allmhadadh: (Nature)
[personal profile] allmhadadh
He half-slept, something between dream and reality; a restless doze, where he would stir himself awake just to make sure he was still breathing.  And then, confirmed, in the rain tapering to a sprinkle, then a mist, then the clear and clean and hazy scent left afterwards, he would drift back into that half-asleep state again. It wasn't that bad, really.  It hurt, but it wasn't that bad.  He knew he wasn't in any mortal danger from injury, just beaten.

He drifted there, in that place, breath shallow to avoid making the pain flare across his left side.  Counted himself lucky that all of the hurt was on the left, and he could lay on the right.  A matter of fact thought, like most of his waking thoughts.  His dozing thoughts were less settled; fragments and pieces and when he woke up to see the suns rising, he realized all over again that he was far more afraid of leaving this place than he was of any number of beatings.


It wasn't that he liked Risa.  He just wanted to have room to run.  He could not stand that sensation of being cornered and pinned; a good kicking had reminded him of why.  Here, he could go back to some quiet spot that was his own, and curl around his wounds.  There, there was no room to run.

He had chosen to go into Starfleet, and the restrictions placed on his time and movements both had not bothered him.  He had gone in fully prepared to sacrifice his freedom for his goals.  And when he got some freedom back, he took it and ran hard with it; ran to the edge of the Pacific itself, and then ran right into it, too.  A moment of impulse, of outward and open defiance.

And when he crawled out of the waves he'd been battling against, cold and soaked and facing a very long hike back to the Academy, he'd rested on his elbows in the sand and laughed.  Just laughed, hard, maybe a little unstable.  Laughed until he practically put himself in tears.  When he'd dragged himself back up, to go back, something in him felt better; like he'd figured something quiet out, that he had not known before.

Now he came back before the Pacific; a half-drifting dream where he didn't run past the edge of the world.  And now, he felt all over again all he'd really lost; in that restless, painful half-sleep, he could only draw the tattered old pieces around him that were left; that he was still breathing, and that he was still unbroken.

He woke up that time to low orange suns and staggered down to the water's edge, trying in vain to clean himself up a bit.  His face was pretty bad; he could feel it.  His head, too.  Most worrisome was that he felt shaky and dizzy; blood loss, probably, now not countered by adrenaline.  Not fatal, not even desperately painful.  Just worrisome.  He knew he couldn't climb back up again, though he also knew he wasn't going to die before...

He tried to clean himself up, then retreated back up to his spot, which was slowly being warmed by the suns.  He would miss this spot, and the pain he felt from that knowledge was far worse than his face.  Not because he liked Risa.  Just because he could understand this, living under a place where people walked and played and ate and talked above, removed some from it and therefore safe from it. 

He half-drifted again, trying to order chaotic thoughts.  He wondered why he had agreed to go.  Why he had ever allowed that other Scott to have that kind of power over him; that the idea of causing sorrow was enough to make him give up his running room.  He didn't even know the man, aside for just over a week; he didn't know how much of any of what was said was true.  He knew the other Scott believed it was true, but Scotty knew well that believing something didn't necessarily make it real.  And now, he was giving up his freedom again.

He just wasn't so sure it was his choice this time.

The suns were higher; still breathing, still unbroken.  He reached out gingerly and dragged his shell over, looking into the pinks and blues and purples and oranges that made it beautiful.  He tried to make sense of it all.  He didn't feel sorry for himself; it wouldn't change anything.  Just felt resigned, and tired.  To him, there was no certain future, no faith, no hope.  It wasn't a bad thing, really.  No more than getting a beating was a bad thing.  It was just the way things were; facts, immutable.

He sent a message to the other Scott with his PADD, not getting up to do it, just like he had signed his application for Command School.  And then, he went back to half-dreaming, half-waking.

Before the Pacific.

Date: 2009-08-21 08:51 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] haroldlee.livejournal.com
He downed what he wanted of the pie, washing it back with the water. He eased himself back into the sand this time, leaving Scotty sitting up, hoping he wasn't too close. Didn't want to move again for a while.

He put is hand back out - seemed right, he didn't know why - and closed his eyes. There was several things he wished he could tell Scotty, but he didn't really know how, or if Scotty would want to know. He settled on, "It fucking hurts, man."

Date: 2009-08-21 09:04 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] allmhadadh.livejournal.com
"Which part?" He didn't want to go assuming which part; he could guess a few, but likely not all.

Date: 2009-08-21 09:24 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] haroldlee.livejournal.com
Huh. Harold wasn't entirely sure what he'd meant when he said. It was just sort of - something to share.

He'd try.

"My head, mostly. Ribs, too. But it wasn't really that. Just sort of hurts to think about going back, or going forward. Too much to think about. Doesn't make any sense, sorry."

Date: 2009-08-21 09:26 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] allmhadadh.livejournal.com
"S'a'right." He looked off, then picked up his little shell, looking down at it. "I could stay 'ere. Live right 'ere, under this thing. Figure out some way o' livin'." It was the thoughts an eight year old would have; the notion of living like Robinson Crusoe, or Peter Pan, or whatever; childish thoughts. Even he knew they were. He just forgot, all too often, that he was only ten years removed from that and not far older. "I dinna wanna leave."

Date: 2009-08-21 09:34 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] haroldlee.livejournal.com
"Heh. We could camp out under this pier until we die, man." He smiled a little at that. Wouldn't be so bad, would it? Wouldn't have to worry about mooching off of a ship he didn't belong on, and off of a relationship he sometimes thought he didn't belong in.

"But-- you know, you're wanted, right? At least--" Aw, shit, he sounded like a girl again. "I don't want you to stay here, okay?"

Date: 2009-08-21 09:35 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] allmhadadh.livejournal.com
"'M nae stayin' here." And that thought again gave him a spike of genuine sorrow. "I told th' other one I'd go. So, I'll go." He wouldn't go back on his word.

Date: 2009-08-21 09:43 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] haroldlee.livejournal.com
"Stay here for now, though," Harold mumbled. A soft happiness blossomed in his mind; he hadn't really known that Scotty was considering not coming back, but the reassurance that he was--

It was like a piece of home.

Harold closed his eyes and breathed, sand flowing easily through his fingers.

"What hurts for you?" he asked, after a time.

Date: 2009-08-21 09:46 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] allmhadadh.livejournal.com
There was no such reassurance in his own mind. Just that overwhelming sense of inevitability. He took a long drink of water, then just shook his head and curled up back in the sand on his good right side, in the sunlight. There wasn't really any answer to that, when the answer wasn't pain so much as fear; he'd already basically said all he could. He didn't want to leave here.

Date: 2009-08-21 09:52 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] haroldlee.livejournal.com
The silence stretched on.


It should have troubled him, really, but--

"Everything's gonna be fine, man."

He wasn't sure if he'd said it outloud, half asleep as he was. Didn't necessarily feel it, either, but saying it was sort of half the battle, he thought.

His hand, open fingers filled with soil, retained its place in the sand, reaching out for anything. He drifted, eventually sleeping.

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