Roland Deschain (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
ka_sera_sera) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
thecapitol2014-03-22 09:06 pm
ka_sera_sera) wrote in thecapitol2014-03-22 09:06 pm
open
Who| Roland and anyone
What| Hey, tributes, meet some of your newest competition. He's making a fabulous first impression.
Where| District 4 suite and/or anywhere in the Training Center accessible by elevator
When| minutes after Roland's arrival
Warnings/Notes| none so far?
The light overcomes him, and he screams "Please! Not again! Have pity! Have mercy!" It's what he's always screams. The one moment in which he truly can choose to say anything, the one in which he is fully himself, and he always cries out the same thing. A part of him always knows this, and the rest of him is always too overcome to care.
He's too overcome, even, to take much note of the little details. No smell of alkali and dust here, no baking heat. White light instead, a vision amidst it, a single blade of purple grass. He sees these details, but does not really process them. He thinks of only the doorway, the pull of his body toward it in that moment before the light reaches him and begins to burn. Some time later, he'll think that Cort probably would cuff him for it. In a life full of important moments, this is the one that dwarfs them all, and he is too overcome by something as petty as his own horror and panic to deal with it in any manner befitting a gunslinger. When he thinks this, later, he'll wonder if it might be an offense worth giving up his guns for, and when he remembers that he already has done so, that it would be too late in any case, he will not laugh. What little humor he possesses does not stretch so far as that. But almost.
But that is later. In the now he is stretched out on a cold, hard surface, looking at cold, sterile walls and it is so unlike any moment that has ever come after that he just blinks up at the ceiling and thinks nothing at all. Waits for the dizziness to set in, the thirst, his own plea echoing through his mind and the smell of roses.
What happens instead is a pair of strangers who come, who speak, who take him by the arms and usher him into an ele-vaydor that opens into a set of rooms. In a scarred, two-fingered hand he clutches the small machine he's been given, feeling the cold of it bite into his palm and thinking little of the feeling. He stumbles in a circle instead, one shoulder pressing against the wall as he watches the ele-vaydor's doors close. His face is slack, surprised; he's amazed that he remembers what it is at all.
And if he uses it, just because he can? If he steps inside and presses a button or two, wondering vaguely if the doors will open again on somewhere familiar? Should you see this shocked, wasted man wandering around your suite, or the training room, or anywhere that moving coffin of a room can reach, know that he is at perhaps the most vulnerable point of his life, and please do be gentle.
Or don't. Hey, don't let me tell you what to do.
What| Hey, tributes, meet some of your newest competition. He's making a fabulous first impression.
Where| District 4 suite and/or anywhere in the Training Center accessible by elevator
When| minutes after Roland's arrival
Warnings/Notes| none so far?
The light overcomes him, and he screams "Please! Not again! Have pity! Have mercy!" It's what he's always screams. The one moment in which he truly can choose to say anything, the one in which he is fully himself, and he always cries out the same thing. A part of him always knows this, and the rest of him is always too overcome to care.
He's too overcome, even, to take much note of the little details. No smell of alkali and dust here, no baking heat. White light instead, a vision amidst it, a single blade of purple grass. He sees these details, but does not really process them. He thinks of only the doorway, the pull of his body toward it in that moment before the light reaches him and begins to burn. Some time later, he'll think that Cort probably would cuff him for it. In a life full of important moments, this is the one that dwarfs them all, and he is too overcome by something as petty as his own horror and panic to deal with it in any manner befitting a gunslinger. When he thinks this, later, he'll wonder if it might be an offense worth giving up his guns for, and when he remembers that he already has done so, that it would be too late in any case, he will not laugh. What little humor he possesses does not stretch so far as that. But almost.
But that is later. In the now he is stretched out on a cold, hard surface, looking at cold, sterile walls and it is so unlike any moment that has ever come after that he just blinks up at the ceiling and thinks nothing at all. Waits for the dizziness to set in, the thirst, his own plea echoing through his mind and the smell of roses.
What happens instead is a pair of strangers who come, who speak, who take him by the arms and usher him into an ele-vaydor that opens into a set of rooms. In a scarred, two-fingered hand he clutches the small machine he's been given, feeling the cold of it bite into his palm and thinking little of the feeling. He stumbles in a circle instead, one shoulder pressing against the wall as he watches the ele-vaydor's doors close. His face is slack, surprised; he's amazed that he remembers what it is at all.
And if he uses it, just because he can? If he steps inside and presses a button or two, wondering vaguely if the doors will open again on somewhere familiar? Should you see this shocked, wasted man wandering around your suite, or the training room, or anywhere that moving coffin of a room can reach, know that he is at perhaps the most vulnerable point of his life, and please do be gentle.
Or don't. Hey, don't let me tell you what to do.
no subject
He's not ignoring the mention of her death, not at all. But again, if he's going to get through this, it's got to be one thing at a time. She's here in front of him, so clearly talk of death can wait.
Roland's free hand runs over his face, the other still holding tightly to hers. "Cry pardon, Susannah. I'm not sure of my memories yet, or I'd speak more plainly. How many..." He searches for a way to say it. Fails. "How many times do you remember?"
no subject
no subject
Roland presses a fist to his temple. Takes a breath. Tries again. "There was a word for it. I know there was. But I can't remember that either. Vannay would be disappointed, I think." Though probably not surprised. But nothing of that is anything like an explanation.
"I mean I remember meeting you. Seeing you for the first time." His eyes close, a part of him going back there. "I remember that first time twenty times over." His brow furrows. "More. I've met you, trained you, led you and begged you not to leave more times than I can count. And it always ends at the Tower, and always begins there, in the desert."
He opens his eyes again and frowns at her. "I remember begging you. And you remember it, too. So I must be at the end. But here you are, and we haven't yet met. I've never had this conversation before." That's plain enough, isn't it? Surely.
no subject
It sounds-- ridiculous. Awful.
Just like the kind of thing that man who wrote the book about them would do.
She slides an arm around his shoulder. Squeezes it a little. "They-- they take you out of where you're supposed to be in your life. It doesn't matter ka says you should be somewhere else. Whatever they do to us, it takes us right out of the path ka's laid out for us. I know, Roland. I-- I've met a boy who I know is gonna grow into a man, who's goin to die in maybe ten years time, and he's here instead. That's... that's probably why we haven't had this conversation before, Roland."
no subject
"If I'm here, Susannah, if you're here--" His hands grip her shoulders a moment, then slide down as he sags, leaning back against the wall. "Oh, I don't know. There must be something." All the hardness has left his voice by now. Mostly, he only sounds tired. "You say those who took you have nothing to do with Los' or his ilk?"
no subject
She gives his shoulder another squeeze. "It's a small comfort, I guess. That we're only being held captive by particularly wicked humans."
no subject
"It's usually a sign of overconfidence." Here his gaze shifts to her and holds there a moment, curious. He doesn't truly think that's the case, not if she's been trapped here long enough to speak of it with such familiarity. What he does think is that he'd like to hear her thoughts on the matter.
"We don't need to worry about the forces of the Red, anyway. The time for their work is done." Roland gives his head a quick shake, brow furrowed.
no subject
"I know a little 'bout these games we're stuck in," she says, looking at him. "From people I've talked to. They've been doin' them for about seventy-six years or so, but until about a year or so ago, they just did 'em with their own people. They divided the country up into twelve parts an' this city an' they imported boys an' girls from those twelve parts an' they'd all fight until only one was left. Now... now they take people from other worlds--I 'spect it's with doors--more an' more of 'em all the time, an' they bring some back from the dead if they think they're sufficiently entertainin'."
no subject
She'd said something similar earlier, hadn't she? Something he hadn't noted at the time. Something about bringing the dead back to life. Something about killing. Earning money for killing. His gaze rests a moment on her fine new legs but then he prioritizes, looks up carefully into her eyes. "And how entertaining have you been, Susannah?" It's not a question so much as a suggestion, a low murmur, his voice very gentle.
no subject
She touches the top of one of her fine new legs. "The money you get's per kill. It's added incentive, I guess, 'cause there are plenty of people who just refuse to, even though the only way out is death or bein' the last one standin'. They'd rather have the arena stretch on forever and everyone die starvin' with clear consciences, but I can't do that, Roland. Hunger's is a terrible way to die."
no subject
Using the skills of a gunslinger as if the word simply means 'mercenary', it's a perversion. Worse than that. It stirs something deep inside him, something hot and angry, but that anger won't turn toward her. Not for this. "I can't quite recall, but I think our ka-tet must be long broken. So I can't give you the pardon of a dinh. But if you'll have it, I can give you the forgiveness of a friend."
no subject
"I'm glad, glad you understand. I don't-- I have to do something, Roland, I can't just refuse to act an' then pat myself on the back for making the moral choice while I wait for someone else to kill me. There's killin' or there's suicide an' if I kill I can at least try to make it that they die fast an' clean an' that's better than a slow death of poison or drownin' in tar."
She should have refused the money, like she did when she'd accidentally shot Eddie in on the dino island, but she'd wanted legs so bad, had watched Maximus walking his metal leg with a deep, clear envy that had startled her in its ferocity.
no subject
"If you need to speak of it more, I'll listen." He'll listen as long as she needs him to. There's more to the situation he needs to learn, his mind has cleared enough to know that, but as long as there's time for this then it comes first.
no subject
She draws a deep breath and lets it out. "An'... an' I have to keep smilin'. Now that I'm out I have to stay smilin' and be gracious and charmin' and pretend that what they're doin' here isn't a goddamn travesty. Because I want to keep coming back, I need more time if--"
And then she stops, because she can't say that she wants to take them down, for Eddie of District Three's sake and because the Games themselves are a mockery of justice. She doesn't know who's listening.
So instead she just leans her head against Roland's and hopes that they're still enough of a ka-tet that he'll know anyway.
no subject
"I know well what it means to do anything to survive. Who'd know better than I?" Memories proving that statement true begin to crowd against his thoughts. A few at first, then too many, each varying only a little from the last. He breathes a harsh breath out, turns his head slowly back and forth against hers. A hand on the back of Susannah's neck helps push them away, the skin warm and real under his. "I only wish you hadn't had to learn that lesson quite so well as you have. But here we are."
"Something will come, Susannah. Now that the both of us are here. What evil has there ever been that two gunslingers together couldn't vanish?"
no subject
She closes her eyes. "I've missed you," she says, although she said it before, earlier. It bears repeating.
Another thought strikes her. "Patrick, Oy, how were they when you saw 'em last?"
no subject
"Would you hear it now, Susannah? I can't promise I'll tell it as I should. Everything's still... I'm not sure I can make out the details." For a man who even before the training could remember scenes from before he'd learned to walk, that isn't an easy thing to admit. But it's true, and he'll give her only the truth. She's earned nothing less.
no subject
She leans back onto Roland, lays her head on his shoulder.
sorry about the length
He starts after she left. This story will be cruel enough without specific mention of the painful, dragging weight of his grief, but it can not entirely be left out. It's in the way Oy stopped eating afterward; in the way Roland snapped at him about it, and let his anger and pride keep him from apologizing. There's grief even in the way the singing of the roses had helped him to forget everything, for a while. It's everywhere.
The story isn't told as smoothly as is usual for Roland. Some parts are vague and very general, others specific down to the last detail. His words slow, sometimes, then he closes his eyes and tracks backward, explaining something he should have well before. He's not spoken so badly since he was very young, but in that fashion a good part of it does get told. The important parts, he thinks. The near-identical separate memories are clumsily woven together to tell of their tiredness, and the way Roland had put everything on the watchfulness of a boy who couldn't even properly understand what he was watching for. And of the confrontation with Mordred.
His speech slows, then, but not because of dim memories. He holds her tighter.
He stares at the far wall and explains, as if reading from a manual, how Patrick had tried to draw Oy alive again, and how Roland had stopped him. He does explain how necessary that had been, how much they'd ended up needing that one eraser, but their meeting with the Crimson King is vague. Almost glossed over. The defeat is told, though. The rose, and the blood, and his idea that if he had convinced Patrick to grasp it instead, it would have cut the boy's fingers to ribbons.
Roland sounds almost relieved, when he reaches his instructions to Patrick. To find Stuttering Bill that was, to open a door. To tell Susannah, if he finds her - and here Roland will try, gently, to tilt her chin up and place a kiss against her mouth - that Roland loves her still, and with all his heart.
"That kiss was my final instruction. It's..." There he pauses again, turns his head slowly back and forth in that way that's rapidly becoming familiar to him. "It's there that the memories, one of them is different. I think. They split. But it doesn't matter. It's there Patrick's story ends, at least so far as I know it." He rubs a hand along her back, and sits straight to better look at her. "Does that satisfy, Susannah dear?"
nah! sorry about the lack of the same!
"Yeah," she says hoarsely at the end of the tale, told so unlike him. "I s'pose. At least Patrick--"
Survived you, she almost says, but that's too cruel.
"I hope he's happy, wherever the door goes," she says instead quietly.
After a long moment, she adds, "I love you too, Roland. Despite everything. Always will."
and now I'm sorry about time taken to get back to this, we could go on like this a while:P
As he looks at her Roland thinks of tears, and death, and tries to think of how much death Susannah's faced here without him. How many times has she faced her own? Faced her own, and fallen through it? His hand drops from her back, wraps around her fingers. "Are you all right, Susannah? I know I've come too late to truly help, but I know... Jake... Jake had trouble with. With his death. Remembering it."
sadly, we really could
She squeezes his hand. "I hope it'll be easier for you too, if you fall and they bring you back."
no subject
Roland gives up, of course, after the first couple seconds. No point in it is there? No point, either, in trying to know whether he'd be able or willing to 'make his own death', even knowing it might not be the final end of his path. It's no judgment of Susannah, but a dim reflection on himself. "We'll see."
He squeezes her hand. "I'm here now, whether by design or by accident." Ka. It's all ka, even the accidents. He knows that well by now. But that always has come more difficult for the rest of them to grasp. If the time comes when Susannah needs to believe it, he'll argue it then.
"I don't know why I'm not in the desert now, but I'm--" His voice cracks a little and he leans back, pausing to clear his throat. It's not emotion this time, though there's no harm if that's how it's taken. "--I'm very glad. To be here with you, for a little while. No matter what comes."
no subject
She's needed him, she realizes, needed him more than she'd been able to or wanted to admit. And Bert's certainly needed him. He's probably just what Eddie needs too.
She leans forward, brushing a kiss against his brow, and then lets go of his hands so that she can stand up. "I'll be back," she promises. "Give me a minute."
She goes over to the kitchen-area of the suite, gets two glasses out of the cupboard, fills them at the sink, and then brings them back to Roland.
"Here," she says, handing one to him. "I figured... we might as well share khef if we were sharing khef. And it sounds like you need it."
no subject
Then she's back and he takes the glass carefully, watches her with interest. "Would you? Would you share khef with me, if we still can? I'm not as convinced that we're ka-tet as you seem to be. Or, we weren't."
But this place, Roland ending up here - not only in this world, in this building, but in this room - exactly when she happened to be passing, well then... perhaps. Perhaps soon.
this is maybe a good stopping point???