[IC CONTACT]

[photophobic]

You should know where to find me.
But if you leave a message here, I will see it.

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some obscene time in the morning after her prophecy network post

[arithmethodical]

What did you want?

[photophobic]

[Oh. Hello. He's been expecting you.]

When I went to bed several hours ago? Sleep.

[arithmethodical]

What did you want from me?

[photophobic]

You're the one chasing me. Aren't you? What is it you want?

[arithmethodical]

I want to know what you meant when you said you got what you needed.

[photophobic]

So you want reassurance. That I haven't tricked you into serving my dark design.

[arithmethodical]

I want to reach through this connection and punch you in the face.

[photophobic]

You wouldn't be the first.

[arithmethodical]

[ A long pause, while she tries to figure out what the fuck she's doing.

Part of her knows, already. What she's doing. Why she's doing it. And that part of her is terrified. ]

What did you mean when you said you could give me what I need?

[photophobic]

You aren't my first. I could feed you your lines, if you like.

[arithmethodical]

Ew. Word choice.

[photophobic]

If that's what you think I want, there's nothing I can do for you.

[arithmethodical]

All right, so the First Order doesn't do jokes. Got it.

[ Another longass pause. ]

What can you teach me that I can't learn myself?

[photophobic]

Considering I never said I would teach you anything, I think we both know that isn't the question you want to ask.

[arithmethodical]

[ She almost disconnects. The problem is she has too many questions. What did he mean, when she could see past recruitment slogans? Why would he take any interest in someone who hates his guts? Why offer what he seemed to be offering?

This is all very new to you, he'd said.

Jess picks up a bolt from her workbench, rolling it between her fingers. Does he mean for her to spell it out? Does he want to humiliate her? She keeps coming back to the way she lost control in the park in Nonah, the way every dark thought of every person in her proximity poured into her head. That can't happen again.

She sets the bolt down, her stomach turning over.

She could be dead in less than a week. She could be possessed by a god, or responsible for the destruction of the multiverse. What's one more potentially terrible mistake? If she dies it won't matter anyway. ]

Will you teach me something.

[photophobic]

We don't have much time, do we. What would you like to know.

[arithmethodical]

[ Suddenly this whole thing feels too easy, but...

There's one thing in particular that keeps happening to her. ]

How to control my mind. How to keep other people out of it. Their thoughts.

[photophobic]

[Right. Because why start with anything simple?]

You've experienced it then. Being under someone else's control.

[arithmethodical]

[ Simple is for casuals.

For a second Jess thinks somehow he knows, that he's already seen her childhood, but she's never even talked to him before. Never been anywhere near him. Besides, he doesn't mean that kind of control.

It feels so wrong to be telling Kylo Ren about any of this. ]

Not exactly. Sort of. I can't keep people out. I keep losing touch with myself. It feels like I'm drowning when it happens, and I

I keep seeing things I shouldn't see. Things no one has a right to see.

I guess it does feel like something else is controlling me.

[photophobic]

[Oh. This, he hadn't expected. There's a pause.]

It's overwhelming, at first. Feeling the Force. The movement of the greater whole you are a part of. It can be difficult. To find the edges of yourself and keep within them.

[arithmethodical]

[ She's relieved, reading that. Knowing that this isn't something strange or unfixable. Relieved and revolted with the emotion. ]

So where do I even start?

[photophobic]

Give up the idea of controlling it.

You don't like what you just read. I know. But you can't control your senses. You already know it, just as you know there is a difference between seeing and looking. Hearing and listening. Which means you already know what you can control.

[arithmethodical]

But

So I just figure it out? Is that what you're saying? Plug my mental ears?

[ She knows it's not what he's saying, not exactly. But she'd hoped. She'd hoped this was something she could control, something she could use. Something she could channel to help people, if she even lived long enough to do it.

She picks up the bolt again, this time walking it between her fingers. Why couldn't this be simple?

She misses flying. She misses the calculations necessary to make things go well, she misses the control she had over her own ship. She feels held hostage by all of this. Everything that's happening, not just her struggles with the Force.

She hates being powerless. Hates when things are outside of her control. Hates it.

She just wants to--

Fly. Flying. ]

It's like a dogfight. You're aware of everything, but you see what's in front of you.

[photophobic]

[He gives her the space to work it out, not replying until there's something to reply to that proves she's grasped something of what he means.]

You focus. On what's relevant to what you want to accomplish. That's all it is. You've been doing it with all the information given to you by your senses since you were born. Now, you have to apply it to this, too. Everything that lies beyond the boundary of your body.

[arithmethodical]

[ Jess realizes then that she really had been hoping for something simple. A quick fix. A way to box this ability up and let it out when required. As though the Force was something that could be boxed up at all.

She's going to have to work at this.

Her stomach gives an unpleasant little flutter.

She's going to have to work at this, if she has a future to do so.

Doctor Strange had said they would find a way. Where there's life, there's hope, and where there's hope, there's Light. That would be the first thing for her to focus on. Finding the Light. ]

I'm guessing this is one of those 'easier said than done' things.

[ Right. Focusing. ]

What happens if I can't? If I lose control again?

[ The again, she didn't mean to add. ]