albinomilksnake | STAR WARS: possible spoiler warning

I'm just saying they're pretty quick, you know? [He's seen it firsthand, and it's there, that tension in his shoulders when he stops to look at her for just a second-- downgrading to watching her via his peripheral vision. Tie fighters snapping up their prey, scouts first, then the relay, then the destroyers - old relics still breathing in the fumes of a scorched Empire. Replays it in the back of his skull, sees the glint of polished metal out there between planets where there's nothing but void.] These guys don't mess around. I've seen it happen a hundred times-- maybe more.

I have it under control.

[She can. She know she can. She might not know this ship, but she knows it components - she knows the kinds of wires that go into it, the connections those wires meet, what they power and how much draw those pieces push and pull. She knows the value of parts and what they're good for which is, she hopes, just as good as knowing how to run. That part she isn't an expert on.

But this isn't running, she reminds herself. They're going toward something and that's different. It still has something beating irregular behind her rib cage, but she refuses to listen to it.]

And I believe you, okay. I do. [One hand pressed to his chest, finally meeting her stare to try and impart a little directness-- a little weight to the conversation where she might opt to otherwise brush him off. The Lieutenants did it, Phasma did it: he's not an actor, but he grew up watching humans twisting themselves under pressure, creating pressure, cycling it all back around again. He knows how to fake it.

Probably.]

That's why I trust you with BB-8, and that's why I had your back back there. But this mission? It's huge. We're talking survival of the rebellion huge, and that-- [He taps the panel between them, instantly recoiling when it beeps like something's been pressed before recovering his own figurative footing.] means scan it again.

[Of course he believes her. She got them out of Niima and off Jakku. Or-- he got her onto this garbage heap of a ship and that got them off the planet. Or-- look, it doesn't really matter who got who where, just that the three of them were here on the ship and they all knew what they were doing. Kind of. She knew how to fly. BB-8 knew where to go. And Finn--

Is setting off the buttons on the center console. She makes a small noise, waving his hand away so she can reconfigure the settings on what he's pushed into the wrong position. Stop that.]

Fine. I'm scanning. Again.

[And she does. Beep boop beep.]

Edited 2015-12-24 17:32 (UTC)

Thank you. [Firmly, arms folding (for safety) as he falls back into his seat. No alarms, no early warnings blaring off behind them through cold, skeletal corridors - it puts his beating heart at ease, if nothing else.

--More at ease.]

Nothing wrong with being careful. [Like it'll somehow change her mind, transfer the urgency of his life, his experiences over across the space between them. Like he's being reasonable, when all he's done is uproot her for the sake of jumping at the first spaceport they reach. Or the tenth - can't be too overzealous when it comes to getting clear of the First Order's path.] That's all.

Obviously.

[It could be easy for that to be sharp, but it isn't really. She's checking the scan, her attention flicking out into the space beyond the window. It's empty, a quiet series of pings. She doesn't know exactly the extent of the ship's features, but she feels confident that if something was wrong, if something popped up on the scans, that it'd be hard not to notice.

Instead they're just left with empty, cold black space. She knows she should be glad. And she is, really. The alternative is being shot dead in Niima...

She flicks a series of switches. The pings go quiet.]

[She's so strange. Easier to read than Captain Phasma at times, but she runs so hot and cold it's easy for his mind to wander - assume the worst in quiet seconds where his mind doesn't know exactly how to settle. Maybe she's mad at him for prodding her, maybe she's having it rough and he's making it rougher, and if she gets too annoyed too quickly she might just-- nah. She wouldn't run out on BB-8, or rush back behind them to say hello to the First Order for the sake of a pile of junk.

--Would she?

He sits there for a moment longer, wiggling his fingers against his arms like a nervous tic beneath leather. Nothing disruptive, just the hum of his own internal engine starting up before he's ready to hit the gas. Figuratively.] Hey, I know it's a pain. It's been my life for too many years: watching for double agents, always checking my back.

But I promise, Rey, as soon as the First Order follows us away from Jakku-- forgets the mark they put on your head-- you can go home.

[That makes her mouth pull crooked, something like a wry quirk of a smile. Barely there at all really, the ghost of a reflex, but it sticks instead of sliding off her face the moment after. She shoots him a sideways look.]

You really think that? That they'll just forget me?

[There's an obvious note of doubt there, but at least half the sentiment is genuine. What does she really know about the First Order? Not what a Resistance fighter does, anyway. Maybe she really can just slide back between the cracks. Disappear. Once he and BB-8 are gone, she'll go back to being nothing more than a scavenger, the only thing of value on her half ruined metal and wiring and repurposed rubber.

That makes sense, then. A person like that would be easy to forget.]

[Infectious, that little quirk there at the corner of her lip: part of the reason he'd pried into the state of her life aside from just the fact that she somehow managed to save his own. His expression instinctively mirrors hers (one of the benefits of helmets, those visors never ran both ways) eyes bright and level when he meets her stare-- he hasn't forgotten the weight of what's behind them, he just has the luxury of a good view of what's ahead.

And it's more than he ever found in cold walls or cramped corridors, armor pinning him in like a noose.

He's not fidgeting anymore.] They get bigger targets. Better ones.

[And then, attention fixed, Finn adds, peeling the leather from his shoulders:] You cold?

Gotta be after spending forever on that dustball. Here.

[That much is true, she knows. If the Resistance finds Luke Skywalker - if that's real and not just a crazy story, like talking about catching the sun (crazy like leaving Jakku on an antique spaceship) then, sure. She's no one.

No one who, honestly, wouldn't mind a turn with the jacket.]

Sure.

[She has no compunctions about taking it off his hands when offered and shrugging into it. No arguments about Jakku being a dustball - no sense arguing with a fact.]

Just keep it closed there-- [Reaching across the panel again, fingers still light over leather until he flicks his grip, laying down one of the automatic snaps just overtop her collarbone. A lot of things they teach First Order troops are ways to kill, to disarm and maim without flinching or fear, but it has the added effect of insight when it comes to helping, sometimes. Little things, like where heat's stored mostly within the human chest, and how insulating it properly can make a world of difference everywhere else. Hands, feet-- counting off the facts he knows in his head as he pulls back away from her into his seat.] --and you'll feel better in no time.

[Things like this? They were rare. He never got to really talk to the only friend he had within the stormtrooper ranks; it's hard not to wonder how well he'd have managed if the both of them had lived instead. Quiet appreciation wound up in the seconds he spends watching her--

Before his elbow hits the same switch again, setting off a jarring collection of unhealthy-sounding beeps. So much for sentimentality.]

Oh. Thank you.

[It's-- a strange, pleasant gesture. She's never had anyone offer her a jacket, to do a snap for her, do anything more than pass her a brush to scrub scrap with. But that makes sense. That's just Jakku. There are other systems and other planets where the people are gentler, where it doesn't cost a microvalve and a mostly working binary motivator to earn a half ration.

And then his elbow throws off the same course switches and she hisses, bats his hand and his elbow and his whole arm away with-:] Watch it!

[She hastily corrects what he's knocked out of place.]

Honestly, what do they even teach you in the Resistance? [How to aim and fire, apparently. He's a good shot even if he doesn't know how to sit in a cockpit.]

[Thoroughly swatted for his transgression, 2187 scrubs diligently at his own elbow, using it as an excuse to keep from giving an answer right away. Mostly because for all the vids they watched, all the speeches Hux gave-- he didn't really know the Resistance. Or much of anything else, for that matter.

They said people starved for the Republic's depravity while Phasma demanded that they mow down striking workers, they promised order and change and a better life, but they stole children to do it, and he watched, uselessly, as Slip just...died. For nothing. For less than nothing. And in the face of all that? There was Poe.

He picks at the leather with his fingertips, the gesture already running out of steam.] Oh you know, most of it's pretty classified stuff.

[Which, if they were talking about the First Order, would actually be true.] Besides, I always did most of the teaching. Cadets needed somebody standing around watching their backs, making sure they don't slip up and get themselves killed.

STAR WARS: possible spoiler warning

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