tolaywaste | 10. » private/video

[What bothers him . . . Alex nods slightly. Ben is lost. Like he said to Zack: Ben's not broken. He's in pain and he needs help, though. Alex wants to help him in any way he can.]

[He clasps his hands together, leans forward, keeps his eyes on Ben.]

Is there anything that feels right? Even if it doesn't seem logical?

[He's aware the answer might be no, or it might be something horrible. He wants to know anyway.]

Hide.

[His answer isn't quite immediate, but it's sound when he does give it, speaking quietly out of a moment of absolute stillness. His eyes tick up from the floor where they'd fallen and, slowly, around the answer and the slow exhale, the wall Manticore built for him is subtly dissolving.

Which, at this exact moment, lets more of Ben's uncertainty and discomfort show, the slight widening of his eyes, the fact that when he starts pacing again it's with a distinctly nervous kind of energy rather than bland restlessness. By the time he turns and comes back, he's worrying his lower lip with his teeth, an unprecedented tick for his interactions with Alex.

He doesn't have the words for how this feels, but Alex will translate it for him. Alex will understand.]

It's not safe out here. People can see. People will see. It's never good.

[He frowns, not with anger but trying to figure this out. Ben's scared, and if Alex is going to help him he needs to understand what he's thinking as well as he possibly can.]

[Turning these words over in his mind, the words and the movements, he tries to parse. It's never good. Bad things have happened; Ben is afraid of them happening again. People can see - and people seeing him is dangerous.]

[He's afraid, Alex thinks, and the more people are around the more afraid he'll be. Too much is happening, too much that Ben can't understand. He's overwhelmed.]

Where's safe, Ben? Even if it's not here on the Barge, where's safe? Where do you want to hide?

[His voice is uncharacteristically soft, gentle. It always is with Ben - most people would be surprised at the way he acts around him - but now he's being extra calm for both of them. It would be so easy to get frustrated right now, but no. Anger and frustration won't get either of them anywhere, and there are other kinds of strength.]

[It's not that Ben hasn't recognized what this is; he's too intimately familiar with the slow motion fray, the sudden threshold and the abrupt snap that happens once he's hit it. He knows what happens next and maybe he didn't kill Robert Kozak, maybe enough people believe him that he might slide sideways out of it, but he remembers Doyle's visions and he knows what has happened in the past.

He will kill someone. He knows this, and then everything will be justified, and then he will be decommissioned or worse; this is how it happens, this is the part Zack never understood. How staying around people, how not retreating, can only end in one way.

But he can't retreat here. He has to find a different way, or he'll disappoint everyone, and he will be even less safe than he is now. So, too, may they be.]

I used to leave the cities. There were numerous abandoned buildings and settlements to be found, and I am trained in basic survival.

It would just... so many people. None of them like me, all of them afraid if they found out. They always did.

But there's nowhere to go, here. [So he's retreated behind the one thing he's been taught is safe his entire life, that he carries with him, so coded into his logic that he hasn't even noticed that it's the same thing that keeps him ostracized: Manticore's training.[

[Oh.]

[There's a glimmer of understanding now. Alex sees. He doesn't want to hurt anyone, but thinks he will. Ben recognizes the signs and if they find out - ]

[Alex thinks he understands now, hopes he does. He doesn't want to set a foot wrong, though Ben is usually astonishingly patient with him. Kinder than he has need to be, since he's stuck in a place that barely understands him at the best of times.]

[His words come slowly, but, God, he's trying.]

Is it . . . being alone? Or the quiet? Would it help if your brother was here?

I want to try to figure out a way to make somewhere safe for you. I just need to know what parts make it safe.

[There's a moment when Ben goes very still - Alex knows about Zack? Zack was never the one to blow their cover, it was always Ben, Ben standing out like a hawk among pigeons, Ben making people nervous because he didn't know how not to, how to be harmless. Ben was always a wolf in wolf's clothing; the rest found their wool.

Then he realizes that it's not necessarily that Alex knows about Zack; he could just mean here on the Barge, not here in the room. Something twists in his chest regardless when, instead of answering, instead of opening his mouth and telling Alex that Zack is here and it hasn't helped, he doesn't know why, he looks down.]

I don't know. [It's a placeholder, but then Ben looks up again, eyes ticking up without raising his head. More emphatically, he repeats himself, finding it true.] I don't know.

No one listens, no one... [His exhale is shaky, marred with the childhood terror he can't look at without being consumed by it; he's said this before, but it passes under the radar, like so much else that he says. He's never tried to force anyone to look at it. They knew or they never would - he's known for a long time.

It's only a matter of time.] We don't belong out in the world with other people. The rest of them still found a way.

I didn't. I can't. I'm... [Flawed. Broken. Different somehow.] Being alone in the quiet. Until it's too quiet and too alone.

I'm listening. I'm trying to.

[He knows that's not good enough. He knows. And it wrenches at him, makes him want to just run away from all of this and go hide in the CTS until port, bury himself in training other people until he can't think anymore, until he's too tired to sleep.]

[But Ben said when you don't take care of yourself you can't take care of anyone else. So he's trying.]

[He feels like he needs to break down every part of himself and put it back together better to fix this for Ben. Every part of himself and every part of everyone else. People should listen to him. He deserves it as much as anybody else does - more, because he hasn't had it in so long, he hasn't had it ever.]

[It's not fair. Alex feels more like a child every time he thinks this, which he thinks more and more often recently: it's not fair, and he wants to rail against something he's never seen or known, wants to pound his fists against some invisible monster and just scream it's not fair, how could you do this to him?]

[He takes a deep, shuddering breath.]

You're not broken, Ben.

[Jesus, he'd pull this ship over in a second and let Ben be free for just a few minutes if he possibly could. He'd do it in a heartbeat.]

If I could find a way to - to keep things quiet, for a little while - would that help? I don't know -

[And it's like he's coming apart at the seams now, pushing the heel of his hand to his temple - he doesn't, he doesn't know what to do. He's failing.]

[Sometimes, when he feels himself flaking apart, he puts up physical barriers again; he writes words that remind himself how to act, how to think, to stay safe and he holds himself together the best that he can.

It's a shock when he hears the same thing in between the lines Alex is saying, reads it in the lines of his body and the push of his hand, shoving him abruptly past his own fear building in his chest to a moment of calm, cool clarity. In that moment he doesn't understand why he's surprised. There's a reason Alex can see him.]

Alex. [Drawing from that place, the same as where the stories come from, Ben's voice is low but steady, firmly insistent for the attention of his friend. He breaks from his stillness on silent feet, drawn closer until he seats himself carefully on the edge of the chair angled to face the one Alex has claimed. He waits, gaze intent, until blue meets brown; he can't help what Alex will see when he looks. But Ben can see, too, and maybe neither of them knows, maybe they're both overwhelmed, and maybe that's okay. It's not, but maybe it is.

No one has ever listened this closely before. It's strange to see what it looks like when someone hears.]

You are my friend. You help.

One hundred percent.

[There's something about Ben's voice in this moment that stills him, something about his proximity that's calming. Alex doesn't know why, and maybe most everyone else on the Barge would say he's crazy for feeling that way.]

[He's not.]

[He looks up at Ben and lets his hand fall. He was right, he thinks, doing his best to swallow his fear and uncertainty and self-doubt. He was right all along. Ben's kind. But he's also strong.]

[Alex is strong as much as he can be. He protects the people he loves, and he protects everyone else, too, if he can. Lua said he's a good person, but he needs to be strong, because he's spent so much time just being afraid.]

[With Ben, he can allow himself not to be, just for a minute or two.]

[He laughs, shaky, but his voice breaks a little bit.]

One hundred percent.

[Ben's eyes, he doesn't look stable. But then Alex doesn't think he does, either. Maybe it's enough, to help, but not to fix. To be there, but not to be everything. Maybe.]

Is that enough?

[Ben is silent for several long moments, holding himself still and contained except for the movement of his eyes, searching Alex's face; whether he finds what he's looking for or not remains hidden behind his own, leaning forward slightly on his elbows braced on his knees, fingers clasped between them.

They're close enough Ben could unfold them and touch Alex's arm, but he doesn't. He looks, he considers, and he counts down the beat of his own heart while he does so. Alex knows what Ben needs to know but Ben is the one with the words, and they need to be perfect. He can see that.

Letting out a slow breath, Ben straightens up where he's sitting, starts to shift back so he can pull his legs up under him.

In the same low, steady voice, he says,] There was a boy. He is a strong boy, perhaps the strongest of his family, and though he is not the oldest he is the one the others trust to keep them safe.

[For a minute Alex doesn't know what's happening. It's like the world's thrown off-kilter, and everything's calm too quickly.]

[And then he recognizes the tone and the words - and he relaxes.]

[He watches Ben like a child watching another child, not wary and not afraid anymore but tired from being both. There's a brief nod and the flicker of a smile.]

[This is talking. Just a different kind. He wants to hear the story.]

[Ben waits, not exactly a pause but a prolonged breath, waiting for the cues he recognizes without having to look for them. He knows when he has his audience's attention, and he doesn't smile, nerves still too close to the surface for it, but something in his expression relaxes.

The stories are for other people, but they relax him as well. Ben is not what most people would consider soft, but there's an element of it in his voice, a warmer tone, when he says:] And they love him. [There and gone again, such an easy admission where it normally would never occur to him; his voice is back to normal when he continues.]

He makes it his duty to learn about the world in any way he can and use his knowledge to keep his family safe from the dangers out in it. But he is only one person and there are so many dangers, and so many he has yet to learn about, that his duty slowly ate away at him until it is all he was.

And because he is only one person and still cannot prevent all the dangers, he became angrier, and angrier, and that ate away at him too.

And because they loved him, his family tried to tell him to stop, but he would not. Perhaps, in the end, could not.

[And they love him.]

[Alex nods. He listens attentively, raptly. It resonates - duty, although different duty; anger, although different anger; love, although different love.]

[His hands hang between his knees, and he watches Ben's eyes.]

Eventually, because the boy would not listen, most of his family became weary of arguing constantly and began to ignore what they all knew. But one of the boy's brothers could not look away, and every time he looked at his brother, he saw only where the anger would take him someday. He could not let him go alone, and he could not keep him from going, but the boy's brother did the best he could, and he never ignored what he knew.

[Ben doesn't have to hesitate; the path of the story is clear to him as he continues, able to smoothly bypass where the truth becomes counterproductive to the point of the narrative. It's simple for him, once the words are flowing, the braid the threads together how he wants them to come out.]

The boy's brother had night terrors. The rest of the family was impatient with this, too, because he was afraid of things that weren't there and they did not understand how he could persist, even admitting as he did once he was awoken from them that they were not real. But the boy could not ignore it, and though it made him angrier and angrier that he could not find a solution, he searched and searched the world, determined that he would make his brother feel secure from these nightmares that plagued him.

One day he returned to find that his brother had had a very severe episode, and it had left him weakened and shaking, and no one knew what to do. So the boy - so angry at his own failure, because he still had no solution, no recourse - ran there as soon as he heard, and he crouched down and he took his brother's hands and felt them stop shaking as he did, and he asked what he could do, what he could possibly do.

And his brother answered, "Don't leave again." The boy argued, because he must go, he must find how to help his brother, he must. It was consuming him, and his brother could see that, and it made him in turn determined to make him listen.

"You make me safe," he said at last. "But you must forgive yourself to see it. You must believe you are good enough." And the boy wanted to argue but his brother had hold of his hands, and would not let him go. Further, he continued, "When you're gone, if you leave me for good, if your anger consumes you, you will not be here to nake me safe. And then I will have no one to protect me from the night terrors."

[Ben falls silent for a moment, letting it all sink in, letting the inferences between the lines become slightly more clear. Then he smiles - a small, shy, currently somewhat shaky expression, but nonetheleess.]

The boy could not believe this was true. He did not believe in himself. But his brother did - his brother does - and it is, for the time being, enough.

[Truthfully, Alex doesn't know if this story is about him. It feels like it is, but it also feels like a story about Zack; it also feels like a story about everyone.]

[He struggles against unanswered questions, lack of specificity, for a while, once Ben has finished talking. Then he looks up and catches the smile and, somehow, is able to let it all go.]

[Whether or not the story is about him, it helps him. That's why Ben told it. And he feels awash in gratitude for having been helped in this way. Ben is - above all else - a storyteller. And he is kind.]

[He doesn't hold his hands out, but he spreads them palms-up in front of himself: a gesture that he can't define the meaning of, but one that seems right. Instinct leads him well, most days.]

[It will have to be enough. For the time being.]

Thank you.

[Ben sees the moment when Alex lets it go, and in turn lets out a breath he hadn't exactly been consciously holding. If he can't help in this way, he's worse than useless, but as long as he can maybe he can still contribute something.

And he, in turn, is calmer now too; he looks down at Alex's hands and a flicker of frustration passes through his expression because the physical is still a complete mystery to him if it's not combat. His own hands are folded in the lap formed by his crossed legs, and he doesn't move them, but he does lean forward slightly. Alex is trying to help him. Ben wants to help, too, and not just by easing the concern he helped, somehow, put there.

His voice is still low, still steady like it is when he's telling stories, when he asks:] What happened to you, Alex? [He wants to hear. He's seen the signs of it for weeks now, maybe always, and he recognizes the shape of it easily; but he wants to know, if Alex will tell him.]

[Glancing up, Alex gives Ben a confused look. What happened to him? It's such a broad question that he can't respond for a second, and when he does, it comes out more self-pitying than he means.]

Which time?

[His own words give him pause, and then he laughs, shocked, just baffled that that came out of his mouth. He sits up straight and clears his throat.]

I mean - sorry, that came out weird. I just don't know what you mean.

[He'd tell, if he knew.]

[Ben isn't surprised by the question, but he is a bit by the laugh, startling mildly and then his head tilting curiously. There's no judgment in his voice or in his face when he replies, just the intent earnestness that characterizes him behind the military lines.]

You are very concerned with justice, with being understood, and with the safety of those around you. With others not being afraid. There are those who exhibit these concerns naturally, but not to the level you do.

You give them the degree of importance that someone who has experienced the absence of all, personally, generally seems to infer. I should know, only... I don't know what to do about it.

[He should shrug here, he thinks, others would in order to dismiss the importance of his last point at this particular moment; he doesn't, but he does circle back and ask again:]

So. What happened to you? Not that it is necessary to tell me if you would not like to do so.

[Oh. That.]

[The things that make him how he is - the things that have made Alex concerned with justice and the safety and security of others, those are complicated. And it's strange, but he sort of feels instinctively like Ben knows. Because Ben knows him very well.]

[But maybe it's easiest to lay it all out, like a timeline. Of course, there's no question if he doesn't want to. It's hard to talk about, but it also helps, sometimes.]

I don't even remember how much I've told you, [he says truthfully and lifts his eyes to meet Ben's.] I'm gonna try to tell you everything in a way that makes sense. It doesn't make much sense to me sometimes, but - I'll try.

The family I lived with had a little girl, and she was like my sister and my best friend, and someone kidnapped both of us one day. I thought he was going to kill her. That's when my mutation first - happened. [Charles would have used a word like manifested, but that doesn't seem right. It just happened, like a freak accident.]

And I killed him.

They put me in prison for a long time, and then Charles and Erik found me. I guess my time in there is why I want justice, but maybe I wanted that before. I was a lot younger when I went in, and I was alone for a long time in there, so I don't really remember what I thought about right and wrong before.

After prison, after they got me out, I was afraid for a long time. Of myself, you know? Especially after Darwin, after I killed my friend. By accident. Not that that made much of a difference; he was dead anyway. But then I learned how to control it.

I'm still afraid. But less all the time. The less afraid I am, the safer everybody else is to be around me, the safer I feel.

I don't know if that makes sense.

[Ben knows the intangibles, the marks the experiences leave, but not the details themselves. He doesn't know what words will make it worse, what to watch out for, and he wants to know.

He wants to know how two sets of experiences can leave them sitting here, staring across at each other from behind two faces so different and so similar at the same time.]

I don't understand why they would imprison you for that. No, wait. Your mutation? [The killing is routine, familiar to him, but so is the fear of others for something different among them.]

I have been told that, as well. It makes sense. It is more difficult to put into action than to understand, though.

Kind of. But mostly, I think they locked me up because they didn't understand me. They didn't know how to control me, and I didn't know how to control myself. I hurt some of the other prisoners, too. I didn't kill 'em, but - it wasn't good. So I asked them to put me in solitary. It was better that way.

[His eyes lower, as they always do when he thinks about that time - and he thinks about it a lot. It's one of those things he thinks it's important to remember, painful as that is.]

[Ben makes him smile, though. A little.]

Everything's like that, I think. Everything that's not instinct is easier to think about than to do.

[That's something Ben both understands and doesn't; the concept, yes. The isolation. But that isn't what happened to uncontrollable subjects where he came from, not by a long shot. There had been fights amongst the units, of course, there was bound to be when children were trained to be soldiers, taught combat abilities far superior to even several of their adult guards, and expected to grow up together in such an environment.

Unit against unit. Never unitmate against unitmate. They were too short on allies to ruin any that they did have and they knew it long before the classes on sound team strategies came into play. But Ben thinks... maybe it was better, for him. At least he knew why. At least he had that answer.

It wasn't something that happened to him and then left him alone to deal with it as best he could, among people who were afraid of him and didn't understand. Later, perhaps, but he still suspects that was more his own doing than anyone else's.]

I'm... sorry that happened to you. I'm sorry they didn't understand. [This in earnest, studying the small smile, Alex's eyes above it.] The family... you were staying with. They did nothing?

[He doesn't ask, yet, why Alex phrased it that way. It feels less like something he should ask about and more like something Alex should offer him if he wants to, when he wants to.]

They -

[Well. He's not sure. He's always assumed that they didn't know. That it was covered up. That, maybe, someone told them that he'd died, been killed by the kidnapper, so that the Blandings could get on with their lives.]

[But maybe that isn't what happened at all. Maybe they were told. Maybe they didn't care. It's certainly plausible. Haley would care, but - Alex doesn't think they'd go out of their way for him.]

[The flicker of doubt is visible, for just a moment. And then he breathes deeply and lets it go. They were never particularly kind to him, but they kept him alive. He'll give them the benefit of the doubt. He'll never know the truth, anyway.]

They didn't know. It was kept from them. That's what I think, anyway.

[Ben doesn't nod, but he does straighten his neck back up, acknowledging the hesitation. He could call Alex on it, make him explain, but Ben already understands. There's no need for it.]

I see. Then I am sorry about that, as well.

Though I am not sorry that it has brought you here.

It's made me stronger.

[He glances at Ben, then away.]

That's not the same as making it worth it. I don't - hurting people isn't worth it. [And maybe being locked up wasn't worth it either, but - ]

I'm glad I'm here, too. Despite everything. I'm glad I'm here.

10. » private/video

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