station72 | sometime after day 5

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sometime after day 5

[ Sam’s never really reached out to the Nest in general like this before, but at this point - well, he’s running out of options. The work he’s done on his mental walls has paid off, and nothing escapes his thick cloud layer except his words, and the soft hint of wind and feathers that flavors his mental link. ]

( Seems like we got a bit of down time, and I’m looking to put it to good use. I’m getting better with my symbiote ability, but I need someone who’ll let me practice it with them.

Simple explanation is that it’s healing, with a side effect that means it’s gonna hurt. Most likely for me. I can get into specifics if you’re up for it. ) [ If it doesn’t bother them or they’re willing to overlook that it means Sam getting hurt, he means, but seeing as he’s communicating with the Nest in general, he’s not gonna say that.

He already knows more than who person who is bothered by it and never seems willing to let Sam use it on them. ]

( I’ll take as many as I can get, more training can’t hurt. )

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[ It was a good end, as far as he's concerned. He can't even honestly say he regrets kissing her - though he maybe regrets that it wasn't under different circumstances. But they were drunk, and that's the way things go. It doesn't have to be awkward, and Sam's determined not to let it.

And he definitely doesn't question her optimism about going home. They'd all gotten here somehow, it stands to reason they could find their way back. There's plenty of people here who believe that, who're preparing for when they return, and Sam's supported that.

It's less of a draw for Sam, who left behind his life more than once before he ever came here, but that's his business. ]

Might as well use the time while we got it, huh? [ Makes sense to him. ] I've had a couple of bites. More than before this, anyway.

Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity!

[ The words slip past her lips before she thinks through the implications of citing Seneca, and her own disapproval crosses her face in such a painfully obvious wince that the shame compounds upon the shame. Such is her life. It occurs to her that she spent too many years of her life with brainiacs like Ritsuko and Kaji. It occurs to her that that isn't really a bad thing. ]

Anyway, come over here and patch me up already. [ She snaps the laptop shut and sets it aside to give him space to take a seat nearby. ] You wouldn't guess who gave me these bruises and how.

[ Honestly, that sounds like the kind of fortunes he got back at carnivals back home, on warm summer nights when you stick a couple of coins into a machine and it pops out your future. He can't help but grin a little at the face she makes, even if he doesn't comment on it.

He sits down, angled in slightly so that their knees are touching. Both because he's someone at ease with proximity and because his symbiote ability requires touch - and he's trying to practice doing it in ways that don't involve his hands. There might be a time where he needs to use it in a situation where he's not free to just go grabbing at someone.

As soon as their knees touch, there's a flow of warmth across the connection - and he doesn't pause in the conversation, trying to multitask so he can scan for injuries at the same time as he talks with her. ]

Do I gotta get a couple of wrong guesses before you tell me?

[ Misato craves physical touch even as she regards it with suspicion. There's an amorphous time in her memory of being alone in a lifeless world and there's a more distinct period in her life when she was denied contact in lieu of a chair, a handful of wooden blocks and a teddy bear. Human touch is more, far more, than any object can compensate for.

She flinches when their knees touch, alarm surging through the link mixed with that particular kind of wanting reserved for parched men lost in a desert. She wants and loathes it, but makes no mention of it even when she feels the warmth, his warmth. The brief pause and the level gaze she grants him are the only acknowledgment she offers him. ]

I think you're smart enough to figure it out in one go.

[ She's testing herself too, a teasing smile on her lips as she imagines a girl as delicate as a flower with fists as solid as tree bark. Can he see what she sees? The symbiote offers such possibilities. ]

[ It's not the first time he's experienced something like this. So many soldiers returning from war crave the comfort of companionship, of knowing they're not alone, at the same time as they shudder away from touch and the tenuous safety it brings. Too much violence, too much loss, too little belief in themselves and others to be comfortable with it. He'd been like that himself, once.

More recently, it reminds him of Bucky, leaning towards the warmth their brood bond offers and the companionship Sam does, pulling away and hissing at him when it gets to be too much.

Sam can tread lightly, ease into it. He doesn't do anything but keep his knee right there, focused on holding his symbiote ability back. And on the image that she gives him. He picks it up easily, focused on their connection as he is, and he smiles back. ]

Ilde. How was the fight?

[ He's assuming it was one prearranged, the kind for practice - he suspects one of them would be more injured otherwise, and that she might not be smiling like that. It was a fight; he's a medic, he'd know the injuries that come from another person even without the symbiote. He lets go after that, and his ability takes over: healing her bruises at the same time as they appear on his own skin. ]

[ She responds with a grin. It's a game of charades and he just scored a win for the team. ]

The girl's got moves, let me tell you.

[ A part of her draws back to consider if that's perhaps less of a compliment and more an insult. Like saying, you fight good, for a girl. She has been on the other end of the equation for so long and proven them wrong time and time again that it irritates her to find that she has become the perpetrator of the very same cycle. It's uncomfortable to admit, so she changes the topic by reaching over to grab him by the arm where she can see the bruises forming with utter disregard for personal space. ]

So does it hurt when it appears on you? Or just when I poke it?

[ As she pokes the bruise that's now his, yes. ]

I'm guessing so do you, since you aren't just a giant bruise.

[ The phrasing doesn't even make Sam blink - he'd use it himself, not meaning anything different than saying the guy's got some moves. Then again, he is a guy, formerly of a special ops division of the military that doesn't have a single female member. He's never thought of women as any less capable, but he's never had to personally experience it, either.

He can tell something's making her uncomfortable, but is pretty easily distracted from exploring what when she leans over and pokes him in the bruise. ]

Hell yes it hurts when you poke it. Thanks for testing that out for me. [ Probably not as much as hers, since the ones on his skin are a little farther along in the healing process, but still. ] Depends on the injury, but yeah, sometimes they hurt when they appear.

[ As if disbelieving his words, Misato looks up to study his face and see for herself. She isn't sure what it is she's trying to find, not so much a believable reaction or a certain thought betrayed by his eyes, but something. Something. He seems too simple, too good, despite his words back when they had drunk themselves under the table, and she's convinced there must be more to the story. No one who has lived so long could remain so plain. Even children have their own secret tragedies.

She draws back and rests her hand against her knee, fingers brushing his knee, but her eyes don't relent. ]

Do you like it? When it hurts.

[ Oh. That's what this is about. He can't be sure what she's looking for when she meets his gaze, but it's not the first time that he's had someone study him like this. Unbelieving that he is what he seems to be, looking for the lie, the reason not to trust him.

The excuse to throw everything he says back in his face as bullshit, but that'd been mostly back at the VA, and not finding anything hadn't always stopped them from doing it anyway.

He holds her gaze back, head tilted down just a little - steady, but not challenging. ]

I learned other ways to remind myself that I'm still alive.

[ Her gaze changes, softens, turning apologetic when she lowers her eyes to the point where their knees meet. It's not his fault that she, an incorrigible ultra-rationalist with a decidedly poor view of humanity, doubts him and his good intentions, this she knows full well. It's on her.

Misato draws her knees to herself, severing the contact, resting both hands on the floor for balance. Only then does she draw her eyes back to him. ]

Like helping others? Making a good difference?

[ He squeezes her knee a little at that apologetic look, before he goes back to resting his hand on his own knee. It doesn't bother him that she's looking for what's under the surface, trying to gauge his motivations and figure out if she can trust anything he says.

A little bit of mistrust is a good thing. ]

Yeah, that's one way, but I never count on just one. I'll also take a good glass of wine or the sunrise after the end of a morning run, good friends at your back, jumping off whatever's highest and punching the bad guys in the face.

[ One of these things is not like the other, but the grin on his face stays the same the whole time. ]

[ His answer prompts her to try and come up with a few of her own, but she knows she would come up empty even before she tries. At least Ritsuko has her cats, Kaji has his flowers. Misato only has her work, and her work is war. All the things he lists out sound pleasant but they're not enough. Maybe it isn't about the thing itself, but the person, a state of mind she can't allow herself to succumb to. The expression she wears is uncharacteristically morose. She's not sad or hurting, not anymore, only wry, jaded and opaque when she gives him an appreciative smile. ]

Prince told me I should learn to live, not just survive. I guess you've figured out how.

[ Clearly she hasn't. But she doesn't want to let him get a word in before she can shrug off her troubles, preempting any pitying remarks by dismissing herself, turning this into something more than about her. ]

But that's a funny thing to say, anyway, after he warned me not to get my hopes up about winning. That's kind of like giving up, isn't it? It's like you're not putting in your all.

[ You're not staying up all night slaving away. You're not bleeding yourself dry. You're going soft. ]

[ Her silence tells him exactly what he needs to know, the same way that the way Steve had paused and looked at him when he asked what makes you happy told him what his answer was gonna be before Steve ever said I don't know. He quirks a smile back at her, equally wry, and not an ounce of pity.

She might dismiss herself, but Sam never will. Everything about her is far too important for anything like pity.

What she says makes him think a little differently of Prince. Sam's never really gotten to know him, only formed an impression of him based on what he's seen of him in the minds of the other Hosts - and this adds a new dimension, gives him something he can identify with. He can see how both of those can exist in the same viewpoint. ]

Way I see it - acknowledging the risks, accepting that the chance of succeeding is real damn small, is just more reason to put everything you got into making sure you do. And sometimes - sometimes surviving is easier than living.

[ He doesn't necessarily mean it as a challenge when he says it, but the fact that he knows damn well that Misato never gives up, never the one to do what's easier, well. It doesn't make him change the way he phrases it. His tone isn't gentle - but he's quiet, not quite melancholy. ]

[ Ah, he knows her well. Misato knows it too, quirking a little smile the moment he says the word easy, doesn't he play her like a fiddle? It's true. Surviving is the prerequisite to living but it is paltry by comparison, like the difference between one puny candle and the sun. She can light her way, keep on walking, but it's not the same. She reaches over to hold his hand, a form of reassurance for him or for herself, her smile turning wistful. ]

When I turned 17, I decided I would talk again and be alright. [ She says decide as she takes upon her shoulders the entire responsibility of choosing between well and sick, allowing herself no excuses. But she doesn't tell him, I saw the end of the world and it left me mute for three years because surely what she does is more important than what was done to her. ] And I did it, you know, I did all the stupid things college kids do and I was happy. I've come a really long way, and I'm still going. Three steps forward, two steps back.

[ Because trauma recurs in cycles of hollow joy and vicious self-hatred and at no point in her life will she ever be able to say I'm healed, still it doesn't mean she would stop trying. She sighs as she releases her knees to stretch her legs long in front of her, hands by her sides like pillars, a sort of unraveling. ]

How did you find your way back?

[ He laces their fingers together when she takes his hand, and turns just a little bit towards her. He doesn't face her full on, doesn't want to put her on the spot and make her feel like he's staring at her - but it's obvious that she has his attention, that he's listening. He listens to what she says and what she doesn't, as she talks about the progress she's made and says nothing about what she'd had to come back from.

Sam doesn't push her, not for that. That's the kind of thing that you can't push for, as far as Sam's concerned, that you've gotta wait until someone is actually ready to talk about it before you start trying to get it out.

And she's got it spot on with three steps forward, two steps back. There's never an end, not for people like them. There's only a place where there's more good days than bad, where every slip back is just a reminder of how far you've come instead of how far you've got to go.

He lets go of her hand when she shifts, letting out an exhale and leaning back a little, facing forward. ]

I had support. Made all the difference for me, you know, finally realizing I didn't have to go it alone. [ He glances back over her, the corner of his lip quirking in a very small smile. ] It's still what makes the difference.

[ Her hand takes a beat to relax in his grip, long enough for then to be the moment he lets go. It's not that she dislikes physical touch, but that she wants it and is unsure she can or should have it or even what it means. What it should mean. She is both glad and sorry when she rests her hand, palm up, on her thigh, forming a loose fist then opening it again, imagining other hands and other instances. ]

What do you mean by support? Honestly, I can't picture you as a loner.

[ Unlike Sam, she would push and push hard, turning toward him to face him head on, clearly watching his every move. She's no expert at reading other people, far from it, but what she lacks in talent she makes up for, as always, in sheer brazenness. ]

But friends can't heal you. [ She stops short of saying you can't depend on other people, your life is your own, because she thinks he might have a word or two against the idea. ] The bad ones leave you high and dry, and the good ones only show you where you're wrong. Not that that's a bad thing.

[ The worst and the best ones, too, are one and the same. ]

[ He watches her opening and closing her hand out of the corner of his eye, and now that it seems like she's mostly settled - reaches out to take it again, threading their fingers back together. ]

Should've seen me six or seven years ago.

[ He'd never been a natural loner, maybe, but there'd been a time when he sure as hell wanted to be alone. When he pushed people away and kept to himself and lashed out at anyone who tried to come close. ]

Not only that. But no, I don't think it's a bad thing.

[ He's quiet for a long moment, thinking over what he's going to say next. How he's going to approach the kind of support he'd had - and after a moment, he just goes with blunt and honest. ]

I had a therapist. Had a few, actually, just most of them I wanted to punch. But I had one that made sense, that made me want to listen. And I went to support groups, for people like me who didn't know how to leave the past behind them, who'd forgotten what it meant to live, to be happy. Then I started leading them.

[ Six or seven years ago she was in Berlin, needing to tell herself at the start of each day that she was accomplished and heading somewhere. They were grooming her for big things. Massive projects. She would have mankind's greatest creation, their one weapon against certain annihilation, under her command, and with it she can absolve herself of any debt owed to her late father. She had it all, see, she didn't need anybody, let alone a man, sad and alone, incapable of even calling out after her when she left him.

Misato grips Sam's hand too tightly, with surprising force despite her frame, and turns away to look at the far wall. ]

People like us, it's not important that we're happy. We bleed so others don't have to, so their children's problems will be puny and laughable. [ Her voice is low and level, cold as steel, it doesn't break. ] I don't mind. It suits me.

[ Too many others don't belong. Maya with heart as soft as her cat pillows, Kaji with his gardener's hands, her father soft and delicate, they were meant for life after the war, unlike her, battered and scarred, built to take a beating and keep going. Sam, now, she isn't sure Sam's made for it either. ]

What happened to you? What messed you up?

That others may live.

[ It's the pararescue motto, and he says it in agreement, his own fingers curling through Misato's just as tight. They bleed so others don't have to, Sam's done that since he was eighteen. Even before, probably. ]

But that don't mean it ain't important for us to be happy. It means it's more important, to love the little moments that remind you why you're fighting. To feel alive.

[ But as for being meant for life after war... He isn't, is the thing. Oh, he'd made a good effort, he'd stepped away from the fight and carved out a life for himself where he could say he was happy and be honest - but he wasn't complete.

He still kept the classified file he wasn’t supposed to have like a resume, still jumped back in the first chance he got. All he'd ever needed was a good reason, one he could believe in. ]

You want an itemized list? [ There's a quick smile, an easy deflection, but despite that, he keeps going. He usually hedges around it, says shit like Riley got his ass knocked out of the sky by an RPG, and even though it's true, no one's ever understood what he really means. That it wasn't Riley's plane that got shot down.

It'd been classified, back when he worked at the VA, and after that - how the hell are you supposed to talk in detail about what it means to see your best friend ripped to pieces in midair, close enough to feel the heat of the explosion and too far away to do anything? But for Misato, he's blunt. He's honest. ] I had a wingman, a partner. We never worried about not wearing armor up in the sky; we were always faster than anything they could shoot at us. Until he wasn't. What they hit him with was meant to take out armored jets, and for all his claims to the contrary, Riley was only flesh and bone.

[ There was nothing left to bury, and no matter how many years it's been, Sam will never get the image out of his mind. ]

[ That others may live. It sounds so noble. Her ever-changing reasons are less so, when first she held on to the promise of vengeance like a lifeline, only to realize that it is absolution she seeks, not retribution. It took her a decade to admit to herself that to take on her father's legacy is an act of love, not of hatred, that it is alright to love someone and lose them, that you never truly lose the ones you love. They remain, like broken bones calcified into something stronger, stiff, easier to shatter. Shrapnel in one's body, an ache occasionally remembered.

When Shinji told her he loved Kaworu, the enemy he strangled to death on orders from her, she told him it was deserved. Only those with the will to live get to survive. Kaworu wanted to die. Kaji wanted to die. Her father wanted to die, for her. The next day she got a call from Section Two, telling her, how the boy had tried to drown himself, wanting to be undeserving.

It's hard, admitting she was wrong. Admitting that, yes, it has been years and it still hurts. It's as hard to look at Sam and see herself reflected back, made noble, worthy. She despises this Riley for hurting him but understands that without the grief, there would be no Sam. Suffering makes one all the more capable of kindness, as someone very wise once said.

She untangles her hand from his so she can gather him into her arms, palm cradling the back of his neck, uncharacteristically yielding. She doesn't say, I'm sorry, though her mind betrays pain to mirror his. ]

I won't live long enough for it to ever be okay, but I hope you do. You're much closer to it. [ Her eyes are dry and her voice steady, but her throat feels tight. ] When you find the answer, come back to me, and tell me. Promise?

[ It surprises him when she pulls him closer, and there's a flicker of it across their mental link - he's so used to trying to be there to give others support when they need it, but somehow it always catches him off guard when someone returns it. But he goes easily, rests his head on her shoulder and folds his arms around her back.

So many years past and he still sees echoes of it in his mind, is still called back to it every time he fails someone. He never quite seems fast enough when it matters. Distantly he wonders how Rhodes is doing, but no. He's not going there.

Her mind is an echo of his, the mutual pain of grief, and he understands without knowing the exact circumstances that she's lost people as he has, unable to do anything about it but figure out how to learn to accept that they died and you lived. There's an immediate, kneejerk reaction when she says that she won't live long enough for it to be okay, and he holds her a little tighter, makes them both a promise right there.

He won't let her become one of them, become one of those he has to accept is gone while he goes on. And he won't die on her - there are too many people willing to die for each other, not enough people willing to live for each other.

It's a stupid promise, maybe, even to make to himself, not one he can really uphold - but he makes it anyway, and hell if he won't try. ]

Promise. I don't ever give up, Misato. I think that's something you and I got in common.

[ He'd thought about it, for a while, after Riley. After leaving the military, after losing his wings, he thought about doing nothing with the rest of his life because nothing mattered anyway. But he wasn't ever made for giving up, and he'd always found something to fight for.

Sam looks back up at her, palms pressed lightly against her shoulderblades, fingers spread out like wings. ]

I won't ever give up on you.

Edited 2017-04-16 07:22 (UTC)

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sometime after day 5

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