myironeyes | the first pedestrian of the apocalypse

[Marsh hasn't made a public announcement in a long time. Not since before the last convergence with the mirror barge, in fact. He frequently keeps to himself outside of his work shifts in the kitchen, his inmate, and a dwindling circle of friends, so for many newcomers this may be the first good look they've had of him: a stocky, tired man in his late thirties or early forties, wearing a hooded black cloak nazgul-style and thin, spiky red-and-black tattoos around his eyes - or, rather, where his eyes should be. Instead he has two blunt steel spikes that have been pounded into his sockets.]

There are few differences between myself and my counterpart. It does not matter which of us I am, or where.

I am strong, and fast, and difficult to kill. If you need help, call and I will help you.

[There's a pause, and for a moment it seems like that's all he has to say. But not quite. The Dalek had prevented him from being psychically puppeted last time, but that isn't a guarantee that it won't happen in the future.]

Unless you see me smiling. In that case, run.

[Okay, now he's done.]

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[She's learned, in the process of that wearing, where he can be most easily touched, which places on his flesh hurt less than others and which nerves and pressure points will - not alleviate his pain, it's too large and pervasive for that. But there are counterpressures and places where a careful hand can help, and Iris is very careful with him indeed.]

I never thought I'd be glad about a Dalek. Nor I'm not, not really. It's very 'ard on C'rizz. Does 'e know 'ow much 'e helps you?

[He shivers, just a little. Six years as a monster and more as a hermit before that have left him touch-starved in ways he's barely aware of, struggles to process anything other than the pain, the way a starving child will throw up rich food. But he doesn't push her away.]

I think it's C'Rizz we're both glad of, underneath.

I've said, a little. But it's the sort of thing that's distressing to be thanked for.

[It's that starvation that draws her: need always acts on Iris like a gaping mouth to a mother bird, visceral, unconscious.

She doesn't think of it as selfless. It feeds her as much as anyone else.]

Aye, it would be. Poor lad. I've not tried to get close to 'im, much. I think I make 'im nervous. But I see 'im around, I see 'ow 'e touches other people. 'E makes them better, every time.

He really does, doesn't he?

[He even touches her back, a little, a few fingers through her hair. It's possible that he has subconsciously picked up preening from aster.]

We're lucky to 'ave 'im.

[She loves to be preened, loves it enough that there's perceptible pleasure bubbling through her, quiet and joyous and warm.]

'As 'e told you much about the Doctor?

Bits and pieces.

Very fond of making speeches, apparently. And there's some in the file.

The Doctor's ...similar to me. We've known each other forever - since we were both very young.

[She doesn't know quite what it is she wants to tell Marsh about the Doctor - about the complicated, painful, joyful and in the end, simpler than it looks relationship between them. About their parallels or about their unbridgeable differences. In the end she just carefully snuggles closer and sighs.]

Not surprised 'e took a liking to C'rizz, either.

You always reminded me of Kelsier, you know. From the first day. The ridiculous and splendid bits, without as much of the arrogance and secret schemes.

The doctor seems a bit more...that.

[Glorious, but also fucking insufferable sometimes.]

[She has to laugh a little at that, for two entirely distinct reasons.]

Arrogance and secret schemes are practically the definition of our species. It's written into our blood and bones. You know, I 'ardly spoke to Kelsier when 'e was 'ere - not 'cause we didn't like each other, or anything. We just - we'd catch each other's eye and no one needed to say owt.

The Doctor's a rebel and a renegade 'cause 'e grew up in one of the ancient, great houses of Gallifrey. A nobleman to the bone. And 'e 'ad the courage and imagination to turn 'is back on that, for which I 'ave to respect 'im.

Me, though? I'm no one. No parents, no 'ouse, no forebears, no 'istory. I blagged me way in 'cause it was there and I'm a renegade 'cause when I got there I decided it were rubbish.

That's a difference between us I don't think the Doctor'll ever quite understand.

[And she turns her head to press her lips against the unspiked part of Marsh's chest, between shoulder and collarbone, because she knows that he will understand that difference and everything it implies perfectly.]

Without as much, I said, not none.

[He's got his dry little grin on, teasing, even through the lightning flash afterimage of old grief. Iris never martyred herself behind his back. She schemes, but she tells the people who need to know, mostly, or she has in his experience.]

No, likely not.

[There's no resentment or derision there - for all his rebellions, he was never the zealot in quite the same way Kel was. But he understands the gap, the unbreachable feeling of the chasm, however wide - or in his case, narrow.]

Kel never - even for years before he knew he was mistborn. He was never in the fields or the mills. He never - worried, like I worried, he was never surprised every day we were still alive. We never had much, once we were on our own, but he never had nothing, either. I made sure.

That - confidence. Not bravery but actual fearlessness, because he didn't think anyone could touch him. Some of it was just him, of course.

[But some of it Marsh did. That's - the best thing he's ever done. And Kelsier died and Marsh lived, because the universe has a terrible sense of humor.]

I never understood him. Not that part.

Edited 2014-09-24 15:43 (UTC)

[She reaches up, then, and kisses his cheek, tender and lightly. Iris has martyred herself at least once, but she had no one with her when it happened.

Although, she recalls, the Doctor - C'rizz's particular incarnation of him, too - did help her with the aftermath, graceless as he was about it.]

The other day I 'ad one of the new wardens 'ave a go at me for telling jokes when we've got the mirror barge coming up. I acted like it didn't bother me, 'e told me, and 'e were so offended by that.

[She chuckles at the memory, soft and low; and at close quarters it's clear the whole exchange has pleased her profoundly.]

I told 'im it'd 'appen whether I worried about it or not, and I'd sooner save me energy for making weapons. It's not 'cause we think things can't touch us, you know. It's 'cause there's just no point.

...just like there's no point asking you not to, my love, you grow it like Aster grows feathers.

[A faint coil of tension at the kiss, awkward-uncertain at the degree of tenderness, but it doesn't ripple from his damaged mind to his damaged body; and his voice when he responds is dry, fussy and fond and intransigent.]

I maintain he was younger and stupider than you.

Before the pits -

[He really was fearless; careless. He was never not defiant, but it was flippancy before conviction.]

He changed. Not enough to stop laughing, never that, you're right. But changed.

[He grew up, much though Marsh struggled to believe it at first.]

the first pedestrian of the apocalypse

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