Alex «Havok» Summers (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
tolaywaste) wrote2014-01-17 11:11 pm
tolaywaste) wrote2014-01-17 11:11 pm
25. » slightly backdated, private
[Alex is angry. Not pissed angry - not angry like he doesn't get how this happened, because some kind of explosion was inevitable. He's not stupid, at least not people-stupid. He can see the tinderbox of Crichton and Scorpius as well as anyone, even if he's been doing what Aeryn told him to and keeping out of the line of fire.]
[But he's angry that she didn't come to him first, didn't talk to him, didn't ask for help. Because he couldn't have helped much, but he could've helped some. He does believe that.]
[So once he finds out, he shoots her a quick text:]
Meet me at the CES. Now.
[--and then he changes into sweats and running shoes and makes a beeline for the CES, waiting for her just outside the door, shifting his weight from one foot to the other.]
[But he's angry that she didn't come to him first, didn't talk to him, didn't ask for help. Because he couldn't have helped much, but he could've helped some. He does believe that.]
[So once he finds out, he shoots her a quick text:]
Meet me at the CES. Now.
[--and then he changes into sweats and running shoes and makes a beeline for the CES, waiting for her just outside the door, shifting his weight from one foot to the other.]
no subject
Yes, she should have told Alex.
But there's one problem there: she didn't want help. She was too angry to see how it could be useful. She's already concerned for what will happen to Alex when Scorpius decides to retaliate against her through him.
Hindsight being what it is, she can think of several ways she could have handled it better, if not simply differently.
So after she receives his reply, and checks in (via video) to Riddick, she goes straight to the CES.
Alex is the first person she actually feels she might need to apologize to and while she can't quite bring herself to say it right away it's there, in the lines of her neither smile nor frown. ]
A run?
no subject
We'll talk while we run. C'mon.
[And he takes off at a light jog, not enough to really put him out of breath - so that he can, in fact, talk. Think while he moves. He does this with Charles - did at the mansion, too, when everything was so much worse than it is here, back before Cuba, in the face of oncoming nuclear winter. They ran, and talked, and thought.]
[He lets a minute or two pass before he looks sideways at Aeryn.]
What the hell were you thinking, Aeryn?
no subject
[ She could enjoy this if it weren't for the situation - which she is well aware is her own fault. ]
Riddick has removed me from dinner shifts for a week.
no subject
If he hadn't, I would've.
If you'd cracked Scorpius's skull, he'd have just come back angrier. It was a stupid move, Aeryn.
What do you think's gonna happen now? [He's genuinely curious. What does she think he's going to do to her?]
no subject
I wanted to be stupid. I wanted to make a mistake, an old one. I wanted to draw his attention away from Crichton for a moment and I wanted to make it clear I wasn't a token to be bartered with. I wanted him to shut the frell up and not call me Officer Sun, or not-so-subtly remind me that I am considered a traitor by my own people and thus have no people to return to.
[ That's ...so much more than Aeryn was expecting to say she has to stop talking in shock for a moment, breathing harder than necessary. Emotions are like cold tea, in moments like this - shocking in it's displeasure. ]
I don't know for certain. It will be interesting to see if he retaliates against me himself or through a proxy. If he manages to kill me, however, he will get his hands on Crichton within arns.
no subject
[But he doesn't say a word. Just nods and keeps eye contact before looking forward again. Running. Giving her space to move, to think, to talk if she wants to.]
no subject
Finally: ]
I expected to end up in Zero, though I'm realizing that is not likely.
[ Is it? ]
no subject
[Just that, brusque and intense as the line between his eyes deepens. They run for another thirty seconds. Then:]
You kill someone, not in self defense, you go in Zero. If you need to be in there to protect other people from you, Zero. Otherwise, I'm not interested.
no subject
She wishes this wasn't her fight. That Crichton and Scorpius could sort their own issues out on their own. But she knows better; Crichton has feelings of some sort and Scorpius is aware of that. More to the point, Crichton is her friend, as frelling frustrating as he is, and she protects her friends. It's all she can do.
Despite not wanting friends in the first place. ]
Then I don't know. You could bar me from the gym. Besides my kitchen shifts that is about all I do that isn't studying the human language.
no subject
[Right now, he doesn't feel like he's doing his job well. He feels like stringing Scorpius up and throwing him over the rail. Maybe Crichton, too.]
[He sighs.]
From now on, you take lunch and dinner with me. We hash out the day in the middle and at the end. You be honest with me about what's going on, or you have to stare at me for half an hour knowing you're lying to me.
If they try to pull this again, I'm taking away your private filters until they get sick of it. [He can't control Scorpius but he damn well can control whatever bullshit covert knowledge he's trying to pass around.]
And I want you to talk to a friend of mine.
no subject
The use of 'they' isn't lost on her either. She can't even imagine coming to Crichton's defense in this - he has trusted her with a wealth of information about Scorpius even though she's not in much of a position to do anything with it.
She is not a Peacekeeper here. She is just another prisoner, in one way or another. ]
Which friend?
no subject
[Mirror Barge being an excellent example of the ten thousand ways that can go wrong if he's not together.]
I mean, it's sometimes a struggle for me not to punch people in the face about. You know, specific things. Things like this, that are designed to piss me off. People targeting other people that I care about.
But Charles keeps his temper, and he taught me how to, and I think he could help you, too. Not that you're not right to be mad, because you are - that's what's getting me about it, and that's why it's hard for me not to throw everything down and take your side. But if anybody knows how to handle crap like this without frying pans, it's Charles.
no subject
It's that simple. ]
I'll talk to him.
no subject
[But there's a part, too, that was confident. Confidence used to be a foreign, impossible thing; now it's only strange. He approaches this quality in himself warily, as though approaching a frightened animal. But it hasn't fled yet.]
Thank you.
I'm sorry. I'm sorry you're wrapped up in all of this. I'm sorry you're stuck here without options. You deserve better than this.
no subject
[ She can admit that. As satisfying as striking Scorpius with that frying pan had been, it was ultimately ineffective. It did nothing to solve the problem that is plaguing her life with this ongoing struggle between Scorpius and Crichton. ]
Thank you for having patience with me. I'm not sure I'm deserving of it right now.
[ A sigh that is more like a huff. ]
Can we discuss something else? [ Anything else. ]
no subject
[A wry grin, though - he gets it. Literally anything else.]
How's the translation going with Ben?
no subject
At least, that's what she thinks in light of all this. Stop doubting herself, stop questioning her resolve. Move on and get the thing frelling done. ]
I received books in Borogravian for the winter holiday, and I have been working on those as well. Translating to English, then to Sebacean.
no subject
no subject
[ A pause. ]
I enjoy the challenge. I would not turn more down.