that escalated quickly

[myironeyes]

[Public, video]

[Marsh, the barge's resident friendly constantly dour eyeless spike-horror, is currently lounging on Iris's most garish couch, the first time the vast majority of barge residents have seen him without his Nazgul-style engulfing black cloak, which is tossed over one of the arms of the couch. Underneath he's wearing vaguely 19th-century style workman's trousers and and loose shirt, both in a drab, unpurposeful sort of dark grey. Bumps - and a few poked holes - in the shirt reveal a topography of even more spikes, over a dozen of them, impaling his chest and abdomen in odd configurations. Nevertheless, he seems both drunk - an unlabeled bottle of dark green glass hanging from between his second and third fingertips - and entirely cheerful, laughing in a low rumble even as he's in the middle of protesting.]

- said I can doesn't mean - Iris, put that down -

We're celebrating, you plonker. 'E deserves the recognition. If you don't tell them I will!

-aaaugh, fine, woman.

[He throws his head back against the couch in defeat. There is a small ripping sound from the spike-tips at the back of his skull taking their toll on the upholstery, but he'll mend it later. He's not looking right at the camera - but he's beaming.]

C'Rizz graduated.

[That's all. Marsh isn't really a speech guy. But some people may connect this with the abundance of pie at dinner, the last few days.]


[Spam for C'Rizz, backdated to a little after the thread with Roderick.]

[Marsh's heart stops when he sees C'Rizz vanished from his item. Truly stops, falters in its constant aching rhythm, still beating around the spike perforating his ventricle. Not dead, gone. He tears up the stairs to C'Rizz's room, a shadowy blur, gasps and sags against a wall when he sees the door still there. So. So -]


[Spam for Iris]

[A knock, after dinner.]

Iris, it's me. I want to tell you something.

[He sounds happy.]

Comments

[godsays]

What are you doing...

[myironeyes]

I am celebrating.

[A shadow, briefly.]

I never got to at home, you know. It always cost so much when we won.

[godsays]

Not like here. Times like this are happy.

[myironeyes]

Yes.

So.

[godsays]

You're happy, Marsh.

[myironeyes]

I can be happy.

[godsays]

I know. I knew. But I'd never seen it.

[myironeyes]

It was never this simple.

[Not without a flood, or someone else's mind spilling into his, and rarely even then. He was mostly solemn even as a child, cautious by nature even before it was all undergirded with pain. Even his reunions with Kelsier were each tangled with blame and shock and cavernous miscommunications.

But he is, right now.]

[godsays]

You deserve this.

Think what Sazed would say.

[myironeyes]

[Marsh's expression goes a bit prim and sour, not in earnest, but as though he's trying really hard to look sour, and the delight is leaking from the corners of his eyes anyway, about to burst out again.]

Sazed would say nothing, because he is much too self-effacing for I told you so.

[godsays]

But you would feel how happy he was.

[myironeyes]

And studiously ignore it.

[Primly. Yes, he is laughing at himself.]

[godsays]

Of course you would.

[myironeyes]

If he wants me to respond to something, he can say it like a person.

[Not just radiate it, like a God. Marsh has his lines.]

We're probably going to have a very long time for him to work up to it.

[godsays]

Are you going to go? Now that C'rizz has graduated.

[myironeyes]

Not right away. He's staying for a bit, just to get his feet under him, and I have to find someone to take over the kitchen -

[There are always plenty of warden volunteers, but it has to be someone who meets his particular standards, who will look after the people on his shift right, and -]

- and. Just make sure it's okay first.

[There's never going to be a time when everyone is fine. But not yet.]

[godsays]

I'm going to miss you.

[ Kelsier and Vin and Marsh now too. ]

[myironeyes]

I'm going to miss you too.

You'll always have a place there, you know.

[godsays]

Where?

[myironeyes]

Wherever on Scadrial needs meddling, I suppose.

[godsays]

But you're from its future, aren't you?

[myironeyes]

Yes.

But you know how Sazed is. Someone has to fuss.