If nothing else, he looks cozy how he is, and she can't deny there's been some days she wants to wrap herself up just as snugly. Shawls go a long way towards helping that feeling. She falls into step beside him, taking deep breaths of the air. Nothing's going to pop out and ruin the day. Hopefully. Maybe.
The question gets a laugh that isn't, more of a rueful exhale.
"I'm better than I was at the start of the month. Don't know how else to put it."
She's just glad for this she didn't have to weather the aftermath alone. She wants to have the ground steady enough under her feet by winter, and it might be possible.
"Yes. I've known Felix for quite some time now. And I've noticed the two of you are very close."
It'd be hard to not see it, if someone was looking. It's in the way they interact, their closeness, their shared company. "Has something changed between you?"
Has it all gone wrong? Is that why it's worse than ever?
"As astute as ever," he sighs with a rueful, sad smile. "I'm afraid so. The recent crisis has left its marks on everyone... some more than others."
As they walk, he begins to take the lead. They climb up and away off the path, up a hill.
"And him, especially so. I... I myself was, while the island was still a nightmare. I'd given myself over to the Lonely and was lost deep in its belly. I was sealed away from all companionship, except... except he found me. He could, because he'd been claimed by the power of the Web, and he could force a connection into existence to find me. And I never would have gotten out if he hadn't. I do not think I would be free of the Lonely now, if not for him."
He stops, takes a deep breath, then keeps walking. "And yet. He is still a servant to the fear of manipulation. He wields the power of lies, whether he chooses to use it or not. And I do not think I can trust myself to figure it out if something starts going wrong... nor do I believe I would want to."
The Lonely, the Web. She's gotten explanations from Daisy in the past - not comprehensive ones, but enough to understand what Mulcahy's talking about. These Fears and what they are, what they control and what they've made, and she can see the vague shape of it as she keeps up with where they're going.
Gaeta's been taken by the Web, then. That...Avatar state, as she's heard it said. And while it helped, it's still manipulation. Something that to someone like Mulcahy, for all he's been through...it must be horrifying, to know the person you love is so altered. Now suddenly a servant to all you had to endure, all that undermined your life and sanity. No wonder it's been a hell of a time. Coming out physically wounded, spiritually drained, and now someone who's supposed to be a comfort is a stranger.
"What are you going to do now? Is there some other way you might be able to protect yourself? Some sort of safeguard, for both your sakes?"
Because abandoning Gaeta over this isn't in the cards, no. It's in his face, in his body. It wouldn't hurt so much if he wasn't so precious.
It’s true. Mulcahy has always known that if what happened to him before happens to him again—not just as an occasional monthly scare, but as a protracted invasion on his life—regardless of any resurrections, he will die. His mind and soul will both be shredded apart and there will not be enough to bring back. Gaeta hangs over him like the Sword of Damocles. He does not get up to move from the table.
“That’s what I wanted to speak to you about. I hope I’m not being too forward when I say that you have proven yourself both decisive and protective. I haven’t forgotten what you did for me at the casino. Or how you found me after the opera, and the gala. And when the zombies came, I have seen you blazing in the sky.”
Fever can see where they’re heading now. A lone memorial bench towards the cliffs by the seaside, in a section of the cemetery marked as a potter’s field.
“I hate to ask this favor, and to burden you with the task. But… if you see something going wrong… if he becomes a monster in my own house… would you get me away from him?”
For a moment, she's silent, looking at him. The expression in her eyes is complex, being handed something precious and indescribably valuable. This trust, this request - it is no burden, but she's still shocked. Protective, he calls her, when she remembers her own undead self tearing into him, leaving him dying. Decisive, he says, when she flies on her own instincts, following what she wants to do.
Do you want him dead, nearly crosses her lips. That is the sort of creature she is, the sort of being he's asking to act like a watchdog.
"Going wrong like what?"
Of course she'll do it. Of course she'll look. If he'll have her for it, she will.
“I’m not sure. With things like this, it’s difficult to know the shape of it before it happens. It will change, constantly, and… I may become complicit in hiding what he does.” This much he’s learned in his years at the Village: the way of the twisting, lying serpent.
“I can only tell you this. If it seems like my attachment to him is doing me more harm than good… if he starts to keep me away from all of my friends, for example, especially Zivia… please, become suspicious. If he traps me, I will not be able to get out by myself. I may not even realize that I need to.”
Great trust has been broken between Mulcahy and Gaeta; between Mulcahy and himself. If he cannot trust himself, he must trust someone else.
Fever helped break open the Village. She caught him during the casino and offered safety at the gala. Over and over, he has watched her rise to the island’s defense. He can think of no one better to save him one more time.
She assumes so. But it feels better than asking if he wants the rift to be utterly permanent without repair. If something feels wrong, then - if Mulcahy seems like he's hiding not out of his own volition. If something just seems too amiss. She'd like to think better of Felix, and for this to never come to pass.
But when you cannot trust yourself to know safety, someone else must. A lifeline, a fallback that will engage without you needing to ask. A way out.
It is a testament to the depths of his terror and his knowledge of this danger that he does not immediately and unequivocally say, yes. His hesitation sickens him. The thought of a life cut on his behalf is nothing short of vile—and yet he will not simply assume that the worst outcome will never happen. It could. Always.
"I beg you to make every attempt to. Do everything that you can. I want for him every second chance. He should be given time and mercy, no matter what happens. But if he becomes... truly, truly monstrous one day... then I trust you will do what you must."
He hunches over and turns away, leaning a hand on the back of the bench. "Oh, God, I disgust myself."
It would be easy to dispense justice on Mulcahy's behalf far before that point was ever reached, if it did happen. She could claim it was impossible to recover Gaeta from this state, and then see just how much it took to bring him down now that he was no longer something human. She wouldn't use the same method as last time, that's for sure. But. This is a thought she lets pass over her, pulled across her body and removed. Her hands will be still, if the time ever comes, until they're absolutely needed.
"Only if he stops being Felix. Only if this thing takes him so deep that he ceases to be himself. Only if the Web kills him first."
Only if he became a thing that no longer recognized Mulcahy. Because then Gaeta was not there to be spared in the first place. Then will her hands move to violence again.
The blood drains from his limbs at the thought; weakly, he sits down on the bench, hunched and small. Oh, God. It could happen. It could always happen, and he won’t see it coming. Mulcahy is going to—could, lose him. Could.
She takes the cue to sit next to him, slowly putting a hand on his shoulder. He's not going to have to do this on his own. He'll have another set of eyes at his back, making sure he can navigate this.
"...There are others in his same situation. Living with it long before they came to these shores. The power need not consume him. He can still be himself."
It would be hard, and it would require Gaeta to keep trying. To keep choosing otherwise, when it would be easy to let go. But he has a reason to keep trying, doesn't he? He has things to keep being as close to human as he can manage. There's every reason to hope.
And, a contract she'll take as seriously as that of anyone who asked her to kill them, should they get out of hand.
“I know. I’ve met them. I know that nothing may happen—but it could, and even if the worst never comes to pass, I fear the change this will bring to our bond. He drinks from me. I have already seen it.”
He’s done it himself, going drunk on others’ fear. He always knew that Gaeta would do the same with him, and now he’s seen the look on his face when he does. He recognized it when he opened the door and saw him on the porch.
"I don't know. I think so. I could, or I was told that I could, back when the Lonely claimed me, but it is—horribly addictive, and I will never stop being a temptation. I make it too easy for him."
His hands move to clasp the back of his neck. "Yes. I... yes."
He takes another deep breath. "Fever. I don't know how to tell you how much this means to me. What you promise is not just my protection, it is... the guarantee that I will live. I can exist with the certainty of my continuation."
No matter what happens with Gaeta. Fever will do what has to be done to make sure that he goes on. The Village left him with no more strength to withstand manipulation, and so he will not have to rely on his own.
No one can do it alone.
(When was the last time he had any kind of safeguard against his own destruction? … Before Korea, he thinks. A decade ago.)
The breeze blows, salt-scented, ruffling her hair, and she looks over the potter's field. It takes a moment to put her feelings into words, to express how all of this is. It's not bad in any way, merely...different, to try to hold it and not say you think better of me than I do myself, unwinding the coiled spring of that reflex. Some have asked her to strike them down should they go beyond any hope of retrieval, asking for the safety of others. Here, Mulcahy asks her for his own, to preserve a life instead of taking it. And she finds that she can look at her hands and have every capability of saying yes.
What is this power good for? To know when to go and when to stop. When to destroy and when to defend. I hurt you once before. Are you sure? Does it make sense to doubt him when he doubts himself? Looking at him, she sees the scars in his hands. Fever hopes they no longer pain him.
Thank you for your faith. I'll see it won't go to waste.
"...You're my friend," she says, feeling herself get stuck past that point. The emotion is simply too big to fit through the narrow passageway of her throat and to find its way outside to be expressed. Making light of it feels impossible. "And you shouldn't be caged again."
(She thinks Mother would be proud of them both for making plans rooted in life.)
He knows in some distant, abstract way that one of his violent deaths was because of some kind of Fever. His logic knows this. But his memories don’t hold that connection: he remembers the dead thing standing in the doorway, wearing Fever’s face but so cold and cruel as to be unrecognizable, and then he remembers a cloud of pain—and that is all. In any case, he had snapped his own murderous double’s neck that month. It’s difficult to blame Fever for his mutilation and he has no interest in trying. Loving one more person than one less is a much, much nicer way to live.
It’s a simple assertion she makes. It touches him all the same. “Thank you,” he says, thickly.
But one more point of business. “Please don’t tell him about any of this. If you must act, then better he never sees it coming, and if you never do, then… then better he doesn’t know that I ever asked.” A beat of hesitation; a memory. “Un—unless you think otherwise…?”
"No. It's best that he doesn't know - your instincts are correct. If he knew I was keeping an eye out, he could very easily work to deceive me to hide himself. And if nothing at all happens, then there's no need to burden him with the idea that he needed to be watched. This matter is between you and me, and it'll stay that way."
It's not as though she's unused to keeping secrets from Gaeta. Sometimes it's not about lying, and more about someone else's peace of mind. What would either of them gain, if she told him why she slit his throat those months ago? What would it do for them? Not everyone needs to know everything.
"If you find you need anything else...I'm staying with Lyubov and Anzu currently, and they've been kind with me having visitors. I know you'd be welcome if you wanted to come by." A tiny, tiny beat. "You said you were sealed away from companionship, and I hope you don't feel like that now."
He appreciates her reassuring judgement more than most would, he thinks. He's spent too long having his own questioned, twisted, and beguiled.
But she speaks again, and he smiles ruefully, looking down at his lap where his hands fidget with one another. "Truth be told, I... I believe that such loneliness is a feeling I will be living with all my life. Though I'm working on gathering evidence to the contrary. Today will be a nice addition, I think."
Lev, Anzu, and Fever all in one place. It sounds like a place he may be very fussed over, which makes him nervous, but a lot of good company besides. It is a good thing, to be worried about. He'll have to learn how to readjust to the discomfort of attention.
"If it's possible, I hope that there will be many more days like today. Many more pieces of evidence to contradict it."
Many more times that someone reaches out in one way or another, to have the word friend said and not contradicted. It's an ongoing process, Fever knows - there's never quite a cure for things like this. But there's patience, and there's those who will provide a safety net, and it's a little easier to breathe with both of those things there. Winter's coming soon, anyway, and that'll lighten the load some as well.
May she never need to act on this promise made. May it remain a possibility, and not an intervention she'll have to execute. May the loneliness, if it doesn't leave, become outweighed on the regular. May he remember he's cared for, by many souls.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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The question gets a laugh that isn't, more of a rueful exhale.
"I'm better than I was at the start of the month. Don't know how else to put it."
She's just glad for this she didn't have to weather the aftermath alone. She wants to have the ground steady enough under her feet by winter, and it might be possible.
"And yourself?"
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He has to keep reminding himself of that. Many years have been change for the worse, but sometimes… sometimes.
“I wanted to talk to you about one of those changes.” No use beating around the bush. “You know of Felix Gaeta, yes? My… my companion.”
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It'd be hard to not see it, if someone was looking. It's in the way they interact, their closeness, their shared company. "Has something changed between you?"
Has it all gone wrong? Is that why it's worse than ever?
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As they walk, he begins to take the lead. They climb up and away off the path, up a hill.
"And him, especially so. I... I myself was, while the island was still a nightmare. I'd given myself over to the Lonely and was lost deep in its belly. I was sealed away from all companionship, except... except he found me. He could, because he'd been claimed by the power of the Web, and he could force a connection into existence to find me. And I never would have gotten out if he hadn't. I do not think I would be free of the Lonely now, if not for him."
He stops, takes a deep breath, then keeps walking. "And yet. He is still a servant to the fear of manipulation. He wields the power of lies, whether he chooses to use it or not. And I do not think I can trust myself to figure it out if something starts going wrong... nor do I believe I would want to."
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Gaeta's been taken by the Web, then. That...Avatar state, as she's heard it said. And while it helped, it's still manipulation. Something that to someone like Mulcahy, for all he's been through...it must be horrifying, to know the person you love is so altered. Now suddenly a servant to all you had to endure, all that undermined your life and sanity. No wonder it's been a hell of a time. Coming out physically wounded, spiritually drained, and now someone who's supposed to be a comfort is a stranger.
"What are you going to do now? Is there some other way you might be able to protect yourself? Some sort of safeguard, for both your sakes?"
Because abandoning Gaeta over this isn't in the cards, no. It's in his face, in his body. It wouldn't hurt so much if he wasn't so precious.
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“That’s what I wanted to speak to you about. I hope I’m not being too forward when I say that you have proven yourself both decisive and protective. I haven’t forgotten what you did for me at the casino. Or how you found me after the opera, and the gala. And when the zombies came, I have seen you blazing in the sky.”
Fever can see where they’re heading now. A lone memorial bench towards the cliffs by the seaside, in a section of the cemetery marked as a potter’s field.
“I hate to ask this favor, and to burden you with the task. But… if you see something going wrong… if he becomes a monster in my own house… would you get me away from him?”
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Do you want him dead, nearly crosses her lips. That is the sort of creature she is, the sort of being he's asking to act like a watchdog.
"Going wrong like what?"
Of course she'll do it. Of course she'll look. If he'll have her for it, she will.
no subject
“I can only tell you this. If it seems like my attachment to him is doing me more harm than good… if he starts to keep me away from all of my friends, for example, especially Zivia… please, become suspicious. If he traps me, I will not be able to get out by myself. I may not even realize that I need to.”
Great trust has been broken between Mulcahy and Gaeta; between Mulcahy and himself. If he cannot trust himself, he must trust someone else.
Fever helped break open the Village. She caught him during the casino and offered safety at the gala. Over and over, he has watched her rise to the island’s defense. He can think of no one better to save him one more time.
no subject
She assumes so. But it feels better than asking if he wants the rift to be utterly permanent without repair. If something feels wrong, then - if Mulcahy seems like he's hiding not out of his own volition. If something just seems too amiss. She'd like to think better of Felix, and for this to never come to pass.
But when you cannot trust yourself to know safety, someone else must. A lifeline, a fallback that will engage without you needing to ask. A way out.
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"I beg you to make every attempt to. Do everything that you can. I want for him every second chance. He should be given time and mercy, no matter what happens. But if he becomes... truly, truly monstrous one day... then I trust you will do what you must."
He hunches over and turns away, leaning a hand on the back of the bench. "Oh, God, I disgust myself."
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"Only if he stops being Felix. Only if this thing takes him so deep that he ceases to be himself. Only if the Web kills him first."
Only if he became a thing that no longer recognized Mulcahy. Because then Gaeta was not there to be spared in the first place. Then will her hands move to violence again.
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“Exactly. Yes.”
He says yes, and puts his face into his hands.
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"...There are others in his same situation. Living with it long before they came to these shores. The power need not consume him. He can still be himself."
It would be hard, and it would require Gaeta to keep trying. To keep choosing otherwise, when it would be easy to let go. But he has a reason to keep trying, doesn't he? He has things to keep being as close to human as he can manage. There's every reason to hope.
And, a contract she'll take as seriously as that of anyone who asked her to kill them, should they get out of hand.
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He’s done it himself, going drunk on others’ fear. He always knew that Gaeta would do the same with him, and now he’s seen the look on his face when he does. He recognized it when he opened the door and saw him on the porch.
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There has to be a way for him to control himself. The bond is already changed. Even vampires can find alternate sources of food.
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"Then you know exactly what he's fighting against, and what he needs to hold himself to. And if he doesn't...I'll intervene. I promise you this."
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He takes another deep breath. "Fever. I don't know how to tell you how much this means to me. What you promise is not just my protection, it is... the guarantee that I will live. I can exist with the certainty of my continuation."
No matter what happens with Gaeta. Fever will do what has to be done to make sure that he goes on. The Village left him with no more strength to withstand manipulation, and so he will not have to rely on his own.
No one can do it alone.
(When was the last time he had any kind of safeguard against his own destruction? … Before Korea, he thinks. A decade ago.)
no subject
What is this power good for? To know when to go and when to stop. When to destroy and when to defend. I hurt you once before. Are you sure? Does it make sense to doubt him when he doubts himself? Looking at him, she sees the scars in his hands. Fever hopes they no longer pain him.
Thank you for your faith. I'll see it won't go to waste.
"...You're my friend," she says, feeling herself get stuck past that point. The emotion is simply too big to fit through the narrow passageway of her throat and to find its way outside to be expressed. Making light of it feels impossible. "And you shouldn't be caged again."
(She thinks Mother would be proud of them both for making plans rooted in life.)
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It’s a simple assertion she makes. It touches him all the same. “Thank you,” he says, thickly.
But one more point of business. “Please don’t tell him about any of this. If you must act, then better he never sees it coming, and if you never do, then… then better he doesn’t know that I ever asked.” A beat of hesitation; a memory. “Un—unless you think otherwise…?”
no subject
It's not as though she's unused to keeping secrets from Gaeta. Sometimes it's not about lying, and more about someone else's peace of mind. What would either of them gain, if she told him why she slit his throat those months ago? What would it do for them? Not everyone needs to know everything.
"If you find you need anything else...I'm staying with Lyubov and Anzu currently, and they've been kind with me having visitors. I know you'd be welcome if you wanted to come by." A tiny, tiny beat. "You said you were sealed away from companionship, and I hope you don't feel like that now."
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But she speaks again, and he smiles ruefully, looking down at his lap where his hands fidget with one another. "Truth be told, I... I believe that such loneliness is a feeling I will be living with all my life. Though I'm working on gathering evidence to the contrary. Today will be a nice addition, I think."
Lev, Anzu, and Fever all in one place. It sounds like a place he may be very fussed over, which makes him nervous, but a lot of good company besides. It is a good thing, to be worried about. He'll have to learn how to readjust to the discomfort of attention.
wrap.
Many more times that someone reaches out in one way or another, to have the word friend said and not contradicted. It's an ongoing process, Fever knows - there's never quite a cure for things like this. But there's patience, and there's those who will provide a safety net, and it's a little easier to breathe with both of those things there. Winter's coming soon, anyway, and that'll lighten the load some as well.
May she never need to act on this promise made. May it remain a possibility, and not an intervention she'll have to execute. May the loneliness, if it doesn't leave, become outweighed on the regular. May he remember he's cared for, by many souls.