raisetheearth | Entry #A-3: "Ask" [Video] [Shepherd's Haven]

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Entry #A-3: "Ask" [Video] [Shepherd's Haven]

[It's getting easier to tell Ryuzaki and Lazarus apart; the latter looks significantly thinner and more unhealthy than the former, and instead of breaking into easy smirks, his face is placid and serious. The two share a Number, but little else.]

Regarding recent events, Saretha has given these aspects thought and is asking you to do the same. Please pay attention to what she has to say, whether or not you've missed these events in real time. It's all important.

I'm one of the people who was contacted by the informant from Thunder Corp, and I know of some others, but there's a question I'm very interested in at this time. I want to know if anyone was both contacted by this informant and approached by a representative from the company, and if there are any Numbered currently active on the Network who experienced neither of these things.

If you're not comfortable sharing this information on the Network, especially considering that I have a particularly destructive and untrustworthy doppelganger who can see even my private network messages and just took a job with someone I have a very bad feeling about, I can meet with you in person to discuss this regardless of your location, or speak with you on a private line. If you've agreed to help Thunder Corp, I'm not not here to judge harshly... at this point, I just want the data I've specified, and your answer one way or the other is something you're welcome to keep to yourself.

To reiterate: Were you contacted by Thunder Corp's rogue informant, or a recruiter? Were you contacted by both? Were you contacted by neither?

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[Lazarus didn't intend for it to be like this, but the fact is that it is a loaded question. It's actually kind of unfair for him to trap Nathan that way when the young man is unsuspecting and especially when he's just concerned and trying to help. But the last time that was the case, Lazarus was out of his mind, reduced to a shell incapable of taking care of himself or being left alone for any amount of time, and he wants distance between himself and that unfortunate situation. He doesn't want to be that person curled in the bathtub while Tony washed his hair and soothed him while the walls were closing in.

In short, he still wants to be the person in his echoes, even if he knows that he was far from a good man. It would at least be better than the helpless, damp infant cut-up with glass and shaking.]

I'm not in a state. You know what that's like, and this isn't it. I won't say you can't help, but the second things get dangerous or look like they will, you leave it to me, understand? I won't have you getting mixed up in something that can cost you your life.

[Normally, Nathan would not contest things like this. He hates conflict. But Lazarus is not the only one dealing with accumulated stress lately and things that he would usually just take and internalize are instead setting him further on edge.]

I'm sorry. But you are exhausting yourself and it does you no favours for your health or your ability to adequately analyze things. Perhaps you are not in a state but I do not want you to put yourself into one.

[Part of him appreciates the concern. Honestly and truly. He's been accepting the comfort that has been offered in the aftermath of what he's been witnessing lately. He's needed it. But it's only gotten increasingly strong over the past several days. And frankly, it's starting to feel like walls closing in. "You will leave it to me, understand?"

[And that wall just pushes in again, after that. He wants to say something about it, but just sets his jaw. He gives no confirmation one way or the other. No clear acquiescence.]

Edited 2015-10-06 22:46 (UTC)

[Lazarus' fingers tighten around the pen in his hand. He notices, setting it aside, but his hand is no less tense. He's trying to channel his frustration and feelings of helplessness anywhere but Nathan, and might have more success if he was in a better state of body and mind. But even though he's never contested Nathan's intelligence or judgment on other matters, this is the matter of him and the avalanche of trouble waiting to crush him like a bug.

He takes a deep, calming breath that doesn't do much to soothe the tight knot in his chest.]

Nathan... please, I know you're trying to help and I appreciate that. I do.

[Honestly, truly.]

I'm not saying that our Others have our lives set in stone, because I don't want that, but... Near outlived L. It only stands to reason that you'll outlive me. I've made my peace with that, and you need to do the same, because I'm prepared to make the decision that keeps you safe whatever the cost is. Even if you disagree, it's the right decision in every scenario I've imagined since Willow Ridge was collapsing. If I slack off now I might have to make that decision sooner than either of us want.

[He picks up his pen again, rubbing at one of his eyes until his vision clears and ceases to blur. The message, though he certainly didn't mean to send it, is this decision is mine; you're a part of it, but you have no agency regarding it.]

[His fingers untangle from his hair. The hairtwirling has always been a sign of his anxiety, and when he stops, it means either of two things: that he is calmer, or some other emotion has shunted the anxiety to the side. And he certainly is not calmer now.

[I'm already mixed up in this. You just don't realize it yet.

[There isn't much that makes Nathan angry. He'll sit back and accept and rationalize all kinds of things to the point where he feels he doesn't even have the right to be. But now he's essentially being told to sit in the corner like he's completely ineffectual and let people die for him. That he isn't capable and would make no difference if he were involved. He knows -- knows -- the words aren't meant poorly. That they're spoken from a desire for his safety. But the implications are stifling and borderline insulting even for Nathan, who retreats from the world and has his own doubts about himself.

[He doesn't raise his voice. Nathan never raises his voice. But his tone is usually soft and timid. Here, it comes out sharp and chilly.] And I am simply to sit back and allow it to happen when my aid could help prevent it? No, our Others' lives do not have ours set in stone, which means that you should not have to die before I am allowed to do anything. If you "slack"? I am here and can pick it up; it does not mean that everything will fall apart.

[There has been something vaguely weighing on him the past few days, and this conversation is only piling it on further. He's now being given no options on something in his own life? How old is he again?] You've always been one to remind others that I am not a child. Could you please take a moment to do that for yourself right now?

[Lazarus stiffens as though he's been struck. He drops his pen, and his hands flatten against the table's surface as he stares straight ahead. He realizes that he's done something terrible even as he struggles to figure out just what it was. Somehow, he managed to cause damage where he'd never intended to, where he was in fact actively working to defend against it from a different source.]

I'm... I'm sorry. You're right, Nathan, please... accept my apologies.

[He covers his mouth with his hand for a moment, as if preparing for something else to slip out and shatter another house of cards.]

When I was captured and held prisoner with Tony, I really... thought we were both going to die. I put a lot of pressure on him to be strong, to keep quiet to protect everyone, to be a man before he was ready. I worry all the time that it broke him. That he's not been the same since and it's part of the reason he left. I swore I'd never do that to you, you know... and now I've gone and done something just as bad.

[He bites his lip at the reaction. While he only gets angry rarely, Nathan has noticed that he tends to get very bitter and incisive when he does. He'd torn into Tony rather viciously when the doppelgangers had first arrived on the scene and there'd been confusion about a highly triggering issue for him. Had made nasty implications about his intelligence, knowing it was a sore spot.

[As soon as he'd calmed down, he'd felt absolutely dreadful about the whole thing. On that, Nathan hadn't had a leg to stand on. He was the one who had been out of line. But he'd apologized and they'd been able to move on.

[Here, though he is justified, he thinks, the anger melts much more quickly. This isn't as deeply seated as some of his other issues. A heavy breath drains out some of the tension.]

Why he left is . . . complicated, I'm sure. I don't have an answer for that. [He and Tony have spoken more than once since he left, but they never really addressed that. And he can't say whether Tony is different from then or not. That had been before his time as a Numbered . . . or perhaps around the time it had started. Nathan had hidden himself then, after looking over the network and finding out about the leak to the mafia. Too dangerous to reveal himself. Hide. Just hide.]

I understand that this came from a good place. I do. And the apology is accepted. I appreciate the concern, but it needs to be kept within reason.

[A part of it might be that when Lazarus knows he's wrong, pride doesn't stand in the way and make an ass of him. The faster someone is to admit fault, the less necessary it is to get incisive and bitter toward them, and for someone who has as much difficulty navigating socially as Lazarus does, it was a lesson swiftly learned.

He rubs at his scalp, tired and sad and overwhelmed, but at least something is on the mend that really needs to be. It would be the last straw if it wasn't, in a pick-a-direction-and-just-start-walking kind of way.]

Understanding is the best anyone can ask for. I'd like your help very much in that regard, actually, and... your correction, and your honesty, as well. Never be afraid to tell me if I stray from reason, OK? Even if it's hard to hear, I'd rather hear it.

[He stands from his seat at the desk, and several bones pop and crack unpleasantly as he stretches slowly and painfully.]

I have to get my circulation going again.

[It's a start, anyway.]

[Honesty. It all briefly makes him reconsider his decision not to tell him about Tony. But no. Lazarus is dealing with enough. Nathan will handle it.

[He nods along with the words.] I will try. [Speaking up is very difficult for him. Even this took quite a bit, and that had been along with the feeling of being pushed into a corner. He's glad that it seems to have worked out so well, though.]

There also has been no sign of my double re-emerging, so for secure communication on this investigation over the network, others could go through me, if it is less fuss for everyone. Though obviously, you and I cannot discuss anything safely there. [Especially considering whatever Ryuzaki is up to these days.]

[There's a lot of hypocrisy on both sides. Even if they privately acknowledge it, it might be best not to voice it out loud, at least not at present. It can wait. It'll be better to keep from coming right out and voicing painful and difficult things when there are so many others to preoccupy them.]

Just because there's been no sign of your doppelganger doesn't mean he's gone for good. Mine was incommunicado for a year and then suddenly reappeared, and if I could take back a lot of what I said on what I thought was a safe channel, I would. That being said... if you've tried to track yours down and you're sure, that could work.

I have to figure out what to do about him. It seems like the more I try to be a good person, the more he tries to be the worst possible human being. I swear there's a direct relationship between the two.

[The question of whether he's made the right decision or not is going to plague Nathan for a while. Whether he should have argued harder against Tony's plan . . . In the end, it had come down to the idea that if he argued too much, Tony might try to avoid him and cut off the only potential lifeline he has if things go bad.]

I've looked into it since Ryuzaki has made himself known. [Because don't go thinking he didn't get paranoid about that.] I have not found anything either way, so I suppose I cannot say anything one hundred percent definitive. He theoretically has the skills to stay under the radar, but from what I observed of him, he hardly has such an inclination.

[He'd never so much as spoken to his double, but he'd observed him on the network. All signs point to him being very social, and frankly rather dimwitted. Skilled in areas that Nathan is skilled in, but lacking his patience and caution. Even if he hasn't shown up on the network, Nathan likes to think his research would have turned up something on him.]

He does seem to take a great deal of pride in such a thing. [Hence Nathan's decision to only observe, not engage. If given the proper opportunity, he has little doubt that Ryuzaki would be absolutely horrible to him.]

[Lazarus cringes visibly at the use of the name. He knows it from his own echoes, and is well aware that Ryuzaki's only using it to mock him.]

Do you think he's dead? That's probably the only way to be 100% safe from him, if he has the same sabotaging behavior as... Ryuzaki. Hopefully he's not motivated to do so, but...

[Hope seems foolish these days. At least naive.]

It's a good thing that you never talk to him when he posts about our misfortunes. You could probably stand up for yourself if you needed to, but... I wouldn't want you to have to. It's not pleasant. I wish I could say that he was probably all talk and wouldn't actually hurt anyone, but he drugged me and tried to smother me once, and that was after he hired Tony's doppelganger to lock me in a closet for two days and seduce the person I was seeing at the time. He's all about real damage.

[He'd used the name both because Lazarus had used it earlier in the conversation, and because it is more concise. But seeing that reaction, Nathan makes a mental note to not do it again.]

He was piloting one of the mobile suits during the invasion. The last reports we got before fleeing indicated they were all still on the field. After that, we did not have the resources to track things as well as we had at Willow Ridge . . . [A soft sigh, remembering that. It had been a terrifying time. And he finds himself rather uncomfortable at the thought of someone with his appearance and even his Echoes being dead. Just a half a moment of equation, of putting himself in that place.]

As to his behaviour . . . while he showed no disapproval toward yours, and wound up causing confusion at the beginning, nothing indicated any inclination toward deliberate sabotage. [Didn't care if anyone got hurt, but also never set out to hurt anyone, essentially.

[He resists the urge to wind his fingers back into his hair, hearing that. Some of it he'd known already -- the bit about being locked in the closet by Tony's double -- but the rest is new to him, and very unsettling.] I did speak to him briefly when he first reappeared, but I ended that quickly. I have no desire to know what unpleasant things he has to say to me. So long as I do not have to engage him, I will not.

[The problem comes if Nathan ever has business outside of Shepherd's Haven and encounters him in person.]

[Concise it is, but that doesn't for a moment mean that it's any more comfortable. Lazarus hates thinking about his doppelganger creeping into aspects of his Other and wearing them like a skinned victim, partly in parody and partly to slyly insist that he's just better at being L than Lazarus ever could be.]

It's true. Our resources were downgraded significantly and we were at a disadvantage when it came to keeping track of certain people.

[He seems somewhat reassured at the seeming apathy Nathan's doppel had toward others, but... still.]

He's currently "dating" someone he's clearly just toying with, and his new employer doesn't seem to much care what he does with his free time. That alone raises a ton of red flags. Clearly he's not just been hired for data entry.

[Yes, he'd seen some of that on the network, with that poor naive boy. Nathan just frankly has no idea what to even do with that. How does one approach such a problem?]

It does. And that is without factoring in that I doubt he would be content doing a job that even I found boring. [That had actually been his job when he'd first become Numbered.]

[One approaches it delicately, with a sensitive touch and an ability to understand human emotion with boundless empathy. In other words, it's something neither Lazarus or Nathan should really mess with expecting good results.]

It is not a job known for being tremendously stimulating, and stimulation is something that he craves in excess.

[Which is why for as bad as he feels for that boy, Nathan has done nothing to intervene. He simply cannot envision managing anything else than failing spectacularly and probably making things worse somehow.]

When did you lean of this . . . employment opportunity of his? The post that marked his re-emergence?

[Lazarus pinches the bridge of his nose.]

That's the one, at the end of August. I could see the initial contact but they took it to truly private means very quickly. I tried to step in and speak with the would-be employer myself, but that didn't go well.

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Entry #A-3: "Ask" [Video] [Shepherd's Haven]

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