text » un: fathier

[starfortress]

I've never seen so many animals in all my life. Where I'm from, there's no wildlife. None. This place is amazing. [ playing the part. be calm, paige. you'll find your way.]  Although, I'm feeling wobbly as a mother Gorgybird.

[ it's the best thing she can think to say, that might attract the attention of anyone in the Resistance. it's not quite the most accurate signal but it's good enough for this situation.]

Does anyone know where I can see or find more?

Comments

[volitaunt]

[ The elevator doors chime. Open. Poe keeps staring at the device in his hand.

He hears the doors slide shut without registering that's what happened. BB-8 beeps a question, and Poe's too far out to even really hear it.

Barely there: ]

No.

[starfortress]

[ She's just learning about time discrepancies but Poe is from her time.]

Oh.

[volitaunt]

[ Another beep from BB-8. They're in the elevator. They're going to see her.

Poe pushes the button to open the doors, stepping out into the hall. ]

I'm about to--I'm almost to you.

[ He shuts off the comm and walks into communal housing. ]

[starfortress]

[ She makes sure to be at her bunk, standing close to the number so he can see her.]

[volitaunt]

[ He stops when he does. She's there. She looks alive, she looks perfectly and entirely alive.

So does Cassian. So does Jyn. He's just never had to think about leaving one of their own behind. Leaving someone he knows behind. Not when they haven't...

But she has.

Poe crosses the room quickly and then hesitates right in front of her, like closing that last gap and hugging her will turn her to dust. He reaches out instead, tentative, and rests a hand against her cheek. ]

[starfortress]

[ Despite the troubling revelations they'd just tripped over, she can't help but smile at him. And when he touches her cheek, she doesn't hesitate in moving to pull him into a hug. ]

It's good to see you.

[volitaunt]

[ He hugs her back, still in shock. He wants to say it's good to see her, too. He wants to be able to mean it. But there's too much going on inside his head. The conflict between being glad she's here, given a second life, running up hard against the mourning he's not sure he's allowed. He feels like he's talking to a ghost, but maybe that's all either one of them is. ]

Yeah. [ Again, the word is barely there. Then he hugs her back a little more firmly. ] Yeah, you too.

[starfortress]

[ She lets him hug her tighter before she speaks, she can sense his shock and she wants to lessen it somehow.]

Poe, it's okay.

[volitaunt]

It's not okay.

[ Her being dead is not okay. Her trying to comfort him, when he should be the one comforting her, is not okay. He draws back a little, brushes her hair out of her face. ] Rose...?

[starfortress]

[ Her expression falters at the mention of her sister.] My sister was on the Raddus.

[volitaunt]

[ So Rose, at least, might have lived. Rose could be back in their world, alive and well. It would break his heart to think the galaxy lost both the Tico sisters and only one of them ended up here.

He just nods. Because saying "that's good," seems entirely wrong. Cold. Cruel.

He pulls Paige into another hug. ]

[starfortress]

[ She wants her sister to be with her more than anything but this place...] Is this the after? [ Is this where they go when they die? Did that mean that Poe was dead? The Admiral? The General? Rey? Finn? The others she'd met from their world were long dead.]

[volitaunt]

I don't know any more.

[ He'd been so ready to believe what he'd been told, in spite of saying he didn't trust this place or its people. He'd wanted it to be true, that they could go back, that no time would pass. ] I don't know.

[starfortress]

Holdo told me the Raddus survived, that they made it to Crait? [ She pulls back to look at him. She doesn't tell him what else she knows, he's already taking it all so badly.] Wasn't that an old base from before?

sure thought i hit reply on this

[volitaunt]

To Crait....

[ Had he read something about that planet? He feels like he did, somewhere, in the swathes of paperwork he'd had to wade through when he first joined the Resistance. ] Maybe. I don't remember.

[ It seems like he doesn't remember a lot of things. ]

i do that a lot

[starfortress]

[ She was more of a nerd than him. She studied, she read. She learned.

He's still... well, she ducks her head to try and catch his gaze.]

It was worth it, Poe. You know that, right? I knew what I was signing up for. We all did.

[volitaunt]

[ He tries to smile for her. ]

I know you did. I know. [ Becoming a Resistance fighter is making a pact with death. Give me this long, to do this much, and you can have me when it's done. Sometimes death even waits long enough for the loss to mean something. ] You don't have to try and make me feel better, Paige.

[starfortress]

[ She manages a smile for him because it's what she's good at, being calm, putting people at ease.] Stop looking at me like we're at my funeral. [ She pats his shoulders.] I'm here.

[volitaunt]

Yeah. [ A tiny exhalation. ] Have you seen Finn? Or Rey, have you met her yet? Holdo and Leia are here too.

[starfortress]

I've spoken to the Vice Admiral and General. [ She smiles a little.] I met Rey on the device. She invited me for dinner.

[volitaunt]

That's good. That's--good, you can meet Finn, too.

[ And he'll have to figure out a way to tell his friends that this is one of his students, and that she can't come back with them. That latter part he'll do away from Paige's hearing, if he possibly can. If she doesn't tell them herself, which she might. ]

You'll like him.

[starfortress]

I heard he was here. [ Cue the fangirling.] Rose would be so... [ Her face falls from the smile she's been keeping up, only for the briefest of moments.] She'll be jealous. [ Not that she'll ever know unless she comes here.

God, Paige misses her.]

So you live... where, exactly?