Poe's been conscious for a while now. Long enough to have realized he's about as present as he's going to be, pounding headache and bone-dry throat and all. Still, he keeps his aching eyes open as often and as long as he can manage, silently watching Sinjir prepare with a look that's blandly inquisitive, like maybe this is all just part of some completely banal routine.

He deliberately doesn't think about the chill creeping up his bared arms and how they've gotten that way, just that the lack of heat lends extra force to those uncontrollable shivers. In that sense, despite the painful brightness of that brilliant light, it's almost a gift.

What Poe is thinking is this: You knew. All along, you knew. Poe refuses, as he so often does, to acknowledge any stirring of trepidation. Confusion, disappointment, and something uncomfortably close to pity comes far easier, and maybe some of that seeps in around the edges of his expression. But even that's tempered, rocky-edged, because this deliberate Imperial provocation means he has little choice but to engage not as Poe, but as Commander Dameron.

No Force-users to pick apart his brain for information -- the rest, he knows he can manage. Not nicely, but well enough and he'll chew and swallow his own tongue like some tragically brave holo character before he gives in, he swears it.

His face itches, dried blood cracking, pulling at delicate hairs. Sinjir disappears behind the curtain that separates him from the other captive (the pretty one with the strange pet who is, as far as he's aware, completely unrelated to any of the rest of them), and Poe thinks of a moment not long ago, Sinjir slumped against the bar and crying like a broken man. I think I should have died on Endor, he'd said, and had sounded like he'd meant it. Poe closes his eyes. Idly wonders what his father is doing at this moment, if he worries for his son now.

The odd thunk of some sort of plastic draws his attention back, and there's a small sliver of curiosity left to spare for the bucket, too. Better that than the blade, than the way Sinjir flows out of his peripheral vision like some dark ghost and he has to force himself not to attempt to turn his head to follow him.

He wonders what would happen, if he pleaded -- if he used every scrap of knowledge he has of Sinjir and that roiling struggle in his head to ask for ... what? Sanity? Sense? If the Grand Moff is in earshot, he could probably do some serious damage to Sinjir's credibility as an Imperial puppet. And yet here he is, blade in hand, so maybe the rest is irrelevant.

You shouldn't have come for me, he'd said, and if he had the energy for it, Poe might laugh. Instead, he tilts his head downward to focus on the bend of his knees, and decides that he's going to take the time to compose a report for the General. One of many to be delivered at the end of ... all of this.

"Kinda funny," Poe rasps. "The Emperor did the same thing, y'know. Lashed out like a spoiled child in death; a real mynock, that one." He snorts, lets his eyes fall shut again. "Operation Cinder. Meant to raze Naboo, and a handful of other planets. Found out years later that my mom led the General and the Queen herself that day into the storm -- to shut it down and save the planet. Pretty remarkable, huh?" So much for the image of the badly maligned, benevolent Emperor. So much for the Empire. He wonders if Sinjir will allow himself to see the lesson in that, or if he, like Poe, intends to take himself elsewhere.

"Nah, I suppose not," Poe mutters. "Just figured a guy with your humor might appreciate the similarities."

He can tell the sharpness of the knife, just by the lack of sound it makes as it cuts through that thin fabric. Poe draws a breath; holds it for several long seconds before releasing it in a slow sigh. "See, you were doing good for a little while there, but then you went and blew it. If you wanted to break me, you'd still be dragging my cold carcass out of here a hundred times over before you found a single bit of leverage. You know why that is?"

There's an instinctive moment of tension, skin twitching beneath the cold edge of the knife dragging up his spine, an involuntary jerk of the head no matter how hard Poe tries hard to clamp down on his reaction. "Because I know the future -- the one he'll never see. And you can hurt me real bad, sure. You can hurt that innocent woman on the other side of this thing or whoever you're aiming for, but you can't take that away. What's there to be scared of, Sinjir? Some angry old moff and his spineless tools? Not in this lifetime." A soft huff. Poe's hands flex in the binders, working some semblance of feeling back into his fingers and wondering if that might not be a stupid idea.

It's a mean thing to say, but Poe's pretty sure he's entitled to a little bit of meanness right now.

"Besides," he continues a moment later, "no one here worth his attention gonna hit the red over a flyboy going down. But yeah, sure. Tell me all about pointless efforts, pal."