for_everyone | (no subject)

Hera's hovering near the door to her cabin.

She would hover near the door to Kanan's cabin, but she knows if she does that, he'll sense her there. And she's not –

He needs to rest. They all need to rest. They were lucky to all be alive. It had been an unbelievably, impossibly long day, ending with a massive shift for all of them. Meeting with Phoenix Squadron, with Fulc-

All right, it had been a more massive shift for some than others. And Hera's not sure how Kanan will feel about her after whatever the Empire had done to him, after her decisions both to leave him and to risk their crew – their family's lives to come after him. And then Ahsoka. She'd kept so much from him, and so much out of his hands, for so long. And she doesn't doubt herself for it, hasn't wavered in her belief that it was necessary, that it had protected them, all of them, not just her crew but the others slowing coalescing across the galaxy. She also believed that Kanan had been right, that they had needed to do more than cause the occasional nuisance to the Empire, than even saving a few lives. There had to be hope.

But Ahsoka's words still ring in her mind.
Your mission was to be unseen.

That hope was fragile as a single flame. What it needed was to survive. Keeping quiet had kept them alive, for the moment. But now there was Phoenix Squadron. There was Ahsoka. The threads of the web were beginning to connect.

And maybe what Kanan needs is to be alone. To think about it, and how he feels about it. And how he feels about her.

Hera doesn't want to be alone. But that's selfish. And she's not sure how to ask how he feels without revealing her own need.

So she lowers herself to the floor of her cabin, sitting up against the door, lekku pressed against it, and stares up at the ceiling. Trying to calm her mind, and trying to think of a way to knock on Kanan's door without having to knock on his door.

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"Thanks."

He manages a small smile, even though it falls away pretty quickly.

"And, you know. Some company for a while would be . . . good. If that's . . . I mean, I don't know if that'd help you at all, but -- "

"Of course, Kanan."

She stays by his side on the bunk, eyes on him, and then flickering away as she considers what she's going to say next.

"And I - if you're in pain, there might be something I can do about it."

"Yeah?"

There's a look of relief in his gaze, though also a faint hint of wariness.

"As long as it doesn't mean I have to hang upside down for two hours while balancing a glass of water on my stomach."

Jedi techniques can be weird.

"... no."

What?

"Just - is it all right if I touch your hands?"

"Oh good."

He cracks a smile at that, and this one lasts a little longer.

"Uh, you know that's pretty much always fine by me, right?"

And their hands had just touched a few minutes ago. But Hera rolls her eyes.

"All right, dear."

Still, she holds out her hands, waiting for him to reach to her.

Kanan doesn't laugh, but some of the tension in his neck and shoulders leaches out at the word 'dear', anyway.

And then, obediently, he holds out his hands for her to take, for . . . whatever.

Hera moves her hands under his, gently pressing her thumbs into the center of his palms.

"When I was growing up, we didn't always have the supplies we needed, so we had to practice other options."

She presses her thumbs slightly deeper into his palms, then slides them up, just below his wrists.

"Just focus on me, and tell me if anything doesn't feel right."

He exhales slowly, breath sliding out between his teeth like someone braced for hurt and then . . . nothing.

"Oh. That's -- all right."

The rest of him aches (or worse, but he's not thinking about that), but the pads of his fingers and the heels of his hands are just tingling.

Pleasantly.

"I can do that."

"All right."

Hera continues to press gently along his palms, before moving very slightly up, to his wrists. As this is where restrains would have been, she spends more time here. But she keeps the same steady rhythm, maintaining her own breathing alongside it, her touch soft and then sometimes firm, but never harsh. As though she could slowly press the pain away, to help it seep out of him.

He keeps his breathing slow and careful, for several reasons. Only one of them involves residual pain.

Kanan flexes his fingers as Hera moves toward his wrists, then lets his arms go limp, trusting them to her grasp.

It's . . . it's a lot better than just sitting alone. (It's a lot better than most things, honestly.)