legionworld | going native

Entry tags:

going native

Who| Locus and YOU? Open.
What| Newcomer to the Legion finding his feet.
Where| Wandering around Legion at large. Locations will be notated.
When| /coughs vaguely and gestures randomly
Warnings/Notes| n/a

It was difficult, even now, to part with the armor. He'd born its weight, its visage, its name for years now, rather than his own. If this was truly meant to be a new start, he should start by leaving it behind. He was no longer meant to be simply a weapon, a gun, but a warrior earning worthiness.

But some habits are difficult to break. He's not ready to show his face. Not yet.

So, on the initial walkthrough of what is expected to be home base for some time, Locus does so in full armor. It does much to ease his sense of discomfort in finding himself in unfamiliar territory, surrounded by strangers, alone. But the way that helmet turns to side-eye people who pass speak volumes about that unease, even if his expression isn't visible.

It's easy enough to find himself on a self-guided path. Past crew quarters, through the mess hall, past the training room and holodeck, before halting briefly on the observation deck for a time. This, at least, feels familiar. The vast emptiness of the black void, dotted with cold, distant lights, and the looming shape of a planet beneath that would be satisfied to drag them down to its surface in a fiery heap.

So he's in a cheerful mood, in other words. Surely not too intimidating a figure to be spoken to.

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Locus is silent for a moment, deliberating how much he wants to give him. Finally, he turns a bit further, if only to regard him a little more easily. He's taken aback, that much is clear. The certainty in his approach is gone now.

Good. Serves him right, a vindictive little piece of him thinks.

"Is that meant to be concern?" That deadpan says he knows it isn't, he's being difficult on purpose, but what Washington needs to know and understand, what he is owed, only stretches so far where Locus is concerned.

The moments following the death of his partner and his escape from Chorus are his, and his alone.

Well, there's his baseline.

Wash has spent enough time with the Reds and Blues to have perfected his unimpressed you are the dumbest thing on this planet expression - it's piercing, even through a helmet. He takes a few moments to let the silence settle after that question, opting instead to fix Locus with that look.

"No," he finally says, flat and unamused, "but you already knew that." He's lost control of this conversation already and he damn well knows it. Time to turn that around. "What I'm trying to do is give a sit-rep to the team rookie." That's you, asshole. "Because you've been here for what, two days? Three? And most of those have been in a hospital bed." Unless they've changed procedure since Wash's arrival, but he highly doubts it. "I've been here for weeks - long enough to have the lay of the land, and allies, and the trust of the people in charge of the Legion." This is what he's been building up to, and his tone evens out, calm and serious. "They know about you. They know about Chorus. They know that I'm the only one with information on you. And right now, they're asking me if you can be trusted without Felix here to yank on your leash. So you can either answer my questions and make life a little easier for everyone, or you can be an asshole and spend the rest of your time here inside a cell." The latter probably won't happen outside of extreme circumstances, but Locus doesn't know that.

"I would say it's your decision, but you don't like making those." It's a slap in the face, and it's meant to be. Wash isn't above being petty, even when the situation absolutely does not call for it.

Edited 2016-12-05 19:01 (UTC)

Logically, he knows a portion of that is complete and utter bullshit. Why send someone with bloody history to interrogate someone? At least before taking them into custody. Does Washington even hold rank here, beyond that of the other Legionnaires?

And yet he pursues none of that, not when a very particular button gets pushed, and a cold sort of rage numbs out rational thought for a time.

Washington's words are all meant to wind him up, and it's working. It's not the first time. The former Freelancer has employed this method once before, in battle, intending to draw him out of hiding by throwing whatever barbs he thought might stick. That tactic had not ended well for him, but apparently he's forgotten that fact.

Or perhaps not. Is he trying to bait him into attacking? That seems the most likely option. If Locus does so, there will be grounds to contain him. To punish him, or worse. And they will take Washington's word over his, he knows this. If he's been here long enough to establish himself, to garner allies...

It's a cold reminder of how very alone he is here, and not for the last time he is grateful that Washington cannot see his face. His tone, he can manage. The next words are utterly devoid of anything Washington can strip away and use.

"Felix is dead."

And when he turns a little further, Wash might just glimpse a very familiar-looking handle on his hip. He may not like making decisions for himself, but that hadn't stopped him from making one very defining decision, all the same.

It's all he trusts himself to say. Washington's next words will have a very severe impact on the actions to follow.

Locus has gone from smartass to shutdown. Maybe that was a little too effective.

"I know." Still in that calm, even tone, and he's sure of at least that much - his team wouldn't have succeeded with Felix in the way. If this is all Locus is choosing to tell him, then it means that either Felix is dead and Locus survived, or Locus died - later or at the same time, he doesn't know - and is lying about it. Too many options.

The sword hilt on Locus' hip tells him in very short order that Locus outlived Felix, at least. It paints a fuller picture but changes nothing - not when the Time Trapper has proven he doesn't have two fucks to rub together regarding timelines. Not when York and Delta are here.

But odds are Locus doesn't know about any of that. As far as he knows, Felix is gone for good.

"That's the only reason I started a conversation instead of putting a bullet through your visor." They both know it, really. "The Legion is willing to give you a chance, and without Felix, you might actually be able to make something out of it, but not if you operate the same way you did on Chorus." There's a beat - you think about what you've done - before Wash continues. "As far as I'm concerned, your second chance isn't worth the lives of everyone here. Either give me a reason to believe you'll use it for something worthwhile, or I'll do everything in my power to put you away." It's an ultimatum, pure and simple, Locus' avoidance of choices be damned.

Hypocrite. Happy to take his own second chance and make his own path on his own terms, but will he extend the same courtesy? No. Of course not. Blinded by self-righteousness.

Ever the disappointment.

"And how far does your power extend, Agent Washington? What rank do you hold that gives you authority over me?"

It makes Locus less than cooperative, though he's still restraining himself from simply knocking Wash to the ground and beating the glass of his helmet into his face. So that has to count for something. Instead his fingers curl at his sides, tone disdainful if anything.

"You have none. I am not here to answer to you. As I told the Simulation Troopers, I will set things right. But how I do so is not yours to dictate."

And the way he stares back unflinchingly, the set of his shoulders, is all he needs to tell Washington exactly where he can shove that ultimatum.

Only one person in the room has committed genocide at any point in their life. Spoilers: it isn't Wash, so as far as he is concerned, Locus can take his indignation and shove it.

Wash just tilts his head ever so slightly and lets the tension ease out of his shoulders. It's loose, flippant, as though he's already won this little argument - which, as far as Wash is concerned, he has. He got his answer - all it took was baiting Locus to the edge of his self-control. That's all it ever takes.

"You told the simulation troopers that you'd set things right," Wash repeats, breezing by Locus' questions and giving the statement a moment to settle. "See, we could have avoided all this bullshit if you'd just said that in the first place."

Of course, there's always the chance that Locus is lying, but Wash doubts it. Felix could lie regardless of the circumstances; by contrast, Locus is starkly honest when he's this upset, at least from what Wash can tell. It's a chance he's willing to take.

The thing is, he let that slip because he'd assumed he already knew. That Wash sees that tidbit of information as a victory? Means he has no idea what transpired.

Rather than letting that ignite that cold-settling fury, now it's Locus's turn to cock his head, almost a mimicry of the motion on Wash. But then, they'd always been warped reflections of what the other might have been, hadn't they?

"...They did not tell you."

Not a question, but statement of fact. There are a number of things that could mean, and he's quickly rifling his way through most of them, moving up to the most likely in short time. Had they survived Hargrove's wrath? From what point did Washington originate from?

Well, shit. He'd tipped too much of his hand with that one, hadn't he.

He can turn this around. Make it look like it's the most obvious thing in the world and Locus is the one in the slow group. The tilt of his helmet changes, and he's back to the wow you're an idiot look. "No, they didn't," he says, flat and sarcastic, "because it's hard to find time to have a heart to heart in the middle of an active war zone."

But it's too late. Locus knows that tactic -- displacement and sarcasm were only Felix's favorite way of shifting focus where he wanted it -- and he's already figured out enough.

Washington hasn't spoken to them since the Communication Tower. They would have told him how Felix died. They would have said enough to prevent Washington from needing to approach him in the first place, if knowing what Locus had said was enough to satisfy his curiosity.

There's something oddly solemn about the way he straightens, realization settling in.

"They did not return."

There's no joy to be taken in that fact, and there's none in his voice.

Wash has two options here: admit defeat - in front of Locus, his uncertainty and the hole in his knowledge amounts to just that - or lie like a rug. He's only good at one of those, which pretty much makes his choice for him.

The helmet tilt stays. The no shit Sherlock tone stays. He's holding his ground, even if he has to build it himself to do it. "Congratulations," he deadpans, "you've officially given Donut a run for the title of Most Needlessly Dramatic."

He waits for a moment and shifts his stance - straighter, more solid, in response to Locus' shift. Locus doesn't sound happy about what he thinks happened; Wash will figure that out later. When he speaks again, his tone is steadier, more even. "They boarded Hargrove's ship and disabled the Mantis swarm, we ran a successful extraction mission and got them back to the planet's surface, and that's when the Time Trapper decided that, since that battle was over, I should come fight this one instead." A beat. Sell it. "They came back, but I didn't get to talk with them before I wound up here."

Washington is volunteering far too much information, where previously he held it as dearly as a miser holds gold. There's something wrong there.

But ultimately, he decides, it's not his concern. If Washington does not know what transpired, so be it. Knowing that Locus betrayed his partner and spared the Reds and Blues would be unlikely to change his views, or his desire to tout his moral superiority in the face of Locus's arrival. None of it matters, in the end. As he'd said before, his redemption is not for Washington to endorse or approve of.

"I see."

Locus isn't buying it, his tone says as much, but there's no point in arguing. Nothing to be gained from it. And he turns his back to the man once more, attention shifting to the stars beyond the glass.

He has what he came here for. Obviously there's no further reason for them to speak.

He's not buying it, but he's not pursuing it either. It's not really a victory, but Wash will absolutely take it as one.

He really should quit while he's ahead (or while he's not really behind; same difference). Locus seems to think the conversation is over. But Wash can't stop replaying it in his head. You'd think that Locus would be happy that the people he'd been trying to kill for months were dead, but there'd been nothing there. No satisfaction, no vindictive smirk, no nothing.

Wash might be reading too much into it, and this is probably a bad decision, but he's never been able to leave well enough alone. Not when he's curious. He's accustomed to having entirely too much information; not having enough is killing him.

"You've been trying to kill them for months," he finally says, against everything that could possibly be counted as his better judgment. "Why do you care whether they came back?" For once, it's a level, genuine question.

"I don't."

Not to any great degree, at least. It would have been nice, admittedly, to hear that they'd triumphed over Hargrove. That the teamwork and trust that they shared, that the Freelancers and even the mercenaries themselves couldn't live up to, had been what secured their victory.

It would have at least validated that there had been something missing, a real and tangible component that he had been lacking that had caused him to fail time and time again while attempting to defeat them.

But 'nice' isn't how the world works. And it could be that he was mistaken once more in his estimation of them. That would hardly be surprising, after all this time.

"I simply assumed if they had, they would have reported to you the details of what happened." Or that Felix's death would have meant something. His fingers curl faintly against the railing. "It hardly matters now."

There's no point in doubling down on the lie when Locus doesn't buy it. He lets the silence settle instead, feeling out his words, planning before opening his mouth again.

"You know, I can't tell who you're trying to convince: me or you." It's that same even, open tone. No games right now. "If you've been trying to kill something for a while and you think it's dead, even if you don't get the satisfaction of killing it yourself, you at least get the relief of knowing you don't have to deal with it anymore." Wash lived through a lot of shit dealing with the Meta. He didn't have to drag it over the cliff himself to be happy it was gone. "We've been fucking up your plans for months now, but when you thought they were dead..." He shrugs. "Nothing. It sounds like you're hiding something. Maybe it does matter. Hell if I know." He has vague ideas, but they're not worth pursuing without more detail. Not yet.

Locus can do what he wants with that; for now, Wash is switching tacks. "You said you told them you wanted to make things right. Did you decide on that before or after Felix died?"

It is somewhat strange, now that he brings it up. He's not entirely certain himself why the thought of the Reds and Blues dying brought him no joy, no relief. Perhaps he'd already divorced himself from the thought of being their enemy so completely that it didn't matter. They were no longer on opposing sides. His investment in their demise had ended.

But Wash seems intent on pursuing this, for whatever reason. Locus turns back just enough to observe him where he stands, deliberating how much to reveal. Well. If it doesn't matter, then what's the harm?

"If I had waited to decide, Felix would not be dead. And Simulation Troopers would not be alive to tell."

It matters more than Locus thinks, which is why Wash is pursuing it. Every answer tells him a little more of what he needs to know to come to a conclusion on Locus. The best thing to do now is stay on the level and keep him talking.

On one hand, given that the Reds and Blues are still alive last time Wash checked, he can't say he's surprised at Locus' answer. On the other hand, for someone who doesn't like to make their own decisions in the interests of avoiding Consequences, that's one hell of a decision to make.

So he nods - understood - and continues. "Did you kill him yourself, or did you let them do it?" So he'd made a decision; just how active was he in its execution?

He falls silent at that. That...that becomes confused when he looks back at the memory of that day. Had he just been a bystander, washing his hands of the matter and leaving Felix to the fate he had earned for himself? Or did stepping aside at the moment his partner needed him, called to him, stain his hands even now? Should he have been the one to pull the trigger?

Could he have? I don't know. The reasoning behind the act blurs until he's no longer certain why he acted, save for the prompting of the AI in the tower, the one who called him 'meddler'.

Did you kill him yourself?

What are you doing?

Did you kill him--

We need each other!

Did you let them do it, he asks. Let them. As though that were the end of his involvement, an absolution. If only he could decide if what he felt was guilt, or something else entirely. It might make this clearer in his head. This should be a clear answer, yes or no, did you pull the trigger or let someone else?

Silence.

It should be a simple question, and somehow it's not. It's never a simple question with Locus, is it.

Wash is quiet, waiting for an answer; it becomes obvious pretty quickly that Locus is being quiet for too long. He's wrestling with something behind that helmet that Wash can't see, and whatever it is, it's not letting him go.

This is what it looks like from the outside, says a tiny voice in the back of Wash's head. It's not pretty, is it.

So he takes pity - and that's something he never thought he'd be doing, taking pity on Locus - and gives him an out. "If you don't want to talk about it, you can show me your helmet cam footage."

"Why?"

Because there's no pride in what he's done, it doesn't feel like an accomplishment or a triumph. It feels like he's broken the last good thing left in him -- because as terrible as Felix had been, they were partners and bound by that loyalty for years -- and he's not even certain if he did the right thing in doing so.

So forgive him, Wash, if this is something of a sore spot. Digging at it is going to be met with some resistance, and the way the words are ground out between his teeth make it clear that Wash is treading on very thin ice here.

He turns once more, that visorless helmet peering down hard at him. "Why does it matter to you?"

And now they're right back into dangerous territory. Of course.

Wash stays where he is and keeps that same neutral tone. "I told you already: the Legion is willing to give you a chance, but they want to know if you can be trusted. The last time I saw you, we were in the process of dropping a spaceship on you, and I didn't have time to debrief with my team after Hargrove's attack. You told me you want to make things right - I want to know what changed while I wasn't there." Without that footage, he only has Locus' word for it, and that's a dizzying amount of implicit trust that he doesn't quite have yet. It's also all he has to go on.

"It matters because it'll affect what I tell Kid Quantum." He folds his arms across his chest, the movement causing his ring to glint in the light. He hasn't missed the fact that Locus is wearing one, either. He's already taken the oath. "And it matters because we're both Legionnaires now, and I need to know that I can work with you."

We keep one another's secrets. Whatever happened to that part of the oath? Though he doesn't ask in earnest. It wouldn't matter to Washington if it got in the way of what he thought was right and just.

There's nothing in that file that he means to keep secret, of course, but it's the way Washington demands, like he's earned any part of it, that sticks in Locus's craw. But then, his choices are limited. He knows that. Washington will attempt to make life here difficult for him if he doesn't cooperate, and Washington is well-established here, if he's telling the truth.

He may not hold rank, but his opinion may sway them all the same. And for some reason he thinks this will bear weight on his testimony.

That doesn't make it easy. It doesn't mean he likes it, that giving in. But it's the mention of the Legion that seals it. He has to prove himself worthy of that title? Fine. One gloved hand lifts, and a second later, the footage from the Communication Temple, beginning with the crash of the Pelican, is forwarded across the comm system.

Wash sees the notification in the corner of his HUD and accepts the file transfer. He honestly wasn't expecting to get it that easily. He keeps an eye on Locus and opens the file, letting it play across his screen.

...he doesn't know what he was expecting, but what he's gotten is...more, somehow. He thought he'd see the fight, or the tail end of it; the conversation with Santa is more telling, terribly intimate and uncomfortably familiar. He's been there - lost and alone, his world reduced to wreckage and ashes, wondering what he's supposed to do, where he's supposed to go, and in his case trying to puzzle his way through an act of mercy he knew he hadn't deserved.

He'd never committed genocide - his sins had been far more personal, but he'd still gotten a second chance, given to him by the same people he'd done his level best to kill.

Locus has his second chance here, given to him by the whims of an extrademsional entity with a shitty sense of humor, in a place where his past sins don't matter as long as he's willing to work to prevent the future from being destroyed. And he'd made a choice - he had the drop on the Reds and Blues, and he could have killed them where they stood, but-

'No more killing.'

-but he'd cut his leash instead, leaving Felix in the mess he'd made for himself and Wash's team alive.

Wash hates comparing himself to Locus - namely because Locus has been using those comparisons to try to justify some horrific shit, and Wash wants absolutely none of that - but he can't deny that, on some base level, they're similar. War fucked them up, people who were supposed to help them fucked them up even worse, and some days it looks like there's no way out.

The difference is, Wash is further down along his path. He got a second chance, and he made something of it. Locus...

Locus still desperately needs that psych eval that Brainy promised. He still needs to be monitored. But...well, maybe he can make something of his second chance the same way Wash did. He's in the right place and the beginnings of the right mindset for it.

Knowing that, Wash can't take it away from him.

He sighs, hoping that this won't be another mistake to add to the ever-growing pile, and looks at Locus. "Welcome to the Legion."

There's a part of him that resents all of this, regardless of Washington reasons or his motivations. Obviously Locus has given him cause in the past to doubt the validity of his claims, and the reasonable part of him knows that. That doesn't make it go down any easier watching him play through the footage and weighing the events on some sort of moral scale before deeming him worthy.

That he has the gall isn't surprising. Far from it. It's everything he's come to expect of the man.

But there is some relief in knowing that now, he understands. He's seen for himself what transpired, and knows where Locus stands on the matter. Perhaps now he'll be a little less concerned that Locus is going to turn around and murder all of his comrades just to make some sort of point. What that point is, he couldn't begin to guess, but that had obviously been some sort of concern of his.

There is no victory in this. Only a sense of finality as he turns away, back towards the glass and the vast blackness beyond. This, whatever this is, is going to be the starting point for whoever he decides to become.

He still hasn't the faintest idea who that is. Whatever is left of Locus that can be refashioned and reforged to this new purpose, perhaps.

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