bigapplesauce | Does it trouble your mind the way you trouble mine? [closed]

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Does it trouble your mind the way you trouble mine? [closed]

Navigating his way to Seth's building without assistance makes Daniel prouder than he has any right to be, but it's just nice to know he's able to adapt and learn his way around. It gives him a sense of accomplishment to contrast with the drifting downward trajectory it feels like his life's taken as of late.

The optimism lasts about as long as it takes for Daniel to find the apartment door. Then he briefly loses his nerve and has to take a minute (or two, or three, certainly no more than four and no, he has absolutely not been counting) to collect all his thoughts into one place and automatically begin assembling a preamble before scrapping the idea almost immediately.

He is not going to start with a formal introduction. That would be ridiculous.

And he's not nervous. Just a shade agitated, maybe. Well within reason. It's just the issue of he and Seth spending a disproportionate amount of time walking around in each others' heads, something that definitely warrants a conversation of some sort. Possibly involving alcohol, and Daniel isn't typically one to make that suggestion lightly.

He's done hesitating. Daniel takes a quick breath and knocks before he can change his mind.

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"Not really," he answers, leading the way towards the couch and dropping down on it, careful not to spill. When he was younger, of course stuff like mixing soft drinks with harder stuff was a thing. But there was absolutely no skill or measurement involved in that, and since then if he'd wanted a particular drink you couldn't get straight from a bottle, he'd just go out. "And I'm going to guess you're not exactly a mixologist either," he adds with a smile. What with the almost never drinking and having a low tolerance.

"Not particularly, no." Daniel follows suit and takes the other end of the couch. "I'm pretty lightweight, unfortunately. Which, uh, you already knew that." Right, Seth got to see that low tolerance firsthand. A fantastic first impression.

"Well, you've got a good hand at it," he indicates the drink with a tilt of his head. "Who knows, you might get to hear me ranting about something in Russian."

Daniel would probably be surprised by just how good of a first impression it actually was. And kind of the motivation to get Daniel to drink again. He would not mind listening to Daniel rant in Russian, even if he'd have no idea what he was talking about.

"How many languages do you speak, exactly?" Seth asks with a curious frown. Because he remembers several having been mentioned so far. Archaeologist with a side of linguist and diplomat, right? Would imply a few.

"Uhh." Daniel actually has to think about that one for a minute. "Twenty-three, if you just want Earth languages. Non-terrestrial is when it gets a little...well, okay, I can't really speak most of those so much as just muddle through a conversation. I've been told my Russian leaves a lot to be desired." He smiles a bit at that. Not surprising, really.

"And I think it bears mentioning that it's usually the more, ah, uncouth words that I get the most exposure to," he adds, smirk widening.

Well then, holy shit. Seth makes a rather baffled face at the number, especially since there's apparently even more. Seth can't even muddle through a second language...

He does smile at the idea of Daniel swearing in Russian or whatever else other languages, but perhaps not as much as he would've if he wasn't busy thinking about his own lack of education. "Well, for me, it's... Oh, let's see if I can remember them all. There's English, and then there's... Yeah, nope, that's it," he answers with a self-deprecating smile.

"It was mostly circumstantial." Daniel shrugs, oddly self-conscious, and stares down into his glass. "I went on a lot of digs as a kid and then later when I was, um, older, and you sort of had to get past the language barriers somehow."

He takes a larger gulp of his Irish coffee than is strictly necessary. "And, uh, usually the first thing you learn is how to ask if someone speaks English."

Seth feels as if he's suddenly made things a little awkward, but Daniel's reply does bring up something Seth didn't know. "Your parents were archaeologists too?" he asks, putting his arm on the back of the couch to turn a bit more towards him.

Edited 2014-10-28 05:04 (UTC)

"Yep," he says with a muted nod, eyes downcast. "Yeah, they, uh, they were. We never really stayed in one place for very long, kinda...went all around the world. Don't remember a lot of it, honestly, except Cairo a little. Pretty sure Arabic was my second language."

He shuffles his hands awkwardly around his glass for a moment, feeling like he should be doing something with them without knowing what. Then he looks up, one side of his mouth quirking in a hasty smile to clear away the distant look on his face.

"But, uh, what about you?" Daniel asks, head to slightly one side. "Early life, childhood?"

Seth can sort of tell Daniel's not entirely comfortable with talking about his childhood or his parents - the distant look is a bit of a contrast to his usual bouncy self when talking about things. He can imagine moving from place to place to be a difficult way to grow up, never settling in the same place for all that long, but still... Getting to see so much of the world must've been amazing.

And then of course he gets the answer back. "Well, you already know some of that," he answers, his turn to have downcast eyes. He hadn't been consciously aware of it when he was actually in the dream, but once he woke up, he'd remembered what the supervisor had shown Daniel. And he's not sure what he wants to add to that. It's not how he'd wish for Daniel to find out about his background, which seems even more unimpressive now, even embarrassing, in contrast to Daniel's.

"Wait, wait. Wait wait wait wait wait." Daniel immediately sits up straighter, frowning at Seth intently. Is he catching the right hint here? He can't be. Can he? "You're telling me that, uh, that - in the dream, the, the clipboard, everything - that wasn't just - that was real?"

God.

God.

Daniel shuts his eyes and rubs one hand over his mouth. He'd imagined some of the dream had its basis in life experience but he hadn't expected any of the exploration to be quite as - extensive.

"I'm sorry," he mumbles, feeling awful for even asking, he should have remembered, he hadn't known the dream had been so rooted in reality, god. "I'm sorry, I - forget I brought it up, I didn't think. You don't have to - sorry."

Oh. Daniel had assumed that had just been dream nonsense. And now Seth's gone and revealed that it was actually real, thereby probably confirming he's a drug dealer too. Great. Wonderful. At least if Seth had simply answered the question, he could've navigated around that without making Daniel think that if some of it was accurate, the rest must've been too. Perhaps he even realises the whole scenario was taken from his head. Fuck.

After his initial surprise at Daniel's surprise, Seth manages to mask his feelings decently well. He doesn't want Daniel to feel guilty for prying or anything, since that had not been what he'd been doing. And he's not entirely sure whether Daniel's distress is because of the invasion of privacy itself, or because of just realising what he'd found out was true. That he's just now realising how very different they are, that Seth qualifies as a low-life for more than one reason, while Daniel's a fucking diplomat for the human race.

"Don't worry about it," he answers, somehow managing to keep his voice remarkably calm. "Hardly your fault my subconscious decided to throw all that at you."

"No, that -" He bites back the automatic protest and transfers his gaze to the opposite wall, staring at it with an intensity usually reserved for glowering at self-proclaimed gods. The details are trickling back into his mind with fearful alacrity; he can't shake away the impersonal little lines of text detailing Seth's behavior patterns.

"suicidal"

Daniel inadvertently trespassed on something incredibly private. He recalls being aware of it at the time but once he'd awoken he'd assumed - god, he'd assumed -

"self-destructive"

"I'm sorry," Daniel says again, miserably. "If it means anything, which I'd understand if it didn't - I didn't mean to find out that way. And if I'd known, I -"

He lapses off. If he'd known he - what? Wouldn't have pried where he knew he wasn't wanted? Wouldn't have stuck his nose into someone else's problems? No, because he's the sort of person who would have done that anyway out of self-righteous, misguided compassion, because he can wield good intent all he wants if it gives him free reign to wreak unjustified psychological hell on someone else's mind.

"drug dealer"

He remembers all of it.

Find out what exactly, is what Seth wants to ask. That Seth's a criminal? Normally he wouldn't give a shit what anyone thought about that, especially someone in the military, but he finds himself caring a lot about what Daniel thinks.

Seth's angry and frustrated, his grip tightening around his glass. Not at Daniel, though. At himself, at the Rift for making these dreams happen, at circumstances. At feeling like he's somehow deceived Daniel by not telling him this shit himself, at least Daniel would know who he'd been making friends with, could've backed out before Seth... before it became such a big deal.

The only reason Daniel's still here, still apologising, is probably just because he pities Seth after that whole ordeal. Daniel's disgust must simply be overpowered by his compassion. The thought makes Seth feel even worse.

It steadily becomes a lot harder to keep cool, and all but impossible to reassure Daniel. He doesn't think Daniel would even want his reassurances now, because part of Seth's mind has just gone and decided that Daniel doesn't want anything to do with him now anyway, because why would he? Some altruistic desire to fix him, to rescue him, like he'd done in the dream? Well, Seth doesn't need rescuing anymore, or at least not from anything Daniel can help with, not anything Seth even wants him to be aware is a problem.

He sets the glass down a little harder than intended, making a sharp sound as it lands on the glass table, and gets to his feet, heading back towards the kitchen, mostly to put some space between them. He picks up the whiskey bottle and opens it, taking a drink, because right now he can't deal with any of their frilly drinks, stuff he'd made to amuse Daniel as a reference to their first meeting.

Leaning his hands on the edge of counter, shoulders hunched and staring at the worktop, he tries to take a few deep breaths. "Sorry I dragged you down here," he says, back turned to Daniel, still sounding more calm than he feels. Not that that's currently an achievement, because he feels the very furthest from calm. "You can leave if you want to, don't worry about it."

"This isn't your fault." He doesn't mean for it to come out so sharply but the warmth and comfortable banter they'd initially shared has all but evaporated, leaving Seth angry and closed off and suddenly a lot more reminiscent of the guarded, hostile man Daniel had been so desperate to save in the dream. And the worst part - well no, there are a lot of worst parts to this, this just happens to be one of them - the worst part is that Daniel can't tell whether Seth's restrained frustration is directed internally or externally, and Daniel can't decide which is hypothetically worse.

Daniel stands. He makes no motion to leave, just gently sets down his glass and pushes his hands into his pockets and keeps himself at a wary distance. Seth's cracked out the harder liquor, which means things have already gotten a good deal heavier than either of them expected.

"I'm not leaving," he says evenly, calmly, like he's making an obvious statement of fact. He continues, a shade more haltingly, "and I'm not here to - judge you on who you were or, or anything. You're my friend, it's not - I'm not just gonna stop caring."

Of course, trust Daniel to unearth all of Seth's demons in the worst, most intrusive way possible. There wasn't much either of them could have done about it at the time, but that won't stop Daniel from yielding to all that gnawing guilt. And it's abundantly, horribly clear that Seth fully expects Daniel to not want anything more to do with it, or him. He doesn't expect him to want to stay after learning all - all that.

But that is not how Daniel operates. To leave Seth to this, alone, would be to defy everything he is on a fundamental level, because he cannot let go of his pervasive sympathy and he will not stop being that knot of overbearing moral sensitivity and he will devote hours and days and years to attempting to fix the broken-edged areas between trauma and self-contained pain even if they are not and never will be fixable.

Seth is not, by his nature, fixable, and not merely because organic material is definitively beyond conventional repair. Seth is not fixable because he is not broken - he functions, he lives and breathes and exists, he buries the

suicidal

and

self-destructive

tendencies under sarcasm, and self-deprecation, and bitter levity, and perceived reservation, and alcohol. He is not broken because he is human, and humans do not break, not in the orthodox understanding of the word, they do not split into neatly organizable pieces that can be boxed and sealed and compartmentalized, because humans are adaptable, their blessing and their curse.

So Seth did not break. He did something much worse - he adapted, he took his pain and anger and self-destruction and internalized them, all of them, integrated them into his foundations, rebuilt himself from the ground up with those tenets as his blueprints. It's all structural. It's all intentional. It's all inherent.

"I'm sorry for all of it," Daniel continues, patient and measured and desperate. "And I'm sorry I found out - that way. But don't think that means I'm just going to, to leave or forget or just - bury any of it."

Seth doesn't turn around, shoulders all tense, gripping the edge of the worktop. Daniel calling him his friend, saying he cares, it seems to make something unstuck inside Seth, except all it accomplishes right now is make him over more upset. He swallows and bites his lip, tilting his head back and blinking rapidly.

He has no idea what to reply to any of this. He can't even bear to turn around. There seems to be nothing he could reasonably say or do to communicate how he feels or what he's thinking, in a way that won't make him any more vulnerable than he already feels. As much as Daniel wants to help, how much he says he cares, it's far too scary to open up about it just like that.

So he just stands there, taking a shuddering breath, willing the turmoil inside him to become calm, so that he can manage to deal with this.

Seth is being worryingly silent, so Daniel takes a few tentative steps forward, advancing evenly enough to give Seth fair warning. He stops a good twelve inches away from him and looks at Seth's back with its hunched shoulders, either unwilling or unable to go any closer, and tries not to picture the awful line of little black numbers he'd seen stamped there. Good thing that had been the dream.

He doesn't know what else to say about it, how to address any of this history that Seth has kept hermetically sealed and shelved away for the entire time Daniel has known him, and probably good deal longer before that.

Except, "I do want to help," he says quietly, "in whatever way I can. If that means you want me to go, I'll go, I won't argue. But just - let me help, if I can."

Seth's kept all this hemorrhaging away inside him for long enough. Daniel sucks in a tiny intake of breath and closes most of that final distance until he's standing next to him, barely a half-step behind. He doesn't look at Seth, just examines the wall across from them blankly, and holds his breath and waits.

Seth doesn't move away, doesn't flinch or try to avoid Daniel. He doesn't move to look at him either. Doesn't do much of anything except breathe, because currently just doing nothing is challenge enough, and it would be even harder to do something.

Chances are he'll have to hear Daniel reaffirm his desire to help more than once after this, but right now it's helping, even if Daniel isn't doing anything but letting Seth know he's there for him. Even if there's not much to be done about what's past, it's an acceptance, and a promise he won't bolt as fast as things get a bit rough.

After several long moments, Seth nods. "Thanks," he answers quietly, relieved that his voice doesn't sound quite as hoarse as he'd feared.

Daniel smiles a little at that, tight and strained, and finally looks at him.

"Whatever might've happened before now," he continues, viciously tamping down the memories of the intimidating little words, drug dealer, because they're hardly important right now, "only matters as much as you want it to."

He hesitates before going ahead with his next sentence, because Seth might not be in the state of mind to accept it. But it's what Daniel thinks, so, "I believe you're a good man."

Seth might be a bit more ready to accept Daniel's statement of faith, if it weren't becoming apparent that Daniel actually thinks some of what the clipboard said has changed. Granted, he's not actually suicidal anymore. That had been partially based in logic, an achievable way of robbing the rebels of his services. Not something he has any desire to attempt now. The only time that ever seemed like an option before then had been when Shannon died, and that had been largely out of guilt and some misguided attempt at karmic justice.

But the thing that Daniel might actually judge him on, that hasn't changed. "I'm still a drug dealer," he answers quietly, because he feels like letting Daniel go on believing otherwise would be deceit. Like having a friend under false pretenses. Let him get all the facts, then he can go about believing in Seth's goodness if he wants to.

That elicits a somewhat longer pause but Daniel shakes away the hesitation and presses on gamely.

"All right, so maybe you're a work in progress. We all are, it's, that's not exclusive to you." He doesn't fully know what to do with that information other than to just keep talking and attack the problem with words and reason and sympathy, however ineffective, and hope it does something. "I can't guarantee that I won't try to change...that. But I can say I'm not the type to just leave, or give up, or, or any of that."

Well, it's not the intensely negative reaction he had feared. And... well, to be honest, he appreciates Daniel not pretending that's not something that bothers him. The admittance that he disapproves but that he still intends to stick around, that's probably better.

"It's just weed," he adds, trying to... reassure, perhaps? Or maybe justify. He opens the bottle again and takes a swig. "I don't deal any of the hard stuff, I know how dangerous that shit can be." Both with loved ones and first-hand, in fact. And a literal archangel of justice had been okay with this, so Seth doesn't exactly feel bad about it. He's just worried Daniel still won't look too kindly on it.

"Well, see, that's already a step forward." The smile comes out a little forced but there isn't much to be done about that. Seth is being open and honest about something that he probably didn't ever want to be open and honest about, even if the reason for the honesty is more circumstantial than anything else. "And we all have stuff we need to work though."

He lets out a low, unsteady breath, because suddenly he knows a lot more about Seth than either of them expected. The subject matter has gotten very abruptly heavy, so Daniel starts searching out a way to lighten it.

"I mean, hey, you want perspective, one of my best friends spent the first, oh, hundred years of his life helping commit interplanetary genocide." In terms of lighter subject material, that particular example might have just face-planted. Nice work there. Daniel transfers his stare to the floor and nervously tries to bring it back around to his original point. "Um, but he wanted to change. He expressed that desire and we, uh, we helped when we could. So, you know. If, if you want me to help, ever, then uh, then I will."

Seth has to look over at Daniel at that, giving him an incredulous look. Well, good to know he's not as hopeless of a case as the guy who helped commit genocide. It does however help him realise just how much Daniel is willing to forgive and help with.

Eager to get off the subject, Seth sighs and shakes his head a bit, turning around to lean against the counter, crossing his arms. "You know, this was supposed to cheer us up after last night, not... this."

"Yeah," he replies, pulling out the word with a wince. "Sorry about that. Look, we don't have to keep, uh, talking about it. If you don't want to. We can just talk about, um," he flounders for a minute in search of an appropriately casual topic of discussion, "sports?"

Of course. They can just transition from their discussion of drug-dealing and genocide and redemption and just shift it along so they can talk about sports. Daniel doesn't know anything about sports. Daniel doesn't even know if Seth knows anything about sports. Daniel doesn't care about sports. Does Seth even remotely care about sports? Why on earth would he suggest sports. How is that the first thing his allegedly vast vocabulary provided.

"Or, or, you know," he amends, rubbing at the bridge of his nose with pinched fingers, "something else. Anything else. God."

Seth can't help give a mild snort at the suggestion of sports. He's not even slightly the athletic type, interested in neither watching nor participating in sports. What with Daniel's obvious regret at suggesting that, he's going to go ahead and assume Daniel isn't that interested either, though at least he looks the part.

"Are you suggesting we discuss God, or are you just expressing frustration at not coming up with a topic," Seth asks, managing a small smile now.

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tw: big loooong introspection, some serious discussion of self-loathing

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