2_old_for_this | From the Preserve to MCA, Saturday

Entry tags:

kanan jarrus,
magic

From the Preserve to MCA, Saturday

It was fairly quiet out here in the preserve; the odd animals seemed uninterested in Peter, which was fine with him. He wasn't out here to animal-watch.

It had gotten oppressive in his apartment, the walls seeming to press on him along with the memories. He still needed to do more, though. The magic was coming back to him, and he needed to remember more.

The air crackled slightly around him as he sank to his knees and took a deep breath. He cupped his hands together, channeling the excess energy into a ball, then pushing it away to dissipate in the air. He took another breath and sank back into the memories of Hell, searching for what he needed. From the outside, it might look like meditation, if you ignored the expression on his face.

[Expecting one!]

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Nobody but Peter, really. And sometimes people who got too close.

In either meaning of the word.

He used the door and elevator as an excuse to keep quiet on the way up to Kanan's place. Used the time for a chance to work himself up to it. He wasn't sure how Kanan might react. Or if he was ready to open that can of worms. He stared distractedly around the apartment, picking a large pink feather off the couch as he sat down.

The feather, of course, wasn't Kanan's doing. The dog that was tailing behind Kanan on his way to the kitchen to put on hot water for tea absolutely was, waggling tail and all. Of course, Stance only tailed Kanan long enough for him to bend down and give him an affectionate ruffle behind the ears, and then trotted over to make himself comfortable on the couch beside Peter, tongue lolling out as he did so.

A few minutes later, Kanan emerged from the kitchen with two cups of tea, a plastic container with sugar in it, a small carton of milk, and some spoons, all balanced with the sort of ease that would make most serving droids jealous.

"Didn't know what you wanted in it, so I just brought it all out."

He gave Stance a glance and a raised eyebrow, and then he just sighed and made himself comfortable on the end of the coffee table that wasn't now having tea and the fixings set out on top of it.

Pushover.

"Thanks." Peter took his cup and just held it for a bit. The dog's weight next to him was comforting. So was the warmth of the tea. Finally he managed, staring blankly into the cup, "It was around a thousand years."

Kanan damn near dropped his cup. He didn't. By some miracle of the Force, he managed to keep his cup in his hands.

He didn't, however, manage to keep from burning his tongue and pulling a bit of a spit-take as a result. Fortunately, it wasn't aimed at anybody in particular. Especially since he couldn't have been bothered to care about that minor thing at just that moment.

"A thousand years?" His eyes were wide as he brought his sleeve up to wipe as his chin. "You... you're serious."

He wasn't lying. That was the thing that was leaving Kanan the most stunned. That estimate wasn't hyperbole, wasn't just a figure of speech. Peter was telling him that he'd been in hell for a millennium. And Kanan believed him.

Peter nodded and leaned back, closing his eyes. He smiled faintly at Kanan's reaction. "Should I apologize again?"

"Nope, the spit's on me," Kanan sighed.

Literally, at that.

"Anyway, I asked." He frowned thoughtfully for a moment, and then lowered his damp sleeve from his face and ventured, "And you've only been out of there for... how long?"

"Maybe an hour before I ended up here," Peter said. "So, about three weeks."

Kanan's dog pushed his head up against Peter's side and wiggled at him, and Peter dropped a hand down to pet him gently.

"Space," Kanan muttered, bringing a hand up to pinch the bridge of his nose. "That's all? It's a wonder you're functional at all, if that's the case."

Honestly, Peter. You were capable of carrying on actual normal conversations without pausing to scream for an hour straight every now and again. There was an impressive life skill, right there.

He'd done that for a time. Been insane for a time, too. Now, he just shrugged.

"There was a battle. Another one. I couldn't let myself just lie there. I shoved the memories down and just kept going."

And then he'd been here, with Sparkle pulling him off the ground.

Kanan pulled in a slow inhale. And then exhaled, just as slowly. And then looked up at the ceiling as though maybe it would tell him what he was supposed to say in a situation like this.

"And now you're dredging them up again in the hopes that it'll get you home. Home must be something special, if you're willing to face that darkness again just for the chance to get back there."

"It's home," Peter answered. "My friends and family are there. It's my world."

Yeah.

That was... ouch.

"I guess it would be, huh?" Kanan heaved a sigh, and then jerked a thumb up toward the ceiling. "If I thought I could even make it there, I'd offer to at least get you to the right planet in my ship. As it stands, the Expedient hasn't been refueled since I got here, and that still doesn't solve the universe issue."

He tapped out a little tattoo on the sides of his cup with the fingers of his free hand, and then sighed.

"That said, if there's anything at all I can do to help..."

Look, Peter. He hadn't been damned to hell for a thousand years or anything, but he could understand that ache for home.

Edited 2016-08-14 01:44 (UTC)

"Thanks. I don't think there's anything you can, but thanks. If I think of something..." Peter shrugged.

Kanan shrugged.

"Hey, there's always tea. Or if you think you might need somebody to spot you..."

So that there would be no more incidents like that thing that had happened in the preserve.

"That...might actually be a good idea," Peter said. "What did you have in mind? The spotting, not the tea."

"Well, for a start, somebody who can keep an eye out, make sure nobody's going to startle you while you're in the thick of it can't hurt," Kanan said reasonably. "Even if the safety and comfort of your own apartment, you're still in a building full of people, and it's pretty clear that their physical presence isn't all that sets you off. You don't know who might come to investigate all of that darkness that's roiling off of you when you're doing your thing, and some people here don't have to leave the safety of their own homes to do it."

"I hadn't thought of that," Peter confessed. "Are there a lot of folks sensitive to magic around?"

"I can think of at least four off the top of my head," Kanan shared, "and I haven't even met all that many people since I arrived here. I can guarantee you that you'll catch the attention of at least one or two, and I don't think all of them will be willing to overlook having lightning thrown at them."

Not to mention that seething aura. It still had Kanan on edge, and he sort of knew Peter.

Well, Peter had bought him a coffee that one time, and Stance seemed to like him. That was something, right?

Dogs were great judges of character!

"I think...I should remember enough now to put up a bit of a barrier in my apartment. At least help block out a bit." Peter turned his head to look at Kanan. "How much magic do you know?"

"Magic in the same sense as you'd know it?" Kanan shook his head and shrugged his shoulders. "Probably none. I..."

He tapered off, eyeing Peter for a few moments, and then heaved a sigh. His hand reached up to run through his hair. Usually pulling his hair back stopped him from making that stupid gaffe, but there he was, with his fingers to the knuckles in chestnut hair, and nowhere to go because of the hair-tie.

Damn it.

"I have other things I can fall back on. No fancy lightning fingers, though."

"Things like what?" Peter asked. "You can feel magic, you said?"

Kanan blew out a breath, then made a face and tugged his fingers free. Right. Fine. Master Kenobi was going to swear up and down that this was a safe place to be a Jedi? Then Kanan was going to take him at his word.

"I can feel a lot of things. I could see the power that was gathering around you in the preserve. Not half as well as some people could, but I'm... working on that."

Probably against his better judgment, mind.

"So you're a natural talent, but not really trained?" Peter asked.

Eesh, that part was complicated, wasn't it?

"I'm a natural talent, and I was trained for the first fourteen years of my life," Kanan replied, frowning. "And then I quit. Completely. I only picked it up again after coming here. It's a long story."

It wasn't that long a story.

"Longer than mine?" Peter asked, giving Kanan a crooked smile.

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