1 ❈ Arrival

[fromnowhere]



WHO: Rey
WHERE: First at the Fountain, then at the Inn
WHEN: End of December
OPEN TO: Fountain is open to Karen; the Inn is open to anyone with answers
WARNINGS: There could be TLJ spoilers, but I will warn for them & please let me know if you'd like to avoid them!

---

fountain - closed to Karen

It was wet. It was cold. It was impossible to breathe.

As Rey came to, she was aware that she was relieving the moment she'd come out of the pool on Ahch-To, only it was actually freezing and the water she was in was much, much deeper than before. She flailed her arms and found herself reaching toward the surface - the blurry light gave her that much of a clue - but there was no way she was going to make it without inhaling the water she was surrounded by. She kicked, arms outstretched, and broke the surface with a gasp, immediately falling under the water again. Something was weighing her down, but she couldn't pinpoint the weight while panicking at the same time.

There was so much wrong with what was happening to her in that moment that when she broke the surface the second time, she croaked out a, "Help!" before her head ducked below the surface again. The kicking helped, though she'd only caught a glimpse of someone walking by before the water had obscured her eyesight again.

inn

The warmth was welcome and, as she sank into a chair by the fire with a quick, but generic, smile at her rescuer, she pulled the bag she'd been wearing closer and took in her surroundings. It wasn't quite like any cantina she'd been to and it was nothing like Jakku, which left her at a loss. She recognized no one and though the language wasn't a barrier, the things she'd been told meant nothing to her.

Worse, trying to reach out with the Force had left her with nothing. It was if it didn't exist and that was the most terrifying feeling of all. Though it was new to her, she'd become accustomed to it being there in the last several days and without it - or a blaster or her staff - she felt more helpless than she wanted to admit. It wouldn't last long, she was a survivor if nothing else, but being deposited on a new planet, tossed unconscious into a fountain like she had been, was unsettling.

To say the least.

Comments

Fountain

[digging]

One thing Karen can say about this place: She's never minded the cold. It is just about the only thing here she doesn't mind, exempting most of the people, who on balance have been as friendly and helpful as they presumably are able to be. It's not their fault she doesn't like what they have to tell her.

There's a sort of casual sign-up to take shifts watching over the fountain, because apparently not everyone who comes through is as accustomed to the cold as she is. When she volunteered, she'd hoped to glean some scrap of useful information, but mostly her shift has been boring. Nothing has changed for the last 20 minutes.

She's blowing into her gloved hands to warm her nose when she hears the cry and snaps her head back over her shoulder. Without thinking, she dives toward the fountain, bracing her knees against the side as she reaches out to plunge her hands into frothy water to try and grasp the flailing arms beneath.

"TAKE MY HANDS!"

[fromnowhere]

Everything is getting heavier and though there's a shout, it's barely heard under the water. The hands, though, are seen and Rey reaches for them like the lifeline they are. Never again will she shun someone taking her hand; this woman has been a literal lifesaver and, as Rey uses the leverage to pull herself to the side, she gasps a, "Thank you," to her.

Taking a moment to hang there, the icy water doing nothing to make it easier to pull herself out, Rey catches her breath in deep gulps as she takes in her surroundings, pushing her hair off her face. Finally, she looks over at the woman who'd saved her life and says it again, "Thank you. I can't--" She looks down at her body, half submerged still, and does her best to heft herself over the side. It takes effort she's not sure she possesses in that moment. "I can't swim."

[digging]

To that, Karen only nods — She hadn't even thought about that particular possibility. "I'm just glad I was here," she says, already hastily shrugging off her coat and scarf.

"Here, put these on, quick," she says, her voice thready from the cold, words opaque puffs in the air between them as she reaches to sling the coat over the girl's thin shoulders. "We need to get you inside before you get frostbite. There's an inn right over there, they'll have a fire going."

[fromnowhere]

"Thank you."

It's really all Rey can manage; her teeth started chattering the moment she was out of the fountain, but as soon as the coat is draped around her shoulders, she can feel the warmth that the woman's body had been holding in it. It rushes through her and she shivers hard, her muscles immediately starting to ache deep.

Looking in the general direction that the woman motions, Rey nods and begins moving in that direction, hefting the pack she'd been attached to. She doesn't know the terrain or the words, exactly, but a fire sounds like a good thing. A very good thing.

[digging]

Talking only expends valuable energy when it's this cold, and the girl seems practical enough to know getting out of it is the most important thing. Karen follows, shivering herself now despite several layers of shirt and pants, and then dashes forward to push open the Inn door for their latest arrival. As predicted, there's a cozy fire burning on the wide hearth in the front room, the blast of dry heat hitting them as they step inside.

"I'm going to go get you some towels," Karen says, peeling off toward the stairs as she motions toward the fireplace. "There should be a pair of dry socks in that bag of yours. You'll want to put them on right away."

[fromnowhere]

Dry socks, dry socks...

As soon as she opens the pack, Rey realizes that it was meant to be waterproof and, for some reason, it didn't happen that way. Everything in it is wet and she takes a deep breath, holding her hands out toward the fire in an attempt to scoot closer and dry the clothes she's wearing. She can dry the rest later, hang them or something. She's not honestly worried about them; it's not the first time she's had to make do with what she's got.

She takes stock of the room while the other woman is away. It's... cozy.

Inn

[onlyeverdoubted]

It isn't one of those spectacularly cold days, but there's enough bite in the air to chase Bodhi inside for a few moments to warm up after a bit of a ramble with Aurora. The big black dog is considerably more sociable than her human companion, as a rule, and Bodhi's gotten used to her occasionally being taken with people while he's perfectly happy in his own head. He doesn't object, exactly. He just wouldn't have thought of making the effort.

He's not good with newcomers, but he's been here long enough to know the dazed and generally damp look. And he takes a great deal of comfort in the fact that everything is always abnormal and awkward here. No one's in their comfort zone. "Did you, um, just get here, then?"

[fromnowhere]

The animal doesn't look exactly familiar to her, but it's an animal and it's not brutish, which means that if it's friendly to her, Rey will first make sure it's not sentient - because that could totally be a thing - and then give it a gentle pat. When the man with the animal speaks to her, she looks up at him and then over at the soaking pack she's put on the floor next to her chair. She hasn't yet had a chance to go through it, but she has a feeling that it won't lend her many answers.

"I did." Her eyes narrow slightly as she looks him over. "Are your familiar with this planet?"

[onlyeverdoubted]

Bodhi had the same reaction to Aurora himself, and while he's known her since she was a puppy now, he still occasionally addresses her as though she understood. Just in case. He's not a xenobiologist. Which makes her exceptionally used to slightly confused pats and enthusiastically licks Rey's hand in open invitation.

Bodhi finds the question heartening. Very few people even think to ask after a planet. He's met a few who didn't understand how planets even worked. "No, our, um, our movements are a... very limited. Here and another valley. I doubt it even is a planet, exactly? We're in some kind of artificial environment." He immediately wants to spill all the data he's come up with at her, but he's gotten better at holding his tongue about suspicious rocks and it's really difficult to get people to believe the sun thing. "Whether we're on the surface of something and just--just cut off, or it's a space station, or... We don't really know." The longer he talks the more Imperial he sounds, through all the stammering. No fault of his own--well, no more than usual. The Academy pushed conformity hard on its teenage pilot recruits.

[fromnowhere]

Just because the animal can't reply in an understood language, does't mean that it can't understand, right? She may be wondering why people taller than her keep patting her on the head and telling her she's good. It's this thought that guide's Rey to pat rather awkwardly and listen to the man next to her at the same time.

"Space station?" The words propel Rey to her feet and, with a shiver in her still wet clothing, she looks outside. The winter landscape leads her to remember Starkiller Base and she looks back at him. "Does it have a name? This pl-- place?" Be it planet or space station.

Being from the Outer Reaches, she doesn't particularly notice that his speech defers to the Imperials; they were before her time. This, however, is something new.

[onlyeverdoubted]

He has so many thoughts he has to struggle to halfway organize them. "It doesn't... behave like a planet. The days aren't predictable, and the sun doesn't--No, no name, not really. People will talk about, um, the village, the valley, the... spring, whatever, because there, um, there aren't any others? We're very stuck." Sometimes, sure, things open up a bit, but he wouldn't want to get her hopes up when the last big expansion led to... another village. When you're used to thinking of planets, the place is incredibly small.

Inn

[immunetolight]

Ren hates being dependent upon anyone but this is a planet he doesn't know and he has little in the way of survival gear to help him along. There are no ships. The clothing he has is barely sufficient for the cold climate. He doesn't even have any tools to gather food or cook in the rough way that he'd been used to as an apprentice.

He is, for better or worse, dependent on the charity of others. It's not a position he likes being in at all but no one has said anything to him about taking food from the Inn. He goes twice a day, morning and evening, and spends the interim trying to find a way out of this place.

When he enters today, he sees a small figure seated by the fire and he very nearly turns on his heel and leaves. Of course she'd turn up here. She's hardly the worst person who could show, at least, but she's still not the easiest to deal with on a regular basis. It's also another firm reminder that he cannot access the Force here and he's impaired. When he speaks, his voice is clipped and to the point.

"Who sent you here?"

[fromnowhere]

That voice.

It's not coming from inside her, which is both a relief and a disappointment. She hasn't been able to tune herself back into the Force in the several hours she's been on the planet, which is unsettling. So, when she hears him speak, she stands and turns at the same time.

Still damp from her arrival - the fire is warm, but not adequate for quick drying of clothing - she looks him over before speaking. He looks like he's in good health, but it poses a question: why is he here?

"You." She inhales deeply, forcing down the first wave of anger she has. She wants to blame him for her current plight, but she suspects that, if he had anything to do with it, he'd be dressed in his regular uniform of robes not... well, the black top and pants he's wearing now. Ones that match hers in all but color. It confuses her, the idea that they're here while everyone else is somewhere else. "I arrived--" She shakes her head and looks toward the window. "No one sent me that I know of."

She looks at him suspiciously. "How did you get here?"

[immunetolight]

He exhales quickly, not quite a laugh and not quite a scoff, and tips his head slightly in the direction of the fountain - or where he thinks it might be in relation to this inn. It's different to map out directions in a terrain he's unfamiliar with without the help of the Force but he's managing well enough.

"The same way everyone gets here. Through that fountain. Don't you think if I had a ship, I would be gone by now?"

The latter is unnecessary, probably, but his temper is a little short because she's here so it almost feels intentional that he is now.

[fromnowhere]

Any knowledge is something that Rey will take and though it's merely confirmation of what she's been told, it's different when she hears it from him. Because she knows him and, though she can't specifically trust him, he's not a stranger telling her something that might be to their benefit. With Kylo, it might be to his benefit, but would he have left if that were the case?

"Unless this is where you chose to be," she points out rather reasonably. If he and the First Order are the ones responsible, not that she thinks they are any more, then he'd have no incentive to leave. Nor would he be dressed in those ridiculous clothes - not that she has room to talk.

A shiver runs through her with her still damp clothing and she hugs herself. "How long?"

[immunetolight]

"Not long." Truthfully, he doesn't know how long it's been but he feels like it's inside of a week. It doesn't feel like he's been here long enough to truly explore every opportunity for escape, at any rate, but the days seem to run together without any sort of system to keep time. Perhaps that is the intent of their captors, to keep them disoriented and confused.

"I didn't choose to be here any more than you did. I don't know why anyone would choose to be here. It's barren and cold." Space is cold, yes, but not like this system.

inn

[theintercessor]

The schedule is loose, but the only thing getting Jude through the winter is a semblance of routine. A revolving set of tasks that fill a day, even if some of those tasks involve a lot of simple wandering. Gathering and drying wood is the important one, and he's come to appreciate the way it can guide his general restlessness, keep him moving, give him something to show for a day of walking around the woods.

Learning to fish might be prudent, when the water isn't so cold he's sure to be worse off for falling in. More worse off than he would be for the panic of it.

Bringing extra wood to the inn is the height of the routine. He does it before eating, before retiring to his house for the night. Bent over to pile it in the holder, he catches sight of her chair, sitting like the next steps haven't occurred to her yet. He'd thought up so many next steps when he'd arrived that he'd run half across the village away from the fountain before getting indoors, but--it had been the height of an artificially long summer.

"You should get into some dry clothes," he offers, voice rough, but quiet. Whether or not she does, he puts some fresh logs on the fire, blazing it a little brighter for her.

Re: inn

[fromnowhere]

Staring into the fire as it dried the clothes she was wearing was something that Rey was finding soothing. She'd found people to be both helpful and not and she was losing herself in thoughts as she watched the flames dance in the fireplace. The place she found herself was so different than where she was from, she wasn't entirely sure that the whole thing wasn't an illusion thought up by Snoke - alive somewhere and playing with her mind.

When the man speaks to her, Rey lifts her eyes and takes a moment to contemplate what he's saying.

"Nothing in the pack is dry," she explains, then looks back at the fire. "It's better to dry what I'm wearing before finding a room and drying the rest." Truthfully, she's a little afraid to leave the room. The place is too new, too different. This, at least, feels safe. Ish.

Looking at him again, she says, "I'm Rey."

[theintercessor]

Jude hums, thinking back to his own first day. He'd left his pack at the fountain, needed it returned to him. Sometimes the waterproofing on the packs seems to work, but--zippers. He can't remember if his own scrubs survived, and they hardly seem worth the concern now. "I'm Jude."

He wants to offer a hand, shake like there's anything normal about this, but that doesn't mean the same thing to everyone who comes through. It might just agitate her.

"Meant though--upstairs, we've got a kind of surplus room. No guarantee anything fits, but it's good enough to eat and sleep in for a night." Even months in, he's gone through it for something dry after a spell of freezing rain. "I could get you a few things, if you want to stay by the fire."

[fromnowhere]

A surplus room sounds like a good place to find any extra things she might need. Anything that might hold answers to why she's there. It only takes a moment to agree.

"I'll go with you." She's been told she can use a room in the inn for the night and she plans to stay there as long as she's able. Using her skills as a scavenger to do what's necessary to help out and survive, she hopes that she'll be allowed to stay for more than one night.

Lifting her pack, Rey hoists it over her shoulder and watches him expectantly. She's still cold, but she's not going to let it affect her finding something new.

[theintercessor]

He's kept his head down well enough that she's only his second new arrival--funny how close together they are. Must be something with the weather: Jude doesn't know much about the canyon or the hows and whys it can exist, but he knows people need to get in from the cold. He knows they need dry clothes.

"It was summer when I came through," he finds himself saying, as he leads her to the stairs. Odd for him to break silence, but he doesn't want to leave her alone with the sound of her breath in her teeth. "It won't always be this cold."

Instead it could be blisteringly hot, with a sun that won't go down, touches the trees on the wrong side of the walls to signify the end of a day. "I'm Jude, by the way."

/comes in late if you don't mind?

[copingskills]

Elena knew what it was like to be new. She hadn't arrived all that long ago herself, and it was easy to recognize newcomers around here. Their community was small; people didn't seem to stay unknown for very long, if at all, especially if you hung out around the inn a lot.

She saw the other girl sitting at the fire, about her age, trying to keep warm. That was familiar too, so she heads into the kitchen to grab a small bowl of the stew there, and comes out with it and a spoon, sitting down near her.

"Here," she said, holding out the bowl of warm food to her like a peace offering. "I don't know if you're hungry, but it'll help warm you up."

it's fashionable!

[fromnowhere]

Still trying to parse the different information that she's been told - not a planet, just a village, outside forces, no actual Force, no way out, no way in, etc. - Rey was caught staring into the fire still when the young woman sat down near her and was taken off guard when she was handed a bowl.

It didn't make sense that someone would try and poison her, not after going to the trouble of bringing her here, so she didn't feel too nervous about eating.

"I am," she confessed, giving the woman a smile. "Thank you." She took a bite, inhaled as she did so to cool it, then flashed a smile as she chewed. After swallowing she said, "I'm Rey."

[copingskills]

Elena settled into her seat as the other girl took the bowl from her, happy that she was able to help. In so many ways, she was completely out of her depth here, having to learn basic survival skills since her arrival.

She's used to way too many technological comforts. She realized now how much she'd taken them for granted.

"You're welcome." She was patient as the other girl chewed, smiling when she was given a name. "I'm Elena. You're new, right?"

[fromnowhere]

Technology runs different in Rey's world, though she's not used to a lack of electricity, it was something that took a moment to notice. That and they were in a different system all together, one that she didn't recognize by the stars. Still, people have been overly friendly and she's not sure if that should make her wary or not.

"Yes," she nodded as part of her answer, then swallowed. "I arrived through the fountain, though I've heard everyone does. It just depends on whether the weather is warm or not."