Chapter Text
“May I talk with the two of you in private?”
Jacen looks up at his mom who has a confused look on her face and her hand tightens around his, almost in that obnoxious protective way that she does. Maybe it means what he thinks it does.
It has to mean what he thinks it does if his mom is getting all protective like that. Right?
They’ve already found Ezra, and they’re on their way home. What else could Ahsoka have to tell both of them? It has to be the thing that he’s wanted her to say to him all along. Maybe finding Ezra opened something up in him. It would be the only reason that his mom is getting all protective and grabby with her hand when Ahsoka says she wants to talk; because she didn’t want him to have it.
As he follows along with his mom into the ready room of the ship, he knows he’s about to find out that he’s Force-sensitive.
Just like his dad was.
It’s the only thing that he’s ever wanted. He wants to be like his dad since he’ll never actually know him. He wants to connect with the Force and maybe that way he could at least talk to him somehow. He saw a holo about the Jedi that said they could do that.
They sit in silence for what feels like forever and then finally Ahsoka looks at him. For some reason, she shakes her head. There’s a look on her face that reminds him of the expression that his mom makes when she says that she ate the last meiloorun.
When she finally speaks, she sounds like she’s sad. “Jacen, I’m so sorry–”
After that, he stops listening.
He’s not Force-sensitive.
He’s not like his dad.
He’s never going to find out if what the holos said is true.
His attention shifts when his mom gasps like she’s surprised.
Nothing surprises his mom.
She is a legendary General of the New Republic and the Alliance to Restore the Republic before that.
But then his mom lets go of his hand and it falls on the acceleration couch next to them. Her eyes are wide and she isn’t the color she normally is. She barely looks like she’s breathing. She barely looks like his mom.
“I don’t understand,” she says and her voice cracks. He knows that sound; that’s the sound of the sadness that she never really lets out. “How can you— it’s not possible. This isn’t possible. There’s no way that it can be possible.”
“It is,” Ahsoka tells her. “It was. I didn’t know about Jacen then and I wish I had. There hasn’t been a day that I haven’t wished I had made it right when I could have the first time, regardless of what I didn’t know. I can’t give back any of the time you’ve lost, but since we’ve found Ezra, I can at least make it right.”
“Wait,” he finally chimes in. “What are you talking about? What are you going to do with Ezra?”
“We’re going to save your dad, Jacen,” Ahsoka says. The way that she says it is like it’s just another random day. Like it isn’t a big deal.
After that, he understands why his mom made the sound that she did. He understands why she’s sitting there just staring at the space where Ahsoka was sitting even though she left them alone an hour ago. He understands why she’s quiet. He understands why she’s got her arms wrapped around him.
Or maybe he’s got his arms wrapped around her.
Jacen knows that he should be excited. He’s going to meet his dad. He’s going to have his dad. Isn’t that what he’s always wanted?
Looking up at his mom, who still doesn’t look like his mom at all right now, he wonders if having his dad is really worth what it’s doing to his mom.
They don’t even wait when they get back to Lothal before they go to the place where they’re supposedly going to save his dad. Nobody talks about it. Nobody stops to question if what they’re doing is really a good idea.
Nobody seems to notice that his mom still hasn’t said a word.
For years, Jacen tried to have the Force. He tried to make things move with his mind. He woke up every day, closed his eyes, and tried to feel the other living things around him. He tried to connect with the Loth cats outside their house and has a couple of scars to show for it. He thought if he tried hard enough that he could make himself have it.
Now he thinks the Force is stupid.
Standing next to his mom, he watches Ezra and Ahsoka reaching out for literally nothing in front of them. He wants to scream at them that there’s nothing here and they need to go home now. Unfortunately, the ground starts to rumble under them in response and he half expects his mom to grab his hand but there’s nothing. He turns away from whatever the stupid Jedi are doing and looks up at her instead.
When he looks up, he sees why she didn’t grab his hand. Her hand is on her shoulder; that’s not how his mom stands. There are tears in her eyes and his mom never cries, at least not in front of anybody. Even if she’s always been a little sad, she never lets anybody see it. His mom is strong.
And she still isn’t making a sound.
Jacen grabs her hand that’s hanging at her side and holds onto it tightly.
This is a bad idea and he knows it.
He doesn’t even want to look at the stupid Temple. He doesn’t want to see what’s going on. He wants somebody to see that there’s something wrong with his mom. He wants her to say something. He wants the tears in her eyes to go away.
Instead, she suddenly drops to her knees and all of the tears in her eyes start to fall down her cheeks. She finally makes a sound and it’s a sound like she can’t breathe. He doesn’t need to look at the Temple to know what made his mom do that, but he does anyway.
Ezra is walking alongside a man who looks nothing like the holos or the pictures he’s seen of his dad. Jacen immediately looks back at his mom. He doesn’t want to see the man with Ezra who doesn’t look like his dad.
This should make him happy. All he has ever wanted is for his dad to be alive, but his mom is crying and it’s his dad that’s hurting his mom. It takes seeing her face twist into some weird expression, like she’s trying to smile but she can’t get it out past all the sadness that she’s always kept hidden, to make him reluctantly look back up again.
He finds himself staring into eyes that look just like his. It’s almost like he’s staring in a mirror at himself.
Only a second later, the eyes that look like his turn a weird grayish color.
Oh yeah, he forgot.
His dad is blind.
Contrary to the fairy tales about nothing hurting when you die — the fantasy that there is no pain when you rejoin the cosmic Force — dying fucking hurts.
It hurts a lot.
It slowly sears away the skin of your palms, layer by layer. It burns with every breath you take even though you don’t have many left. It rips your heart out of your chest while it's still beating, throws you into a duracrete wall, and then leaves you to suffer alone in agony for another fifteen seconds before you finally succumb to the darkness.
Nothing hurts like dying.
At least Kanan used to believe that.
Now he knows that nothing hurts like being unexpectedly slammed back into the world to find yourself facing a man that calls himself Ezra Bridger but has hair that’s longer than yours used to be, a full beard, and creases at the corner of his eyes. A man that should technically be fourteen years younger than you but is actually only four years younger than you.
Dead men do not age.
The pain of being slammed back into the world ten years after dying is so great that the first thing that leaves his mouth is “Let me go back.”
A blank stare is the only answer he gets to his request and he realizes that the man in front of him really is Ezra.
“What is going on?” he finally chokes out. “Why am I here? Where the fuck are we?”
“Ahsoka,” Ezra starts, his voice cracking slightly as he speaks. “She came back so we could…” his voice trails off for a minute. He clears his throat and starts again. “It's this place that’s between worlds, and there was a way to save you, and so after she came to find me we came to save you.”
Kanan balks at his explanation. “I didn’t need saving, Ezra. I was dead.”
“But—”
“I died for a reason,” he continues, ignoring the protestation. “I knew what I was doing. I made that choice. There was absolutely no reason that you needed to save me ten fucking years—”
“You have a son,” Ezra blurts out. “Maybe you don’t need to be saved, but I know from personal experience that he needs his father. So maybe stop being an asshole for one minute and say thank you, Ezra.”
Living is definitely way more fucking painful than dying.
“Did you just call me an asshole?” Kanan asks because acknowledging the other part of Ezra’s statement is too fucking painful.
Ezra grins. “You have no idea how long I’ve wanted to say that to your face. Now come on, they’re waiting for you.”
Kanan grabs Ezra’s arm to steady himself. He feels his face contort to reflect the agony that he is feeling but also underneath it, a glimmer of hope.
“Hera?” he asks, his voice breaking.
Force, please don’t let that be the reason why his son needs him. It’s the only thought he has. Kanan recognizes that it’s incredibly selfish and that he’s got a son out there, but he’s just been dragged back into the world ten years after he died. He doesn’t think he can handle being in a world that Hera isn’t in.
Ezra’s expression brightens when he answers, “She’s waiting for you.”
The only thing more painful than living and dying?
Hurting the woman you love more than anything in the galaxy, even when you know that what you did was absolutely necessary.
It’s not a long journey back to the mouth of the Temple but at the same time, it’s been a ten year journey back. His heart is racing, which feels strange when you’re accustomed to being dead. His feet carry him faster than he wants to move but yet not fast enough.
This is wrong.
Everything feels wrong.
When his eyes fall on that familiar and beautiful emerald gaze that’s only been lightly touched by time, suddenly everything is right again.
Hera’s knees give out beneath her and he knows that she would have never believed this was possible. He knows that she hurts. He knows he will do everything in the galaxy to take her pain away.
Kanan takes two steps toward her and his eyes lift from hers for only a moment. He finds himself staring into eyes that are his own under a heavy green mop of hair. And then he sees nothing at all.
Oh yeah, he forgot.
He’s fucking blind.
Because he’s been dead for ten years, everything alive is too fucking loud, he takes halting steps forward in the direction that she was in. It doesn’t take long for her to notice that he’s having a hard time getting to her because he only makes it four steps before he finds himself with the woman he loves wrapped around him. He knows now that she’s holding onto him, she will never let him go again.
Nothing in the galaxy feels better than being able to wrap his arms around Hera—being able to say that he loves her and that he’s sorry, over and over again. Nothing takes his pain away like the woman in his arms and he swears to the stars that he’ll do the same for her now that he has the chance. Nothing will come between them ever again.
It seems like forever that he just holds her. Not a word has left her lips because she’s crying so hard. He has a feeling that she’s crying tears that she’s been holding in for the past ten years. He’ll hold her as long as he needs to while she lets go of it. They have all the time in the galaxy.
Kanan kisses the top of her head and murmurs that he loves her again. The tears only seem to come faster. He holds her closer and promises her that it will be okay, that everything will be okay.
How can it not?
They’re together.
“Mom?”
The voice of a boy slams him back into reality once more. Eyes that were his own under a green mop of hair. Worry in his voice. He can’t fucking see his son to know what he must be thinking.
Should he reach out to him?
What’s his name?
It’s the sound of their son’s voice that staunches the flow of Hera’s tears. She finally manages to pull it together just enough to tell their son that she’s okay.
“I’m okay,” she repeats and Kanan knows that she’s trying to convince herself.
“You’re okay,” he echoes, wrapping a hand tightly around hers.
Hera doesn’t let go of his hand, even when he rests his hand against her shoulder in silent reassurance that he’s still there.
Her voice is still beautiful, even when it’s broken. Even when she’s still struggling to find words. Even when it’s thick with tears and pain and ten years of grief.
But it’s never been more beautiful than the moment that she says, “Kanan, this is your son, Jacen.”