ukan | IC CONTACT

He was sleeping, having drifted off at some point, angry and hurt and scared and annoyed with himself and half a dozen other things less readily identifiable, but he jerks awake again the second there's movement.

It feels like dragging himself one-armed up a vertical wall, but he makes it, voice a bit slurred as he asks, "Everything alright?" Because business always comes first.

"Yeah." He looks more rested than Alec, at least. He sits next to Alec's bunk. "Alejandro's taken the watch, Franky has the radios, and supplies are secure. So I'm here."

To guard Alec's sleep.

It rankles. It feels like weight crushing down against his chest to not be in the rotation. It feels like it could be panic if he let it.

A sarcastic comment floats up in his mind but he breathes through it instead, and shakes his head.

"I don't want to sleep, Lark." Even when he needs it - especially when he needs it - he wants nothing to do with it. He fears it. There's nothing for that. "I scouted a few miles up the river, but I had to come back. I was getting too cold. I do know my limits."

He knows. And if this was anywhere else he'd have the patience to talk it through. But he's still frustrated, and hurt, and angry.

"Why do you think you should be running at your limit right now? Why is that better than having you rested so you're at an advantage?"

"What makes you think you know better than I do what's an advantage for me?" he presses, but it's not sharp this time. Not yet.

"I get it. You were human. But I've performed under duress just as much of my life. I'm not going to be able to sleep either way. Not long enough to matter. And then I'll feel like shit on top of wasting time."

"Either you trust me to know how human brains work, or you don't," he finally snaps. "Neither of us has time to sit down and dissect this. It's not about how tough you are or how much duress you can take, this is not a fucking test, it's about finding what advantages we can, and if you want to push back on this, fine. Go ahead. I don't have time to argue about this."

"Fine," Alec snaps, glad for the blanket that masks how his hands are shaking by the time Lark is done. It's not cold this time.

Lark is right about one thing anyway: they don't have time for this.

"You can go. And the next time you feel the need to talk to me like that, don't."

It manages to shake Lark out of the anger, but he only has a few seconds to start to say something--to apologize--when he hears a second radio crackling and Franky still on another. So he gets up and has to answer, has to put the fight away from his mind and work.

Alec is angry, always, in the quiet moments between thoughts and at the core of his bones; but it's been years since he was so angry he could feel it on his skin. He stays absolutely still until he's sure Lark is gone, even now a little amazed that it worked, but he shuts that out mercilessly and stands. He's wide awake now, anyway. He heads out again.

He stays away from the camp after that except when he absolutely has to return for supplies or to rest, or to bring someone else in. He doesn't try to have another conversation with Lark, limiting their interaction to strictly business or strictly checking in: he's mad, he knows Lark is mad, but that doesn't mean either of them wants the other dead.

It also means it's best that they don't try to work together right now, so that's where it stays. And, after everyone is back on the Barge and Alec has checked in one more time that Lark made it on board, that's where it ends.

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