"If I believed in changing the past instead of the future, my deal would have been for Hope to get Phoenix when, and how, it was intended." Fucking Rogers.
Then the question and he snorts a little. "I don't know what to tell you about her. She really, really doesn't like me and I really can't blame her. I pushed her hard. Good morals, bad social skills. Hot temper, but well controlled. Hyper-competent in ways that probably aren't good for her mental health."
"I mean I trained her hard and past her perceived limits, Lark, not that I beat or or emotionally abused her." He pushes a hand up under his glasses and rubbed her eyes. "And that's not fair. Hope's perfectly capable of responding to challenges than meeting him. The reasons she hates me are varied and complex and every last damn one of them boils down to me being me and that's not actually a major problem for me. In fact it's better for her."
Scott can ramble when under some sort of duress? You bet your ass he can.
Lark just stares at him, lets all of that settle into a silence so they can both hear it echo. "If she understands what's going on, she's an idiot for hating you for pushing her hard or being distant. And if she doesn't understand it, you're an idiot for not telling her--but I somehow doubt that's the case."
He stays put with his butt on the floor and his back against a wall but he looks up and stares back. How the hell did Lark manage to cut through his disorganized crap and come to a not only reasonable but accurate summary.
"I don't think she has any notion of me as a person, and that's not something I can shove down her throat. In a lot of ways, though, she's just like the other people back home who are pissed and I think it boils down to not being openly emotional enough for any of them and that's not something I can change - even if I wanted to and had whatever skill-set that takes."
He's calmer at least? "I have to figure out what the hell to do about Nathan."
"It isn't something you should change. There are roles in society for a reason, and sometimes they shift and sometimes they disappear entirely. But yours right now is as a soldier. Your one goal, for right now, is to make sure they survive. Right? That means you cannot also be their daddy or their teddy bear or their therapist. If you did, you'd lose lives because your focus was divided in two extremely different directions."
Lark can speak emphatically about this because he, too, has a pack who long to feel like family, and he, too, is tasked with making sure they survive and continue.
"I think 'leader' is in the way more than soldier, at least when it comes to her, but you're right. It doesn't change anything." Never had, and honestly he's not that bothered by Hope disliking him. Hell, he's not that bothered by anyone disliking him, though lately he's been capable of getting pretty damned pissed off at the things some of those people have decided he owes them. That's neither here nor there.
"Nathan's dying. Hope's deal here is to save him. That isn't going to do anything for mine, because of the timeline changes of being here and the deals we earn. That means I'm going to have to either try to find a way to drag his ass back home and do something - or knowingly let him die again for a greater good. Odds are high it's going to be the second, but I'm really fucking sick of that option being the right now, Lark."
Lark listens, nodding slightly to himself as the facts arrange themselves. There are a lot of blank spaces still, and that's probably how it will always be, but he can work on what's at hand. "What can you do for him in your timeline that she can't do for him in hers?"
"Probably not a whole hell of a lot." Assuming everyone got their powers back, there were a few more options available to him, but even those would take work. A lot of it. "Not dying alone is likely as good as it's realistically going to get, unless I go for round 2 here." Which - Well, if he's hanging around for Lark, maybe, but otherwise is just a terrible idea. "I need to see what I have to work with."
...This is actually helping. Somehow. "You should go into psychology."
"Working with people gets tricky when 90% of the population sees me and immediately, instinctively wants me dead." It's one of the worst parts about being a wolf but Lark talks about it with wry humor.
"It wouldn't be the worst idea if you got a second deal for him, Scott. Everything is apparently going to be waiting for you back home. I'm not saying you should--just don't dismiss it, either. You'll have enough loss you can't stop, there's no reason for you to voluntarily add to it if there's another way."
"That's what you get for being a lawyer." He's joking, obviously, but he's also -
He's frozen up on the other subject, and his voice comes out all kinds of weird. Stilted and strained, even frustrated. It might be the first time that's happened with Lark. If it's not, it's one of the first.
"I need to find out if he wants to be saved, first." Not even touching whatever he's actually vapor locked on, at least not really, but it's a real consideration.
It is the first time he's seen strong emotion out of Scott, and instead of rushing in to try to fix it, he lets them both just sit with it, accept it. Expressing any of this can't be something Scott gets to do often.
"When we were in the Land of the Dead, he was my soul." How's that for a stupidly sentimental. "Tough. Grizzled. Scarred. A soldier all the way down to his bones and blood. Somehow, he's usually not jaded, just wise and realistic balanced against hope and compassion. He's... one hell of a man."
"Then I hope he wants to be saved." He also hopes that if it comes to it, Scott can do whatever it is that he can best live with: saving Nathan against his will, or allowing him to die if that's his son's wish. "Your world could use a man like that. So could mine."
"I don't know. Maybe if I can make a second deal work, I'll make it to send him, healthy, to your world." He probably doesn't mean that. It's a nice idea, though. He thunks his head back against the wall in a relatively mild display of frustration. "Come on. I've kept you up long enough with this bullshit. Do you plan on sleeping in that thing or my bed?"
Scott wouldn't entirely blame Lark for choosing not to sleep in his bed in anything but fur, but Scott isn't going to argue with him, either. "Our slumber parties suck."
He studies Lark for a moment, He thinks about getting up and moving to the bed, then instead thunks his head back against the wall, with his eyes closed behind the glasses. "Do you know what the primary difference between us is?" He's not going to earn respect points here, but he just doesn't care. "You want to rebuild that pack and be in charge of it."
"Shut your damn mouth, I enjoy them," Lark retorts effortlessly, because it's exactly what he says to Alec's griping. Except that Alec is almost always grinning and playing when he says it, so Lark looks at Scott to be sure that landed all right.
"Yes, I do. But it's also a biological imperative for me. If I wasn't driven toward it the way a salmon is driven upstream, I'd probably be..." Not alone. But something else. He shakes his head, unable to even picture being anything but how he is. "My mentor wants me to quit the pack. But that's--it's not retirement. It's suicide. Literally, wolves on their own last a few months if they're lucky. A day if they're not."
It landed fine. Scott even manages to summon up some kind of a crooked smile to show Lark that it did and it's fine. He's perfectly comfortable with that kind of remark from Lark, at least in the absence of some pretty strong tells that he's not playing with him.
"Who the hell is your mentor and are they stupid?" Scott asks, temporarily distracted from his (self-indulgent) ... revelations? Honesty? Attempts to get something out of his head and into open air, in the general direction of another person? To connect with someone or to hope like hell this gets thrown back in his face.
Fuck, he doesn't know. Something.
It's temporary distraction, anyway. "Retire instead of die hasn't been a possibility for me in a long, long, time."
"Tati," Lark answers, his voice dry, "And sometimes he is. He's a genius with tactics, though."
Mostly he thinks Tati wants him out of the packs because Lark can't leave well enough alone. It's not enough to have a pack, it has to be the one with the most money, the most power. Lark's ambitions kill people.
"So what's the tactical advantage in getting you to retire?"
He has to assume there's something. He reaches up and turns the overhead light off, leaving them with lamp light. It'll be an easier transition to bed when they get there.
"No. My deal is going to give me the people I need to make one last run at giving the people who survive a world worth living in, and a choice beyond fighting or dying. I have burned every personal connection I have ever had getting this far, and I can no more stop being a soldier than you can stop being a wolf - but I don't particularly like being a soldier or leader anymore, either." If he ever did.
"I honestly don't know." But Lark frowns. It's almost a grimace. "How naive do I sound when I say that every now and then I think he's the only person in my life who has ever just wanted me to be happy?"
Not naive, he decides. Just stupid.
"I think if people live long enough they all burn out on what defines them."
Lark looks at him a long minute, like he's been told the ice is not as thin as it looks, to just try it, really.
"You and I both know if it came to it you'd use me. If I was paired with you instead. It's not a bad thing--but we're not selfless people. I don't expect you to be. I don't know that there is such a thing. For all I know, what I'm not sure how to interpret in Tati isn't altruism, it's just laziness and a lack of creativity."
But softer, so much softer, "I believe you want me to have better than I do, though. And I can't say that about most people."
He is somewhat appeased - and reassured - that Lark is at least willing to recognize that at least where Lark is now he isn't a means to an end. Lark is the end. Lark is a goal, and an objective. Maybe not one that's any more achievable than saving mutants, but not the tool, not the process, but the end product.
Getting, being, and having better. Not him having Lark.
Okay, no, he doesn't believe Lark's quite there or will get there until Clark graduates and Scott's still stubbornly there, but he knows Lark being willing to grant even what he has is a big deal.
He casts around for a response and what he ultimately comes up with is a question. "What exactly is selfless? Can you think of a single scenario that counts?" Because Scott isn't sure he can. Not using Lark's definition. No, not even Jean suiciding to save them.
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Then the question and he snorts a little. "I don't know what to tell you about her. She really, really doesn't like me and I really can't blame her. I pushed her hard. Good morals, bad social skills. Hot temper, but well controlled. Hyper-competent in ways that probably aren't good for her mental health."
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Scott can ramble when under some sort of duress? You bet your ass he can.
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"I don't think she has any notion of me as a person, and that's not something I can shove down her throat. In a lot of ways, though, she's just like the other people back home who are pissed and I think it boils down to not being openly emotional enough for any of them and that's not something I can change - even if I wanted to and had whatever skill-set that takes."
He's calmer at least? "I have to figure out what the hell to do about Nathan."
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Lark can speak emphatically about this because he, too, has a pack who long to feel like family, and he, too, is tasked with making sure they survive and continue.
"What about Nathan?"
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"Nathan's dying. Hope's deal here is to save him. That isn't going to do anything for mine, because of the timeline changes of being here and the deals we earn. That means I'm going to have to either try to find a way to drag his ass back home and do something - or knowingly let him die again for a greater good. Odds are high it's going to be the second, but I'm really fucking sick of that option being the right now, Lark."
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...This is actually helping. Somehow. "You should go into psychology."
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"It wouldn't be the worst idea if you got a second deal for him, Scott. Everything is apparently going to be waiting for you back home. I'm not saying you should--just don't dismiss it, either. You'll have enough loss you can't stop, there's no reason for you to voluntarily add to it if there's another way."
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He's frozen up on the other subject, and his voice comes out all kinds of weird. Stilted and strained, even frustrated. It might be the first time that's happened with Lark. If it's not, it's one of the first.
"I need to find out if he wants to be saved, first." Not even touching whatever he's actually vapor locked on, at least not really, but it's a real consideration.
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"What's he like?"
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"When we were in the Land of the Dead, he was my soul." How's that for a stupidly sentimental. "Tough. Grizzled. Scarred. A soldier all the way down to his bones and blood. Somehow, he's usually not jaded, just wise and realistic balanced against hope and compassion. He's... one hell of a man."
And Scott's stupid proud of him.
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Like there was ever a doubt, really.
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He studies Lark for a moment, He thinks about getting up and moving to the bed, then instead thunks his head back against the wall, with his eyes closed behind the glasses. "Do you know what the primary difference between us is?" He's not going to earn respect points here, but he just doesn't care. "You want to rebuild that pack and be in charge of it."
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"Yes, I do. But it's also a biological imperative for me. If I wasn't driven toward it the way a salmon is driven upstream, I'd probably be..." Not alone. But something else. He shakes his head, unable to even picture being anything but how he is. "My mentor wants me to quit the pack. But that's--it's not retirement. It's suicide. Literally, wolves on their own last a few months if they're lucky. A day if they're not."
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"Who the hell is your mentor and are they stupid?" Scott asks, temporarily distracted from his (self-indulgent) ... revelations? Honesty? Attempts to get something out of his head and into open air, in the general direction of another person? To connect with someone or to hope like hell this gets thrown back in his face.
Fuck, he doesn't know. Something.
It's temporary distraction, anyway. "Retire instead of die hasn't been a possibility for me in a long, long, time."
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Mostly he thinks Tati wants him out of the packs because Lark can't leave well enough alone. It's not enough to have a pack, it has to be the one with the most money, the most power. Lark's ambitions kill people.
"You don't think it will be after your deal?"
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He has to assume there's something. He reaches up and turns the overhead light off, leaving them with lamp light. It'll be an easier transition to bed when they get there.
"No. My deal is going to give me the people I need to make one last run at giving the people who survive a world worth living in, and a choice beyond fighting or dying. I have burned every personal connection I have ever had getting this far, and I can no more stop being a soldier than you can stop being a wolf - but I don't particularly like being a soldier or leader anymore, either." If he ever did.
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Not naive, he decides. Just stupid.
"I think if people live long enough they all burn out on what defines them."
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"Sometimes, you're so busy playing a long game and looking at the big picture, you're blind as hell."
So, yeah, stupid, but not the way he thinks he is.
"
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"You and I both know if it came to it you'd use me. If I was paired with you instead. It's not a bad thing--but we're not selfless people. I don't expect you to be. I don't know that there is such a thing. For all I know, what I'm not sure how to interpret in Tati isn't altruism, it's just laziness and a lack of creativity."
But softer, so much softer, "I believe you want me to have better than I do, though. And I can't say that about most people."
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Getting, being, and having better. Not him having Lark.
Okay, no, he doesn't believe Lark's quite there or will get there until Clark graduates and Scott's still stubbornly there, but he knows Lark being willing to grant even what he has is a big deal.
He casts around for a response and what he ultimately comes up with is a question. "What exactly is selfless? Can you think of a single scenario that counts?" Because Scott isn't sure he can. Not using Lark's definition. No, not even Jean suiciding to save them.
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