tramitem_log | Pahuuden Maa Event Catch All Log

Entry tags:

Pahuuden Maa Event Catch All Log

Who: You and everyone else
What: Exploring Pahuuden Maa, the newly expanded universe
When: Pre-dated Dec 15 - but all events in this thread happen Dec 21 - Jan 4
Where: Pahuuden Maa
Rating/Warnings: Please add approprite CW/TW labels to your threads if necessary when necessary
NOTES: Solstice Plot Dec 2020: Pahuuden Maa

Welcome to a new universe, everyone.

Please use this as a Catch All Log Event post for all your winter adventuring needs. You may use the link above to remember all the various things you can do in this new space. But below, we've listed a summary

1. Visit the Ice Palace

• The Ice Palace has gardens with ice and snow sculptures
• There is also the ice maze to have fun in.
• The Ballroom
• Fine dining

2. The outdoor ice rink

Spend a day skating the whole way around, there are skate rentals and food all the way around the rink.

3. Visit the Ski Lodge

• For skiing and snowshoeing
• Rent a room for a night or week, or whatever
• There's the dining room for a good warm meal
• The saunas
• The hotsprings

4. Explore the Mountains and Forests

• Go for a walk
• Take note of the unique plants (get high?)
• Take a picture of the unique animals
• Run into a wild Energy Burst

5. Visit the town

• Go shopping!
• Go for a sleigh ride
• Remember, there's a big trolley pulled by a team of reindeer that is essentially a bar on wheels
• Visit the reindeer stables
• Run into/capture some mischievous Energy Bursts

6. Generally marvel at the magic in this place

7. Have fun!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"No. You started by saying to stop discussing it when I tried to start a conversation about it." That's how Anakin had understood what Ben's message meant.

"You can't tell me to not discuss something and then be surprised and upset when I stop discussing it. You can't say don't discuss this, but talk to me if I need to. I needed to talk about what you didn't want to talk about."

"I didn't tell you not to discuss what you were feeling, I was telling you that I was leaving the argument!"

This is...

This is...

"This is ridiculous. Not you. The layers of misunderstanding here."

Anakin stopped and looked at Ben, working to let go of his anger and hurt. It was hard, his emotions could spike in an instant, but they rarely fell just as fast.

Dangerous.

"Okay, but... what am I supposed to do with that? Needing to talk about my feelings means needing to talk about what happened in my memories, from my perspective. But you assumed it was an argument first then avoided me for over a month."

Sure, Anakin had been avoiding Ben, too, but he really had thought Ben didn't want to talk to him when he'd reached out for help. And that had hurt. Where was Anakin supposed to figure out he'd misunderstood Ben, but from Ben, himself? If someone doesn't want you to talk to them, Anakin knew for a fact you just don't talk to them.

"What about next time?"

Anakin already knew that 'next time,' he'd say less, act out more. There was alcohol in front of him now. He hadn't had any in years until this last month. Trusting in the system of his therapists and their orders to pave the best, healthiest, stable path for him. But that system had been blown apart by the Bureau or whoever was behind giving him these memories.

So why did he ask?

Everyone left him in the end- he'd told Ben that before they became something like friends (then became actual friends).

So Ben could prove him wrong?

Ben's temper was fast, hot, and faded out quickly--

but in this case it flared right back up in response to Anakin's words, and he actually had to give himself a second for that fresh flare of anger to fade out.

He also needed the second to try to figure out how to navigate this to avoid upsetting Anakin further, and to make sure that he was not going to resent feeling the need to do that while still pretty hurt himself.

The last thing he'd said to Anakin was 'I love you, if you need to talk I'm here'. The previous misunderstanding had definitely set that up to be unlikely, he knew that now, but he hadn't then.

it really was just a second of frustrated anger, before he faded into just feeling inadequate, somewhat helpless and old.

"I don't know, Anakin. Because you do need -and deserve - to be able to talk about your memories from your own perspective." he absolutely meant that. "but you said something about being able to separate ourselves from our memories and I'm not entirely sure I can do that, at least not all the time and with all of them. Your feelings are valid and real and you - again - deserve to be able to talk them out, but I don't think I trust myself not to be hurt and poised to back away when what you need to talk out is not being wanted and what I am remembering is mostly loving you fiercely, if incredibly incompetently. I don't think my flinch response is particularly fair to you, either."

Edited 2021-01-05 07:09 (UTC)

That deflated Anakin.

Because he saw the shape of the outcome of this conversation now looming in the distance. Approaching fast.

Everyone you met had the potential to hurt you, and they would, sooner or later the longer you stuck around them. The trick was surrounding yourself with people that were worth getting hurt for.

Anakin had thought Ben was worth it, and had assumed Ben felt that in return.

Anakin realized he’d been wrong.

When your needs hurt another person, the only thing you could do was accept it. You couldn’t ask another person to bleed for you, even if you needed it. It had to be willingly given.

But sometimes your needs were too big to put on a shelf out of the way to spare another person pain.

There was only one option, then.

Anakin was quiet for a while, staring down at his drink.

“Do you... in your memories, do you ever take back what you said on the landing pad? Do you ever say the words?” He had to know before he left.

"Not that I am aware of, but my memories are incomplete."

He would also like to- He sighed and rubbed a hand over his face. "Though I do feel the need to point out that this is me not being enough - or good enough at controlling my feelings - for you. I am not rejecting you for having the need to start with." He hadn't even said he wouldn't listen. He said that he didn't know what he would do next time because, yeah, that shit hurt and it was enough pain to make him want to withdraw -- or draw a line.

He doesn't expect saying that to change a damn thing, but Anakin had been clear about what he expected when they'd first started being friends, and he kind of now wonders if this is actually what Anakin meant and how he saw most of those 'rejections'. People just not being enough for him and him deciding that meant he was too hard and they left.

Instead of them not being enough and Anakin leaving them.

No one could be everything to a person, he didn't think. Or maybe they could. He didn't actually know. He just knew that he all he'd said was that he didn't know what would happen next time, and he couldn't promise to objectively listen and not be hurt by... things that hurt.

He wished he could.

But he couldn't.

Edited 2021-01-05 16:12 (UTC)

Anakin has heard that before. Not always the same words, but the same sentiment.

Of course it didn't make him feel better, it never made him feel better. In the end, I can't help you wasn't functionally different from I won't help you. He was still on his own either way.

The inverse to Ben not being enough was Anakin was too much. Too loud, too much energy, too much excitement. Expressed too much. Felt too much. Needed too much. All his life he'd tried to make the whole of himself smaller to fit the limits of everyone around him. But he always, someway, somehow spilled out of whatever container he tried to cram himself into, and the gig was up.

If he could only be less than himself.

The silver lining, he could tell his therapist a version of this that was true without having to bring up things he couldn't bring up like his other memories. I lost a friend today translated across these universes they traversed.

"I am sorry I hurt you," he said, quietly, eyes meeting Ben's for only a moment.

That was another nail in the coffin - reaching out to a friend for help shouldn't hurt anyone involved, it was an act to alleviate pain. That it did here, just proved Anakin should respectfully keep his hands to himself. And what could he do with empty air as an answer anyway? Sure, air was necessary to live, but it didn't catch you when you were falling. If he was going to reach out to someone, he needed to know they would be there.

Edited 2021-01-06 02:54 (UTC)

He couldn't know what was going on in Anakin's head in full, but he could put together that apology with his earlier memories of Anakin saying that everyone left and guess a little of it.

He leaned back in his seat a little and dragged his hand down over his face, tiredly.

"You don't have anything to be sorry for. There's -- you didn't do anything wrong, and you still haven't." Was he frustrated? Yes. That was the problem. "Obi-Wan couldn't express a feeling to save his life - or help a kid who needed to hear it, and I can't stop expressing them long enough to be a decent friend. I wish I thought I could."

Edited 2021-01-06 03:07 (UTC)

"You are a decent friend..." Anakin said quietly, but he added, "When you're talking with me." As opposed to a month of them avoiding each other.

"You can be messy with your emotions... I am."

"I don't know how not to be with the memory stuff."

It would be ironic if Obi-Wan had been any better, instead of just shutting more and more of it down or hiding it.

"I miss you, Anakin. I want you to talk to be able to talk to me about the shit show the whole thing is - and it's more of one for you. I just... don't know how to make it not messy on my end, and that really doesn't feel right."

is he babbling? He's babbling.

Edited 2021-01-06 03:58 (UTC)

Anakin looked down and mumbled a heartfelt, "I missed you, too."

It wasn't an admission he was embarrassed about, it just came on the coattails of a lot of emotions, emotions that had been up and down all evening.

He was still wary, because of those emotions, because of past experiences. Because he didn't want to get hurt either, and he'd already been singed enough, here.

He scratched at a spot on the table. Fidgeting helped him think.

"There isn't... a wrong way to have emotions, they just... are," he said. He'd spoken a lot with his therapists over the years about emotions and having them and how to deal with them. "I'm not mad that you have feelings. I'm not saying that you shouldn't have any emotions about what you experienced or what I experienced... Just... to hear me out."

He's pretty wary too, because emotions and miscommunications and failure and memories and-

he's wary but he's staying at the table because this is important. Because Anakin is important. Because this matters - Anakin matters - more than almost anything.

Just pushes everything that isn't that aside, because it's not his focus right now.

"If you can handle my emotions, I am more than willing to listen."

Anakin fought the urge to flee. He didn't know why, after hearing Ben say that he would listen. Perhaps it was because he didn't know what lay beyond this point, or perhaps it was because in the past there had never been a beyond this point. Maybe both.

But he paused, not looking at Ben.

But he finally nodded, looking up, and said, "Okay."

He waits a bit past the okay, watching Anakin with concern and a little uncertainty, but then it becomes clear Anakin isn't going to continue and he isn't sure if he should ask and -

"Do you wanna talk now or do something else together now?"

"We can talk now," Anakin said. "Unless you want to do something else right now?"

"No. If you are willing to talk, and need to talk, there's nothing else I want to be doing." ...Should he prod, he wonders. Maybe? He thinks about it and debates it and decides he will but maybe a brief gap first.

Anakin nodded and then lapsed into silence while he struggled with what to say now that he had a chance to say it. He knew the question was going to hurt them both but it had been on his mind since the memory came to him. And it couldn't be shaken.

"Do you," he started, then looked down. "Do you think I'm dangerous?"

He was prepared for Anakin to start talking, but that question startles him. "I don't, no. I remember being pretty... scared and worried, but I don't think you're remotely dangerous and I think my feelings about it in my memories were actually pretty-" Wait, no using wrong for feelings, "Misguided and unfair."

Anakin nodded, but only a little bit relieved. Because he was also thinking about the time, here - well, on earth, not in this winter resort - where he'd lost control of his emotions and with the Force had broken his window.

"But I am, aren't I. If I panic, I lose control. Maybe that's what... they could tell."

"Do you want me to tell you what I think it was, or just listen?" He can do either, but he wants to know which one is most useful to Anakin, here and now.

Anakin opened his mouth and then stopped himself. He had to not say the first thing that came into his head. He needed to be thoughtful about this. No one was here trying to hurt the other. Jumping to conclusions had been the bad, wrong choice the first time. And Anakin was trying not to do that again.

Finally, he nodded. "You can tell me what you think."

"I think some of it had to do with the Prophesy, and some of it had to do with how powerful you were. But I think some of it had to do with the kind of fear... traditionalists have for something new."

Well, he'd gotten permission first, though whether Anakin would understand that last was criticism of the Jedi or thought it was Criticism of him, Ben did not know.

And it made him nervous.

"What do you mean they feared something new?" Anakin asked, more because he didn't quite understand. Not because he'd taken it as an insult against him.

"The Jedi had done things in a very particular way, for a very long time. Part of that was taking very little kids with... no trauma and trying to ensure they didn't really experience any. Changing the way things were done and the idea of the Prophesy was about change, too... I think it scared some of them, and some of them just resented it."

He's slow and careful but he isn't mincing words or shying away from sharing the thought, at least.

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