interstellar5555 | the hope of morning

Entry tags:

the hope of morning

Who: Tiger, Pinkie, and Kido. Maybe others??
What: Tiger is scared and sad on Halloween night and so he sneaks into other people's rooms.
When: Morning of the 1st.
Where: Around the System Crash penthouse.
Warnings: Maybe discussion of child abuse but idk.

If it was even possible, Tiger gets more reclusive and emotionally frayed after his apparent exploits downtown. Jin doesn't go into details, but she comes back mad, and implies that he's run off into down in the middle of a press event. From the way that Tiger has been acting, it seems pretty likely he didn't really want to come back.

Trying to talk to him about it has been impossible recently - trying to talk to him in general has been impossible. Whatever spiral Tiger has gotten himself onto seems like it's only getting worse and worse.

Tiger is trying and failing to sleep for the 8th hour in a row when he starts having those weird thoughts again. It's impossible to describe, just like one moment life is one way, and the next, it's different. Dozing listlessly, he remembers the sound of thunder.

He was younger, then. By five years, at least. He remembers shivering in the back of a van, spooked by the sounds outside, and only composing himself as well as he is due to the presence of his dad next to him. He remembers him explaining why rain falls and why thunder cracks, and how in understanding something that scares you, you can find peace.

Before the absurdity of that idea can even set in, another flash of memory comes back to him, of staring out of that same van's window at a dark and sickly green sky. Something is chasing them, he thinks. But he is finding reasons to not be afraid.

Maybe when Peridot gets to Earth, she'll see how nice all the people are...and she won't wanna hurt anyone.

Just like his mother, he tells him.

Realizing it isn't real causes his entire body to seize. No nightmare could make him feel worse than he does right then, as that feeling of warmth and pride drains away from him. He starts crying right then and there, and just wishes that this would stop - that he could be sane again, like he was before. He's rather be angry than sad.

When he can't stand the silence anymore (or imagining the rain) he steps out into the hall for the first time in a while. When he arrives, he arrives completely unannounced.

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"It doesn't matter," he says sadly, though he will crawl up the side of the bed a little so that he's closer to her before flopping down. He's still sniffling a little from the crying he'd been doing before. For whatever reason, huddling close to someone for comfort feels more acceptable than it has for a long time. Even if he's still afraid of the idea.

"Not feeling so hot?" She won't push him to talk about it, but she will give him an in, if he wants to. She's hesitant, but she reaches to put a hand on his shoulder.

He actually...lets her? Wow. What is happening.

All he can do is think over and over again about the memory of his dad holding him close as he explained the rain. A dad that doesn't even exist, really. In a place he's never been. Trying to tell himself that the place he's remembering doesn't exist is more heartbreaking than anything he's ever experienced.

I want to go home, he thinks, over and over again, but as far as he knows he doesn't have one, never really has. He wants to go home. He wants to go home.

"I want to go home," he mumbles very softly, unsure of if she'll even hear it. Maybe she shouldn't. She already knows about how his dad is. His real dad. The one he hates.

Why would he ever want to go back to that empty house?

... Oh boy. She watches him another few moments before she tosses the blanket over him because he needs more comfort than she know how to give.

"Yeah. I do, too, sometimes." She doesn't know what to say that can help. She wants to go home to a place where no one cares that she exists, outside of her ability to carry on the family name. "I think we all do."

"Do you..." It's hard for him to say the words. He doesn't feel like he's allowed to, or feels like if he does, she'll think he's crazy. "Do you ever feel like things aren't you remember them?"

He curls under the blanket, welcoming its presence.

It strikes something with her, something she knows that's right, but she's hesitant to respond, in case she's misunderstood.

"What do you mean?"

"I thought..." He trails off. He doesn't really know how to phrase it either. "I keep...thinking like...like things are different. From how I thought they were. Like I'm different."

She doesn't tell him he's acting different, because that's not going to help. She also doesn't BS him about how he's getting older, though she thinks about both.

"Yeah. I think I get it. Things have been weird lately for everybody, huh?"

He knows he's acting different - right now at least - but he feels like it's in some kind of fucked up crazy way, and opposed to just feeling like a different person. A younger person. He definitely doesn't feel like this is getting older or more mature. If anything he feels less so - less confident, less self assured.

Maybe less in general.

"It's more than just weird," he says grumpily, burrowing into the blanket. He's still shaking a little bit from the whole thing. He feels all broken like, like parts of his own identity don't connect anymore.

"Want to tell me about it?" She puts her hand on his shoulder again. She really, really feels bad for him right now. It's gotta be hard to navigate.

He's quiet for a few moments, not sure what to say. He doesn't shrug her hand off, which seems like something he probably would have done before. Part of him wants to get even closer, but the other half is repulsed by the idea of wanting to offer himself over to that kind of intimacy.

Why is he so broken inside?

"I keep...thinking about my dad," he says, his voice fragile. "But not like...the crappy one I told you about. Like...imagining if he was...if my dad actually..." His voice cracks. "...cared about me."

He sniffles again, the tears in his eyes growing more thick.

If he won't move closer, Kido will, drawing her legs up under her so she can sit right next to him without worrying about accidentally kicking him on the way over. She rubs his shoulder for a second.

She doesn't have a way to combat that. (Hell, even if she had all her memories restored, she wouldn't know what to say. Both of her dads tried to murder the shit out of her.)

"... What was it like?" The way she says it says a lot more than the words themselves do. Like she's telling him that she's been there, she's imagined it, too.

He understands what she means. He's thought about it a lot too, especially recently. What would things be like if these feelings were real? If they were like him at all?

"I remembered..." he starts, and then the trails off. That's not really the right word for it, is it? You can't remember something that never happened. "I was just thinking...I dreamed I was with someone who I thought was my dad. We were living together in this van..."

A sharp contrast to growing up in what was essentially an abandoned mansion house. No one around except for paid caregivers that he spurned as early on as he could think to do it.

"I'm so stupid," he says, unable to finish explaining. He buries his face in his hands.

She lifts her hand to his hair, trying to be comforting as she can. She's not good at it but she's trying so hard because she feels this feeling in a very deep way.

"Then I'm pretty stupid, too. I think it'd be nice, living like that. Kind of like the tour bus, but less cramped, you know? Living with somebody who gives a shit about you."

Something about that gesture, touching or ruffling his hair, makes him feel so weird. He hates it, is condescending. But. ..it makes him feel better, makes him feel loved. It can't be both these things at the same time and the feelings clashing inside of him causes him to start shaking.

"I don't know what's wrong with me," he whimpers. "Nothing feels right, it's all..." He chokes. "It's all messed up."

He shrinks down away from her hand, as if trying to shield himself from her touch.

Kido yanks her hand back, then, as if she's burned him.

"Tiger?" She's hesitant. Nervous? "Did you remember that or did you imagine it?"

He looks at her, sort of stunned. His hard to read his expression in the dark, but the look in his eyes is still enough to speak for itself.

"I...I don't know," he says, but the fact that he's even entertaining the idea suggests otherwise.

"Because I think I'm remembering things, too."

She doesn't know if it's better that he's in the same boat as her, or worse. But it would mean neither of them are alone.

That gives Tiger pause. He considers it silently for a few moments, before very hesitantly asking, "...Like what?"

She's not going to tell him about the burning woman... So she has to think a little bit in a way to explain.

"A woman I've never met, in a house I've never been in. She's trying to save me. And I'm trying to save her."

"Oh," he says, softly. He's quiet for a little while in turn. It's hard to know what to say. "This is weird."

"I don't think you're stupid. And I don't think we're crazy, Tiger." She may have never sounded so sincere. "But I think something's going on. Ever since the party, things are... feeling weird."

He looks at her for a few moments, and then his gaze drops. He feels resistant to that idea, and he doesn't really know why. It explains everything, doesn't it? Why he feels like this? Why he keeps discovering these memories...

But acknowledging it makes it feel like he must be doing something wrong, like he's breaking some kind of rule.

"Why us...?" he mumbles, closing his eyes. He wishes it would just stop.

She always feels like she's doing something wrong. It thrills her. But now it just sinks like a dread to the bottom of her stomach.

"I don't think it's just us..." She shakes her head. "But I think we need to be careful."

Well, that feeling of dread is certainly spreading now. His voice becomes quieter - more obviously frightened.

"What...why?"

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