Mr. Flood managed to kill the first soldier who made me feel at home here, my teacher, my sister, my lover, and my son over the span of a single afternoon.
If you want to bring something, bring me another book.
[Not something Jedao ever really expected to request, but Quentin is certainly the person, and he's read the one he had on hand two and a half times already. Nico wanted to hear his voice, sleeping or waking, and it did seem to help a little to keep him from getting lost in flashbacks.]
[Maybe Nico would disagree, but the memory of reading him real bedtime stories is too strong just now for Jedao to care. Right now, Jedao gets to be gentle with him.]
[He can't pick, turns up an hour later with three. He's reading Graham Greene, which is not calming, has wanted him to read the Secret History, also not . He has compromised on Discworld, Guards Guards.
He gets, maybe, a little nervy. Jedao is aware that the odds of Quentin getting jumped in the hall by someone fast enough to avoid being hexed into a doily are low. He knows Quentin is....spacey, sometimes, and finicky, and probably he shouldn't have asked for anything. But he needs to see Quentin, to know for a fact that one fucking person in his orbit hasn't been torn up by a disaster that didn't even have anything to do with him, and by the end of the hour, he feels halfway to clawing his own skin off.
Nico is drowsing, even more wan than usual, in Jedao's bed. Jedao has dragged a kitchen chair into the bedroom, and the floor is littered with an open crate full of ration bars, his black enameled tea set, several tupperware containers of actual food he's recruited other people to fetch - for Nico - and the other pillow from the bed dropped next his chair. He hasn't slept or showered - or, indeed, left the cabin - in almost forty hours. Which wouldn't be an unusual amount of sleep deprivation to pull through, if he didn't feel like there was a hole in his head where the bond with Horseriver used to be. If he didn't feel like grief and helpless bitter anger were gurgling up out of that hole to drown him.
Jedao is still reading when Quentin comes in, voice hoarse with constant use, but he drops the book unceremoniously and is on Quentin in an instant, pushes him against the wall and just clings to him, nails digging into Quentin's shoulder through his clothes on the flesh side, face mashed against Quentin's neck, just breathing him in, Jedao's jaw tight where it presses against Quentin's skin.
He says, with a tender laugh, arms folding patiently around him, chin tucking on top of his head.
"Woah there, I'm okay. Had a depressive bout and slept right through it. Silver linings everywhere you look. You're going to be okay, Fantastic Mister Fox. Shitty week on a shitty barge."
"I am going to feed Hux his own severed fingers if he says one more wormfucking thing to Fives," he mutters, not because Hux is relevant to anything at all, the useless blowhard, but because that's as good an illustration as any of how on edge Jedao is right now. His grip gets tighter, but his shoulders slump against Quentin a little more.
"I need you to be okay right now. I just. Need it."
He breathes. Reaches down with his other hand, carefully entwines his fingers with Quentin's.
"He goes in and out," Jedao says honestly. "You sit."
He steers Quentin into the one chair, then folds cross-legged onto the pillow himself, and leans against Quentin's knee, all without ever relinquishing that one hand.
He snags a half-full teacup with his other hand, and takes a slow sip.
"You could read," he allows, and somehow the minor relief of the tea seems to have made his rasp worse.
He reaches down instead, cards a hand through his hair, and gives it a ruffle.
"I'll read to you in a minute. For now, let's focus on settling you down. You're buzzing like a cheap TV. Is there anything that helps you feel better when you feel this way?"
"I'm sure the barge will contrive," he counters. Better fatalism than living in terror of it, or denial and then shock. "And I dream about it all the time."
None of which is the point, and he knows that.
"Not now. I'm. I'm still on duty. This is better." Now that Quentin is here.
In other circumstances, it would be stupid; as it is, it's selfish. But Jedao sinks his teeth into the terse dismissals. Anywhere else, he'd want to know so that he could stop him, but here, the only form prevention is allowed to take is healing. The whole damn rest of the ship will probably be keen to volunteer. Even Fives is groping for preemptive sympathy, wrecked though he is.
Jedao doesn't care if Flood has a literal screw loose, if he was programmed to it, if he had no choice at all. He doesn't have to care. Nico is his son.
He's let himself drift away from Scott, and he knows it; their temporary pairing left Jedao feeling bruised and confused. But his murder now feels like turning over a rock in field during the dead field after first frost, and finding a dozen different creatures thriving and crawling there. Affection, protectiveness, yearning curiosity, nervous shyness, the deep possessive tenderness that shouldn't be the result of the time Jedao killed Scott, but is.
Tris gave him beauty, and peace, and a place to settle his hands long before he knew how to ask for them. And Iris, his bright brilliant Iris, who killed Mikodez for owning him in another life, when he never could have done it himself.
He makes a soft, low keening sound, turning to press his face harder against the steady plate of Quentin's kneecap.
Whispers Quentin, back to him, still carding his hair, now bending over him in a protective furl.
"Oh honey, oh lovely, you're safe, they're all safe, they're healing now, and every one of them is so strong. You've got to know Scott has just shrugged. Iris has her feet up and is drinking gin. Fives is just worried for you and Nico is more than anyone gives him credit for."
"Fives and Nico," he breathes, turns a little more so the bone grinds into his eyesocket, makes stars jump behind his eyelid.
"They're both skewered on echo damage, the toll means pain with no source and their brains account for it by drowning them in the worst of their pasts. When they remember what did happen they blame themselves. They're being tortured and I can't do anything but wait. Of course they're strong enough to keep going, they're fucking used to torture, that makes it worse."
He shouldn't tell, shouldn't share either of their secrets. But he can't bear it, holding in the rage and the helplessness alone, knowing no one else will even notice, because neither of them think their pain matters, because both of them want to hide it. The toll is just an inconvenience. No will know and no one will care that he hurt people, brutally, who won't be just fine after a week, for no skullfucking reason at all.
He breathes, quietly, because there's just not anything that can fix that. Alec's PTSD group doesn't always cut it.
"Oh God. You'd cut yourself apart to save the rest of us. This will be hard, but you've got to keep breathing. That's the only thing you have to do right now."
"I wish I could," he croaks, and means the first thing.
He breathes, though, shakily but deliberately.
"I wouldn't be so fucking weak for it," he adds after a minute, jaw tight in embarrassment. "But Horseriver just - he was in my head, did I tell you?" Normally Jedao would remember everywhere he'd put pieces of information like that, but he is not at his best. "Since November. He was good for me."
Quentin seems as likely as anyone to believe it. Jedao thinks maybe he needs that too, needs to bear witness to someone who won't scoff or doubt.
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2018-07-28 06:26 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 06:47 am (UTC)And my king is graduated and dead and gone.
Are you safe?
no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 07:38 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 07:48 am (UTC)If you want to bring something, bring me another book.
[Not something Jedao ever really expected to request, but Quentin is certainly the person, and he's read the one he had on hand two and a half times already. Nico wanted to hear his voice, sleeping or waking, and it did seem to help a little to keep him from getting lost in flashbacks.]
no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 07:52 am (UTC)Do you want to read something calming or something uncompromising?
no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 07:54 am (UTC)Calming.
[Maybe Nico would disagree, but the memory of reading him real bedtime stories is too strong just now for Jedao to care. Right now, Jedao gets to be gentle with him.]
no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 08:02 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 08:16 am (UTC)Nico is drowsing, even more wan than usual, in Jedao's bed. Jedao has dragged a kitchen chair into the bedroom, and the floor is littered with an open crate full of ration bars, his black enameled tea set, several tupperware containers of actual food he's recruited other people to fetch - for Nico - and the other pillow from the bed dropped next his chair. He hasn't slept or showered - or, indeed, left the cabin - in almost forty hours. Which wouldn't be an unusual amount of sleep deprivation to pull through, if he didn't feel like there was a hole in his head where the bond with Horseriver used to be. If he didn't feel like grief and helpless bitter anger were gurgling up out of that hole to drown him.
Jedao is still reading when Quentin comes in, voice hoarse with constant use, but he drops the book unceremoniously and is on Quentin in an instant, pushes him against the wall and just clings to him, nails digging into Quentin's shoulder through his clothes on the flesh side, face mashed against Quentin's neck, just breathing him in, Jedao's jaw tight where it presses against Quentin's skin.
no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 08:25 am (UTC)He says, with a tender laugh, arms folding patiently around him, chin tucking on top of his head.
"Woah there, I'm okay. Had a depressive bout and slept right through it. Silver linings everywhere you look. You're going to be okay, Fantastic Mister Fox. Shitty week on a shitty barge."
no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 08:43 am (UTC)"I need you to be okay right now. I just. Need it."
He breathes. Reaches down with his other hand, carefully entwines his fingers with Quentin's.
no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 09:00 am (UTC)And, nosing against the top of his head.
"Want to sit and read?"
no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 09:11 am (UTC)He steers Quentin into the one chair, then folds cross-legged onto the pillow himself, and leans against Quentin's knee, all without ever relinquishing that one hand.
He snags a half-full teacup with his other hand, and takes a slow sip.
"You could read," he allows, and somehow the minor relief of the tea seems to have made his rasp worse.
no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 09:25 am (UTC)"I'll read to you in a minute. For now, let's focus on settling you down. You're buzzing like a cheap TV. Is there anything that helps you feel better when you feel this way?"
no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 09:44 am (UTC)But he's been letting himself - forcing himself to - feel things here that he could never have done anything but crush and hide in the Hexarchate.
no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 09:49 am (UTC)Reminding him, gripping his hair again, firm and comfortingly controlling.
"You're going to need an active strategy for what you do instead."
no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 09:58 am (UTC)None of which is the point, and he knows that.
"Not now. I'm. I'm still on duty. This is better." Now that Quentin is here.
no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 10:07 am (UTC)He agrees, scratching a peaceful rhythm.
"As long as you come find me when it is time. I can wait, as long as this part of the aftermath takes."
Now, then;
"What the fuck was Teddy's damage?"
no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 10:21 am (UTC)In other circumstances, it would be stupid; as it is, it's selfish. But Jedao sinks his teeth into the terse dismissals. Anywhere else, he'd want to know so that he could stop him, but here, the only form prevention is allowed to take is healing. The whole damn rest of the ship will probably be keen to volunteer. Even Fives is groping for preemptive sympathy, wrecked though he is.
Jedao doesn't care if Flood has a literal screw loose, if he was programmed to it, if he had no choice at all. He doesn't have to care. Nico is his son.
no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 10:31 am (UTC)Agrees Quentin, loyally, almost serenely.
"Whatever." Reaching down, squeezing the nape of his neck. "Fives, Nico-"
Not immediately able to place the rest of his list.
no subject
Date: 2018-07-28 08:38 pm (UTC)He's let himself drift away from Scott, and he knows it; their temporary pairing left Jedao feeling bruised and confused. But his murder now feels like turning over a rock in field during the dead field after first frost, and finding a dozen different creatures thriving and crawling there. Affection, protectiveness, yearning curiosity, nervous shyness, the deep possessive tenderness that shouldn't be the result of the time Jedao killed Scott, but is.
Tris gave him beauty, and peace, and a place to settle his hands long before he knew how to ask for them. And Iris, his bright brilliant Iris, who killed Mikodez for owning him in another life, when he never could have done it himself.
He makes a soft, low keening sound, turning to press his face harder against the steady plate of Quentin's kneecap.
no subject
Date: 2018-07-29 01:10 am (UTC)Whispers Quentin, back to him, still carding his hair, now bending over him in a protective furl.
"Oh honey, oh lovely, you're safe, they're all safe, they're healing now, and every one of them is so strong. You've got to know Scott has just shrugged. Iris has her feet up and is drinking gin. Fives is just worried for you and Nico is more than anyone gives him credit for."
no subject
Date: 2018-07-29 01:35 am (UTC)"They're both skewered on echo damage, the toll means pain with no source and their brains account for it by drowning them in the worst of their pasts. When they remember what did happen they blame themselves. They're being tortured and I can't do anything but wait. Of course they're strong enough to keep going, they're fucking used to torture, that makes it worse."
He shouldn't tell, shouldn't share either of their secrets. But he can't bear it, holding in the rage and the helplessness alone, knowing no one else will even notice, because neither of them think their pain matters, because both of them want to hide it. The toll is just an inconvenience. No will know and no one will care that he hurt people, brutally, who won't be just fine after a week, for no skullfucking reason at all.
no subject
Date: 2018-07-29 01:52 am (UTC)He breathes, quietly, because there's just not anything that can fix that. Alec's PTSD group doesn't always cut it.
"Oh God. You'd cut yourself apart to save the rest of us. This will be hard, but you've got to keep breathing. That's the only thing you have to do right now."
no subject
Date: 2018-07-29 02:03 am (UTC)He breathes, though, shakily but deliberately.
"I wouldn't be so fucking weak for it," he adds after a minute, jaw tight in embarrassment. "But Horseriver just - he was in my head, did I tell you?" Normally Jedao would remember everywhere he'd put pieces of information like that, but he is not at his best. "Since November. He was good for me."
Quentin seems as likely as anyone to believe it. Jedao thinks maybe he needs that too, needs to bear witness to someone who won't scoff or doubt.
no subject
Date: 2018-07-29 02:17 am (UTC)He sighs, and twists his hands in the air, casting so that;
"Hospital bed charm. He won't hear us, and a sound will chime when he wakes."
He can talk properly, can stroke his jaw and promise, I'll go check on Fives.
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