atowncalledtreffy

A few hours after breaking up Trevor and Envy's confrontation, Xie Lian follows up as promised. He wouldn't think to use Trevor's inbox, instead working his way through the ship, looking for him.

Trevor is easy enough to find. He's up on deck, on the highest point he can get to, which happens to be the roof of where the Enclosure would be. He's letting Sonia fly in a circle above his head; when she notices Xie Lian, she calls to him and Trevor turns to eye him.

Xie Lian smiles, waving a greeting. Hua Xie, draped around his neck, watches Sonia with friendly interest. Most gods like to stand on the highest perch to be found. Xie Lian has fallen and broken too many bones to follow that instinct. Still, he understands the urge.

"Hello."

Trevor grunts in acknowledgement and stands....and sways. He's a little drunk, having spent the first hour completely ineffective due to his transparency and the last hour making sure of it.

"What?" It's rude, but so is he when he's had a few.

Xie Lian moves a little closer, partly to make it easier if he has to catch Trevor. Xie Lian is almost always polite, but he's equally unmoved by rudeness from others.

"I was wondering if you could tell me what happened earlier?"

He's definitely not sure-footed and maybe that's by design. Trevor at the moment is at his worst, most self-hating. He stands straight, neither moving to come down nor backing away.

"Probably. Which part? I'm not going to fucking regale you when you were there for half of it. Where's Envy?"

"I just came in at the end," Xie Lian demurs. "Though I suspect I can guess the outline of what came before. I would just like to hear your perspective. I couldn't tell you where Envy is at this moment."

"You let him go." The accusation comes out, sullen and tired.

"What else would you have me do?" The question is genuine, free from any defensiveness. He's not going to turn down hearing another's perspective or ideas. "I don't think he needs more lessons that suggest that being stronger than someone gives you a right to control them. Should I have written up a warning?"

"You could have beat his head in the way he was beating his poor animal half to death." He retorts, slumping back down to sit on the roof.

"Violence sometimes only understands violence."

"Perhaps, but does that help anyone? That animal is a part of himself, I think his actions demonstrate the limits of only understanding violence. If I broke his skull, would that show it's wrong to hurt people weaker than you, or would it be further justification of his reasoning?"

"If you broke his arm, he would have stopped punching her, and you'd have saved the animal." He retorts back. "But maybe that's why I'm not a fuck-off warden."

"I bound his arms and his daemon escaped. Why would breaking it have been better?"

"His daemon can't go far from him. He'll find her soon as you unbound him."

"The limit might be further than you think. I've watched him before." He also thinks Envy has less desire to hunt down his daemon than Trevor might think, but that's a more personal comment. "But you're correct, he could find her again, and he could try to hurt her again. But I hope if you saw me inflicting the amount of violence necessary to stop him from being able to act, you would think it a reason to stop me."

He looks up at the sky a moment, before back at Trevor.

"There are likely better solutions, that haven't come to me. But I don't believe hurting him is one of them."

He snorts, and disappears from view, crawling out of sight. It's likely he's lying on his back on the roof.

"Then we really don't have a lot to talk about."

"Perhaps not. But it didn't seem to me that your approach was working." There's no judgment to that. He rubs the back of his neck. "Also, I don't think it would be helpful to write up this 'incident', but it would feel like a dereliction of duty not try to talk about it."

"Do what you want." He calls back, irritated. At least Xie Lian has that privilege. And it really rubs him the wrong way to have his cursed handicap be dangled in his face.

"Write it up or don't. But I'm done talking."

Not talking is Trevor's choice. Xie Lian won't ask him to say more.

He does jump lightly from the deck to the roof, Hua Xie held protectively in his arms in case his bad luck takes his moment to strike. He's already fallen down the stairs several times.

Despite the remembered ache in his legs, it is nice to be up high. And it offers a nice view. Though, mainly, and most importantly, he's worried that Trevor will fall off.

Trevor is lying on his back. Listless, letting the stars wash over his gaze. Next to him is Sonia, his red-tailed hawk daemon, keeping a watchful eye on her charge. She eyes Xie Lian warily but neither says anything.

Once they reach the roof safely, Hua Xie returns to her favorite position on Xie Lian's shoulder. He leans back to enjoy the view, clearly not going to speak when Trevor has said he doesn't want to.

He's spent many happy hours losing himself in the beauty of the stars.

The silence lasts a while. Finally, Trevor glances over at Xie Lian, moody and tired.

"I came up here to be alone, you know. I don't want company."

Xie Lian had been mediating, but turns his attention back to Trevor when he speaks.

"I don't want to see you injure yourself. I can sit below, if you'd prefer."

"M'not going to injure myself." The hawk gives him a dubious glance and he waves her off.

"Might be a good lesson if I do. Christ, all right, fine. I'll get off the roof. Happy?"

Xie Lian doesn't go back to his argument against pain as a lesson. He never said it was completely without validity, after all, he rarely goes up on roofs these days.

"Less concerned, perhaps."

IC Inbox

Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam

Re: Spam