ukan | IC CONTACT

"It doesn't sound like Kiryat is full of them, and I would have thought you'd be a target," Lark retorts, though he's not entirely serious. Pagan seems like exactly the sort of person who would go to one.

Lark, on the other hand? "I went to them, but I never played the games."

"Hm. They were fortunate if they had traveling shows," he mutters.

He takes the cards to the table and sits down, starting to shuffle them. "What did you do?"

He shrugs. "I just rode the rides with friends, bought every fried food they had. I never really dated seriously enough to want to spend my time winning trinkets. What did you do at them?"

"There was a place at home called Ocean Park," he tells him. "My friends and I would play hooky and ride the rides. See the animals."

He shrugs. "I didn't date, either. Who the fuck was going to date Gang Min's son?"

He isn't sure he wants to ask about Pagan's first love, he has a good idea who it was and she's a sore subject. So instead, "Make him take you to Disney World when you graduate."

"God, no. I told you that he doesn't even know what Disney is. If I take him to Disney World, he would be insufferable."

He grins, keeping the topic light. "He's not like us, you know. He's so fucking genuine."

"He is. I never quite know what to do with it." Lark sounds terribly fond as he says it. "I'm able to be honest with him more easily than I am most people. Actually, it scares me sometimes how honest I am here."

He does not, will not, lie to Pagan. He obviously never lies to Alec either, and furthermore does his best to keep his poor husband informed of the twisting ideas in his head, and when he fails he's quick to apologize and explain. He tells Tiffany things he's uncertain about, he can tell B anything but appreciates that it's not expected of him.

"I can't even be honest with most people back home about what cereal I like."

He hums at that. "Then it's a good thing no one gives a shit about what your favorite cereal is."

He folds his arms across his chest as he leans back against the couch. "What price does honesty have here over the gains you get from lying? Lies don't last here, Lark. I've only been here a year and I know that."

He scoffs. "Liar. If I had a favorite and I had a box of it you'd be the first one eating the marshmallows out of it."

The question is unexpected. People don't tend to ask him anything in depth; he's always doing the asking. It's by design. But, unfortunately for him now, he can't slide out of it because it's Pagan asking.

"Lies can last if you can control what people believe about you," he says carefully. And that is absolutely something he does. With one exception, he's nudged people's views of him in one way or another. "So honesty can cost you the ears of people who could genuinely help you get where you need to go. But I'll admit most of what I do is deeply ingrained habit from how I have to be in order to survive at home. It's dangerous for me to change that here when it will get me killed when I leave."

"Lark - " he says with a warning sort of sigh. "Do you think your honesty really comes so easily?"

He leans forward. "Furthermore, do you think you're actually going to meet someone like Kazuma, someone like me, at home? Someone you will always tell the truth to? And, if by some miracle you do, what danger would that pose? You're careful with your friends, with your confidences, Lark. Something I am not. Or...wasn't."

"Even before we were paired, I liked your honesty. You're confident with it in a way I never have been." And Lark Tennant is not someone who lacks for confidence. "But no, I don't think there's anyone like Kiryu who will ever pass near my circle. Which is all the more reason for me to enjoy it here."

He hasn't answered the question, but it's because he needs to pull it apart a little, to figure out the answer to a question that has always simply felt like instinct.

Pagan sits back, shrugging. "I use honesty like a weapon the same way you use lies," he tells him.

"They're both sharp."

He doesn't offer up any more information, any new questions, letting Lark take apart his own thoughts.

"The thing is, at home no one has ever seen a magician. Not a real one. No one has ever met a mermaid, no one has ever had their mind planted with an entirely different life. When they do meet someone like me, it sets off the same instinct that makes a deer bolt at the snap of a twig. The only time it doesn't is when they're so traumatized that instinct is shut down. Those are the only people who can survive the change into a lycanthrope."

He frowns, picking his words carefully. "So someone like Kiryu, in my world, would instinctively hate me. There is no exception to that rule."

Pagan gives him a knowing look. "I don't think he would. He's had his share of traumas. He simply has decided to do something different with them."

He sits back. "And you know I've shut down any and all fear responses years ago. So there are still no exceptions, but - I think your read on him is wrong. Which is new for you."

He shakes his head. "I worded it poorly. It isn't just a lack of trauma that makes them hate us. It's only people who can't find a way to choose the wise thing with their trauma become what I am. People who are destroyed by it and never find the strength to recover. Kiryu is..." Too good? No, that implies something innate. "Too strong already as what, who, he is. Some port that's enough like home, I'll show you what I mean."

"A port like your home is not one I'd want to see," he points out.

But he will leave the point for now.

"So what's the benefit of that honesty with us here? Obviously, honesty with me means I trust you and I graduate faster. But the rest?"

"Honesty with you isn't really about you graduating faster." He's given his deal to Pagan, after all, there's no benefit to Lark. "I like knowing that you and I are a team. You're not my subordinate. I trust your perspective. I wouldn't get any of that if I lied to you."

The rest? It's harder to say. "I don't enjoy lying. I try not to, to be honest. If I can get away with it I just let people make their own assumptions and then run with it. And that works pretty well here, it's just... people have room here to give a shit about me, even when they'd be wiser not to. I don't want to take that for granted." A beat. "Anymore."

"Almost," he starts out with a grin. "As if you were an inmate and have since graduated because you learned something better."

He sits back thoughtfully. "For what it's worth, Lark. I have never felt your subordinate. Oh, perhaps at first, when you and I didn't know each other, when we were still talking. But now? No. There's no one else I'd want by my side."

It's extremely hard to ping the part of Lark that cares what people think. It's even harder to make him feel- whatever it is he's feeling now, a warmth in his chest he can't identify with words.

"You know I'll never be able to be a warden after this. I'd spend too much time judging the next inmate by you." And finding them lacking. He can't even make it sound like he's teasing, because he's not.

He sucks in a breath. "Lark, does that mean after me...you're done?"

It's a question he hadn't expected, at least not from Pagan. "I have so much still to do at home. Why do you ask...?"

"Because you came here, Lark. And you'd be leaving - with fucking nothing." He just stares at him.

"What I needed most, I have. I came here because I wanted to save Alec, and then I did. I came here because I wanted to be sure the rest of his people wouldn't face the same genetic issues he had, but Alec has that covered. Giving a better space for people here and giving you back your family is-" Enough. Lark is never satisfied with enough, but the thought of these things being done is, "Satisfying."

Pagan nods. "Well, you're leaving Alec here. Unless he's planning on abandoning Norton." Because Pagan absolutely plans on graduating before Norton.

Little bitch.

"He won't." Alec thought he would, Lark is pretty sure. But Alec has a very well-hidden streak of loyalty. "And I'll be around until he's done; someone has to keep him out of trouble. What are you going to do as soon as you find out you've graduated?

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