indispensible | one. spam & voice. spread love like violence.

[There's no question in Vin's mind about reading through the file several times. There's also no question of letting Stark see it. He knows what's in it. She is not all that surprised herself, not about the generalities. The specifics hurt more than she thought they would.]

[Hell. And - Alice.]

[She knows his habits well enough by now that she can track him down quickly. He's on the deck. She wrinkles her nose again; he's smoking.]

Stark.

[If he'd wanted to be James, he would have said that from the start.]

public } voice

[While her voice isn't hesitant, it's definitely quiet. She still doesn't quite understand the point of the network, but now that she's been paired it'd probably be more noticeable not to say something.]

I'm Vin. I arrived here a few weeks ago, and I've spoken to - some of you. I'm a warden.

[She considers leaving it at that, but decides against it.]

I'd like to know about other people's worlds. I don't know very much about Earth, but that's not where I'm from. So it would be useful.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

No.

[She blinks up at him coolly.]

There are people here you should ask - how breaking me worked out for them.

Try it.

I don't need to.

[He knows they ended up dead. Probably more than that. But he's not afraid of that because he doesn't care about the consequences.]

[She can't push without expecting to get shoved right back.]

I know you don't.

[She's not threatening him, either. She wouldn't want to - doesn't need to - and it isn't her style. No, she doesn't threaten. She destroys. Or she preserves. One or the other.]

[This, this is something new. A repair. She's added another crack today, but it would've been added one way or another. Alice is at the center of everything. Even Vin can see that. Alice loved him, and Alice is gone.]

[His Elend is gone. He's lost the ability to care, and his will to live. But he can get that back. She believes.]

[She also knows how long it'll take.]

So we'll keep fighting until you get tired of it.

[Stark rolls his eyes and starts to walk out, but he stops at the door.]

Mention her to me again, Vin, and I'll kill you.

[He looks over his shoulder at her, the look in his eyes is entirely serious. He's not threatening or posturing. He's stating simple facts of point A to point B. Vin had no right to even say Alice's name let alone try and make him talk. Part of him knows she did it just to provoke him and she didn't expect actual results, but that doesn't make it okay.]

[That never makes it fucking okay.]

[She could have said anything, poked and prodded at whatever issue in his file there was, and he wouldn't hate her. He'd get pissed, but he'd walk away from it not hating her. He could let go how she totally gets it with some pop psyche bullshit. But Vin doesn't fucking know jack shit about Alice and seems to think she has a clue just because she read some words out of a file. She can make all the assumptions in the world about him and what he's gone through. But she has absolutely no goddamn right to even pretend like she knows anything about Alice. She's not her. She never met her. And what couple of throwaway lines are in his file aren't enough to make it otherwise.]

[His anger didn't fade. It just hardened into something much stronger.]

[The trouble is that Vin knows, can see, what Alice was to him and what she's become. He loves her - but she's become more and also less than that. Something to hang his anger on. Something to give him strength.]

[He loves her, Vin can see that, but it's more complicated than that. And that's why she will have to be brought up again.]

[Vin doesn't doubt what Stark is saying in the least. If she mentions Alice again, he'll kill her. But all that means, in this place and at this time, is that she'll be dying again soon.]

[She is resigned to this. It's what she needs to do, she supposes; there are worse things to spend her new life on.]

I understand.

[Stark only lingers for a second or two longer. Just long enough to see that she does, in fact, understand. She understands that Alice is important to him. Maybe not in the ways she might expect or assume, but enough so that he would kill her over it.]

[But she ~~knows the risk, but she has to know him~~ is still standing there. She's unafraid. He can do his absolute worst and she'll stand there and take it.]

[Goddamn her.]

[Stark turns and leaves. He just has to get the hell away from her even though he as no intention of going back to his room right now even a little roughed up.]