patheticvillain | fifty-five ➢ spam & voice

Entry tags:

fifty-five ➢ spam & voice

private } mickey

Hey. You busy?

private } beyond

Got something for you.

spam

[Recovering from being disemboweled physically took about forty-five seconds. Recovering psychologically is taking a little bit longer. Cassel takes comfort in simple tasks and routines in the meantime, trying not to think about what happened with Creed or what happened in the Enclosure or what's going to happen next. There's this feeling like the other shoe is going to drop - not uncommon on the Barge, but not something he wants to deal with, either.]

[During the day, when he's not in the gym, he spends time in his room or in the common rooms with yarn in his lap, curled up in an armchair, knitting and purling on autopilot. He has no idea what he's making, which is usually how he goes about things. Eventually he casts off and picks it up, examining it in the light. It appears to be a tiny sweater with at least three arms.]

[He never said he was good at this.]

[At night, a lithe black cat roams the halls. To Cassel's credit, this time he's wearing a little blue collar with a name tag. On the other hand, it took him this long to come up with that, so maybe he's not so smart after all. He curls up on the backs of couches, winds between people's legs, and wanders into cabins behind their occupants, purring loudly and very insistently.]

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[He doesn't quite believe that. Not really. Loss is not inconsequential. But it's the kind of thing he would have said, once - admittedly with different vocabulary - so again, he lets it slide. Just nods and looks out at the grass, which needs mowed, and remembers what the point of all of this was, before honesty happened.]

Right. Something to give you, actually.

[He digs into his pocket and pulls something out: a small, round, white stone, about as big as a marble. He holds it out for Beyond to take.]

[beyond untangles himself and reaches out to take the stone from cassel's hand, wearing a curious look.]

What is it?

It's an amulet.

[He spreads his hands and leans forward a little, jostling a rusted-out pot with his foot as he does so.]

Against transformation work. I make them sometimes. It'll only work once, but if something goes wrong - if somebody, like, mind-controls me and sends me on a rampage, or if powers get switched around - that happened once--

If anything like that happens, you'll be protected.

Safe?

[beyond gives him a sideways glance; the question is an echo back to cassel's earlier claim, that he wanted to make beyond feel safe. the mere mention of possible out-of-control powers is enough to negate such an idea.

beyond returns his gaze to studying the amulet in the palm of his hand, turning it over and over, rolling it between his thumb and fingers.]

Thank you, Cassel. I ... I don't have anything to give you in return.

[which is not entirely true.]

Safe.

[He meets that glance, again apparently unembarrassed. Safe is, for him, a relative term, and he feels safer on the Barge than he ever has anywhere else. Safety can also come in small parcels. But then, he doesn't expect everyone else to understand that.]

[Nor does he expect anything in return, not really, but when the opportunity comes, it's really hard to pass up. Again: he is still a Sharpe.]

[He cocks his head.]

You don't have to give me anything. But can I ask you a question?

[an answer to a question makes as good of an exchange as anything. beyond nods.]

You may. [he's even inclined to answer truthfully, in light of the gift he's been given.]

Edited 2015-06-27 06:36 (UTC)

Do you really think it's inconsequential?

[He leaves it up to Beyond to interpret this question - whether to address what he's just said or what he said the other day.]

That I didn't die the way I'd intended?

[he's not being cagey, for once - this is the most recent conversation, so it's the one that comes to mind first.]

Yes. Ultimately it does not matter how I died, or when - the outcome is the same. I am dead now.

[beyond slips the amulet into his pocket and once again draws his leg up into the chair, hugging his knee to his chest. he presses the tip of his thumb to the front of his teeth for a moment, considering what to say next.]

And no. I was kept alive, against my will, for more than a year - possibly as long as two years, I'm not certain about the exact passage of time.

[that matters.]

[It's not quite the answer he was expecting, but it makes sense, in a crooked kind of way that Cassel probably understands too well. To be kept from the end of everything, despite the certain knowledge that you don't deserve it, sounds a little bit like hell.]

[He looks at Beyond with his head tipped to one side.]

I don't understand why anyone would do that to you.

Because he had the power to do so. [a dark edge creeps into his tone. this is how beyond sees it - L was responsible for keeping him alive and in agony in prison, not that he did anything wrong. (except lose.)] Because it was the opposite of what I wanted.

That's cruel.

[Maybe not to most people - but clearly to Beyond, and isn't that the point? If it hurt him, it's hurtful and it shouldn't have happened.]

[Then again, maybe Cassel's a little biased.]

Perhaps.

[beyond goes silent for a long moment, and then:]

Perhaps it was just.

[he would never admit this to anyone except cassel; beyond has been more honest with the boy in the past week than possibly anyone else in his life. and beyond himself doesn't even fully believe this, even as he speaks the words, but there is some small part of him that still clings to the indoctrination he received at the House: L is Justice.

and beyond had lost to L. he forfeited his names to the other detective; perhaps he also deserved L's judgment.]

Justice is not often concerned with kindness. [cassel may be able to pick up on the capital-J way beyond says the word justice.]

Edited 2015-06-29 00:48 (UTC)

[There's a flash of surprise across Cassel's face, a flash of indignation. On the part of Beyond, not himself, whoever taught him to belief that, whoever lied to him. Because somebody's been lying.]

That's not justice.

[Hesitation then, only for a moment, and then, softer:]

I can't imagine that being justice.

[He's never been on the side of justice in his life. But whatever it's supposed to be, in an ideal world - it isn't torture.]

[beyond tilts his head, turns his gaze toward the boy. it's a surprising response - beyond has spent so much time in the company of others with the same programming. there's no room in his head for anything to the contrary.]

What do you believe is justice, then?

Edited 2015-06-29 01:32 (UTC)

I'm not gonna lie to you and say that I know, exactly.

[Pressing his lips together, he shrugs.]

Where I come from, people like me are illegal. So for a long time I didn't believe in justice at all, because any justice meant me and my family locked up. But now - justice shouldn't be something that tortures the people I care about.

[beyond interprets that phrase - the people i care about - to mean him, and for a moment, he visibly bristles. this is unfamiliar territory for him, and it's extremely uncomfortable. he shifts in his chair, dropping his attention to a stray thread at the hem of his jeans, watching silently as he winds it around the tip of his index finger. finally, after the silence has had time to grow heavy between them, he asks, quietly:]

Cassel ... why did you say that you like me?

[it's not his real question; beyond has a good enough idea of how cassel operates to understand that he says things because they are true. what he really wants to know is why do you like me?]

[He goes quiet at Beyond's reaction, unsure exactly what he's done wrong. Too much, too soon, maybe, too honest, not enough lies. Some people take a while to calibrate to his unique new brand of honesty, and Beyond shows evidence of not knowing why anyone would tell him the truth in the first place, much less consistently.]

[The silence, however, doesn't phase him. The question doesn't surprise him. It sounds like something he would have asked a couple of years ago. Actually, he's pretty sure he did.]

[A one-shouldered shrug - and he is still enough of a teenage boy, though only barely by now, that he picks at the cuff of his glove in embarrassment.]

Because I like you. Because you're curious and you want to know how things work. Because - you don't trust people until they've earned it, if then. Because you weren't scared of what I can do.

[Because you believe me.]

Is that enough for you?

[his words come out a little sharper this time, sharper than he intends.]

You don't know me.

[he frowns, eyes narrowed as he watches the tip of his finger darken purple with backed up blood.]

I could be anyone. I could be lying to you, about everything.

[he's not, though, and he isn't playing at being a fellow warden, like he has told several others in the days since he's been on the barge.]

Everyone who is here has been brought for a reason.

[and even though beyond believes he doesn't belong here, even though he believes his actions were justified in service to a greater plan, he knows he is a criminal - he has embraced this identity. and even though he was not cruel in his methods of murder, he committed crimes; this he knows. he chose to commit three gruesome murders because it was a perversion of everything he'd been taught, everything L stood for.

and as his stomach knits itself into knots as he listens to cassel speak, he is struck with an overwhelming impulse to tell the boy everything, to display for him every logical reason why he should not like beyond. he wants to force a distance between them.

because as much as he has always craved the sort of close connection cassel is offering, beyond is also terrified of it.]

You don't know what I've done.

Edited 2015-06-29 19:08 (UTC)

[For the first time, Cassel dons a mask: a careful, cool, neutral mask. Whether it's to shield himself from pain or to shield Beyond, he couldn't honestly say, but his smile is gone either way.]

[It's true: he doesn't know Beyond. Not really. You can't get to know someone in a couple of days. Once, he would have said you can never really know anyone. That everyone lies, all the time, that it's only a matter of time before anyone sticks a knife in your back. Once, he would have smiled and nodded and agreed with everything Beyond is saying now, because it's only logical.]

[The knowledge of how easily he could be betrayed still looms large in his mind. The difference between who he was then and who he is now is that he takes chances, now. He allows people to hurt him, if that's what they want to do, and realizes that the vast majority of the time they won't. Even here, he's either been remarkably lucky or his tactics remarkably effective.]

[He levels his gaze on Beyond and nods: acknowledging that everything he's said is true.]

You're right. I don't know you. I don't know what you've done.

But you don't know what I've done, either. Everyone who is here has been brought for a reason.

[He sits back in his chair, pulls something out of his back pocket: a pack of cigarettes and a lighter.]

Do you mind if I smoke? [And the mask is gone, as if it never was. He smiles.]

[beyond remembers - cassel said he'd been brought as an inmate first. they are basically strangers, and yet, beyond has given the boy a few small glimmers of himself (too much, he thinks). for a moment, he feels sick, and incredibly stupid, and overwhelmed. he pulls the string loose from the hem of his jeans with a violent tug, and watches as it uncoils and the blood rushes back into the rest of his finger, his hand, his thoroughly unsettled body.]

I don't mind. [he gives cassel a small sideways glance.] It's not healthy.

[He lights up without looking at Beyond, breathes in smoke and blows it out through his nose - turning his face ever so slightly away, in deference to his quiet objection.]

Are you worried about me? [A tease - he can't quite help himself.]

The way I look at it, I've already died. The infirmary is full of magicians and extradimensional beings who can cure cancer as easy as blinking. So what does it matter?

[That, and it's his way of holding death close to him, in just one small way.]

Just an observation.

[said coolly, because of course beyond wouldn't admit to having feelings for cassel. not someone he's only just met. not someone he doesn't entirely trust (as if he can trust anyone, ever). not someone who is a fellow criminal, who is capable of taking revenge against those who hurt him and succeeding at it. not someone in whom he recognizes a thread of similarity to himself, certainly.

he would never admit it. but that doesn't mean that it's untrue.]

By that extension, does anything we do here matter?

Edited 2015-06-29 20:00 (UTC)

Not health-wise.

[He shrugs. He knows about eight billion people who'd disagree with him and probably yell at him for saying it, but honestly, this ship is overflowing with functioning and non-functioning alcoholics, and none of them have died of alcohol poisoning yet, so it's probably fine.]

[A sideways look. If he's gonna be all nihilistic about it . . .]

Want one?

[add smoking to the list of things beyond would ordinarily have no interest in doing. but an offer coming from cassel?

if it ultimately does not matter, beyond can find no compelling reason not to accept.

he turns his attention to cassel, studying the boy, hesitating even as he knows what his answer will be. he twists his head to crack his neck one way, then the other.]

I suppose. [he shifts in his seat again, leaning in toward the boy with hand outstretched.]

[He opens his mouth to say That has to be bad for your neck, but then remembers: nothing matters, right? So instead he grins, taps another cigarette out of the pack - Gitanes, because he's feeling sentimental this week - and hands it over along with the lighter.]

You know what you're doing?

action.

action.

action.

action.

action.

action.

action.

action.

action.

action.

action.

action.

action.

action.

action.

action.

action.

action.

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action.

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action.