pain_train | SANCTUM INBOX

"Like a cheshire cat with floofy hair." She remembers Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. It's one of the few books she has on her reader. She likes the layers of it, the illogic.

"What's that?" His parents had occasionally read books to him when he was young but they'd never gotten around to that one.

"The Cheshire cat?" Because floofy would be petty self explanatory. "You never read Alice's Adventures in Wonderland? Or Through the Looking Glass? Well... it is kind of an old ebook." She frees her hand enough to stroke his palm with her fingers idly. "There's a young girl named Alice, and in the first story she falls down a rabbit hole, and in the second she walks through a mirror. And ends up in these strange worlds that are... They're like dreams. Edgar Clay did an amazing series of neo-surrealist luminous paintings based off the story. I've got high def scans of them and... Anyway not important. Bit the paintings are... why I decided to read it." Of all the things to remember, though she couldn't say how many years ago this had been. "Because it felt so familiar."

"Anyway, the Cheshire cat lives in Wonderland. He can vanish by fading away, and the last part of him you see is his smile. Well, he only does that when Alice asks him to stop disappearing and reappearing so fast because it's making her dizzy."

Edited 2014-11-06 13:47 (UTC)

"I haven't read anything like that since I was pretty little," he says. "You remember a lot about that." That's interesting to him, since she seems to have memory problems in general. Perhaps things from her childhood are more enduring.

"I have a copy of it. I don't own that many ebooks... Just no time, you know. But I...come back to Alice. I know I must. I guesses i just decide that I'm tired of training manuals and tactics books and then... there she is. I finished reading--rereading the story a couple weeks ago, I guess?

"Then I was going to get my old paintings back out of storage and look them over, but then you guys decided to attack the Hub." She pokes him lightly on the thumb with her finger. "If you're interested, I don't mind loaning it to you."

He smiles. "That's nice of you. I wonder if Theta would be interested in anything like that."

Theta is an AI, so maybe it means he likes math? She'll offer that up. "There's apparently a lot of mathematical concepts in the story. That's what people say. I never really got that, since I kind of suck at math."

Other than 'enemy-head=no longer a problem.'

"If you want, you can grab the reader out of my housing unit next time you're on base. Not like it's doing me any good just sitting there anyway."

Think.

"Oh shit. I think I left like half a sandwich under my bed, too. Oh, ew."

"I definitely think he'll be interested, then. It sounds like a fun story. Thanks for offering."

He laughs. "Ah, so you need me to clean up after you, is what you're saying," he teases. "I'll make sure and take a member of your platoon and a mop and let them tackle it."

Wrath sticks her tongue out at him. "No, I'm telling you that you should go in with full armor and get a flamethrower from Niels cause I don't want you to die." She tugs on his finger. "And the mutated sandwich monster is your own darn fault, you know. I was in the middle of eating when I got dispatched to the Hub."

So nyah nyah. (Teasing is so much fun.)

"So if you want to brave certain death, it's officer housing unit 101. The guest access code is 723599. That will work except at night hours. The reader...it's on the table next to my bed. That's where I always put it."

Oh god. Is there anything else bad in her room? The laundry had all been bagged, right? Shiiiiiit. Too late.

He pulls his glasses out to take note of the access code. "As long as I don't find some kind of vortex inside I think I'll be safe," he says with a smile. "I've dealt with messes before. My sister and I used to share a room and she can...she can make a mess." The thought of his sister reminds him of what he'd seen in the reflection of the bracket. He only falters for a moment, though. He puts his glasses away again, reaching into his pocket. Their hands had separated when he had gotten them out but now that it's free he doesn't immediately reach for hers again. It's nice to be connected like that but she doesn't really need it now, right? He doesn't want to seem too forward, especially since they're just forming this friendship.

"Nah, I'd just done laundry, so you're safe from the underpants vortex."

Oh, his sister. She's not really sure what to do. It must be like poking at a bruise. "I can't really imagine sharing a room with someone. There are other people in my housing building and on my floor, but I don't have to deal with their messes."

Wrath feels strangely bereft when he doesn't take her hand again. Well, it's not like he has to. And who knows, maybe she's gotten annoying with her clinging. She's meet people like that and does not want to be one of them. And definitely doesn't want to get on North's nerves.

But he also told her that if she needed anything, she could ask. Should ask, even. Well, she feels like she needs him, but knows better than to frame it like that. And ultimately, when the choice has been to be bold or to hold back, she's... never believed in holding back.

Finally in a tone that sounds more self assured than she currently feels, she asks, "Can I have your hand back, or would that be annoying? It's okay to say so, I won't get upset. And I'm... not really an expert in the hand-holding thing."

Edited (Swype errors) 2014-11-06 21:52 (UTC)

"We shared a room until we were old enough to move out. It was pretty aggravating sometimes. Whenever one of us was in a relationship we had to make sure that all our visits were at the other person's house." 'Visit' is kind of a euphemism but he's sure she'll understand.

He chuckles a little and returns his hand to her grasp. "It's not annoying. I didn't know if you were getting tired of it."

"Wow, that sounds like it could be really aggravating. But wasn't it fun, too? Just like... having someone around, I mean." Oh, she gets the euphemism, and is amused in general and... trying to not think in that direction.

Wrath smiles, closing her fingers over his. "No, I like you and I'm really glad you're here." She licks her lips. "And... I mean, I know I shouldn't be looking for friends but I kind of don't care. You make me really happy and I don't want to forget this."

"It was fun having someone I was that close to. We could talk about anything. She was a lot different from me; impetuous, impulsive. But she balanced me out, and I enlisted because of her. So I owe her a lot."

He rubs at her knuckles with his thumb, enjoying the affection. "Why do you say that? Friends are important. Having friends...that's part of what makes us human, you know? We need to make connections to be happy and to feel safe."

"That sounds really nice..." She never had a family. Or if she did, even the memory is irretrievably gone. "Balancing you out... that sounds important." And now she's gone and might have betrayed him. Which is horrible.

"I..." She pauses, frowning. This it's one of those things that never makes sense in her head, where instinct says one thing, but when she thinks about it, she knows the answer is something else. "Whiskey's my friend," she finally says. "And that makes me happy. And you're my friend now, and that makes me even happier. So being happy is good, right? Or... is it?" This is so confusing.

She licks her lips. Her mouth tastes strange. "It's just when I think about it, I also know that... well, I'm a soldier, and I'm good at my job. My job makes me happy. And... Close social bonds are a distraction from the mission." The words taste like honey on her mouth, don't find like her, but they're out of her head. "And that's as true as gravity. So... I know both of these things. Which one is right?"

"Close social bonds don't have to be a distraction, not if you don't let them be." His voice hushes a bit on the next bit. "When we left the Project, at first my sister and I were on different sides. I had to convince her to join my side. If she hadn't, I would have had to leave. And I would have, if it had come to that." But thankfully, it hadn't.

She considers this, slowly stroking North's thumb as she does. "I'm glad you could do that."

It's important.

Wrath also thinks about the hazy, disorienting thing that happened earlier. Her fingers tighten around North's, rather unconsciously. "I think I'd fight harder for Whiskey, or for you. But if that's true..."

She can't quite get the connection there in her mind straight. She remembers waking up on the hospital, not quite so badly injured, several months ago. And everything was easy as gliding, like floating through a world that couldn't touch her. But it was also like being numb. She hadn't painted anything.

Maybe that's why she's clinging so fiercely to North now.

"If I still could do my job," because it's about the job, the job, that is all she is and all she needs to be, "and do it well even if I had more friends than Whiskey, do you think... maybe I'm not noncompliant?"

He almost wishes he could encourage her to be noncompliant. But of course he can't. "Definitely."

She licks her lips again. "Okay." She trusts North. "I... like how I feel now." She doesn't want this to be a bad thing that requires her to visit the compliance office.

They put out fires. Her own words. But trying to find the one frayed thread of memory she'd found to say that is an impossible task. It had seemed so important at the time.

She squeezes his hand. "I want to keep feeling this way. Maybe I should have tried to have more friends before now, huh?"

Always too busy, right?

Edited (Swype errors) 2014-11-07 01:11 (UTC)

He caresses her fingers as she speaks, feeling for her a lot. It must have been difficult, enduring everything alone. And if she'd been forced to be that person that he'd glimpsed when he'd first arrived, well...god, that was just horrible. He's determined to keep his promise, to keep anything like that from happening to her again.

"Yeah, maybe," he says. "But you can't go around regretting what's already happened. You can just look forward and see what kind of difference you can make in the future. You know what I mean?"

She can't help but move her fingers against his, just a little. It feels good. It feels like actually touching someone in a solid way.

She gives him a wry smile that shows a measure of bitterness she keeps well suppressed. "Probably helps that I can't actually remember anything I could regret, huh?"

Because she's not stupid. It's not easy to sort out her thoughts at times, but it would take a moron to not know that there's something seriously wrong with completely losing the first sixteen years of your life. Just... Before very recently, she hasn't cared, and now she did.

"Yeah." She nods. "That's how you do it, right?" And her smile comes back to something sunny again. "I'll do some good work with you. Get you and Whiskey up to speed and then we'll go with whatever wacky ass plan the boss has and make it sing."

He moves his hand around again to thread their fingers together as they'd done the day before; that bitterness in her tone shows him that there's a lot about what's gone on that she knows isn't right. "It might help," he says quietly. "Remembering things can be tough sometimes. But it can be good to remember, too. You learn from things, you know?"

Then he squeezes her hand. "We'll do awesome work together. It'll be incredible."

good nite, north. have a good day at work tomorrow!

(ps found out y i still have hair. whiskey washed my hair! but pretend u dont no he was super embarrassed.

Good night. And thanks. :)

I'm glad he was willing to pay attention to that, I know he's pretty busy.

thats cause i have the best friends <3 lucky!

zen hugs til u sleep!

Edited 2014-11-07 04:05 (UTC)

Night 152; text

bothbarrels - 2014-11-07 04:33 (UTC) - Expand

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