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"She sent me a message."

But the contents, those are something she's going to keep to herself unless Tommy asks. She doesn't think he will, but if she's honest with herself she didn't think he'd show up here at all, let alone so soon after the breach.

And something that's still soft in her, that's still so open and free with her feelings about him has her sitting down on the curved couch. In the back of her head she wants him to sit close to her, but she-

Well. She knows better.

He's feeling the same urges, and ignoring them just the same way. Because it won't feel the same, it won't be the same.

He picks up his glass. He takes a sip. Tells her: "We went riding. I took her riding," he corrects himself.

It's different, for Rey. It will feel the same because it would be the same, the same way they held each other after she was hurt by the harpy so long ago, the way she held him after nightmares.

The way they just held each other to hold each other, because they were in love and and it was so easy to be together in that way. It's bringing those memories back more than she expected, but she won't show it. It feels private, something only she should feel.

He wouldn't want to share it anyway and there's just a point where offering parts of herself to the man Tommy is now becomes more of a colossal waste of time and energy more than it is sad.

"Had you done that with her before the breach?"

"No," he says, shaking his head and trying to relax back against the cushions.

"She liked it, I think. Don't think she's worked with animals all that much."

There's a good bit of distance between them, but she doesn't move to try to fill it. She could reach him if she reached out, but she doesn't. All the same, this doesn't feel as painful as she would have expected, as awkward, and she attributes it to the fact that they've done this before, been lovers in a breach and worked it out well after the fact.

"It's not a hard thing to like," she points out. "It's- peaceful. The horse doesn't expect anything from you, not really, and that automatically makes them better than a lot of people. Of course she liked it."

And if she had to guess, spending time with Tommy while the memories of him being her father were still there had probably made the whole thing feel a little more important.

"Do you see yourself in her?" He wonders, all of a sudden, with the kind of insight he suddenly displays sometimes.

"In some ways," she admits, frowning thoughtfully as she considers it. "She came here after she contacted me and we talked a little. She brought me an orange."

He'll know what that means to her, the kind of impression food freely given leaves on her.

"And she must see herself in you, in that case," he says, sounding a bit surprised.

"She has some social grace, but I see her watching me for cues sometimes."

"You'll have to ask her that," she says, because it's not something Rey is going to bring up. It feels too strange to do that, less invasive to just register what matches and what's different.

"And if we are alike, then her looking to other people for how to act can't be that odd to you."

It's something Rey had done in the beginning to get some sort of idea for what the basics of human interaction were, after all. Of course, she hadn't actually followed a lot of that, but some of it rubbed off on her.

"Her looking to me for how to act is odd to me," he points out to her, raising the glass to gesture a little.

That's a fair point, but Rey just shrugs

"No one can choose who they look to, it's just- something that happens. If we see ourselves in them and they seem to be doing something better than we are, why not want to emulate it?"

He waves his hand a little now, puts his glass back down and crosses his arms.

"Only I'm not her father anymore, am I? I'm her bloody inmate."

"You know it takes a little time for those memories to really fade," she points out, and there's a little something there that implies maybe he knew that, maybe he took her to see the horses while the memories were still fresh on purpose, but it's not something she'd say out loud when she doesn't know for sure. "Avoid her if you want to make a point."

Something, something strange and wild and unsure, makes her think he might not actually do that this time.

"No need for that," he says, a little stubbornly. "It's not her fault the Admiral's a prick."

That makes her laugh, which is a little surprising even for her, but there had been so much lightness to her in the breach and that hasn't faded away yet.

"At least we can always rely on that. The Admiral being a bastard will always be the one thing we can count on."

He hums a little, nods, then reaches for his glass again.

He seems to consider something for a second, and then decides to throw caution to the wind, and tells her: "The reason I asked you not to come to my cabin a few weeks ago is because I was planning on killing Kylo Ren."

Well, that certainly catches her off guard. The sudden honesty, the revelation itself, it's just- very unexpected. Why was he planning it? Why didn't he want her to know? She can guess he didn't want her around so that she wouldn't feel obligated to stop her, and maybe that extends into why she couldn't know, but more important is that the way he puts it, it sounds like he no longer has those plans.

"You were planning on it," she says, putting a gentle stress on the way he's used the past tense. "Not anymore?"

He shakes his head slowly, lips pursed a little in thought.

"Nope. Not anymore. Wouldn't have told you if I did."

She's still a little surprised he's told her at all. Maybe it's the breach, feelings lingering from it still that are making him more open than he normally would be.

Maybe what he did for her, finding her in Zero, giving her the strength to stay there, comforting her after she was out, maybe all of that shifted something in him. She doesn't know, she doesn't want to guess, so the easiest thing to do is just accept it and move forward.

"I'm glad you're not," she admits despite being entirely aware he already knows that. It just feels like something she needs to say out loud right now. "And I know it makes me a bad Jedi to say this, but there's an entire ship of people who haven't made that decision. He'll be paying for the things he's done for a long time."

That's a dark, cruel thing to say, but the one thing she's always been with Tommy is honest. When he's giving her that now how can she do any less?

"It's why I did come to this decision," he admits, shrugging a little and picking his glass back up.

"I know several of the people I'd contacted are still going to try and do it. Let them."

Her eyes widen a little in surprise when he says that.

"You got together a group to go after him?"

"Strength in numbers," he says, dryly, like he doesn't know why that's a surprise.

There's no arguing that, not when it'd been exactly what she had told him, and Steve, when they were showing signs of going after Kylo Ren to get her warden item back from Kylo Ren.

Don't go alone. The part that matters more is that he had listened when she said don't go at all. She reaches over and takes the glass from him, fills it back up, but instead of handing it back over right away she takes a drink from it herself first. Some things settle better with a little whiskey, she's learned thanks to him.

"I don't suppose you'll tell me who else was going to help," she says as she gives him the glass back.

He takes it, having raised an eyebrow at the sight of her taking a drink from the same glass. That's- intimate, but then again, they have been fucking.

"You suppose right, Rey. You're still a warden."

They have been fucking, and more and more lately they've been relying on each other, even going to each other for comfort. This is the first time Tommy's come to her, but there's no discounting the fact that they've both been fumbling with intimacy for months now.

"You're right. That's why you shouldn't let them know I appreciate the sentiment, if not the actual execution."

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bleak_midwinter - 2017-04-07 07:56 (UTC) - Expand