driftfleet | Starstruck March Mingle Madness!

[He narrows his eyes at nothing.]

I had a gun. I always have a gun.

M'not your... crewmate when I'm like that. I'm a feral that needs t'be muzzled.

[It's a matter of fact, s'far as he's concerned.]

Max. [ sharpish, with an unintended thread of disappointment. ] You are i>always my crewmate.

[ so long as they were both stuck on this tub together, at least. all bets are off once life resumes: his in his hellhole, hers in someone else's history book. peggy sighs. ] You sure as shit weren't going to land any serious hits on Steve, and -- annoying though the gallantry is -- Steve would never have allowed you get at me. Some muzzles aren't really muzzles; instead, they're the safeguards we put around us.

[ she puts her hand in her pocket, but grimaces. ]

[He shakes his head minutely, as if trying to dispel that disappointed reply. He may have very much embraced that violent and turbulent knee-jerk panic before, but being here — being a person in a relatively helpful and coaxing environment — it's put a damper on what he used to do, to survive. Before, a blind lashing to danger was good. Now, it's a threat to everyone here.

He scrubs his hands over the crown of his head.

There's a sort of raw frustration when he speaks.]

Exhausted.

Being crew is — exhausting. [Not quire the wording he means. He licks his lips.] Being... unsafe... is exhausting.

[ peggy nods once more. ]

I used to think everyone around me died. [ never quite with the same systemic violence lived day-in and day-out by max and other wastelanders; she's not trying to compare her apples to his oranges. but she needs him to know his inability to touch his tongue to the right word is understandable. relatable, even. ] That I was unsafe because of what I did and who I routinely pissed off -- and therefore everyone around me would be in jeopardy. Turns out I was wrong; it's possible to be stronger together.

[ the words stick odd in her mouth. it's the kind of sentimentality she doesn't voice even with steve -- she's not certain he'd understand. he's too strong. too capable. too easily inclined to work within a team, regardless.

peggy clears her throat and pulls a closed fist out of her pocket. like she's hiding something. ] I've got something for you. I noticed your paracord, on your wrist, and thought you could do with a bit extra.

[He hesitates, but holds out his hand. Unsure. Something somber catches his expression as he lets the paracord fall into his hand. On his wrist, the bracelet is a bit worn, dirtied by time. He has a white ring there where the sun doesn't always catch him. Quiet for a moment, he hums, but something in his throat sticks.]

... I didn't make it. Belonged to, umm. A kid.

Helped her mom get her back. But. [He licks his lips.] Were ambushed as I was driving away. No way I could reach 'em in time. Carstruck. Pedestrian fatality.

[He never talked about Glory or Hope, or the paracord bracelet.

Because it was what really pushed him over the edge.]

[ peggy's gift isn't quite the same -- nor does it express anywhere near an identical level of craft or even effort. instead, it's a narrower band, beaded with hex nuts, and with a funny division knotted into its length. they're pace count beads, but they harbour a sweeter hope that she doesn't dare commit to words.

instead, she reaches for his hand and makes short work of tying the cord-and-but bangle next to the thicker one he'd kept from home. ] Both of them?

[ just a little bit of prying; she knows she has the pace beads to fall back upon and explain should her question prove too much. ]

Always.

[One is usually never so lucky.]

Mom died instantly, didn't know what hit her. [He patiently sits with his hand extended, letting Peggy do whatever she pleased.] Was relieved for her after. Better to die and not know. Not have to think or worry. She wouldn't have wanted to live.

[He swallows hard, the hand twitching. His heartbeat is fast against Peggy's knuckle, his stare long and drawing away as he stares through Peggy's shoulder.]

Stayed with the kid, for a while.

Don't think she was in pain.

[ her touch is perfunctory -- but it isn't cold. each touch is only as long as it needs to be: no more and no less. even when she feels his pulse racing, she barely lets her finger linger. instead, she draws two beads across the paracord and lets them clack together. dully. ]

You didn't have to stay.

[ she's not arguing. rather, she's underlining the part of himself about which he most often lies: the empathetic man willing to sacrifice time and company to hurting creatures. ]

... Guess I didn't.

[He's not really sure. Something in him says he absolutely had to.

Not really an option, even if there was. His hand twitches to the two bracelets.]

I told myself not to look in the mirror. Don't look back.

... Punishment for looking, maybe. Made mistakes. Failed my job.

Punishment from who? From what force?

[ her tone is purely curious. but beneath it all, she hopes to challenge his assertion. there is no greater power, she thinks, pulling strings so neatly to invite retribution on any of them. should there be a god, she cannot imagine one who micromanages. ]

[He leans back, humming, thumbing the bracelet. As she'd hoped.]

It's a long list.

[He glances at her.]

Always growing. Always watching.

[Someday, you or the others might end up on it.

That's something he dreads now.]

There's no higher power waiting to rain hellfire on you, Max. [ no matter what the clergy back at st martin in the field's used to say to warn the girls from breaking curfew or pilfering drink. ] There's only history and circumstance. And your own guilt dogging you, of course.

[Max would chuckle if he had that in him.

Peggy, whatever power there is, it's already rained hellfire.]

Might be more than that.

[He recollects Glory's influence — how impossible some of it seemed.

He holds out his hand again, and it slowly opens, a bit clunky, like partly broken machinery still trying to work as it once did at peak proficiency. There's a circular scar there where something had clearly cleaved right through his hand; an arrow, the kind blissfully without a triangular arrowhead.]

My hand stopped an arrow, once. It flew through. My hand was stuck to my head. [He holds up his hand, thoughtful, placing it where an old round scar on his forehead was.] Like this. If I didn't put my hand up, probably would have sank further in. Probably woulda' killed me on the Fury Road.

[ now, there's an unexpected twist. peggy takes his hand like a fresh opening -- curling her fingers under the back of his palm and drawing it nearer so she can better investigate the scar. she's adept at reading scars -- and imagining the violence that goes in to creating them. ]

I never took you for the sort of man who believes in -- what shall we call it? Fate? A higher power?

[Snort.]

I'm not much of anything. Whatever God there is, they hate us.

[He pauses, though, and he supposes that spells some uncertainty.]

Before I was shot by the arrow, ahm.

The ghost who gave me this bracelet -- the girl, she appeared. In my head like the others, but. She startled me into putting up m'hand, right in that spot. Never would've stopped the arrow myself, never would've known to.

[It's one of those things that absolutely mystifies him. Is it the ghosts, realer at times than he ever thought possible? Perhaps just Glory herself, twisted with death but no less helping. Perhaps a higher power -- though he's always hesitant to think it. He just knows that, looking back, some things never added up. And Max is always careful to do the math.]

Edited 2017-03-28 15:22 (UTC)

[ gentle, now -- she relinquishes his hand. it is his own, after all. and she knows he's not so partial to being touched with any frequency or duration. instead, peggy sits back and pins him with her gaze. ]

Let us call it providence, then, instead. [ a brief hum. ] Or perhaps a way in which your self-preservation decided to manifest itself in that moment.

[ she's not callous when she says it. at least, she doesn't want to be. the man is prone to hallucinations -- often giving shape and voice to his darkest feelings. why shouldn't his brighter moments also be represented? ]

[... Snerk.]

Maybe. We'll see what my self-preservation does next.

[He flexes his fingers, one at a time.]

Hnn. [He shrugs.] Spent a lot of time self-preserving. Dunno, though... I think this place screwed Mr. Survivalist up a little.

[He says it calmly, though. Relaxed. He knows one of the reasons he took his physical outburst so poorly this time around is because he isn't who he used to be back home. He knows it now. Really, truly. It took twenty years to undo him — and yet maybe there's something here. Back home, he wouldn't have cared even remotely if he flailed and bit and punched, because he would have packed up and ran.

Ever since he accepted he couldn't run from the fleet, well...

Survival hasn't really been on his mind, not like it was.]

Starstruck March Mingle Madness!

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