IC contact

[candor1]

Fulcrum; go
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[OOC—update: Just specify in subject line which game!]

Comments

text at 4 am and bruh i am so sorry

[carbonfrozen]

who do you think's gonna come in next and from when

the way our luck's been going I'd put money on an Imperial showing up from before Yavin

response not much later and bruh don't be i love it ^_^

[candor1]

i dont know but

[a long pause before he can get himself to finish typing the sentence.

…Yavá. God. Is this happening. Is he going to go there. Without being forced. Or is it better to preempt.

I was finished]

should we

[I can't I won't no]

consider organizing

[he looks down at the comm for several long moments.

Considers deleting.

Considers writing something else.

Considers hurling it into the wall and watching it shatter and rain.

Considers hurling himself—

Jyn.

Shuts his eyes.

Hits send.]

[carbonfrozen]

[Han does not know anything about Cassian's inner conflict. As far as he knows, this is a sensible and serious suggestion to his less than serious shitposts texts.]

not a bad idea

the ones coming in ain't much right now without an army, but Dooku's been here more than a year so he's had some time to figure some things out

least we can do is put our info together and work out some kind of plan just in case

[And then there's the matter of Darth Vader sans the black armor, but that's not something Han will talk about. Not without Luke's say-so.]

[candor1]

[Han's agreement is surprisingly calming—perhaps in the direction he takes it in. Draws Cassian's mind back from hypothetical extremes and to the immediate]

agreed - was considering amassing a timeline anyway

[he already had a fair amount stored in his enhanced memory just from speaking to everyone else. But forming something they could actually reference. In an ideal, benign world, it could be useful to newcomers orienting themselves. In a less…

No matter. Synchronize information.

No files on them as individuals—no dossiers. The local government already had more of that than Cassian liked. No need to do more of their work for them.

But their universe's history. He couldn't foresee how that could be used to ill effect here. Maybe wishful thinking but he could foresee at least three positive possible impacts.

He decided to run the theory by Kaytoo before enacting it.]

going to talk to k-2 about helping me on that
we can either generate a file for sharing or keep it with k
will consider best option
but solidifying the big picture -

- would like to hope it could even be persuasive that

[no. He strikes that out. He'd been working so hard at shedding the spy. Now (shoulders unconsciously squaring at the thought) he starts to regather those ways of operating. Including: only answer the question put. No speculation.

Gather intel. Set the goal.

...understand this change of subject, Han. Please.]

i quite enjoyed game night
thinking of hosting a rematch

[carbonfrozen]

with people getting ported in and out regularly, we should stick it all in a file that'll stay even if we get ported out

plus with people coming from all over the timeline we probably might end up meeting our own ancestors so there should be something in place so we don't accidentally run over our own grandpa

[Yes. This is the kind of thing Han thinks is important late at night.]

yeah sure

if you're up for going back home with empty pockets

[candor1]

[if we get ported out

It's a good thing they're in text.

Though how Solo could even type it so nonchalantly.

He supposed because Solo conceivably had things to go back to?

Or was just, contrary to all affect, better at accepting what couldn't be controlled.

…or possibly was a bit sleep-deprived-inebriated.]

im sure youd manage to swerve

want to grab skywalker and calrissian ill get k and jyn tomorrow night
see if skywalker thinks we should include revan

[he's using surnames and putting Kay before Jyn. None of that can be good.]

[carbonfrozen]

[It's sleep deprivation.]

yeah but what if somebody ELSE kills him what happens then

there's two Skywalkers be more specific

and yeah I can grab Luke and Lando

you okay there? [Han might not be Force-sensitive, and is not always the most sensitive person at all, but something is Up here. And Cassian's a fellow rebel, if not a friend. He's—concerned, to say the least.]

[candor1]

thats too good of a question

[maybe dying here returns one to there. Maybe they can't be killed here because they are already dead. Maybe they're just shadows of the people who are still continuing in the original timeline so it's utterly separate and doesn't matter.

Does anything ma… stop]

yes luke
heard through the dorva vine

[one for you, Corellian.

Though by which he means watching other peoples' conversations]

that anakin skywalker goes by another name

[To the last line…

Even on a good day, Cassian has no idea how to answer that question.

For now can only type—with a heaviness even to text]

i was finished

[carbonfrozen]

I know

Luke told me when he got here

I promised not to shoot his dad just yet but if something happens cause of Vader we gotta figure something out

[Han thinks: I've seen this before. Has felt it before, sometimes, when it felt as if the war wouldn't end any time soon. As much as he doesn't want to admit it, he's grown to care about the Rebellion, about its cause.

He blames Luke, and Leia, and his own bleeding heart.]

Friday night, just you and me and the closest thing there is on this dustball to Corellian rum

drinks are on me

[candor1]

[…the place Cassian mentally flashes to is initially hard to reconcile.

Crash position. Legs braced. Elbows on knees. Head hung almost between them. Suspended shy of the blaster somehow still in his numb hand.

Unable to stop staring at it.

With vision distorted by tears.

The last he'll be able to produce and shed for… well. For the rest of his life.

He doesn't look up hearing Kay approach. He knows it's him. A KX droid's footfalls are hard to mistake, and Kay's have a cadence others' don't thanks to… having a personality. Thanks to the "jailbreak".

Is that what I did? Did I free him? Or is he now just enslaved to me?

Some would say I freed them. They're idiots. There isn't always two sides to everything.

What if I've never freed anybody.

What if I'm no better than

What if I'm

…

That was Kay pausing. No doubt staring at him. Trying to ascertain why Cassian was in this utterly unprecedented position. The droid will be able to analyze factors and tell that Cassian isn't injured. That Cassian's system is uncompromised by foreign toxicants. That his blaster has been recently and repeatedly fired.

Will have to find other explanations. Doubtless his original programming, however no longer controlling him, has ample psychological data in service of interrogation.

He will be able to recognize the sight of someone who's been broken.

Not "been". Done it myself.

The surmise seemed to be correct. As Kay, with a gentleness his manufacturers would not have intended and most still would not think possible, had taken Cassian's weapon and then took Cassian himself and got them all back to the ship. Had been positively parental in getting Cassian situated before getting them the hell off Jenoport.

Somewhere in there, Kay had made the offer. Volunteering himself for a memory wipe, in case Cassian's "continued dignity and service demanded it".

Cassian hoped he'd responded aloud, not just in his mind. No one is ever messing with your programming again. Ever. I need who you are.

Cassian wouldn't go too far with any comparison between Han Solo and Kay.

You know. Other than overall manner and self-opinion and disregard.

But perhaps it was because… it felt…

Maybe, as close as an organic could reasonably get to K-2SO, maybe Han seemed unlikely to be injured by or get lost in Cassian's pain.

…That was welcome.]

guess we shouldnt do that right now

its on

thank you

[carbonfrozen]

[Han would honestly be Offended, down to his very bones, were Cassian ever to compare him to Kaytoo. Some of this is his dislike for droids, exacerbated by Threepio's constant chattering presence on the Falcon, and some of this is just Han's personal dislike of Kaytoo.

Still. Cassian's a rebel in the same vein as Luke and Leia. Han can't not try to help him out a little, even if his idea of help is a bit special.]

of course I never promised anything about not punching him

hope you can hold your liquor, I hear Maurtia Falls has the best bars

[candor1]

i never thought he was real - youll have to tell me more

usually only pretend to drink the bulk and act lashed as a front - guess its worth finding out the reality

[carbonfrozen]

he's a chuff-sucking black-clad bucket of rancor puke

don't tell Luke I said that

[Anger is better than fear, the kind of fear that creeps up his neck like cold ice.]

the reality's fun for the night, less so in the morning, but I know some hangover cures

[candor1]

you have my word

[and perhaps the illusion it's given solemnly rather than spluttering with laughter due to the mercy of text]

am fine with anything short of what k will do to both of us if i seriously damage myself

[carbonfrozen]

tell your droid I promise not to let you get seriously damaged

just maybe a little drunk

[candor1]

[Cassian types hes not 'my' droid

Looks at the words for a moment.

It was a designation that had kept Kay protected in the Alliance—where the wounds of the Clone Wars were still so rawly felt, a combat droid was a difficult presence to accept. It was enough for Kay and Cassian to know between themselves it wasn't true. (…Cassian to hope it wasn't true.) And there were enough others even there—techs and meds mainly—who would just as readily call Cassian as "K-2's human".
(Because they were the ones who knew what Kay's primary function really was.)

This was a new world. An opportunity to get in on the ground level of establishing droids as equal sentients and so not to be claimed by anyone.

…Except Han is of the old world. And as such could either be talking idiomatically, or have the entrenched ideas…

Either way…

Cassian deletes the sentence unsent.

…either way. It's a conversation he'd like to have with Han. But perhaps after more foundation. Especially if it is a deeper ideological divide.

He thinks Kay would agree with the strategy. If it makes Cassian feel a little angry at himself.

Still. He switches without difficult to thinking about Han and the situation he's getting himself into.

And smiles.]

can tell him after the fact
see you then