helloeverybunny | OPEN RP POST • STAR WARS MINGLE ⭐️

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OPEN RP POST • STAR WARS MINGLE ⭐️

whatever it is you've been doing
you are now in Canto Bight!

That's right. It's just like those jamjar games. One moment you're minding your own business, and then... poof!
You're in Canto Bight for no apparent reason.
(Or you've always wanted to be here, and you finally did it. Whatever, we're not the cops.)

That's not the weirdest part, though. Because you might be seeing double.
It's like the time-space continuum collapsed over the city
and now doubles and multiples of you or people you ~~like~~ ~~hate~~ ~~want to kill~~ know are appearing.
So go have fun with that!

HOW TO PLAY:

Toplevel your character. Different version/AU, different toplevel please.
Add a short background or link to an info post, and indicate prefs. TELL US WHAT KIND OF SHENANIGANS YOU'RE LOOKING FOR. Shipping, smut, family reunions, dark side shenanigans, murder, a Ben Solo smackdown...
~~Troll~~ Reply to others.
Lather, rise, repeat.
Please note that while the intent of this post is for characters from various Star Wars verses to mingle, you don't need a Star Wars character to play! All characters are welcome — characters AU'd into SW, characters having interacted with SW characters in games and memes, fandom OCs, ship babies, etc.
Have fun and be excellent to each other! ♥

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

For a lightheaded moment, the standing figure—the voice and the touch—are Jeron.

(When you only dimly remember someone, you can make them do whatever you want. Especially things they never really did.)

Cassian turned his face into the touch and murmured in their shared language, "Be here when I wake up?"

But was asleep before being answered.

"Of course," Cassian says softly, into the silence. He stays there for a long moment, still with that disoriented feeling, as though he too is half dreaming.

Then he draws away, to set about doing what there is for him to do.

He goes over the entire loft, quietly, meticulously. That takes some time; it's not a small room, nor a very new building, and the clutter isn't everywhere but where it is, it's dense and heavy. There are the crates (of course he goes through those, all that aren't firmly sealed). There are a few articles of furniture, a few other articles that... could technically be called furniture, he supposes; and there are the facilities.

But his other self's confidence seems not to have been misplaced; he finds nothing to alarm him, except a second skylight far in the back - too scratched and dusty to admit much light - and a small hole where the floor looks as though it's been eaten away. He scuffs about a little, kicks a stray bit of rubbish over the hole just in case. Wanders back toward the stairs.

Sits down on the floor, finally, his back against the open crate, to take stock.

He has the clothes he stands up in. He has what's in his pockets: minor necessities, mostly. Enough cred for any eventuality he could foresee this morning, laughably little in Canto Bight, of all places. Sira Dotharn's ID, which may or may not pass for valid in this place, in this time. A keycard to a room halfway across the galaxy.

He has the contents of his other pockets, the ones you have to be looking for: less mundane, but no more immediately useful.

They're both at least minimally armed, which is something. They have this room for the next few hours. They have other-Cassian's knowledge of the city, and at least some of his connections, however reliable those are.

They've survived worse things with less. Both--

--of him.

He tilts his head back, lets his eyes drift shut for a minute, listening to the low unglamorous clunk of the cleaning cycle. Breathes a sigh.

And then he composes himself to wait.

* * *
Humans are one of the relatively few species who rest their whole brain at once: close both eyes and go fully unconscious. Most animals only rest half their brain at a time and sleep with literally one eye open.

Cassian had been sleeping with one eye open what felt like his whole life. When in enemy territory and couldn't betray his position with a sound; when sharing a room or bed with a mark and couldn't let them take him by surprise or hear him sleep-talk anything out of character; when alone piloting a ship and had to be ready for an alarm to go off—or just to stave off being entirely at the mercy of his own subconscious.

Being watched over by himself, knowing exactly how capable a guard that was—as well as, perhaps, being unprecedentedly wrung out and uninterested in his own survival, from Scarif—Cassian slept more deeply than he had in a long, long while.

The downside of which was: he dreamed.

on the broad steps of carida academy
in the riot
the tall man crumpled and the boy ran out from cover
brandishing a toy blaster and uselessly trying to defend the man with it

he deposited a handful of grit into the gears
trying not feel the terror of being inside the war machine
the moving parts that enclosed and could crush or maim him
he was small and slipped out again and cheered with the rest to see the machine explode
but in his dreams for the rest of his life, as he hadn't at the time
he saw the operators trapped inside burning alive

he fought so hard - whirling around and around himself - couldn't stop if he wanted to
and he did want to but
frightened at the momentum - at how it went on without his own consent -
at how he was trapped in it and couldn't break out of it
until suddenly it was done - he was still - looking down at the bodies splayed out around him
and though they'd been stormtroopers a moment ago
now they were everyone he cared about and had been trying to save

making love to jyn
suddenly her kyber pendant in his hand as he throttled her with the cord
his hand on a blaster firing into her stomach
her lips going black because he was poison
her body going limp and face turning blue and he could do absolutely nothing

screaming at kay not to leave him alone

or all their atoms simply drifting, dissolving apart in the white-green kyberlight

He would have doomed himself if on assignment, with the tossing and crying out.

He's a restless sleeper, apparently. Cassian's not entirely surprised to learn this about himself, and doesn't think much of it at first. He knows what peaceful sleep looks like, can do a fair imitation if the need arises, but he's pretty sure he's never been that relaxed in his life, not since - not for a long time. He sits where he is, impassive, until the unhappy muttering starts sounding more like panic.

He's not fool enough to touch him, try to shake him awake, even if part of him has that softer instinct; he knows how that will go over. Instead he shifts, scraping one sole against the floor as he sits up. "Hey," he says, low but penetrating. "Wake up, yeah? Wake up, you're okay."

Over the years he's done this enough times, for scared recruits and shocky comrades, keeping his voice soft and even, like a rope they can pull themselves out by. The words come easily. "You're dreaming, c'mon. You're okay." But his own name sticks in his throat, choking him. He flounders for a moment, and then gives up on Basic altogether. "It's all right, it's a dream, wake up."

Edited (punctuation how do) 2019-07-31 02:54 (UTC)

It's all right, it's a dream, wake up
How, Dad? You never taught me
Besides, it's not a dream: you're really dead
All of you

Then it was the twin moons, resolving into the oculars of K-2SO. It's a dream. Wake up.

Cassian sat shock upright, breathing hard, looking in all directions before his eyes had properly focused, hand reaching for a weapon that wasn't there. His eyes fell upon himself. For a disoriented moment, he couldn't reconcile the sight. (Mirror? Clone? Another dream?) Then, finally, he remembered. He lowered his guard to rub his eyes. (Still as weird, but at least more sure it's not a dream; I've never slept and dreamed within a dream before.) "Hi. Um. Sorry… Was I…?"

"Not having a lot of fun, I think." The other watches him steadily, tilts his head. "You want to talk about it, or no?"

He asks without thinking, almost by reflex - the next verse in the litany. In the next moment he hears himself, and abruptly falls silent. Glances down, discomfited.

(nothing you give them nothing you're not a kid anymore and you know better shut it down there's nothing there's nothing)

Embarrassing, really. Where's your self-respect? he thinks, with a wry twist to his mouth, and aloud: "Sorry."

Younger!him looks away; older!him feels the echo, too. How many trainees/recruits had he said that to? …And how many marks, also…?

"Why are you sorry?" There's always a myriad of things; but in this moment, either he's not sure what, or is rhetorically making a point.

"No need—nothing you won't recognize." …Well, one—or two—things. Neither anything he wants to share. To further bury those: "Dad at Carida, CIS kid blowing up walkers, and the good old trying-to-save-someone-instead-killing-them."

The twist morphs into a twitch. "So, just normal stuff."

(It's surprising how many people in the Alliance don't appreciate jokes like that. At least not from him.)

"Yeah." Taking it slow, Cassian sat upright, letting the sheet pool in his lap, and rubbed his eyes. Now he was awake, probably best to stay that way. "You get any rest?"

"Yeah." Sleep, no, but just sitting still for a couple of hours in reasonable safety counts too. "No excitement. Laundry's done, I think." He sits up a little further, rolling stiff shoulders, and then gets to his feet to check on it. "Think you'll hold up for a while now?"

(Recovered enough, he notes with faint amusement, to have regained some sense of modesty, pointless as it may be. He'd do the same, of course.)

"Good." Stretching experimentally—no neck or spinal injuries, nothing choosing to reexert itself from Scarif—Cassian stood, folding the sheet double to wrap around his waist, and looked around to remind himself what was there. "Think so. Gonna wash up a bit—no point cleaning the clothes if I just get 'em dirty again by putting them on. Maybe do something about this being identical thing. You see a razor in that box where the soap came from?"

"I'll take a look." The clothes are, in fact, clean by this time; he slings them over his arm, still crackling from the dry-cycle, and sidesteps to make way. "Your friend's got last year's dresses stashed in the back, if you want to really switch it up."

He shakes out the stupid trousers, tosses them down with the shirt on top of them. It takes a minute or two of rummaging to locate what he's looking for - stashed in a battered old case underneath the detergent, for some reason. "Yeah, here."

Other!him may or may not have been joking about the dresses, but this!Cassian considers it. It'd be a more complete outfit for streetwear than his jacketless half-uniform, and he would definitely look less like his counterpart. Since it'd go with being clean-shaven, too, he tables that decision until after the rest.

He takes the razor with a "Thanks", grabs soap and a towel, and heads for the tub. He doesn't fill it up for a bath; just washes off in the running stream. After, he stands in front of the mirror, now with a towel in place of the sheet, but pauses and holds out the razor, with some humor, to the other. "Unless you'd rather…?"

"Not gonna fight you for it," Cassian says dryly, putting the detergent back where he found it. He's shed his own jacket onto the cot in the interim; it's after midday by now, and the attic is getting stuffy. "We can draw lots if you really want to. Not like there's much difference, yeah?"

Otherwise, he figures, future-Cassian was the one to bring it up, so future-Cassian can put up with the weird shivery vulnerable sensation in consequence.

"No need. Just checking." Cassian regards himself in the mirror with a grimace. Where he walked, being too clean-cut made you conspicuous. So the last time he'd done this—the reason he hadn't done it since—was to be Joreth Sward and fit in with Imperial regs.

Boo hoo. Get on with it.

He may not have done it regularly, but Cassian could still do a decent job quickly. It takes a little longer to use the knife off his own utility belt to crop his hair. He washes knife and razor and checks his work. Clean-shaven and crew cut, it seemed like a really bad joke: how much younger he looks. He mutters something about it in Corellian before closing and resheathing the knife and turning to his counterpart.

"I'd rather look for a spare jacket than go with a dress. See anything back there?" Could always do some 'alterations' with the knife, if there was something with frills that could be pared off.

"We're not that pretty," he agrees. He's sitting on the end of the bed now, going through his own jacket more thoroughly. "I didn't, but I might have missed something, if you want to look again."

He glances up, and blinks once or twice - okay, yeah, it's almost as weird from this side of his face. His hand half rises to touch his own jaw, before he turns it into a scratch behind his ear instead. "If not, you can take this one till we come up with something better."

He turns over the possibilities in his mind, idly, as he goes back to his inventory. Throw what money they have at the problem. Some combination of sweet-talk and shoplifting. Break into the sewing kit - he weighs it in his palm for a moment before tucking it away again. All of the above. They'll figure something out.

We. Still… reassuring, maybe, to have that re-confirmed. ~~Even~~ Especially from himself.

Cassian nods, and moves to pull on the clothes he already has before following other's earlier indication. (The clothes are much better now they're clean. Though, ugh, these trousers. It wasn't just loathing for what they represented. Imp uniform fitting was designed for how it looked, not how it felt. No wonder they all walked like they had blasters shoved up their—)

"This might work," Cassian calls unnecessarily. He brings out a worn shortcoat that may once have been purple but has faded to greyish blue—not completely unlike the grey of the trousers. He leaves behind the skirt and bodice that went with it. The cut of it is obviously meant to highlight female secondary sex characteristics, but only if fastened up; if he leaves it hanging open, it's indistinct. There's a bit of stitching to gather in the back that he carefully picks out with the knife, changing its silhouette from hourglass to squarish. He pulls it on. Not having a full-length mirror to check, he spreads his hands to his alternate. "Down-on-my-luck nondescript, or escapee from V-333's Silken Parlor?"

A beat, while he looks himself up and down, taking in the effect. "Little of both. I'm definitely the respectable one," ill-fitting uniforms notwithstanding. So far, Cassian reflects, the other Cassian is bearing the brunt of their sartorial deficiency. Maybe they should trade pants.

It is easier, now, to think of him as someone else, a separate being. Somehow that's just as unsettling in its own way, and on another of those sudden impulses he looks him square in the face. His own eyes look back at him.

I see you. I know you.

It should not reassure him.

He snorted gently. "Well, it is Canto Bight." Taking that to be sufficient.

That settled, he unmade the bed and tossed the bedclothes into the 'fresher. He went to retrieve the soap and razor to put back in their crate. Glancing again in the mirror as he passed, he flashed a quick smile at his alternate and, with some actual humor, quoted back to him, "Not that pretty my foot."

(…Nevermind that having a face that opened doors for him was actually something he hated.)

The other only raises eyebrows at him as he gets to his feet. Sure. We can pretend this is fine, if you want. We can hide from each other, from ourself. We do it all the time. Aloud he says lightly, "You just want me to wear the dress."

He shrugs his jacket back on, runs his hands through his hair. Considers the dead man's boots, where they gleam dully under the skylight, and prods them with one toe. "We could swap these, if you want. Mix it up a little."

"Either way. Warning: mine still have sand in them." Speaking of hiding from himself.

He'd already sat down to pull on the boots. He sets them aside, but looks up at the other. "Wanna plan our next move?"

Cassian weighs that a moment in silence. Leans down to pick up the boots again, and then goes over to shake them out, one after the other, into the bath. He does it thoroughly, and with absolutely no regard for that mirror-finish. When he's done he tosses them back down at the other's feet.

That attended to, he comes back over to perch on the corner of the open crate, regarding his double thoughtfully. "Once we get out of here, where are we going?"

Cassian picked up the boots silently and slipped them on.

At risk of repeating himself, but needing to make sure he wasn't missing anything: "Normally, that'd be an easy answer: back to the Rebellion. But right now… if we're right, we're already there." And offering their service three times over didn't feel like the right play. "Maybe we should look at getting you back to where you came from. In space, anyway, and see if the time part follows. Where are you here from?"

The first half of this might as well be thinking aloud, admittedly. Even one of him, turning up unexpectedly this far from where he's supposed to be, not knowing all he should, would raise alarms; two wouldn't stand a chance. They can both do that math in their sleep.

(If he follows that track very far, of course, he'll end up at the fact that for the first time in fifteen years he is absolutely alone in the universe - has nowhere, in fact, to go; so he doesn't.)

He folds his hands loosely between his knees, listening. Polite attention. It actually takes him a beat to parse what he's hearing, which he'll probably appreciate, later. Right now it just makes him a little more tired. Aren't we altruistic.

He blinks at himself, mildly. "Me, and not you?"

"Yeah." He's not going to volunteer more information on that. Just adds, matter-of-factly: "You were mid-assignment. Right? Mine was done."

that tag :') A++++

no u!! <3

^_^ ^_^ ^_^ <3

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now I want to pat his fuzz, dammit.

/purrrrrrr/

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