re_alignment_logs | Hallways always [OPEN]

who: Vandal and any visitors. [OPEN]
what: Vandal is bed-bound, recovering from her month-long detainment and torture.
when: All this week.
where: The Medbay
warnings: very yes
notes: Tag in your own threads, it can be set during any point in the week.

The beep of the monitors is loud with her head this eerily silent. Whatever he did to her, between the needles and questioning, he separated it. Took something. Now that static in her head is far quieter. It's almost as maddening as when it was present.

Now she's almost lonely without it. Well- she was lonely before, but now even more so.

She doesn't sleep, no. It's not safe to sleep anymore. She wants to scream every time she's left alone, but it's not practical to have someone with her all the time. Prism is dead, the Gatherer is dead, but the way she goes back to that place every time she shuts her eyes.

So she lays in a space between waking and sleep, startling back to consciousness every tie she starts to drift. Shaking. Thinking about it. What it did to her.

She reaches up to smooth a finger over the gauze covering what used to be her right eye.

Ruined. He ruined her worse than the church did. The mental, the physical.

Everything. Ruined.

She wishes they'd have killed her when they found her.

But she's also a coward, and afraid of death, so here she sits and lets the stitches heal.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Because we're your friends," he says. It's all right if she doesn't sound confident -- in this case, he can do it for her.

The confidence fades quickly, though, when she asks the question. He blinks, shaking his head slowly. Had he said something wrong? He was trying to make a point. To help.

"No...? Should I have?"

He'll learn. Eventually. He already found out the hard way not to say "buttfuck".

"Sweet. I wouldn't say that." Another shake of his head. "Sweet implies goodness. I've... done things no one would consider good."

"We are." She relents, nodding at him tiredly.

"Ah don't worry about it. I should know better than to swear around you anyways." He's like a small child that's bitg and made of metal.

"You know, a lot of people here say that exact thing, including me. Doesn't matter what you did in the past, okay?"

He lets the first matter drop. He won't press her, not on that, and not when they agree. No point in it.

But he does frown, then. "I don't mind," he says. "You can speak how you want. It doesn't bother me."

Probably because he hasn't heard those words before, but, there you go.

"If it doesn't matter for me... does it matter for you?" If he's not allowed to claim he isn't a good 'person', then his friend shouldn't, either. At least, that's how it works in his mind.

"If you're sure. Just feel like a bad influence, but I guess it's a little late to change my ways."

She shrugs.

"I-" That's a tough question, one she can't answer.

She closes her mouth, looking away.

"I am sure," he says. "If I were bothered, I would have said so. I'm... apparently good at that."

Even when he doesn't mean to be. Besides, she can't be more of a bad influence than the robot who told him human intercourse involved the phrase "penis excitement".

When she looks away, he tilts his head, waiting to hear her continue. She doesn't. His hand inches forward a little, fingertip brushing her arm again.

"I don't think you're a bad person," he says, quietly, firmly. "You've been better to me than any human in my world ever was. You care for the other robots, even though they aren't your kind." He shakes his head. "I can't think poorly of you." The bare flicker of a smile again.

"You don't have to agree. But... that is how I feel about you."

She doesn't agree but, well she has no will to argue it and it wouldn't seem appropriate anyways. She lays back and closes her eye briefly.

"Okay." She'll just accept that for now.

"You don't have anywhere to be do you?" She's hoping he'll say no. Maybe if he stays she can get some rest...

"Okay."

He'll take it at that. She's already been through a lot. Pushing wouldn't help anything right now.

Instead, he shakes his head. "I told Kay I would be here. If she needs me, she knows where I am..." So, no. He doesn't have anything pressing, unless the girl calls for him.

"Would you mind staying for a while?" It will probably be boring for him, but she very desperately wants company right now. She hates that she still feels scared, even knowing that Prism and its Gatherer were destroyed.

"Yes."

He answers almost immediately, before thinking about that for a moment. He shakes his head. "I mean... no, I don't mind. Yes, I'll stay."

He shifts closer to her side, fingers resting on the side of her bed. "Do you want me to be quiet for you? Or speak...?" Because, more than anything, he just wants to help her.

"Whatever you want. Just as long as you're here, it doesn't matter. Why don't you tell me a story. Something about your past. Something that makes you happy."

She wants to hear about happy things right now. Things that don't involve pain or suffering or sadness.

"A story about... Hm."

And something that makes him happy. Honestly, that leaves him really only one option, in his opinion. She might as well have flat-out asked.

"Do you want to hear about him? The one they designed after me?"

She asjusts, trying to get comfortable, looking up from under her messy bangs.

"Yeah. Tell me about him." Something that seemed to make Kagerou happy, and that was good enough for her.

He nods, and settles down beside her bed. His hands rest on the edge of it, alternately hovering over her and sitting beside her. It's comfortable that way. There's a slight smile on his face.

"I wasn't supposed to meet him when I did," he says. There is a lot of warmth in the words. "I broke in. Into the room they were keeping him in. I don't know why we were kept separate at first... Maybe he wasn't ready. But I wanted to meet him. Badly. So... I broke in."

The smile turns a little sheepish. "I think I frightened him at first. Barging in like that. He... was very shy. Back then. But I saw someone worth living for, even then. Even hooked into the repair bay like he was. I... Released him early. He wasn't supposed to be walking, and almost fell down."

He paused, waiting to see if she wanted him to keep going.

Hallways always [OPEN]

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject