WEEK ONE: SUNDAY, POST GROUP MEETING

[parodeity]

[ well, after That Meeting was over, dave would have hooked a hand on dirk's arm, said "a'ight, come with me" and dragged him off to an area where they can maybe be alone and have enough room for...whatever...the hell he dragged dirk off for.

dirk gets a measured look before dave crosses his arms - dropping dirk's - and says: ]

Ground rules for comin' with me into dangerous shit: you guard the rear, I'm on point. Solid?

[ before dirk can answer, he adds: ]

You're less familiar with weapons that ain't the damn katana. I'm more familiar with 'em. So, point's me. [ he's tense and hesitant when he continues with: ] ...And you guard my back. [ he's usually more than a little wary about having dirk at his back, so this is. probably progress? ]

Comments

[splinten]

If you were that you wouldn't feel anything. You wouldn't have to shut it off.

Except that it isn't. It isn't going to blow up in your face. I can do this, if you'd let me.

[parodeity]

I won't fight it when it does. Shut off.

[ because he halfway expects it. it already happened a little and he should have grabbed on. ]

You're incapable of stoppin' the remindin' me part. I...maybe it won't, but I can't...trust you. Not the way you need.

[splinten]

That doesn't limit to you to what you were raised to be.

[He doesn't say, You said I was on your team. He doesn't say, You said you wouldn't let me drown. Because Dave is a fourteen year old kid with too much on his shoulders and Dirk is sixteen and a half and should be taking care of him. Not the other way around.

Dirk needs to hold it together. Dirk needs to be the one who doesn't fall apart. Dirk needs to give Dave no reason to shut his emotions off, even if it means Dirk is never allowed in.]

I don't want to remind you. It's a shitty thing to do.

[parodeity]

It's not shitty how you're doin' it.

[ like. dave will still die for dirk if need be? that's what a team is. he doesn't have to trust him and he doesn't have to like him, even if dave can't stop himself doing that part, but he will at least die for and fight for anyone he's agreed to take on. he'll try to help when he knows there's something he can do and he can do it.

but he isn't so good at letting people do things for him, or letting them in, because that has historically fucked him over with bro. ]

It's probably more shitty that I can't...see past it. Doesn't change the deal, just means I'm...ready if it breaks.

[splinten]

It won't break. Your Bro made this problem, Dave, not you.

[If it's on anyone here, it's on Dirk. It's the weight of a splinter he has to take.]

[parodeity]

[ ... ]

I'm sorry I can't believe it just over...you bein' yourself. [ "just" over that, and thirteen years he can't ignore or forget. but this isn't a well-told lie; there's genuine regret in dave's voice and his shoulders hunch forward instead of slumping and he wishes he were...

not the mess he is. or that rose was there. ]

[splinten]

That isn't on you.

[It's Dirk, and it's Dirk again in another life.]

[parodeity]

Still. There's levels of unfairness to which I ain't gonna stoop.

[splinten]

Not even if I asked you to.

[parodeity]

If you asked me to do...what, here?

[splinten]

To be more unfair.

[parodeity]

I don't understand why you'd want that.

[splinten]

I value you.

[parodeity]

I - [ and why were you going to say it back immediately on automatic, mouth? there's a startled stumble before he swerves into: ] think you need to value yourself, too, though. In order to survive.

[splinten]

I could say the same to you, Dave. [He isn't sure if he values himself less than Dave does but he doesn't think there's a huge difference.]

im tagging this every 7 people i process.

[parodeity]

The point is, bein' unfair to you would make you less capable of survivin'.

[splinten]

My survival isn't really something that you're planning for. It's something I've promised to work on, but it isn't something either of us expect. There are three people you are aiming to get out of this alive, and I'm not one of them.

[parodeity]

If I have to pick, yeah, the girls get out. But I don't want to resign myself to a three-person endgame.

[splinten]

Neither do I.

[parodeity]

I'm not...not plannin' for your survival.

[splinten]

I know you aren't plannin' to get me killed. You've already made it clear that if I let myself die after you're gone, you won't talk to me even in the afterlife.

[It's a pretty bad threat, though, when Dave isn't talking to Dirk anyway. The conversations Dirk has against himself aren't easy to win.]

[parodeity]

I...

[ "am so bad at this" wouldn't be encouraging, even if it were true. ]

...part of the reason I kept tellin' you to fuck off was because it'd be easier for you.

[splinten]

I think I've already made it self-evident that self-preservation isn't a priority, or that at least I don't consider certain kinds of life worth living.

I've made a promise, so I'll do my best to live that life even if I don't see any real reason to bother being alive. I won't go back on that and it isn't really a concern. I just mean that we probably have roughly the same amount of value for our own lives and our personal well-beings, and any difference probably doesn't amount to much.

[parodeity]

What promise? To back me up? Because - [ ngh how to even say words ] - I don't know if it's true we have the same amount of value or ourselves. My life at least does have a purpose.

[ 2 throw it away for everyone else, that is. ]

[splinten]

To throw it away for other people. [He knows.] Do you think I'm alive for myself? You kinda implied you'd hate me if I stopped trying to live after you died.