maskormenacelogs | when happiness spells misery

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when happiness spells misery

WHO: Miles Edgeworth + John Mitchell
WHERE: random run-in land aka somewhere near casa de la Edgeworth and friends
WHEN: afternoon of 22 April
WHAT: Edgeworth is a mild mannered attorney with the ill-used superpower of guilt manipulation. Mitchell is a vampire ex-serial murderer with a whole lot of guilt. sparks fly when they bump into each other. this ain't no love story.
WARNINGS: more guilt than a Catholic joke + murder thoughts at worst!

[Nearly two months, and Mitchell still mostly hates Florida.

It almost isn't fair, to Florida. About a solid forty percent of his hate is misplaced, more to do with him having been dragged here against his will in the dead of night, at the whim of some higher power that no one knows a great deal about. He's about done with higher powers acting their will on him, or at least that's what he's been telling himself for months prior to this incident.

But there's a lot to dislike about Florida, even outside that forty percent. There's the weather, the sunlight he can barely stand. Sunglasses, leather jackets, anything to block that oppressive light--and knitted gloves, too, because sunlight isn't enough to warm the hands of the undead. Working later shifts means that he looks like less of a mental case, or at least, that there's fewer people around to see it. At least work is consistent, pretty much the same as it's always been, even if it's weird to be on a shift without the possibility of sharing it with someone he actually knows. It's weird, going home to the wrong housemates. The one's he's got are tolerable, but there's a consistency that's missing, and some days that's all right, and other days--are harder.

Today is somewhere in the middle. Today he can feel his hunger working around under his skin, like some parasite pushing a little closer to the surface. He should call off, maybe, but he's got the whole walk to the assisted living facility to work it out. A walk, and a cigarette, or two, or three, and he's smoking as he realises where he is: walking past Violet's house, and he thinks briefly of her, glancing at the window as he passes by, like maybe she's going to be looking out or something. She doesn't remind him of Annie, not exactly--she's way too sharp for that--and he's not insensitive enough to pull any all-ghosts-are-similar-enough bullshit, not after knowing Annie as long as he's known her. But there's something to Violet, something that's had him tell more to her than nearly anyone else here. He needs people like that, or else--

There's a flash, a thought toward before. A girl with long straight hair, wide eyes. Covered her mouth when she smiled. A hotel room, Herrick in the car. All teeth when he smiled. Mitchell's hand, the girl's hand. Slick of blood on the floor. She had a flower name--not Violet, but something else. Petunia. Lily. Tansy. Posy. Violet. Or there were five girls. Or there were five, five separate hotels, five girls. Girls who never became ghosts. Vampires trailing ghosts after them, a whole string, like paper dolls joined at the hand, one after another.

His distraction means he walks right into someone. It startles him; he drops his cigarette. It's nearly all ash now anyways, but Mitchell stoops to grab for it, mumbling--]

Sorry--

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[He usually doesn't come home during the day. It's usually not until two in the morning or later that he makes his way home; there's something entirely sad about that trip, about the exhaustion and the quiet, the streets silent but for the pulse of crickets. Yet he still prefers that to walking home in the day; he feels so much more accomplished when he comes home past midnight.

(He's started in with his old bad habits again. He knows that. But he cannot help himself.)

Today, though, he has a file that he's left at home, so he's coming back for that. He's half-glad he does. Because as he walks towards the house, he sees a man - unfamiliar, but someone who recognizably looks like bad news, with ratty clothes and greasy hair and a cigarette between his fingers - staring for far too long at Violet's window. His frown is immediate; his wariness and mistrust flares; and so, in an opening gambit to open a line of conversation with this man (which will conclude with do not bother her, whoever you are) he reaches down for the cigarette himself.

But Edgeworth is clumsy. His hand bats against the man's. And then, somehow, something happens - he doesn't know what happens, but something happens.]

[Lauren.

Lauren, the mark of her lipstick against her cigarette. Before, and after. Lauren, her cheek pressed against the stained bedsheets, her head twisted too far on her neck and her fingers loose, but God, she'd gripped at him--while she kissed him, while they waited for the taxi, while she was pulling him in the front door--and in bed, too, her breath ragged against his ear. Even when he bit in to the soft skin of her throat she was gripping at him, her blood hot in his mouth and her breath fading into this quiet thing, something closer to surprise than pain or fear. And his hands, on her, holding to her and holding her down, greedy until he remembered to feel guilty, and then it was too late, she was already going cold under his hands.

Lauren. Save me, her eyes damp, that girl is almost gone, all that's left is her, and again, save me, and the weight of the stake in Mitchell's hands, save me, and that should have felt good, like he'd finally done the right thing. Instead it felt like this, like a weight on his chest, like someone stepping on his throat--but something's wrong, something that goes beyond what should be a flash of his usual guilt. Not easy, but manageable, the way you learn to live with anything after years and years of it.

But it doesn't fade, and it doesn't let itself get fought down. Lauren, sticky with blood in shower. Lauren, greenish in the bowling alley light. Lauren, in hospital scrubs, biting at her lip. Lauren, dust, in the air, and Mitchell makes a low noise as he shoves away from the man he's knocked into--shoves him, hard, falling back, his stomach pitching--]

Jesus--

[Edgeworth, half stooped over, had been off-balance to begin with; he wasn't expecting that push, either. Why would he have been? So when the man shoves him, he goes over in a sprawl of limbs - and his leg twists awkwardly and painfully under him. He grunts in surprise as he hits the pavement elbows-first; he jerks his neck to protect his head, but his glasses go skittering across the ground.

It's more stupid and awkward and embarrassing than painful, really. He is fully aware how ridiculous he looks when he falls, and truly, his dignity is what suffers the worst injury. He'd meant to seem intimidating and cool and collected, enough to spook this man away from his home; but instead he just shoved him over like it was nothing.

Good God, why did he shove him? Why would he have done that?

It's Edgeworth's intention to demand the answer to that question from his feet; one never can quite leverage the answers one wants when one is sitting on the ground. So he goes to try to stand - but finds that his right knee is very much in pain, enough that he lets out a little strangled noise and sits back down again.]

[The cigarette burns out on the pavement, a thin line of smoke that hangs in the air like a string that fades to nothing--Mitchell doesn't register that noise of pain, he's thinking only of the ashes on the ground, the cracks that split Lauren's face, dry and crumbling, and the relief that she wore, and still he'd felt like a coward--because he'd damned her from the moment he met her, smiling at her as he passed her in the hallway, doubled back to hold the door for her with her arms full of files--

He's not thinking of his own dignity, he's thinking only of getting away, and the heaviness of his guilt feels doubled, worse than Purgatory, this-- concentration of guilt and grief and self-loathing, and he crawls backwards before he can bring himself to scramble to his feet, his knees weak and his hands shaking and his throat, it's like it's closing in, and he hunches over himself, crouches on the ground with a noise of pain of his own--]

What the fuck-- what the fuck did you do--

[Because it's different, this guilt, it's his but it's so much worse, it stabs at him from the inside out.]

[Edgeworth looks up. His brows draw together. He forgets about his own lost dignity, his own embarrassment and frustration, in light of this man, shaking and terrified - inexplicably so. The what did you do registers, dimly, but he doesn't spend overlong dwelling on it; there had been that feeling of wrongness, yes, but that hadn't been his doing. So something had gone wrong; Edgeworth worries, abruptly, that the man is ill, that he's having a heart attack, something...

He moves forward. Winces when his knee moves, but then shoves that pain to the side. He touches the man on the upper arm, trying to brace him, trying to help him. He asks - ]

Sir. Are you all right? Are you ill?

[Pushing away from him again is all defensive instinct. Better for everyone that the man get clear, because pain has a way of working itself around in Mitchell, of tearing out of him as anger instead, like a half-rabid dog--but he's not fast enough to push away, he's dulled by the force of guilt, and Christ, it's a force, a spike that tears into him and leaves him dizzy under the force of--

Josie. Maybe it's because he was thinking of the hospital, of Lauren's quick dark smile--Lauren becomes Josie, and Josie becomes old. Age adds lines to a face Mitchell had kissed a thousand times--but always the same eyes, those same eyes, and the curve of her mouth when she smiled. His mouth, hot with her blood. What he told himself, that she was dying anyways, that she'd asked him, told him, if you don't stop Herrick, who will--that was all after, that was all a construct, a lie so he didn't have to feel this. She asked him, and he killed her, drank her blood, healed himself--and all for what?

Blindly, Mitchell strikes out, like he can dash the memory out of his head, loose the grip of guilt that he does his best to hide from. He doesn't yet register the touch of the hand as the cause of this--he doesn't register the concern in the voice--because in the end, it will always come down to this, to Mitchell, alone, and the stack of his crimes against him, the trail of blood that goes on for miles, for nearly a hundred years. Even the things he loves most are steeped in it, all his fault--]

Stop-- [There's a note of pleading now--brief, before it bleeds back to anger, before his nature turns his pain to a weapon--he claws at his arm, at the hand, anything to break free of this--] I'm-- I'm sorry, stop--

Calm down!

[It's hard to see this sort of panic and not panic himself. It's hard to see the fear and not feel afraid. And fear manifests itself in Edgeworth as anger - because that's always how his fear manifests, as anger or paralysis - and makes his voice sharper. Because he doesn't know what's bringing this about. He doesn't understand the root of it, and so even as the man gouges at his hand with short blunt nails he holds on and shouts at someone else, standing nearby - ]

Call a doctor.

[And then he turns back to the man. His voice is rough and aggressive, but his words are soothing.]

It's all right. Calm down. Calm down.

Don't--

[That word comes out a snarl, and Mitchell feels his fear swiftly turning to anger, rising in him and filling in the gaps that panic left behind--that same familiar flow of emotion that's always preserved his life, time and time again. He will never hand anyone a stake and ask to be killed, because some bitter centre of him will never allow for that to happen, a selflessness that only goes so far, never scraping below the blackness that is actually contained in him, I'm an animal, a monster--

Calm down. The words press through. The weight of that order, and Mitchell twists under it, hates it, no one tells him what to do, not any longer--

And yet something in him subsides. It's like a jolt of cold water. The taste of guilt, washed out, however briefly, and Mitchell sags under the grip of the man's hand as some measure of tension bleeds out of him. Josie, smiling at him. The guilt he has bound to her--it eases, for a second, enough that he can get in a breath--Josie, smiling at him, shading her eyes against the sunlight, and Mitchell stops scrabbling to be free, as his hand presses the man's hand closer, to his arm, an act that is all instinct.]

[Thank God - The man's calmed suddenly, the violent scratching turning into a gentler touch. Edgeworth is still frightened - frightened that the man is dying and this is the next phase of his illness, that the heart attack has caused the...blood to be cut off from his brain or something, or that it's some psychotic break, or something - but better this calm, this relief, than the previous twisting fury and panic.

Edgeworth hand comes out. He grips the man's neck firmly, uses his leverage to tilt up his head. Meets his eyes. Edgeworth's glasses are in the grass; his vision is fuzzy; so he leans in to focus enough, to see that the man's pupils are steady, that it's not a stroke or some other event.

And he asks, firmly:]

What is your name.

[This feeling of relief makes no sense. There's nothing that prompted it. Mitchell has barely felt its like before. The closest that he can think of is Annie's forgiveness, the cold press of her lips on his, and even that was less than this. This is so absolute it's dizzying, like a chronic pain that's suddenly faded to barely a tingle.

He realises, muzzily, that he's got his hand pressed against this man's, holding tightly to him. He should let go, but he finds that he doesn't want to, that there's something that stops him from loosing his grip. The world is beginning to fade back in again, piece by piece--Mitchell sucks in a ragged breath, fighting to come out of a daze that's far more pleasant than anything he's felt in a long time--]

Mitchell. Mitchell, I'm-- [And the words from just a few minutes before suddenly piece themselves together, and he sits up a bit, looking around for whoever the man was speaking with, whoever was sent for a doctor--] No doctor, I don't-- I don't need a doctor--

Mr. Mitchell.

[The faint familiarity of his voice suddenly makes sense. This is Mitchell the Import, who's never appeared on screen but who's chatted about things often enough - the one with whom Edgeworth's spoken enough times that he ought to have known him. And now he's ill or injured, and Edgeworth doesn't know why -

(Strange, though. That feeling of wrongness is gone, now. There's something strange coming from his hand - is it? He doesn't know - )]

You're ill. You need to be seen to. A doctor will help.

[He pushes Mitchell back down, gently.]

Sit down.

[It's the mister that makes him realise, pulls him a little more out of that weird feeling. He looks around and makes the connection at last. Edgeworth. The attorney, the one who never shuts up, and he's still going on about doctors--]

No, you don't-- you don't understand. I'm not ill. I'm fine, it was just-- it was a moment, it's passed.

[A little more loudly, as he tries to stand--] I'm fine--

[But he's still got his hand over Edgeworth's. It's that feeling--it can't have anything to do with him, but he feels like if he lets him go then he'll lose it, and he can't lose it, not now--]

[He certainly does not seem fine. He still is clutching at Edgeworth like he's in pain. But it's of course not Edgeworth's place to force him to accept medical attention - it's just his place to try to convince him.

So Edgeworth pulls back and tries to extract his hand from Mitchell's grip. He answers tartly and firmly as he does.]

You're clearly in pain, sir. There's nothing fine about that.

Are you uninsured? Is that the problem? If so, I will cover any medical costs.

[He's got no reason to hold to Edgeworth, nothing except a vague need tugging at him, a need to keep this feeling--though what the feeling is, exactly, Mitchell couldn't say. He lets Edgeworth pull away--and the feeling washes out of him with dizzying immediacy. Mitchell has managed to get to his feet by then, and he staggers back a step, thrown by the flight of something so close to relief. It was unreal, and now it's gone. Maybe it was never there.

No, he knows it was. He stares down at his hand, too distracted to really put together what Edgeworth is saying. There's a loose bit of yarn at the index finger of his right glove. Mitchell curls his fingers so he can tug at it, making a loose fist.]

No.

[He looks up, all at once, his gaze far steadier.]

I'm fine. I don't need help. [And his tone is steadier, too, less fragmented--but his eyes are narrowed, as he flicks his gaze over Edgeworth's face.] What was that?

[Mitchell is standing far enough away that his expression is blurry and nearly unreadable to Edgeworth's nearsighted eyes. It's not pleased - that much is clear - but nor is it contorted in pain. So the man's not dying, at least.]

What was what?

[Edgeworth gathers himself as he speaks, shifts his weight to stand - and then immediately he puts pressure on the leg he twisted. It was fine while he was sitting, when it was bent just so - a little sore, but nothing worse than that. But now, when he bends it, it flares up agonizingly; Edgeworth lets out nothing more than a quiet grunt, because he will be damned before he makes any noise louder than that, but -

That's not good.

Yet self-consciously, he tries to hide his distress. Even though it doubtless looks strange that he's not standing, and even though it's idiotic to pretend as though he's fine in some rare burst of masculine pride, he is not willing to make a show of his injury.]

That--

[But he doesn't have a word for it. Feeling seems insufficient, even if it's the closest thing.

Mitchell has done it all, nearly, participated in every vice and depravity that fell into his lap. There's nothing quite like being blood drunk, nothing that leaves him feeling so fluid and sated and deeply happy--but it's a heavy happiness, weighed down and soaked with blood. The weightlessness that he'd briefly felt--it went so far beyond anything else. He stares down at his hand again, letting his fingers loosen and fall open. The tingle has gone. The usual weight is setting back in on him.

When he looks around again, it's at that quiet noise that Edgeworth makes. He's still on the ground, which is weird--isn't it weird? Yes, Mitchell decides, after a second, it's weird; Edgeworth doesn't strike him as someone that grubs around in the dirt.]

You all right?

[He asks it somewhat warily, but still with a touch of general concern.]

Fine.

[His voice is just a little higher than usual, a little strangled. He looks for his glasses; they're just out of reach. He'd like to ask Mitchell to fetch them, but good God, that would be embarrassing. But so would scooting across the pavement, so - better to be blind. For the moment, at least.

But so is sitting here. So, reluctant and more than a little humiliated, he mumbles:]

I merely - twisted my knee, it seems. It's of no consequence.

[And he clears his throat. He tries to seem together, confident, when he demands:]

That what. You will have to be specific.

[Oh. Mitchell's mood is a measure lighter than it's been, lately--and again, he couldn't exactly say why, if he were asked. It feels a little like a contact high, or something--and it's enough that he smiles, vaguely, at Edgeworth's admission.]

Maybe we'll need that doctor after all.

[Ha ha he's totally in a place to laugh at someone's pain. Edgeworth keeps looking around, and Mitchell follows his glance, trying to work out what he's looking for. Better that as a distraction than answering the question that's been put to him.]

Nothing. Probably just-- [His imagination? But he knows that isn't true, it was something else, and Mitchell quickly glances back at Edgeworth, a little wary again.] You didn't feel anything?

[Edgeworth blinks up at Mitchell, and squints, trying to read his expression. Is he smiling? He looks to be smiling - But Edgeworth cannot fully tell, and immediately he gets embarrassed about squinting and looks away again. It's a terribly undignified thing, to squint.]

Nothing that requires a doctor. It's fine. I...Right.

[He clears his throat. He tries to focus on the question instead - and then realizes that there was some...sensation, indeed, but - Had that been what Mitchell was reacting to?]

And I did - What exactly what the "thing" I was to have been feeling?

I don't know.

[He answers pretty quickly, determined to establish that there's nothing really out of the ordinary about him. Again, he studies Edgeworth's face. He's not feigning ignorance. Mitchell is pretty good at determining liars--not with a hundred percent accuracy, but with at least enough suspicion to press with.]

It was just-- a feeling. I don't know, maybe it was nothing. It doesn't matter, it's gone now.

[Though he wishes it wasn't. There's a little touch of that regret in his tone, despite himself.]

[Just a feeling. That kindles a flare of worry in the back of Edgeworth's mind. Just a feeling...

He asks, something gone cold in the pit of his stomach - ]

What...sort of feeling?

[They'd told him, hadn't they, that he could bring about feelings in others. Feelings of guilt - and he'd sworn never to use it. But if that was the source of Mitchell's agony, his clear misery - ]

[The shift in tone is obvious enough that Mitchell glances over at Edgeworth again. Some shadow has crossed his face in the past few seconds, some hint of recognition--]

What did you do?

[Some of the ease has left his tone. The taut edge of suspicion is there, just barely. That moment in between--the nameless lightness--that made it a little easier to forget the grip of his guilt. Not forever, not completely. But enough that it stings a little less, even now.]

It was-- good. The second time. The first time, it was-- [He doesn't want to say, to bring back any of that feeling.] What did you do?

[There's no question that Edgeworth is not happy to hear that. The it was good doesn't even really register; he doesn't hear that there might be any gladness, focused as he is on that contrast. The first time, it was - It's not hard for Edgeworth to fill in exactly what it is. Because guilt -

Guilt is a useful thing, at times. Guilt brings about repentance. But it's something that must be arrived at independently. One cannot simply force it upon others. That's inhumane, and something he does not want to do, either - Because has he himself not lived so many years with the pain of nameless guilt? He knows how it eats at you, how it worries at you...

So, with real distress in his face, he says - ]

I - It - it might have been my ability. Sir, I swear to you, if it was, it was not my intention to use it. I would never utilize that upon someone without their consent. Indeed, I would not even seek any sort of consent; using it at all is out of the question.

[Then, finally, finally, Mitchell's first statement sinks in. And Edgeworth asks, belatedly - ]

What do you mean, "good"?

[That confession isn't so much a shock--it was something, Mitchell knew that much, something unnatural, and it doesn't take someone supernatural to recognise that. Just because he'd had an inkling of the nature of the feeling doesn't mean that he likes it--no, exactly to the fucking contrary, the knowledge that it was something used against him drives his wariness right up to anger, as neatly as if someone had turned a dial. He doesn't know what it was, exactly--all he knows is how it made him feel, that it was used against him--

But the misery with which Edgeworth admits his involvement wrong-foots Mitchell, like when you're climbing the stairs and you go an extra step, and your foot sinks into nothing when you're thinking there ought to be another stair. He stares, blankly, at Edgeworth, all of his emotions sort of hanging around some inner fringe, unsure of which to plunge in with.]

Uh-- yeah.

[Out of the question. It doesn't always work that way. No matter what his file says, Mitchell doesn't necessarily think of his vampirism as an ability. So maybe it works differently, but...]

It was just-- good. It was a good feeling. [No, that sounds stupid; he scowls, rubs his hand over his mouth, roughly--] Not a feeling. Exactly. Look, what the hell was it? You're claiming responsibility, you have to know what it was.

[It is an awkward thing, to give a bow of apology when one is sitting. It's an awkward thing to be holding a conversation such as this while sitting at all, truthfully. Nevertheless, he's not willing to take the time to stand; it will look like he's avoiding the topic, or trying to draw attention away from it, if he engages in the laborious effort of forcing himself upright.

So he stays sitting. And he gives that apologetic bow. And he tells Mitchell what he's only told one other - only Wright.]

They informed me that I had the power to induce guilt in those around me. Someone's idea of a joke, I should have to think.

[He only lowers his head further.]

That might have been what you suffered, sir.

[The explanation of guilt being the root of the feeling is no real surprise. Mitchell is more than familiar with his own guilt. The weight of it, all at once--he'd felt that before, too, in times just after he'd acted his darkest, in the long hallway of Purgatory with Lia at his side.

But someone doing it to him is different. He doesn't deserve that. (He tells himself he doesn't deserve it, even though he knows that he deserves it and worse.) Someone laying his guilt in front of his face, that makes him angry all over again, but it's an anger that's quickly tempered. The misery on Edgeworth's face hasn't left him yet.

And on one hand, so what if he feels bad? He should feel bad. Mitchell didn't deserve to be made to feel like that, he's followed the rules, he's kept on the straight path and he's done his time with his guilt. He doesn't need some bastard lawyer shoving it in his face all over again.

And on the other hand... he feels bad. A guilt of his own. And beyond that--]

But what was the second part?

[He asks it somewhat abruptly, breaking his silence.]

The second part, that was-- different. What was that?

[He'll come back to the induced guilt, later. He'll probably be angry with Edgeworth, later, all over again. It's inevitable. And he'll remember to be grateful at the same time, grateful that however Edgeworth brings out that guilt, he can't see the root of it, because if he could--

Christ.]

I...cannot say. Perhaps it was the simple contrast between...feeling that unpleasantness and not feeling it.

[Because they didn't say anything about giving feelings that were good. All it said was that he could manipulate guilt. That he could cause guilt. And there was nothing good about that - about forcing those miserable feelings upon others.

He's quiet a moment, then adds:]

I've never used it before. I don't know how it works, truly. It - I wish I could tell you more, but I don't want to subject people to it.

[No. Mitchell is shaking his head before Edgeworth even finishes the first part of that. The only reason he doesn't go on in that brief silence is because he's trying to reconstruct the feeling itself--the good feeling. The guilt he has in spades. But the more he concentrates, the harder it is to keep hold of. The mere memory of it had been good, just moments before. Now it's slipping away, losing its potency.

Guilt, and then the absence of guilt, as neatly as if someone had plucked it out of him. Mitchell has enough that the crack has been filled in again, a thousand other guilts filling in the place where it had been--maybe still is, because how could anyone actually take that from him--]

Do it again.

[He looks down at Edgeworth, intently, his jaw set. A beat, and then, decisively, he begins shoving up his shirtsleeve as he crouches down.]

You're going to do it again. Come on.

Edited (oops) 2014-04-25 15:59 (UTC)

[He doesn't understand at first. Indeed, at first, he thinks that Mitchell is rolling up his sleeve to punch Edgeworth in the face, or something - Edgeworth has never been in a fistfight, but it seems to him that in films and the like, people often roll their sleeves up before getting in a fight. The idea that Mitchell might be requesting that again is so absurd that it's altogether out of the question - ]

What?

[It takes him a full five seconds before he even thinks to recoil. But when he does, he recoils far.]

I - No. Absolutely not!

[He struggles for eloquence - ]

If this is some - charitable offer to help me practice, that's out of the question. I am not going to use this ability at all, ever.

[Seriously? Mitchell laughs at that, grimly. His sleeve is shoved up well past his elbow by now, but Edgeworth has sort of flopped himself a short distance away from where he's currently crouched.]

Yeah, I don't do charity. I'm not offering t' be your lab rat. I'm asking you to do it again.

[Asking, that's putting it nicely. He's asking for now. He won't be, in a second.]

Do it again. I want to see if you can get at-- the second thing, that happened.

[Wouldn't that be a good thing? Edgeworth rejected this ability of his the moment they told him about it: guilt, after all, is nothing more than suffering if it is not in answer to wrongdoing, and if it is in answer to wrongdoing it should be come by honestly, not because it's been forced. Inducing guilt is thing that's monstrous at worst, pointless at best.

Alleviating it, on the other hand - that is something worthwhile. How much suffering comes about due to misplaced guilt? How many psychological disorders are accompanied by irrational remorse? Edgeworth lived so many years tormented by guilt himself; if, during those years, someone had come with the ability to remove some of his misery, wouldn't he have taken that offer? Would he even have hesitated?

And yet. A man without guilt...He has known men without guilt. He is chasing one even now. Men without guilt are men with bloody hands.

Mitchell doesn't seem a bad sort of man. Edgeworth doesn't know, and will not inquire for now, what it is that makes him so eager to have his guilt dulled. But the man tried to help him with Violet, and he's been decent in this way. Edgeworth cannot in good conscience justify testing this upon him when it might have uncontrollable, long-lasting consequences.

So he scoots back another few inches, uses his hands to push himself backwards onto the grassy patch just off the sidewalk. He does it on the pretext of reaching out for his glasses; in truth, he's doing it to get out of Mitchell's proximity.]

Out of the question. Not when there's just as much of a chance that I'll make you feel worse.

[His hand goes out; his fingertips touch cool metal, and he picks up the glasses and begins to clean a bit of the dirt off them.]

[Watching Edgeworth scramble backwards, scooting around on his arse to get into the grass--that might be pretty funny, at any other time, especially considering he's in like a three-piece suit and cravat. Right now, when Mitchell scoffs--it's more at the idea of him feeling worse than any little displays of physical comedy he's got going on in front of him. It doesn't get much worse than what he knows as his constant.]

Yeah, I'd like to see that.

[That's more to himself than anything, though possibly he shouldn't have said it aloud--but whatever. It was a throw-away comment. More urgently, he leans forward, his eyes fixed intently on Edgeworth, like maybe he can compel him to go along with this.]

Look, I'm asking. I'm asking, with full knowledge of what could happen. Try it again, just to see.

[Would it work, if he took Edgeworth's hand and shoved it against his arm? Or does it require some effort from him?--but it can't, because he hadn't even known that he'd done it. It's something involuntary, and if it works--even for a second--to feel that clean relief again--]

Just try it.

Edited (doot doot doot ) 2014-04-25 20:34 (UTC)

[Edgeworth is not a man who's easily unnerved. But Mitchell's intensity is, frankly, unsettling. To this point, Edgeworth has known him only as the somewhat sharp-tongued, rather lazy-seeming man who had rather too much to say about television. This version of the man - unblinking, intent, following him across the ground - is...

It's simply that at this given time, Edgeworth does not really enjoy having a twisted knee. Which, he tells himself, is the root of his discomfort - he doesn't enjoy being unable to stand. It's pure dislike of the power dynamics of being lower than someone. Simply a problem when one is accustomed to being taller than those about oneself. That's all. No fear involved, just discomfort. Dignified, reasonable, rational discomfort.

And it's discomfort which lends a bit of heat to his voice when he responds - ]

If you're advocating that I try it to see, you clearly do not have full knowledge. What if something goes permanently wrong? What if I burden you with so much misery that it destroys your mind? What if I strip your conscience from you altogether?

I am sorry that you feel in need of relief, Mr. Mitchell, but I cannot give it to you.

[And with that little lecture delivered - and delivered with firm anger - he feels better, feels more in control. He shoves his glasses back onto his face and glares at him.]

[There is so little that Mitchell wouldn't consider risking to get some of that relief that they're talking about. Relief, even that seems an insufficient word. Relief is like having a headache for an afternoon and taking some tablets and then feeling better some twenty minutes later. Relief is such a small and human word.

The sharpness of Edgeworth's tone works under his skin--not that it would take much, right now, because he knows what he wants, and he doesn't want to be denied. If there's anything that can replicate that feeling, even for a moment, then the risk be damned. He wants it.]

You don't understand. [He spits out the word, his tone dropping.] I'm asking you, I'm telling you: do it. I want to know if it works, if it was real.

[It can't be real. There's nothing that could feel that good, not for Mitchell. He doesn't deserve it, but Christ, he wants it--and so he stands, at last, a single fluid motion. There's still a distance between him and Edgeworth, but he could close it easily, and he's not thinking of the daylight, of the fact that he's probably late for his shift.]

You don't understand how it felt. You don't get it. And you don't have to. I'm telling you to do it, now do it. Please.

[It should sound more like begging than it does. He holds out his arm.]

[It ought to have been Edgeworth's nerves and misgivings that made him refuse, of course. He ought to have refused out of principle. He shouldn't be refusing because he doesn't like being ordered around.

And, truly, it's mostly out of principle that he's refusing. Mostly. It's mostly because he doesn't want to damn this man to suffering or to a radical shift in personality. But there's a little bit of him that just reacts to that command - issued as though Mitchell has any say over him, as though he has the right to demand action of Edgeworth, Chief Prosecutor of the city of Los Angeles, who's speaking out of principle and compassion - And that little stubborn proud bit of him digs in his heels completely.]

No.

[No matter that Mitchell is looming over him, no matter that Mitchell's voice is aggressive, Edgeworth matches him glare for glare. This isn't the hesitant, remorseful man of a few moments before; this is the Edgeworth who speaks on the network, unflinching and more than a little angry.]

Again, sir, you have my sympathies, that you are so desperate for this. But I do not put others' sanity at risk. And nor do I act merely because some man I bumped into on the street is barking orders at me.

I will investigate this further and examine whether it is safe to use. But I will not use it now.

Is that right.

[Anger is all right. Anger gives him a reason to respond in kind, to narrow his eyes and take a step forward. Edgeworth, his glasses glinting in the late afternoon sunlight, still sitting in the grass, with that level glare on his face--yeah, that's better. He can respond to that.]

And just how d'you plan to investigate further? And why, because you're not going to use it. That's what you said. Right? Don't lie and say you're going to investigate it. I don't like bein' lied to.

[Again, he crouches down--much closer to Edgeworth, now, within arm's reach. Again, he wonders if it's something that Edgeworth has to concentrate to do, or if it just happens. It wouldn't be difficult, overpowering him.]

When else are you going to find someone who'll let it happen? You don't want to surprise someone with it. I get it. But this is voluntary.

And I don't like being intimidated, Mr. Mitchell.

[Edgeworth squares his shoulders, sets his jaw. He knows perfectly well that that's what Mitchell's trying to do, moving closer like this, creeping in. Looming. It's strange, how easy it is to be intimidated by him - for all that he's greasy and long-haired, for all that he was perfectly amicable over the network, there's something unnerving about him. Something that goes deeper than appearance, deeper even than words or voice or mannerism...

But that hardly matters. Edgeworth is intimidating as well, after all. And he's a damn sight better at it than Mitchell is.]

Help me to my feet. I need to have my knee seen to. After that, I will speak to the government to see what else they can tell me about this ability. Afterwards, I will consider utilizing it on you, but only after I have drawn up detailed consent and liability waiver forms. And even then, if I deem it too dangerous, it will not even get to that stage. Is that understood?

[But he won't. One look at Edgeworth, sitting in the grass with that mulish expression on his face--spouting off about forms and dangers, all of it just words, words that mean, indirectly, that he won't. He won't do anything of the sort, he won't offer to help. Why would he, when he barely knows Mitchell?

But he ought to. If he has the means, he ought to, and it's so like someone in his position to deny aid when he can give it. Supply and demand, and Edgeworth has got this stranglehold on the supply--it's so like humanity, to think in those terms.

There's an unfairness to that conclusion. Edgeworth doesn't know, what Mitchell is really asking of him; he doesn't know the terrible weight that it would lift--and if he did, he still might deny his aid. And if he were in his right mind, Mitchell couldn't blame him for that. But he's miles away from his right mind at the moment--not as far as he could be, but still pretty far--and so he stares at Edgeworth with disgust, and takes a step back.]

You won't.

[A sneer tugs at his upper lip; he draws the back of his hand over his mouth, putting brief pressure there, a gesture of suppression.]

You won't. You know you won't, you know you're going to-- Christ, you have no idea, what you're-- [Even just once would be enough, just to feel it, for a second--that relief, that empty clean feeling--] You don't understand. I need this.

[Edgeworth looks up, then slowly begins the process of getting to his feet. It's a laborious exercise, difficult and painful, but in a way he's grateful for it: it keeps him from having to look Mitchell in the face as he speaks. It keeps him from having to see that...

That hunger. That need.]

The mere fact that you seem already so emotionally invested in it has me concerned. Does it not worry you? This sort of thing could very well, and very easily, alter your brain chemistry. It's dangerous without further testing.

[It's chatter, honestly - to fill the air, to keep Mitchell from speaking again. There's something about the way he said that - I need this - that makes Edgeworth feel...cold. Frightened. Guilty, more than anything else. And uncomfortable, as well - because that confession had been so raw, and so intimate, and Edgeworth has never been comfortable seeing that sort of intimacy.]

I'll contact you once testing has been done.

[And truly, he...might not. He might, but he very well might not. He mostly just wants to get out of range of this rawness, this misery, this hunger.]

It's not dangerous.

[There's an edge to that contradiction. And some part of him knows, he should back off, he should leave, now, or he risks being suspicious--no, he's gone beyond suspicious now, he's somewhere else, but he can't stop himself, he can't change the heavy look that he's got leveled on Edgeworth--he's frayed too thin for self-awareness, and his grip on self-control is so loose.

Could he force him? The answer is yes, probably. Or he could at least frighten him into compliance--but what if that changes the way that the feeling works? Buying forgiveness with something that will create more guilt, it can't work that way. Hungrily, he stares at Edgeworth, his fists tight at his sides, taut with want, with the urge to take what he wants, now--

With a shaky breath, he shoves the heel of one hand against his eye, as he takes a step back, and then another.]

It's not dangerous. It can't be dangerous. You didn't feel it-- and I'm not asking you, to understand, I'm asking you-- [Don't beg, don't beg for it, and his jaw tightens, but he forces the words out from between gritted teeth--]

I'm asking for your help.

[For help. Slowly he adjusts his stance to put his weight on his good leg. He doesn't look up as he does so, but there's a tension that grips him. Asking you for help, the man says, and that's not something that Edgeworth can hear without feeling a powerful, agonizing desire to help.

But he can't. He can't - He'll hurt Mitchell, of that he has no doubt. Even setting his pride aside, setting his anger aside and his simple stubborn unwillingness to bend, there's still that core issue. Edgeworth could hurt him. He could drive him mad. He could do irreparable damage to the man's mind. He can't, not without taking immense risk, not without...hurting him. And he's not willing to do that.

So he doesn't look up at Mitchell. He just glances miserably to the side, towards the door. And he says, quietly:]

I have to have this seen to.

[His knee, he means. He's too cowardly to address the more central, more pressing issue.]

[He's not going to help. He's as good as confirmed that, he's not going to help, and any bare little hope that he might dies there and then. And Mitchell is left knowing that he's got some form of relief within reach--something that can help ease the force of his guilt, make it all go away--

And what wouldn't he give for that. What wouldn't he do, to get it.

The quiet refusal unlocks something in him, for a moment, like there's a cold door somewhere that unlatches. Fuck him. Fuck him, and humanity, and all of it. No wonder Mitchell is the way he is, when there's people that can help but refuse. That's the whole fucking world, always against him.]

You're a bastard.

[The words grate out of him, pitched low, nearly a growl. He stares at Edgeworth, his shoulders raised, his fists clenched--]

You're a fucking bastard.

[He spits the last word, and it takes everything he has to not retaliate in some way, to not get what he wants. Christ, he wants it, he wants it so badly-- make him do it, the urge is tearing at him, but Mitchell sets his jaw and turns to go.]

[He cannot get out of there as quickly as he wants to. He wants to run away, into the house, and lock every door against this man. Not because he is afraid; he is not afraid of him, not remotely. No: because those words, that bastard, that low fury, over the fact that Edgeworth is denying this man some small peace -

Edgeworth doesn't know who Mitchell is. He doesn't know what he's done, that he needs such relief - he doesn't know if Mitchell even truly does need relief or whether Edgeworth has done some harm to him, altered his brain and his thoughts even just with that single use...

God, Edgeworth doesn't want to hurt him.

He can't run, though. Not on his bad knee. Instead, he just moves slowly up the walk, hobbling along, wincing in pain with every step. Feeling monstrous.]

(deleted comment)

just replace bees with logs

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

when happiness spells misery

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i've missed that icon

It has missed you as well

i miss YOU, harry

Good thing we'll be together in a week

8) 8) 8) 8) 8) 8) 8) 8) 8) 8) 8) 8)

WE WILL HAVE FUN by god or I will blame you

um why would we not have fun

I dunno, if it turns into a horror film?

well if it does I think you're our Dana Polk so you're probs safe

Well you're our Chris Hemsworth (obvs)

tosses gorgeous blonde hair

admires your muscly arms

just the one muscley arm actually but thnx

It's muscley enough for two

you're right guess it's time to join the circus

COME see the bizarrely asymmetrical girl

entranceofthegladiators.mp3

dramatic music ALSO OH MY GOD are we going to finish a log???

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