It doesn't bother Rey, really. For the longest time she'd spent nearly every night with Tommy, she gets starting to think of other rooms as more like home than your own.
But she's glad to be in the Falcon now, something familiar, something that she's still struggling to remind herself is hers, and when she hears the door open and shut, when she reaches out with the Force to see if it's Annie that's here, she looks entirely at home when she comes to find her first.
"It must have been odd, coming to find my room and finding this instead."
"Sort of like how I always pictured going onto a movie set would be--all the big magic of it? I mean especially 'cause my cabin is so teeny and all." As it should be, because Annie doesn't associate home with any buildings. She's just glad she ended up with a hut instead of Ruiz's house.
She looks around, soaking it all in. "Plus I was kind of in a panic, I didn't get to appreciate it before."
If anything else could possibly remind Rey why she invited Annie here, she has no idea what would. While she's still looking around Rey puts a gentle hand on her shoulder to get her attention, and when Annie turns back towards her it's going to be to Rey slipping both arms around her for a gentle, incredibly affectionate hug.
"Thank you," she whispers softly. "I know you must have been so afraid, but you found me anyway. You didn't give up. Thank you, Annie."
She has never been thanked before, not like this. Annie is a girl who offers small comforts: a sandwich to the hungry, a pack for the lonely. The one time she ran into danger to save someone, they had all been too traumatized afterward to feel gratitude. And they'd died, anyway.
So this has her burying her face in Rey's shoulder, holding onto her like something is trying to pull them apart.
"You know I got your back," she says, but her voice is froggy and thick. And so she tries for something more honest, something that won't feel so out of place with how intense her feelings are right now. "I'll never leave you behind."
She's been here, on this ship, for a year now. It took months for her to reach a place where someone reaching for her hand was something she allowed, longer still for her to willingly hug people, but she'd been proud of the progress she had made. By the time she'd met Annie, she'd been in a place where holding hands, quick hugs, that was fine with her.
Kylo Ren has been a setback, her skin crawls now when people reach for her just like it did a year ago, but she's so determined to fight past it, to drown those feelings out and replace them with physical contact she does like. Tommy had helped, and this does now. The only thing she feels now, holding Annie, reaching a hand up to stroke her hair, is warm. Content, if a little concerned for someone she absolutely considers her friend now.
"It's alright," she whispers against Annie's hair, turning her head a little so she'll be sure she hears. "It's okay now. We'll protect each other, won't we? Nothing like this will ever happen again."
"Never again," Annie agrees in a fierce whisper, thinking not just of Rey in that cage, but of exhausted eyes watching her as she was carried off, of dogs howling for her, of running away from her home as it burned with her brothers trapped.
"I wish I'd had you at home," she mumbles. Someone brave like Rey, brave but so steady and comforting.
"You have me now," Rey promises at once, with no hesitation, and she finds herself wishing that she'd been there with Annie for whatever it was that's making her wish this now. "I can- It's odd and it's invasive, but I can use the Force to keep track of you. If you ever need me, if you're ever in danger, I'll feel it and I'll come find you."
Weird or invasive doesn't frighten Annie at all, even if perhaps it should. It doesn't from Rey, is what matters, and she nods. It actually makes her feel significantly better to think that someone would know if something happened to her.
"It doesn't have to feel like anything," she says easily, and she's still holding Annie close, one hand still rubbing her back. "I really only ever did it with Tommy more than once, I could- talk to him, sort of. It was more just putting feelings and pictures in his head and letting him make sense of them."
It's not at all what Kylo Ren does, she's learned to do it gently, without causing pain, and most of the time it's something that people don't even feel.
"I could set the Enclosure to a beach and show you the ocean to get you to come swimming, for example."
Annie has always craved affection, has done anything she could to make sure she got it somewhere. Now that she's a wolf, there's a new aspect to it, a simple pleasure in knowing someone cares, in tying that in with the touch of a kind hand. It's easy to lull her (or Lark, or any other lycanthrope) into a state of relaxation so deep it's almost hypnosis.
But it isn't just the touch of Rey's hand that makes her nod. She trusts her, she has trusted her for longer than Rey probably knows. "That'd be so cool. Could I do the same thing back to you? Be like, here's a picture of brownies to say hey girl, they've got brownies come get one?"
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2017-01-24 12:41 am (UTC)But she's glad to be in the Falcon now, something familiar, something that she's still struggling to remind herself is hers, and when she hears the door open and shut, when she reaches out with the Force to see if it's Annie that's here, she looks entirely at home when she comes to find her first.
"It must have been odd, coming to find my room and finding this instead."
no subject
Date: 2017-01-28 01:10 am (UTC)She looks around, soaking it all in. "Plus I was kind of in a panic, I didn't get to appreciate it before."
no subject
Date: 2017-01-28 01:44 am (UTC)"Thank you," she whispers softly. "I know you must have been so afraid, but you found me anyway. You didn't give up. Thank you, Annie."
no subject
Date: 2017-02-02 02:19 am (UTC)So this has her burying her face in Rey's shoulder, holding onto her like something is trying to pull them apart.
"You know I got your back," she says, but her voice is froggy and thick. And so she tries for something more honest, something that won't feel so out of place with how intense her feelings are right now. "I'll never leave you behind."
no subject
Date: 2017-02-02 02:37 am (UTC)Kylo Ren has been a setback, her skin crawls now when people reach for her just like it did a year ago, but she's so determined to fight past it, to drown those feelings out and replace them with physical contact she does like. Tommy had helped, and this does now. The only thing she feels now, holding Annie, reaching a hand up to stroke her hair, is warm. Content, if a little concerned for someone she absolutely considers her friend now.
"It's alright," she whispers against Annie's hair, turning her head a little so she'll be sure she hears. "It's okay now. We'll protect each other, won't we? Nothing like this will ever happen again."
no subject
Date: 2017-02-02 02:46 am (UTC)"I wish I'd had you at home," she mumbles. Someone brave like Rey, brave but so steady and comforting.
no subject
Date: 2017-02-02 02:51 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-02-02 02:55 am (UTC)"What does it feel like?"
no subject
Date: 2017-02-02 03:00 am (UTC)It's not at all what Kylo Ren does, she's learned to do it gently, without causing pain, and most of the time it's something that people don't even feel.
"I could set the Enclosure to a beach and show you the ocean to get you to come swimming, for example."
no subject
Date: 2017-02-07 04:19 am (UTC)But it isn't just the touch of Rey's hand that makes her nod. She trusts her, she has trusted her for longer than Rey probably knows. "That'd be so cool. Could I do the same thing back to you? Be like, here's a picture of brownies to say hey girl, they've got brownies come get one?"