Ren Waugh-Solo (behindthemask) wrote in noexits, @ 2022-03-07 10:07:00 |
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Entry tags: | !log/thread/narrative, ₴ inactive: ben solo, → week 032 (dungeons & dragons) |
Day 1 | D&D In fact that was one of the strangest things generally. The part where his Force sensitivity was simply gone. Or shifted? Probably the fact that he'd woken up with horns and a differing skin color, should have been the strangest piece of the week, but the Force had been so ever present in his life, that this was like having lost a sense. Even though he could feel a connection at least to the earth. It just was just the earth.
At this point he'd found a quiet corner in a cafe in a district that at least seemed to embrace the electric. There'd been coins in his bag so he'd managed a cup of something that was like the caf - or the coffee - at Delerth, and now he was quietly going through his bag, a hood up over his head so that at least he wasn't so visible.
He should have reached out to Rey first, but going someplace on his own had felt necessary.
Change was possibly going to be a constant here, and Ben had never loved change or a loss of control. The peaceful ability of a Jedi to take a look at something and shrug it off, definitely wasn't his strength. That had been true before when he'd been Ben Solo, it had been true as Kylo Ren, and it was still, irritatingly, true now that Kylo Ren was gone.
It was one thing too, to metaphorically and symbolically release that version of himself, but it was another to actually move back into who he should be as Ben Solo - as if Kylo Ren had been merely a role he was playing. Because it hadn't been just a role. It had been a choice. And last week had reminded Ben of just how damaging that choice could be. To himself, and to everyone around him.
He had the feeling that this was a week where he could pick up some additional clothing - although fitting himself as he was and fitting himself as he would (presumably) return to being next week should be an interesting task. But he wasn't ready to move into that just yet.
Could he ever really move away from who he had been into something else? What did that even look like? There were these ideas of who he thought he should be, but he wasn't convinced that those ideas translated into a version of himself that wasn't just another series of masks and expectations. Had he ever not been trapped into someone else's expectations? And he could say there were no expectations here, but there were. There were Rey's, and Ahsoka's - whom he still hadn't really talked to about the choices that he'd made at home. Maybe last week should have made that easier - but he didn't know that it would have. He supposed that there was the potential for darkness in most of them… given the right circumstances?
A dagger, a sling and stones - not a weapon he would generally think to choose - there was a ring, something he recognized as similar to one his mother had kept in her things - something from the house of Organa, if he were remembering correctly. Ben turned this over, maybe this version of himself had been nobility or royalty? A prince in every universe? Even if that felt like something he really wasn't - not actually.
He slipped the ring back in the bag, and reached his hand up to massage the back of his neck for a moment. He might need food, on top of the coffee, and then to check in with Rey, and then … well they could figure out what was next from there. Supplies maybe. Especially as it seemed as if much of what they'd taken from Hoth had been lost in the reset of the new, smaller rooms.
But this town might not have much in the way of space faring things, but it wasn't so dissimilar from many of the port towns he'd been to over his lifetime. He suspected he could get around, and he'd just deal with the stares, hopefully.
Ben finished off his beverage, and slipped his bag over his shoulder as he stood up to leave the booth.
And this time, as he left, he couldn't help but think how it was funny how even without the Force - he could feel the eyes following him.