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rainbowfic2015-06-25 03:12 am
starphotographs) wrote in rainbowfic2015-06-25 03:12 am
Dragon Scale Green 7, Milk Bottle 12, Folly 11
Name: starphotographs
Story: Corwin and Friends
Characters: Corwin (POV), Spenser
Supplies and Styles: Graffiti (Dragon Scale Green, Milk Bottle, Summer Carnival)
Colors: Dragon Scale Green 7 ("Let me tell you: the only way to get rid of dragons is to have one of your own." ― Eugene Shvarts), Milk Bottle 12 (Stand the Bottle), Folly 11 (Of course it's safe.)
Word Count: 1995
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Choose not to warn.
Summary: Corwin and Spenser have a long-overdue talk.
Note: Kind of a follow-up to The Right Tool for the Wrong Job. Some themes somewhat inspired by stuff I read when I was looking up what “stand the bottle” is. Title somewhat inspired by this comic. Going into a little of what Spenser thinks about joining the main cast very slightly inspired by seeing Fury Road, because I thought Nux had kind of a similar narrative. And as always, all commentary welcome!
The Questions He Was Asked
Well, I made it through the night.
The bandages felt clean and dry; the hole in my arm no longer bursting with slime. I just felt like I had the flu, not like someone had stuck me in the microwave on high because they thought it would make my teeth stop chattering. And it seemed like I could probably open my eyes and be sure that everything I saw was really there. So I opened them. Too much sun was streaming through the window, so I closed them again, lids burning so violently red that it wasn’t much better. I let myself adjust to that hot, bloody glow, then decided to try again, starting with just a crack this time, slowly widening it until I could look at the sunbeam on the ceiling. Then, clenching at the windowpane, I pulled myself up until I could look at the blue and white sky. The day was so bright that I felt like I’d phased into a different world. Last night was dark and feverish, Sorrell hovering over me while I stretched out on her bed, telling me that I was going to be fine, just fine, while some strange woman she’d called to the house at god only knows what hour it was crouched at my side, siphoning off what felt like buckets of boiling sludge, strip-cleaning the crater in my flesh until I started bleeding all over again. And then (now), I woke up. I was fine, just fine. Either that, or I was the double that survived, and nothing past my bedroom door would be the same.
Then the door opened, and I knew I must have been the original after all. Because there was Spenser, utterly unchanged. Same old scars, awful tattoo, stupid t-shirt, heavy glasses, dirty hair, gangly and awkward and smiling. You know you’ve got problems when that asshole seems like the most consistent thing in your life.
“…Yo! Man, I thought I was gonna have to wake you up! Anyway! How the hell are you!?”
And there it was, same old loud voice.
“I’m… Fine. Better.”
“Good, good! Excellent!” He sat down on the edge of the mattress, bounced a few times, then froze up, staring at the floor. “…I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay. I’m getting used to you bouncing on things.”
“No, not that! I mean, I’m sorry I fucked up your arm! I’m not a doctor, and I didn’t know what the fuck I was doing… And I don’t think I even washed those pliers… And if I had to dig, I probably shouldn’t have, and…”
“Spenser. Just… Stop. I’m not mad.”
He turned and faced me, looking like he was about to cry. Well, on him, that look actually meant “about to throw something,” but that was basically the same thing as crying in his case, so it didn’t look any less pitiful.
“I don’t give a fuck if I made you mad, you shithead! I almost killed you.”
He was staring at the floor again. I tried to think of something to say. It probably was his fault that I got so infected, but if I said that, it would sound like I was accusing him, even though I wouldn’t be, not really. It was something that ended up happening. That he’d caused it seemed somehow less than relevant.
“No, the guy who shot me almost killed me. You just tried to help. Badly, yeah, but you’re not the first person to fuck up a helping attempt.”
“Yeah, well, I probably shouldn’t have dragged you there in the first place.”
I shrugged.
“…Maybe not, but you got me out. That was pretty awesome.”
“…Yeah?”
“Yeah! I mean, it made me glad you were on my side.”
Spenser scooted back until he was leaning against the wall, us sitting on opposite sides of the window, the world moving past between us.
“…Would you believe you’re not the first person who ever said that to me?”
I looked over at him. He was sitting with his dirty boots on my sheets, and even now, he seemed kind of dangerous, or at very least unpredictable.
“If I was, I’d be kinda shocked.” I thought back to that day, how crazy he looked, yelling and throwing out plasma channels, a thunderstorm trapped in a bag of skin. I remember wondering, in the back of my mind, how many times he’d done that before, and how I’d ended up friends with something like that. “…So, you used to be one of those guys back there?”
“Sort of. Never worked headquarters, and it seems like the whole operation got real fuckin’ organized in the last few months. But, yeah.”
“If you surrendered, do you think they would have taken you back?”
“I dunno. Maybe. Might’ve just staged an impromptu execution. I wouldn’t have done that, though.”
Would you have? The fact that he’d left them behind so suddenly and readily, with almost no acknowledgement that he’d ever been part of it at all, actually made me worry more than if he’d needed some convincing. It made me wonder when he’d move on and do the same to us, go back to being an unknown liability, just one more thing to watch out for. A friend I couldn’t keep.
“…Spenser?”
“Yeah?”
“What made you leave?”
He actually seemed to be thinking before he spoke, which was… New. I wasn’t sure if I liked it or not.
“Nothin’ specific, actually. They just kinda treated me like an attack dog or some shit. And I’ve had enough of that, y‘know? Plus, I hate gettin‘ bossed around and whatever, so I just snapped and got the fuck out. You remember.”
I remembered. He was a stranger then, and who he was when we met seems like a stranger even now. He looked different; longer hair, older glasses, crazier. He had me pinned in the back seat, holding electrodes to my neck and arguing with the driver. Then I don’t know what happened. All of a sudden, Spenser, who I didn’t know was Spenser yet, had somehow opened the left front door while still holding me down, then let go of me, crawled over the seat, and threw the driver out on the highway, taking the wheel, flooring the gas pedal. Then he dropped me at a bus stop and told me to get my ass in gear and head home. Still shaken, and with no idea what the hell I’d just seen go down, or exactly why I’d had to be part of it, I watched the car I’d nearly died in getting smaller and smaller, speeding along for parts unknown, with a complete lunatic at the switch.
“…Yeah. I do. Looking back, it seems like we were both in a kind of a crappy situation there.”
As I now understood it, we were actually being held hostage together. In different ways, and for different reasons, but both equally unwilling and terrified. The outcome wasn’t all that surprising, when I thought about it that way.
“You can fuckin’ say that again.”
Spenser normally seemed weirdly cheerful for someone so completely and objectively fucked in the head, but when he stopped smiling and let himself relax, you could see years and years of “crappy situations,” etched into his face. He always looked so fucking tired. I mean, he doesn’t sleep, so that seems obvious, but what I always saw in him never looked like something sleep could fix. I didn’t know if anything could fix it. But he always seemed like he was trying, and I guess that’s really why he looks so exhausted all the time.
“…Spenser?”
It was also why I liked him. He tried too hard, and tried all the wrong things, but at least he didn’t stop trying.
“Yeah?”
“What made you end up coming here?”
He was laughing again, looking less worn-down and more like himself.
“Hate to be a real dull fucker and use this twice, but… Nothin’ specific. I saw you downtown and wanted to apologize… And shit, I didn’t even get around to that… But I guess we just hit it off, and I kept wantin’ to hang out with you. Then you guys gave me that sick job dismantling shit and that room downstairs, and… I dunno, man. Shit happens. I guess I just liked that you all treated me like a regular person.”
“…That it?”
“Eh, I don’t think anything is ever, like, ‘it,’ but that isn’t exactly a small deal. And… I have no idea. It’s a dangerous world. I know how to do certain things. And if I’m going to be out somewhere doin’ ‘em anyway, I figured I was gonna do them for people I actually like for fuckin’ once.”
Spenser pulled a dangling clump of threads off one of the holes in his jeans. I stared at him for a while. Somehow, I’d acquired my very own fucked-up bodyguard. I got the idea that this only happened because he’d been looking for someone who would protect him.
“…Things like electrocuting people and smearing them across the concrete?”
“Well, yeah. I mean, it’s pretty horrible when I think about it. But I’ve already done horrible shit, okay? I’ve done it for pay, I’ve done it for self-defense. You can’t unring that fuckin’ bell. So I just decided that if I couldn’t undo it, the best thing I can do is start doing it for someone I give a crap about. And only if I really need to.”
You don’t give a crap about yourself? That question, I decided, could wait.
“Hold on a sec. Did you finally just officially say we can trust you?”
“…Corwin, the fuck!? The hell have you been? I thought you’d know by now that you’re actually safer with someone like me living in your fuckin’ house, with, like, a dog in all your fights and shit, than you’d be if I was knockin’ around anywhere else and fuckin‘ shit up indiscriminately? Dude. I‘m, like, your secret weapon.”
I considered this. I considered he might be right. But, I felt like being difficult, just for the sake of it. Just because I knew it’d make him laugh.
“Well, you did hold me hostage…”
I was right. He cracked up for a while, kind of smacking the back of his head against the wall the whole time, then turned to face me.
“…I did! And Shattuck, I forgot to apologize again! Corwin… I’m sorry for scaring the tar out of you and then nearly electrocuting your ass half a year ago.”
He might have scared me shitless back then, but, from the very first time I saw him outside that context, I knew he wasn’t exactly what I thought he was. What he really is, I’m still figuring out, but I already know that I’d want to know, and I think that’s a pretty good start.
“Apology accepted. I’d rather have met you than, like, kept up my spotless non-hostage record or whatever.”
“Well, damn… Thanks, pal. Anything I can do to make it up to you?”
“Don’t think so.”
“…But I want to! C’mon!”
He wasn’t letting up, so I figured I’d at least humor the poor fuck.
“Okay. Start with going downstairs and getting me a beer out of the fridge.”
He grinned, flashed me a thumbs-up, and catapulted off the bed, moving like there were more springs in him than in the actual mattress.
“…Can do!”
Shitty as I felt, I couldn’t help but smile. If Spenser was ever really a bad person, he was well on his way to no longer qualifying.
Still tired and sick, but slowly falling back into the rhythm of the world, I slid back under the covers, planning to close my eyes and let myself drift for a while, until I heard him clomping back up the stairs.
It was a crappy situation, but I’m glad I was stuck in it with you.
starphotographsStory: Corwin and Friends
Characters: Corwin (POV), Spenser
Supplies and Styles: Graffiti (Dragon Scale Green, Milk Bottle, Summer Carnival)
Colors: Dragon Scale Green 7 ("Let me tell you: the only way to get rid of dragons is to have one of your own." ― Eugene Shvarts), Milk Bottle 12 (Stand the Bottle), Folly 11 (Of course it's safe.)
Word Count: 1995
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Choose not to warn.
Summary: Corwin and Spenser have a long-overdue talk.
Note: Kind of a follow-up to The Right Tool for the Wrong Job. Some themes somewhat inspired by stuff I read when I was looking up what “stand the bottle” is. Title somewhat inspired by this comic. Going into a little of what Spenser thinks about joining the main cast very slightly inspired by seeing Fury Road, because I thought Nux had kind of a similar narrative. And as always, all commentary welcome!
Well, I made it through the night.
The bandages felt clean and dry; the hole in my arm no longer bursting with slime. I just felt like I had the flu, not like someone had stuck me in the microwave on high because they thought it would make my teeth stop chattering. And it seemed like I could probably open my eyes and be sure that everything I saw was really there. So I opened them. Too much sun was streaming through the window, so I closed them again, lids burning so violently red that it wasn’t much better. I let myself adjust to that hot, bloody glow, then decided to try again, starting with just a crack this time, slowly widening it until I could look at the sunbeam on the ceiling. Then, clenching at the windowpane, I pulled myself up until I could look at the blue and white sky. The day was so bright that I felt like I’d phased into a different world. Last night was dark and feverish, Sorrell hovering over me while I stretched out on her bed, telling me that I was going to be fine, just fine, while some strange woman she’d called to the house at god only knows what hour it was crouched at my side, siphoning off what felt like buckets of boiling sludge, strip-cleaning the crater in my flesh until I started bleeding all over again. And then (now), I woke up. I was fine, just fine. Either that, or I was the double that survived, and nothing past my bedroom door would be the same.
Then the door opened, and I knew I must have been the original after all. Because there was Spenser, utterly unchanged. Same old scars, awful tattoo, stupid t-shirt, heavy glasses, dirty hair, gangly and awkward and smiling. You know you’ve got problems when that asshole seems like the most consistent thing in your life.
“…Yo! Man, I thought I was gonna have to wake you up! Anyway! How the hell are you!?”
And there it was, same old loud voice.
“I’m… Fine. Better.”
“Good, good! Excellent!” He sat down on the edge of the mattress, bounced a few times, then froze up, staring at the floor. “…I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay. I’m getting used to you bouncing on things.”
“No, not that! I mean, I’m sorry I fucked up your arm! I’m not a doctor, and I didn’t know what the fuck I was doing… And I don’t think I even washed those pliers… And if I had to dig, I probably shouldn’t have, and…”
“Spenser. Just… Stop. I’m not mad.”
He turned and faced me, looking like he was about to cry. Well, on him, that look actually meant “about to throw something,” but that was basically the same thing as crying in his case, so it didn’t look any less pitiful.
“I don’t give a fuck if I made you mad, you shithead! I almost killed you.”
He was staring at the floor again. I tried to think of something to say. It probably was his fault that I got so infected, but if I said that, it would sound like I was accusing him, even though I wouldn’t be, not really. It was something that ended up happening. That he’d caused it seemed somehow less than relevant.
“No, the guy who shot me almost killed me. You just tried to help. Badly, yeah, but you’re not the first person to fuck up a helping attempt.”
“Yeah, well, I probably shouldn’t have dragged you there in the first place.”
I shrugged.
“…Maybe not, but you got me out. That was pretty awesome.”
“…Yeah?”
“Yeah! I mean, it made me glad you were on my side.”
Spenser scooted back until he was leaning against the wall, us sitting on opposite sides of the window, the world moving past between us.
“…Would you believe you’re not the first person who ever said that to me?”
I looked over at him. He was sitting with his dirty boots on my sheets, and even now, he seemed kind of dangerous, or at very least unpredictable.
“If I was, I’d be kinda shocked.” I thought back to that day, how crazy he looked, yelling and throwing out plasma channels, a thunderstorm trapped in a bag of skin. I remember wondering, in the back of my mind, how many times he’d done that before, and how I’d ended up friends with something like that. “…So, you used to be one of those guys back there?”
“Sort of. Never worked headquarters, and it seems like the whole operation got real fuckin’ organized in the last few months. But, yeah.”
“If you surrendered, do you think they would have taken you back?”
“I dunno. Maybe. Might’ve just staged an impromptu execution. I wouldn’t have done that, though.”
Would you have? The fact that he’d left them behind so suddenly and readily, with almost no acknowledgement that he’d ever been part of it at all, actually made me worry more than if he’d needed some convincing. It made me wonder when he’d move on and do the same to us, go back to being an unknown liability, just one more thing to watch out for. A friend I couldn’t keep.
“…Spenser?”
“Yeah?”
“What made you leave?”
He actually seemed to be thinking before he spoke, which was… New. I wasn’t sure if I liked it or not.
“Nothin’ specific, actually. They just kinda treated me like an attack dog or some shit. And I’ve had enough of that, y‘know? Plus, I hate gettin‘ bossed around and whatever, so I just snapped and got the fuck out. You remember.”
I remembered. He was a stranger then, and who he was when we met seems like a stranger even now. He looked different; longer hair, older glasses, crazier. He had me pinned in the back seat, holding electrodes to my neck and arguing with the driver. Then I don’t know what happened. All of a sudden, Spenser, who I didn’t know was Spenser yet, had somehow opened the left front door while still holding me down, then let go of me, crawled over the seat, and threw the driver out on the highway, taking the wheel, flooring the gas pedal. Then he dropped me at a bus stop and told me to get my ass in gear and head home. Still shaken, and with no idea what the hell I’d just seen go down, or exactly why I’d had to be part of it, I watched the car I’d nearly died in getting smaller and smaller, speeding along for parts unknown, with a complete lunatic at the switch.
“…Yeah. I do. Looking back, it seems like we were both in a kind of a crappy situation there.”
As I now understood it, we were actually being held hostage together. In different ways, and for different reasons, but both equally unwilling and terrified. The outcome wasn’t all that surprising, when I thought about it that way.
“You can fuckin’ say that again.”
Spenser normally seemed weirdly cheerful for someone so completely and objectively fucked in the head, but when he stopped smiling and let himself relax, you could see years and years of “crappy situations,” etched into his face. He always looked so fucking tired. I mean, he doesn’t sleep, so that seems obvious, but what I always saw in him never looked like something sleep could fix. I didn’t know if anything could fix it. But he always seemed like he was trying, and I guess that’s really why he looks so exhausted all the time.
“…Spenser?”
It was also why I liked him. He tried too hard, and tried all the wrong things, but at least he didn’t stop trying.
“Yeah?”
“What made you end up coming here?”
He was laughing again, looking less worn-down and more like himself.
“Hate to be a real dull fucker and use this twice, but… Nothin’ specific. I saw you downtown and wanted to apologize… And shit, I didn’t even get around to that… But I guess we just hit it off, and I kept wantin’ to hang out with you. Then you guys gave me that sick job dismantling shit and that room downstairs, and… I dunno, man. Shit happens. I guess I just liked that you all treated me like a regular person.”
“…That it?”
“Eh, I don’t think anything is ever, like, ‘it,’ but that isn’t exactly a small deal. And… I have no idea. It’s a dangerous world. I know how to do certain things. And if I’m going to be out somewhere doin’ ‘em anyway, I figured I was gonna do them for people I actually like for fuckin’ once.”
Spenser pulled a dangling clump of threads off one of the holes in his jeans. I stared at him for a while. Somehow, I’d acquired my very own fucked-up bodyguard. I got the idea that this only happened because he’d been looking for someone who would protect him.
“…Things like electrocuting people and smearing them across the concrete?”
“Well, yeah. I mean, it’s pretty horrible when I think about it. But I’ve already done horrible shit, okay? I’ve done it for pay, I’ve done it for self-defense. You can’t unring that fuckin’ bell. So I just decided that if I couldn’t undo it, the best thing I can do is start doing it for someone I give a crap about. And only if I really need to.”
You don’t give a crap about yourself? That question, I decided, could wait.
“Hold on a sec. Did you finally just officially say we can trust you?”
“…Corwin, the fuck!? The hell have you been? I thought you’d know by now that you’re actually safer with someone like me living in your fuckin’ house, with, like, a dog in all your fights and shit, than you’d be if I was knockin’ around anywhere else and fuckin‘ shit up indiscriminately? Dude. I‘m, like, your secret weapon.”
I considered this. I considered he might be right. But, I felt like being difficult, just for the sake of it. Just because I knew it’d make him laugh.
“Well, you did hold me hostage…”
I was right. He cracked up for a while, kind of smacking the back of his head against the wall the whole time, then turned to face me.
“…I did! And Shattuck, I forgot to apologize again! Corwin… I’m sorry for scaring the tar out of you and then nearly electrocuting your ass half a year ago.”
He might have scared me shitless back then, but, from the very first time I saw him outside that context, I knew he wasn’t exactly what I thought he was. What he really is, I’m still figuring out, but I already know that I’d want to know, and I think that’s a pretty good start.
“Apology accepted. I’d rather have met you than, like, kept up my spotless non-hostage record or whatever.”
“Well, damn… Thanks, pal. Anything I can do to make it up to you?”
“Don’t think so.”
“…But I want to! C’mon!”
He wasn’t letting up, so I figured I’d at least humor the poor fuck.
“Okay. Start with going downstairs and getting me a beer out of the fridge.”
He grinned, flashed me a thumbs-up, and catapulted off the bed, moving like there were more springs in him than in the actual mattress.
“…Can do!”
Shitty as I felt, I couldn’t help but smile. If Spenser was ever really a bad person, he was well on his way to no longer qualifying.
Still tired and sick, but slowly falling back into the rhythm of the world, I slid back under the covers, planning to close my eyes and let myself drift for a while, until I heard him clomping back up the stairs.
It was a crappy situation, but I’m glad I was stuck in it with you.
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I'm sure Corwin is relieved, too. :P
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Thanks for reading!
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