lifeaftr | home sweet home? (closed)

Entry tags:

home sweet home? (closed)

Who: Leonard Church and Agents Washington, Texas, and Maine
What: Meetings, reunions, and definitely no awkwardness.
When: shortly after the April intro log
Where: Islet #4, Cottage #3
Warnings: canon typical language

[ What's better than a group of space marines with lots of interpersonal baggage? Plucking them all from different points in time, then shoving them in the same house and seeing what happens.

MINGLE POST. Make your own top-levels, tag around, go nuts. ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ Touche, she might say. She doesn't, though. ]

Yeah, sometimes.

[ She looks up at him again, though—because of course he's taller than her and god she hates this stupid organic body—takes his hand, and just kind of...looks at him. For a good long moment. She's not normally this open, not during the time they had in Blood Gulch, not when they were reunited in the Meta, and certainly not the first time he was on the Moira. She tried a different tack when he was there the second time, but it was too much, too fast, and she's trying to be more measured this time around.

She's not sure how successful she's being at that.

She squeezes his hand, then lets it go. ]

[It's such a stark contrast to how they were. Bickering and annoying and brushing up against loving until the well-meaning insults took over. 'Asshole' was basically synonymous with 'babe', and now that she's here and it's not that, he has to wonder...why. Why it was that. Why did he think of her as someone that stole his money, and why did he think of them both sleeping around, and why did he think they were going to get married but that Freelancer took her and changed her and did she know? Did she know the whole time that it was wrong and she just...played along with it?

Why put up with that? Why did he do any of that, and why did she let it happen, and...is it really her that's different, or just circumstances leading her to act less like Badass Freelancer For Hire Tex and more like...just Tex. Texas. Beta?

He doesn't know where it leaves them. And he wants to get mad. Because that's always the default reaction. But not with this. This just leaves him disoriented, confused, elated, skittish.

He wishes she didn't let go, but he keeps himself for reaching back for her hand.]

Oh.

[And now he's being a creep and she just can't look at him sometimes. Okay. This is fine. He can deal with this. Just...stop being weird.]

Well--well, good thing there are different rooms, and plenty to do around here, and I'm not always gonna be around watering holes except to talk to people, obviously, so...I'll. I'll back off. You can give me a punch if I'm being too, uh, intense. Friendly punch! Arm punch, not, y'know, not punch-punch.

[Just having her around is good enough. It has to be.]

Ugh.

[ She reaches out and shoves his arm. ]

Don't do that either. I know it'll be better when we've both gotten a chance to get used to this, okay? Just don't act like I'm...I don't know, a museum piece.

Ha, see, like that! [Arm shoving. Like. Play punching. See?]

Man, you're not giving me a whole lot of options here, Tex. You don't really want me just hanging around, and I'm not--I'm not trying to treat you like anything else, I just know we need some, I dunno, time? To re-sort ourselves out.

Goddammit, Church.

[ She rolls her eyes, frowning. ]

I don't mind if you're hanging around. Just don't stare at me. It makes me feel like...like...

[ She knows how it makes her feel, but she doesn't know how to say it in a way that doesn't blame him for being in a robot. She looks fully off to the side. ]

Fuck.

Then you can just say 'hey dipshit, quit staring at me' instead of acting...weird!

[ She turns her head back to look at him, scowling. ]

Fuck off, okay? I was just trying to—

[ She cuts herself off. ]

You know, whatever. Go somewhere else, just go away, see if I give a shit.

[ Which is, of course, her way of saying, 'please stay with me, I want you here,' but who ever said she was good at expressing her emotions? She'd tried and it had turned into an argument anyway. ]

That's about the most you thing you've said this whole time. I'll stop fucking staring. But I kinda live here, so you're just gonna have to put up with me being here.

[ She shakes her head, rolling her eyes again. ]

The hell is that supposed to mean? If I said it, it's a me thing.

I mean the nice thing you've been doing, which, again, that's not a bad thing, just...a thing to get used to, for me, who isn't used to you being nice. It's fine, it's okay, there's just a lot of weirdness going on.

[ She arches an eyebrow. ]

Look. I just figured we had some shit to sort out and being a bitch about it wasn't going to help. If that's too 'nice'—

[ she says the word like she's talking about something filthy or distasteful ]

—then I don't know what to tell you.

[ She's incredibly frustrated now. It seems no matter how they reunite, it always goes wrong. ]

Okay! Okay. We'll...sort out our shit and you don't have to be a bitch and I'll try not to be an asshole. It'll work out. 's just a weird point we're going through right now.

[ That seems to mollify her. She had been gritting her teeth, she realizes. She relaxes her jaw. ]

Okay.

[ She looks at him for another moment, then stifles a sigh. ]

Okay.

[ She turns and walks over to sit on the bed. ]

Come here and sit down and we'll talk.

You want--you wanna work it out right now? Like, right now, sit down and talk about shit?

[Whatever happened to repressing everything until it becomes therapy-worthy? He's starting to miss those days already.]

Um. Sure. [He comes over and sits, awkwardly.

[ She sits back against the wall and curls up, her knees in front of her chest. Rolling her eyes, she watches him as he perches on the edge of the bed. ]

We don't have to if you'd rather not. I just thought it'd be good to. But hey, maybe it'd be better to wait until we're fighting about something unrelated and then drop bombshells on each other to piss each other off.

Man, I'm already doing that with Wash enough as it is; I don't need that on another front.

Okay, so...okay. [He drums his fingers on his knees.] Where do we start?

I don't know.

[ It's been well over a year since she saw him last and she's experienced too much in that time to have immediate-aftermath-of-the-EMP stuff on her mind. Actually, the main thing she keeps thinking about is how she's moved on without him, how she had a boyfriend on the Moira before she woke up here, and how hard seeing him again is under these circumstances because of that. All stuff she's definitely not going to address. ]

I don't want to compare you to other versions of you, so...

[ She shifts uncomfortably, placing a hand on her mouth. ]

Maybe this is a mistake. Goddammit.

[ She moves onto her knees, tucking her feet underneath herself, so she can shift to be right next to him on the edge of the bed. ]

Just...

[ She takes his hand, like earlier, hangs on to three of the fingers. ]

...forget it.

[ She doesn't know whether he can tell she's omitting things by the expression on her face, but really, when is she ever not omitting things? ]

...No, c'mon, let's actually give this a shot, okay? It...it might be too soon, and we're both kinda fucked up, but at least let's try and put some effort into it, okay? [He lifts her hand and gives it a gentle squeeze in return.] Not like you to give up at the word 'go'.

So. Maybe first thing is, uh. Other versions of me. Be...because Wash already said I got... [replaced] That Epsilon lived on and sort of got adopted to be like me. So, yeah, I don't want you to think of me like other potential versions of me when I'm just...me. All I knew before waking up a month ago was the EMP.

You. In the Meta's head. And all...the others, besides Epsilon.

Wait, Epsilon what?

[ She had never been told this part by the Washington she had known. She plans to address the rest of what he'd said but first, that. ]

Uh...the guys never took Epsilon to the UNSC, and Caboose got him to wake up and he thought he was me?

Wow. Wow. I knew they didn't take him and turn him in, but not that part.

[ She shakes her head. ]

That really does mean we died for nothing, doesn't it? Nothing at all.

Literally the only part of the plan that went as planned was us dying. Not even Wash died. It's assloads of bullshit.

It is.

[ She pauses to go back to what he'd started with. ]

Okay, so other versions of you. From what I know of alternate universes, you all lived similar lives but with minor differences. Which means you, you know, you're different. So yeah, I'll be careful not to mix you up with either of them.

[ She rubs her thumb against his fingers. ]

Time was so short when you joined us. In the Meta. We didn't have enough time to...you know. Do this.

Wait, differences, like how--like, was I human? Was I a woman? Was I a hot human woman?

[You know, the important questions. Don't ask why it's there his mind jumped to.]

Yeah I, uh, I guess everyone else was also vying for attention, and...I know it felt like a long time, but it wasn't enough time, and it was...pretty overwhelming. [He says it with a light, nervous laugh, raising his other hand to his head to rub for a moment. He doesn't think about it. Tries not to think about it. They all felt like family. They all felt like him. Like they belonged.]

No, you were a guy. Both times. But human, yes.

[ She declines to answer about his hotness level either time. ]

I bet it was. Theta was so excited. They all were, in their own way.

Edited 2019-04-12 22:24 (UTC)

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject