driftfleet | [text] your blue walls get in the way of these facts

[It takes her a second, lost in thought as she's managed to get, but then she nods.] Sort of.

[To be honest, she hasn't really trained in years outside an Evangelion, unless that punching bag on the ship counts, but her contamination's left her plenty strong. Physically, she's at a peak that scares the hell out of her, if she lets it. She hasn't been human in years, but it's a reminder of how much less so she's gotten. She kicks a rock, scuffing her shoe on purpose.]

Eva isn't like hand-to-hand, but I'm capable. [Her mouth twitches.] You'd like to see what I can do?

[he nods a little, because he does want to see firsthand what she's capable of--both for reasons of fascination and caution--but this goes beyond that. so, he's quick to elaborate.

'I feel better now. Need to start practicing again.'

and who better to train for battle against super-strong beings with than her? especially since his last over-powered sparring partner went crazy and punched a hole in his chest.]

Good.

[Being around him makes her more terse than usual. Probably because she can't really ask about too many different things at once, or make him elaborate much, although she doubts he would even if he could speak. She nods.]

Nice not to have to use the punching bag for everything. [He never has looked like much of a fighter, but if he and Zhas were monster hunters, then it had to be part of the bargain. Plus, he wouldn't have been in there in the first place, around to help her sew the bag back up, if it hadn't been something he used himself. Asuka nibbles the inside of her cheek.] Yeah, okay. But if you hold back, I'll be pissed off.

[she can have her doubts about how capable he may or may not be in a fight, but if she's ever wondered if his mind and spirit are into it, the way his expression changes might be a clue.

with a challenging statement like that, he just turns to her with the closest thing to a smile he ever gets--all of those blank and warmthless lines lighten up, especially around his eye. it could maybe even be called something like happy.

he nods brightly, and points at her. 'You too.']

[Wow. Is that Coil actually looking almost... happy? Asuka has to blink once, twice, before finding herself starting to almost-smile back.]

Hey, you look better like that. It's good.

[the promise of violence is maybe not the sort of thing that normal people look delighted over, but... yes, that definitely is Coil's mood brightening.

and it only lasts until she points it out. the expression fades to one of vague confusion as he unintentionally mirrors her blinking, until he finally realizes what she must be talking about.

he hadn't noticed that his expression had changed at all, really. it's not something he really thinks about. and with the fact that most people don't tend to give sudden comment on his face (at least not in any sort of positive way), it comes as a little bit of a shock.

so, he awkwardly puts his eyes forward again--focusing on the path and not the way that heat is beginning to rise to his cheeks.]

[If Asuka were a less hard-bitten person, she'd come close to saying Coil was acting cute. As it is, she's still thinking it. The blush on his face kind of makes her want to tease, just a little bit. It's just so weird to see him acting, well, normal, that...]

It's a compliment. ["Idiot" is right on the tip of her tongue, almost on automatic, but she swallows it. The minute anyone at all turns away from her, him included, she doubles her gaze on them, stepping up the pace in case he gets any big ideas about going faster than her.] Haven't you ever gotten one of those?

[it's fortunate for him that they aren't holding hands right then--he would be appalled to know what she's thinking. 'cute' is just not one of those things that exist in the lexicon of things said about him.

and he wishes a little bit that he'd put her on his blind side, as he sometimes does to people that he would like to ignore. it would make it easier to pretend that he doesn't feel the gaze pinned on him. it just keeps picking at him until he finally glances toward her again in annoyance.

he nods, but it's too defensive, and he waves a few short, irritated signs at her-- 'but not like that.']

[If he had put her on his blind side, he would've ended up on her blind side, too, thanks to their opposite bad eyes. So maybe it's just as well he hasn't. Asuka laughs-- really, it's a cross between a giggle and a cough, the slightly unpleasant sound of someone who hasn't found much funny in years.]

Sourpuss. [And then, on impulse, she starts to sign back at him for the first time-- 'What's the problem?']

[that kind of laugh is familiar, at the very least. every once in a great while, when something horrible strikes Zhas as funny, his laughter sounds something like that... if the sound was mixed with that of a rock tumbler, anyway.

and Coil had been set to really try and ignore her after that, but the signs catch him. he finds her deigning to use the language instead of only read it even more striking than the laugh.

so... again, he's baited into actually answering.

'Nothing. You're just strange.']

So? So're you. [She's too accustomed to speaking verbally to remember to sign those few words. It's funny, really, since she hadn't ever planned on making signs at all-- what was the point, when he could hear just fine? But her need to prove herself and impress hasn't been decimated with time, just buried until she's found someone worth impressing... or at least, surprising. Remembering her and Nagisa's short but borderline-relaxing conversation in German made her think of it. Signing's probably not his native language, but he probably feels more comfortable when both parties are using it.]

You want a break? I think we're close.

[he can't argue that point, and he doesn't want to go into how her brand of strange is different (it's that particular sort of strange that girls always seem to be, to him), so he drops it.

and it is true that he's more comfortable being signed at than talked at. he's used to it with Zhas, but never expects others to pick up the same habit... so it's always a gesture that he takes to heart when it happens. even though she goes right back to speaking out loud, it still counts for something.

'We can take a break at the tree.' it will give them both an excuse to stop and acclimate themselves before they go about getting Asuka a gift. in the meantime, he's ready to truck along toward their goal, despite the uncomfortable burn in his ribs.]

Okay.

[She doesn't technically need to rest, but she's used to other people needing to, and she's used to pretending to need to when everyone around her knew better, just another of a revolting list of lies she tried to tell herself. She's sweating, sure, but she's not breathing any harder than when she started, even when the path begins to get steep. Embarrassingly, she trips a couple of times over exposed roots, managing, if barely, to right herself before falling flat on her stomach or enduring the humiliation of being offered a hand up. Karmic payback, or else the product of half a life spent with one eye and a full life spent without ever seeing, much less traipsing through, anything like woods.]

[It's some time before they reach the tree. Asuka spends a minute just looking at it, absently chewing the inside of her cheek, before finding a place for both of them to sit: a partially-rotted log only a few dozen feet away from the tree. She taps at the wood. For all her confidence earlier, now she's starting to feel awkward again, what with the objective right in front of them.]

Hungry? [A pause.] I'll get you something after this.

[for as little time as he's ever spent trying to navigate the wilderness, he has spent earlier, more-formative years without the aid of two eyes, and has spent the entirety of his life paying obsessively-close attention to the lay of the land at his feet. tripping while bolting after vampires as absolutely unacceptable (and potentially lethal), after all. it also helps that the dimly-glowing eye of his sees exceptionally well in low light.

so, he's always a little startled when she stumbles, but he tries to keep himself from hesitating too noticeably. he doesn't want to embarrass her by appearing too ready to help.

and then, finally, they're at the tree. he scarcely looks at it before following her over to the log--not because he isn't unnerved or impressed by the thing, but because he is just more than ready to take a rest. once settled down, he is more focused on evening out the uncomfortably-tight breaths in his chest than the unsettling aura surrounding the tree, and certainly more than whatever she's asking. he nods without absorbing what it is that she's offering.

it's a good minute or so before he properly catches his breath, and when he does, he remembers the question that he'd had bookmarked in his head to ask her once they'd reached their destination. this isn't exactly how he'd pictured it--with him looking tired, her already feeling awkward, and there being absolutely no lead-up to it whatsoever--but it's important enough for him to know that he just... asks it anyway. kind of out of nowhere.

'Have you only killed monsters?' and he makes sure to use the most non-threatening, mundane sign for 'kill,' instead any of the shorthands that he and Zhas have come to use between the two of them.]

Yeah.

[Angels are monsters, definitely. (But Shinji isn't. Shinji never hurt anybody.) Over the past fourteen years, she's gotten rid of every last one (except Nagisa, who got rid of himself, and except for Shinji, and except for that part of her) without remorse or regret for anything except the mess they've singlehandedly made of her life.]

[But why is he asking about that now? Does he not want to hold hands with someone who murdered people? Does he think she's that bad? It's kind of late in the day to be concerned with that. Asuka frowns, her hands fidgeting on her knees while she watches his face. She really can't gauge his motivations at all, not when he gets so abrupt with what few questions he offers.]

Why?

['You remind me of someone,' and that someone happened to be a killer. but though those similarities drew him to her in the first place, they are becoming less important the more that Asuka distinguishes herself from her. and if Asuka is already having trouble tracing the ghost-trails of Coil's motivations, then an answer like that probably isn't going to help.

it's ultimately a useless response. so, after a hanging moment, he tacks on the rest of the thought. '--and because I have.'

so, it's maybe the opposite of what she's concerned about. he's not worried about what might be in her head--he's warning her about what might in his.

if she has any second thoughts about this whole thing, he's leaving an opening for her to voice them now.]

[Asuka's eye darkens a little at the first sentence. She's carved her own place in this world, and the thought of being reminiscent of someone else, of not being unique, stings childishly. At the second comment, she straightens up a bit.] Killed monsters? Or-- [and while she's saying it, she remembers and does the sign] people?

[Obviously he's killed monsters before. People puts a new wrinkle on everything, if that's what he's getting at, but it's still too late to turn back now. So he's screwed-up. So is she and everyone else she knows. Even though he's trying to warn her, she's not going back to the inn empty-handed after this long spent hiking.]

Look, whatever it is, I can handle it, got it? [It's not like her thoughts aren't vile cesspools whenever she's at her most miserable and petty and bitter when she's not. It's not like there aren't enough scary things in her brain already. His additions can't bother her as much as what she's so prone to replay on her own spare time. She exhales and extends her palm.] So take my hand.

[he doesn't blink while she susses out the meaning of what he'd been getting at... so, yeah. he does mean people.

and that's his disclaimer. he doesn't know what she'll find in his head, but if she ends up deciding that it's something too ruinous, well... at least it won't be a surprise. he's warned her. they'll both be braced for whatever comes of it.

so, pretending as hard as he can that he has no reservations about this at all, he reaches over and grabs her hand.

and despite having run through this once before, he doesn't know what to expect. him and Zhas were already so close, it had been like diving straight into something he'd already been half-connected to. it was a straight plunge to the bottom. he has no idea what bumping up against a new soul might be like.]

[Okay. Okay. Asuka already feels a little wobbly almost as soon as his fingers touch hers-- anticipating in almost the same way she would a shot. It is kind of like a shot, the foreign sensation of sharing. With Shinji it had practically sent her into tears, but with Coil, thankfully, it's different. The intensity isn't as painful, but it's still there, and it leaves her off and disjointed, like she's a spectator in the wrong movie theater, curious but wary of what she'll find in his head.]

[She's thinking about how she's grateful that so far it's not so bad. She's trying to be as bland and blank as possible, defiantly attempting to hide her feelings, but it's not working. There's an ever-present bitterness that's permeating her mind even as she wonders for the dozenth time what she'll get from the tree. Weird flashes of memory, of soaking in blood-red LCL, of splintered commands barked over a communications system, a purse full of smashed cosmetics... it's all a splattered jumble she can't coax into hiding from Coil right now.]

[Shakily, she gets up from the log, tugging him with her. It's sort of hard to speak at first, because she's not sure what's feeling and what's real, but then she manages, softly.]

C-c'mon, we have to stand up for this.

[even though he's unsteadily pulled to his feet after her, he still wants to know why they need to be standing. or why she's always just telling him to do things. he doesn't need to listen to orders from anyone but Zhas. and he also doesn't need to sign any of it for her to know that he's thinking it.

the rest of it--the rest of whatever he has inside--is kept somewhere deep and dark and small, where it's much easier for him to hide. and control. he can focus better that way, and everyone will leave him alone. he's thinking things and feeling things, but it's all still trapped somewhere far away. like hearing the roar of the ocean down in the bottom of a well.

right now, he's trying not to worry about what she might see if she lingers long enough. he's trying hard to focus on how much he wants to see. he wishes he could just reach in and pick something open, but he knows it doesn't work like that. he's also wondering how long it's going to take for her to get her gift, and he's hoping (for now; foolishly) that it isn't over quick.]

[Apart from what's on the surface, he's all locked up. Great. At least those superficial thoughts are a glad distraction from her usual mishmash. She tells him to do things because he'll usually do them, isn't that obvious? If he ignored her, she wouldn't take half as kindly to his company. No use imposing her will on someone who won't. It's kind of like Shinji, except Shinji's obedience is one part being bullied and two parts his own passivity, at least, when she's feeling uncharitable.]

[Thinking about Shinji is its own hateful spiral, though, because he's intrinsically connected to half her life, the half she fought in bled in lost herself in, and it all starts to mesh together again in sour, quick glimpses, a smashed wall, endless yelling. Gritting her teeth, knowing he's seeing and cataloguing more than he should, she tries to dig in deeper into his mind, but she might as well be trying to coax a flame out of the water. You're trespassing, she thinks, but she is, too. Just less successfully. Coil's dug every bit of himself too far beneath for her to get more than vague suggestions, while she's a sour but open book, tapping her foot irritably as every second passes with no gift in sight. She doesn't need to talk to him right now, but she opens and then abruptly closes her mouth anyway, wondering just what he's so damn curious about.]

[as quiet and grey as he is on the outside, his mind clicks along like a dark, exacting little clock. he's curious because he likes to know how things work. he wants to tug on her strings and see what moves; not like a puppet but like tendons and nerves working on bone. he doesn't find many things interesting, but he digs into them with fascination once he does. he finds her interesting. he doesn't mean to think it, but he does.

he also doesn't mean to dig at that thought of Shinji. not in the way that he could actually intentionally excavate thoughts from her, but in the way that she can tell that he would like to. he doesn't like the sound or the feel of it, and he doesn't like how he can tell just how plugged into every part of her it is. he can tell it's a heavy name, like how Zhas weighs in his own soul.

--and turning his attention even a little bit toward that skull-faced man threatens to drag thoughts and feelings up and into the open by the roots. he tries to quickly avert his mind somewhere else, sending an ice-water trickle of anxiety through their connection, but he already lets little fragments slip. they're the easy, most familiar ones. long, still nights in a grey place, and fast, violent ones spent running through the dark. they never run because of fear, however. it's always hunting. together like brothers, dogging after monsters until they can't feel their own limbs anymore.

just little glimpses, but they're important enough to him to be right at the top of his thoughts before he can catch them.]

[It's so weird. It's so weird being-not-being in someone else's head. She winces and she's not sure if she's really wincing in real time or not. The line between feelings and reality is so tenuous. It always has been. Has been since...]

[Since...]

[... and there's weird flashes now, the adjustment of what look like large headpins, a peer in a mirror, an awful sound like an engine smashing and a scream so high (Shinji) it has to be hers reality no reality something shooting through her eye and then a hospital bed. Fascination, huh, and she bristles, her emotion like a cold shoulder that only halfway softens. She's seen fascination before. She's seen scalpels and swallowed pills and performed every damn test they could think of. Her stomach churns-- stop it, it's not his fault and curdles as she tries to focus on him. They're like wild animals, him and Zhas, from those tiny snippets. Like those hunter-gatherers from thousands of years ago. And yet there's a weird security there, like soldiers, no, like a two-man pack. A connection forged of... what? She wants to know.]

[Her hand is slick with sweat, but she doesn't stop gripping his yet.]

[it's hard to absorb and defend at the same time, apparently. he can focus on keeping his mind clear and his emotions smooth and contained, up until his interest snags on something else. then, as he explores the foreign thoughts that come filtering through, he can't help but reflect little things back in the other direction.

the flashes he sees are all new to him, of course, but still familiar enough to remind him of things. stitches and knives and straps on tables--he has spent plenty of time on either side of that arrangement. people are just meat and skin, after all. soft, complicated machines run on blood and stand on bone. losing an eye, excising a tongue, closing a wound, wrapping the dead. that's what her thoughts remind him of.

and then she pulls the painted face of his partner across his mind's eye again, and it fits so perfectly into what's already in his head, that he can't help but bounce her worldless question right back with an answer.

their connection is formed of family--which is a sick, broken door with way too much behind it. he can't help but dwell on the meaning of it for a moment, since it sits on top of him like a crown, ruling literally everything he does. the oldest glimpses are of his family of blood, and they look so tall and dark with how small he is. then the images roll forward into a whole knew family, scooping him up out of broken glass and dropping a coat down to cover his shaking shoulders. he's been following that skullface ever since then. they're something like brothers, but it's so much more important than that...

and there is so much--such a surge at the bottom of that buried well--threatening to churn up and show itself, he squeezes her fingers with the effort of searching for something else to mentally latch onto. he'd closed his eyes somewhere along the way, and now they clench tight.

so, he fixes back on her. he thinks about their missing, mirrored eyes, and being something apart from human. he thinks about her heels bouncing idly against a railing, breathing big lungfuls of toxic air.]

[He's wrong. The feedback loop is pretty much endless, even if it's mostly intimations she's getting, they can respond back to each other. Arguing with him like this might even be easier. She doesn't shudder or back away from his flashes, surgeries, experiments, whatever, but there's definite revulsion there still because it's the soul beyond that's really hurt when those things happen. She knows damn well that's so.]

[Envy bubbles up, slow and low and almost silent. Family. Real family. Asuka's hungry as a starving child for every image that passes. The tall, dark ones and Zhas both make her want and want and want. Father's a shadow, a birthday call that stopped coming fourteen years ago, and Mother's a corpse and Asuka a crying brat neither wants. Zhas saved him. Zhas protected him. Keeps protecting him. Asking about signing the first time he was on the ship. Stabs of longing shoot through her like sparks, and they only stop when she finds herself there. There from the party.]

[But she hates thinking about herself and she's scared of what she'll see of how he thinks of her like the nervous coward she really is deep down. Because she's awful, just awful, and everyone must really know that. Asuka blinks back one watery, overwhelmed eye, looking directly at him, thinking that for his silence, for his stubbornness, his morbid curiosity, he's all right, far more than all right. There's a thump of something soft landing, right by the tree's massive roots, a sound that she barely hears.]

[text] your blue walls get in the way of these facts

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