patheticvillain | thirty-eight ➢ private video & spam

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thirty-eight ➢ private video & spam

spam } horatio

[When Cassel picks the lock on Horatio's door and slides inside, silent as a cat in the dark, he finds the man asleep in a hammock hanging gently above creaky floorboards. For a moment he regards him in the dim light coming from the hallway, considering all of his options. He could easily turn Horatio into something unspeakably vile as punishment. It might even be right.]

[Instead, he pulls a black silk cloth out of his pocket and, leaning up on his tiptoes, ties it around Horatio's eyes and behind his head. Then he sits in the corner of the room, legs crossed and eyes half-open, waiting for the man with his naked hands to wake up.]

private } daneca

I need your help with something. Or someone, I guess.

What do you do for blowback? I have some techniques that I used on my mom, but - you probably have better ones. She never really tried to control it.

private } needy

[In between all of this, he's almost surprised by the arrival of Needy's file. He's still a warden here. Even though Czeslaw's gone, he gets another chance.]

[As he reads it, a smile grows on his face. Nothing he's reading is good, but it's not - foreign, either, even when it technically is. He doesn't feel lost. He feels - intrigued.]

[He's still half-smiling when he opens the feed, cocking his head at her through the connection.]

So. You pissed?

open spam } gardens

[He sits under a tree, making statues.]

[Maybe this will frighten people, now that they have some context: he's got his gloves off, folded carefully at his side. There is scrap metal - soda cans and piles of paper clips - by his knee. This he uses to build his statues, long, thin, somewhat overwrought looking things, melded and twisted by his transformation into something vaguely human.]

[Occasionally he pauses and takes a sip of the open mug of steaming coffee at his other knee. Then he goes back to building ugliness.]

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Damn right.

[He looks up at Duke, carefully scrutinizing.]

So you're okay? You don't need any discount therapy?

Are you shitting me?

[He pulls out her file, then tosses it onto the table at his side. With a wide gesture at it, he shrugs expansively, as if to take in everything in it and everything beyond it, too. Everything written and said, unwritten and unsaid.]

I know what that brick says, a lot about a normal kid who got a big nasty wad of completely abnormal bullshit thrown in her face around the same time most people are, like, learning to drive or whatever. I know nobody goddamn believed you, and I know you're pissed and you're scared, and I know what anger is, but beyond that?

Not a whole fucking lot, Needy. I didn't live your life, and it sure as hell isn't my job to diagnose you. I'm not your therapist.

Hey, it's what I'm here for.

[Usually she reminds Cassel of what the better choice is when he's about to make a mistake - regardless of whether or not he listens - but sometimes she points out when he's making the right choice all by himself.]

[She likes those times the most.]

Depends. Which one?

[She sets her mouth together and though the look in her eyes is hard and fierce, the way she holds her head up makes it look like she's trying not to cry.]

Then what are you supposed to do, then? What are you good for?

[It's a challenge, though maybe not a direct one.]

Why did this place bother bringing me in if it's not going to try and do something about it?

Truly you have the spark of maniacal genius, [she says with a roll of her eyes.]

I'm holding up. [And he is; his smile is tired but it's still genuine.] Besides, I've got a few types of therapy back on the Cape Rouge.

How about you?

[It's awful. The touch of Cassel's fingers on his shoulder is like someone jamming a wire directly into his nerves. Horatio spins on his heel, and it is only the very last trace of his self control that forces him to soften his hand before he slaps Cassel's arm away, before jerking back as if he's the injured party.

As if he's just been burned.]

Please. Please.

[Horatio's voice is tight and strained with anxiety. Like every muscle in him is wound tighter than a drum, hemmed in and clamped down as much as he's able.]

Please just go away. I can't-- I can't trust myself. I can't let myself--

[His teeth are gritted now, rage and restraint clawing against each other inside of him, and he brings his hands back up to dig his fingernails into his cheeks. He needs to keep them occupied. He needs to keep them away from Cassel.]

I will not hurt you again. Go away.

[He smirks, like, I know. Because he does. He knows what she means, which is 'bullshit', and he even sort of knows why she's here. Here with him, not here on the Barge. There's something to be said for making acquaintances from enemies, even if they never quite get to be friends.]

So if I'm a maniacal genius, what does that make you? [A sideways way of asking, How are you?]

The one where I got paired up again. That one.

No.

[And here's the other thing: maybe it's punishment. Maybe this is his way of showing Horatio how horrible he is, how much worse he could be. A way of burning him one more time before all of this goes away.]

[A way, too, to get revenge on the people he can't get revenge on anymore. A way to hurt his mother, his brothers, every worker who would have hurt him if they'd gotten the chance. Himself.]

I'm the only one who'll understand. You might as well take advantage. Because I'm not going anywhere. I won't, and you can't make me.

I never said I wasn't good for anything.

[Maybe he'd say as much with actions rather than words, or if asked more obliquely - but right now, that's not what he's saying. And anyway, he's sort of starting to believe that even if he isn't good for himself, he's good for other people. He could be good for Needy.]

[Kon said anger lies on top of everything else. He can see one part of her everything else. It's fear. He knows fear way too well, and how to kick its ass.]

I just don't have letters after my name. I don't even have a high school diploma yet. But then again, neither do you, right?

I'm not gonna just fix your problems because they don't have a simple, magical solution. This place brought you here because you've been fucked over and you have a right to start again. What I'm supposed to do is be on your goddamn side, no matter what, and believe you.

[Pausing, he seems to realize how this sounds and rolls his eyes.]

So buy stock in Hallmark.

[Horatio's fists tighten. His nails dig into his cheeks almost hard enough to break the skin, and then, slowly, he unfurls. He feels light headed, almost despairing, surrendering, finally and entirely to the fact that Cassel is here.

Cassel won't leave.

And it's more than he deserves. Cassel has so many people here already. So many friends, so many admirers - for perfectly obvious reasons, of course - but he's choosing to stay. Choosing to give Horatio his time.

Even through the wildfire of his guilt (the only emotion that Horatio can be certain is entirely authentic right now) Horatio feels grateful.]

I really don't want to hurt you. Thank you, truly, for being here with me, but I only want you to be well.

[And, strangely, it's becoming true. The urge to hurt Cassel is fading, replaced with relief, and a kind of overwhelming happiness that the other warden is here.

He stares at Cassel now, his expression slipping across from being attentive to being enchanted. He swallows, whets his lips, then offers:]

I feel quite a bit better now, actually.

Does it make me way too much of a teenager to say I'm still sorta working on that?

[Things feel steady under her feet for now, but with this place it's always up to chance how long that will last. And besides, things are only just now starting to feel a little normal again.]

At least I quit the femme fatale thing when I turned my humanity back on.

[At that very end there she makes an odd face, like she simultaneously could laugh or cry, and manages a twisted smile.]

Thank fucking god you ended with that, or I would have wondered what the hell you did with the real Cassel.

Right. Needy.

She had no idea we were dating and sort of flipped about it. Weird but...okay, I guess.

You think she'll stick around?

Good. The femme fatale thing is boring.

[He says, hypocritically.]

But you're not femme normale either. Too many vampire boyfriends.

Like flipped out how?

I don't know. How the hell would I know that? It's a crapshoot. But I guess I act like she will, whether she does or not.

He probably got kidnapped by weird omnipotent aliens or something.

Oh wait, that actually happened.

[He smirks.]

So what now? You gonna be pissy and ignore me and make me follow you around like a kicked puppy?

[It's obvious what's happening, of course, to a connoisseur like Cassel. The tide of emotion's turning, ostensibly positive now rather than negative, although he wouldn't term it as such. Adoration's just as dangerous as abhorrence.]

[The urge comes over him before he recognizes it: use this. He could make a fast ally this way, if he was clever enough. If he was kind in the right way.]

[Cassel swallows.]

I bet you do. But you'll feel worse again within the hour.

It cycles, see. It'll keep cycling until you get all the way out of it.

[You're lucky doesn't know about Lila or Cassel, she'd super call you out.]

Okay, one, I'm pretty sure femme normale isn't really a thing. And two, I don't have vampire boyfriends anymore. Even if I did, I'm a vampire. Don't you think that counts a little more?

You know so much about this.

[Horatio comes a little closer to Cassel, then feels a sudden anxiety. Will Cassel want him to come too close? Probably not. He wraps his hands around his shoulders and crouches low, still gazing admiringly up at the other warden.]

It makes me feel very stupid, to be honest, having inflicted such a state on myself while knowing so little of it.

[When he is better, he'll be mortified by his own honesty here, but right now, this is Cassel... How could he not trust him with his every thought?]

Not flipped out like Touko. Flipped out like "waaah I have a crush on this guy and you suck and you're not good enough for him and why would an awesome guy like Cassel go for an asshole like you?"

Does it make it harder to get attached?

I mean. I guess. But you're still Elena.

[No; Cassel doesn't want him to come too close. In fact, he backs away slightly when Horatio approaches, still frightened of his touch.]

I can tell you about it. But you have to stay over there.

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