ukan | spam; the last journal post

spam; the last journal post

[Getting on board was a moment of chaos. He remembers turning a corner, expecting to find fur and blood in his mouth, expecting maybe to get torn up in return, expecting maybe a bullet from above to take him down, too-

But instead he's somewhere metal, somewhere that smells of strangers and strangeness, and he's bleeding a trail but he runs for safety anyway. If there is any. If there are doors, anywhere, that he can open without changing back, because this has to be the FBI's work and so long as they think he's just a wolf, maybe they won't slit him open and poke around inside.]

[ooc: Lark is a wolf, for now. He'll have to change back sooner or later even if he doesn't want to, so feel free to tag him as human or wolf, just lemme know which.]

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The real challenge is the opposite. The world thinks I'm a defense attorney, bought and paid for by the mob. They think I might be a gangster myself. [He is. Just...not the kind they think he is.]

Without this group you're hunting down, what's going to be the next big threat? [Because there always is one.]

[Steve hums a little.] People're funny, huh? You'd think it'd be easier to see the good in someone - or at least, the good he's done. [He's not stupid enough to think that everyone does good things for the right reasons. But at least they can still do good things.]

[He considers that, letting out a breath.] I don't know. Honestly? Part of me's worried it's gonna be another alien invasion. Most of me thinks it's gonna be on the home front, though. There's plenty of messes left to clean up. There always will be.

Whatever it is, we'll meet it and do it one better.

[He remembers having told himself very similar things, as he'd taught his collection of gutter punks to fight trained and seasoned wolves.] The law of evolution. Adapt, or die.

--Did you say aliens?

Exactly. And if there's one thing I respect the hell out of humanity for, it's the fact that they can adapt to just about anything. And not lose a lot of things along the way, if they make a little effort. [Because adaptation is one thing, but adaptation while keeping the good things about humanity, like kindness and respect... he thinks that's more important.

He makes a face, laughing a little.] Yeah, I know how it sounds. About two years ago, someone named Loki - different alien - decided Earth should be his personal empire. He opened up a portal into New York, let his army of Chitauri through.

That didn't go over so well with the rest of us, you can imagine.

I've heard of him. I was a little...involved at the time, I never got around to asking about what he'd done to get here. Now I know, right?

How do you beat back an alien army?

[That's right - Steve had heard more than once that Loki had been on board before.] Now you know. He and I didn't exactly get along, but. [Shrug. Can you blame him? At least Loki wasn't his inmate.

The short answer to that? You get a Hulk and a nuke. The slightly longer answer:] You get a good group of people together and get them to work together. Then you almost lose some of them on the way.

[Part of him's amazed they didn't lose anyone. Most of him's just grateful. Thank God some people are just shitty at dying.]

Plus, the NYPD learned to take orders from a ninety-year-old in the stars and stripes pretty quickly.

[He laughs at that last part]

Be glad you weren't working with the LAPD. They won't take orders from God. [Sure maybe he's bitter at them from his career standpoint, but the LAPD has shot and killed an awful lot of wolves, too.]

What I'm hearing is we need a catastrophe to get the Barge to cooperate.

[And Steve grins.] Oh yeah? I'd believe that. They did steal my baseball team.

[He's quiet a moment, but he can't deny,] A big catastrophe always gets people to cooperate.

It doesn't mean I want one.

I don't doubt it. Which one was it? [He followed baseball loosely all through high school, but law school and then learning how to lead a double life ate up all his time after that.]

I know eventually we'll have one, but- I don't want one we can't control. The key is in nobody being seriously, or permanently hurt. Look what a rift there is now because no one can agree on how to handle the pain.

The Brooklyn Dodgers. [Emphasis on Brooklyn.]

The problem is, nobody ever gets permanently hurt. And it changes things. It changes people changes how they think, and I don't like it. Not that the death toll hasn't saved my ass, or my friends', but... I still don't like it. And I wonder if maybe that's part of the problem. Death's supposed to be permanent, and when it's not - everything changes.

[People can become infinitely more cruel, and they can even try to justify it to themselves.]

[Lark nods, the smile from the Dodgers crack fading as he thinks about the tension boiling all over the ship.]

You know what I would do if this was my Barge? I'd make it so the murderer suffered the death toll and the sense of slow healing right along with the victim. I'd make it so the murderer lost something proportional to how bad the murder was and how vicious their intent was.

[He blows out a breath, thinking about that for a moment.]

Part of me wants to say that's a brilliant idea.

Part of me wants to say it's not right, either way.

[He shakes his head.] Maybe what it boils down to is that I don't want the threat of punishment and suffering to be the thing that stops people from killing. I understand it may work, but is it really doing people the service we're here to do? It might be a good stopgap measure. But I have a feeling that you know as well as I do how often stopgaps end up staying in place long past when they should've been removed.

I know. But at least this way, the perpetrator would be forced into some kind of empathy--and if they're masochistic enough that the empathy doesn't matter, at least they'll be voluntarily giving up some power or talent or desire. It might get them to stop and think a moment rather than rushing on in blind panic.

There are people who don't care about what it'll mean for them, as long as they get what they want. That's not going to stop them, is it? [His expression is wry. Steve's thinking of Bucky, telling him that if someone hurts Steve, he can't promise not to retaliate. He knows for an iron-clad fact that Bucky would do whatever he thought he had to do, regardless of what it meant for him.

And Bucky is a warden.]

I think discouraging killing is a good thing. I think if this were a regular prison, that would be the end-all of what happened here. But it's not, and I think that here, stopping it at the source is a better solution.

But I also can't deny that we're not doing that, at the moment. We're not doing either, so I shouldn't shoot down any solution anyone's got to offer so quickly, huh?

That's true. The consequence can always be adapted, though. [Lark is also one of those people who would take revenge no matter what it cost him, so he understands. He also isn't sure what would stop him.]

I'm open to any idea that works without making life worse for everyone. [Lark tends to push his own ideas through but that's only because, at home, he is The Boss. No one else has all the cards. In a group setting like this, he's willing to let someone else--primarily Steve, at this point--have the reins. ...Some of the time.]

I guess it can. Maybe that's what needs to happen, anyway. Dealing with everyone the same way may not be the most effective means of doing anything around here.

[Steve thinks there should be consistency. But that doesn't mean doing things exactly the same with every inmate. That could be doing them a disservice, instead, forcing them to conform to a system that clearly isn't working as it should.]

I am, too. But I think we also should have a pretty good idea of what works means, [he puts in.] Anyway, it's nothing we're going to solve overnight. It's taken a long time, from what I can tell, for things to come to a head, and I don't even know that this is it. It still doesn't mean I want to let things go on this way, though.

It's a shame things have to turn worse than this, but I think you're right. This isn't the turning point.

[And one thing Lark knows: you can control symptoms but some things just have to burn out on their own or they never heal.]

Hey- have you spoken to the Admiral since you were hired?

No. I've seen turning points. Honestly, I'd like to turn this around before then.

[But Steve knows the same thing. Sometimes, it has to get worse before it gets better. Sometimes, people have to see just how bad it can get. And you can't always save them from that.

It doesn't mean he won't try, though.]

Yeah - well. If by spoken to, you mean, made requests. He's usually got some smart remark, whether the answer is yes or no. So I guess you could call that speaking to him.

Aside from that? Not really.

[Here Lark is different. He wants the same thing in the end: to have some peace, to get progress for everyone. But he's of a mind to speed it along, to crash everyone into the worst case scenario in order to get them over it and to the other side faster.

...Naturally it's not something you mention out loud.]

How likely is it that he'd let someone request a specific Warden?

[Well, to each his own.

Just don't be disappointed if Steve tries to stop you - if he ever catches you at it.

He considers that a minute.] I really don't know. I think - if you wanted that? It'd be a better bet to have the warden you want make the request. He's not really in the habit of listening to inmates, from what I've learned.

You already got someone in mind?

[He'll like you even if ~~when~~ you do :c ]

Not yet. The Wardens I know are all paired. But my last two Wardens from before didn't go very well for me. I'd rather not waste my time with more of the same.

[At least he'll understand the motive? Even if he can't condone the actions.]

Ah. [He smiles a little, though it's more thoughtful than anything.] You sound a little like my first inmate.

I don't know if there's a rhyme or reason to the way the Admiral pairs people. But if you find someone, it probably couldn't hurt to have them ask.

Probably.

[Knowing the Admiral, he might do something to spite you. So.]

[He's worried about that spite factor. He saw the Admiral do some ridiculous things just to passive aggressively turn people down.

But finding out how negative a person can be is still a useful thing to know, isn't it?]

How would you feel if I asked him if I could be paired with you after your inmate graduates? Just to test and see what he does?

[Exactly. The Admiral is both a handy and terrifying guy to have as your boss.

A lot like Steve's other boss, back home.

But that is a useful thing to know.

Steve considers that - looking at Lark a minute, just because he doesn't do anything by halves, even if his reply comes out as more of a joke than anything.] I'd say you're welcome to try it, but be careful what you wish for - because if he says yes, you might be waiting a long time.

[T'Pol is about as stubborn as Steve is. It's been slow going.

But still, he feels compelled to add,] I'm not going anywhere, though.

[The reason he came here is here. So, really, what reason does he have to leave? Honestly, at this point, he's not even sure he has a deal anymore. The Admiral can't give him what he asked for, either way. But he was never here for the deal, in the first place.]

If he does say yes, I can live with that. Waiting isn't the same as having my time actively wasted. [He billed a ridiculous amount of money per minute back home. He's touchy about the difference between downtime and lost time.]

Thank you, Steve.

[And now they're talking about business:] How is your inmate?

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