ataraxionlogs | out flew the web and floated wide

Entry tags:

out flew the web and floated wide

CHARACTERS: Roy Walker [

fallasleep] and anyone who wants to visit him
LOCATION: Medbay
WARNINGS: Suicidal thoughts, depression. The usual with Roy.
SUMMARY: Roy wakes up when he doesn't want to wake up. People visit him.
NOTES: Takes place from 14 Aug to the end of the month. Please put the date down when tagging in, thanks!

[ His eyes are open and he feels cold and he doesn't want either. His throat and chest and stomach ache. Some might think that is a good thing. But pain means he's alive, and that's what Roy doesn't want. He sees the medbay again. He sees his own fingers, curling by his side, and both seem the deepest cruelty anyone can inflict on him.

Roy understands why he lives, though. He hasn't hidden himself well enough. He was too eager. He didn't try his very best to find what he needed. The painkillers should have been stronger. Maybe he should have taken the acid instead of the iodine. Maybe he should have asked for stronger alcohol. Maybe he should have just taken a scalpel instead of... Maybe, maybe, maybe. A thousand of them and no way that he can fix it.

(But he was so desperate. He is still desperate. He will have to try again, as soon as possible. He knows that.)

He stares in front of him. Straight ahead. No matter the sounds, no matter who looks. He simply stares emptily.

His throat hurts. (There's a part of himself that's happy about that.) He can't speak, though he still has his tablet by his side. ]

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[ the optimism is still there, but it's muted and silent right now. it's not giving up if she just needs a moment to regain her balance before she can try to make a difference again, is it? it's not giving up if she'll be back to herself in the morning. anderson can't - and wouldn't want to - give up that optimism, the need to help and make a difference, her drive forward. it's just that right now, she can't do it. right now, she's still too shaken up and it'll take a while to compartmentalise it, to make sense of it, of her emotions and the helplessness.

she catches sight of his intention a moment before his hand closes around her collar and before his warning comes. she probably wouldn't have broken his nose or any other part of him even without it. eyes wide, she lets him drag her up (goes willingly, because he couldn't pull her onto the bed if she'd resisted) and then they're side by side.

roy's warm and he's solid and alive and maybe that's enough.

she should question this - both his and her own motivation, why they're doing this - but it helps and if the breath she lets out feels almost painful, like it's being dragged out of her, roy is alive and solid beside her and she closes one hand around the wrist of the hand on her collar, fingers finding his pulse beating under his skin. ]

[ It's a strange emotion within him. His hand on her shoulder, feeling the tension drain out of him. Feeling her fingers, callused, on his wrist, as if taking his pulse. Roy closes his eyes, lets out a long, soft breath, and he slowly lets his hand inch upwards. Cups around her neck, the tips brushing through the short strands at the very nape. ]

You- [ A breath. These words are rusty on his tongue, scraping against the sides of his throat. ]

Do you want to tell me what happened?

[ Christ. How long has it been since he even tried to offer comfort? Even with Alexandria, he had been clumsy, fumbling with words, knowing that he's fucked up. Maybe he won't fucked up this time. (He doubts it.) Maybe-

Roy tries, and he's not sure why he does. ]

[ he might not realise it, but having his pulse under her fingertips, proof that he is alive and relatively well, that he's still there, that is a comfort in itself. being this close to him is, too; proximity isn't something that anderson has experienced often since her parents' deaths. there haven't been many hugs, no people to put a hand on her neck and touch her hair at the hall of justice. she's always tried not to want or need it.

it helps, though.

her breath catches in her throat, eyes closing with his question, as if closing herself off from the memories. ] I don't think I want to talk about it.

[ maybe in a few days, when it doesn't feel quite so fresh and raw anymore, she'll be able to without her voice shaking. until then, she'd rather not relive it. ]

Can we just — stay like this. [ stay close. please. ]

[ It's a proximity that practically makes Roy's skin crawl. He tries to not think of her - she who broke his heart and left him for Sinclair; the woman whom he broke his back in a half-hearted attempt to impress (that's also a half-hearted attempt at killing himself). The last time he's been so close to someone with fully-grown hands had been her- but he refuses, about-turns from that thought, and thinks of Alexandria instead.

Alexandria's hand on his cheek, right before he falls asleep. And woke up here.

Roy places his arm on Anderson's shoulder. Slow, careful. As if he's afraid that he's a bomb and the smallest of pressures will set off the trigger. But he flattens his hand on one shoulderblade. Careful, carefully. ]

Okay. [ Quietly. ]

I don't have anything else to do today anyway. [ He never has anything to do, really, but that goes without saying. ]

[ if it makes his skin crawl, if it brings up unpleasant memories -- why did he pull her up on the bed, why is he putting an arm around her shoulders right now? for once, she isn't reading his mind or his emotions, isn't trying to understand his motivation. she doesn't even know her own motivation in this.

it makes her feel a little better. isn't that enough?

she lets out a slow breath. ] Thank you.

[ because he might not have anywhere else to go or anything else to do, but that doesn't mean that he has to give her this; he doesn't have to give her any form of comfort. she sought him out, after all, not the other way around, exhausted and shaken up by what she'd seen and experienced.

anderson settles her head against his shoulders and feels his pulse beat under her fingertips and reminds herself that it's all right. he's alive and solid, and so is she. so are most people here, unlike on the space station. ]

[ Maybe it's his way to repay the debt he owes her. He might not like to think about that; doesn't like to even imagine owing anyone anything - but the fact of the matter is that he does. Anderson might have brought him to the pod against his will - and that's not what he will thank her for - but she showered him and took care of him. And that's something.

Roy has practically nothing here in this place. She allows him to keep his dignity. And even though he might disagree with it, he knows that her optimism is something that's part of her. It might be annoying to him, and he knows that he should get rid of it for her so she will stop trying to make him live- but somehow.

Somehow, he finds that he can't be that selfish.

His hand squeezes her shoulder lightly, his other hand folding downwards to brush against her fingertips. ]

This doesn't suit you.

[ There's a hint of tears in his throat. He doesn't know if it's for her, or for himself. ]

[ he doesn't owe her anything. what she did wasn't done so that he would incur some kind of debt, it was done because she wanted to make things better, wanted -- and continues to want -- him alive and as well as possible, because she wants to make a difference, because that is, at her very core, who she is.

he doesn't owe her anything for that.

that, and she would much rather he do this not out of a sense of obligation, not because he thinks he owes her but because he wants to comfort or -- whatever his motivation, it shouldn't be obligation. she doesn't quite know her own motivation in this, though, in being quite this close to him and in letting her head tip forward a little further, close to his neck, and she doesn't want to look too closely at his, either.

not right now, at least. ]

I know. [ it's still subdued, but she knows she'll get through it. the optimism, her drive -- what constitutes, in the end, her strength to keep going -- that's all still there and it'll come to the foreground again sooner rather than later. she'll pull herself together and she'll keep going.

she always has. ] I'll be fine. [ and she means that; there's a growing sense of conviction behind those words. ]

[ It's easier to think about series of debts and favours instead of admitting that she might do what she did purely because she wanted to help him. The world wasn't decent to him for such a long time that, when faced with decency, he finds it easier to disavow it entirely than to face the facts that maybe, just maybe, he was unlucky. Maybe the way he lived his life is his own fault instead of the world's unkindness.

He doesn't want to think about that; doesn't even know how to begin down that path. So he focuses on her voice, her words, instead. ]

But you're not fine now. [ Half conviction, half a wish. If she's fine, then she'll leave, and somehow he doesn't want her to. ]

You can stay here until you are, I guess.

[ his lot in life hasn't been an easy one necessarily; maybe it isn't the world's unkindness but really that he was unlucky and met unkind people -- and maybe it is partly a self-fulfilling prophecy. anderson was lucky in the sense that her mutation makes her valuable to the hall of justice, an asset, and so she'd been given second chances where normally no second chances would have been given.

she could resent it, but she is grateful instead. ]

No, I'm not. [ it comes out over something that is almost a laugh, though it isn't a happy or amused sound. she is decidedly not fine right now and she wants to stay here, to hide her face against his shoulder for a moment longer. she'll get up soon enough and face the world and her own emotions again, but for the moment, just a little while longer, she wants to stay right where she is, close to him. ]

Thank you. [ she's said it before, chances are she'll say it again. if he owes her -- he doesn't -- then there's no reason to thank him, but if this is him willingly sharing his space and time to make her feel better, something he has no obligation to do, then it's different. ]

[ Her posture now reminds him of a child's, and he wonders suddenly her age. If she's younger than he is or older. She looks so young, but Roy doesn't trust faces (a remnant of the streets, where boys of fourteen will pretend to be eighteen; where women of thirty will pretend to be twenty). He doesn't ask, though. She'll pick up on the question, won't she?

He's not helping her exactly. Not in his way of thinking. He's not not helping- and it might be a childish way of thinking, but Roy finds that he's resorting more and more to childishness these days.

Because she's making him hope. Feel a connection, somehow. And Roy needs to run back to childishness, to the days before her and before Sinclair, before he knows how to deal with it. ]

Stop saying that.

[ anderson has shed childishness a long time ago; she grew up around age seven when she'd lost both of her parents. of course, parts of her are still more childlike than she even realises -- the optimism and idealism could be argued to be a child's blind faith or stupidity and some people have argued that way. anderson doesn't listen to those people.

and maybe she is seeking comfort from him like a child might. she doesn't exactly have a frame of reference for this. ]

I'm 21. [ said low under her breath, automatic almost as though he had asked the question out loud. he didn't, she's aware of that; she's not really inside his head, she's not really trying to read his mind, but it had been right there at the forefront of his mind.

any other time, she would argue or ask him why he doesn't want her to say those words, why he doesn't want the gratitude even though she has a good idea of why already. right now, though, she doesn't want to move and she's half afraid that he'll make her leave if she argues. so she just doesn't react. ]

[ It's probably a significant age at some time, twenty-one. But Roy can't think of any, really. He finds that he doesn't really have a reaction towards her answering the question out loud - it'll be more disturbing if she spoke in his mind, won't it?

He touches her hair again; runs the gold strands through his fingers slowly. ]

Tell me a story. [ He doesn't tell her to tell a story that she has heard before - it doesn't seem that she has heard many stories in her life. And isn't that a curious thing, that he knows that? That he has managed to remember that, no matter how much he tried not to?

If she wants to tell him a story of herself, he thinks he will remember it too. ]

[ the age isn't significant to her in any way beyond the fact that it is the age at which she'd been given another chance to become a judge -- and failed again.

( she can't think of that failure right now. most of the time she can handle it, but not right now.

his hands in her hair are a welcome distraction and she focuses on that instead, on the way it feels to be this close to someone, to him. )

she hasn't heard many stories in her life and she has told even fewer. still: ] I grew up in a block by the radiation wall. There were far more mutants there than elsewhere, but no one knew I was a mutant until I learned how to speak and knew things I shouldn't have known.

[ she doesn't have memories of that time, but she has some memories of her parents' memories of it. she lost her parents so early on that she doesn't have very many memories of them, but she has this. ] What people were thinking, sometimes I answered questions no one had asked out loud.

I thought everyone could do it.

[ Radiation and mutants. If not for the solidity of her skin underneath his hand, Roy would've thought that this is something from one of the films that are being made in Los Angeles; something unreal and created through one man cutting up pieces of film and messing around with them in a darkroom. (Or something similar to that. Despite working in the film industry, Roy doesn't know how films are made exactly.)

But there's something striking about her story too. I thought everyone could do it, she says, and it's almost like his own voice. I thought everyone likes stories too. It's not the same, completely different, but maybe the two of them are drawn to each other- maybe the reason why she's here- it just comes down to plain loneliness.

He lets her hair run through his fingers again. ]

How did you figure out the difference between the questions asked aloud and those asked inside people's heads?

<small[ Maybe that's selfish too. Hadn't Roy taken some time before he realised that there's a difference - a huge one - between the stories he reads with his eyes and the stories people tell with his ears. ]

[ her life is something that closely resembles what he and many people here would call a science fiction movie or perhaps a dystopia, she is distantly aware of that but doesn't consider it too closely. it's her life and the only reality she's ever known before the tranquility. it's very real to her.

the hand in her hair feels good. she closes her eyes and allows herself to just enjoy it, some of the tension from before leaving her body, bleeding out slowly as the minutes pass and he remains solid beside her. ]

I learned how to speak and my parents figured it out quickly. They told me to hide it, not to answer questions that aren't asked out loud. [ she doesn't do that anymore; her telepathy makes her an asset for the hall of justice and it's saved her life before. she refuses to be ashamed of being a mutant. ]

[ It's a strange thing, the pleasure he feels when the tension eases out of her frame. Roy's hand pauses in her hair, as if trying to stop feeling that way. (Good things are never good for long.) But somehow he has learned not to be selfish within these months here, especially with her, and he keeps going.

He licks his lips before he speaks, and his voice is soft. ]

Your parents must've thought you a prodigy. [ A soft chuckle. ] There's probably more that you know than they do, given that you're hearing the minds of the people around you.

[ It'll make for a good story, he thinks. A curse that is a blessing in its own way, even if it's cruel.

(And that's selfishness too. She talks of her life, and he thinks of it as a story. But stories are easier to swallow than lives, and he thinks that she, if no one else, will understand that.) ]

[ if he were to stop-- she wouldn't ask him to keep going, even though she likes the feeling of his hand carding through her hair, even though it feels good. ( intimate, too, in a way that being inside someone's head isn't for her, in a way that she is not used to at all. ) ]

They thought me a mutant. [ she doesn't sound bitter only because her parents never loved her any less for her mutation. she doesn't know whether she is lucky to have had great parents, or a mutation that is not visible, or both. either way, she has been loved despite her mutation, rather than cast out or mocked. her parents never looked at her with disgust.

of course, her parents died far too early. ]

[ Mutant. It's a word that keeps coming up. Roy likes trying to look at words in his mind; to try to figure out their meanings by the weight on them on his tongue, the shape of them pressing on the sides of his mouth.

But he can't, for 'mutant'. It is too alien. (He thinks about circus freaks, of women with long beards and twins who are joined together by their bodies and men with big bellies and curved spines who look pregnant- but those aren't mutants, are they?)

He has to ask. ]

Are they all like you, mutants?

[ those aren't mutants, but the association is still not entirely incorrect and anderson turns her face into his shoulder and pushes down the thoughts of mutie and go die.

she's heard it said to others more often than herself; she doesn't look like a mutant and her mutation is one she can easily hide, but that makes her no less a mutant and she's not hiding. ] No.

[ letting out a breath slowly. ] Most of them are nothing like me. Malformed, three legs or three eyes or organs in the wrong places and incapable of living. Some are stronger than a normal and some, like me, have psychic abilities.

[ Malformed, three legs or three eyes or organs in the wrong places and incapable of living, she says, and Roy thinks he has never seen those. Of course he hasn't - they're likely to have been born dead, aren't they? Or even if they weren't, they would've been killed - if not by their own parents, then by someone else.

He closes his eyes and lets out a breath that's almost like a laugh. ]

You're lucky to have been born in your world. [ He pauses, looking at her and strokes his fingers through her hair. ] If you were born in mine, you would've been dead.

[ many of them are born dead or born alive only to die soon after, incapable of sustaining themselves and living off their own power -- and medicine has made huge advancements, but no one cares enough for mutants to want to keep them alive. ]

I'm not easy to kill.

[ but he's probably right, and the words come out almost regretful because she knows this from experience. some of those experiences are ones she'd rather not have. ]

[ Neither is he. Roy smiles, a bitter creature, barely acceptable as an expression on a person's face. ]

That's not really a good thing.

[ Her, him- what does it matter, who he's really referring to? She'll know anyway, even if he doesn't. (And that's reliance, isn't it?) ]

I think it is.

[ but then one fundamental difference between the two of them is that anderson doesn't want to die, that she will always cling to life with both hands and hold on and try to make the best of it, whereas roy wants to die.

and she thinks it is a good thing that he isn't quick to die, too, because she wants him alive, too. she'd hate to lose him. ]

[ She doesn't have to say it; he knows already, that she wants him to live. It's obvious when she came to him. If Roy is the type to laugh at the world when it is mocking him, he would have.

(But he isn't. Might make his life easier if he is. Might make his life easier if he is a lot of things he isn't.) ]

Can you imagine a reason to want to die?

[ He knows that she can feel what he does. But that question- it's a different thing.

Maybe he's seeking some sort of perverse connection. It's the only kind he can manage, these days. ]

[ for a moment, anderson stills. it would be unfair to give him a superficial or blithe answer, and so she thinks about it-- can she imagine a reason to want to die? ]

Yes.

[ she hopes it will never come to that, doesn't think it will ever come to that, but if she honestly thought that there was nothing she could do to make a difference, not even the slightest difference to even just one person? she thinks then she might want to die. ]

out flew the web and floated wide

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