[ When the ability to experience such things as shame is removed, it is easier to meet another's gaze and hold it, no matter how uncomfortable it would be for most humans. But somehow, Amber feels the need to look down and away from Havoc's eyes. There's something in them she recognizes but can't name. Something she should understand but doesn't. Something she lost but not completely.
She doesn't remember a family, but she still remembers the hollow spaces they left behind in her mind, like the negative of a family picture with the important details washed out.
But she can read between the lines, nodding in understanding. ]
You could find someone else like her. Now that you're this way.
[ This way, she says, as if she can't quite say it, admit it, out loud. ]
[Havoc's voice was low, her gaze falling once Amber's did, returning to the chicken. The sound her knife made was soothing, blade on cutting board, the sounds of domesticity and a home.]
You can't just find someone else that easily.
[No matter what way you were. It's what made family "special". She'd learned that in those quiet days.]
[ Her instinct is to say there must be a way, because there is always, always one. But that mindset isn't for everyone. For most, one life is all one has. One family. One great love of their lives. Even if she would wish for a clean slate for her friend, a way of starting anew with a family to love, a home to belong in. Just because she lost it once doesn't mean she can't find it again.
Right?
Amber spares her a sideways glance, having stopped her chopping by now. ]
[ Amber, for her part, is content to do nothing else but watch Havoc, as if seeing her standing over a pot of boiling water is the most fascinating thing in the world. She needs to know if she would lie to her, even if this method isn't foolproof. ]
The ability to remember-- [ No, that's not quite it. ] To remember your life as your own.
[ Unlike the way she views most of her memories. Detached. As if watching it happen to someone else entirely. ]
[She answers quickly enough once the clarification is out there, though she doesn't look back Amber's way. Not out of the desire to hide, but simply because she was focusing. Cooking was soothing to her- once she'd begun to like it, and what it did to other people. What it could do.
Make them happy.]
I didn't go under for the ME much in the first place... one of the benefits of freelancing.
[A benefit most Contractors couldn't afford. But with offensive power like Havoc had possessed... even without a government sponsoring her actions, she'd been almost untouchable. Who'd want to risk their own life taking her down?]
I asked them for my ability to feel back, more specifically. Like humans did.
[Paused, hands in a bag of barley scrapping out what little remained.]
Do.
[Even she couldn't quite remember the phrasing- her recruitment had occurred where her death had, on cold concrete with shards of ice melting in her chest. It was all a blur. But she knew she must have specified something about it being unable to take back- or she knew as a Contractor she would have gone to the instructors first chance she had and voided the request.
What Contractor would willingly compromise their ability to survive that way?]
Once you know what the emotions are like... it doesn't feel like watching someone else's life anymore.
[Tossed a handful of the grain in to the water to thicken it, reaching for her last can of broth, mechanically cutting open the lid.]
[ It doesn't feel like watching someone else's life anymore. Like that one moment of clarity when she saw Hei smile, blinding. It felt like seeing a glimpse of a world in streaming colors after decades of seeing only in dulled black and white. It was jarring, frightening. It left her feeling as if she's standing on the edge of a deadly cliff, wanting only to get away, return to safety. It left her wanting.
How many years, decades, centuries, would she give just to see it one more time?
Now Havoc lives in that world, far removed from her own, no matter that they stand in the same room. ]
Why?
[ Having finished her chopping duty, she carries the cutting board with the pseudocarrots closer, setting it right beside the stove for whenever they're needed. If only to seem less invested in her question than she actually is. ]
[One foot in the world of humans, and one still in the world of Contractors. Even as Regressor, the spectre of her star had haunted her in the form of phantoms, agents of organizations she could only remember in snatches that wanted her dead whether she remembered a thing or not.
One foot still in that world, in the CDC, with her old comrades, her old memories. It wasn't true freedom, not true life like humans lived, maybe. But it was enough.]
Why?
[The broth goes in, a more savory smell beginning to waft out on the steam roiling off the water, reaching for a wooden spoon and beginning to stir. As she did, her gaze slid back over Amber's way.]
... I think you know why. Better than most Contractors.
[How many years, decades, centuries would Havoc give to have her life be color once more? No- How much would Carmine give? To live feeling like things had meaning and life to them, rather than simply existing in a grey, logical world.
How much would you give to drink from that cup once you'd had a taste?]
Amber steps away from the stove, leaning back against the kitchen table with arms crossed in front of her in a guarded pose. But her eyes linger on Havoc, curious but with a tinge of something that might be-- might be sadness.
There's too much at stake. But yes, she knows how frustrating it feels to hover always at the periphery, going through the day like a bystander in one's own life. People are always kept at an arm's length. Disconnect is commonplace. She knows that there must be more than this, which is why she wants so much to learn. It begs the question of whether she would ask the same of the CDC, if she can afford to. Yes, absolutely yes to the former, but never to the latter. ]
Better to die a free man than a slave.
[ A slave to what? One's own rationality, perhaps. ]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
She doesn't remember a family, but she still remembers the hollow spaces they left behind in her mind, like the negative of a family picture with the important details washed out.
But she can read between the lines, nodding in understanding. ]
You could find someone else like her. Now that you're this way.
[ This way, she says, as if she can't quite say it, admit it, out loud. ]
no subject
[Havoc's voice was low, her gaze falling once Amber's did, returning to the chicken. The sound her knife made was soothing, blade on cutting board, the sounds of domesticity and a home.]
You can't just find someone else that easily.
[No matter what way you were. It's what made family "special". She'd learned that in those quiet days.]
no subject
Right?
Amber spares her a sideways glance, having stopped her chopping by now. ]
Carmine. Was this what you asked from them?
no subject
Havoc was running out of things to chop, but that wasn't a problem. She busied herself with preparing the burner, starting the water boiling.]
- Which part?
[Being human. Being able to care at all. The family themselves.]
no subject
The ability to remember-- [ No, that's not quite it. ] To remember your life as your own.
[ Unlike the way she views most of her memories. Detached. As if watching it happen to someone else entirely. ]
no subject
[She answers quickly enough once the clarification is out there, though she doesn't look back Amber's way. Not out of the desire to hide, but simply because she was focusing. Cooking was soothing to her- once she'd begun to like it, and what it did to other people. What it could do.
Make them happy.]
I didn't go under for the ME much in the first place... one of the benefits of freelancing.
[A benefit most Contractors couldn't afford. But with offensive power like Havoc had possessed... even without a government sponsoring her actions, she'd been almost untouchable. Who'd want to risk their own life taking her down?]
I asked them for my ability to feel back, more specifically. Like humans did.
[Paused, hands in a bag of barley scrapping out what little remained.]
Do.
[Even she couldn't quite remember the phrasing- her recruitment had occurred where her death had, on cold concrete with shards of ice melting in her chest. It was all a blur. But she knew she must have specified something about it being unable to take back- or she knew as a Contractor she would have gone to the instructors first chance she had and voided the request.
What Contractor would willingly compromise their ability to survive that way?]
Once you know what the emotions are like... it doesn't feel like watching someone else's life anymore.
[Tossed a handful of the grain in to the water to thicken it, reaching for her last can of broth, mechanically cutting open the lid.]
It feels more... attached.
[The only way she could describe it.]
no subject
How many years, decades, centuries, would she give just to see it one more time?
Now Havoc lives in that world, far removed from her own, no matter that they stand in the same room. ]
Why?
[ Having finished her chopping duty, she carries the cutting board with the pseudocarrots closer, setting it right beside the stove for whenever they're needed. If only to seem less invested in her question than she actually is. ]
You almost sabotaged yourself back there.
no subject
One foot still in that world, in the CDC, with her old comrades, her old memories. It wasn't true freedom, not true life like humans lived, maybe. But it was enough.]
Why?
[The broth goes in, a more savory smell beginning to waft out on the steam roiling off the water, reaching for a wooden spoon and beginning to stir. As she did, her gaze slid back over Amber's way.]
... I think you know why. Better than most Contractors.
[How many years, decades, centuries would Havoc give to have her life be color once more? No- How much would Carmine give? To live feeling like things had meaning and life to them, rather than simply existing in a grey, logical world.
How much would you give to drink from that cup once you'd had a taste?]
no subject
Amber steps away from the stove, leaning back against the kitchen table with arms crossed in front of her in a guarded pose. But her eyes linger on Havoc, curious but with a tinge of something that might be-- might be sadness.
There's too much at stake. But yes, she knows how frustrating it feels to hover always at the periphery, going through the day like a bystander in one's own life. People are always kept at an arm's length. Disconnect is commonplace. She knows that there must be more than this, which is why she wants so much to learn. It begs the question of whether she would ask the same of the CDC, if she can afford to. Yes, absolutely yes to the former, but never to the latter. ]
Better to die a free man than a slave.
[ A slave to what? One's own rationality, perhaps. ]
I know.