I just indulged myself with rereading A Love Song. As I went through the scenes, finding how deeply caring is Jyn and Cassian relationship in your fic, how mature are their gestures (the M-scene that always makes me crumble) and actions (Jyn's decision to leave Cassian behind in the port in order to save him), I began to wonder... How do you think in this AU would went the plot of Rogue One? Especially Eadu and its repercussions? I'm dying to know, as I'm sure it has been in your head already ;)
“I re-read your story” is forever my favorite thing to hear in a comment. I mean, lost of people will give something a courtesy first read, but if it was good enough to check out twice, and maybe good enough to give you something new the second time around, then I feel personally satisfied as a writer. I mean, damn.
Anyway, to your question...I really, truly believe that, given how in-tune Jyn and Cassian became when they had to start from a position of distrustful strangers, that if they had started the events of the movie already knowing and trusting one another, many things would have been different, but most specifically - Eadu. Cassian would have told her about his secondary secret orders to assassinate Galen. Jyn would have been angry - but remember, in the beginning, she didn’t know if Galen was trapped by the Empire or willingly one of their minions either. So she would have been more willing to work with him, less willing to run off and grab Galen on her own (after all, before Jedha, she didn’t know that Galen still even thought of her, if he was alive). So I think Eadu would have gone differently, which would mean maybe the Council would have gone differently (yes, I have many ideas about how and why that would have worked out). And even if the Council still rejected the at-the-time-unthinkable story of a Death Star, the Fleet would have responded a little differently. Maybe Cassian would have had time to do a little more sublte information spreading, resulting in more people being aware of the possibilities, the threat, maybe Raddus would have had more time to prepare a better CONOP for the battle of Scarif, maybe there would have been more assets, more coordinated air and ground support, an actual exit strategy, a higher survival rate...
Okay, long story short, I have put a *lot* of thought into what a slightly different galaxy might be like. The basics are the same, it really wouldn’t screw with A New Hope too much, but....yeah, it would be a different combat scenario on Scarif, which would lead to a different outcome.
