Private Emergence

[Marus Saretti]

He ate faster than she did.

That made it a simple decision to, as soon as she'd finished speaking and buried her head in her hands, to stand up. She probably thought he was going to go and take care of the plate. Instead, he stepped around behind her, putting his hands on her shoulders and starting to rub some of the tension out of them. Awfully brave, all told, to be quite so physical with someone he'd just met, who was in the middle of going through something terrible, and who, based on what she'd been saying the night before, probably knew all the weird tricks that he was told were part of 'using the Force.'

But he couldn't just let her sit there, simultaneously so vulnerable and yet trying to be so closed off and locked tight, and suffer. Beyond that, a lifetime spent on space stations and ships, curled up in all manner of strange positions, constantly seeking warmth or comfort for one more night had left him both with a decent sense of how to ease tension from the muscles, and a healthy appreciation of the necessity of physical connection.

Rhia Kesyk

 

[Rhia Kesyk]

In the initial silence she tried to go over it all again. How many people needed to be notified? How many of those people could she even feasibly gain access to? Could she remember all of the information he'd tried to get her to memorize, without anything to fall back on? Passwords and codes and frequencies and--

Rhia jumped to the feeling of hands on her shoulders and immediately jerked away, all at once on high alert, She turned toward him, half expecting to find someone else entirely where he stood, and glowered. "What are you doing?" she asked, a little sharper than perhaps was necessary. Why was he touching her like that? Offering her a hand to stand was one thing, heck in the moment even him hauling her off her feet had been a little funny given the context of no socks on a cold floor.

But this?

Well Rhia didn't know what to make of this. Didn't really understand what even he was trying to do.

Marus Saretti

 

[Marus Saretti]

Well. That didn't work as well as he'd hoped.

"You're tense," he poined out. "...Moreso now, but even earlier. You keep bunching your shoulders up like that, and you're going to start to have terrible knots, from your neck all the way down your spine." Factual. A good start, and likely to save him from suffering any potential further harm that morning. He hoped. "You've got a lot going on, and that's understandable, but I can't exactly help you relax your mind. What I can do is help minimize the chance you add on to any of that stress with physical pain by easing out some of that tension before it becomes a problem."

Except she had quickly rounded on him and faced him with a glare when he went to do so.

"Or trying to, anyways."

He turned his hands up helplessly, giving a small shrug.

"I honestly wasn't sure if you'd even notice or respond if I asked, and beyond that, I'm starting to get the feeling that you're so focused on the need to take care of everybody and everything else and everythat thing entails that you'd probably have said no anyways, and then we'd be in this same situation, just with me on the other side of the table, trying to remind you that it's okay to just exist and try to get comfortable for now." Maybe that was too much. Honest, sure, but...

Oh well, too late now. And had he just mixed up a couple words in there? Sithspit.

Rhia Kesyk

 

[Rhia Kesyk]

She should have given a measured response now that he'd explained further, not least because in a way she supposed it did make sense. Or maybe she should have told him to back off, and mind his own business, or heck even agreed with the notion that she probably should give herself a little time to unwind.

Instead, her glower softened first to a glare, and then to confusion, and then, finally, to amusement. She couldn't help herself, for all the words he'd uttered in that moment there were only two which had truly stood out in the end.

"Everythat thing?"

Try as she might - and oh, it was obvious she tried, she even bit down on her lip to refrain from what happened next - Rhia could not keep the laughter pressed down. Force, why had that tickled her so? For a moment, just a moment, she succumbed to it, chuckling harmlessly - well, she hoped he wouldn't take it to heart at least - to the mixing of words. Everything about this Jedi so far had been delightfully, refreshingly, innocent.

And how could she stay mad at that?

"Well, uh, maybe don't get all touchy feely with someone who can't see you coming," she warned, shifting her shoulders and correcting her posture to at least do something to appease his knot-based worries. Rhia's expression softened. "You know, you don't have to fuss over me either right? Taking care of Ideon, pottering about, that's just something I do to cope. And for the most part it helps - keeps my brain busy. If I just sit here and do nothing my brain might well implode... It'd be a mess to get out of the upholstery, I'm sure."

She reached out, making it very very obvious that she was reaching toward him so as not to be a hypocrite, and settled her hand upon his shoulder.

"But... Thanks."

Marus Saretti

 

[Marus Saretti]

That bit of laughter was the first thing out of Rhia to get a noticeable blush on Marus's cheeks, at least where she could see. The embarrassment itself didn't last long, it was clear she wasn't trying to mock him, but it wasn't intentional unlike the night before. Instead, his brow furrowed at her words. "Couldn't see me coming?" It was clear he was genuinely confused. "I get being lost in thought, but...I literally just went from right in front of you to behind you." He was genuinely perplexed at that choice of phrase from her; had she really been that deep in her own thoughts?

No, not thoughts. He could recognize that posture and the look on her face just before she buried it. Worries.

She reached out, slowly and deliberately—meriting a quickly raised eyebrow—to pat his shoulder and say thanks. He raised up his own, pulling hers off. "Rhia, I mean it," he insisted, the stubborn frustration evident in his tone. "I said it last night. Sure, you gave the eight hours I told you to, but forcing yourself to stay busy, fussing over Ideon, fussing over me, is just bottling up and delaying whatever's going on in your head." Then he pointed back at the refresher.

"Until you can't hold it in anymore. That's not going to help either of you, and I could tell from the tone of your voice before you buried your face that you were heading right back in that direction. And please, for the sake of all three of us, don't just brush it off when it gets pointed out to you." He certainly felt like it would make his current life a bit easier if she'd be more willing to acknowledge what she was feeling than to try and distract herself with everything else around it.

He, at least, might be able to stop fussing so much.

Why did his face feel warm? Oh, right, he was still blushing. Probably from more embarrassment at how frustrated he must have sounded, in the face of a girl who just had her life ripped out from under her.

Oh no.

He wiped at his eyes, suddenly starting to feel like he didn't get enough sleep. "Listen, you said you used to be a Jedi, right? Why not try some of those meditation techniques they're always practicing? Try to empty your mind, acknowledge your feelings, and just live in...the...moment..." His brow furrowed again, as though he'd just hit upon some mystical, universal truth.

"So that's what they mean by that."

Rhia Kesyk

 

[Rhia Kesyk]

"I mean... I wasn't exactly looking at you" she mumbled, noticing immediately the way in which his patience had begun to fray. Feth, she was messing up even this. She-- no. No more in-your-head nonsense. Rhia did her best to shake it off, and then returned her gaze to him. Softer now. "I don't know. I just... I didn't see you. Wasn't focusing I guess."

Stuck in her head.

Yep, that sounded about right.

And if she'd spied some frustration before, when he shook of her touch it was fully out there to see. She shied back a little, going so far as to scoot back some on the booth-like seating which wrapped around the side of the table she was on, and then proceeded to sit there and listen to every word he threw her way. Well meaning words, but no less harsh to hear in the moment.

In the brief lull, the gaze which was transfixed by him lowered to her lap.

"So, what... You want me to sit here and fall apart?" There was an uncomfortable edge to her tone, yet the words themselves were more or less whispered. Or at the very least softly spoken. "How I'm feeling isn't going to go away after one session of tears, that urge to scream and throw something isn't going to up and vanish just because I acknowledge it. It wasn't just our ship we lost, you know that right? It wasn't even just--" it was clear she was not using that phrase lightly at all, but she'd said it anyway to make a point "-- our Master. That man was everything we had. Our shelter, our security, our guardian. It's gone, Marus. All of it. Everything. And quite frankly I have absolutely no fething clue what to do except exist in this one moment. This one breath. Then the next one that follows. And the one after that."

Exhaling through her nose, she stared at him; she'd actually lifted her head sometime around the word Master, but she hadn't even really registered the fact that she was looking at him when she said it and all that came after.

"You're standing there asking me to meditate, as though all the things I've been focusing on aren't precisely a form of that for me. I ran from the eggs because I was working through everything as I cooked. And yeah, it was too much but it was always going to be too much because it was the first time I was acknowledging how much there was to be done. Because I hate the fact that right now we're existing solely on your good will, and there's currently no way I can even really pitch in until I deal with the mess Shif left behind. All the power is in your hands right now, and we're just along for the ride. You seem nice, you seem genuine, you really do, but that scares me all the same. And you cannot blame me for being scared; that isn't a reflection of you, it's---"

Rhia shook her head. Ran a hand up through her hair. Clenched her fingers into the roots, and tried to breathe. Truly it felt as though the walls were closing in. She was aware of just how much she was throwing out there in that moment, of just how much of a rant she'd just unloaded on this poor good samaritan. In the moment she couldn't even begin to stop herself, but now.

Well now she just felt shame added on top of everything else.

"I'm sorry. None of that was even really about you, I'm just... drowning." Suffocating with all the air right there to breathe from. "I don't want to meditate the way they show you to, because I don't want to let go of him so soon... He was important to me, Marus, and he's left a real void. I can't just dismiss it like he was nothing. It hasn't even been a day... Don't make me give him up so quickly. Please."

Marus Saretti

 

[Marus Saretti]

"See, now you're apologizing for actually voicing any of it." Maybe he'd pushed a bit too hard, but...progress was progress, at least? He'd keep telling himself that for the time being, anyways. "I'm not asking you to give him up, just...you've been in your head this whole time. It's understandable, it makes sense, but it's like I can hear you trying to process it and not getting anywhere because you're getting caught up in the details, the logical side of things, the computational stuff, and it all grinds to a halt worse than an astromech with a broken wheel."

If anything, it almost gave him a headache watching her get stuck like that. "Don't lose yourself so much in what needs to be done, how it all needs taken care of, so soon after it all just happened. Save that sort of stuff for when you've got other people around, people not as close to it, to help get it taken care of. Right now, well, feeling is part of existing. Letting yourself feel it is an important part of that acknowledgement, not just recognizing it, and if it's the sort of thing where you need to fall apart and pull yourself, or get pulled, back together, I doubt Ideon will judge you for that, and I certainly won't."

As for all of that about not liking being stuck relying on the good will of a complete stranger...he wouldn't much like it either. But he hadn't had a choice, when he'd been drug off to Kashyyyk. By this point it had basically become a fact of life for him. Maybe it would for her, maybe it wouldn't, but...hopefully she'd be able to accept it over the trip, and accept that she wouldn't have to worry about paying him back or anything like that.

But by that point he was out of any words to really add on, so he was left with only one other course to take. "Here." He held out one hand, just past midway between them, for her to take. "I'll ask, rather than just going for what I'd normally do. Take me or leave me."

Rhia Kesyk

 

[Rhia Kesyk]

Wait... This was what he'd wanted? For her to spit it all out even in as uncoordinated a fashion as it had, so that she could actually process it rather than keep it all on a loop in her mind?

"No," she said, brows furrowing together, "I'm apologizing because I don't want to come off as ungrateful. Because I'm not... I appreciate all you've done and continue to do, I just..." It didn't matter, did it? She leaned her head back against the wall, and the next exhale she made seemed to push forth any dregs of fight left in her. She let the matter go, and fell silent for a while.

"And anyway, I don't really have anything else to do but worry about it" she finally stated, before shaking her head, "Save argue with you," The tiniest hint of a smile, though it was gone as quickly as it appeared. Then he was holding out a hand. Rhia wasn't entirely sure what he was planning on doing, hauling her out of the booth perhaps? Bah, but she'd just got comfy.

She reached out all the same.

Marus Saretti

 

[Marus Saretti]

Well, he did haul her up and out of her seat, but in his defense, she'd just given an unspoken agreement to it. As soon as she was up enough, he let go of her hand, instead opening up his arms and pulling her into a hug. "I'm not so great with words all the time, so I hope this gets the idea across," he said after pulling her in. I also hope this isn't too cuddly for you. But, she had played along happily with him carrying her earlier, so he figured chances were high that she at least wouldn't be bothered by the hug.

Of course, what idea he was trying to get across with said hug...well, he went with the hug because he didn't quite have the words to express it, and wasn't exactly sure of it because of that. Acceptance? Didn't feel right. Care? Well, that was obvious, and far too simple of an answer. Maybe it was multiple ideas. A hug was a hug, it could express multiple things.

"If you'd rather sit back down, I've been told I make a great pillow." Now that, though, might definitely be too cuddly. Some people were perfectly fine with a standing hug, but some viewed the transition into one person holding the other or both holding each other while sitting, leaning against each other so closely, as being more akin to absolute cuddling.

Oh well. He'd already offered.

Rhia Kesyk

 

[Rhia Kesyk]

Slid from the seat and bade to stand, Rhia was almost ready to get feisty again.

Then she found herself engulfed in a hug and all that fire was tempered. Doused even. She hadn't realized how much she'd been needing such until it was offered, and she nearly crumpled in response. Her hands had lifted some, and now were caught between them. Ordinarily she might have minded that, their loss of mobility, but instead she allowed herself to just be surrounded by the warmth of it all.

For the third time she succumbed to tears, and yet it was the first time she'd done so openly. He'd just said something prior to it, too, about sitting down, but it had been temporarily lost to the aether in so far as Rhia was concerned.

Marus Saretti

 

[Marus Saretti]

Oh. That was positively heartbreaking.

Or was it heartwarming?

Maybe both. Whichever way, he could tell that at least one stumbling block towards building up some trust and mutual cooperation (as opposed to mutual fussing) had just been taken out. That was enough to get a somewhat more contented sigh out of him as he held her close. For a moment, it struck him that he didn't exactly know what to do for when she eventually stopped crying. Pull back, wipe away the last of the tears with some sort of encouraging words? No, that was a romance holofilm sort of trope. Surely not a good choice for that moment.

Offer her a napkin or a handkerchief? That seeemed far too...distant. Remote. About the only thing worse would be to entirely abandon her once she was finished, and that option was right out the airlock before he'd even thought of it. "You didn't really sleep well, or much at all, did you?" he asked gently, one thumb lightly stroking along somewhere on her upper back. He didn't have much else to do with his hand, and likely couldn't anyways, given how his mind had just latched on to how much she'd been hiding her fatigue alone. He should've noticed that earlier, but he'd gotten distracted by her cold feet instead. "Alright, come on, we're sitting down."

He turned, pulling her along with him without breaking the embrace, and slid the both of them in towards the center of the curved bench seat. Enough so that no matter how Rhia decided to sit or otherwise recline upon the seat it wouldn't have to break the hug.

Maybe he'd be able to convince her to nap before they arrived at Trevura. She could certainly use it, and he wasn't doing anything else, so remaining there to keep from waking her wouldn't be a problem...

Besides, he could probably use one himself. That pilot's chair was better than a lot of what he'd dealt with, but it still wasn't a perfectly restful place to sleep.

Rhia Kesyk

 

[Rhia Kesyk]

As he called her out on her lack of sleep, Rhia sniffed and couldn't even deny it. She shook her head against his chest, and drew upon the comfort he provided without finding a single thing to balk at. Not even when he flexed a thumb along her back. Nope, none of it. She was too numb to fight, and he'd just reminded her of how unbelievably tired she was.

She joined him on the bench without resistance, and brought her feet up to join her on the seat. At this point she wasn't really crying anymore, though the occasional sob-and-shudder still rocked her. She mumbled something entirely incoherent against him and closed her eyes, freeing her arms and wrapping them around herself where he wasn't already hugging her to act as a barrier against the general chill of the place.

A few more senseless mumbles, and her previously tense body finally relaxed; when compared with how difficult sleep typically was for her, Rhia succumbed to its throws in a heartbeat.

Marus Saretti

 

[Marus Saretti]

Marus held Rhia until he was sure she'd fallen asleep; surprisingly enough, it didn't take too long. "I told you you were going to burn yourself out," he muttered, glancing down at her peaceful face.

Of course, given that he'd made himself her pillow, he couldn't exactly get away and do the dishes, so they'd have to wait for later. Not that he minded much; having her against him was much nicer than sitting in the pilot's chair with a holobook. So, he reached over to the blanket that was left on the table, and wrapped it back around her again to keep her warmer.

Shifted a little bit, so that the both of them were in a slightly more comfortable position together; hopefully she wouldn't mind waking up with her legs just across his lap instead of herself curled into a ball.

And, with nothing better to do—except for a stray thought about Ideon, who he hoped had just decided it was a good idea to leave the plate on a desk and go back to sleep given how he and Rhia had been arguing earlier, and who he definitely hoped wouldn't walk on out and decide to make some comment about their current state of being—decided it was a good idea to take a nap himself, since he couldn't well go anywhere.

Rhia Kesyk

 

[Ideon Taldrel]

Raised voices. Flaring, glaring emotions. After finishing up his much needed breakfast, Ideon had simply drifted the plate across the room to the bedside table and therein wound himself up in the blankets to hide away from it all. Let the older kids argue it out, he wanted no part in it. So he lay there with his thoughts, trying insofar as he could to keep away the memories which kept springing up. He hadn't seen as much as Rhia had through the viewing port, her big head had been in the way, but he had felt, and he had understood.

At the time he'd screamed and cried along with her. But now? The tears wouldn't spring up so readily as they would for her. Just a quiet broiling rage simmering beneath the surface. He was sad, of course, filled with grief, but some emotions were simply more dominant than others.

In that moment however he just felt... Numb. It took him a moment to realize that all had gone quiet. Not even regular voices speaking, just... Silence. He waited a few more minutes, before detangling himself from the blanket and rolling off the bed. He paused, listened, waited again. Still nothing. Rose up, grabbed the plate, and carefully, quietly, made his way out into the hallway beyond.

His gentle footfalls padded against the floor, a little cold though he had sense enough to keep his socks on. He didn't really know where he was going, given that he'd barely been awake while on the ship, but he followed their general presence out into the common space and therein found what he was looking for - the galley. Upon entering though he halted, turned his head, not his body just his head, and glanced at the pair of them where they sat. Rhia was asleep, genuinely soundlessly asleep, and Marus looked as though he was on his way toward similar.

The kid just stared at him, wordlessly. For a moment it looked as though perhaps he was glaring. Then, without warning, he just nodded his head once. Took up the other two plates, and then made his way into the kitchen area. The boy was quiet as he cleared away the mess, unashamed as he finished off the rest of the now cold meal that Rhia had left behind, scrubbed down the dishes. He even rummaged through the cupboards, grabbed a few snacks and the like, a bottle of water, then he was gone just as quickly as he came.

Didn't even spare a second glance toward them.

He grabbed a holobook from some place or another before retreating back to his room. Closed the door this time, too.

Marus Saretti

 

[Rhia Kesyk]

She slept.

Like, for a long time.

Longer, perhaps, than either of them had expected. No doubt the only reason she even came to was that they reached their destination, and even then she was groggy and reluctant. It took her some time to even open her eyes, but before that she realized the weird new position she was in, and the warmth of the blanket, and the scent of the man beside her.

He'd stayed?

That was unexpected. Maybe he'd fallen asleep too... Force knew he couldn't have had a good night's sleep in that seat. Then again, was this one any better?

At least he'd made a comfortable pillow. With any luck she hadn't made him just as uncomfortable.

She shifted her head, and finally peered up at him. Took a few seconds longer to process how weird it was that she'd stayed that way after waking up, so she began to untangle herself from him and the blanket, having a bit of a tough time with the whole thing.

"Sorry" she muttered hastily, though it was clear the word was uttered more from embarrassment than anything else. Cheeks flushed, and her defenses tried to spring back up into existence.

Marus Saretti

 

[Marus Saretti]

While he didn't really notice Ideon come through, for Marus it really was more of a short nap than a longer sleep there with Rhia in his lap; much of it had ended up spent daydreaming or dozing somewhere in-between full wakefulness and sleep. Until she woke up, and started struggling to free herself in her half-awake state. "Sorry for what?" he asked, releasing his arms so that she could free herself more easily. "I offered to be a pillow, after all." Resigned to the fact that his lazy dozing was over, he cracked open his eyes, glancing down at her—

Just to see that blush of hers was coming back. Before he could get entirely too distracted by that, he glanced back towards the table, just to see that the dishes were gone and dealt with.

But he hadn't dealt with them, and certainly she hadn't. So Ideon must've come back out that way. Uh-oh. Hopefully the kid wasn't too bothered seeing the two of them like they had been. "Just remember to get some proper sleep tonight, alright? And keep what all I was saying in mind. As fun as it's been, I already prefer when we're able to just joke around and talk without having to argue." He slid to the other side of the booth, out from under her legs, but stopped before getting up.

"...That might have come out wrong. I do enjoy your company, honest, just...don't convince yourself that neglecting yourself to take care of everything else counts as actually taking care of yourself. All that'll happen is you'll burn out. Now, I'm going to go see just how close we actually are to Trevura, or if we're still half the system out."

And with that he finally got up and made his way to the cockpit, though not without a single knock on Ideon's door once he passed by it. "Thanks for the dishes, kid," he said, loud enough for Ideon to hear, and continued on along.

Rhia Kesyk

 

[Ideon Taldrel]

Noise? Oh, they were awake again. Ideon had burned through a solid amount of the book in that time. He heard feet coming his way, pausing outside his door for not even a second, and then a voice rang out in thanks.

The kid just sent out a general feeling of YOU'RE WELCOME to the man, a surprisingly bolder sensation than the previously more muted ones, then went back to reading.

 

[Rhia Kesyk]

In her groggy state, the man's words came off as a little bit more of a lecture. Surprisingly enough though she seemed to just let it go, preferring to simply nod as opposed to argue with him on the subject. "Alright," she sighed, "So long as you don't sleep in the cockpit again, deal."

That was a compromise she was willing to make, after all.

Finding herself alone on the seat she stretched out her limbs and yawned, then rubbed at her eyes. She too noticed the distinct lack of dishes on the table, and then heard her stomach grumble in frustration. As Marus made his way out to the cockpit, and alerted her to the fact that Ideon had been the one to clean up along the way, she shuffled out of her seat and padded toward the galley.

"Oh so now you decide you want to eat?" she grumbled at herself, opening up a cupboard and pulling down some sort of packaged junk food from within. The sort of thing Vero would have chided her for reaching for. Oh well, in pressing times you made do with what you had on hand. And she had...

Corellian potato sticks?

Sure, why not.

Rhia stretched some more, up onto her tiptoes and bending out her sore feet, before opening the package and wandering along after Marus. As she joined him in the cockpit she offered him some of the stick from her bag.

 

[Marus Saretti]

By the time Rhia caught back up, he'd already set them on a route towards Voma, the planet's capital city. He'd already gotten telemetry data on the current locations of in-system objects, projected movements, and the like; now it was just the cruise to the planet. Luckily, luckily, they hadn't come out of hyperspace at the edge of the system—which would take multiple more hours of travel at sublight—but instead near some gas giant in the middle of the system that had some sixty-four character long alphanumeric designation instead of a proper name.

Or, alternatively, could just be called "Trevura 5," if they wanted to be simple about it. 'Trevura' was actually Trevura 3, but nobody cared that much.

He was momentarily distracted hearing some sort of crunching sound, though, as he turned to see Rhia walking in with a bag of...potato sticks? Or were they topato sticks? Does it really even matter? Not really, he soon decided. "No thanks. Don't want to spoil lunch." Of course, at this rate it'd be about an hour before they could have lunch, but he'd need that time to try and sniff out the best spot to eat.

"We're about a half-hour out from landing, if you want to take that shower."

Rhia Kesyk

 

[Rhia Kesyk]

He rejected the offered snack, and she glanced past him to the world they were approaching. Lunch... Somehow that didn't seem as appetizing as snacks did to her in that moment, though she admired his willpower to reject the salty, savory sticks of fried potato.

Leaning her arms over the back of the seat, she sighed a little.

"How quick is your laundry system?" she inquired with a chuckle, "Thirty minutes to get these cleaned and dry to rewear..?" Soon enough she finished off the package of chips, and crinkled up the wrapper ready to toss in the trash. "Ugh, I'd love a shower, though. You don't have, like, a spare shirt or something lying around do you?"

She remembered then that this wasn't even his ship.

"Nevermind. I guess it'll just be extra nice when we're back with a change of clothes. Then I'll shower..."

Rhia plopped down in the copilots seat, and drew her feet up much in the way she had done the night before while he slept. "Have you been here before?"

Marus Saretti