He's silent for a few seconds after that, as he looks at her and lets that sink in. She needed to share this with someone and chose him, and he's not sure why that makes such an impact but it does. Even after all this time on the Barge, he doesn't consider himself a good man. He isn't. But at least here, he can do a good thing.
"Thank you for telling me," he finally says, sincerely.
Being in the Enclosure as they are, they don't hear the announcement. When the flood hits, it's just them, on this ship in the desert- but he knows something happened. Because suddenly he can feel someone else's exhaustion and worry besides his own- and Rey may feel a little more soothed than she might have been just from his words, just from having him here.
"Are you...?" He frowns, turns to her completely. Is she feeling this?
She feels less beaten down by this place now, still far from happy but at least at a place where she can see the light at the other end of the tunnel again. She hadn't gotten to thanking him yet, so when he beats her to it she realizes maybe this was something they both needed. Something good for both of them. She had referred to him as her friend when asked about him before, but at the time she had only used that word because she didn't know a better one.
Now, she's a little more sure that's right. And that's something she can try to focus on instead of the gnawing hunger in her stomach, the uneasiness about the future. It's a help, and she can at least reciprocate.
"Thank you for letting me," she finally says, and that's much better.
She doesn't feel a change, though, as she's looking around the AT-AT one last time before intending to step out of it and leave it behind as much as she can. She'll never be entirely free of Jakku, she knows that now, but she doesn't have to dwell.
"I'll be fine," she says, misinterpreting his question entirely. "This can't last forever, right?"
"No," he says, frowning and shaking his head, bringing up a hand to silence her-- and there it is. He can still feel something, like he's hearing it in his head.
"Can't you feel that? I--"
He's about to try and explain it to her, how there's a shift, how there are things in his mind that aren't coming from him.
And then the lights go out, and the space they're in gets smaller, and suddenly he can't quite think of anything but his own emotions anymore.
She's been in small places before, of course, so they don't bother her, but she can absolutely do without all the lights going out on her like this, leaving her feeling exposed and abruptly remembering why this was supposed to be a short trip to the enclosure. They both know by now this has been happening, problems in the enclosure, but she had timed it on purpose to the most recent one and had been so sure that they'd have at least enough time to get in and out.
Things must be getting worse if the enclosure is failing at a faster pace now.
As the space gets smaller she's forced closer to Tommy, can feel her back bump into his chest before the walls finally stop their closing in. She's hesitant to reach out and find where he is, and even more hesitant to reach out to feel for where the walls are because now that she thinks about it she can't remember if anyone said pushing back against the walls was painful or not.
"I thought we'd have more time," she says, and her voice is even, she's calm enough about this that she won't spike his fears any higher on accident.
He's breathing hard already, trying to keep himself calm by closing his eyes- she won't see, not in this darkness. He lets her calm wash over him but can't quite-- he can't quite manage it.
The warmth of her body nearby makes it a little easier to focus, and he grits out the words: "Call someone to come get us out?"
She knows that won't work, they've all heard by now that the enclosure powers down and doesn't open up until it's ready to, but she can tell this isn't settling well on him. She knows it won't do any good but she brings her communicator out anyway, and calls Furiosa to tell her what's happening.
But all they can do is wait, so once the call is over Rey sighs heavily and shakes her head.
"There might be enough room to sit down if we sit closely. It might be awhile."
"I'm not," he starts, and then bites the inside of his cheek to get himself to focus. It's been almost two years, he tells himself, get the fuck over it already.
He searches out the wall, to see how far he has- not far at all, and when he sits down he can feel his knees shaking a little.
"Rey," he begins again, hesitantly, wondering if it'll make it better or worse to tell her, but in the darkness it still feels like the walls are closing in on him, like there's no air to breathe, and he isn't sure but he thinks he can hear it, can hear the knocking, like a nightmare while he's fully awake--
He doesn't even realize it, but he's shaking, breathing fast enough that she'll know he's having a panic attack.
Rey has never witnessed a panic attack, but it doesn't really matter when it's immediately clear something is very wrong here. This is more than not liking a small space, she can hear in his voice that it's more than that, and there's so little space in here that when he sits she can feel him trembling when he bumps her.
She's still not afraid, but now there's concern blooming in her and she's not at all sure what to do with it, how to help him. She gets down beside him, somehow manages not to smack him with her knees, and when she reaches out to find where he ended up her hand lands in the center of his chest.
Which won't do. She moves it immediately to his shoulder instead, settles down beside him without really registering how closely pressed they are.
"It won't last all day," she says, because clearly he needs to not be in here. "It's- it always comes back on. We'll get out."
He can feel the concern piling on top of his own anxiety, her uncertainty over what to do. And something inside of him is reaching out to her, piling comfort on her worries, her troubles, but it's making the mess inside of his head even bigger.
His nails are digging into his palms so hard that he thinks he's drawing blood, but even that can't bring him back.
He can hear them, on the other side of the wall. Whispering ich hör es and sei ruhig, and they're going to kill him, they're going to burst through and run him through and shoot Freddie and this time the blast will kill him with all of them.
He's crying without sound, tears rolling down his cheeks in an attempt by his body to push the tension out as the pressure on his chest gets bigger and bigger.
With her hand on his shoulder she can feel what's happening to him. He's shaking, yes, but it's different now. He's crying.
Something happened to him long before he ever came here, something that has nothing to do with her, and it must have been something in a dark, trapped space just like this. He's got to be terrified if this is what he's reduced to because he's always been so strong, so stoic, and that had been what she found comforting about him from the very first time she had run straight into him after a confrontation with Kylo Ren.
But she has no idea how to turn that around and help him like he had helped her. She's not good at comfort on a good day, but this? This requires action, and she has to do something because her heart will break if she doesn't.
She's done what she can to leave the breach behind her and for the most part she has. Those memories are not hers, that woman was not her, but that woman knew how to take care of that version of Tommy. She had been there for him in his times of need. She had known what to do.
Is it right to take the actions of someone she never was and apply them to something like this? Wouldn't it be worse to not do anything she can? That has to be worse. She has no idea what she's doing, but relying on memories of what it felt like to love someone and help them through their lowest points can't be bad.
Her hand moves from his shoulder up to his neck, around to the back of his head, and she gives him a light tug to pull him towards her.
"It's not going to last." She says quietly, but there's a firmness to her voice that makes it hard to question that as anything but fact. Her other arm goes around his shoulder, and it's odd but she's holding him anyway and if he lets her she'll go on doing it until he's calmed down. "The lights will come back, and you're not in here alone. It's just the Enclosure, it isn't dangerous."
It doesn't filter through at first: he can hear her voice, but lost in memories like he is it's warped into something different, something hostile. Her worry threads through his panic, her uncertainty making his own worse, and he hunches to try and get away from it all.
If he remembered he had a gun, right now, he would have started shooting already.
But he doesn't: in fact, he hardly remembers that she's there at all until she cups the back of his neck just so-- until she's so close that he can feel her against his entire front, and she's saying something. Someone is teling him it isn't dangerous, but they must be mad, and the lights haven't been on for what feels like weeks.
It tears a sob from his throat even as he moves into her body, fists still clenched at his side. "They're right there," he whispers, and once he opens his mouth he can't stop: "They're there, I can hear 'em, we have to get out, they'll blow us all up--"
She has no idea who they are, of course, but when it comes down to it it really doesn't matter if she understands what he's talking about in this moment. Maybe she'll find out some day, but it won't be right now. She doesn't really care about the details right now.
"No, Tommy, it's just us. It's just you and me, and we're on the Barge." Something makes her move her hand from the back of his neck to the back of his head, makes her rub his back as she keeps him in close. "You're on the Barge and they aren't. It's just us, Tommy. Look."
He can't look in the dark, but she moves her arm away for just long enough to follow the line of his arm down with her hand, find his fist and unclench it and press it to her cheek.
"See, Tommy? It's Rey. You're with Rey on the Barge."
Later, he won't know why that broke through the fog: her cheek underneath his skin, warmth, the calm she's radiating into him somehow. He doesn't understand it, but the fact of the matter is that he stops weeping for long enough that he hears her words.
It's Rey, he hears, and he hears Barge, and it's jut her and him, just him and her, in the darkness, together.
She's overcome for a moment by the intense desire to turn her face in his hand, to kiss his palm, and it almost happens. Something about the dark, on pulling from memories that aren't hers, it's blurring things too much and she almost slips.
But she doesn't. She does lean her forehead against his, though, because that seems okay. That's not too far.
"That's right. You showed me horses here, remember?"
"I did?" He sounds genuinely confused for a second, but somehow he feels loved, cherished, desired. There's still confusion in there, and some pain, but mostly it's just calm.
"I did," he then decides, eyes still closed tight against the darkness outside. At least this is a darkness he chose. "You-- ate the bloody jerky."
Despite everything, that makes her smile a little. Out of everything he could latch onto, it's her eating the jerky he had wanted her to give to the horse.
"I'd do it again, too." She says, and her hand is absently smoothing down the back of his head, the stubble there is catching on her fingers but she hardly cares when he's coming out of this and she just feels relieved. She's never felt the impulse to care for someone like this, to want to protect them, but now it isn't going away.
She wants to do everything she can for him, and if that includes staying exactly like they are right now until the lights come back she's going to do it.
"Gotta--" He shivers, hiccups a little sob before he can try again. That hand on his head feels so good, and he tries very hard to relax into whatever it is that's happening that is letting him feel relief. And there's care, again: more care than he's felt in a long time.
"Gotta save it for r-rations, now," he finally manages. His chest still feels tight, painful, and in his head he can still hear the shovels. But she's giving him something else to think about.
She bites the inside of her cheek to keep from saying Oh, Tommy when she hears his voice crack, and there's a fresh wave of concern that she still can't make any sense of. She was never in love with him but that doesn't mean she likes this at all, she wishes she could stop it, that she could take her lightsaber and cut the walls down and get them out, but it won't work. All they can do is wait.
If she ever gets the chance to, she's going to beat the Admiral bloody for this. For Tommy, for her, for the entire barge.
"I know, I've been careful." She murmurs, and it feels odd and not at the same time to pitch her voice so it's soothing and gentle. "I've got a whole stockpile now, we'll be set in the Falcon."
"I scared you," he whispers, still keeping her close, letting her presence be the thing that grounds him when there's nothing else. There's anger coming from her, concern, a hint of violence- he can feel it like he's looking at her face.
For some reason, that makes her move her hand from his, stops pressing it to her face so she can put her arm back around him and hold him again.
"That's alright," she says at once, because it is, it doesn't matter, if anything him scaring her is probably the least important thing that's happened in here today. She's forgotten being hungry, being afraid of there not being any food, being worried about her friends outside this room. All there is right now is Tommy, keeping him with her and talking to her instead of listening to whatever he had been hearing before.
He's silent for a while, while he gets his breath back, while he tries to alleviate the pressure on his chest. He probably-- he knows he should, he should let go of her, give her back her space. But there is no space, here, it's a tiny, dark box that can barely hold the two of them. And right now, he feels like the only thing anchoring him is that embrace, her presence, her words.
He lets the silence linger as he things, and then finally speaks up again. "There was a war, in my world," he starts.
While he's quiet she just holds him, hands stroking up and down his back and the back of his head, and the only thing he'll pick up from her now is the unwavering sense of rightness. She's more than happy to do this for him, she's touched he's letting, and she's honestly a little glad to know she can do this. That it's in her, somewhere, and even though she had to call on the knowledge of someone she never was to get this far she's there now. Hopefully, that will never go away.
When he starts to explain she stays quiet, but her arms go a little tighter around him, protectively. She'll let him work through it on his own time, and as long as she refuses to let go of him she hopes it'll make telling this story easier.
"I forged a birth certificate," he starts, because that's easier to talk about. He presses his nose into the crook of her neck for a second before catching himself. It's just that getting closer to her feels like getting closer to the comfort, to the soft emotions that she's giving off.
"Didn't have one, before. But I wanted to fight for my country, so me and my brothers forged birth certificates and signed up."
She doesn't mind it, she finds, when she feels the brush of his nose and the puff of his breath against her neck. In another situation it might make her blush or think too hard about what that means, but he had just been crying. He might still be crying, and if he wants to press his face into her neck for whatever reason she's going to let him.
She can put together a little better where this is going, now. He'd gone to war too young, too hopeful, and whatever happen had beaten that out of him. She bites her lip and holds him tighter still, like if she just keeps him as close to her as she can she can soak up all his pain and sorrow.
She's never wanted to do that for anyone before. The fact that she does now leaves her feeling a little awed, because it's honestly something she didn't know she was capable of.
"I started in the yeomanry," he says, sounding a little more distant, now: he feels it, with his eyes closed and her comfort washing over him- there's hints of other things, awe and surprise and understanding. But mostly it's care, soft and gentle.
"You put a load of gypsy lads on horses and they'll fight for that horse harder than they'll fight for themselves, right?"
He sighs, softly, shifts his head so his forehead is just resting on her shoulder. He can still feel the panic in his belly, can feel tears threatening, but he can keep them at bay for now.
"This war... it was static. New weapons, bigger armies. We went to a different country and dug ourselves into trenches and we wouldn't move for weeks. We'd lose men by the dozens, but we wouldn't move."
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 03:44 pm (UTC)"Thank you for telling me," he finally says, sincerely.
Being in the Enclosure as they are, they don't hear the announcement. When the flood hits, it's just them, on this ship in the desert- but he knows something happened. Because suddenly he can feel someone else's exhaustion and worry besides his own- and Rey may feel a little more soothed than she might have been just from his words, just from having him here.
"Are you...?" He frowns, turns to her completely. Is she feeling this?
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 05:23 pm (UTC)Now, she's a little more sure that's right. And that's something she can try to focus on instead of the gnawing hunger in her stomach, the uneasiness about the future. It's a help, and she can at least reciprocate.
"Thank you for letting me," she finally says, and that's much better.
She doesn't feel a change, though, as she's looking around the AT-AT one last time before intending to step out of it and leave it behind as much as she can. She'll never be entirely free of Jakku, she knows that now, but she doesn't have to dwell.
"I'll be fine," she says, misinterpreting his question entirely. "This can't last forever, right?"
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 06:34 pm (UTC)"Can't you feel that? I--"
He's about to try and explain it to her, how there's a shift, how there are things in his mind that aren't coming from him.
And then the lights go out, and the space they're in gets smaller, and suddenly he can't quite think of anything but his own emotions anymore.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 06:51 pm (UTC)Things must be getting worse if the enclosure is failing at a faster pace now.
As the space gets smaller she's forced closer to Tommy, can feel her back bump into his chest before the walls finally stop their closing in. She's hesitant to reach out and find where he is, and even more hesitant to reach out to feel for where the walls are because now that she thinks about it she can't remember if anyone said pushing back against the walls was painful or not.
"I thought we'd have more time," she says, and her voice is even, she's calm enough about this that she won't spike his fears any higher on accident.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 07:00 pm (UTC)The warmth of her body nearby makes it a little easier to focus, and he grits out the words: "Call someone to come get us out?"
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 07:09 pm (UTC)But all they can do is wait, so once the call is over Rey sighs heavily and shakes her head.
"There might be enough room to sit down if we sit closely. It might be awhile."
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 07:16 pm (UTC)He searches out the wall, to see how far he has- not far at all, and when he sits down he can feel his knees shaking a little.
"Rey," he begins again, hesitantly, wondering if it'll make it better or worse to tell her, but in the darkness it still feels like the walls are closing in on him, like there's no air to breathe, and he isn't sure but he thinks he can hear it, can hear the knocking, like a nightmare while he's fully awake--
He doesn't even realize it, but he's shaking, breathing fast enough that she'll know he's having a panic attack.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 07:24 pm (UTC)She's still not afraid, but now there's concern blooming in her and she's not at all sure what to do with it, how to help him. She gets down beside him, somehow manages not to smack him with her knees, and when she reaches out to find where he ended up her hand lands in the center of his chest.
Which won't do. She moves it immediately to his shoulder instead, settles down beside him without really registering how closely pressed they are.
"It won't last all day," she says, because clearly he needs to not be in here. "It's- it always comes back on. We'll get out."
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 07:41 pm (UTC)His nails are digging into his palms so hard that he thinks he's drawing blood, but even that can't bring him back.
He can hear them, on the other side of the wall. Whispering ich hör es and sei ruhig, and they're going to kill him, they're going to burst through and run him through and shoot Freddie and this time the blast will kill him with all of them.
He's crying without sound, tears rolling down his cheeks in an attempt by his body to push the tension out as the pressure on his chest gets bigger and bigger.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 07:51 pm (UTC)Something happened to him long before he ever came here, something that has nothing to do with her, and it must have been something in a dark, trapped space just like this. He's got to be terrified if this is what he's reduced to because he's always been so strong, so stoic, and that had been what she found comforting about him from the very first time she had run straight into him after a confrontation with Kylo Ren.
But she has no idea how to turn that around and help him like he had helped her. She's not good at comfort on a good day, but this? This requires action, and she has to do something because her heart will break if she doesn't.
She's done what she can to leave the breach behind her and for the most part she has. Those memories are not hers, that woman was not her, but that woman knew how to take care of that version of Tommy. She had been there for him in his times of need. She had known what to do.
Is it right to take the actions of someone she never was and apply them to something like this? Wouldn't it be worse to not do anything she can? That has to be worse. She has no idea what she's doing, but relying on memories of what it felt like to love someone and help them through their lowest points can't be bad.
Her hand moves from his shoulder up to his neck, around to the back of his head, and she gives him a light tug to pull him towards her.
"It's not going to last." She says quietly, but there's a firmness to her voice that makes it hard to question that as anything but fact. Her other arm goes around his shoulder, and it's odd but she's holding him anyway and if he lets her she'll go on doing it until he's calmed down. "The lights will come back, and you're not in here alone. It's just the Enclosure, it isn't dangerous."
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 07:59 pm (UTC)If he remembered he had a gun, right now, he would have started shooting already.
But he doesn't: in fact, he hardly remembers that she's there at all until she cups the back of his neck just so-- until she's so close that he can feel her against his entire front, and she's saying something. Someone is teling him it isn't dangerous, but they must be mad, and the lights haven't been on for what feels like weeks.
It tears a sob from his throat even as he moves into her body, fists still clenched at his side. "They're right there," he whispers, and once he opens his mouth he can't stop: "They're there, I can hear 'em, we have to get out, they'll blow us all up--"
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 08:10 pm (UTC)"No, Tommy, it's just us. It's just you and me, and we're on the Barge." Something makes her move her hand from the back of his neck to the back of his head, makes her rub his back as she keeps him in close. "You're on the Barge and they aren't. It's just us, Tommy. Look."
He can't look in the dark, but she moves her arm away for just long enough to follow the line of his arm down with her hand, find his fist and unclench it and press it to her cheek.
"See, Tommy? It's Rey. You're with Rey on the Barge."
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 08:37 pm (UTC)It's Rey, he hears, and he hears Barge, and it's jut her and him, just him and her, in the darkness, together.
"Rey," he croaks, and then again: "Rey?"
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 08:44 pm (UTC)But she doesn't. She does lean her forehead against his, though, because that seems okay. That's not too far.
"That's right. You showed me horses here, remember?"
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 08:47 pm (UTC)"I did," he then decides, eyes still closed tight against the darkness outside. At least this is a darkness he chose. "You-- ate the bloody jerky."
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 08:54 pm (UTC)"I'd do it again, too." She says, and her hand is absently smoothing down the back of his head, the stubble there is catching on her fingers but she hardly cares when he's coming out of this and she just feels relieved. She's never felt the impulse to care for someone like this, to want to protect them, but now it isn't going away.
She wants to do everything she can for him, and if that includes staying exactly like they are right now until the lights come back she's going to do it.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 09:46 pm (UTC)"Gotta save it for r-rations, now," he finally manages. His chest still feels tight, painful, and in his head he can still hear the shovels. But she's giving him something else to think about.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 09:55 pm (UTC)If she ever gets the chance to, she's going to beat the Admiral bloody for this. For Tommy, for her, for the entire barge.
"I know, I've been careful." She murmurs, and it feels odd and not at the same time to pitch her voice so it's soothing and gentle. "I've got a whole stockpile now, we'll be set in the Falcon."
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 10:00 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 10:08 pm (UTC)"That's alright," she says at once, because it is, it doesn't matter, if anything him scaring her is probably the least important thing that's happened in here today. She's forgotten being hungry, being afraid of there not being any food, being worried about her friends outside this room. All there is right now is Tommy, keeping him with her and talking to her instead of listening to whatever he had been hearing before.
"I'm alright now, I promise."
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 10:16 pm (UTC)He lets the silence linger as he things, and then finally speaks up again. "There was a war, in my world," he starts.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-14 10:24 pm (UTC)When he starts to explain she stays quiet, but her arms go a little tighter around him, protectively. She'll let him work through it on his own time, and as long as she refuses to let go of him she hopes it'll make telling this story easier.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-15 07:00 am (UTC)"Didn't have one, before. But I wanted to fight for my country, so me and my brothers forged birth certificates and signed up."
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-15 07:09 am (UTC)She can put together a little better where this is going, now. He'd gone to war too young, too hopeful, and whatever happen had beaten that out of him. She bites her lip and holds him tighter still, like if she just keeps him as close to her as she can she can soak up all his pain and sorrow.
She's never wanted to do that for anyone before. The fact that she does now leaves her feeling a little awed, because it's honestly something she didn't know she was capable of.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-04-15 07:17 am (UTC)"You put a load of gypsy lads on horses and they'll fight for that horse harder than they'll fight for themselves, right?"
He sighs, softly, shifts his head so his forehead is just resting on her shoulder. He can still feel the panic in his belly, can feel tears threatening, but he can keep them at bay for now.
"This war... it was static. New weapons, bigger armies. We went to a different country and dug ourselves into trenches and we wouldn't move for weeks. We'd lose men by the dozens, but we wouldn't move."
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