Internal Meltdown

[There was some stuff that should go here, but I forgot to grab a transcript of the chat portion, so I suck :( ]

Pen
Her frown eases, but her eyebrows perk at Grace's assessment of trust, and she listens, and (I'd like that, if we could be.) then her expression shifts, subtle things, this faint and reserved upturn of the corners of her mouth, a moonlight suggestion of a smile maybe a touch wistful and she says, "Let's hope," where hope is this open-ended word, and it can mean all manner of things.

But then Grace adds an epilogue, and Pen's eyebrows draw together again; for a beat she debates letting it lie there, a note of regret, but!

"How did I punch him when he was down?" Pen sounds (Earnest) concerned and confused. Of course she is intent; this is an opportunity, perhaps, to glean insight.

Grace
"Well. He doesn't see it as being down, not really, I think. He is always endlessly surprised whenever I, or anyone else speaks up for him. He expects abandonment, because that's all he ever got as a child. I fully expect about ninety percent of you guys having a reaction like yours, or worse. He expects more like a hundred percent," she says, one of those sad smiles on her face, because Ka...Elliot's dire reactions to things are always a little funny, except when they aren't. "I don't know for sure. But I think a part of him is happy that things are going so well."

He is alive. They did not execute him for treason. You know, so very well.

"You were... Family to him. Sometimes you don't get along with your family, but they're there. Now that he's left, it's like he was a Jehovah's Witness who went apostate. Shunning, by those he used to have an automatic connection to. I can't see how that's not punching him while he's down."

Suddenly, Pen has her full attention, the flighty eyes landing on her for a change instead of a cloud or a piece of interesting grit in the wall of the bar. Does it feel like a stab, perhaps? To have that shifting, but ever-sharp focus arrayed against one?


"And I can even understand, to an extent, even if I don't agree. You feel attacked? Nobody's a horrible monster in any of this. It's still hard to... Watch."

Pen
"Mm. Yeah; I understand. It's always when… But I think it's also - I mean, who wants to be surrounded by people who believe the same thing and have no independent thought? Who doesn't want a dissenting voice now and again? I think it's good when we disagree, that we can, and civilly, without Disagreement becoming the sum total of our Word. I think that's something separating our people from Big Brother. I - "

Pen could not be more earnest, or present (doubt that the stars are fire) in this moment. She gathers her thoughts and lays them out for Grace like so.

Expressive. Eloquent eyes. Searching voice. Questioning. Questant.

"Okay. I certainly don't wish to cause Elliot unhappiness, but… Grace, in this scenario, he is the one doing the abandoning. Yeah, you don't get an automatic connection when you choose to sever it. And I want to be really clear. I'm not shunning him." Ardent, too. "I fully expect to see him around and to discuss, privately and not on a public green while on a date ten minutes before a play begins, anything about leaving the Order he'd like to discuss. I mean, he sat there and told me he allowed me to continue living in Denver - his city - because I didn't have beliefs he disapproved of. Thanks, Elliot?"

From ardent to baffled. "How would you have reacted if you were in my position? How should I have reacted?"

See - it's that searching quality her clear gray eyes have; as if she really means that she wants an answer to these questions. She does. Pen rakes her fingers through her hair, holding it back and away from her face. Her bangs fall back into place, a rakish angle.


"I told you guys I didn't know what to say; I was just honest. I don't think I was cruel to him." Pen: lifts her shoulder: this expressive little curse. "I don't… I'm just sorry it's upsetting you." Beat. Her eyebrows loft: "Do you wanna call him and see if he can come by? Then we can all three go in."

Grace
"How would I have reacted? To someone who say, admitted to me that he couldn't hack my little club due to personal weakness, and then told me I'd been allowed to set up shop in my new residence? I'd probably laugh, because that's hilarious. I mean, tell me how lacking in ability you are, and then try to push me around without cause? But Pen, you know you didn't exactly arrive here at an auspicious time. And you, a transplant from a place on the brink of outright war? Tensions were thick. We had cause to kick you to the curb if it was obvious you loved that war so much your purpose for coming to Denver was not to build a new home here, but to come to ours and start flinging gasoline and sparks."

She sighs, her eyes go darting off again. There was another Hermetic Mage from the East coast in Denver at just that time, too. Somebody who did love that war. Who wanted to start it. Who was taken aside and told no. It's not like she's speaking of impossibilities or from a place of undue paranoia.

"I'm no authority. I don't go around deciding for other people what they can and can't do, where they can and can't live. But I'll step in if I think people are going to get hurt, yeah. That's not just 'having beliefs he disapproves of', and that is what he was talking about."

She asked another question too. Did she want to call up Elliot and ask him to come too? Just to prove that no shunning was involved and everybody's okay?

"I have to... Have a date with a pint of ice cream, my empty room, and a recalcitrant piece of code right now. No offense, but between all of us, including myself, I've had about all I can stand of people today. Computers are easier."


They always have been. From the beginning.

Pen
To the first things Grace says by way of reply, Pen adds very little. Except, "Nobody loves war but mercenaries, and merchants of oblivion. I am neither."

And Grace sighs, and her gaze goes bouncing away, and Pen glances briefly at the door of the bar, before bringing her gaze back to Grace. Who is no authority, who doesn't go around deciding for other people, etcetera, and Pen's eyebrows draw together again, and she shakes her head at 'that's not just,' says only, "We have had very different interactions with Elliot, you and I."


And Grace has a date with… Here, the spark of a smile, lake-light; can't quite hold it, the way it will dissolve if you try to. "Well, I won't twist your arm. I am glad we ran into one another, and aired some of this out - I did not think it wore on you so. Can we meet up to discuss the letter soon?"

Grace
As Pen talks, Grace's expression again turns to one of intense pondering.

What the fuck, Pen?

Yeah, Elliot's point was that you weren't a merchant of death. The whole time. Those were the words you put into his mouth maybe, but fuck...

Does she regularly respond to a request for the time with 'I AM NOT AN AXE MURDERER' too?

And then, a short time later, it's all 'Yay, let's all go eat nachos, I love spending quality time with people who I believe hold contempt for me and everything I stand for!'

Pen didn't think any of this wore on her so.

She rubs at her eyes. These are headache-inducing levels of purely incomprehensible. Grace must be an alien. It's the only possible explanation available for being the singular 'human' being on planet earth who makes even a tiny bit of sense.

She nods, responds to the one thing in this mess that she can cling to with: "Yeah, yeah. That's a good idea. They're discussing it in there right now, or were when I left. New things have come to light. I'll see you."

And maybe, next time, this all won't feel so bizzarre. Everybody will be sane, even Doctor Sepulveda. There will be kittens and penguins. And some nachos for Pen to cuddle.


Her eyes defocus to some faraway infinity of that happy familyhood, and she promptly starts walking toward it, away from the actual Penelope.