(no subject)

[oldladyleia]

Who: Leia Organa and various folks. (Some open and closed threads!)
What: A whole bunch of stuff i.e. your basic catchall.
When: Various times.
Where:Various locations.
Warnings: Angst.

Comments

For Amilyn: Closed

[oldladyleia]

When Leia had first received the notice that there was a cylinder for her, who to reach out for had been instant. That was one good thing about having your oldest friend here when everything was happening. They were ensconced at Leia's office at the Guard, and she was sitting in the chair with her spine stiff when she opened the canister that contained memories that she had only heard about from Amilyn. But her stiff upper lip was impossible to hold onto as loss after loss seemed to slam into her body with the physicality of a blaster bolt. So many people, so easily lost. People who she couldn't imagine losing, people whom she had known all her life just snuffed out in a moment. It wasn't Alderaan, of course which was the measure by which all of her losses were measured but this was a Pandora's box all it's own.

But like the Earth myth that she had read about in her time here, there was hope at the bottom of the canister, in the form of six words from her brother that she had both heard and felt vibrating in the Force around her. "No one is ever really gone." When she became aware of the room, she could almost hear him whispering them to her again, and she felt the phantom touch of his lips on her forehead as silent tears moved down her face. He wasn't gone. Ben wasn't gone. Han wasn't gone.

Amilyn wasn't gone. She had figured out months ago that later on her best friend had died. But she had hoped that they could change it here. Now, she knew that she couldn't do it. Like so many times before, the Resistance was built upon the bodies of the people who had fought for it. And Leia would honor the sacrifice that her friend had made by moving forward and saving as many people as she could through whatever means she needed to do it. For all of that, it didn't mean that Leia Organa wasn't going to reach over and wrap her arms around Amilyn and hold her as tightly as she could.

[protectingthelight]

Amilyn knee all about the canisters, of course, but this was the first time she’d seen one, seen it used. She said nothing as Leia opened it, waited for the memories to pass, her heart in her throat.

(She wondered as well if Leia would know more than Dameron did, if her memories went any further past his. The possibility that she still might be “behind” didn’t bear thinking about.)

She watched Leia’s face, and when her oldest friend embraced her, she held Leia tightly, feeling tears well up in her eyes. She had so many questions about what Leia knew now, but she would let the answers come as they would.

[oldladyleia]

Leia just let herself be held for a moment, remembering the phantom feeling of her thought of this never happening again once the two of them had parted company. Back home it would be true, forever true but here the two of them had this borrowed time, and she closed her eyes, feeling the warm, solid tallness of her best friend in front of her and around her, and just savoring it.

But like so many other times, Leia's veteran instincts kicked in, and she drew back a little bit, but just to the length of being able to hold her friend's hands like she had before. (She wasn't thinking about the last time. Not right now.)

Important things first: "We escaped. Luke came and bought us time to get to the Falcon and we got everyone who survived out. Rey came back." She couldn't and wouldn't lie to her friends about the numbers who had gotten out, but she had. Chewie had. 3P0 did. Rey had. Poe and Finn had. They had survived periods with less.

[protectingthelight]

Amilyn nodded. Her shift in manner matched Leia's, the instinctive move into debrief mode. "Poe Dameron—he told me that you made it to Crait. But not the rest." And then she realized exactly what Leia had said. "...Luke? Luke came to Crait?" Astonishment was written all over her face.

For Poe: Closed and backdated to Hux's arrival.

[oldladyleia]

Leia is sitting in her office, going over reports with a pen in her hand. She's been ignoring the network, because sometimes she just needed to focus on things without the chatter of it. So, it makes sense that she wouldn't know about the arrival of the man whom she'd privately named 'the red haired bladderweasel.' If she had known about him, then the General would have been much less relaxed than she was, but for now she was just thinking that it was a normal day here on the moon. Of course, this day was anything but it.

Poe and herself had been avoiding one another ever since there had been the incident of Leia siding with Rey over letting Ben train her. She understood why Poe was so against it, but she was worried about Rey as well. Honestly, Leia worried about all of the people she knew who were here, but she also didn't want to chance something that might make their relationship worse. She'd already felt like she'd lost Ben fully, and she didn't want to break with Poe entirely. Honestly, she wasn't sure she could handle losing him over something like this. It was bad enough each time she'd needed to send him into combat, but that was one thing because he was a pilot. This was something entirely different.

It was why then, that there was the surprise when she felt him coming close to her in the Force, and when she could feel his agitation. Quickly, the papers were resting on the desk, and she looked for the man in her open doorway before she just asked quickly her voice calm but urgent: "What's wrong?"

[volitaunt]

There she is. He's seen her at a distance over the past week or so, sure, but they haven't spoken. It's the longest he's gone without talking to Leia when not on a mission in years.

For a second he just stands in the doorway, missing her, hearing her say Follow him. His heart is torn two ways.

But they're on the same side. She needs to know what he knows. And he wants to know what she remembers now, if it's anything more or less than the rest of them.

"Hux is here."

[oldladyleia]

The follow him is something in her future now, for just a little while longer, as is the slap that preceded that. (And of course the shooting.) Whatever else, despite how angry he was at her, Leia Organa would trust him not just with her life, but something infinity more valuable: the spark of hope that might save the galaxy from the First Order.

At the mention of Hux, Leia's concerned face slipped, locking down into the battle ready and planning look of sharpness that she could sometime get. Her hands went flat against her desk, because she wasn't going to allow herself to look concerned. There were advantages that they had that the First Order didn't, and sheer numbers was one of them.

Of course, there was a concern about one thing that he might have that they didn't, so Leia just asked quickly. "Has he given any clues from where he is on the timeline?" Was he latter than Poe himself was now.

[volitaunt]

Poe doesn't sit. He walks the edge of the room, tense, watching Leia to try and pick up on any signal she might give. She's got that face on, the one that says she's analyzing, planning. The security it gives him to see it makes him miss her all over again.

"None that I saw. He's even with us at least, though--Paige told him she blew up his ship and he knew what she was talking about."

For Kylo. Closed.

[oldladyleia]

No one is ever really gone. Luke had told her that at her lowest point, and she had known then that whatever he was going to do was going to end up with him leaving too. He had bought them time in order to escape, and they had. Back home, she was safe on the Falcon (well, as safe as one could be on the Falcon when fleeing the First Order) and here she had a chance to hopefully try to connect with Ben again. She'd been avoiding him as much as he had been avoiding her, because she hadn't wanted to push him into the Darker side of things.

But now that Hux was here, and that she'd gained the memories of things that had happened since she'd been home, there was a new urgency to find her son and to try and talk to him. To try to get him to understand that she was alive, that she was fine and that she didn't think he was a monster. That she was sorry for what Luke had done, and that she never would have condoned it. And moreover that she was still his mother and he was still her son and that there was nothing that could be done to change it.

And of course, that she loved him with every part of her. And that she always would.

Tracking him down had been more difficult than she would have liked, but in the end here she stood outside of the room of the seedy hotel that he had barricaded himself inside of. She could feel him there inside, a pulsing vision of both light and darkness that she was more aware of now that she was using the Force more often than she ever had. Her fingers touched the ring with the two blue stones that Han had given her when Ben was born. It was reassuring in a way, calming and reminded her than Han wasn't really gone either. It was just a second before her hand closed in on itself and knocked against the cheap door.

[killthepast]

That Kylo has been avoiding his mother is... nothing new, really. He avoided her before receiving the canister that showed him his missing memories, stubbornly clutching to his hurt and anger, and reeling from the unexpected guilt, and the overwhelming sorrow from having killed his own father.

After the canister, it's only gotten worse. Whatever tenuous stability he'd known had been ripped away, and he feels as if he's lost all sense of direction. More than that, though Leia lives on here, he can't shake his memories of feeling her presence on the Raddus-- connected, for one moment, before his escorts took out the bridge. In an instant, that presence was gone.

He can't help but wonder: did she think, in her last moments, that he was the one who took the shot?

She'd have no reason to believe otherwise. He'd already killed his father, after all. He should have fired on her and taken out the Resistance leaders himself. It was only a moment of weakness that stayed his hand.

And yet...

He can't face her. The thought of looking his mother in the eyes, and seeing just how abhorrent she must find him, is bad enough. To see her would make it become reality, irrefutable confirmation that he is a monster.

Weak. Foolish. Stupid boy. He swears, he can hear his doubts in Snoke's voice.

He's managed to avoid her for months. But now she's coming. He can feel his mother's presence, growing closer. She feels like the Light, that same Light that his former master always cautioned him against. Kylo moves to the door as she stands on the other side, looking at it as if he can see her small frame through it.

But he doesn't answer when she knocks. Closing his eyes, he rests his forehead against the wood, touches his palm to the door, and just breathes. He steels himself, but he still can't bring himself to let her in.

[oldladyleia]

Leia knows that Ben is on the other side of the door. He's just too much of a force in the Force for her not to feel it. She'd hoped that he would have opened the door, that she wouldn't need to ask him to do it. In some ways, this reminded her of when he was a child, and she too pressed her forehead against the wood, and let out a little soft sigh as she placed her hand next to the handle.

"Ben." The word was soft, but she knew it would carry through the thin material that separated them. The voice that she used was not the voice of a general, or a senator. It was the voice of his mother, the gentle tone that she'd used to talk to her son when was still in her womb. It was the same tone that she'd used when she'd taught him to write, and when she'd told him the stories of her parents and Alderaan. It was a voice that few in the galaxy were truly aware of, and most of them were now dead. Han, Luke, Amilyn... And that just left Ben.

"Let me in." Her voice was the same, but there was a little more urgency in it before she added "please." To the prior sentence. Perhaps that was even something monumental. Leia wasn't well known for actually saying please when she wanted or needed something.

[killthepast]

It's just like the assault on the Raddus, when he felt her through the Force and there was only love and worry for him, and a deep sense of loss. Again, there's no anger, and he can't fathom why. She should be angry. She should despise him, the son who worked so hard to dismantle everything she built. Instead, even now, she pleads for him to let her in.

Kylo draws in a breath, steeling himself, trying to draw strength from the Dark Side-- the strength to finish this, somehow. Kill her, send her away, convince her once and for all that there's no 'saving' him. Anything, just to end the conflict always raging within him.

Instead, he unlocks the door and opens it, taking a step back. General Organa, he wants to say, in a cold voice, devoid of all sentimentality. He wants to stand tall and proud, as the Supreme Leader that the First Order and Resistance think him to be. (Even if he's all but given that up by now.)

He wants to, and yet the only thing he can say is, "Mother." He can hardly look at her, afraid of what he might see in her eyes, and in her face.

Open: Outside the barracks.

[oldladyleia]

[Occasionally, (or perhaps slightly more than) Leia Organa enjoyed doing her paperwork outside. It was a thing for which the novelty had not worn off. She loved to feel the sunshine on her face while she was doing the little things that were a constant problem when one was a bureaucrat. Oh, it had been a bit of difference to learn how to write things on paper rather than doing them on a pad, but it was one that she'd not minded all that much. Writing things reminded her of Ben in happier times, and the memory was less bittersweet than it might once had been.

There was another thing that sitting outside on a chair was good for: it made her more accessible to people who both knew her and who didn't. This place wasn't like back home where everyone knew her, at least by her reputation if nothing else. Here, she needed to make a new name for herself, and she knew that if nothing else, that always started with the people that were around her.

So when people looked to her, she smiled, and when people paused, Leia greeted them warmly, one finger just resting against the spot in the papers she was holding onto so she wouldn't lose it.]

[deploy]

[There's a grown-ass man in full uniform (shirt untucked, sleeves rolled, pants halphhazardly bloused) skateboarding down the path, a file folder under one arm. That man is John Sheppard, and he's actually an officer. Somehow.

The PG aren't such a small organization that John doesn't know who's at the top. He's seen Leia around from afar, read her name in the minutes of meetings he wasn't important enough to sit at. She's interesting to John. A diplomat turned general turned organizational pencil-pusher. Poe's told him about enough her, with that far-off look in his eyes, that she's earned her stars.

So he slows his (literal) roll to come to a stop in front of her, and snaps off a salute. Old habits die hard.]

Ma'am.

[oldladyleia]

[There were some sights that Leia Organa had gotten used to during the two rebellions that she had been involved with, and offices running at a certain level of underdressed was one of them. Of course, there were those here who took it to the extreme, but Leia didn't mind--they didn't have the same thing to worry about as Leia did back home (or honestly their homes too most people here came from something similar at least in the Guard.)

What she hadn't gotten used to was seeing grown men on toys. There was a quick thought that her brother would have dearly loved the board that the man was currently skating on. Especially if he could figure out how to turn it into something airborne. Leia had given up hope that her Luke would have shown up here, before she'd added the new memories to old ones, and now the sense was renewed, and there was an amusement in her eyes as she looked from the salute downward to the board.

The result was a quick and automatic:] At ease. [Before she pointed down towards the man's feet.]

What is that?

[deploy]

[There's only so at ease John can get around an unfamiliar general. He doesn't stand at full parade rest, but he's not going to slouch with his hands in his pockets, either.

That said, she looks friendly enough, and John's always had a particular admiration and respect for female authority figures. He was always a mama's boy.]

It's a longboard, ma'am.

[John kicks the board up into one hand, wheels still spinning. The underside is painted with a fox's head, bright orange against black, already scuffed with use.]

Faster than walking, and you don't get stuck in traffic.

[realists]

[ leia isn't the only one that likes doing her paperwork outside. as a general rule, jyn takes the least amount of notes possible and then includes a note to look at cassian's notes because she's that kind of dickhead, but sometimes she does have to write her own notes and when that happens she takes her datapad outside to type them all in because if she did it inside she would go insane.

she's an outdoors creature by nature anyway.

having noticed leia earlier, jyn pauses to grab lunch and her own chair that she settles down next to leia's, draping down on it with all the grace of a drunken poodle. she holds out the second glass bottle of what looks like some kind of pink fruit soda to the princess. general. whatever. no, jyn is sticking with princess and they can pry that from her cold dead hands. ]

Have you tried this yet? [ the rest of lunch is a pair of sandwiches, but she really means the sparkling juice. ]

[oldladyleia]

[There were certain people in her life who could get away with calling her 'princess' because they had known her (well) since she had been one. A war hero who should have been older than Leia was one of those people who would be allowed to. Besides, she expected that Jyn didn't care if Leia liked it or not. Leia probably wouldn't have if the situations were reversed.

So, instead she just enjoyed the companionable silence with the girl who reminded her more than a little bit of a certain smuggler and how he could too look like a drunken poodle at times. The thoughts brought a bit of a smile to her face, and she just shared the silence cordially until Jyn broke it.

Looking to the bottle, she just shook her head. Someone had introduced her to whiskey and something called "orange juice" and that along with water were the things that Leia drank.]

I don't believe that I have.

[realists]

It's good, [ jyn offers, as if her clearly unrefined palate even deserves an opinion of what is good and bad. she spent six months eating nothing but prison protein cubes and probably two years thinking saw's protein drinks were the height of cuisine.

leia should probably trust her own taste buds and not jyn's but she offers her opinion anyway because yolo. ]

It's sweet and light, like if they made juice from a starblossom. [ the destruction of alderaan isn't something jyn can fully conceptualize still, so it doesn't occur to her that starblossoms might not be around anymore. ]

[fhux]

[ In the days since the ISA was founded and Hux granted a working engineering lab of his own (complete with an office to sleep in, shh) his days at the Guard have been more fulfilling post-induction. He understands why he was put through his paces before joining but he doesn't have to appreciate the time wasted on verifying the truth (that he is capable, fit, and loyal to a cause if it counts as his own, AKA owning his own department however small) which is one of the reasons he has taken so long to shake down into the routine of things. These days he has traded out his FO greatcoat for a similar leather duster that better handles the Arkanis-like downpours, his blaster strapped to a thigh to distract from the blade hidden up a sleeve. Neat shirts have been swapped for tops that accumulate smears and marks, having returned to his roots in engineering (he suspects if anyone such as Mitaka were to arrive on the moon they would hardly recognise him) as he adapts and customises various weapons; the latest has been a new blaster for Ren, small in comparison to the man in order for him to effectively conceal it from the rebels whom he may very well have to fire upon one day, should they decide to take him on again and the mystical witchery of the Force proves just as useless as the first time he was shot at. He tries not to think of it as keeping Ren alive, but rather investing in the better nature of an overgrown, easily manipulated child. Then there is the fact he has no one else who would even consider answering a plea for help, should he ever require protection. Ren hates him right back, yet at the very least he values Armitage's worth as a second-in-command.

Carrying a box of accoutrements intended for the blaster, he draws up short halfway across the quad when none other than General-Fucking-Organa seems to rise up around a corner working on ... paper. Outdoors. The absurd sight throws him off long enough for his shadow to linger in her eyeline, and then it's far too late to move; alarm spikes instinctively, a Fight-or-Flight reaction frozen somewhere between. He knew she was here, of course. It's recorded information, easily accessible. Also, he suspects she is one of the reasons that Ren hasn't done away with that scavenger girl just yet.

He fervently wishes that Ren hadn't wasted his time fighting apparitions on Crait and instead allowed Hux's army to storm the stronghold, killing off the snake of the resistance by cutting off her head. Not that he can ever even think that in Ren's presence, or Leia's, which is why he immediately shuts down the same mental wall he has been practicing since Ren's invasion of his thoughts. Kriff slips out beforehand, however, and his grip tightens on the box of spare parts. ]

... General.

[ He may prefer Leia dead but never let it be said that Armitage succumbs to hatred recklessly. Manners don't have to be kind, which is often when they count the most. ]

[oldladyleia]

[Leia Organa had privately titled Hux 'a red haired bladderweasel' long before now, and she was struck with the image of how right it was as she felt the man coming closer to her. The sneer was kept from her face (for the moment anyway, after all General Hugs wasn't the only politician who was here) when he spoke to her. Her eyes lifted, and she studied him with cool and appraising eyes, noticing the smears and marks on his shirts. Those dark eyes lingered on them for a moment, just long enough for him to knew that she noticed before they lifted to his face.

Whatever else he was up to, someone letting him into engineering was probably not a good idea but her power and influence here hadn't extended to stopping him. At least not yet: she was going to begin to put out some extremely discrete feelers to see just what it was that he happened to have access to. It was always better to be safe than sorry, and unlike Hux, General Leia Organa wasn't known for underestimating her foes save for one: the very one that both of them tried to protect.

Protect mostly from himself anyway, but Leia expected that if Ben stepped too far into Hux's way there'd be another causality that would read as an 'accident' but would be anything but. Leia was going to be very certain that he couldn't do that. At least not here.

But now was the time for that cold politeness that she had shown to multiple generations of Empire scum, and she inclined her head just a bit before she responded, giving him his title as he had given her her own:]

General.

[fhux]

[ Isn't it ironic? The only person who offers him the slightest begrudging respect of his actual title has to be her. His insides quake but, as ever he did before Snoke, he remains sedate on the outside. If not control over his armies, it counts for something over himself too.

Inclining his head with a fraction of a nod, he scours her with a similar glance and comes to stand naturally at something like parade rest. ]

Paper documents? Such an obscene waste of resources. If you're lacking in reliable datapads, I have a spare.

[ Which he would, of course, immediately customise to track her every use of the thing. But it's the thought that counts, no? ]

Re: Open: Outside the barracks.

[like_quicksilver]

[The barracks were right outside one of the training areas, one that Gyda preferred because there was an outdoor area with targets. She was getting better at throwing weapons and could just make twenty in a row at the target.

She was on her way there now when she saw a woman outside and writing on paper. When she looked up and greeted her, Gyda returned it with a small smile.] Afternoon.

[oldladyleia]

[The thing that surprised her most about this moon (other than the fact that so many of her people were on it) was the fact that there were younglings all over the place. It warmed her heart, and made her think of the period between the worlds when there was that unsteady peace and her own son was as young as the girl in front of her. Seeing that the girl was coming from the training area, she raised a brow and asked softly:]

So what were we training in?

Open: Pick a bar, any bar.

[oldladyleia]

[Despite what a workaholic Leia was, a woman couldn't live on work alone. It was less true here than it was back home, but it was still true nonetheless. So, occasionally, Leia would visit a bar. She always chose a table, something that had open chairs for people to stop by and visit her if they wanted too. People who stopped were always welcomed, and there was always a wave to the bartender for a fresh whisky for her and whatever else the person was drinking.]