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amywritesthings · 1 year

Text

about you. (cassian x you)

Pairing: Cassian Andor x F!Reader

Word Count: 5.6K

Summary: You are a rebel spy working as an escort at Canto Bight's cliffside casino. When Luthen cannot meet you for an intel exchange on New Year's Eve, he sends his best asset. Never in your wildest dreams did you think that meant you'd reunite with your former childhood best friend, Cassian Andor.

Warnings: New Year's Eve, Spy Thriller, Escort Service, Romantic Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Childhood Friends, Reunions, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Mentions of Sex Work, Wall Pinning, New Year's Eve Kiss

A/N: Happy New Year, everyone! I had a fun holiday one shot idea and wanted to try my hand at writing Cassian Andor. I am wishing you all a happy & healthy new year, and I can't wait to continue writing in 2023.

( Read on AO3 )

Canto Bight is always bustling at New Year’s Eve.

It’s why Luthen Rael has shown up on your doorstep for the first time in months. In his not-so subtle way, the man requests (see: demands) that you float back to your old haunt, the one within the glittering halls of their monument cliffside casino, and do what you do you best: entertain as a partner experience escort for the rich and powerful.

The partner experience operation has been your designation from the very beginning of this rebellious calling. Your contribution to the rebellion, as he claims, is valuable — because the whispers in the night by decorated Imperials that feel safe in your company are priceless.

Whispers bring intel, and not even gold is as priceless as Imperial intel.

Luthen claims he knew of your potential the moment he laid eyes on you in a seedy dive bar on an Outer Rim moon. The little lamb far from her home planet Ferrix, looking fearful yet enraged all the same; starved, but most importantly willing to do anything to take down the Empire one domino at a time.

It was the type of spunk the older man needed in a claustrophobic world.

So you struck a deal: under trained supervision, you would run the casino circuits and red districts — never quite getting close enough to sleeping with the enemy (who knew the Empire thrived on humiliation and edging?) but enough to drug them, learn from them, then report back to him for the next move.

Rinse and repeat for six successful years.

And right now, you were supposed to be done. Find a small shack in the middle of nowhere knowing you did your part in the small but mighty agenda. Perhaps, eventually, you would find a way to make peace with your past and your present.

Then Luthen fucking Rael shows up at the stoop of said shack only six months later with a new opportunity.

A new strategy on the chess board.

(The rebellion, as he so candidly puts it, is never final.)

“Did you hear about what’s going on with Life Day this year on Canto Bight?” Luthen grunts, opting to stand by the doorway rather than a seat at your makeshift kitchen table.

You drop down unceremoniously with your arms at your sides. You know — and you know he knows — there is a blaster taped on the belly of the steel table should this be an unpleasant visit.

“You mean the Wookie holiday?”

“Hmm,” Luthen sounds, caught between a yes and a no. “Supposed to be the Wookie holiday, but it seems the Empire has allowed the casino a profitable chance to participate until the new year.”

“I’d expect nothing less,” you muse in return, surveying him. “When you say profitable, you mean—”

“Everyone who is anyone will be visiting.” Luthen never makes any sudden movements; always trapped sounding bored with this life he leads. It’s also a tactic not to play his cards too far from his chest. “They’ll be running the gambit for paid time off.”

Smile bland, you nod once. “Which is code for… you need someone on the inside.”

“For the season,” he agrees, shifting his weight. “A gift to the faces who may have missed you.”

“Missed me?”

“I hear about the Diamond quite a lot.”

Their precious Diamond.

Maker, that nickname always made your skin crawl.

You huff, rubbing your nose with the back of your thumb. “Flattery gets you nowhere with me, Luthen, you know that.”

He takes a pause, small eyes observing everything that you do. Updating a mental database logging your quirks and your discomfort to cipher for a later date — that’s all he’s ever done, study and download people, and he’s done so without error yet.

(It’s why he’s never been caught.)

“It isn’t flattery,” he finally says. “It’s an opportunity.”

To do everything we couldn’t the first time, is what he really implies.

It’s feeding an addiction no amount of dead fascists will be able to quench.

“And how do I tell them why I want the job back after I quit?”

“Your mother was very ill. You needed to help with her expenses,” Luthen fabricates from thin air. “It was easiest to part ways without the low note on your record. But the credits have dried up, and their clientele will be thankful of the casino’s decision to allow you back on the floor.”

It’s your turn to pause — to study. He gives away nothing. You lean forward to rest your elbows on the tops of your thighs.

“You think that’ll work?”

“You’ll sell it,” is all he gives back like you’ve already said yes.

You’re supposed to be out.

(Do you want to be out?)

No.

No, you don’t.

Getting the job back at the casino as a specialized escort is easy. The difficulty lies in remembering how to fall into old, subtle habits when all you want to do is cause chaos. Staying engaged while chatting up Imperial scum as they spittle in their expensive liquors and moan about the woes of their occupations and agenda can only go on for so long.

Yet you laugh with the rest of them once they’re kissing your feet and your hands, because everyone in this rebellion has a part to play.

(Our loveliest of diamonds, back to see us once again.)

Luthen, of course, never leaves you to your own devices for long. Gifting a hefty sum of credits and a bag of dissolvable sedatives every time he passes through Canto Bight as his alter ego is about as noble as the illusive man gets.

You fill small briefcases with voice memos and holovideos of nightly conversations, drunken manifestos and slippery plans.

It works.

By some miracle, you have never been caught.

New Year’s Eve is filled to the brim with Imperial guards enjoying time off from their grueling schedules. Some of the higher commanding officers already have their arms draped over people inviting them to a great time. Others chase after the debauchery promised by scantily clad creatures inviting them into the halls and out of their money.

You? Have a booking in advance: a high-ranking officer, but not within the Inner Circle.

According to Luther, he’s a valuable asset double-crossing their superiors.

A plant.

You are to deliver the intel to him under Luthen’s command and trust.

(Ironic. You always believed Luthen trusted no one.)

At the final half hour of the year’s end, you round the corner from the main entertainment room and down the hallway towards the private event spaces. A multitude of sounds are muffled by the doors — some good, some not so. Your focus is set on the twelfth door where your officer awaits, and suddenly you feel nervous all over again.

Meeting one of Luthen’s other operatives feels all too daunting.

After a moment, you place your code into the code box by the door and wait for the durasteel to slide, revealing the plush crimson meeting space. It's staged with a convenient king-sized bed and a vanity for refreshment, inviting comfort and suggesting the obvious.

What greets you as the door opens — a silhouette at the edge of the bed, dressed in Imperial formals — is not what you envisioned.

The man’s hair is what you notice first: disheveled brown locks are combed back neatly, smoothed by gel to keep the unruliness at bay. The jacket’s shoulders are a little too pointed, as if he’s not grown into his uniform quite yet — or like he’d stolen it on his way into the venue. The lines on his faces aren’t new, but aren’t old. He’s tired — so fucking tired, but he sits taller the second the door opens.

The blank expression on his face is purposeful, almost doe-eyed, with a feigned, smug-like innocence only an Imperial officer would wear.

Then his gaze travels from your open-toed shoes, up your bodysuit dress of sequins, and locks onto your face.

Just like that, the façade is broken.

What once was blank now hardens, wholly confused, before the lines on his prominent brow smooth with recognition.

Cassian.

Of all the idiots in all the galaxy, Cassian Andor is dressed as an Imp in your meeting space on the eve of the new year.

And you thought, with this rebellion, that you’d seen everything.

While the officer in disguise is much older than what your memory recalls, you could never forget that face even if the Empire tried. The feeling of dirt under your fingernails, the scent of rubber burning, the spark of an electric charge from a stolen piece of property — it all floods back in a tidal wave, almost knocking you a step back into the hallway.

On Ferrix, Cassian Andor always ran around with different people — sometimes it was Bix when she wasn’t punished for entertaining teen scoundrels; sometimes it was other boys in scrappy brawls and mended machinery; most of the time, however, it was you.

Hand and hand, causing mayhem in the bright suns and the full moons. He'd shown you what it meant to stand up for yourself. To want what you want and not apologize for it. To be bold, even at the expense of disruption.

And then he’d pummel whatever wayward eye looked at you the wrong way.

Trouble.

Cassian Andor was so much trouble, and you were mad for it.

Your last memory of him is as vivid as the neon lights lining the ceiling: you're both sixteen years old and shoulder-to-shoulder on an inclined metal slab, staring up at the stars. He's wearing that jacket from his father and hasn't combed his hair in days. You're lost in telling him about your dreams of a better tomorrow, of one day leaving Ferrix for good and making a difference in the vastness of the galaxy despite how small you feel. He laughs, a hum more than anything else, and takes your hand in his.

You're too afraid to squeeze back.

Having Cassian poke fun of the idea of doing much of anything in the galaxy never felt like he mocked you for wanting to try. More than anything, his laugh was one of envy: he couldn’t afford dreams, so you dreamt for the both of you. He couldn’t handle intimacy, so you were satisfied with resting your hand in his the entire night.

Nothing was said. Nothing had changed.

He gave what he could, and you understood.

Childhood friendship has a funny way of feeling that simple.

Cassian, however, never truly chose to change with you. He never truly chose anyone, not really, not when he had so much to give — to his mother, to his scrapyard confidantes, to Bix.

You fit somewhere in the chapters of his life, but Cassian Andor could never tell you which ones. He could not, and would not, promise someone tomorrow.

An unfinished book.

You never did tell him where you were going after hitching a ride on that stock transport to get the hell out of Ferrix for good. Not a single holocard or a note.

Just… gone, into the galaxy, to dream.

Now he sits in front of you at the edge of your meeting space bed, threatening to ruin your calculated cover in one-fell swoop.

Before Cassian can implode your operation, you turn on the mask: with a bright smile and squared shoulders, you gesture to the plush furniture of the room. “Is it to your liking, Mr. —?”

You trail off on your question to give him a chance to speak.

Cassian blinks a few times, only to remember himself.

“Raoul,” he blurts without dismissing his accent, eyes widening with an unspoken question: what are you doing here? “Sargeant Murl Raoul.”

Maker, you haven’t heard that voice in so long.

It’s deeper now. Rusty. Scratched.

“Sargeant,” you correct pleasantly, taking a step into the bedroom to toe the perimeter. Cassian pulls the geometric gray hat clear from his head, balling it in his fist, but you raise a palm at the hip when his mouth opens: don’t.

He listens, pressing his lips together with purpose.

“I asked if this room was to your liking," you repeat.

Cassian struggles with an answer, studying you with concern. You hate it. You hated it back on Ferrix when he tried to play protector, and a decade and a half apart doesn’t dilute the emotion.

Your brows rise, and he clears his throat. “I— yes, I am quite comfortable.”

“Good,” you conclude with a small nod. “Now before I join you and get more comfortable, do you have any questions for me?”

“More comfortable?” he asks a little too fast, so you recover with a glide of your hand along your sparkling thigh.

“Can’t do much when I’m in this old thing,” you coo, that stage performer voice now sounding so phony to your ears with a known audience. “Shouldn’t take long.”

Cassian runs the tip of his tongue along the seam off his lips, shifting his seat on the mattress. “I suppose I could ask how… uh, how long have you been doing… this?”

You don’t know if he’s asking about the escort arrangement or the Informant position, which further complicates the game. The odds of Cassian showing up on Canto Bight should be slim. Cassian wearing an Imperial outfit on his own ought to be slim to none.

But appearing in your private meeting space, fake alias and all?

Your blood runs cold with truth between the lines.

(Luthen never does anything by accident.)

This meeting — reuniting Cassian and yourself — is his test, a judgment call, but you refuse to let Luthen win the game with this surprise hand.

“Years,” you answer honestly, to both.

You continue to face him as you skirt around the left side of the sparkling vanity, not taking any chances with your former friend. Your manicured fingers glide along the mirror’s back, searching for the planted Imperial wire.

(Not only are they cruel, but perverted in their efforts to catch spies.)

“So then you are... experienced?” The question comes out rougher than you believe he intends. Gruff, like he’s embarrassed to even ask.

(The question almost — almost — makes your face burn.)

“If you’re worried that you won’t have a good time, Sergeant, then I promise they sent you to me for a reason. I’m going to take great care of you.”

Cassian’s expression darkens at this as he rises to his feet with purpose.

You rip the microphone from the back of the mirror, holding the device between your index and middle finger for show.

This stops him from moving ahead, eyes locked on the microphone before flickering back to you. You shake your head.

I said don’t.

He nods once, and you take the microphone between your hands. With two clicks, the wire cover pops open, displaying a multitude of tiny wires. You fidget between two, pulling, until the red eye at the center of the device dissolves into black.

The room is blanketed with silence.

Now it’s just you and a ghost here.

“We’re clear,” you tell him after another beat, dropping the seductive aloofness in your tone.

Cassian’s shoulders drop a fraction of an inch. “That was fast.”

Your brow picks up that fraction, raising high. “You have to dismantle them fast."

“Let me take a look at it,” Cassian replies, tossing the hat twisted in his hands to the mattress. "Are you certain it's off?"

“Positive,” you say, sheltering the item closer to your chest. “You don't need to look at it. Easy to disable and reassemble at a moment’s notice, so I’ll turn it back on when you depart.”

“What about lost footage?”

“Chalk it up as faulty equipment they’re too stubborn to replace in a shithole like this.”

Cassian mulls over your answer, taking a cautious few steps forward to observe the small device in your hand. “Imperial-grade wires are tough to work with. A five-second warning doesn’t give many people time to disable the alarm,” he informs in a whispered afterthought. “Where did you learn to do that?”

In your bones, you know it’s a trick question.

Fifteen-something years of reuniting in a moment like this comes with immense drawbacks. When he asks, it is not out of curiosity — it is out of the desire to see if you are truly you.

(Because he remembers your face, too.)

“On Ferrix,” you reply.

He gives no reaction, continuing to deadpan. “Where on Ferrix?”

“You want me to remember from that long ago?” you laugh, placing the microphone on the vanity’s surface and following up with a thick blue cloth to drape over top of it.

“Humor me,” he reasons, flexing his leather-clad fingers at his sides. Now that he doesn’t have a distraction, Cassian doesn’t stop looking at your face.

(The same intensity as the boy without dreams.)

“The old Slavyard. There was that one incredibly rainy month when those prim and proper freaks—”

“—installed the spyware on the back door in the middle of the night,” he interrupts, finishing the story with a misplaced awe under his breath. “You played lookout while I disabled the devices.”

You don’t answer, not really, as you offer a half-hearted smile. “Say what you want about that place, but you learn a lot of things when you watch restless boys who never know when to stop getting in trouble.”

The return smile is small and fleeting, but the corner of Cassian’s lip upticks. His brows knit together, contemplating before a huff of a laugh exits. “Not a very good lookout, then, if you were so busy watching me.”

“You never got caught, though, did you?” you joke.

You swear he almost laughs.

The silence settles at your ankles and rises with each passing second, encompassing you both in a shroud of possibilities: pleasantries are nice, but the popping of bottles and shouts of celebration passing by your room brings you both back to a reality where you’re playing pretend.

Cassian huffs once more, running a hand down his face and around his neck before dropping it in a gesture towards you. “He cannot be serious.”

He.

You catch that pronoun with intrigue and tilt your chin.

“Serious about what? Who’s ‘he’?”

His voice softens, shrinking in size, as he nears half a step closer and into your bubble. “Don’t tell me it’s you.” You maintain eye contact — maintain dominance of this situation — and stay in place. “When he said to wait…”

“...for the Informer, you didn’t think you’d run into a ghost?” you finish, and he’s polite enough not to nod. “He only told me the person he was sending in his stead was one of his best assets. This reunion isn’t my doing.”

“No,” Cassian agrees, low and certain. “It isn’t.”

Because Luthen knows.

Luthen knows, and that’s dangerous in and of itself: his little lamb on Ferrix knew his most trusted asset long before the mastermind was in the picture, and this sabotage is meant to figure you out.

(To figure you both out for his own gain: to make sure you were both up for the task, history aside.)

Your jaw clenches as you nod with assertion, mindful of the train of your body-tight dress when you shift around Cassian to create some space. He turns his torso, following.

“Did he force you to do this?” When you pause in your steps to quirk a brow, he struggles with verbalizing what this means. “Entertaining these low lives while they piss their credits away.”

“Very strong words for someone dressed as an Imp.”

He completely ignores you, hyper in his budding rage. “Because if anyone has touched you—”

“No one’s forcing me to do anything, Cass,” you reply, hateful that the former nickname leaves your lips so fluidly; as if no time has passed. “We’re all cogs working for the same machine.”

“That doesn’t mean he should be having you do this on your own,” the man argues. “He’s not even on the planet, for fuck’s sake. This is dangerous work.”

“You keep saying this or that, but you’re not really asking the real question.” Your nose scrunches, maliciously playful. “I don’t fuck them. It’s pretend, Cassian. My honor is intact.”

Cassian squints with a scoff. “That isn’t what I meant—”

“It isn’t?” you challenge.

“No,” he responds just as fast and just as intense. A smirk plays on your lips, slow and growing. “Fuck whoever you’d like to fuck. One or a dozen, I don’t care, but not them. They don’t deserve you.”

“And who does?”

“I don’t know, but not Luthen or the pieces of shit out there or anyone on this planet.”

“Not even you, right?”

He stares down at you, hard. You snort in disbelief.

“I never thought I’d see the day where Cassian Andor is jealous of a body count, but I guess stranger things have happened for both of us.”

Cassian’s jaw sets, nostrils flaring with an anger he refuses to bury completely. He searches your face, lost on a response, before sharply inhaling through his nose.

“I need information on your regulars.”

Ah.

No more games.

You roll your eyes, absently waving him off as you turn to walk towards the crate-like nightstand. “I have the files on a drive.”

No more games, or so you thought — Cassian follows close behind. “Drives are easily corruptible or lost or stolen. You could just tell me.”

Your hand hovers on the drawer when you turn your chin to look at him. “Yeah, sure, let me just… tell you about a mission I’ve spent years finessing so you can get the details wrong when you relay with Luthen.”

“Do you think so little of my memory skills?” he says and it’s a joke, but it teeters on the edge of an argument.

Just like old times.

You don’t need this type of deja vu before the new year.

“Whisper down the lane only goes so far,” you answer, turning back to the drawer in front of you. Your hand lifts the edge of the bottom plate, removing a small box from the center of the hidden compartment.

You only pause when you feel his presence right behind you as soft puffs of air tickle the back of your exposed neck.

He says nothing, not at first, in this proximity. Then a syllable sounds:

“Why?”

The question is a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it whisper. His voice flutters along your skin, causing a shiver down your spine. Deep down you know he’s not asking about the drive or your distaste for his preferred method of relay. Why — the one word you hoped to never face.

If you concentrate hard enough, you can smell the scent of his cologne.

It smells nothing like Cassian.

You stay focused on a miniscule dot on the wall, too afraid to turn around.

“We can’t do this here,” you murmur, barely audible in return.

“I paid for the hour,” he replies. “If I were to leave ten minutes into your company, then there would be questions.”

(He’s right. As much as you hate it, your former friend is right.)

You raise your chin to the ceiling, closing your eyes. Contemplating. Seeking anything, everything, to say to avoid what’s to come.

You open your mouth to speak, but Cassian gets there first.

“I looked for you.” A vulnerable statement from an impenetrable man. His chin leans forward, the warmth of him spreading to your aura. “In dozens of quadrants—”

“Cassian.”

“—and about a hundred planets—”

“Stop.”

“—but you left nothing.” The final word emphasizes with raw emotion, causing your throat to swell. His gloved hand rests on your tricep, but you turn to finally face him. The closeness of him is a surprise — piercing brown eyes meet yours with mere centimeters between noses. “No note, no goodbye, no telling where you might have headed. Nothing.”

Frowning, you don’t realize that you’re shaking your head. The lines on his face are too distracting. He is distracting.

“You were never supposed to see me again.”

“And I never understood why.” He steps forward. You step back. When you think he won’t advance, he continues to step once, twice, until the third lands your back to the corner of the room. “So I am asking — now — while I can still have you: why?”

While I can still have you. You know the implication isn’t there, not truly, but your heart aches for it. The tension makes you feel so small, as if you’re eighteen and flying all over again.

You’re supposed to be over this; over him.

“I had to start new,” you answer after a considerable pause, forcing yourself to look him in the eye in what little space is held between you. “I was always going to leave Ferrix.”

“I knew that,” he argues softly. “I was never going to deter you from—”

“No. No, you were never going to,” you agree, nodding. “But you were always off and on the planet, doing what you had to for everyone else. If I didn’t cut Ferrix out of my life, then I wonder if I would have had the same fate as my parents or my friends: getting stuck there. And not just getting stuck, but waiting.”

“Waiting?” Cassian asks with confusion, brows knit.

You relax against the wall with a humorless laugh. “How did you not see it? The way I always waited for you.” Anxious, you turn your cheek to check the main door as you mull over your next few words. “I would have waited my whole life for you.”

The air in the room shifts.

Although he remains in your peripheral vision, the man stays staring at you without a discernible expression. The gravity of what you’re admitting drags lower, lower, until he says something that forces you to look at him head-on:

“I thought you were indifferent to me.”

Your eyes widen. “Indifferent?”

Cassian nods, short and quick. “You had all these big plans. I listened for hours. Not one of them involved me.”

“Because I didn’t think you’d want to be a part of those plans.”

“Maybe I didn’t think I couldn’t make a difference, not in a… rebellion, though the irony is not lost on me now,” he admits with a huff of a laugh, “but I wanted to be a part of you. I didn’t care what it was, so long as I still had you.”

You stare at him as he stares back at you, totally dumbfounded with this brand new information. Cassian swallows thickly, shifting his weight yet again from one leg to another. The loud party continues outside of your room, drowning these confessions in the excitement for a nearing midnight.

You had all these big plans.

Memories warp at a second’s notice as your brain tries to understand what he’s laid at your altar.

Not one of them involved me.

He shouldn’t be saying this.

He shouldn’t be saying any of this.

Closing your eyes to find a pause in your racing thoughts, you try — try to find where perhaps this is fabricated, designed to see if you’re easily swayed by the past that you so desperately let die in this rebellion.

Slowly, your eyelids flutter open. Cassian is watching with something close to concern.

(Something, maybe, closer to fear.)

You gently shake your head. “This is a test.”

“I know.”

“Luthen did this—”

“Fuck Luthen,” he breathes out, eyes dropping to stare at your lips, and your heartbeat quickens.

His brows meet in the middle, concentrated yet lost — as if he’s back on Ferrix, scrawny and scrappy and calculating the gravity of the risk should he decide to steal or trespass —

Or do something he wasn’t supposed to.

“Cassian.”

Your voice is gentle with a warning. His eyes do not raise, but he does answer.

“What?”

“You have that look on your face.”

“I have a look?”

“When you’re contemplating doing something stupid? Yes.”

He snorts, amused. “You remember what that looks like after fifteen years?”

“It's very hard to forget it.”

He mulls the moment over, flickering his attention back up to your eyes and nodding.

“You’re right. I am thinking of doing something stupid.”

“How stupid?”

“Incredibly.”

A beat passes.

Finally he blinks up to your eyes, searching for an answer to a question he hasn’t asked yet. You wait, just as you’ve always waited, to hear his voice.

“It’s almost midnight,” he says, flexing the leather gloved hand at his side. “I should go.”

Everything sinks.

The crowd outside grows louder as people depart from their private rooms to celebrate in the middle of the casino. Everyone begins the unison countdown of the final minute until the new year rings out.

The device in your hand grows heavy — a reminder of why he’s here in the first place, what Luthen will be looking for, yet your arm cannot rise to give it over.

(A few more minutes and he’ll be gone.)

To find a reason to keep him here with you would be selfish.

Instead of protesting, you nod.

“Yeah. You should go.”

He nods, too, and his throat bobs with a swallow.

Outside your door, their laughter and shouts reach a collective ten, nine, eight, seven…

Yet he doesn’t move.

Neither do you.

Six, five, four, three…

“Cass?”

Two.

Cassian speaks with broken finality, rushed and wanting. “I can't go without—”

You beat him to it.

Canto Bight’s cliffside casino roars with excitement of the new year while you grab the lapel of his Imperial uniform, dragging him in as he simultaneously launches his lips to yours.

The force of him smacks your head into the wall, but the stars behind your eyes aren’t from impact. It’s from the way he presses his mouth to yours, desperate to pour years of frustration and wonder into a long-awaited kiss. You whimper into it, eager to dissolve any space between you.

Cassian Andor cages your head into the palms of his gloved hands, holding you with a tenderness and strength only he can have. He groans into your mouth when he tastes you, tongue dragging along your lower lip — the neediness of it is enough to make your knees give out.

Except he drops his hands to your shoulders and spins you, pressing your chest into the wall. Using your hands to balance yourself, Cassian wastes not a second more to place his hands over yours, pinning you in place.

“We should have — opened with a fight,” he murmurs breathlessly into your ear, kissing your earlobe before bringing it into his mouth.

You bite back a moan, dropping your forehead to the wall. “If I'd known you wanted to kiss me after all this time, Cass, then I would have — gone straight past a fight and went for it.”

He chuckles behind you, letting go of your earlobe to travel kisses down the side of your neck.

“There is a lot I wanted to do back then, but I was too chickenshit to try it.”

The imagery of a lot burns into the back of your skull.

“And now?” you ask, but it’s wavered.

Cassian slows down, but his lips remain against the crook of your neck. You mourn the loss of speed, pushing your hips back to connect with his.

A hand shoots down to still your waist as his thumb runs soothing strokes into the skintight dress.

“Not here,” he decides, but it isn’t regretful. It’s determined. “When I see you again—”

“When?” you interrupt.

“When,” he enforces, squeezing your waist, “I see you again, I’ll do what I’ve been too chickenshit to do and it won’t be under a watchful eye.”

When I see you again.

You smile small, delirious in the haze of him.

“Is that a promise?”

“As good as I can make one,” he responds in earnest, turning to leave a small kiss on your cheek. “You’re not losing me so easily this time.”

And you believe him.

Misunderstandings, miscommunications — all of that hardship to end up here, of all places.

You have so much to learn.

(He has so much to hear.)

Even if this was Luthen’s doing, even if this was a test of faith, you cannot find a reason to care. Not when your lips still tingle with the kiss you’d only dreamt about your entire life.

Reaching for his arm, you gently bring his free hand to yours and place the small drive in the middle of his palm. Cassian’s chin drops to observe the tiny metal, jaw setting to its unreadable clench.

Because at the end of the night, you both still have jobs to do.

A new year.

(A new horizon.)

“Until next time,” you say, removing your hand from his.

Cassian curls his fingers over the drive, shoving the small device in his coat pocket. He flexes and raises his hand to bring it up to your cheek, cradling your face once more as he leans in for one final kiss. This time it’s softer. Timid.

The closest Cassian Andor can ever get to a promise.

He pulls away, nose to nose, and mirrors in reply.

“Until next time.”

#andor #cassian andor #cassian andor x reader #cassian andor x you #cassian andor x female reader #cassian andor x f!reader #andor tv #andor tv series #star wars fanfic #star wars fanfiction #star wars #andor fanfiction #cassian andor fanfiction #luthen rael #female reader #reader insert #new years eve #about you #amywritesthings

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amywritesthings · 1 year

Text

ownership of mine. (1/4)

Pairing: Kino Loy x Reader (ANDOR)

Word Count: 3.7K

Summary: The Empire has settled on a new experiment involving prison integration, with you as a test subject as one of the few women in Narkina 5. In a surprise turn of events, the manager of the unit takes you under his wing -- but for reasons you didn't anticipate.

Warnings: Rated M -- Prison, Implied Power Imbalance, Age Difference, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Mentions of Violence/Death (please note: because this is a prison, there is a fear of assault but no assault happens)

A/N: As is the Amy way, I wrote this in about four hours. Kino Loy is so goddamn fine. This could become a 2 or 3 parter, should people be interested. UPDATE - this is now a 3-parter.

PART ONE / PART TWO / PART THREE / PART FOUR

( Read on AO3 )

“Who were you in another life?”

Within these confined ivory walls, your whisper echoes like a shout. Yet no one in the cell block stirs from their slumber, your words drowned out by rumbling snores and palpable exhaustion.

It used to terrify you, how quiet this place could get after lockdown. How a breath felt like a scream, while screams bled into the whines and wears of factory machinery. Now you barely notice; it’s easy to become complacent, comfortable, in the inevitable.

(This is it. No way out.)

Kino Loy stares from across the electrified barrier in his neighboring cell, surveying you with scrutiny. He sits with both hands clasped, elbows balanced on either knee and expression indiscernible as he faces you directly. Watches you, directly.

Because everything, everyone, is under his watch — including you, the mistake that’s now cost the floor dearly.

“Doesn’t matter,” he gruffly responds. “Not anymore.”

. . . . . . . . .

ONE WEEK PRIOR

The Empire’s decision to integrate women into a men’s facility is not a mistake.

It’s a choice.

On your transport sat two other women in chains, scared out of their wits. Clearly fresh meat, by the looks of how much blood has drained from their body and pooled like dead weight to their feet. Trembling, too afraid to look around or up.

You watch, because this isn’t your first transport. Planted theft; the charge already made you go through the motions, the trembles, but it’s been seventy-eight days in the women’s prison back on Tertiere 2.

You’re not quite sure what warranted to the transfer to another women’s prison, but you’re not meant to ask questions. Keep your head down, endure, and maybe they’ll let you go.

None of you knew it was a transport to Narkina 5.

Narkina 5 is notoriously a male prison.

“We want to integrate populations,” is the reason you’re given by the head of operations once you step off the transport, painfully barefoot and freezing. “Consider yourselves the lucky three that decide if it’s worth it.”

One of the women cry out in fear when they announce her unit: One-Two-F. Another trembles harder at her verdict: Seven-Three-C.

You keep your mouth shut, but there is dread that fills your lungs so you wouldn’t be able to speak even if you tried: Five-Two-D.

They explain the floors are tungstoid steel, ready to light up at a moment’s notice. Something similar was used at the women’s prison, something as vile, but you make no sudden movement or reaction when you reach the guard tower overlooking a factory floor of two-dozen men.

A pin needle could drop in the silence that exists when they open the door and reveal the unit’s next victim.

Hands behind your head, you press your tongue to the roof of your mouth as you descend. Whispers start to trickle about your gender — some in wonder, others in disgust.

Yet a singular man — shorter, broad chested with a scowl — breaks the formations to receive you on the landing’s edge. His thick salt and pepper hair is combed back, groomed neatly despite the conditions.

You refuse to make eye contact as the Imperial guard shoves you off the platform, putting you at the mercy of the factory floor masses.

A pregnant pause almost makes you scared.

“My name is Kino Loy.” The man speaks, voice baritone and low with an unmistakable growl. “I own you now.”

The statement is matter of fact, but not in a malicious way.

You finally raise your eyes to him when the guard tower is sealed off, nostrils flaring with a mask of aggression.

His gaze is cold, but it’s calculated. Rehearsed.

“What is your name?”

At first, you don’t give it. You’re too busy giving a pointed look to every table of shocked faces: establishing dominance, if you can, before you’re meant to retire in the same barracks. You’re sure they didn’t design women-centric quarters.

(Hell, it looks like none of these men were given a warning that they were integrating.)

“Don’t look at them,” the man named Kino demands. “You don’t report or answer to them, you answer to me, is that clear? I asked for your name.”

“Doesn’t matter what my name is,” you reply under your breath.

“It does to me.”

Despite yourself, you focus back on him with a surprise lost in its translation. He doesn’t falter in his intensity.

(He means it.)

You mumble your name so that only he can hear, and Kino draws in a long, slow breath. The other men begin to abandon their posts to gawk around corners, the whispers growing to loud concern and worry.

Soon a half-circle forms like a pack of wolves.

“Now I know this isn’t our usual addition, but nothing’s changed.” Kino’s voice echoes with power along the ivory walls as he steps back, brows sliding higher in regard to the rest of the men here. “Do you hear me? Nothing. That means we leave her be, just as we leave everyone else be, and we don’t treat her any different.”

A protest breaks out from a gangly, lean man with thick black hair to your left. “She’ll slow us down!”

“She won’t.”

This isn’t a vote of confidence from Kino, but a threat. He looks at you, really looks at you, with a determination you cannot refuse.

“I won’t,” you supply belatedly, swallowing thickly to coat your throat as you look around the room to the others who aren’t so convinced. “I worked well at the other facility. I did what I needed to do.”

“The other facility?” one elderly man inquires. “You mean they transferred you?”

“This is heavy machinery,” another of the men sneers, and you step towards him with your own hiss of venom.

“What do you think they have the women’s prisons doing? Knitting Imperial sweaters?”

“Enough.” Palm flat and raised to keep you in your place, Kino signals a ceasefire before the war can start. “I spoke my terms, and those are the rules I expect you all to obey. Have I made myself clear?”

The floor goes silent, but eventually the masses nod in reluctant agreement. The power Kino has over the other men is enough to take your breath away — they respect another inmate so completely, with a clear and present hierarchy, that you cannot help but feel small.

“Good. Time to clean up for the evening, boys. Lights are gonna go in twenty. Make it quick. You—” He means you. “—they didn’t give you a separate unit, did they?”

“No.”

His jaw clenches with a decisive nod. “Then you’ll follow.”

To the barracks from the elevator, where you can feel everyone’s breath crawling down the back of your throat. Kino stays by your side, chin raised like a proud soldier.

Everyone disperses once the doors open to the barracks, leaving you as the final person standing in the broken semi-circle. Kino turns on a heel without another word, padding lightly down the brightly lit hallway with puzzle pieces for jail cells. You wait a second to ponder whether or not engaging is a good idea until you find yourself walking his way, crossing your arms over your chest.

“I will do what I need to do,” you reassure him once you’ve caught up, shoulder to shoulder.

His nostrils flare in a pause. “I know you will,” he responds, “because you have no other choice. You’ll be assigned Table Four. We have an opening there.”

“What position?”

“Whatever one I give you,” he says, and you feel your stomach curl. “I like my floors to be precise, hardworking, and pristine. You will not ruin my men’s chances of getting out of here.”

“I won’t.”

“I do not accept anything less.”

“Yes, sir.”

Kino pauses at that, turning his chin to stare you down. You stare back, uncertain of the elongated eye contact.

“Don’t do that.”

“What?”

He shifts his attention to the empty cell behind you, opting to leave his request in the past.

“That’s yours. Keep it tidy, keep it quiet, and don’t touch the floor.”

When you open your mouth to ask, the overhead speakers sound with a minute’s warning and Kino steps up to the cell to the left. The rest of the floor find their order like dominoes, one by one disappearing into their cell units until you remain.

You stumble backwards, up a step, until you're clear of the final few seconds. The floor glows red, simmering to a cool eggshell white with a trim, and that is it.

Kino turns away, back to you, and finds his place on the cot for sleep.

Five-hundred twenty-two days to go.

. . . . . . . . . The first three months are grueling.

At Tertiere 2, they have the women working on their factory floors with finer details. Magnifying technology, precision — everything has to be just so, or you lose.

Narkina 5 is a whole new level of ache.

While most men avoid even looking at you — wouldn’t dare, not when Kino rounds every corner like a rabid animal waiting to strike — Table Four does their best to include you. They make it a point to learn your name, treat you as one of their own, even if it means you don’t always make it to the winning table.

From what you’ve learned, they don’t really ever win the flavored food. Resign. Good enough to make it to the middle of the leaderboard, but not enough to get fried.

Everyone gets by. Everyone, in relative terms, is happy.

In your work, you frequently meet the older man’s gaze. He’s partial to watching you work; nodding every so often with approval when you beat the others in the assembly line, shaking his head if you fumble with a part, pausing in his pace if you lock eyes, but you never question it.

Maybe it’s because when you eat dinner alone in your cell, Kino Loy makes it a point to engage in the briefest of conversations. Little check-in’s that he affords the other inmates, but not at the frequency of yours.

Maybe it’s because when you take your leave to shower, you’ve seen Kino block the entryway with his own build on more than one occasion.

Maybe it’s because he gives you pointers, like how to opt for a counterclockwise approach to the knobs that you need to assemble or that your stance on the floor gives you less momentum than it would if you stood taller, prouder, like you’re a contributing member and not a hindrance.

Regardless, those little things may cease today when you finally say what you’ve wanted to tell him for the last several weeks — because there is a reason this table isn’t making top marks.

And it isn’t because of you.

You’re sucking through the clear tube for sustenance when you see Kino’s gray hair come into view. His lack of smiling somehow brings you comfort, but the constant surveying like he’s trying to figure you out negates it.

“You seem like you’re in a mood,” he states after a moment when you don’t greet him.

Removing the tube from your lips, you give a half-hearted shrug. “Because we have to talk.”

His brows bunch in the center. “Do we?”

“Yes.”

“About?”

“You know what.”

Kino’s expression smooths with recognition. His bare foot steps up, then the other, until he stands in your cell. You note Melshi’s look from the top barrack as he feeds, but he turns the other cheek when your eyes meet.

“Enlighten me.”

Better now then never.

“You need to change my position on the Table.” That intrigues him. Kino takes a step closer, crossing his arms over his chest in order to lean against the wall, cornering you into your cot. You stare up at him, legs crossed.

“You’re where you need to be.”

“But I’m not, and you know it,” you argue swift and low to avoid the masses from listening in. “You know Winshaw is Table Four's weakest link.”

“Excuse me?” Kino is not amused. You push on.

“It’s easy to blame me for the shortcomings of the table, but I’m ahead of everyone else. You’ve seen it.”

I know you watch me, is the subtext. His jaw sets.

“He has a bad hand.”

“So then he should have my station, and I can take his. It’ll put less strain on his hands.” You place the feeding tube back in its cubby hole before stranding, meeting Kino with a closeness you would never award anyone else. He doesn’t move, giving a look of contemplation. “I can lift the heavier equipment. I can benefit the unit’s productivity.”

“Bold of you,” Kino sniffs, “to assume all this.”

“I’m ready.” Toeing the line to step closer, you murmur with a softness that could get you killed. “Kino, I know I’m ready.”

If you didn’t know any better, then you’d swear his eyes dropped to your lips before finding your eyes. Always making a point of eye contact, to see you as a person — you’ve grown to greatly admire Kino for his principles, but you swallow the butterflies before they can float any higher.

“Please?”

You don’t recognize your own voice as you whisper.

Kino hovers in what little space is between you, mulling over your offer, before disengaging. You find yourself missing the warmth radiating from him. You don’t know why.

Without a word, he nods once — a yes — before the minute’s warning starts.

He walks across the hall with his back turned to you, but when the lights go out and the floor is ignited, he sleeps towards you.

. . . . . . . . . Swapping places with Winshaw gives you a second place win.

At first, Table Four adamantly hated the idea. Still do, with how they glare at you through the twelve-hour shift. Kino’s new directive to bring you to the other side of the table, trading Winshaw a new position, doesn’t sit right.

They don’t say no to Kino Loy.

They will, however, say their piece of mind to you when the shift is over and you’re on your way to the showers.

The table that once learned your name sits in a pack, arms crossed and waiting for your arrival. You shrug it off, trying not to notice, but a stocky man named Gris steps into your path.

“Some shit you pulled today, Lady Narkina,” he tells you, bending to find your attention. You keep your eyes low, somewhere pegged in the chest of his shirt where you’d surely like to punch.

“We won second,” you reply, monotone. “If anything, you should be celebrating.”

“You don’t get to make decisions for the rest of us,” Gris reasons. “You’ve been here for three kriffing months.”

“I have,” you say, “and not once have we gotten remotely close to the top — until now.”

“It’s ‘cus she worked her way to the top,” a man named Pusl grumbles, causing you to finally stare with wide eyes.

“Excuse you?”

Pusl grimaces. “Not sure how you fuck him so quietly, like.”

“Pusl,” a mousy addition, Trem, warns with a sharp gasp.

“What? S’the truth.”

You take the step to the right towards Pusl, chin raised with a challenge. “I’m hearing a lot of words, Pusl, but they all sound like bullshit.”

“It’s not like we don’t see him coming right to your cell after shifts,” Gris agrees without as much fervor. “Someone has to be offering favors to get beneficial treatment like today.”

You huff with disgust. “I asked for a change to help Winshaw. Everyone here pretends they don’t see his left hand going, so I offered to take the heavier load in order to save it from getting even more fucked. Kino would have your fucking head if he knew you thought so low of him.”

“And which one of these fucks thinks so low of me?”

The booming voice of Kino Loy breaks up the precipice of a fight, causing Table Four to cower from their interrogation. The older man's face is a tint of red, neck muscles strained as he flexes and balls his fist at his side.

“Nothing, Kino,” you hear from Gris.

“Didn’t sound like ‘nothing’.”

Kino simmers, taking purposeful steps into the circle to directly address Gris and Pusl. They keep their chins down, trying desperately to blend in with the wall. Kino doesn’t back down.

“If you have something to say about my decisions for this unit, then you come directly to me.”

“Yes, Kino.”

“Have I made myself clear?”

“Yes, Kino.”

“Good.”

One by one, Table Four disbands from the fresher doors to hide in their climbable cells. You don’t move, wouldn’t dare, until it’s only Kino that remains.

He breaks his own rule: when you turn to make way to the showers, Kino follows.

“You will remain in Winshaw’s spot tomorrow.”

Your heel turns, whipping around at the audacity of his intrusion and his order. Eyes wide, you laugh humorlessly at the manager of the unit.

“You’re serious?” you ask him.

“Do you question me?” he asks instead, brow quirked. You soften, smile blank.

“They think I’m blowing you to do this.” Kino doesn’t react to your vulgar confession beyond a blink. “That I’m influencing your decisions when you visit my cell.”

“You do influence my decisions,” he replies. “You made a good observation on Winshaw.”

“Did you hear what I just said?”

“And if they have issue with—”

“Kino.”

The desperation in his name causes him to stir, shift, against the tiles of the shower floor. You blink away with a defeat you cannot afford in the barracks. When you return your attention to him, you notice a chip in the manager’s resolve.

“I heard what you said,” he murmurs. “They’ve been assuming it since your first month here.”

Your mouth drops open. “Why?”

“Because we’re in unique positions. Manager of the unit and the only woman on the bloody floor, of course they’d assume.”

“And you didn’t elect to tell me?”

“Did I have to?”

His question brings a sort of clarity to your senses, filling your legs with lead. Of course. Of course they would assume, given his extra care to make sure no one gave you trouble. Of course they would speak behind your back, because you are not truly one of them.

Not even after getting them second kriffing place.

Deep down you always knew your constant interactions with Kino would make waves, but knowing is an entirely different beast.

“No matter what I say, they won’t believe me, will they?”

Kino observes your reaction, calculating what to say next, but all he can do is shake his head.

No. Nothing you say will make anyone believe differently.

You toss your towel to the shower stall with force, dragging a hand through your hair. The laugh just happens — first a snort, drowning in disbelief, before turning into a fully-fledged laugh. Kino remains still, waiting, but there is an inflection in his stare.

“Guess I won’t feel so bad now if I get off like Taga does every night without putting a mute button on,” you cruelly respond, taking to a turn towards the stall. “If everyone thinks I’m getting my shit rocked anyway—”

You lose your train of thought entirely when you feel a strong hand grab your forearm, closing around your flesh.

“Stop.”

You do, obeying the command of the older man. Kino looks different in this light, almost bordering on apologetic when he doesn’t need to be.

“I know… it isn’t pleasant to hear, and I’m sorry I didn’t say anything earlier.”

You wet your lips, tongue darting between them, and Kino’s attention drops. It isn’t until now that you realize you haven’t touched another person in nearly six months.

“I thought not talking about it would protect you.”

“Protect me?”

“They don’t bother you,” he finally states, but the sentence doesn’t sound like him. It’s coarse, sure, but it’s laced with uncertainty — something Kino Loy doesn’t possess. “Not if they think you’re mine.”

Oh.

Your entire body electrifies like the floor’s been activated unannounced.

No one has attacked you, no one has ever tried, because they all think their leader has taken a claim first. They must all notice how he looks at you, how he visits your cell to discuss work and menial tasks.

(Has he done all of this on purpose, to ensure your safety in the prison?)

“I’m sorry.”

You didn’t think he was capable of apologies. He never felt the need to.

“Don’t be,” you answer after several beats pass. “You’re right.”

There it is again: that flicker of an emotion he won’t relay, not fully. His grip lessens on your arm, but you do the unthinkable — you reach for his hand, placing your palm over his tired knuckles.

Kino becomes a statue.

“The goal is to get out of here, right?” When he doesn’t answer your question, you duck your head to evoke proximity. The older man inhales, slow and controlled, through his nose. “That’s the end game. That’s what we’re all striving for. If anything, you’ve done me a favor.”

“Don’t make me sound noble,” he warns without bite, slipping more of his grip from your arm. “Winshaw’s position is yours now. They’ll hate you for it, but if you do the same work as you did today, then the storm will pass.”

“And will you still visit?”

You ask despite yourself, suddenly feeling small. All of this could take your only ally in Narkina 5 away. In the depths of the rumor is truth: you care for the man, even if it’s foolish to care at all.

The absurdity of the question instinctively brings the grip to your arm, as if it’s an anchor when he tilts his chin in silent inquiry. You find yourself relishing in the proximity.

“It’s the only way they’ll keep assuming,” he answers plainly, before putting his free hand on yours. Gently he pries your fingers away until they’re held in his hand, small in the weight of his. “Do your job, keep your head low, and I will visit. Do I make myself clear?”

By the time you’re used to the calluses on his palm, the man completely removes himself from you and steps backwards once, twice, until he turns to resume his post as a guard to the stalls — for you.

You watch as a newfound feeling creeps into your veins and up your neck.

“Yes, Kino.”

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