thearena | If we met at midnight

Entry tags:

If we met at midnight

Who| All those on the liberation mission and all those being made to fight against them.
What| The liberation of District 2.
Where| District 2.
When| This week.
Warnings/Notes| War, violence, death. Please warn for more in headers.

The hovercrafts fly in over the tall mountains of the Rockies, dwarfing the towering trees. From the sky, the scene is beautiful, all glittering snow, blue water, and green that never fades. The planes stretch on into the east, seeming never to end. Nestled in the mountains is a city that doesn't appear to have ever seen better days. It's worn and patched, and were the temperature a little warmer, one's first thought might be of the old west. The trains only add to this image, going all over into the various mining mountains.

Propaganda can be seen everywhere here in the city; posters of Snow, of Capitol supporting Tributes, things seeking to inspire District unity. If it seems to rebels like they're the bad guys here, that's because they are. District two doesn't want liberation. A District home to people loyal to the Capitol, to their District and the Peacekeepers, fans of the Games, and full of indoctrination, rebels are not only unwelcome, they're considered threats. Loyalty means everything to them and rebels are disruptions to this loyalty. There will be no help from the people here unless you're a soldier for the Capitol, in which case, housing and bed are offered, as well as munitions. Poster of Albert, Anna, and Felicity have been placed up, saying "The Courage Of Sacrifice!", "The Light Of Victory Shines Ahead!, and "To A Bright And Protected Future!", respectively.

If you serve the rebellion, however, it's off to the mountains with you. It's not exactly safe, but it's the best that can be managed until a takeover is made. The hovercraft lands upon a wider ledge of the snowy mountainside, sitting there rather precariously. There's no cave, and only barely enough room in the hovercraft. Resources are heavily rationed. Camp fires will need to be made outside the plane, and food hunted. Simply pulling in breath in the high altitudes may be difficult. Fight off frostbite may be more so. The moaning winds inspire all kinds of paranoia. Best stick close to one another.

Although everyone is lucky to find the sun shines during the day, allowing for some warmth, as the night falls, the temperature drops. The District shuts down all power, putting it all into heating and leaving the city in total darkness. This provides an advantage of cover for everyone, but if you're not a Districter used to the dark, seeing what you're doing may very well be a problem.

The war continues, and in the back of everyone's mind is a familiar phrase; may the odds be ever in your favor.

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Roland tries to read Firo's face, his voice, tries to read the emotion there but, as he told Firo, right now Firo's face is closed to him. He can't focus on it long, anyway. There's wind blowing from the door, from around and under it, and Roland can see sand, the dirt from the hard, cracked desert ground blowing past behind Firo's head. He watches it, he shudders, pushes down the same fear that pushed that moan a minute ago out from his lips and the way his grip slides off Firo's shoulder is what brings his attention back to it. He grasps for the boy's arm, tries to feel the sleeve under his fingers, takes a breath.

"Shitty plan. Is that what we were talking about? Yes, that was it. Was it one?" Walk through it. He remembers how it was up on that mountain. Lay out those facts, then decide. "They knew our faces. There was one way up that mountain and one way down, unless you'd like to try your own feet and spend a couple days lost in the snow. Or worse. There was no hiding the body. Not forever. Guards all around. Was there a better plan? High as I am, I may be missing it. You show it to me, Firo. What should I have done?"

Edited 2016-06-25 22:23 (UTC)

Firo inches forward when he sees Roland shake, and now he reaches up with both hands to try and pin that hand to his shoulder. If Roland’s too distracted or pained or anything to keep it there, Firo intends to do it for him.

He keeps his mouth shut as Roland goes back through the plan; okay, so maybe Firo can concede a lot of those things. Still, there’s room for argument. “Well, to start, we coulda’ just cut his throat instead of shootin’ off a gun and lettin’ the whole mountain know. And we coulda’ dragged him into the hiding spot before killin’ him. That woulda’ bought us time.”

But perhaps not enough, he knows. Roland’s right that they would’ve been found eventually. This isn’t exactly like a gang hit, where everything would’ve been planned out and where nothing would’ve happened until escape routes were known and clear. They were working with what they had, which wasn’t really much.

There’s one big thing, though, that Firo knows didn’t have to go the way it did. He leans forward and doesn’t realize that he's almost yelling now, “Only one of us got in trouble for it, do you get that? They only needed one! You didn’t have to fuckin' stand out there waitin’ for ‘em to come get you!”

They only needed one. Roland's mind is slow, he knows that. Just now, it's slow, and he has to take a moment to work out the implications of that. He watches Firo's shirt as he does it; there's no telling what he'd see if he looked further into the room, over Firo's shoulder, and so he doesn't. He's avoiding the vision behind Firo and he's avoiding it out of fear, and that eats at Roland. It makes him want to look. But Firo deserves an answer, he doesn't deserve his friend staring into the space behind him and gibbering.

He makes himself focus, and feels his gaze sharpening. They only needed one. "That's true. They did only need one. And you're angry about that, aren't you?"

And then it hits him.

"What great evil did I ever do..." he murmurs, half in memory, half quoting something he remembers thinking once, many times. He can't remember the rest. It's a fair question, anyway.

Focus. Firo. "You must never take my place, do you understand?" He leans forward, his free hand moving to try and clench itself over one of Firo's. It's the one with those two metal fingers, the fingers he can't feel, and in this state their grip may be a little tighter than Roland knows it to be. His eyes are wide, his expression one of great urgency. "When it's my sacrifice to make. It had to be me. You must never make it for me, do you see? Not even if I ask you. Not even if I demand. What in the world did you think I was going to do, up on that mountain, if not that?"

“You knew they were gonna do this to you, but you still did it. Not killin’ that guy—“ He waves his hand dismissively; he doesn’t really care about that. “—but makin’ sure they knew to take you.”

It was Roland’s whole little play after the murder that makes Firo want to tear his hair out. It’s exactly the opposite of what you’re supposed to do in those situations, which is button your lip or deny, deny, deny.

Firo doesn’t think about his reasoning for arguing here, because it’s something he doesn’t have to think about. It’s just what’s natural. He looks down at Roland’s hand, then back at his face. Why is he talking like this is so important when he’s just spouting nonsense? “Why the hell shouldn’t I? You don't have to fight your battles alone.”

He recalls Maiza facing off against Szilard in Alveare, urging his sworn brothers to hide. To save them while giving up himself. The Martillos didn't let Maiza do it then, and Firo doesn't intend to let Roland do it now or ever.

"I know I don't. I know that." He should be clear headed for this. Well, nevermind. He isn't. "There's a difference, Firo, don't you see it? The difference between fighting a battle and dying in it. Dying for it. For me. Firo, I called all their names, did I mention that? I remember. Every time. All my dead. Some of them by my own hand. Alain. Ask Alain. He remembers."

Roland closes his eyes, opens them to focus on Firo, and takes a breath that gets steadier the longer he makes it. "But I'm free of it. Why don't you see it? I'm free now. No more."

His hand goes again to the side of Firo's face, moves to brush back his hair. "I'd hate to see you become one of those names. I'd hate it. Men will die - you may die - but it won't be because of me. For me. Fight for me, if you like, but no sacrifices. I'm done with those. I've earned this much, haven't I? After everything. No more sacrifices. Why does that anger you so?"

He nods slowly, the movement hitching only a little in surprise when Roland credits himself with some of those deaths. The dead—that much he remembers. Hearing his friend list all those names was an eerie experience he doesn’t think he’s going to soon forget. As for whether those names arrived on the list through Roland’s own fault… Firo’s not inclined to believe that. At the least, he can’t believe that Roland would do such things if they didn’t need to be done.

This time, he doesn’t track Roland’s motion with his eyes, and he makes no move to interfere.

“…To be completely honest with you, I’m not sure I understand the difference.” Even with Roland acting so bizarre, Firo’s not inclined to dismiss the distinction as meaningless. That doesn’t mean he’s close to knowing why there’s a distinction in the first place.

“It doesn’t…” He sighs and shakes his head. Roland asked him not to lie. “Maybe it does make me mad. It’s just—it doesn’t…”

He leans in, speaking more firmly. He can talk about what he does know, maybe that'll help. “Listen, the way my Family does things—the way every Family does things—you never woulda’ needed to even be there. And your guys woulda’ made sure you didn’t get caught for it. It just doesn’t make sense. You couldn’t’ve gotten free any other way?”

Roland keeps saying that, but it’s yet another thing Firo doesn’t quite get. He'd said he was dead before--is that the freedom he's speaking of? If so, how will he feel when he's fully aware again?

The way Firo thinks has always been, for the most part, fairly clear to Roland. He thinks over it now and what he sees, fairly clear, is that there is no way to explain his reasoning here. "Things were so in my world too, more or less, but no more. Not with me. I can't explain to you why I know that, but I know it. I know what I can afford to sacrifice, Firo. If that sacrifice is myself, rather than you - well, I know my own mind, even now. I know very well what it is I need. Is that not enough?"

Firo's not so foolish as to think that they may never have to act--or that he may have to not act--on this decision. Trouble will find them, as it always does, and he'll have to keep his promise. Hard as he knows it'll be, he intends to. Because this is important to his friend.

There's still apprehension in his voice when he nods. "If that's what you want."

Need, though, that was the word Roland used. Firo studies his face, searching for clues on how to make him back to normal. Or at least to make sure he's comfortable

"What else do you need? I can't really read you either right now--not that I can usually do it or anything." The task is just harder when Roland's mind seems to be running around in ideas and in memories that Firo's not familiar with. ...Though he supposes that, too, is normal in a way.

Roland sags a little, relieved, and a grateful smile stretches over his face. "Thank you, Firo. Thank you. Enough have died for me already. And I told you, these days, childe Roland is dead. That makes little sense, doesn't it? Perhaps I'll be able to explain better once my mind is my own again. Once this wears off, anyway. But you, agreeing to this even though you must not understand a bit of it - you're a good lad, Firo."

He shakes his head, corrects himself. "A good friend. That's what I need now. Just wait with me until this wears off. Then I'll see if I can't answer any questions you still have. Alright? That much makes sense, doesn't it?" Does it? He hopes so. They might both just have to make do, if it doesn't.

Who would've thought a guy would look so happy to hear his friend wasn't planning on dying for him? Firo wouldn't have, but his confusion doesn't make his relief--and happiness, because it's pretty easy to be happy when his friends are happy--at seeing that smile any less deep. He returns it with one of his own, a mixture of bemusement simple joy.

Most people would have Firo hissing and spitting if they called him 'lad' or anything similar to the dreaded 'kid.' It doesn't even occur to him to make a fuss about it now. Maybe he does smile just a bit more proudly when it's corrected before he ducks his head. "C'mon, this is just what friends're supposed to do "

He looks back up. "The answers aren't that important anyway. Well, obviously I wanna know what the hell's goin' on, but I don't need to. I'm just glad you're okay." He shuffles closer now, close enough that they're just bumping together. "And I'll stay."

Of course he will. Even if Roland had told him to get lost he still would've hung around.

Roland watches Firo move closer and, once he's finished, moves to take Firo's hand. He leans his head back, and stares at the center of the room. He listens.

"Maybe any friend would have agreed," he murmurs, his voice warm, still staring ahead, "to shut me up. See me calm. Not everyone would mean it."

Firo does. He knows that, and the knowledge settles into him. He doesn't have to be able to read Firo's face or his voice to know that he means it. He means to keep his promise, and he means to stay. That's enough.

Firo lets him take his hand, and he squeezes Roland's in return. "I do mean it." He bobs his head once. He doesn't say so because he thinks Roland doubts him; he says it to confirm the certainty of the promise.

He twists his head over his shoulder to follow Roland's gaze. It looks to him like the same spot he was so fixated on before. Firo straightens his back and squares his shoulders when he turns back around, doing what little he can to try to block what might be there. "Are you still lookin' at it? Maybe you should turn around."

With the hand Roland isn't holding, he reaches out to try and nudge his friend's shoulder.

Roland looks at his shoulder, looking briefly surprised at the feeling, then looks up again. "This is the last time, I think. I wish... I wish I could see the whole of the place, one more time. Just once more."

His hand lets go of Firo's, moves as if to reach out- Roland stops it. His fingers curl against his palm and he drops his hand to his side again, keeps it there. "Perhaps I should turn away. Perhaps I should..."

"A little while longer. Just a little while. Until it leaves me be for good. That's alright, isn't it Firo? Just for a little while?"

Firo's eyebrows knit in confusion. "You want to see it? But..." But he was so glad to be free! And he seemed so afraid.

He's not sure why Roland's asking him for permission, and part of him wishes he wouldn't--how is Firo supposed to know what to tell him? He thinks it over, certain he's going to make the wrong decision. How could he make the right one when he doesn't even know what's going on? "I-I guess. Just a look. Don't try goin' near it again because I won't let you."

He presses his hand more firmly on Roland's shoulder. He's ready to dig his heels in and fight if he sees things go south.

Roland nods, smiles gratefully, briefly, then puts his hand over Firo's. There's been a lot of that, he realizes, a lot of touching, and Roland finds himself looking at Firo's face, trying to figure out if he minds. But he can't afford to wonder about it right now, with his mind trying to go in so many directions it oughtn't.

"This may be the only time I can explain," he realizes. "Some of it, anyway. A great deal of it. Would you ask? My answers may not make a great deal of sense; maybe Alain can help you decipher them, later. If he's- If he lives. My mind can't visit that time in my life otherwise, Firo, it layers over itself, the memories are... difficult. But now-" He shrugs. "I don't know. If there's anything you'd like to know about me, about all this, best ask it now."

Firo blinks; he'd figured that there wouldn't be many answers, especially not while Roland still seems to be recovering. It's tempting, but then he shakes his head as something jumps to mind. "Wait... no, first I owe you an apology. For when I tried to hit you." In all the confusion, he doesn't think he got around to saying that. He said he would, so he will. "I apologize for that."

That taken care of... questions. Boy, does he have questions. What matters is finding which ones are most important; with that, as with many things, Firo thinks it's best to be as straightforward as possible.

Brisk and businesslike, he starts off: "You said you were free. Is this stuff still gonna bother you? What do we do if that happens?" His manner softens, and he smiles almost apologetically. "You'd think I'd already have the hang of this by now."

Twice. Both times he felt like he was going to stumble around in the dark until he lost his friend. He doesn't want that to happen again.

Roland's expression goes sour, disappointed, but certainly not with Firo. "You'd think I would."

He tilts his head back, watches the ceiling, closes his eyes to better hear the Tower, that chorus of whispers on the edge of hearing, the murmuring of a thousand... a thousand somethings. Someones. Echoes, maybe. The thought strikes him - and it might not have, were he not in this state, but he is and it strikes him - that his own, now, might be one of them. A moan starts up again in his throat and again he stops it, he forces his eyes open, he shudders and stretches his fingers out, feeling around with them, trying to figure out if Firo's hand is nearby. It is, and right under his. He takes a deep breath.

"But it will, won't it?" he murmurs, his voice quiet with resignation, slow and ashamed. "Of course it will."

"Only remind me of the here and now, Firo. Whatever that happens to be. I don't care how. Talk about it. Keep touch with me somehow. I'll come back to you. It's a sinkhole in my mind - suppose it always has been, in one way or another - but there's nowhere for it to pull me under to. Only wait. Don't let me forget about you."

He shrugs, the movement quick and jerking, the irritation that's been creeping into his voice making its way now onto his face, too. "I don't know. I only dealt with men like this briefly, years and years ago. During the war. New Canaan's war, that is. I don't know how to- how to live it."

"There's no need to apologize for hitting me, either." His gaze has moved, thankfully, back to Firo's face. The only safe spot in the room to look. "If you feel like you need to hit me, do it. I trust your judgement."

The words may be born from Roland's irritation and his need for some place to direct it, but he means it, anyway, means it so much that the last sentence almost sounds dismissive. It's an afterthought, something he feels he barely needs to say. Of course he trusts that.

That moaning again. It’s eerie and scary and all Firo can really do about it is hold on and watch. When Roland doesn’t seem to lose himself and instead keeps talking, Firo frowns; it doesn’t seem right for Roland to be so hard on himself. “Hey…” How to actually express that sentiment he has no idea, so his protest trails off.

As Roland looks to his face, Firo looks back at him, smiling just a little, “Whenever I think I need to? You’re openin’ the door pretty wide there, you know.” Not that he would want to hit Roland enough to take advantage of it, but still.

“I’ll remember that. All of it. If this happens again, I’ll be ready for it, and I won’t leave you. I promise.” Much as the thought of fumbling through this incident twice had needled him a minute ago, Firo realizes it’s a good thing too; they have proof twice over that the method Roland’s sharing will work.

He thinks a little more. “Is there any of it you want me to ask about?” When they spoke before about Roland’s past, he’d simply said that he wouldn’t talk about something if he didn’t want to. This time, Firo still wants to be cautious about the topic considering how much trouble Roland could be in if he falls back into raving. Besides, he doesn’t even know where to begin to ask about it all.

"I could tell you of the Tower." He shudders, listens to the noise of it, the echo of the place which he's spent his life in seeking, the place he'll never see or hear again.

He'd been saying something, hadn't he?

"Oh, yes. The Tower. My quest. Its end, and its end, and its end, and- no. That isn't the important part, anyway."

Roland laughs. It's perhaps the first time in this land, in Panem, that he has made such a noise, at least in this way. It's a loud, rust-covered sound, less a laugh than a series of enthusiastic croaks. "Isn't that strange? It's not important anymore. I spent my life getting there, you know. I sacrificed everything. Everyone. Have I said that to you before? And it's them I'd tell you about now. The very people I- well. They're gone now, anyway. Everyone is."

He looks at Firo again and then tries to keep doing so, aware that he needs to keep looking, needs the reminder. "Nearly everyone."

"But what to say? What would be enough? How do you remember a man to someone who has never met him? It's hard to think. What would you ask, Firo? What's the first thing you want to know about a man, when the two of you first meet?"

Everyone. Now Firo feels a little bad, maybe, for being angry at Roland for sacrificing himself. For very nearly asking why he wouldn’t have let someone else go in his place.

He can hardly identify that sound Roland’s making as a laugh, but he still tries to smile along.

“When we first meet? Then I just wanna make sure he’s not gonna stab me or something.”

That issue has been long resolved with Roland. Firo never trusts people from the start, but he has a pretty good track record of figuring out who will or won’t attack him without provocation. Roland has never been someone he thought would lash out at him with no warning, and over time he’s become someone Firo trusts implicitly.

These friends of Roland are another matter, because Firo realizes that he knows next to nothing of them. But it sounds like they’re well beyond stabbing him too, just in a different way. On account of being dead.

“I guess… You could always start at the beginning—how you met.”

"How we met? Usually, I..." He leans heavily against Firo and lets his head fall forward, already getting dizzy from trying to sort through all the memories, nearly the same, all layered on top of one another. But it's important. It's important and, right now, he can do it. "I stole them. Took them from their homes. I needed them. From New York - always New York, seems like. I stole them, saved two of them from themselves, and damned them all."

"How we met? Ah. Doorways. Always doorways, for the two of them. Susannah. She was here, you know." It's a relief to speak of that, even for a second. Those memories come easy. "Taken by thirteen after her death in an arena. I never saw her again. She's the one who left. Came here right after. She hoped she'd find Eddie, I think. You remind me of him, sometimes. Eddie. Couldn't be more different, in some ways. Eddie and Susannah. Gunslingers, both. Loyal and brave. Do meetings really matter? We met, that's the important thing."

"Was there something else? Start at the beginning. The beginning was- It was- There was a desert. The Mohaine desert. That's what I hear in front of me now, Firo."

Roland watches Firo's face and, for a second, two seconds, he looks afraid. "Ask me something, Firo. Or tell me. Anything. The first thing you want to know of a man is whether he's going to stab you. And the second thing? Once you're sure he won't?"

"Hey!" The exclamation comes more out of worry than any need to grab Roland's attention. Firo tries to wrap one arm under Roland's to help prop him up. "I--hang on."

It's all flying over his head, the goddamned doors, the desert. He holds onto what he can: their names, the comparison. Anything that might be important. Right now, he doesn't know if he's helping or hurting.

"God, I don't--" He rarely approaches getting to know someone so systematically. With the strong personalities he tends to meet, Firo often finds himself just along for the ride. He doesn't know what the second thing is, or the third, or all those after that. But he has to come up with something--he has to make that fearful look on Roland's face go away.

"I want to know... I want to know how they act, I guess. If they're the type to stand by you or run. But you already said they're loyal. Tell me what you guys did together. Is that gonna help?"

"Help?" He doesn't try to puzzle through that, that help would be the first concept to come to Firo's mind. He just shakes his head and explains as best he can. "Help doesn't matter. What matters- Eddie. And Susannah. Even Oy. And Ja-"

His mouth, his mind, stumbles over the word. Over the name. Something in him doesn't want to say that name but he tries saying it again, anyway. "Jake. My son. Jake. Jake Chambers. Eddie Dean. Susannah Dean. We traveled together, I taught them everything. Everything there was time or reason to teach. Eddie drove me crazy, that part never changed, he always drove me to the very limits of my patience. Past them. He knew me for what I was, always. Followed me anyway. He made me laugh."

"Susannah - She was kind. Thoughtful. Patient. Didn't take any shit, but she was patient. She'd have to be. She and Eddie were a good match. A fine match. Eddie sometimes seemed afraid to come close to me when I wept. Something about his world, I think. Like yours. Susannah never was. She was quicker than he was, too, a little. Quicker on the draw. Never liked to admit how natural it came but she knew how to harness those parts of her, aye, and use them."

"There's one other, one more I'd remember to you. I've told you his name. Told you who he was- What he was, anyway." Roland swallows. Then he does it again. Then he speaks on something else, something different. It's for Firo's sake. Firo might still be concerned. "Generalities. If you're still concerned about helping. The generalities come easier. Those tend to be the same, easier to think on. It's the details that crowd in on me. Do you understand? It must be very strange for you to watch. It's the memories. Too many of them. I don't suppose it's possible to explain to you just what that's like, holding too many lifetimes inside of a single mind."

Firo listens attentively, eyes fixed on Roland's face and not moving. He shakes his head. "No, you don't need to. I told you, you don't need to explain anything you don't want to or can't." There's a smile on his face that's almost amused. Multiple lifetimes, eh? Not quite what Firo has going on, but... "And, actually, I think I know exactly what you mean."

Coincidences are funny. Maybe someday he'll ask Roland how he came by all his other memories and Firo can share how he came by his. For now, they have business to attend to. Generalities, Firo thinks he can do that. He thinks that Roland, before he finally dispensed his advice, seemed like he was trying to point Firo to another topic. Firo'll seize on it and be glad for the guidance--coincidentally, he wants to ask anyway.

"You said... Jake? That's the other one you wanted to tell me about? Your son. You mentioned him earlier, but I don't think you'd ever told me about him before... before all this." He waves his hand vaguely, but he thinks it's clear enough what he means.

It seems weird to him, that Roland wouldn't talk about his son before, but only because it's Roland. Perhaps thinking of the kid is too painful even for Roland to dwell on, for all that he likes dragging things out of other people.

Firo moves toward the subject of Jake very quickly and Roland forgets, for the moment, that Firo's talk of knowing what Roland means when it comes to memory is something Roland is genuinely interested in. For the moment, he can only think of Jake.

"I never have, have I?" Roland's shoulders slump. "I never have. I'm sorry, Jake. I'm sorry."

"You have to understand, Firo, at the time Panem took me I remembered everything. Everything. It crowds in on me. That time in my life, anything from it, best avoided. You've seen what happens. Any memory from that time pulls me closer toward the Tower." He shudders. Breathes.

"Oh, Jake. He was just a boy. A fine boy, healthy in body, mind, in every other particular. Thoughtful. Brave." It's on that last word that the tears come. He stays silent a moment, feeling them move down over his skin. It feels right to weep, and it feels only respectful to be quiet, to give the tears and the grief the attention they deserve.

"He deserved more. More time with child's things, without my damned quest hanging around his neck. I could've given it to him, if only I'd done the one thing I never- Could have, or would have. I don't know which. I tried, I think. In- There were-"

Roland leans over toward Firo, dizzy again, pressing the heel of his hand hard against his temple. "There were times. Times I- I tried to, ah-"

"Did I try?" he continues, in a faint voice. "Did I? I might recall, I- Oh, Jake." He raises a hand to his face, feels the tears, remembering they're there. He takes a quick, shuddering breath. Has Roland forgotten again that Firo's even there? Well, maybe. Maybe.

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