around and performing another kov’nyn was beyond satisfying, even if it didn’t follow with the crack of a broken nose. The shattering of the trooper’s visor was sufficient enough. Reaching his gloved hand up and under the helmet was another thing. The trooper’s attempts to push him away did nothing after Din got a good grip on him, twisting his neck until the trooper quit fighting entirely.
Anger makes him powerful, and it makes him damn stupid.
One of the officers took the shot when he was leaving himself open, shooting right where the beskar left his thigh exposed. He hits the ground a little harder than he wished, getting the wind knocked out of him. When Din turned to raise his blaster, the officers were already on top of him.
One was young, his chest heaving shuddering breaths, the hand holding his blaster shook so much Din doubted he’d land the shot even at this close of a range. The other officer, however, looked exactly like she did the last time Din saw her. Angry, but so in control of the situation that Din was certain that this is when he would die. This spiteful woman with the eyes of cold durasteel would end him here and now, on his back, only feet away from his escape.
“Get away from him, you hateful bastards.” Cassian spat, and suddenly the male officer was down, smoking between his eyes. The woman was quicker on the draw, firing back over Din’s head. She snarled, then pointed the blaster back at Din’s abdomen. The flight suit was thick, but he doubted it would help him from this far away.
“Throw down the blaster and I won’t shoot the bucket right off your friend’s head!” Despite the threat, her finger was off the trigger. She wasn’t going to shoot him, not yet.
“Rot in hell!” Cassian shouted back, but he didn’t fire either. Later, Din might sit down and process how that gesture meant Cassian cared enough to not want Din getting shot. But now he was left to his own devices, too far to try and trip her, and too far from any blaster to get the upper hand.
He doesn’t know why he tries it. Maybe it was muscle memory, maybe it was the desperation, but it works just the same. His whipcord fires from the launcher on his vambrace, and wraps tight around the officer’s midsection. She’s taken off guard, looking down at herself, then him in shock. Only her arms aren't caught in the cord, and she goes to raise her blaster. Din wraps the cord around his wrist, gripping with both hands, and tugs.
The officer hits the ground so hard her neat little hat flies off her head. Her blaster lands within reach, but Din kicks it away. Cassian approaches the both of them, this time clutching at his arm as well as the limp. The officer starts to struggle in her restraints, but Din places a boot between her shoulders to keep her firmly face down.
“I don’t know what I expected from the likes of you,” She said, spitting at Cassian’s socks. Her greying hair has fallen out of its tight bun, leaving her in disarray. “Rebel scum, and a Mandalorian savage.”
Din’s boot pressed harder. Cassian knelt down to her level, face free of pain despite how his leg shook with the effort. He raised his eyebrows and smiled, shaking his head. “Ma’am, I’m just a mercenary.”
“The Empire will crush you and all of your rebel friends under their boot. They will restore order to the galaxy--”
“Under their boot? Just like how you are being crushed right now?”
Din pressed down even harder to prove Cassian’s point. The officer wheezed, then gave another brief struggle in her bonds. She stopped, then looked Cassian straight in the eyes.
“Who is the Fulcrum?”
“I have no fucking idea.” Cassian said, drier than a Tatooine sandstorm, then shot her dead. Din retracted the whipcord, examining the launcher after it clicked back into place.
“This has been jammed for weeks.” He says, mostly to himself.
“What made it start working?” Cassian said, tucking the officer’s smaller, more discreet blaster into his belt. He was shockingly calm despite it all, not paying any attention to the bodies around them. Though he did give the trooper with the exposed brain matter a wide berth.
“Getting electrocuted is my best guess, otherwise I have no clue.” As the adrenaline started to wear off, he became more aware of his injuries. He felt over the back of his thigh, his glove coming back wet.
“You okay?” Cassian asked.
“Bleeding, but I don’t think it’s serious. You?”
“About the same, gonna be real sore. I’ve got bacta, if you wanna give me a boost?” Cassian asked, pointing a thumb over at one of the open windows. The ledge was too high up for either of them to reach alone, but a quick boost had Cassian sitting over the edge no problem.
A slight breeze whipped at his hair, and Cassian smiled. He had this far away look to his eyes, gazing at the outside world for the first time in days. He sighed, then looked back down at Din.
“We’re on the ground floor. Just a little jump, then up and over the razor wire fence and were out.” His eyes were watery as he held a hand out for Din to grab.
When Din was up next to him, his own eyes were a little wet. The stars shone so bright on this moon, the night sky was illuminated with them. Just over the horizon was the moon’s satellite planet, a great pink gas giant. Sure enough, their only obstacle was about a ten foot drop, then a large fence topped with some nasty looking barbed wire.
Behind them, the lights turned red and a siren started to blare. Sounds like their absence has been noticed.
“Well,” Din says, smiling widely under the helmet. He couldn’t remember the last time he felt this happy over anything . “Lets go hop a fence.”