Two roommates reset for the first time, and explore a non snowy
Delerth campus.
⚠Nah. Two slightly mistrustful dudes talking, that's it.
The sense of exhaustion that Ben woke up with was real. He'd laid on the bed not forcing himself awake just yet, but letting himself feel the room around him. The campus felt different, and there was a darker energy he didn't care for, maybe additional people, but he also had nothing to compare it to.
Hoth had been, well, an Ice Planet. And he knew, in theory, that they would all reset at the end of every week, and for the moment he was just being thankful that he hadn't reset again into a snowdrift.
He pulled himself to his feet, swung them over the edge of the bed and glanced out of the window. No snow, so at least there was that. After it felt likely he could stand up on his own for a bit, he did so, and then opened the door from his bedroom to the main quarters that were shared with the others.
"Snow's gone," he announced to Silver, before stepping to the side and sinking to the floor with his back against the wall. He hated that just walking out of his room was taking this much energy, and there was a frustration that was bubbling up with the realization that this was going to be every week, and if there was something dangerous, he wouldn't be much help for the first day- at the least.
One moment, Silver had been standing near a beach on New Providence Island, coming to a tentative understanding with Madi. In the space of a heartbeat, he was somewhere else, falling off of a bed onto the floor and jarring his leg something awful. It had never healed well in part due to his refusal of help and in part, his never taking time to convalesce, continuing to live aboard ships and fight in battles as if he wasn’t missing a leg at all.
“Fuck.” He pulled himself up to sit, his situation snapping back into focus. Something about a reset. He had been warned enough times about it, but the knowledge of it didn’t make it any less disorienting.
Silver took up his crutches and made his way out into the common area wearing the clothing he had arrived in, still armed to the teeth with two pistols and a cutlass. It was at that moment that the door opened, one of the others letting himself in. He hadn’t gotten to know any of those he shared quarters with very well. He’d gotten a grunt or two out of the white-haired one, and this one wasn’t much better. Silver was, in truth, surprised to hear his voice.
He watched as the man lowered himself to the floor, a picture of exhaustion. “Is it bad?” he asked, assuming it was because he had seen where they had ended up. A look out the window didn’t reveal anything dire, though he knew better than to think that called for complacency.
Ben glanced up, not sure if the other man was asking about wherever they were, or Ben's own state. His gaze flickered over the full look, and for a brief half moment, he missed his cape, and his own weapons. Having arrived with absolutely nothing wasn't something he was thrilled with. But he hadn't asked for this, and it was clear he was going to be reminded of it every single week.
"No snow, normal temperature, well -" he shrugged. "I don't know what you consider normal, but it seemed normal. Felt weird, but I didn't stick around to figure out what that meant."
And he realized even as he said it that 'felt weird' had the potential to require some explaining. He reached inside, pulled on the Force for a moment, and then pushed himself back up to his feet. He stood for a heartbeat or two, in what hopefully didn't look like he was taking stock of his energy levels and ability as much as he actually was. And then he moved across to get some water from the faucet. "I guess we should be prepared for anything though."
“Oppressive humidity that causes you to sweat while you’re lying down doing nothing is my normal,” Silver said, realizing for the first time that he was in his natural sweaty and dirty state as if he’d just come through from The Bahamas, though he knew that he’d spent the past week on another planet. Reset, indeed.
Silver had skill in reading people, discerning things about them through careful observation. He could tell something was off with Ben, though he chose not to bring it up or ask after him. If Ben was anything like himself, he wouldn’t want his questions and feigned concern. Silver wasn’t at a point yet where he felt true concern over anyone in that place. He was still assessing, and attempting to decide where to place his bets on the best people to ally with in order to get out of this in one piece.
“I still can’t quite believe that there is running water,” he said, as Ben turned on the tap. Wiping residual sweat from his brow, he regarded the stranger with quiet interest before asking the one question that did keep snagging on his mind. “What did you mean about it feeling weird?”
"Been there," Ben remarked quietly. "Mustafar wasn't as humid as some places, but the heat was pretty intense regardless." He threw water on his face, and breathed in. It would be alright. He should probably figure out food, and maybe find Rey. And those two things might actually look similar if he could handle some of the rations they'd pulled from the base. They should possibly figure out a plan.
Still tired, but feeling a little bit more human, he straightened up, reached for a towel and wiped his face off, and then turned around.
The question was legitimate, but Ben wasn't entirely certain how to answer it. And without going into the Force, it was maybe more difficult.
Or maybe it wasn't that hard.
"I get feelings about things sometimes, sixth sense you could say. Something feels off from last week, but." He paused and looked towards the window. "I don't really have a baseline to know if it's normal off, or something we should be worried about."
“Mustafar? Different planet, I’m guessing?” Talking about home, of places people had been, was a tried and true method of making conversation. Silver never talked about where he was really from, but he found it easy to claim that his home was on board ships. That his land base, like many pirates of the time, was in Nassau.
He was aware of the existence of magic after his first week in Derleth. He had witnessed it himself. There was something Ben wasn’t telling him, but again, he didn’t press. The man reminded him of a cornered animal. Any wrong move and he’d spook or lash out.
“I heard earfuls about this place all last week. From what I can discern, we should always be exercising caution.” He hobbled over to the kitchen cupboards and began to open them to see what they might have reset with.
"Yeah, more volcanic than ice," Ben explained. There were other ways to describe Mustafar, but it was the easiest to just describe it that way, and Ben assumed that Silver would know what that meant. "It probably wouldn't be any easier a place to be than on Hoth, actually, but this doesn't seem like that."
He turned his attention to the other man, his eyes falling on the leg. He and Rey had been digging around for schematics in the med bay, and he didn't know if they'd be able to put together a more mechanical leg for him if he wanted something like that, but they had some possibilities maybe. He didn't mention it though, not knowing if they'd have pulled enough stuff together to do anything like that.
"Rey said something about that. As have most people I've spoken with. Maybe baseline is just - not great, and things will feel off every week," he scoffed lightly. Not that it sounded like a great idea, but it didn't seem outside the realm of possibility either. "Despite the fact that they aren't great, I did pick up some of the rations last week, which I assume are still in the storage lockers in my room so if there's nothing decent food wise there - or in the cafeteria, you could have one of those."
“Ah. I don’t think I would want to be on that planet either.” At least where he was from, one could escape the Caribbean heat by sailing north. It was difficult to imagine entire planets with one climate. Difficult to imagine that one could travel to other planets at all when it had not been all that long ago that intrepid sailors had begun exploring and exploiting new shores.
Silver noticed Ben’s attention falling to his leg. He wasn’t quite used to the stares or the pitying looks, though Ben didn’t seem to be doing either, for which he was grateful. Handling other people’s pity wasn’t one of his strong suits. Refusing help, though, was something that he had done time and time again to the point of the leg never healing right. Sometimes he thought could still feel it, would get up to walk and be brought back down to earth with a snap.
“That reset wasn’t easy, I’ll say that. If that is what it is like every time, things are going to be off every week regardless.” Silver didn’t have a rosy outlook on the situation, but he could at least enjoy the conveniences of where he had landed, including things as basic as running water and beds that weren’t hammocks with unwashed bedding. “What rations?” he asked. “I never ventured out last week. Didn’t think it would be wise to try to navigate on the ice, so I never got around to doing what I do best.” He gestured at himself, the expression on his face betraying his amusement. “Pirate.”
"I was only there to…" Ben paused, and then a brief trace of amusement crossed his lips. "Steal something, so you know - I didn't stick around."
He nodded though. The exhaustion was still laced through him. Palpatine had stolen some of his life energy, and Ben didn't know where things had gone after he'd been pulled here. He hadn't asked Rey if she knew, although her mention of Kashyyk on the network suggested… well, he hadn't asked. Perhaps it was cowardly of him not to but he'd turned his attention into focusing on what they could scavenge and bring back with them. And the exhaustion would fade. At least it had last week. Last week, Rey had given him a little bit of her life energy - he was hoping this week he wouldn't need her to do that, because he hadn't landed in a snow pile and nearly froze to death before he'd found the dorms.
"The base that was near was an old military installation, well, rebellion military. My parents spent time there before I was born, although it's very unclear when we found it. Regardless Rey and I spent most of our time scavenging things out - some rations, medical supplies, datapads, droid parts, and some other electronics we may be able to do something with in the future. It feels like a mish mash, but I don't think we were entirely sure what we would need."
He paused, and then headed back into the bedroom, digging in the storage lockers for a moment, before returning with a small plastic container that he handed over. "They're stale, and I gave Rey a bad time about them, but they're still edible, all the nutrition you need in one slightly cardboard tasting package - just add water. Or I guess we could go see what they've got at the cafeteria and you can save that for a rainy day."
Silver snorted out a laugh. “Ah, it seems we have something in common.”
A lot of what Ben was saying was going over his head, but there were similarities between the futuristic world and his own. Military. A rebellion. Scavenging for anything not nailed down. It seemed things did not change all that much below the surface between one time and place to another. “So that planet is a part of where you’re from, then?”
He stopped going through the cupboards, finding nothing of value. Instead, he took down one of the empty drinking cups and filled it with water from the tap. At least he could hydrate. The first rule of survival: find the nearest water source and drink of it. He downed the water and set the cup down just as Ben came back into the room. Silver took the offered container, tapping a forefinger against it. “Such a strange material. At any rate, I think it would be wise to save it. Shall we take a walk?” He tucked the container into one of the pockets of his coat, not wanting to limp to his bedroom and back.
Ben couldn't quite keep a small smirk from his lips at that. "My Dad was smuggling shit across the galaxy when he met my Mom, so you could say that we do have a bit in common. I know a few things about piracy, actually." Even if it hadn't been something he'd done a lot of himself.
He breathed in, considered how he was feeling and nodded.
"Let's check out the cafeteria. Rey said there was something with noodles and yellow paste and it didn't look appetizing, but I'm not certain I trust her overall sense of what is good food and what isn't, honestly."
He stepped outside of the door and waited in the hall for Silver to join him before making his way to the lobby and the front of the building. He kept his pace in check, but he found that wasn't a bad thing considering that the exhaustion was still there, an edge around everything else.
"Guess you're pretty used to ration types of things too though, yeah?" Ben didn't know a lot about the type of piracy that Silver engaged in, but it seemed a likely reality of most pirate lives.
Silver couldn’t help his amazement at the whole thing. Despite the huge differences, at its core, piracy was still piracy. “From what I understand, you’re on flying spacefaring ships instead of floating seafaring ships, but the job is almost exactly the same. It’s fascinating.”
From what he could gather, Rey must have been someone that was from Ben’s world. No one had shown up from his yet and he wasn’t sure what the reactions would be from them if they did. Whether they would be glad to see him or if they’d want to kill him.
“Trying new things here has been an adventure. I had soda. I believe that’s what it’s called. It was disgusting, but I’m willing to try anything once.”
He had on and off days as far as his mobility went, and seeing as he had jarred his leg something awful falling out of bed, he was moving slower than he might have otherwise. The easier pace that Ben kept without having to be asked was appreciated. “Yes, we’ve had to ration before,” he answered Ben’s question. “I’ll never forget the time we were becalmed for so long we were all shadows of ourselves. One day we saw sharks. Flint and I went out in one of the cockboats to take one on, we were so desperate. I’m sure the noodles here will taste better than raw shark meat.”
"Yeah, spaceships. My Dad had an old Correllian Freighter, Millennium Falcon. It was a good ship, fast. He made the Kessel run - this…" it occurred to Ben that it would mean nothing to Silver. "It was this bit of space with debris and black holes - almost unnavigable. But in the Falcon, they made it through. Impossible flying kind of runs in the family though."
Cause he certainly had some stories, his Grandfather had, for all Ben could tell, and his Dad. And he could feel complicated things about any of those things, and he did sometimes. But there was also a core pride in the fact that he was at least as good as his Dad, maybe as good as his Grandfather, at least in this particular way.
He snorted. "My Mom was a Senator in the Republic for a while, we'd have these big old government dinners when I was little. You'd end up trying all sorts of weird ass delicacies from around the galaxy and it's a big galaxy. You just sort of say 'well, I'll try anything once, and got really good at napkin-ing anything that was terrible but if you didn't eat it might threaten galaxy stability," he shook his head. "Pretty sure I never had raw shark meat, but there were some pretty terrifying things over the years."
He pushed open the door on the dorm and stared out into the Green. No snow. A noise - like a wind storm seemed to be near - and the feeling of something being wrong was still there, like something crawling under his skin. Food first, since it didn't seem that anything was going to kill them - immediately. It wasn't that sort of feeling of wrongness.
A lot of that went straight over his head. Silver had thought about going to the library to read references on subjects that came up a lot in conversation so that he would be able to understand people, but he’d put it off for the simple fact that he didn’t want to stumble upon anything about himself or the people he knew in the annals of history, lest he was able to return. Knowledge of his or anyone else’s immediate future was not something he wanted to be burdened with.
“Sounds a lot like the Walrus,” he replied. “Took a lot to finally put that frigate in her grave.”
There seemed to be a lot of royalty and upper-class types around the place. Silver couldn’t help but wonder how the likes of him got thrown in with them. He was, despite all of the bombast and legend surrounding his name, just a common criminal at the end of the day. Someone who had long been waiting for the noose. “I wouldn’t have fared well at dinners like those. Probably would have started a war.”
When he followed through the door, setting foot outside, it was decidedly warmer. On high alert, Silver took stock of their immediate surroundings, glad that he hadn’t stored his weapons away. Ben was right. Something was off. Maybe not life-threatening off–at least not yet–but it was reminiscent of the change in the air before one of the vicious pop-up storms that the Caribbean was well-known for. “Ah, I get your meaning now,” he said to Ben. “It’s not easy to describe.” Silver continued toward the dining hall. “We may run into others who know more, and anyway, I’m hungry.”
Ben scoffed, and nodded. His Dad probably nearly had a time or two. Han hadn't much been cut out for that sort of thing, and to a certain extent neither had Ben. It had been part of the problem, never really feeling like he fit anywhere- not the royal house of Alderaan, not his father's former Smuggling life, and certainly not as a Jedi. Those thoughts swished together, but Ben decided he couldn't spend much time on them, and he wasn't certain what the point was here - nobody knew those things. He didn't have to be… whomever he'd been. People didn't even know Kylo Ren here. Except for Rey and BB-8.
"It's -" He looked over towards what appeared to be new buildings, a darker looking sky, and… another monolith similar to the one he'd seen on this campus. "Yeah, maybe someone will. I guess if they don't we can figure out if we need to go exploring, hm?"
Something he'd rather do with Rey at his side if he did go. After all, he didn't have his lightsaber here.
Silver had not had the opportunity to explore the campus in-depth yet. He had settled for the bare minimum in his first week, getting his bearings, learning, observing, all as best he could without leaving the dormitory building but for reasons he deemed necessary. That minimal knowledge wouldn’t do anymore. As he noted their new surroundings, that had become apparent to him. It was time to start acting instead of assessing.
“Yes,” he said, noncommittal. Silver didn’t want to promise himself to any exploratory mission with someone he hadn’t exchanged more than a handful of words with before now.
Inside the cafeteria, he perused the food options. Not for the first time, he wished that there was a cook. He had made men ill with his cooking before, so he felt like he was taking his life into his own hands every time he attempted it.
None of the food was necessarily familiar to Ben. But he wasn’t completely without any cooking skills either. Although it might not be entirely expected, Han had determined his son wouldn’t be without practical skills, and his time with Luke and the other Jedi had allowed for some additional practice, even if the First Order had not. But this seemed to be somewhere between a kitchen where food could be prepared, and some things seemed to be more readily edible than others.
He picked up a box of what appeared to be some sort of porridge, and opening it revealed several individual packages. Add boiling water felt simple enough.
“Interested?” He cocked an eyebrow at Silver. “There’s bread over there it looks like.”
He watched as Ben opened the package, and he could tell that it wasn’t something he was going to be able to get a grip on. Silver didn’t trust himself to get the water warm enough, let alone figure out all of the envelopes of ingredients inside. It wasn’t something he was keen to try out while someone was watching him. Perhaps experimenting with modern food preparations was better left for the small hours of the morning when he couldn’t sleep.
“I think I’ll have some bread.” He hobbled over to it, picking up a piece and eating it out of his hand without a plate. “Mmm, fresh.” Far and away the best bread he’d ever had.
Ben considered everything around the kitchen. It wasn’t like most of the ones that he was used to, but he decided he could probably figure out the water and filled up a kettle to put on a burner and after considering the dials, he turned one. It seemed to start a flame — so that seemed to be right.
“I think I’ll have extra,” he remarked to Silver, while stepping back to let it boil. He lifted a lid on another kettle next to it and grinned. “I think this looks like caf. Toss me a mug and let's see.”
“Fire on demand,” Silver said as Ben turned a knob on yet another unfamiliar invention. “Of course there is fire on demand here.” He shakes his head, looking around for the mugs, grabbing one up with his free hand and throwing it underhand in the other man’s direction in a smooth arc.
Ben raised an eyebrow, and caught the mug smoothly, not even requiring the Force to do so. Silver seemed to be a decent throw. He poured some of the liquid into the mug, gave it a sniff. It wasn't exactly the same - but it certainly felt similar. "Here," he handed it over. "Here's to 'fire on demand', and 'might be caf'," he smirked.
Silver couldn’t help but laugh. “I’ll raise a glass to that.” He took the offered mug, lifting it to his face and inhaling. “Smells like what I’d call coffee.” A slow grin spread across his face at that realization. Yet another product that would have been a luxury to him, readily available in a pot set over a fire that could be summoned at the turn of a key. He took a grateful sip and nodded. “Coffee. Delicious. My thanks to you, friend.”