[ closed/open ] Highway to the danger zone

[volitaunt]

who: Poe + CR + ALSO YOU, MAYBE??
what: Catch-all with closed and open prompts
when: April/May
where: ALL AROUND LE TOWN, more prompts to come i'm sure
warnings: Poe attempting to babysit ten thousand tiny Star Warses and then self-destructing when he doesn't have that distraction any more???

Comments

[volitaunt]

[ Poe stares down at her tiredly, wondering how much trouble he would get into if he just figured out a way to drug everyone in this apartment right now including himself. ]

Didn't anyone ever teach you not to hit people?

[ Those words actually just came out of his mouth. This is Jyn Erso. Hitting people is and apparently always has been Her Thing. ]

Just. Don't hit him, all right?

[ From the other room, BB-8 makes a concerned noise and Poe has to stop himself from running in there to check on whatever it is. Hopefully the droid can handle it for the moment. ]

It isn't nice.

[realists]

He isn't nice.

[ why don't they get along? who even knows. two little kids with clashing personalities and none of the self-control of their adult selves. ]

How come he isn't in trouble for inst-inst- instaging.

[ instigating. she means instigating and she is so proud of her fancy and incorrectly used vocabulary word, puffing up happily and defiantly. ]

[volitaunt]

Inst--?

[ It takes him a second. ] Instigating? Because he didn't punch you to start it.

[ Poe rubs a hand through his hair. ] What did he do?

[realists]

[ jyn mumbles something about huttheads but cassian probably did nothing wrong she just has the self-control of a six year old and sometimes they can't articulate with their words so they do it with their fists.

nothing changes into adulthood. ]

He made fun of my dolly.

[volitaunt]

Okay, well, we don't hit people for doing that.

[ SIGH. ] If he does it again, try. Talking to him.

[ How can he tell this child to try talking to people when two days ago he was getting punched for fun and profit. HYPOCRISY 101??? ]

[ Poe is trying hard to channel his dad here. He really is. Kes would know how to handle this, no questions asked, no quarter given to tiny monsters who like weaponry. ] Tell him you don't like it when he does that. And if he doesn't stop, tell me.

[realists]

[ get ready to navigate some hard to navigate shit, poe. jyn looks up at him with her clear green eyes, all big and owlish because she hasn't grown into her features yet, everything still round. ]

He doesn't like it 'cause it's a trooper and troopers killed his planet. But Papa said it was conflipcated! 'cause they protected us from the droids during the war. But if they hurt Cassian's family that means they're bad.

1/2

[volitaunt]

[



fuck



]

[volitaunt]

[ Poe kneels, trying to figure out how to do this. How to explain this. Before Finn it would have been easy for him to side with Cassian, even a Cassian this young. He knows it's different, when these kids are from, it's very different, but... ]

It is complicated. [ Deep breath. Exhale. How can he possibly put this? ]

Even good things can go bad.

[realists]

[ jyn peers at him and there is something in her eyes that seems to indicate she doesn't believe him. but she doesn't not believe him. it doesn't sound right but she doesn't know enough about things to dispute it. ]

Like bantha milk.

[volitaunt]

Like that.

[ He puts his hands on her arms lightly, then takes her hands in his, and wonders how many times Jyn is going to punch him when this is over if she remembers this. ]

I'm not great at explaining stuff like this. Ships, engines, droids, I've got you covered.

[ He's talking nonsense at her, trying to avoid telling the truth. ]

Things aren't always simple. They don't always make as much sense as we wish they would. Things go bad, like bantha milk, they do. But sometimes things...

[ This is too much. He shouldn't be bothering, he shouldn't even be trying, it's not like this is going to last. It's not like he's going to have to navigate Jyn and Cassian knowing each other as children in the long term.

But the same way he owes the adult Finn the best he can give his younger self, Poe owes Jyn, too.

It's really, really hard not to just say that stormtroopers are bad. Things are complicated, but stormtroopers? Definitely bad. ]

The troopers didn't--don't protect everyone. The people they protect think they're good. The people they attack think they're bad. You have to decide what you think for yourself.

[realists]

Mama said we gotta hide when they come. [ and it's sad that lyra taught her it was a when, not an if. the empire was going to come after her family and lyra needed her tiny daughter to be prepared. ] But she said they wouldn't hurt us.

[ leverage, for galen. luckily, jyn is too young to realize now and too bitter to care as an adult. ]

Is that why FN-2187 wasn't mean about Stormie? 'cause they protected him?

[volitaunt]

...Sort of.

[ It still isn't his place, now, in Finn's future, whenever, to share Finn's past. (Present?) More than that, though, he's not even sure Jyn at this age would understand. ]

He understands the troopers. No--he understands why they fight. [ Poe gives a tiny exhale, not sure he's making this any less confusing. ]

People have a lot of reasons to feel the way they do about things. Sometimes their reasons don't make sense for others.

[ Under his breath: ] I don't even know if I'm making sense any more.

[ To her: ] My mom fought against troopers. So did my dad. But my best friend? He was a trooper. Sometimes things are hard, and complicated. [ Slip, Slip and every other faceless soldier he's ever blown away. ] Sometimes they're confusing. That's part of what we get to do, what we have to do, while we live. Try and figure out what we believe and why we believe it.

[realists]

[ jyn looks at him for a long time, quiet and seemingly calculative but she is six so maybe she is thinking about whether or not blood oranges are really made of blood and not the difficult issue of children ripped from their families and brainwashed into subservience and forced to be child soldiers until they become adult soldiers who don't know any better because they believe in the cause and they're just doing their jobs.

her mouth turns down into a solemn, thoughtful frown that her adult counterpart wears more often than not. ]

I'm not gonna be best friends with Cassian. He's a Hutt's arse.

[ and because she said a bad word to an adult and that is Not Allowed, jyn walks away before she can be scolded. #YOUTHS ]