ic contact//CURRENT

[darkov]

[INSERT DEFAULT INBOX VOICE MESSAGE/EMAIL GREETING HERE]
email: ENABLED (will go unanswered)
text: ENABLED (high probability these will go unanswered)
phone/audio: ENABLED
video: ENABLED
latest status update 3/6/2018

Comments

[ct_7567]

[ He shouldn't need reassurance. He shouldn't need it from a kid of all people either, his kid, suffering the way he has been. He could let Martin walk away, as he usually does. But they haven't talked about it properly, have they? What Rex had done, to someone Martin loves? They just settled back into their ordinary routine, ignoring that vacuum that surrounds them like a shroud, not knowing how Martin felt about the way Cassandra had passed, not knowing if he and Andy or anyone else had spoken of it at all.

Mouth dry, he speaks, his voice as matter-of-fact as it always is, that familiar low rumble in his chest. ]

Do you, now? Even after what happened?

[darkov]

[he nods once more, staring at the window. the comfortable chill radiates from his chest to his arms, makes them feel for a moment heavy, then barely there at all.]

She said... [he swallows down on the crack in his voice.] We deserve better. Than what we were raised for. You and me.

She told me that a lot.

[and Rex? Rex is...even if he's like Martin in ways, he's better. even if he pulled that trigger. he'd never do it to be cruel. he's good, all the way through. there's no wretched piece of him, not the way Martin has.]

We shouldn't have to...kill them. The ones we love.

[ct_7567]

She did. Didn't she.

[ Cassandra's words are helping him even now, damn her. It shouldn't have been her. It should have...

Maybe it shouldn't have been any of them. ]

You're doing what I told you.

[darkov]

[Martin's posture shifts a little as he tries to place what he means. a faint bit of anxiety flutters in his stomach before dissolving, but it does enough to have him scour recent memory for what Rex is referring to.

what he told him. he tells him a lot of things, and none of them about the possibility of having to put down a treasured person -- a family member.]

I don't know what you mean.

[he finally looks back, squinting a little for some sign of clue on Rex himself.]

[ct_7567]

I told you, once, that the best way to honour someone's life is to carry them with you. To respect the things that you had learned from them, if you thought them to be right.

[ Martin doesn't remember - or if he had, it's not something he's actively thinking about. But he absorbed it nonetheless. Maybe he's gotten better at dealing with grief, after all that he's been through. Or perhaps he's just puzzling his way through it, bashing it into different shapes to try to make it make sense. ]

You're carrying her with you.

[darkov]

...

[his gaze flickers away as he processes the weight of that answer. the weight of...carrying another person. their lessons.

is that the heavy feeling in his chest? is it the same for Rex?

he nods vaguely, starting to turn away from the window, his eyes settling on the unfinished laundry on the bed.]

Do you want help finishing up?

[ct_7567]

...no. No, that's fine. I can handle it. [ God knows he should be able to handle that much without melting down again. He probably will after Martin leaves the room, but he'll maintain as much dignity as he can. ]

Go say hello to Andy. Help her get dinner on.

[ Even if that just means picking out take-out. ]

tapdances off-stage w this endtag

[darkov]

...Yes, sir.

[there's more he should do or say, Martin thinks. there's some gap he's not filling to make this better -- not right, because he certainly knows he'd never be able to do that. but...turning away, leaving Rex with the silence of Cassandra's room...

was it really enough to try comforting him? trying is, after all, the only thing he believes himself truly capable of. but trying to help Rex isn't the same as doing it, and despite the weight of weariness pressing down upon him, stifling the means to exert so much effort and care, Martin still does care.

he hates what this has all come to. she was right. they deserve better. Rex does. there shouldn't have to be more wars to fight -- especially among each other, against their wills.

he's finally, really grasping onto that and believing. they deserve better than this.]