16 - shall not harm
Feb. 28th, 2012 05:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no_fastolfe[Private to Hannibal]
Doctor, I can only conclude that you did not recognize the Repo agent who murdered you. My apologies are useless but I extend them nevertheless. I do not ask for your forgiveness because it was not a forgivable act.
[Private to Chromie]
Madame Chromie, I will be absent from work for two days.
What I did in port was an obscenity and I cannot express my remorse in any terms I know. I am sorry.
[Private to Dracula]
As terrifying as you were, sir; in trying to save me you were more humane than I was. It was too late. But I am grateful that you tried.
[private]
Date: 2012-02-29 02:20 am (UTC)[He leans back, steepling his fingers, digesting this information.]
My feelings on this matter are, understandably I imagine, mixed. On the one hand, you did perform rather unnecessary surgery on me. On the other...
On the other hand it was brave and forthright to extend an apology and thus identify yourself. I cannot ignore that. And I get the impression as well that you...are somewhat lacking in killer instincts. [A glitter-eyed smile before he becomes serious again.]
I am not certain that there are many things as traumatic as having a killer's memories when one is not one oneself. Thus I do not imagine that you are eating, sleeping or feeling particularly better than I.
[He has another reason for reining in his outrage: what she did reminds him in many ways of what he had done to Benjamin Raspail. At least she had adminstered a sedative...he kept thinking about it in spite of himself. Raspail's sweetbreads served to the Symphony board...his harvested to save someone else's life.] How strange...
[private]
Date: 2012-02-29 02:23 am (UTC)Nor seen a death by anything but old age, in a hospital facility.
[private]
Date: 2012-02-29 03:15 am (UTC)I have enough acquaintance with the strange Barge cosmology to know that in this matter you are essentially blameless in spite of it all. But even if I felt the urge for revenge I know that you will blame you; any human being in your situation would, outside of a sociopath. Which you clearly are not.
You need not fear reprisal, Doctor. I am not quite up to forgiveness yet, but I do understand.
Re: [private]
Date: 2012-02-29 03:18 am (UTC)[She shakes her head. She does look awful; she has slept some, in the safety of her warden's quarters, but food is a challenge she hasn't yet been able to meet.]
'Blameless', perhaps. But not. If you had asked me before, I would have said myself incapable of what I did. Of being so thoroughly deranged. But I remember it clearly, justifications and simple selfish cruelty.
I told you because you had a right to know. Because you had to at least hear the apology, no matter how little it could mean.
[private]
Date: 2012-02-29 03:21 am (UTC)And I am impressed by your apology. You are an intelligent woman and not unobservant; it cannot have escaped your attention that I am a murderer. You made your effort, and it does have meaning.
[private]
Date: 2012-02-29 03:47 am (UTC)I think I would have been afraid to approach you had Mister Graham's warning of your crimes been less ghoulish. Counter-intuitive, perhaps, but as it stood it was so unbelievable to me as to be a kind of poor joke.
That I did approach you and we have at times been allies and conversational partners-- that your life has more than usual value to me-- is not something I can change easily.
[private]
Date: 2012-02-29 04:21 am (UTC)But Will was merely trying to protect the populace with warnings about me. And in honesty, perhaps I even deserved that. I was ghoulish, and rather horrible, it's true. I do not recommend it. [A coughing laugh] I am not certain I would recommend it to myself anymore.
[private]
Date: 2012-02-29 04:27 am (UTC)Doctor. I am-- and will be-- more sorry than I can say. Thank you for accepting that-- if not forgiving.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-29 05:16 am (UTC)What do I say to her, that I cope with pain and betrayal by killing people?
[Suddenly he feels a little sick.]
Are...you all right? No, of course you are not, but...are you taking care of yourself?
no subject
Date: 2012-02-29 05:28 am (UTC)I-- Rhade has seen me through the worst of the physical reaction but I am so ashamed. The harm that I have done.
[private]
Date: 2012-02-29 06:13 am (UTC)Private, text
Date: 2012-02-29 06:41 am (UTC)Did one of them find you as well?
Private, text
Date: 2012-02-29 03:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-29 05:18 pm (UTC)Rhade? Good man. As is usual for him.
You...of course you are horrified. You are a creator, not a destroyer. Violence isn't in your blood as it is in mine.
Vasilia...please, listen to me. I gave in to very old and ugly impulses while I was there, and I am not proud of it now that I have returned to myself. [Ironic smile]. That part of me...the monster in me, the monster I was even born with in some ways...has led me to do terrible things. Many of which I regret now.
What I discovered in the midst of that regret, and all the brooding I have done on my existence is this: one cannot change the past. One can only choose to do better in the future.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-29 05:25 pm (UTC)May I come see you? In this time I wish least of all to be alone with my thoughts.
Private, text
Date: 2012-03-01 12:38 am (UTC)It's alright. It wasn't you. Jim got away.
no subject
Date: 2012-03-01 02:17 am (UTC)[He hesitates.]
Of course. Give me perhaps five minutes. I will...clean up a bit. [And get some lights going; he's been sitting in the dark.]
no subject
Date: 2012-03-01 02:42 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-03-01 02:59 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-03-01 03:00 am (UTC)[She really isn't sure what that might be.]
no subject
Date: 2012-03-01 03:02 am (UTC)I'm almost done actually if you wish to come over.
->Spam?
Date: 2012-03-01 03:06 am (UTC)Spam?
Date: 2012-03-01 03:29 am (UTC)[He looks a little out of sorts when he opens the door; his hair is loose and a bit mussed, and he is in his shirtsleeves. The room beyond is now lit with all his candles and the fire, and is starting to warm up.]
Please, come in.
Re: Private, text
Date: 2012-03-01 03:30 am (UTC)Spam
Date: 2012-03-01 03:33 am (UTC)I... do not know what to do, my friend. The memories haunt me and the knowledge that there are people aboard with worse memories because of me saddens and frightens me.
Spam
Date: 2012-03-01 04:07 am (UTC)I remember back when I did not care about such things. For a while I hated having feelings again for just that reason; suddenly I was overwhelmed at times with the shame of my deeds. I have been sick at myself many times in the last few months. So...I know. I understand.
But I would be more concerned if you felt nothing, as I did once. The pain and the shame are horrible, but they will pass. And they mean that you have a soul.
Spam
Date: 2012-03-01 04:17 am (UTC)I can see no end to them. I am told there must be, but it seems so all consuming. Those I hurt have ... accepted my apologies, or dismissed them, but-
Yet you know better than I do what I mean. I am sorry; I complain.
Spam
Date: 2012-03-01 04:46 am (UTC)I do not mean it in a metaphysical sense. I am no student of such things anymore. But I am...I do...I mean it in a psychological sense. A person who feels no shame and horror at such callous acts is as I was--hollow. Empty. Incomplete. Not like you.
[He hesitates. Had his voice gotten a bit sentimental at the end of that? Never mind. No time for embarrassment.]
You have made your apologies, but making peace with yourself is more problematic. It always is. Nevertheless it will fade...the first part is always the worst. Talking helped. So did distractions.
[He goes into his wall cupboard and comes out with a small container of rose hips and mint, dried from the garden.]
Speak on as much as you need. It troubles me not.
Spam
Date: 2012-03-01 04:53 am (UTC)You have a great deal of faith in my that I don't think I have earned. I will, though, choose to believe in it. Selfishly.
And yourself, count. Whatever you have been. You are not soulless, either.
[She smiles at him, this one a slightly better attempt.] And your friendship-- friendship, I rejected it for better than twenty-five decades, misanthropic and happier with my work-- it is constant, and trustworthy. Please, do not deny what that means to me, not now.
Private, text
Date: 2012-03-01 08:33 am (UTC)Spam
Date: 2012-03-02 03:14 am (UTC)I am only returning the favor. It is friendships like yours that help keep that...part of me at bay. I am not used to friends either. I would say I wish I had met you sooner, but...I'm glad I didn't. I used to be an ass.
Perhaps I am not soulless after all. But I really do need to do something about my temper. [He crushes the herbs up and puts them in a tea-strainer.]
Spam
Date: 2012-03-02 04:58 am (UTC)I would have loathed you, naturally.
Spam
Date: 2012-03-02 05:46 am (UTC)Back then I did not understand the cost of being loathsome, how it isolates one. I did not care enough or feel enough for it to matter to me.
[The teakettle rattled slightly as the bubbles started to form inside of it.]
Spam
Date: 2012-03-02 05:49 am (UTC)[A sigh]
Oh Count. If I ever leave this ship how will I do without my friends?
Spam
Date: 2012-03-02 06:26 am (UTC)[His eyes twinkle briefly.] Besides, I'd love to have more of those grapes.
Spam
Date: 2012-03-02 06:29 am (UTC)We may be a conservative planet, stagnating in the long untested certainty of our own superiority-- but our grapes are wonderful.
Spam
Date: 2012-03-02 06:47 am (UTC)[A hesitation.]
My own must be rebuilt from the ground up. It is why I read so much. History, sociology, politics...studying systems and groups. Considering what sort of society I wish, how to rule it, and how we are to coexist with humans....
Though to be honest... [A slightly sheepish look] the last consideration only entered into my thoughts perhaps five months ago.
Spam
Date: 2012-03-02 06:49 am (UTC)I might have said the same of Earthers, and more recently besides.
You mean to rule, then? [There's no judgement to that; they are both creatures of ambition.]
Spam
Date: 2012-03-02 10:40 pm (UTC)[The teakettle starts boiling and he moves past her to take it off the swing-arm, not bothering with a hot pad. He pours the tea and drops the ball in, then replaces the kettle, quietly thoughtful as he does so.]
But first I must learn how, and earn under the Admiral certain...adjustments...to our race that will help us to coexist.
Spam
Date: 2012-03-02 10:47 pm (UTC)You are a good man. I think you will be a good father. [A careful judgment, fathers being difficult to her in any form.]
Spam
Date: 2012-03-03 01:40 am (UTC)Spam
Date: 2012-03-03 05:34 am (UTC)[She sighs softly.]
I do not know what I should do with it. Humanity was not designed for it, I think. You will manage, however. I believe it.
Spam
Date: 2012-03-04 06:06 am (UTC)Spam
Date: 2012-03-04 06:08 am (UTC)Thank you. For a great deal more than the tea.
Spam
Date: 2012-03-04 07:03 pm (UTC)You are...welcome.