Die Another Day [Post-Death Open Post + some closed]

[be_seeing_you]

Who: Number 6 & YOU
What: Waking up from death after a sliiiight miscalculation
Where: Cabin 113 + Other places around the ship, just going about his day like nothing happened
When: The day after the beach party
Warnings: discussion and depictions of death, trauma, grief



That was unpleasant.

Pain is the last thing he remembers. Pain, and the distant sounds of screams. One of the voices may have been his. The black abyss they'd tipped into was akin to being swallowed whole in a nightmare. Fittingly, when you die in a nightmare you wake up. So too, does Number 6 awaken again at exactly 6:00 am the next morning, safe in bed. But not safe from the memory of the black and the way it scraped at his mind like a dull cheese grater.

He lies there a moment reorienting himself. Above him, the sight of his familiar cabin roof is both sickening and a comfort. He's alive. He's... unharmed? Why does that fact make him furious? He'd hoped, foolishly, that if he did meet death out there on the water it would be the kind that lasts. It would free him from the fate of being tied forever to the Eterna. No such luck. But if he's here then... Arthur! And young Steve! They must be just waking up as well.

There's no time to wallow in his failure. If he must continue to live here, then he may as well get on with it. He should go see how his fellows are doing. He thought he saw a group of people lingering on the beach after the last call went out. Were they planning their own escape, or was there something else going on? The only way to find out is to get out of here and go see for himself.

Number 6 can be found all around the ship, going about his day like he didn't just fall off the edge of the map like a chump. And, no, he really doesn't want to talk about it, thanks very much. (So definitely bring it up to him, wink.) He kicks off this brand new day with his usual routine of training on the sport's deck. Does he seem like he's hitting that punching bag just a little harder than is necessary?

After training and then a long shower, he'll go down to Sand Dollars to order himself a coffee (yes, you heard that right) and a cake. Today, apparently, he's making an exception about his no sugar rule. He'll stay there for an hour, reading a book with an aura radiating off him that threatens violence to anyone that approaches. (But when has anyone let that stop them?)

Full of caffeine and sugar, he'll spend the next part of the day pacing the decks and the promenade, feeling the need to just move and keep moving. During that time, he will realize with dismay that he knows neither Arthur nor Steve's cabin numbers, so he will either have to ask someone else or wait to find them on his own. Mostly, he's choosing the latter.

He finished the book Clara gave him this morning over his coffee, so once the pacing gets too tiring, he tries popping back into the library to find something else. All he ends up doing is staring at the titles without hardly reading them. He's not really in the mood.

Eventually, he will drag himself to the Windjammer for an evening meal. And sit alone. As one does when trying to avoid talking to anyone about their first death experience. He's got himself an entire plate of bangers and mash but he's mostly just pushing it around his plate. He just keeps seeing the black. Over and over. How is he going to sleep tonight? He supposes he will cross that bridge when he comes to it. Which won't be until well after midnight this time. He's got some more pacing on the deck to do first.

But he's fine. Really. He's fine. There's no need for anyone to talk to him about this. Ever.

Comments

[be_seeing_you]

"You've found another of my flaws." Even he can't lie about the size of his own ego.

"Strawberry and chocolate syrup." Number 6 will continue to be boringly uncreative with his ice cream order.

"What would you say to them, today, if it were you?"

[businessorlibation]

"That they were very brave to come with me. That dying is a miserable business, and that I wish they hadn't had to face it either. That they're welcome to talk to me about what happened, and I understand if they want nothing to do with me after that."

He passes Number 6 his bowl of ice cream, before loading his with hot fudge and Oreo crumbs and chocolate chips.

"But that I hope they would still talk to me, because this ship needs bold fools, just as it needs shrewd cowards. All risks are calculated, and we need to face them with the knowledge of what the worst-case scenario is. This won't be the only opportunity to die bravely. I think...choosing to go out and try something like this, it's more meaningful than any death in the battle royale was."

[be_seeing_you]

"I should send you to be my spokesperson. You're more accomplished at it by far." He's thinking back to a couple of altercations he had on the beach during that drinking game. There were the teens, of course, and then Stede as well.

He takes a gloomy bite of his ice cream. Only he could make such a thing look so depressed.

"There was something different about that island. There were fish in the sea. Birds in the air. I thought there might truly be something beyond the horizon."

[businessorlibation]

"I'm not sure you could afford to hire me as your spokesman, Smith."

But that's warm teasing as he settles down into a seat with his sundae, letting out a bit of a heavy sigh. He's going to need to stop by his cabin or the infirmary for a Midol at some point.

"The island sounds like it was lovely. It's a shame you weren't able to enjoy it for what it was. I do understand why you felt it necessary to try to escape. But it was never going to work."

[be_seeing_you]

Fudgy syrup and creamy ice cream melt and mingle on his tongue, and as he sits there, he can't seem to recall the last time he'd tasted it. He can't seem to recall a lot of small details like that. What does he enjoy about life? What are his favorite flavors of food, his favorite colors? He's been so driven by a need to escape that he's lost track of himself. Did he enjoy the sun on the beach, the sound of waves, and the grit of sand between his toes? No, he'd been too focused on his plan.

"I suppose not. But, I don't know if I could ever simply enjoy it for what it is, not while I'm a prisoner here. This place is too much like the last one. I never stopped trying there, either."

[businessorlibation]

"I think there are people who would say that enduring tenacity makes you a stronger man than I am. And I'm certain that if you'd been held hostage by the Black Note, you'd have managed to break yourself free, as I was never able to."

He pauses, licking fudge off his spoon.

"But I think in the current situation, you're also a miserable man who's afraid to build genuine connections to others. You wear spitefulness and defiance as armor, and that sounds like an exhausting way to live. Reminds me of how loudly I used to insist to people that I'm 'no weak sister,' keeping up a facade while miserable, not letting anyone close."

[be_seeing_you]

"Maybe..." he answers noncommittally. He used to be good at getting out of predicaments like that. His track record recently has been less encouraging.

His pride bristles at being called a miserable man, but the heat behind it fizzles just as quickly. He wants to argue against it. How can he? And then, once that rush of contrarianism subsides, his mind latches on to that one peculiar detail. Slowly he turns his head to look at Johnny, some level of shrewdness in it but lacking the usual sharp edge.

"Is that a slang term unique to your world?"

[businessorlibation]

“How would I know if it’s unique to my world or not?” There’s a wry humor there for a moment. “Has anyone ever accused you of ‘hitting like a girl’, or told you to suck it up because men don’t cry? To be a woman is seen as weakness, wrong as that is, in my world.”

But he makes eye contact, as if silently asking 6 exactly how deep he’s reading into things, and if he’s ready to actually have this conversation.

[be_seeing_you]

"Not since I became an Olympic boxer," he returns in that same wry tone. Yes, those sorts of assumptions run rampant in his time. There are plenty of women that truly are wilting flowers in the face of adversity, but there are just as many who proved to be a far greater threat than any man. He'd learned very quickly never to underestimate a woman. They could be the most treacherous of all...

Number 6 holds that eye contact with a strong and steady gaze. Johnny may be able to visualize the scales weighing in his mind. That same lingering suspicion of something is back. He's getting a stronger sense now of what it could be. But is he ready to peel back the edges and look it in the face? Is he? He faced death just yesterday, so why does this feel infinitely more dangerous? Is that because Johnny seems ready to trust him? Or is it because he isn't sure if he's worthy of that trust?

"'If I can be a man you respect,'" he recites. "That's what you asked of me. It's a fair ask."

[businessorlibation]

"We're doing this, then." He nods quietly. "Right. Growing up, my parents thought they had a daughter, a little girl to teach to be pretty and poised, to prepare to marry into the right family. I was delicate, fine-figured, soft...and miserable. I hated the trappings of girlhood, and I feared womanhood, and I felt out of place entirely for most of my youth. At some point I realized that for me, femininity is and always has been a lie. To grow up and marry some man and be his wife would be a deception, always wearing a mask to cover up the person I truly am. At sixteen, I ran away from home and started working to build a life where I can be myself, the person I actually am."

He gestures up and down himself. "Johnny Summer is not a disguise, not a lie or act of deception, Mr. Smith. He's who I truly am, even if parts of my physical form would say otherwise."

[be_seeing_you]

Something about the way Johnny says that: "We're doing this, then" makes Number 6 wonder if he hasn't been waiting for this opening for some time. And now, as he listens, he realizes what it was that Cesar was hinting at before, too. They'd both been pushing him--haven't they?-- little by little, to the edge of this moment, waiting for him to take the dive.

So he does listen, openly and with as little judgment as a man like him can muster. He hears the common threads that unite him and Johnny, despite this hard-to-swallow revelation. He resists looking too hard at Johnny's features, to see if he can find the remnants of the person that was. That person is gone and Johnny has firmly put them in the grave. That much is immutable fact. And now he finally sees why Johnny had been so earnest in refusing to give away Number 6's secret, refusing even the idea of calling him by anything else. The pieces fall into place, at last.

He's quiet for a long moment after Johnny finishes explaining. It's a pensive silence. He's taking his time to digest. Another piece of advice he'd been given by Cesar. It is still shocking, he decides, to encounter someone who has eschewed their previous gender like this. But is it more Shocking than a girl who can change form with a thought, or phase through walls, or shoot magic from her hands? No. He decides it isn't.

"The physical parts of you that might say otherwise are of no concern to anyone but your lovers, whom I already know are in complete support of you." There, that was the hardest part out of the way.

"I know what it is to live a lie, day in and day out. And you already know why that is. It's no way to live." Miserable, just like Johnny said. It is miserable. Number 6 is... miserable.

"So, you are who you say you are." It's what Johnny had said to him, and it's advice worth taking. "And I believe you. I... respect you still."

[businessorlibation]

Johnny relaxes visibly at hearing that conclusion, smiling down at his ice cream. "It does mean a lot to hear that from you, after everything. I wasn't sure where you'd fall when it all came out. But you've grown, in the past couple of months, haven't you?"

[be_seeing_you]

"Yes..." He has to admit it, though it still feels very unlike himself to be so candid--so vulnerable. "Yes, I have. I do not think I could have accepted you this way if not for, well, your patient prodding."

[businessorlibation]

Johnny nods a bit, not bothering to hide his smile.

"The way you approached me during the pool party made me realize you perhaps needed that patience. That you weren't accustomed to being given grace."

[be_seeing_you]

"No, I suppose I wasn't. There's never been much room for error in my line of work." It also meant he had to take in information quickly and make fast judgments. That's been working both for and against him here.

"Even less in The Village."

[businessorlibation]

"Well. You have it here--at least from me. Probably from others, if you open yourself to it. But you have to be willing to accept it."

Which he knows is the rub.

[be_seeing_you]

"I'm willing to open myself up to it in the same way you are willing to leave this ship for excursions." There's no harsh tone of judgment in that, just a very matter-of-fact statement. They both have their difficulties, don't they? It can't be changed overnight.

[businessorlibation]

"'The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.'" He nods his understanding quietly, getting what Number 6 means completely. "I managed it when the zombies attacked, somehow."

[be_seeing_you]

"And I've managed it with you, and a few others." Not quite as dramatic as a zombie attack, but no less meaningful.

"It must mean there's hope for us, yet."

[businessorlibation]

"Hope, and an eternity of time before us to work on our problems." Johnny offers a crooked little smile. Because it's true. It's true and worth looking on the bright side of.