Jackson's ring

And ... now I've had a thought so horrible I must share it.

The contrast between Pietr's dog tags and his wedding ring is going to be a running thing in "Skeleton Key". In this world, they sit pretty easily next to each other. The tags come off when he gets off shift; his ring never leaves his finger.

Now we've got Jackson with a set of dog tags and a ring. And we've separated him from his spouse at least as thoroughly as we did Pietr
from his. That ring is gonna be /damn important to him. He's probably going to develop a Herc-like tic of playing with it.

Now as a Ranger, this Jackson's got the same issue as SK!Pietr: the ring has to come off when the circuitry suit goes on.

He has to let it out of his sight.

But he doesn't have Wash to mind it for him.

Is this PPDC evil enough to ensure the ring disappears one day?

I want them to do that. I want them to do that so, so very badly. But I feel the Drifts after that point (at least in the first week or two) would be extremely unstable-- HOWEVER!!!!!!! What if it happens at the Academy? Have you seen anyone more erratic and unstable than someone who's lost something precious and important to them? He's already extremely stressed out, imagine how many fractures /that'll cause.

YES. At the Academy! They'd want to try to break his resistance as fast as possible. Stripping his family from him as thoroughly as they can is a great way to do that.

Oooo those words are chilling. Very, very chilling. You were quite astute to observe this entire AU's about psychological wafare.

Have you seen anyone more erratic and unstable than someone who's lost something precious and important to them? He's already extremely stressed out, imagine how many fractures /that'll cause.

And, yeah, that'll cement the reputation and put some facts behind that permanent Code Violet.

Essellent.

And then you've got Logan trying to learn to take care of someone else on the fly while being stressed almost to his limits, too.

On the 'snork' side of things, I imagine there'll be quite a few derp moments as what Logan expects to happen doesn't... or something like that. Word failure!

Yeah, Logan will /definitely have some derp moments. Poor boy is totally out of his element.

AND- if they can hurt his throat (too hot soup, for instance), he'll be tearing around and no one'll be able to understand what he's saying.

I don't think we'll need to purposely injure Jackson to end his voice. He'll probably yell and then cry himself hoarse. Add in that he's Mister Sweater Weather in Alaska with a stressed immune system, you could probably just sneeze on him and give him a sore throat that'd last forever. And I'm gonna guess the accent on a sick, hoarse, frazzled Aussie is nigh-impenetrable.

I forgot about the immune system (which is /infinitely more plausible)- another reason people'll want to stay away from them!

I also just remembered this is still Jackson, with his killer protective instinct. But now we've stressed him, reduced his family to Logan, and given him some residual new dad hormones. If they /ever let the Joneses spar with someone else at the Academy and Logan even gets a black eye, Jackson's probably going to try to kill the offender. And Logan will be so stressed from watching his brother suffer, he's probably randomly decking people (like he does in "Jumpers"). Adding yet /more reasons folks will want to steer clear of the pair.

Very good points. To the list!

Speaking of steering clear, I'm going to redo "Code Violet,".

WAIT!

I CAN MAKE IT WORSE!

The ring goes missing at the Academy.

The next time anyone sees it is when the PPDC ships Wash Jackson's personal effects.

If it went missing for so long, Wash (who probably has his size on file) would very calmly pick out a new one for him, march to the Shatterdome and the PPDC figures, "we can just forget about her in Reception" except Wash can out-wait just about everyone and does, then tracks down Jackson, hands it over, gives him a kiss, tells him to have a good day, and leaves.

What if... (Trying to find a medium between 'maintaining Drift stability' and 'giving Jackson as little of his identity as possible'.) The ring periodically goes missing? (But would he eventually come to expect that?) Having to go to a warden (or similarly ranked officer) to retrieve it--like he has to ask permission before becoming 'Jackson' again.

Hmm. How 'bout we split the difference?

The ring goes missing sometime at the Academy, after the reward of flying back
for Book's birthday, but fairly early on. When Jackson and Logan get their 'reward' for completing their training and crash at the Darling-Jones house,
Wash has the new one waiting. The new one goes missing. Wash shows up at the gate with another replacement. Jackson gets in the habit of only wearing it when he's in his quarters and hiding it thoroughly when he leaves. The original and the first replacement show up in that last box. Or maybe Jamie's contacts manage to recover ring #2 at some point and get it back to Wash.

The rings are "Original", "New ring" and "Ring #2", correct?

Yes. Three rings total: Original ring, replacement ring #1, replacement ring #2; for clarity's sake. Original vanishes at the Academy and is recovered at the end of the war. Replacement ring #1 vanishes at the Shatterdome. Jamie's people may get it back to Chuck mid-war. Replacement ring #2 never leaves Jackson's quarters. It also comes back to Chuck at the end of the war.

"Again"

Checked the 2020 calendar for September and, by my logic, it makes sense to give the boys 36 or 48 hours at home before locking them away in the Shatterdome after they get out of Anchorage/Kodiak.