[ yancy looks up just enough to reach for the wire--
--and then pauses when he sees the beginnings of blood welling on the fresh cut on chuck's arm.
it has to be understood: before he was a ranger, before he was a cadet going through the ppdc's rigorous requirements to make the inevitable cut, yancy becket was a brother to two younger siblings first. he was a son to a mother fighting a losing war to cancer, a son to a man who walked out without so much of a backwards glance at the family he decided he no longer wanted.
chuck and him... they're not friends. he can't even call them 'comrades at arms' because they never served together. chuck's father is a different story -- hero, icon, someone yancy had seen in action in manila just months before. if the five years felt like five years, maybe the awe deep in his gut at the mention of the name HANSEN would be settled into something less... visceral. but those five years have been five years for everyone else -- not so for him.
he doesn't remark on the wound, just stands to look around for anything to offer to chuck to staunch the wound with as much as he is also looking for the wire cutter. ]
Got time. [ sleep is going to be shot for a while. might as well be, anyway. given how things have been. ]
[ it'll bruise, which makes the slash on his elbow one more irritant to grumble over in the morning- but chuck is largely unconcerned otherwise. mori had made as much of a fuss as she was ever inclined to for leaving a brand new scar across his brow, but chuck thinks that the two are probably close in significance. his body isn't going to dredged up from the pacific, if any of it was left recognizable in the first place- and what is there to mourn by way of new scars and burns on a body he no longer owns.
becket is moving around some short distance off, likely after the cutters, and chuck leaves him to it. he isn't unguarded (because chuck has never learned how to be that. how to be a person. flesh and blood beneath a drive suit.) but in his lack of attention, of wary observation- it's near enough. yancy becket is surprisingly easy company, and chuck hasn't yet dug up an interest in tearing the foundation out. ]
Avoiding them too? [ it isn't a give away because it isn't inclusive. chuck isn't like them- isn't mori or becket or his old man- and he never will be. but he's been used like this before; a distraction. a tool. and at least this he knows. ]
[ the question makes him stall a little, just as he's about to ball up a piece of discarded fabric that at least looks like it's closer to clean than anything else in the area. ]
What makes you say that? [ in other words: yeah. maybe. but the words are a question and not an outright confirmation.
[ chuck nods by way of reply and wipes his palms over the fabric at his thighs. the sink- like most of their shoddy stand-in for a house, works, but it isn't pretty. they aren't exactly going for home & garden magazine, and he gets that. but the trouble with being a perfectionist is that the standards tend to run across the board. the hot water tap takes a few minutes to warm up. the cold comes out like a waterfall.
at least the pipes don't rattle. ]
Only come down here when the rest of 'em are out.
[ the words are quiet, which is as close to a truce as anything. there's a certain brand of confession in that as well. a modicum of understanding. chuck isn't the type to walk on eggshells. to play it safe, quiet, close to the chest for the sake of other people- and sure as hell doesn't do it for himself. but becket tries to keep out of sight the same way chuck does. like they could somehow make it easier on everyone around them. on their copilots. families.
like they could make death easier for the living.
chuck notices absently that the collar of his shirt is plastered to his chest and smells a little like burning plastic. hot metal. ]
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no subject
--and then pauses when he sees the beginnings of blood welling on the fresh cut on chuck's arm.
it has to be understood: before he was a ranger, before he was a cadet going through the ppdc's rigorous requirements to make the inevitable cut, yancy becket was a brother to two younger siblings first. he was a son to a mother fighting a losing war to cancer, a son to a man who walked out without so much of a backwards glance at the family he decided he no longer wanted.
chuck and him... they're not friends. he can't even call them 'comrades at arms' because they never served together. chuck's father is a different story -- hero, icon, someone yancy had seen in action in manila just months before. if the five years felt like five years, maybe the awe deep in his gut at the mention of the name HANSEN would be settled into something less... visceral. but those five years have been five years for everyone else -- not so for him.
he doesn't remark on the wound, just stands to look around for anything to offer to chuck to staunch the wound with as much as he is also looking for the wire cutter. ]
Got time. [ sleep is going to be shot for a while. might as well be, anyway. given how things have been. ]
no subject
becket is moving around some short distance off, likely after the cutters, and chuck leaves him to it. he isn't unguarded (because chuck has never learned how to be that. how to be a person. flesh and blood beneath a drive suit.) but in his lack of attention, of wary observation- it's near enough. yancy becket is surprisingly easy company, and chuck hasn't yet dug up an interest in tearing the foundation out. ]
Avoiding them too? [ it isn't a give away because it isn't inclusive. chuck isn't like them- isn't mori or becket or his old man- and he never will be. but he's been used like this before; a distraction. a tool. and at least this he knows. ]
no subject
What makes you say that? [ in other words: yeah. maybe. but the words are a question and not an outright confirmation.
he looks over. ]
Does the sink work?
no subject
at least the pipes don't rattle. ]
Only come down here when the rest of 'em are out.
[ the words are quiet, which is as close to a truce as anything. there's a certain brand of confession in that as well. a modicum of understanding. chuck isn't the type to walk on eggshells. to play it safe, quiet, close to the chest for the sake of other people- and sure as hell doesn't do it for himself. but becket tries to keep out of sight the same way chuck does. like they could somehow make it easier on everyone around them. on their copilots. families.
like they could make death easier for the living.
chuck notices absently that the collar of his shirt is plastered to his chest and smells a little like burning plastic. hot metal. ]