i_speak_softly (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
i_speak_softly) wrote2011-06-07 07:32 pm
i_speak_softly) wrote2011-06-07 07:32 pm
Entry tags:
Forty-Sixth Theory [Voice/Action]
((Action part backdated to the wee hours of this morning.))
[The horror ends at midnight.]
[Sort of.]
[Don doesn't know how long it takes him to realize that he's lying on cobblestone instead of mud, and that the water pooling around him is only the rain running off his own skin.]
[It's still raining now, but so lightly he can't even feel it through the numbness.]
[He gets up. People are running in every direction. Someone had organized a clinic and healers, and everywhere he looks the injured are being tended to.]
[There are no provisions for the dead. There are never any bodies.]
[Don turns away from the confusion, points his steps towards home. The walk seems to take a long time. When he gets there, the house is quiet. Don finds Mike asleep at the kitchen table, gives him what may be a startlingly cold hug, inhales the plate of spaghetti at his elbow, and moves on.]
[He closes the door of his room, drops his gear to the ground. Climbs into Leo's bed and finds his brother not yet asleep.]
We lost.
[That's all the words he has energy for.]
[He sleeps for the next thirty-six hours. He wakes intermittently to whisper half-intelligible accounts of the battle into Leo's ear. He runs a low fever.]
[On Wednesday afternoon he manages to get out of bed - or at least sit up, if his family won't allow any more than that - speak to his brothers and father, listen to his messages on the journal. In the evening he'll put out some short, poorly-filtered messages to obvious people.]
*
Ms. Daisy... I lost the samples.
*
Frederic, I'm so sorry. Do you want me to come over?
*
Mr. Mulder. Did you make it back safely?
*
Kay, ah... What are you doing Saturday?
*
((Feel free to leave Voice messages, but assume Don's replies are forward-dated to tomorrow. You may also get a more-timely response from one of his journal-stealing housemates.))
[The horror ends at midnight.]
[Sort of.]
[Don doesn't know how long it takes him to realize that he's lying on cobblestone instead of mud, and that the water pooling around him is only the rain running off his own skin.]
[It's still raining now, but so lightly he can't even feel it through the numbness.]
[He gets up. People are running in every direction. Someone had organized a clinic and healers, and everywhere he looks the injured are being tended to.]
[There are no provisions for the dead. There are never any bodies.]
[Don turns away from the confusion, points his steps towards home. The walk seems to take a long time. When he gets there, the house is quiet. Don finds Mike asleep at the kitchen table, gives him what may be a startlingly cold hug, inhales the plate of spaghetti at his elbow, and moves on.]
[He closes the door of his room, drops his gear to the ground. Climbs into Leo's bed and finds his brother not yet asleep.]
We lost.
[That's all the words he has energy for.]
[He sleeps for the next thirty-six hours. He wakes intermittently to whisper half-intelligible accounts of the battle into Leo's ear. He runs a low fever.]
[On Wednesday afternoon he manages to get out of bed - or at least sit up, if his family won't allow any more than that - speak to his brothers and father, listen to his messages on the journal. In the evening he'll put out some short, poorly-filtered messages to obvious people.]
*
Ms. Daisy... I lost the samples.
*
Frederic, I'm so sorry. Do you want me to come over?
*
Mr. Mulder. Did you make it back safely?
*
Kay, ah... What are you doing Saturday?
*
((Feel free to leave Voice messages, but assume Don's replies are forward-dated to tomorrow. You may also get a more-timely response from one of his journal-stealing housemates.))
[Voice | Filtered 100%]
... I-I am just glad you are... [... not really alright, but...] b-better.
...
I w-wish I... c-could have done something...
[Voice | Filtered 100%]
[He's been down this path before. It never leads anywhere good.]
[Voice | Filtered 100%]
...
I w-wish I could.
[He presses a hand to his face and tries to steady his breathing.]
[Voice | Filtered 100%]
[Very softly:] If you ever want to... learn something... from my family...
[He'll leave it there.]
[Voice | Filtered 100%]
But...
... No. He can't think about it, even if that little dark part of him relishes the thought of breaking whatever harmed Helios... even knowing they're dead and gone, now.]
I... I d-don't know...
I c-couldn't; i-it'd... it'd be.... unethical... [Don might notice how Robert's words seem less strong than they were before. And his complaints about the war have been less about the violence and more about the fact that people got hurt or killed.
... Luceti is definitely changing him, and he's almost afraid of it.]
[Voice | Filtered 100%]
[Just one more nudge.]
If you just want to hit something, you're welcome to use our training dummy.
[It's a healthy way to vent anger, and Don can't see how anyone could argue that it's immoral to punch a bag of sand.]
[Voice | Filtered 100%]
...
He has wanted to, though, for maybe the second or third time in his life. The sheer anger and disgust he feels towards this situation is enough to actually make him contemplate violence - and then, of course, all that anger and disgust turns inward, at the horrifying fact that he could ever possibly think these things at all, could ever possibly consider the idea of harming something ever for any reason.]
...
H-Hitting something...?
...
[Robert shivers.]
I... [The revulsion is so deep-seated that he doesn't even have the words to describe why he can't consider it.]
[Voice | Filtered 100%]
[Don drops the subject.]
When can I take you to the lake?
[Voice | Filtered 100%]
The subject change does help, though.]
... I... I-I suppose whenever you are feeling better...
[It's not like he has much in the way of obligations. He's just been holing himself up building the small hydroponics garden and in general being a recluse.]
[Voice | Filtered 100%]
[He may have been using this to keep himself sane in the jungle.]
[Voice | Filtered 100%]
[Robert smiles, weakly. He'd been using similar thoughts to keep himself sane, too... though of course, sitting and languishing is nowhere near as taxing as fighting a war.]
Just... I would like to be here on the twelfth and thirteenth - Helios is l-likely to return then, and... I n-need to be there when he returns.
... Y-You would likely want to b-be there as well, regardless. [Because Helios is Don's friend too.]
[Voice | Filtered 100%]
[Voice | Filtered 100%]
...
I-I, I missed you. [Robert really wishes he could hold Don right now.]
[Voice | Filtered 100%]
[Voice | Filtered 100%]
... See you soon, Don...
I love you.