This post is William's IC inbox at ataraxion. You can drop network or action stuff that doesn't quite feel like it fits or warrants a post on the main communities in here.
[ William's concern is like sandpaper on his skin. He resents it like he resents Charles's perfectly logical maybe-it-wasn't-the-ship suggestion because he doesn't know what to do with either.
Can't it be enough that I'm here doing you a favor? he wants to ask. William really pissed him off last jump, but here he is-- he thinks he (or anyone) would have ample reason to never speak to him again. But of course it's not enough; it's never enough for anyone that he just does things. They've got to pick at him and if it's not one reason it's another, but it's always because something is wrong with him. 'Concern' like this or trying to interrogate or vilify him.
Bitterness coils in his chest, but he's too tired to lash out. ]
I'll need scrap metal and dirt. [ He's just not going to acknowledge any of that, because fuck you. ] Transfiguration is not always permanent, and with little things like this and all their parts that are meant to change when they hit a target, it's risky leaving them for too long in storage. They might revert given enough time. I can make you a few test rounds, then more before you leave.
Is that what happened to the sort-of-table in your room? [William inquires, before he can remember the incident that led him to be in the wizard's room. He pauses, his face locking into an inexpressive robot impression for an instant, before he blinks out of it. (Being an average person in this respect, William does not tend to be concerned about people when they are doing well.) (Nor would he pick on anybody if there was nothing wrong with them, but that is neither here nor there.)
(Presently, he's confident he's done something wrong, but this mortification seems less important than whatever mysterious shit smeared Severus' day.) (Less important to himself personally, and also evidently to Severus as well.) (Also not news.)] I can absolutely find scrap metal and dirt for you, no fucking problem. I've got a few spliffs and cigarettes left over, too, if you fancy it.
Or feel comparatively ambivalent toward it. [Tentatively, he lets himself slouch forward again, his elbows on the table. He looks at the reassembled bullet.] Could run it by y' room at the same time.
[ Staring at work all the time even from his bed is what he was tired of. Normally work is calming and comforting, but the headaches and roadblocks the ship throws at his magic can frustrate him to the point of rather intense anger. He hasn't decided what he'll put there instead; maybe he'll just let it be itself again.
Merlin... Severus suppresses a sigh. What is William on about now. ]
You can take it to my office in the science labs. The bullet materials, [ he clarifies pointedly. ] and a reference. I've no need of anything else.
[ Let's be real: Severus could do with getting high, and also getting laid. But it's not happening. ]
[That would certainly be the case from where William is sitting. He suspects this is the attitude cultivated by a lot of book-learnin' and the resultant competencies. It's quite admirable, if you find pain tolerance amirable, and there are many subcultures around the world that make a rather profound point of that. Unironically and everything.] Science labs, [he says.] Sure.
Are you worried about side-effects? [He is probably not referring to the scientific laboratories or Severus' office location within them.
Probably??] The incidence of cancer of any kind aboard the Tranquility is remarkably low, actually, and I'd bet the psychoactive effects of the ship have got fuck-all to do wif substances. [He pinches the bullet between his fingers, pushes it back into the clip. Looks up at the Professor again with what passes for optimism, if you think you aren't likely to become transformed into a pig very soon.]
I smoke. [ Cigarettes. William has probably noticed; he's not a chainsmoker or anything, but his clothes smell like the remains of it sometimes. His room, too, faintly, and the other man was in there. Relatively recently.
Being a nuisance.
But anyway, he traded for cigarettes here and there, and got plenty on Arima. So, ] The rest of it just bores me.
[ He did reference quaaludes, a little while back. He was a kid in the sixties and seventies; Severus is no stranger to recreational drug use. Hell, he's mixed some himself. Alchemist. He just doesn't care. It shuts his brain off and when his brain shuts off he feels like he doesn't have anything.
Good, [says William, in response to Severus' remark about smoking.
He is the greatest doctor that ever was. Possibly also, in some small part of himself he cannot admit to to anyone in his actual acquaintance, William is rather pleased to have confirmed a small personal detail about Severus Snape other than the fact he favors the color black, is British, and knows very much about evil magic.]
What's boring about it? [he inquires. He collects the handgun in the same hand he's holding the clip in, jumbles the lot of it back into the bag, metal clicking on metal as it settles on the shapeless fabric bottom.]
[ While Severus is relieved that William has ceased his prying, he knows that this is just another tactic. A bizarre animal ritual, trying to wiggle close enough disarm him. He doesn't understand why - whatever motivation the other man has, it's too insidious (or mysterious) for him to currently grasp. Sincerity doesn't make the list; stupidity, maybe, or desperation. Wanting to be near someone monstrous out of fascination.
He wants to ask. Why are you doing this, why did you kiss me-- but he won't. Even articulating the questions to himself would come too close to acknowledging the black hole he keeps boarded up, the one which once had a label that he's long scratched off. The space sits in his insides and obligingly pretends not to exist. The crushing weight of how lonely he is turned some time ago to emotional dark matter best left unexamined. ]
I'm not interested in altering my perception of reality.
[With the gun and gun bits put away, there's nothing for William to do with his hands that could make pretend to be busy here anymore, but that's okay. The ruse was for his own sake more than anything, behavioral Novocaine that he uses to ease into the painfully long painful stretches of awkwardness pain that comes of most of his attempts to talk to Severus.
He has some peculiar pain tolerances of his own.] Is that because it's a right cunting bastard when the effect wears off? [William asks, amiable still, if you're the type to like people. Fascination with darkness would require a better grasp of relative comparisons than William might actually have. Fascination is more Guangtou's style, at any rate, and Guangtou's been quiet lately.
Yet another demonstration that William should probably work on his perception of variations in darkness.] Coming down, the morning after.
[ Dark eyes narrow at the language. Severus is not puritanical in his vocabulary, not by far, but there's something about the particular way William abuses the world via things said out loud that occasionally gets on his nerves. It really is distasteful. ]
No. [ A syllable that's only slightly drawn out. ]
What are you trying to forget, that you do like it?
[That question traveled against the flow of traffic. William scratches his leg underneath the table, a little uneasy about it, not entirely aware of why. He doesn't want to say anything embarrassing. As unimpressive as he is now, he was considerably less so before before Guangtou.
He almost forgets to be adominished-by-squint about his language, but only almost. Message received. He isn't exactly sure which word was the wrong one; he supposes Severus' parents might not have been married.] I was a criminal, [he says, finally.] Stole some shit, went places I shouldn'tve, stuck wif the wrong people, and ovver people died because of it. I was a different person.
[This, he says very matter-of-factly, before thinking to soften it with a joke:] Even on a fuckin' brain-activity level, I mean.
Anyhow. [William shrugs.] Lesson learned. Don't like remembering exactly how, is all. No point in that.
[ So, William is a reformed criminal. Also probably a drug addict. He manages to be halfway functional despite it, apparently. Severus isn't surprised, but it does explain why he seems to think the wizard is an acceptable target for his attempts at closeness. Low standards; a taste for the gutter already in place.
Something else stands out to him, though. ]
Is that all?
[ Another man might have laughed. Lucius probably would.
He thinks again about asking William why he kissed him. ]
I don't think that's damning enough to warrant blowing your brains out on chemicals.
My brain recovers faster than most, [William says, easily enough that it's hard to tell he's increasingly surprised at this line of questioning, not in a bad way necessarily. He suspects Severus is deflecting, which still works out all right; he is being conditioned to make a nuisance of himself more often.
But cautiously.
His silence twists like a worm on a hook. This is a new level of painful awkward, but to be fair, William has only been it for a little while.]
Someone got inside my head.
[--even just saying it reminds William, all at once, that there ought to be someone inside his head. His eyes cut abruptly across the rec room, sweep the blank walls, in search of-- anything, a springwater leak, a corrosion in the shape of a palm, roaches in a troupe, fragmented hallucinations of the old world, the cadence of a rust-edged breath grating through his inner-ear. But there is nothing, no one, even when he thinks, 光头?, and he realizes only afterward some seconds have passed-- he's not sure how many-- probably enough to be rude, by the standards of the present company.] It's a stupid story, with a load of stupid parts, and I feel daft telling it. [He thinks he'd feel daft, anyway; he hasn't, before.] Any particular reason you'd like to know?
[ Severus watches this squirming progression with the silent attentiveness of someone very used to making other people squirm. His gaze is always intense, but right now it's particularly piercing; not aggressive, not offensive, just needlelike. As if he can puncture holes in the bubble of William's story just by looking-- to see what comes out.
Softly, ] Why is it you're so keen on asking me invasive questions but are unable to handle the scrutiny of being asked about a topic you brought up on your own?
[ His voice is a jarring contrast to his eyes. But the quicksand quality remains.
William is the one who started talking about drugs.
After what is not a very long moment at all, Severus decides he doesn't care about the answer. He rises, elegant movement and spider angles. Cowardice is worse than the language, and he doesn't want to talk about things being inside of peoples heads right now. Sometimes his own aches from the Occlumency, but even he doesn't know why; protesting being trapped, maybe. Or maybe it's being called by that previously mentioned black hole. ]
Drop the items at my office when you're able.
[ If William finds his own past that unbearable...
My questions wasn't that bad, [sounds feeble and William knows it sounds feeble. Worse, probably, unfair. His cowardice is only that.
But as he watches Severus get up, he's seized by a sudden and unexpected urge to move perpendicular to fear. His gut clutches up on itself like a badly aimed attempt to clamp his balls up as he watches the professor get up, start to turn.]
I was a whore for awhile. [His voice holds steady but sounds like he swallowed a cup of gravel between the wizard's blinks.] It wasn't my idea and I hated it, and I thought I got out when I enlisted wif Blackstone, but. [but.] Morgoth used it, when he needed.
Turned me inside out like a velvet tube wif googly-eyes. Which I suppose was just about what I was back then, on Earth, [has the register of a side note to it, to go with the furious rubbing he gives his left eye.] I tortured some people on Arima for him, and at least one of them remembers. It all smears togevver into one stinking stain when I remember.
So.
[so.
After some seconds, he decides that things are not much improved by the sudden discovery of his backbone. Jelly shreds; bone breaks. Severus has nice shoes. He would rather talk about demons, even to a guy who can probably exorcise the one he needs.]
[ He stops. Sort of. It is not a sudden, straight-backed stop of guilt or shock. It is a slowing, one step taking a longer moment than the one prior, the last one heavy with suppressed aggravation. A hand goes to his hip, his posture impatient. For a long moment he does not turn around.
When he does: ]
If you're having complications from Morgoth's magic, I can take a look at it again. If you need a therapist, you'll have to go elsewhere. Xenogen does not currently employ one.
[ Really, though, why isn't doing him a favor enough? Did William bring him here with a bullshit request just to try and have a heart to heart? The manipulative bent to telling him something that's supposed to be wrenching and sad as he tries to leave makes him bristle. What's he supposed to do with this information? Pat William on the shoulder and tell him it's fine? Give him a hug? Write a sad poem? Everyone suffers. William is not special for it, and blurting it all out does not make him want to turn his gaze soft and apologize. Severus cares about William in his own way, but whatever it is that the other man wants from him, Severus does not want to give.
(He will not forget any further revelation about what kind of monster Morgoth was.) ]
[An offer of help was more than William had expected, judging by the confused spring to his eyebrows. To the best of his own recollection, he had been answering a question about his substance use after having been knocked soundly for his evasion.] Thanks, professor. But it ain't nothing a bit of weed some days don't sort, [he says.]
[(To be fair, this is the first time he has ever been possessed by a demon.) (Certainly, it's been an ordeal of some years, but it's one continuous ordeal; he has no way of knowing.)
Help offered is better than a grimacing recoil, at any rate. If that help offered happens to be wearing a formidable scowl, well-- so has it ever. He imagines he had been too slow answering; Severus must be aggravated at the delay on his way to his next deed of exasperated samaritanship, or magical studies, or sitting in the cold darkness in his room, or whatever it is.] And thanks for the bullets. [He stands up too, bag over his shoulder.] I'll be along wif the stuff soon.
[ Right. Fine. Whatever. Severus doesn't hide his look of irritation as he moves away again. You know, not everyone who spews out a tragic tale at him gets anything besides a door slammed in their face, but by all means, William, brush it off and continue to deal with your problems by getting high.
It's not really that terrible of an issue, Severus just gets irrationally annoyed at complacency.
Once he's outside the rec room doors, he turns on his heel and vanishes. ]
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no subject
Can't it be enough that I'm here doing you a favor? he wants to ask. William really pissed him off last jump, but here he is-- he thinks he (or anyone) would have ample reason to never speak to him again. But of course it's not enough; it's never enough for anyone that he just does things. They've got to pick at him and if it's not one reason it's another, but it's always because something is wrong with him. 'Concern' like this or trying to interrogate or vilify him.
Bitterness coils in his chest, but he's too tired to lash out. ]
I'll need scrap metal and dirt. [ He's just not going to acknowledge any of that, because fuck you. ] Transfiguration is not always permanent, and with little things like this and all their parts that are meant to change when they hit a target, it's risky leaving them for too long in storage. They might revert given enough time. I can make you a few test rounds, then more before you leave.
no subject
(Presently, he's confident he's done something wrong, but this mortification seems less important than whatever mysterious shit smeared Severus' day.) (Less important to himself personally, and also evidently to Severus as well.) (Also not news.)] I can absolutely find scrap metal and dirt for you, no fucking problem. I've got a few spliffs and cigarettes left over, too, if you fancy it.
Or feel comparatively ambivalent toward it. [Tentatively, he lets himself slouch forward again, his elbows on the table. He looks at the reassembled bullet.] Could run it by y' room at the same time.
no subject
[ Staring at work all the time even from his bed is what he was tired of. Normally work is calming and comforting, but the headaches and roadblocks the ship throws at his magic can frustrate him to the point of rather intense anger. He hasn't decided what he'll put there instead; maybe he'll just let it be itself again.
Merlin... Severus suppresses a sigh. What is William on about now. ]
You can take it to my office in the science labs. The bullet materials, [ he clarifies pointedly. ] and a reference. I've no need of anything else.
[ Let's be real: Severus could do with getting high, and also getting laid. But it's not happening. ]
no subject
Are you worried about side-effects? [He is probably not referring to the scientific laboratories or Severus' office location within them.
Probably??] The incidence of cancer of any kind aboard the Tranquility is remarkably low, actually, and I'd bet the psychoactive effects of the ship have got fuck-all to do wif substances. [He pinches the bullet between his fingers, pushes it back into the clip. Looks up at the Professor again with what passes for optimism, if you think you aren't likely to become transformed into a pig very soon.]
no subject
Being a nuisance.
But anyway, he traded for cigarettes here and there, and got plenty on Arima. So, ] The rest of it just bores me.
[ He did reference quaaludes, a little while back. He was a kid in the sixties and seventies; Severus is no stranger to recreational drug use. Hell, he's mixed some himself. Alchemist. He just doesn't care. It shuts his brain off and when his brain shuts off he feels like he doesn't have anything.
He hates it. ]
no subject
He is the greatest doctor that ever was. Possibly also, in some small part of himself he cannot admit to to anyone in his actual acquaintance, William is rather pleased to have confirmed a small personal detail about Severus Snape other than the fact he favors the color black, is British, and knows very much about evil magic.]
What's boring about it? [he inquires. He collects the handgun in the same hand he's holding the clip in, jumbles the lot of it back into the bag, metal clicking on metal as it settles on the shapeless fabric bottom.]
no subject
He wants to ask. Why are you doing this, why did you kiss me-- but he won't. Even articulating the questions to himself would come too close to acknowledging the black hole he keeps boarded up, the one which once had a label that he's long scratched off. The space sits in his insides and obligingly pretends not to exist. The crushing weight of how lonely he is turned some time ago to emotional dark matter best left unexamined. ]
I'm not interested in altering my perception of reality.
no subject
He has some peculiar pain tolerances of his own.] Is that because it's a right cunting bastard when the effect wears off? [William asks, amiable still, if you're the type to like people. Fascination with darkness would require a better grasp of relative comparisons than William might actually have. Fascination is more Guangtou's style, at any rate, and Guangtou's been quiet lately.
Yet another demonstration that William should probably work on his perception of variations in darkness.] Coming down, the morning after.
no subject
No. [ A syllable that's only slightly drawn out. ]
What are you trying to forget, that you do like it?
no subject
He almost forgets to be adominished-by-squint about his language, but only almost. Message received. He isn't exactly sure which word was the wrong one; he supposes Severus' parents might not have been married.] I was a criminal, [he says, finally.] Stole some shit, went places I shouldn'tve, stuck wif the wrong people, and ovver people died because of it. I was a different person.
[This, he says very matter-of-factly, before thinking to soften it with a joke:] Even on a fuckin' brain-activity level, I mean.
Anyhow. [William shrugs.] Lesson learned. Don't like remembering exactly how, is all. No point in that.
no subject
Something else stands out to him, though. ]
Is that all?
[ Another man might have laughed. Lucius probably would.
He thinks again about asking William why he kissed him. ]
I don't think that's damning enough to warrant blowing your brains out on chemicals.
no subject
But cautiously.
His silence twists like a worm on a hook. This is a new level of painful awkward, but to be fair, William has only been it for a little while.]
Someone got inside my head.
[--even just saying it reminds William, all at once, that there ought to be someone inside his head. His eyes cut abruptly across the rec room, sweep the blank walls, in search of-- anything, a springwater leak, a corrosion in the shape of a palm, roaches in a troupe, fragmented hallucinations of the old world, the cadence of a rust-edged breath grating through his inner-ear. But there is nothing, no one, even when he thinks, 光头?, and he realizes only afterward some seconds have passed-- he's not sure how many-- probably enough to be rude, by the standards of the present company.] It's a stupid story, with a load of stupid parts, and I feel daft telling it. [He thinks he'd feel daft, anyway; he hasn't, before.] Any particular reason you'd like to know?
no subject
Softly, ] Why is it you're so keen on asking me invasive questions but are unable to handle the scrutiny of being asked about a topic you brought up on your own?
[ His voice is a jarring contrast to his eyes. But the quicksand quality remains.
William is the one who started talking about drugs.
After what is not a very long moment at all, Severus decides he doesn't care about the answer. He rises, elegant movement and spider angles. Cowardice is worse than the language, and he doesn't want to talk about things being inside of peoples heads right now. Sometimes his own aches from the Occlumency, but even he doesn't know why; protesting being trapped, maybe. Or maybe it's being called by that previously mentioned black hole. ]
Drop the items at my office when you're able.
[ If William finds his own past that unbearable...
Well.
He's just going to leave. ]
no subject
But as he watches Severus get up, he's seized by a sudden and unexpected urge to move perpendicular to fear. His gut clutches up on itself like a badly aimed attempt to clamp his balls up as he watches the professor get up, start to turn.]
I was a whore for awhile. [His voice holds steady but sounds like he swallowed a cup of gravel between the wizard's blinks.] It wasn't my idea and I hated it, and I thought I got out when I enlisted wif Blackstone, but. [but.] Morgoth used it, when he needed.
Turned me inside out like a velvet tube wif googly-eyes. Which I suppose was just about what I was back then, on Earth, [has the register of a side note to it, to go with the furious rubbing he gives his left eye.] I tortured some people on Arima for him, and at least one of them remembers. It all smears togevver into one stinking stain when I remember.
So.
[so.
After some seconds, he decides that things are not much improved by the sudden discovery of his backbone. Jelly shreds; bone breaks. Severus has nice shoes. He would rather talk about demons, even to a guy who can probably exorcise the one he needs.]
no subject
When he does: ]
If you're having complications from Morgoth's magic, I can take a look at it again. If you need a therapist, you'll have to go elsewhere. Xenogen does not currently employ one.
[ Really, though, why isn't doing him a favor enough? Did William bring him here with a bullshit request just to try and have a heart to heart? The manipulative bent to telling him something that's supposed to be wrenching and sad as he tries to leave makes him bristle. What's he supposed to do with this information? Pat William on the shoulder and tell him it's fine? Give him a hug? Write a sad poem? Everyone suffers. William is not special for it, and blurting it all out does not make him want to turn his gaze soft and apologize. Severus cares about William in his own way, but whatever it is that the other man wants from him, Severus does not want to give.
(He will not forget any further revelation about what kind of monster Morgoth was.) ]
thx for the thread, im flying out now **/
[(To be fair, this is the first time he has ever been possessed by a demon.) (Certainly, it's been an ordeal of some years, but it's one continuous ordeal; he has no way of knowing.)
Help offered is better than a grimacing recoil, at any rate. If that help offered happens to be wearing a formidable scowl, well-- so has it ever. He imagines he had been too slow answering; Severus must be aggravated at the delay on his way to his next deed of exasperated samaritanship, or magical studies, or sitting in the cold darkness in his room, or whatever it is.] And thanks for the bullets. [He stands up too, bag over his shoulder.] I'll be along wif the stuff soon.
Hope fings get better.
have a good/safe flight!!
It's not really that terrible of an issue, Severus just gets irrationally annoyed at complacency.
Once he's outside the rec room doors, he turns on his heel and vanishes. ]