Will Gorski (officerstrange) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2018-08-05 20:27:00 |
|
|||
Entry tags: | !complete, anakin skywalker, will gorski |
Who: Anakin Skywalker and Will Gorski
What: Will goes to help Anakin with his window problem, Anakin answers some of Will's questions
When: July 12, when it was all snowy
Where: From Anakin's place to the hardware store
Status: Complete
Sometimes, Will really had to wonder about the messes he got himself into. It had been one thing to offer a complete stranger over the internet help in picking up some plywood boards, but it was a completely different thing when that same stranger had blown out his own windows and believed in alien prosthetics. It was enough that he had opted to wear his sidearm under his jacket, but he hoped he wasn’t going to need to use it.
He wasn’t expecting to need to drive through the occasional flurry once he’d moved to the Orange County, but he had plenty of experience doing so back home, and so the drive to the address Anakin had given him wasn’t that difficult, so long as he avoided the other drivers. One he pulled in front of the apartment, he texted Anakin to let him know.
---
Anakin swiftly sprinted down to meet Will at the curb. He was wearing both of his hooded sweaters and his only zip-up jacket, and he was still cold. He hopped into the car and, after buckling his seatbelt he jammed his left hand into his pocket. He reached across to shake Will’s hand in greeting with his right, robotic hand.
“Thanks for the help,” he said, shivering.
---
Will tried to hide a smile at how bundled up Anakin was, though he understood that Anakin was neither used to this weather nor had a proper winter jacket. Will was just glad he had thought to brought a decent coat with him instead of getting rid of all of them.
He’d been warned about Anakin’s prosthetic, but he still couldn’t help but stare at it for a moment. It was like nothing he’d seen before. But a second later he took Anakin’s hand in his and gave it a shake. “No problem,” he said with a bit of a smile. “You’re going to have to tell me where to go though. I really have no idea where anything is.”
---
“Oh, right,” Anakin gave a shaky nod. The vehicle was warm but it would take him minute to warm up.
He didn’t offer any explanation for the robotic hand, but simply pulled out his phone and opened the directions. “Go to the third light and then take a left.”
He could see down the street that it was not snowing ahead. Lucky bastards.
“So what brought you to Southern California?”
---
Will had a lot of questions for Anakin, but he wasn’t entirely sure where to start. He wouldn’t pry into anything with the arm, though there were questions surrounding that too. But until he could figure out how to ask anything without feeling insane, he’d bite his tongue.
He thought on Anakin’s question for a moment. “Things weren’t really working out in Chicago,” Will said after a moment. Between his father and his legacy, and half the department calling him a traitor behind his back and to his face, he thought it was best to leave before things got worse. “I don’t know why I chose Southern California, but it felt right somehow.”
---
Anakin nodded, and laughed a bit by the end. He shook his head, amused. Today he’d decided to be amused at the crazy shit the universe had dumped at his door.
“The universe,” Anakin pointed at the sky as they passed from the line that marked the half of the street as a winter wonderland from just a cloudy day.
“This felt right?” Anakin smiled some more.
“I chose California because I knew if I chose Florida I’d lose my other hand to an alligator.” He looked thoughtful for a moment and then shrugged. “Now that I’ve been here a while, maybe I should have tested my self control?”
---
“I didn’t realize it would be snowing,” Will said with a bit of a smile. But he didn’t really know how to explain the feeling he’d had. Just that this is where he belonged. The feeling hadn’t gone away, even with the strange people that lived here.
“You have a problem with this place?” Will asked, glancing at Anakin through the corner of his eye.
---
“Well, there’s the snow,” Anakin pointed out, “In summer. In southern California.”
That really did speak for itself.
“Then the windows of my apartment. And then there’s the network.” Anakin shook his head. “A little bit after moving here, a woman threw a tennis ball so hard at my head it knocked me out.” He shook his head again. “Someone else I knew suggested I try the network to find her. I did. Shouldn’t have done that.”
---
“You never did tell me what happened to the windows,” Will ventured. A fit of rage that involved Anakin smashing every one of his windows seemed excessive, but he couldn’t really imagine any other way it could have happened.
He raised his eyebrows and took his eyes from the road for a second so he could look at Anakin. “Just how hard did she throw that tennis ball? Are you alright?” he asked. Head injuries could take a long time to heal he knew.
---
Anakin ignored the question about his windows and skipped over to the question about Ahsoka throwing a ball at him.
He waved off the concern, “I’m fine, I was out only for a few seconds and it was months ago. She turned out to be family I didn’t even know I had. A sister, actually-” He looked down at his phone. “You’re going to want to turn right at the second light.” He’d stop shivering by now.
“She said she thought I would catch it. Pfft.” Anakin shook his head. He was, in a way, using this story as a shield to keep Will from asking about the crazier things about the network-afflicted. But Anakin did feel a true sense that he and Ahsoka were connected in a familial way rather than just friends. Something that came with the Dreams. Part of him resisted it. What right did these memories have to waltz in and plant themselves fully formed, complete with emotional connections ready-made? But they felt as natural as anything he’d ever felt growing up on Earth, he just had to accept them.
“Sisters. Right?”
---
Will rose his eyebrows, following Anakin’s directions. It was an interesting way to meet new family, at least. “I wouldn’t know,” Will said. He was an only child, after all. He’d never really known what it was like to have siblings, though he’d had enough friends with them to know that it had its fair share of both hugs and bruises. “Is that why you moved out here then? To find family?”
---
Anakin shook his head.
“No, I came out here ‘cause I was in the Air Force, but I lost my arm,” he raised his right arm, “in a fighter jet crash. Got a medical discharge, and then took a job out here with Boeing. My sister found me. That was a surprise.”
He glanced at this phone.
“We’re almost there. Three more lights and it’s the shopping center on the left.”
Anakin felt maybe he drop a warning now.
“You should get used to that around here. Surprises. Like that. They just kind of happen here. You know. In Southern California.” Ya, that was a good warning.
---
Will glanced again at the allegedly otherworldly arm, and then shoulder checked so he could switch over to the left lane. Once he was safely in his lane, he glanced over at Anakin, eyebrow raised. “Is this a California thing?” he asked. “Just vague half-answers and warnings about everything? Because it’s starting to get old.”
---
Anakin snorted. “Oh ya.” And he nodded. “We’re a ‘like to let you acclimate slowly,’ kind of bunch. In about a month, this will make a lot more sense.”
His expression turned serious for a moment. “I hope all you get is this weird weather.” He thought about it a second more before relaxing. “But don’t worry, people here, they look out for each other. You already have that down.” And he leaned forward to look at the front of the hardware store.
“Really, thanks for helping me with this.”
---
“I’d rather acclimatize quickly, if it’s all the same to you,” he said, not quite using his cop voice but coming pretty close to it.
He pulled the car into the parking spot, but used the power locks to lock the door before Anakin could get out. “How about a trade? I’ll finish helping you out for some information.”
---
Anakin almost felt bad for Will. The man deserved to have a drink with a few of Anakin’s former commanding officers. That voice just never fully worked on him. Cleaning the latrines - worth it, always worth it.
“Hmm that depends on the information,” Anakin said thoughtfully. “I might not have the information you’re looking for. But I’ll try to give you an answer.”
He pointed to the lock. “This is kidnapping though. And I’m pretty sure that’s illegal. That’s pretty gutsy.”
---
“Well, I’m a cop,” or at least, would have his first day as an Irvine police officer on Monday, “so we can deal with the legalities later,” Will said.
Now came the actual asking of questions, and Will had to take a moment to think about where to begin. It was difficult, because there all he had was just one, big question: What the hell was everyone talking about?
“Let’s start with this weirdness everyone seems to vaguely reference,” Will said, and looked outside at the slow. “I mean, other than the freak weather. What do you know about it?”
---
“There are two things in that sentence that do not impress me,” Anakin said. “You are very unethical.” But he didn’t move or fight. Yet.
Anakin took a deep breath. If Will didn’t like what he said, well, it wasn’t Anakin’s problem.
“The Network is an access to the intersection of an infinite number of universes. String theory is a possible name for it that might sound more familiar to you. Everyone who has access to the Network is actually from another universe besides this one. You don’t know about it yet, but you will, soon. Your memories of that other life in that other universe will start to return to you. You can’t stop it now that you’ve accessed the Network. The strange things that happen here are a mixture of the other universes seeping through or someone from another universe messing around. Some people have supernatural powers. Or they have some kind of device that can mess with the weather. We get things from other universes.” He waved with his robotic hand.
“The weather is probably just another person messing around. Give it a day, see how long it lasts. If it keeps up after a few days, then it’s from seepage of another universe and you should start to worry.”
---
Will didn’t respond to the unethical statement, though it had been a difference in ethics from the majority of the police force in Chicago that had caused him to leave in the first place. Instead, he watched Anakin as he spoke, looking for any hint of a lie. Despite how unbelievable what Anakin was saying sounded, he didn't spot one in his face. It seemed as though he believed whatever he was telling Will, which meant he was either delusional or California was very different than what Will had thought.
He frowned, not quite able to believe what he was hearing, but it lined up with the other vague things he’d heard on the Network. And, unless Anakin was delusional with access to highly advanced prosthetics, it made the arm make a little more sense too.
“And these are what the dreams everyone is talking about are? Memories from this other universe?” he asked.
---
“Yes,” Anakin said. A simple answer.
---
Will thought on it for a moment longer. He couldn't believe it - who could possibly believe such an unbelievable story when his only proof was unseasonable snow and a metal arm - but if other people could believe it, it made the people around here make a lot more sense. He also wasn't able to just forget about it and pass it off as some madman’s story. So maybe he still didn't know what was going on, but at least he had some idea of the people he was going to be dealing with now that he’d moved to the other side of the country. He was tempted to ask about the windows, but he somehow suspected that Anakin would bring it back to the multiple universes which really wouldn't put him any closer to an actual answer.
He turned the ignition off and opened his door. “Alright, let's see what we can get for your window.” A beat. “You can just open the door. I don’t have child locks for the front seat.”
---
“Psychologically, that was messed up.” But there was no animus in tone.
Anakin opened the door and stepped out of the vehicle. He saw a long, rusted bolt on the ground, near the paint dividing one stall from the next. He picked it up. And using his middle finger of his robotic hand as a fulcrum he used his pointer and ring finger to bend the bolt into a U-shape.
“Your door wouldn’t have held me anyways.” He looked at the metal U and shrugged. “My arm isn’t a metal alloy made on Earth. I can’t even take a sample of it ‘cause I can’t cut into it. At least not with any equipment I can get my hands on. And I’m not willing to cut off my arm.”
He reached back into the vehicle and held out the U-shaped, former bolt to Will. “You were the least violent person to ever have owned me. Even if it was just a trick.” It was a strange thing to say, and Anakin had meant it that way.
---
“Sorry,” Will apologized. “I just needed someone to be straight with me.” It had been more difficult than he’d thought it would be, though if everyone believed what Anakin said, well, maybe it made sense.
He frowned a little when Anakin bent the nail, and couldn’t help his eyes flicking toward his car, suddenly glad that Anakin hadn’t tried to just bust out. It would have been as simple as using the door handle, but who knows if he would have tried that first.
“Uh, thank you?” Will said, with a wavering, uncertain smile. It was definitely the strangest compliment someone had ever given him. If it was meant to be a compliment at all. “You get into violent situations often?”
---
Anakin tipped his head towards the store and then closed the door. When Will had caught up he spoke again.
He shoved his hands into his coat pockets to protect his left hand from the cold. It felt unbalanced to keep out his right hand, but it hardly needed to be kept warm. “I remember being owned by two different people so far.” Anakin left out the part where they were different species. “Slavery is an inherently violent institution before you take in an individual master’s personal actions, so I guess, ya, the first ten years of one of my lives was pretty violent.”
Inside the store was warmer, but it was air conditioned, so Anakin still thought it was kind of chilly.
“After that, in that life, I was taken in by a quasi-religious cult, and cults never work out for anyone. But on Earth?” He shrugged. “Aside from crashing my fighter jet and losing my arm? Growing up in Arizona was… Arizona.”
He paused, looking up at the aisle signs.
“I hope your universe is a good universe.”
---
Will frowned to himself. “I didn’t mean to own you like that,” he said after a moment. “I was never planning on actually keeping you in the car.” Which was probably obvious, since he’d revealed the whole thing to be a bluff. Still, had he known what Anakin dreamed of, he probably would have found another way to get his answers.
“If I get one,” Will added. He still wasn’t sure if he believed this whole parallel universes, dreaming thing. “I hope so too. Maybe yours will get better.”
---
Anakin stopped looking up and turned his face towards Will. And for a moment he hid nothing, because his emotions always traveled constant with the speed of the universe. No, it wouldn’t get better. It would only get progressively worse, and then he would die. And as fast as that look came, blink and it was gone.
But he wouldn’t address it.
“Don’t worry, I won’t hold it against you,” he said with a half grin. “My sister doesn’t hold my actions when I first got here against me.” He’d out right rejected Ahsoka at first. It wasn’t until his first Dream that he finally believed her. “You just pay it forward. And learn to be patient when people you recognize show up-” he held up his robotic hand. “No, you aren’t from my universe. That wasn’t a cryptic hint. I just meant, when you start getting your memories back, you’ll remember people from them.”
He looked up and down the aisles.
“I think the wood is this way, c’mon.”
---
Will followed Anakin to toward the wood aisle. “So people have the same dreams as you?” Will asked, furrowing his brow together. This just kept getting stranger and stranger. Though, people dreaming the same thing wasn’t nearly as weird as… his eyes strayed back toward Anakin’s arm. “You said that came from the dreams too? How exactly does that work?”
---
“Sort of,” Anakin explained. “You only dream about stuff you experience. They dream about stuff they experience. But you can dream about the same place, same event. Just a different point of view.”
They turned down the aisle and the smell of processed wood swept over them.
“My arm just showed up one morning. I had a different prosthetic after I lost my arm in the jet crash. It was a pretty advanced for Earth prosthetic, but nothing like this,” he said, and held up his hand. “But this just showed up one morning replacing what I had. I was pissed. But this one’s grown on me.”
He dropped his hand as he started looking at the cost of different boards.
“You have to be careful of what comes through the dreams. You can get injured in a dream and it transferred over. But I hear death doesn’t.” He would find out that one personally.
---
Will frowned to himself. None of this - not the injuries or the prosthetics or the dreams themselves made any kind of sense. How could a dream actually hurt you? “I hope you’re right about that one,” Will said.
He shook his head. “So, if all of this is happening here, how is it that no one else in this country has heard of it?” It definitely seemed like the kind of thing that would make international news, let alone national.
---
“No one not on the Network sees it,” Anakin shrugged. “It’s weird, like Narnia or something like that.”
Anakin smiled.
“Look, you don’t have to really believe me. But when you start seeing the aliens and fairies, it’ll seem more real.”
---
“I bet it will,” Will said. Seeing was believing, after all. He shook his head, and glanced at the plywood, frowning to himself. “How does this look?” he said, reaching for one of the middle-priced boards. It seemed thicker than the cheap stuff, and less likely to dissolve into a pulpy mess if it rained, but the price wasn’t too bad.
---
Anakin appraised the boards and the price. “Ya, this works.” He was willing to leave off giving more information about the oddities of Will’s new “back yard.” The guy had enough to think about as it was.