[it takes her a matter of minutes to get there, dropping lightly to the ground just beyond the front steps. the look on her face is strange, tight; she's trying not to let anything show, trying to keep it all hidden where the only person it can eat at is her.
and it is eating at her.
because badou has always wanted to go back there, hasn't he? and why? to look for his brother, to avenge his brother? he's a kid, he's going to get himself killed--
[there's a quiet curse, and orange embers flare and sputter beneath the huge arches of the church front]
[it's not that he particularly cares if Carol sees him smoking, he just doesn't want to have to hear her bitching about it, or get another goddamn pack flushed right under his nose (he'd been warned, what seems like an age ago, that the price was going up)]
[he grinds the cigarette out against the stone, leaving an ugly smear, and shoves it behind his ear, under one of the eyepatch straps (it's not as hidden as he thinks)]
[she spots it (of course she does), as she jogs up the steps and comes to a stuttered halt in front of him, but at the moment it doesn't matter. she doesn't give the cigarette anything more than a cursory glance before her eyes slide right off it.
(it registers in the back of her mind, though, in the same place that keeps saying he wants to die, he doesn't care if he dies, he's so beat up already he just doesn't care--)]
Hey.
[her voice is soft, and she looks small and miserable under the weight of everything, regardless of how much she's trying not to. carol knows what she's come here to do, but the last time she tried it -- it hadn't worked out. maybe this time it will, while he's not wounded or distant or fucked up again like he was. she can always hope. because that's everything she's got.
so she'll move forward, slow and uncertain, and reach out to try and embrace this stupid kid, and hope.]
[she looks like shit is the objective (obvious) thought he has, seeing her pound pavement up to his cave]
[and he would have reacted, as he usually does, with a hard flinch away, but the embrace is too slow, the circumstances too odd; he shifts his weight backwards and stares in irritable confusion at her until she's practically cornered him against the dumbass decorative stone behind him]
[the arms close, and the panic kicks in immediately; don'tdon'tdon't touch me (life's unkind hand has scrambled his already fritzing wires, made him seek hit instead of touch and smack instead of hold)]
[he lurchesfalls back against the stone, completely bewildered and trying to get his pulse to stop slamming against his wrists]
[face pressed into the top of his head, one hand sinks into his shitty scratchy hair (it's getting long, lately), the other clinging to his back like she needs to hold onto him, to reassure herself that he's here, he's alive.
right now, carol doesn't really care what he wants. she's being totally selfish. she needs this, and she needs to save him, and she needs him to live, and if he doesn't like it then she doesn't give a fuck.]
[and he doesn't like, not one bit -- he doesn't like her clean smell, the enormous strength in her arms, her long hair against his cheek, or the softness of her touch, because they're all reminders of who isn't here to hold him and call him stupid, and call him Bad Boy]
[his heart scrapes against his chest it's beating so hard, but she's not letting him go; this kind of thing, it's happened once before, with another person who wasn't Dave]
[he'd let Sakamoto hold him then, although he hadn't wanted it, and he lets Carol hold him now, body collapsing in anxious exhaustion under her; he says nothing, but words wind tightly on his tongue, spring loaded]
[carol holds him for a few moments more, and it does nothing to stop the roiling in her gut, the tightness in her chest, if anything it makes them worse, but this is still better -- better than not being able to, stopping herself every time she feels the urge to comfort him (comfort her).
then she rubs his back, gives him a final squeeze, and -- gives him another one of those useless kisses, to the side of his head, this time.
she loves him, is the thing. carol loves fiercely and enduringly and often, is powerless to stop herself, and it's never been this hard before, but there it is.
she draws back, lets him go, looking at the ground at his feet.]
[the kiss to the side of his head rattles that place it had before, but not as strongly (he's not as broken-open receptive, all his armor still up, and the signal doesn't transmit). the line of his mouth turns down, into that unappealing scowl -- he's sick to fucking death of hearing that, of I'm sorry]
[swamp green eye pinning the outline of her to the space before him, like a scientist's dissection table, he snaps]
For fuckin' what? What're you so goddamn sorry about? What is your fucking problem, already?
[it stings, the way he looks at her, the way he talks to her, but it's only a surface sting, no worse than at any other time the two of them have butted heads. the thing that really hurts carol in all of this is herself, because she knows her apologies are no good, but if she can't help him then what else does she have but apologies?]
I'm sorry about everything, okay?
[her voice is still small, frustrated, she's still not meeting his eye.]
How I can't ever seem to do right by you, how I'm always screwing everything up. How I can't do anything to help you, or stop you getting hurt. I know you don't want any of that but I still hate it, and I'm sorry, and I'm always gonna be sorry.
Ya were already sorry about that shit. Ya ain't needed ta say it before now.
[he's not stupid; he's been seeing the stress lines at her mouth, the tired eyes, the ham-fisted attempts at calming both his and her own anxieties, for weeks now]
[the question isn't really what is it, because he's known it for some time. the question is, what changed?]
[pretty blond hair and petite hands surface in his mind]
[it takes her by surprise, and he's off the mark, but she still feels cornered, abruptly, awfully. she shouldn't have said anything, she shouldn't have come here, but she was--
stupid, selfish.
does he mean lily? nill? they're the only ones really fit to know anything, anything that could make her like this anyway, but it wasn't either of them who set carol on this manic course. she shakes her head.]
Nothing. I was just--
[she doesn't lie to him, doesn't ever lie, but she doesn't want to tell him, either. so she clams up.]
[he knows that being like this to her, to someone who cares for him so obviously, is fucked up. he's different from those kids from the below, who are too socially retarded to know better]
[Badou, contrary to popular opinion, is not socially retarded; it's just that he's seen society, every disgusting part of it, and he's grown to hate it, hate everything it's ever done. he may understand society's rules, but he's never, ever going to adhere to them, not if he doesn't damn well have a good reason to]
[(becoming a journalist in the city really fucked somebody up; being raised a journalist, when you had a mind naturally like a rat trap, was light years worse)]
[it makes her irrationally -- angry, that he thinks she'd do that, go snooping for information about him instead of just asking him. carol knows he doesn't trust her, maybe he won't ever, but she's been fighting so hard to prove at least that she is a trustworthy person, that she cares, and every time he turns back around and pushes and refuses it digs further into her, hurts worse, like claws in her skin.]
He said you're going to die.
[that you want to die.]
All of you. That that place is going to kill you. I told him I wouldn't let that happen.
[some tension drains out of those aggressively arched shoulders; she didn't know anything new, she just got -- scared. he probably told her about what it was like, down there]
[shortly (he still doesn't have time for her hope, but he won't bash his head against it until they're both bleeding, like stupid fucking Heine would)]
He's from real deep. He don't know about the City, even. He don't know nothin' else but dyin'. It's --
[she knows too much now, and he has no idea, and she wishes she could just... forget it all. that they all could. that these stupid, sad, fucked-up kids could get a fresh start to just be kids, because they've been too aged and broken by the world, more than anyone should be in a lifetime, let alone in fourteen years.
so it isn't a comfort to her. she knows it wasn't just heine's life informing his outlook. there's something else there, and it's all badou.]
If you ever get sent back...
[quietly, her shoulders hunching up, in on themselves like badou's are sometimes wont to do.]
I'm gonna find you. I'm gonna pull you out. I don't care what it takes.
[something flinches in his face, angrily, but for just a second; he looks away right after, because even though Badou is good at not saying something, at filling his mouth with useless, stupid words and misdirections instead, he's always an open sore to look at, all teeth and twitch and viscera]
I don't believe that people get sent back.
[it's a short, true statement that says nothing at all important; the cigarette's taken from behind his ear, from below that black strap as he rolls a shrug, squats down on his haunches to light it back up; he has no fucking intention of getting rescued, not by her, not by anyone]
[it says a lot about carol's priorities right now that she doesn't even glance twice at the cigarette, at the fact that he's smoking right in front of her and it's just another way of killing himself. at least that one's not so immediate. at least she has time, there.]
Wherever they go, then. It doesn't matter.
[it's stubborn, dogged, awful honesty, the kind carol is best at, and it's written in every line of her face, every angle of those hunched shoulders; I will not give up, I will not surrender, this is the way things are, this is the way they're going to be. I'll make sure of it.]
If I have to rip a hole in spacetime and drag your ass back through it, that's what I'm gonna do, and nothing's going to stop me.
[a short snap, like Carol's stepped on his tail and he's warning her, don't fucking do it again]
M'not stayin' here, I'm goin' back.
[he regrets it the instant it's out, wishes he could have stuck that filter in his mouth just a second faster; he does now, takes a drag on the cigarette (it's getting smoother, and he doesn't cough anymore -- shit, one day he might even actually want to taste these stupid fucking things)]
[her nails dig into her palms and carol can feel it coming on again, that awful push that always happens between them, when she cares too much and he doesn't care enough and everything ends up -- bad.
this has got to stop happening. she can't stand it.]
You have business there? Fine. You get it done, but you come out of it safe. You make sure of that, or I will. And then I'm getting you out. I won't leave you to rot in that place.
[for a moment, he entertains it; a world where he goes into the pits and comes out, comes out with Dave, and they get away from the horrible fucking City that Dave wanted to save so badly from itself, and Badou just wanted to burn, burn, burn]
[even in the brief dream, it doesn't make sense -- Dave would only want to fight harder, having seen kids like Heine (he thinks of how he felt, meeting Heine; furious, mostly -- some things would never change). could Badou let him? no. could Badou walk away? no, to that too.]
[and in the back of his head, another scenario; he goes into the pits, comes out, comes out alone -- ]
[ -- no. he'd rather stay down there, he'd rather get swallowed whole by that blackness, if that's how it would be, because there's nothing else he could possibly want, nowhere else he could possibly go, no matter how far Carol took him or how much she tried to love him]
[there's no escaping it, in the end. it's always gonna be him in the cold, cold ground]
[it's a growl, a snarl, a defiance that feels weak in the cold center of her chest (the part reserved lately for badou badou badou), but burns fierce through the rest of her, and the rest of her is more than enough.
carol wants to shout, to shake him, to take a fist to the concrete church steps beside him, do anything to wake him up. she doesn't; just stands there instead, fists and jaw clenched. she feels like she's shaking, isn't sure if she is. it doesn't matter.]
I've seen rotten. I've seen evil, and demented, and fucked up beyond saving, and none of that is you.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Re: text on the 17th
just got outta
iwai-zakes n walked nill back
by the church now
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I won't hold you up long ok
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[ominous]
ok
action
and it is eating at her.
because badou has always wanted to go back there, hasn't he? and why? to look for his brother, to avenge his brother? he's a kid, he's going to get himself killed--
can't stop someone who wants to die--]
Badou?
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[it's not that he particularly cares if Carol sees him smoking, he just doesn't want to have to hear her bitching about it, or get another goddamn pack flushed right under his nose (he'd been warned, what seems like an age ago, that the price was going up)]
[he grinds the cigarette out against the stone, leaving an ugly smear, and shoves it behind his ear, under one of the eyepatch straps (it's not as hidden as he thinks)]
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(it registers in the back of her mind, though, in the same place that keeps saying he wants to die, he doesn't care if he dies, he's so beat up already he just doesn't care--)]
Hey.
[her voice is soft, and she looks small and miserable under the weight of everything, regardless of how much she's trying not to. carol knows what she's come here to do, but the last time she tried it -- it hadn't worked out. maybe this time it will, while he's not wounded or distant or fucked up again like he was. she can always hope. because that's everything she's got.
so she'll move forward, slow and uncertain, and reach out to try and embrace this stupid kid, and hope.]
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[she looks like shit is the objective (obvious) thought he has, seeing her pound pavement up to his cave]
[and he would have reacted, as he usually does, with a hard flinch away, but the embrace is too slow, the circumstances too odd; he shifts his weight backwards and stares in irritable confusion at her until she's practically cornered him against the dumbass decorative stone behind him]
[the arms close, and the panic kicks in immediately; don'tdon'tdon't touch me (life's unkind hand has scrambled his already fritzing wires, made him seek hit instead of touch and smack instead of hold)]
[he lurchesfalls back against the stone, completely bewildered and trying to get his pulse to stop slamming against his wrists]
Th-the fuck're ya doin', get offa me -- !
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[face pressed into the top of his head, one hand sinks into his shitty scratchy hair (it's getting long, lately), the other clinging to his back like she needs to hold onto him, to reassure herself that he's here, he's alive.
right now, carol doesn't really care what he wants. she's being totally selfish. she needs this, and she needs to save him, and she needs him to live, and if he doesn't like it then she doesn't give a fuck.]
Stupid kid.
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[his heart scrapes against his chest it's beating so hard, but she's not letting him go; this kind of thing, it's happened once before, with another person who wasn't Dave]
[he'd let Sakamoto hold him then, although he hadn't wanted it, and he lets Carol hold him now, body collapsing in anxious exhaustion under her; he says nothing, but words wind tightly on his tongue, spring loaded]
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then she rubs his back, gives him a final squeeze, and -- gives him another one of those useless kisses, to the side of his head, this time.
she loves him, is the thing. carol loves fiercely and enduringly and often, is powerless to stop herself, and it's never been this hard before, but there it is.
she draws back, lets him go, looking at the ground at his feet.]
Sorry.
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[swamp green eye pinning the outline of her to the space before him, like a scientist's dissection table, he snaps]
For fuckin' what? What're you so goddamn sorry about? What is your fucking problem, already?
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I'm sorry about everything, okay?
[her voice is still small, frustrated, she's still not meeting his eye.]
How I can't ever seem to do right by you, how I'm always screwing everything up. How I can't do anything to help you, or stop you getting hurt. I know you don't want any of that but I still hate it, and I'm sorry, and I'm always gonna be sorry.
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[he's not stupid; he's been seeing the stress lines at her mouth, the tired eyes, the ham-fisted attempts at calming both his and her own anxieties, for weeks now]
[the question isn't really what is it, because he's known it for some time. the question is, what changed?]
[pretty blond hair and petite hands surface in his mind]
What did she say ta you.
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[it takes her by surprise, and he's off the mark, but she still feels cornered, abruptly, awfully. she shouldn't have said anything, she shouldn't have come here, but she was--
stupid, selfish.
does he mean lily? nill? they're the only ones really fit to know anything, anything that could make her like this anyway, but it wasn't either of them who set carol on this manic course. she shakes her head.]
Nothing. I was just--
[she doesn't lie to him, doesn't ever lie, but she doesn't want to tell him, either. so she clams up.]
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[he knows that being like this to her, to someone who cares for him so obviously, is fucked up. he's different from those kids from the below, who are too socially retarded to know better]
[Badou, contrary to popular opinion, is not socially retarded; it's just that he's seen society, every disgusting part of it, and he's grown to hate it, hate everything it's ever done. he may understand society's rules, but he's never, ever going to adhere to them, not if he doesn't damn well have a good reason to]
[(becoming a journalist in the city really fucked somebody up; being raised a journalist, when you had a mind naturally like a rat trap, was light years worse)]
Heine, then.
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[it makes her irrationally -- angry, that he thinks she'd do that, go snooping for information about him instead of just asking him. carol knows he doesn't trust her, maybe he won't ever, but she's been fighting so hard to prove at least that she is a trustworthy person, that she cares, and every time he turns back around and pushes and refuses it digs further into her, hurts worse, like claws in her skin.]
He said you're going to die.
[that you want to die.]
All of you. That that place is going to kill you. I told him I wouldn't let that happen.
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[shortly (he still doesn't have time for her hope, but he won't bash his head against it until they're both bleeding, like stupid fucking Heine would)]
He's from real deep. He don't know about the City, even. He don't know nothin' else but dyin'. It's --
[A MOTHERFUCKING SLAUGHTERHOUSE]
-- worst, down there. I told ya already.
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so it isn't a comfort to her. she knows it wasn't just heine's life informing his outlook. there's something else there, and it's all badou.]
If you ever get sent back...
[quietly, her shoulders hunching up, in on themselves like badou's are sometimes wont to do.]
I'm gonna find you. I'm gonna pull you out. I don't care what it takes.
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I don't believe that people get sent back.
[it's a short, true statement that says nothing at all important; the cigarette's taken from behind his ear, from below that black strap as he rolls a shrug, squats down on his haunches to light it back up; he has no fucking intention of getting rescued, not by her, not by anyone]
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Wherever they go, then. It doesn't matter.
[it's stubborn, dogged, awful honesty, the kind carol is best at, and it's written in every line of her face, every angle of those hunched shoulders; I will not give up, I will not surrender, this is the way things are, this is the way they're going to be. I'll make sure of it.]
If I have to rip a hole in spacetime and drag your ass back through it, that's what I'm gonna do, and nothing's going to stop me.
[not even you.]
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M'not stayin' here, I'm goin' back.
[he regrets it the instant it's out, wishes he could have stuck that filter in his mouth just a second faster; he does now, takes a drag on the cigarette (it's getting smoother, and he doesn't cough anymore -- shit, one day he might even actually want to taste these stupid fucking things)]
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this has got to stop happening. she can't stand it.]
You have business there? Fine. You get it done, but you come out of it safe. You make sure of that, or I will. And then I'm getting you out. I won't leave you to rot in that place.
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[even in the brief dream, it doesn't make sense -- Dave would only want to fight harder, having seen kids like Heine (he thinks of how he felt, meeting Heine; furious, mostly -- some things would never change). could Badou let him? no. could Badou walk away? no, to that too.]
[and in the back of his head, another scenario; he goes into the pits, comes out, comes out alone -- ]
[ -- no. he'd rather stay down there, he'd rather get swallowed whole by that blackness, if that's how it would be, because there's nothing else he could possibly want, nowhere else he could possibly go, no matter how far Carol took him or how much she tried to love him]
[there's no escaping it, in the end. it's always gonna be him in the cold, cold ground]
[what he says is]
M'already rotten, idiot.
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[it's a growl, a snarl, a defiance that feels weak in the cold center of her chest (the part reserved lately for badou badou badou), but burns fierce through the rest of her, and the rest of her is more than enough.
carol wants to shout, to shake him, to take a fist to the concrete church steps beside him, do anything to wake him up. she doesn't; just stands there instead, fists and jaw clenched. she feels like she's shaking, isn't sure if she is. it doesn't matter.]
I've seen rotten. I've seen evil, and demented, and fucked up beyond saving, and none of that is you.
Re: action
I don't care what ya think I am. Like it even really matters?
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