fandomhigh | Summer Shenanigans- Wednesday, August 11

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Summer Shenanigans- Wednesday, August 11

Oh hey, Anakin and Beaker weren't here today! Instead there was a short brunette with a megaphone. She didn't need it, she just liked it.

"Welcome to today's Shenanigans. Grandfather's not here. I'm Jaina and I'm going to be your drill instructor today," she announced. "Today you're going to be doing a mud run. You will get dirty, you won't like it, and I won't care."

Jaina hadn't realized it was Truth Day, that was just how she talked to people.

"We have five obstacles for you to get through to make it to the end, where you will win absolutely nothing. Maybe my grudging respect. No teams today, it's every being for themselves. And I don't know hardly anyone's names so whoever I point to has to come down here and participate, and I know who I'm pointing to so don't think you're getting away with anything."

EVERY BEING FOR THEMSELVES
Annie
Astrid
Belle
Din (and Grogu)
Dwight
Faye
Harry
Sakaki
Stark
Troy
Wanda

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"I'm glad I do," Stark said. "And relieved. Very relieved. And...you could tell me. If you're worried. I'll listen. If you wanted someone to listen. I'd like to listen if you wanted to talk."

"But you might hate me if I told you everything," Faye insisted, proving that even on Truth Day, the truth about her insecurities would have a greater impact on things than the truth about...like, her actual life. "Like how I'm not really turning twenty-four on Saturday. And how I secretly like cuddling a lot."

Oh, god, both of those were huge, life-impacting secrets and now they were just out there.

Edited 2021-08-11 18:39 (UTC)

"Why would I hate you?" Stark asked. "I don't think I'd hate you. I don't hate many people. You would have to try very hard to make me hate you. And I don't think you would."

"Wait. Saturday? You didn't say that before. You just said August. We need to do something I need to do something. For you. With you. What would you like? We can do whatever you like. The number doesn't matter. I don't even know how old I am. And cuddling...you should have said so. I would have protested more when you threw me out of my own bed."

"I liked it, that's why I did that," Faye said, whining a little in frustration at herself at how that had just slipped right out. "I've never celebrated my birthday, actually. I only know it because it was on my chart when I woke up."

Faye, you could stop talking. That was an option.

"I'd like anything you did, Stark, because I like that you think of me and oh my god this has to stop."

"I don't want to get it wrong," Stark said quietly. "Especially if this is the first time. That makes it more important. I don't have enough experience with birthdays. I haven't got one. It should be something you like. We could go somewhere. If you wanted? I liked going to Mars. Very much. Even the dancing. And after Mars...you knew that. But I like staying here there are plenty of things to do here. If you want."

"We should do something here," Faye said decisively. "It doesn't have to be a big deal. Just the fact that you care this much is kind of doing it for me."

Faye really wanted to stop talking, but it was like every thought in her head was just becoming words without her permission.

"You won't get it wrong, but if you do too much I might freak out." There! That was helpful information that she wouldn't normally relay, instead of just emotionally-compromising weirdness.

"That's fine," Stark assured her. "Here is fine. There are even places here I've never been. Never had a reason to go." He wasn't going to take himself to a fancy-ish restaurant, after all.

"If you don't want to do anything you don't have to. We don't have to. I do care. A lot. But I don't want to do anything you don't want. I don't want you to freak out. Usually that's what I do. Not other people."

"I don't want you to freak out," Faye told him. "When you were upset in the hole I hated it so much and I worry all the time I'm going to hurt you and it's the worst and that's why I don't do this because feelings are the fucking worst."

Stop. Stop talking, Valentine. Stop.

"I'll -- think about my birthday. No one's ever wanted to celebrate it before. I don't even know what's normal." And you know what would help her stave off a freakout? Focusing on him, and so she added, "Did you say you don't know how old you are?"

That weirdly made her feel a little better.

"I try not to freak out. It happens less than it used to. You helped, in the hole. You helped a lot. I think I would have been much worse if you hadn't been there. Why are you so worried about hurting me? You haven't hurt me yet. You've only helped and I don't think feelings are so bad."

And Stark had a lot of feelings Faye. So many.

"I don't. No one kept track. It wasn't important. I wasn't important. Just...useful. Valuable. And time here and time there hasn't always been the same. I could guess? But I don't know."

"I just think I'm going to. Things happen and people die or leave and it hurts, and it's probably going to be me." No one could ever say she didn't warn him, now. Because that was what Faye did just about every time things got even remotely hard or confusing or even wonderful: she left, before it could turn out worse.

"You're important," she added, thoughtful and a little sad. "And...useful and valuable but who told you you weren't important? I'll kill them."

Said with the matter-of-factness of someone who was horrified at how those feelings kept spilling out of her mouth, but whose internal decisions were absolutely ruled by them, anyway.

"I think," Stark said carefully, "leaving is a choice. And worrying about hurting someone usually means you're at least trying not to. But of course those things hurt. Endings always hurt. Death hurts. Every time. It's unavoidable and it's necessary and it's painful."

"For a very long time no-one thought I was important," he added softly. "I'm a Banik. We're mostly slaves. A lesser species. You'd have to kill a lot of people."

For a long moment, Faye was just quiet. Partly because he was right -- the fact that she worried about hurting him did, indeed, speak to the fact that she didn't want to.

But also because what he'd said kind of knocked her for a loop. Faye was so used to making sure that her own fraught past stayed hidden away she had never even considered that Stark might have one of his own.

"I'd do it," she finally said, simply. "Even if it was a lot of people. Everyone who ever -- I didn't know that, Stark. Has it been a long time?"

"I'm sure you'd try," Stark said. And he was. "You shouldn't. It wouldn't end well. But thank you. I don't know how long it's been. Long enough. Too long. Both."

"That's one reason I like it here. Being a Banik is never an issue, here. It's not that issue, anyway."

How dare you, Stark, she would totally go on a successful rampage and live through it just fine.

"It's not any kind of an issue. Nothing about you is an issue and I hate that it ever -- I hate that. I'm so sorry." And you know what, she was super irritated at how none of her convenient, easy truth-evading maneuvers were working today, but she also wanted to emphasize her point with a kiss to his cheek, all the same.

"And I'll be seventy-eight on Saturday," she added, wincing a little at herself. "Just -- to share."

Because he'd been honest, even if the island was making it happen somehow, and she'd mostly just...danced around things uneasily. Hopefully that wasn't an issue, either.

Edited 2021-08-11 20:50 (UTC)

But what if she'd learned how to take on large, well-armed groups all alone from Spike??

"I think I have plenty of things that are issues," Stark said. "But I'm glad you don't. I could tell you about all the rest of it. It wouldn't even have to be today." Once he got started sometimes it was hard to stop him talking but he'd do his best.

"And...78 is fine with me. Or 24. Or any other age you like. Zhaan," he added, "was 815 cycles old."

Yes, Stark, bring up your dead girlfriend now. Good plan.

Um, how dare you, Spike was the best at that. Also at plans.

"I'd like to hear more. If you want to talk," Faye replied, now sort of looking puzzled at herself because she mostly hated hearing other people talk about themselves.

But that puzzled look had nothing on how her face changed when she asked, "Who's Zhaan?"

Did she sound jealous? Good. She was.

(Also it helped that she still looked twenty-four. Faye's age was a weird gray area of technicalities.)

Stark wasn't other people though, he was her alien. Obviously. Totally different!

"Zhaan is my, was my...You remember the children?" Stark asked. "Her mother. The daughter that belonged to another me. Zhaan is her mother. But not here. My Zhaan died. Before I came here."

He was fiddling with the buckle at his neck now without realizing it.

"I loved her. Love her. That doesn't stop. And she loved me. But she's gone. She's been gone a long time."

Faye was struck silent again, watching him as he fiddled with that buckle and her jealousy faded. There was no reason to feel threatened by a dead woman.

(Alien? Probably.)

"I'm sorry," she said after a moment, reaching a hand out to lightly rest on his arm. "I...get it. I had someone, and he died. It's so hard. I think about him all the time. It doesn't go away."

And that was more honest than Faye had been in a long, long time, Truth Day or not. She did not talk about this. Not with anyone. Whitney's death had destroyed her, even if there hadn't been a lot of her there to destroy.

"It's always hard losing someone," Stark said, looking down for a long moment. "It gets easier to live with but it doesn't go away. You just make room for it. I'm sorry that you know what it feels like."

"It's why I don't do...." Faye gestured vaguely, broadly between them. "This. Usually. It's scary."

Faye needed to dig a hole and go crawl into it and never talk to anyone ever again, because what even was this day.

"I don't want it to be scary," Stark said, reaching for her hand. "I don't think it's scary. I just...haven't had many opportunities. For a long time."

"I've had plenty of opportunities." Faye, shh. No need to be that honest. She twined her fingers through his, even as she flailed a little with her other hand. "I just haven't let anyone get as close as you since...Whitney died. I don't let a lot of people know me."

And thankfully she seemed like she was able to stop talking there, rather than elaborating on the many reasons she found herself drawn to Stark, and -- oh god, she could not say this aloud, she might develop a rash or have to go fly away to space forever or something -- why she was pretty sure she was falling stupidly hard for him.

Feelings were stupid and meant to be kept secret.

Stark had been around for pollen week. And other weeks. He knew about her opportunities!

"Of course you've had opportunities. But...I would very much like to know you. All of you," he clarified, reaching for that other flailing hand as well. "If you'll let me."

"Maybe." At least Faye had the grace to look a little sheepish at that admission, shrugging a shoulder as she let him take her other hand. "I'd like to. I've done this as long as I can remember. Which isn't a long time."

All the confessions today, apparently!

Now that he had both her hands, Stark tugged her in a little closer. "Good. I'll listen to whatever you want to share. Or if it's today maybe what you don't want to share but I'll still listen."

"I want to ask about the not remembering but I don't want to pry. But I suppose I asked anyway. I didn't mean to."

Summer Shenanigans- Wednesday, August 11

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