towerofanimus | (no subject)

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benigncancer for now - if one of their roommates would like to join, please start a new root comment so we can assume they had a chance to finish their conversation first!
Setting: Room 2-08, backdated to immediately after Ψiioniic's intro post thread with Mao
Format: Prose please, I suck at action tags
Summary: Signless is going to have a long, tough job to put his friend back together - AGAIN.
Warnings: probably lots of swearing, and mention of torture & abuse

Ψiioniic was still half doubled over in shock and pain as Signless hustled him into the room with their names on the door. 'Overlord' Mao was left out in the hall, and part of Ψiioniic's freak-out had a lot to do with the thought of potential punishments he might be suffering the next time he met the strange alien.

The rest of the freak-out was very much focused on the troll right in front of him. "You're dead," he gasped, choking on his tears. "You're dead, I thaw you die."

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Screwed up... yeah, that was one word for it. Ψiioniic huddled against his friend, clutching at his jacket and trying to convince himself that the warm, solid body against his was real. Really there, really Signless, just real.

"He wath... I..." Thinking back over the conversation, Ψiioniic tried to remember at what point Mao had said he was Ψiioniic's owner. He couldn't think of any particular moment or thing that Mao had done. "Nothing?" he finally concluded hesitantly. "I think... maybe... he just took advantage because I was already panicking, and he acted like someone in authority. Fuck I fucking hate this conditioning, I hate it," he yelled the last words directly into Signless' shoulder.

Signless wasn't good at comforting people, but as Psiioniic clung to him, he started to calm down himself. He stroked the other troll's hair awkwardly, not sure what to do or how to help him.

"Well, now you know," he muttered, tightening his grip to give Psiioniic more support. "Anyway, no panicking, all right? It makes your mind go all fuzzy, and then you make silly decisions, like bowing down to some random fuckass."

"I can't help it," Ψiioniic said miserably. "Half my mind ith just shouting at me that I have to get back to the ship, that I need to return to my potht or she's gonna kill me. And then I thaw your name on the door and freaked out, I couldn't help it, because I wanted to see you tho bad but I'm not even allowed to say your name or think about you at all..."

He was babbling and he knew it, but it was all he could do to get the words out and he was afraid if he stopped, even for breath, he would never be able to start again.

"Ship? Ship?" Signless exclaimed, breathless with rage and confusion. "Fucking hell, Psi. You haven't talked like this in ages. What's gotten into you? Is it the collar?"

He caught Psiioniic's chin and turned it up to look at him, meeting his gaze. "Calm down, Psi, okay? You're safe, and you're not making sense. Just take a fucking breath and remember who you are."

"I'm thorry," Ψiioniic whispered, shivering against him. It took everything he had to make himself meet Signless' eyes, even though it was obvious that was exactly what Signless wanted. And this was his friend, his beloved companion. Signless was right, it had been a long time since Ψiioniic had acted this way before him.

He took a deep breath as ordered (not an order, damn it, Signless would never order him) and struggled for coherency. "I am the Helmsman. I am the Ψiioniic. I don't even fucking know anymore, god. She's breaking me, and there'th nothing I can do. And you're dead."

Oh god oh god oh god Signless keep it together you have to keep it together for him.

"You are not the Helmsman," Signless said in as measured a voice as he could manage. "You're my best fucking friend. I'm not dead. I'm right here, and there are timeline shenanigans going on here, okay? I already met some wrigglers from like a thousand years in the future, so if you remember me being dead, that's fine. Because I'm alive now."

"You're here now, but you died, and they made me watch," Ψiioniic told him miserably. "They made us all watch and then they took Dolorotha and sold her, and they took me... they took me..."

He shuddered, trying not to actually think about the events of that day. Just the memory was enough to make him scream into the darkness of his control room sometimes, consumed by the horrible thoughts. And then he would scream for a different reason entirely, as his own brain punished him for thinking heretical, rebellious thoughts.

It was threatening to do so now, but he clung to sanity by a thin thread, holding off the panic attack by using Signless' presence like a shield. "She made me her Helmsman. And she ith never, ever going to let me go. I don't, I don't... some dayth I don't even fight back, anymore," he admitted in a wretched whisper, his greatest shame. "It hurtth too much, SS."

Signless just held Psiioniic, hoping he wasn't going to completely flip out, giving him a chance to get it all out of his system. It seemed like he needed comfort, but also that he needed to tell someone, to purge that poison, at least a little bit, through words.

"Well fuck," he murmured, stroking the other troll's hair. "Of course you fucking don't. You bide your time, wait for an opportunity, just like you did before. Those fuckasses want to use you, but you're not a tool, and you got out, Psi. You got out. See? You're not on that fucking ship, but here, with me."

"No, no, no," Ψiioniic moaned, upset because he wasn't making Signless understand, and that meant he had to explain. Had to lay himself bare, admit to all the many and varied ways in which he'd betrayed his friend's memory. "I wathn't... biding my time. I was just so tired. Tho hurt. I couldn't take it anymore. She would come, and punish me and oh god it hurt, it hurt SS you don't even know... and I hate her. I hate her so much, she's everything we fought againtht, I hate her, and even that ith betraying you, but it's not like you care because you're dead..."

He buried his face in Signless' shoulder, mostly to try to stop the flow of words before he said anything more incriminating. Like blurting out how much he'd really felt for Signless, and how absolutely crushed he'd been when his friend had died.

Or worse, before he told Signless how at the end Signless had betrayed his own ideals and died raging and cursing the world.

"Look," Signless said quietly. It was obvious that Psiioniic was distraught not just because of what he'd been through, but because he was ashamed of how he'd reacted to it. "You have nothing to be ashamed of, all right?" He papped gently. "I care about you being alive, and I care that you're going to be okay, now. I mean, fuck, who could blame you for hating the one who tortured you? Certainly not me!"

Trying not to sniffle, Ψiioniic nodded against Signless' shoulder. It helped a little to hear the words, but he still blamed himself for the betrayal. At the very least, it shouldn't have been the romantic sort of hate.

At the very least, he should have still been fighting back.

"They strengthened... the conditioning," he explained haltingly when he had a little better control of himself. "I'd escaped onthe, they weren't taking any chances. And she backth it up, conthtantly. She'll never give me up. Now they realize how powerful I am."

"Right," Signless said, his fingers tightening in Psiioniic's shirt. Psiioniic wasn't the only one who felt guilty about this. "I'm not really surprised. I'm sure you did your best, Psi. You did as well as anyone could have done."

"Oh god, I mithed you," he said softly, burrowing closer. The feel of Signless' fingers tightening in his shirt made him feel better. "I tried to hang onto what you taught me, SS, I tried. But it wath so hard." Especially because every time he'd tried to remind himself of what Signless had said, he'd also been reminded of the Vast Expletive that had come at the end.

Signless felt his cheeks burn a bit and he bent his head, hiding his face against Psiioniic's hair. "You ever noticed how many times a day I fuck up? I get angry all the time, and you're always the one telling me I just have to keep working on it, trying to follow our ideals. Why are you so special that one screw up means it's some kind of betrayal that I shouldn't forgive you for, huh?"

"Because it'th not one thcrew-up, SS, it's all the screw-upth. All of them," Ψiioniic insisted miserably. "I started to forget. Not jutht what you taught me... everything. Even... even you and the otherth. I wasn't allowed to even think about you."

"It doesn't matter," Signless said grumpily, tightening his arms. "It doesn't matter. In the end, you still remember me, and still remember what I taught you. You're not attacking me, or something crazy like that. And you're definitely allowed to think about me, now."

He brushed a hand over the psychic's cheek. "We're on another planet, now, far from our home. No highbloods are going to be fucking with you here, okay?"

"Even if you're right and they're not here... it'th not going to be that simple," he told his friend. "I can't just turn off my conditioning. It'th worse than it was when I firtht met you, SS."

That had been a rough time for him, his first struggles to overcome his conditioning and follow the Signless instead. Signless had helped him more than he could ever express thanks for, and it felt cruel to force his friend to go through the whole thing again. Maybe worse than before.

"Tell me something I don't already know," Signless said, rolling his eyes. He smiled down at his friend, a little fiercely - a lot stubborn - and very affectionate as well. "And what are you going to say next? 'Oh Thignlethh, pleathe don't wathte your time on poor old me. Jutht leave me to wallow in my bulgethucking guilt and thame'."

He tugged on a lock of Psiioniic's hair. "Every word is bullshit, okay? You're my best fucking friend, and I'll never leave you behind. Get that through that thick, mutated skull of yours, and don't forget it."

Ψiioniic swallowed hard, and managed a weak smile back at his friend. Signless had correctly predicted pretty much everything he might have said, and he already knew it was useless to argue with the headstrong, stubborn idiot.

He didn't want to make the one argument he had that might actually score a point - that Signless had already broken that promise and left him behind. He was trying not to think about it, and there was no point in hurting his friend when there was nothing Signless could have done to prevent it.

"You know me too well," he admitted.

Telling him that would definitely hurt, but it wouldn't make Signless' point any less valid. Being ripped away from his friend and killed was completely different from leaving him, in the manner that he had meant.

"I know you, and you know me. And I hope you didn't really think I'd be pissed off at you for this." That hurt a bit, in and of itself. But he wasn't about to hold it against Psiioniic, this time.

"Are you feeling any better?"

"No, I knew you wouldn't be mad at me," Ψiioniic assured him. "You're a little too good at not blaming people, sometimes. But I knew it would hurt you to see, you blame yourself inthtead of everyone else."

Half of the function of Signless' closest followers had been to try to ease that burden that Signless so willingly forced on himself - not that they'd ever told him that. None of them liked to see their beloved friend and leader hurting, so they'd worked hard to try to limit the number of things he could blame himself for.

Signless flushed and scowled and shifted a little further up on the bed, pulling Psiioniic with him so that their little tangled pile was more comfortable. "Yeah well. I only blame people for things that are actually their fault, and that includes me!" he grumbled irritably, reaching up to rub the back of Psiioniic's head some more to soothe him.

That actually startled a laugh out of Ψiioniic. It was a thin, weak laugh, but a laugh nonetheless. "SS, I swear you blame yourthelf for the entire existence of the hemospectrum. Tho don't tell me you only blame yourself for things that are actually your fault."

The more comfortable position - and the way Signless was papping his hair so soothingly - made Ψiioniic wish they never had to move. He loosened his grip on Signless' shirt to something less desperate, but still a clear declaration that he wasn't letting go anytime soon.

"Technically the existence of the hemospectrum isn't my fault," Signless muttered. "Just all the bigotry and everything surrounding it." At least, so he suspected from some of the more obscure dreams he rarely shared with his flock.

He was glad to feel Psiioniic loosening his grip, but he wasn't about to let go any time soon. It seemed his papshooshing really was helping, which was a relief, because he was out of ideas otherwise.

It was definitely helping, though Ψiioniic would have been embarrassed to admit it out loud. Somewhere, in the deepest, most sheltered corner of his heart where he still harboured the hope that Signless had given him, he dared to believe that maybe it would really all be okay.

"You're sure the collar doethn't mean we're slaves?" he asked a little anxiously. "And She's not here?"