weaponwithoutpurpose

He blinks at the question, his eyes focusing, trying to settle on the form holding his closed fist. Everything is fuzzy around the edges, like trying to see the world through a film of television snow. It slowly dissipates, leaving the question unheard, but he can guess.

"I'm alright," he breathes out.

Wen Ning is relatively new and has yet to take a permanent position, but he's used to the barge enough to phrase the next question carefully and slowly in the same softly neutral tones. If you layer on too much soothing and make a patient feel condescended to, you can do more harm than good.

"Is your warden someone who'd be useful, or would you prefer somebody else?"

"It's Norton," he tells him. "He's- it's fine."

Norton feels safe enough, and he's coming back to himself, back to some semblance of normalcy.

"Just call him."

He's going to find out eventually, and Jacob would rather just collapse in one of his stupid chairs than wait for him.

The reassuring smile is as trained as the voice, though he isn't as good at it. He takes a step back, making a show of giving some space, though his eyes are still sharp in case of a resurgence of aggression.

His calm only cracks when he pages Norton, apparently a much greater trial than being repeatedly tenderized.

Jacob leans back against the wall, scrambling for a moment before he finds his water bottle in his pocket and takes a few deep drinks. That seems to calm him more than anything else.

He'll wait for Norton, though he doesn't look at Wen Ning for a moment.

"Not bad for a guy who lives in a cave," he mutters, staring at the ground.

Modesty wars with fear of being dismissive, but really, all dubious credit goes to his nature. No normal person could be expected to stand up to what he is. Any competent combatant would have no trouble with who he is. "A fierce corpse is a weapon," is what he decides on. It's what he's for, all frills aside.

"You and me both, brother," he remarks bitterly, running his tongue over his teeth and taking another drink.

"The kid get away?"

He doesn't actually remember.

"He's gone," Wen Ning confirms noncommittally. The infirmary is presumably staffed by people with the sense to prevent altercations. It's probably quite secure. But. He doesn't know how much bad feeling might underlie that fight. Maybe Abel will be forgotten, maybe this is a grudge being born.

He laughs and there's no happiness behind it. It's just a sound. A noise.

"I probably would have killed him," he remarks lightly.

"Looked like it," Wen Ning says, glad he's at least reached that conclusion. And at least on some level is glad it didn't happen, even if it's only a matter of barge inconvenience. "Killing people's very easy."

[Norton appears--quite literally appears, teleporting straight from his cabin--as soon as Wen Ning tells him there's been an altercation.]

What happened?

Wait--not here. [He steps forward to grab hold of Jacob's arm to teleport them both to Norton's cabin.]

[He doesn't have time to react. One moment, he's sitting against the wall, the next, Norton's simply appeared, asked a question that Jacob can't comprehend at the moment, grabbed his arm, and he's in Norton's cabin. He stumbles a moment, trying to jerk his arm away from him.]

Give a man some fucking warning!

[Norton lets him go, doesn't think he'd be able to successfully hold onto Jacob against his will for very long if he tried.]

Sorry. [He's not sorry, and doesn't sound very sorry.] Prefer to do this bit out of the public eye.

Wen Ning said there was a fight. Are you injured?

[Jacob just sits in what he has started to think of as "his" chair.]

No, I'm not. He didn't get a hit on me.

[Norton settles onto the settee, one leg crossed daintily over the other.]

So. Tell me what happened. [He says in an almost lilting voice.]

[He groans, but leans forward, trying to parse through the fragments of memories.]

We spoke at port. Tried to help him out. He went off about some holy war that he's fighting against. A hivemind that was claiming the rights to their ancestral home.

Told him that he might want to understand his enemy if he had any chance of fighting against them properly. He got mouthy and I left him alone.

He works at the gym. Insulted my fucking work [At least in his actions, not his words.] and I told him exactly what I thought about him.

He called me a zealot, told me to take a walk, so I punched him. And - then I kept punching him.

This is the second, no, third time someone's been mouthy and you've gone straight to escalated violence.

[It's not exactly surprising, considering the violence of Old Man Seed, the foster home, borstal, his time in the military. So many places where violence was simply the normal response to things.]

As someone who's usually the mouthy one in these sorts of scenarios, I can't say I approve.

[He shrugs because Norton's right. It is the third time. And Jacob goes straight to violence because that's the only language that he knows and it's the only way to react. As a child, his father used the belt to tell him that he was displeased with him. In foster care, Jacob did the same with an axe and a match. In juvie, he told the guards that he was unhappy, that he was angry at them, by throwing punches and being defiant. In the military, he used a gun. With Joseph, he was encouraged to be violent, to train others in that violence, to teach them to embrace it.

And the outcome has been favorable here. Arthur's since left him alone. Rawne's left him alone. Everyone's left him alone after he "tells them" that he doesn't want to be fucked with.]

What do you want me to say?

Any thoughts on preventing a fourth, fifth, and sixth time?

[He spreads out his hands.]

I don't think there is preventing one. Unless you, as the mouthy one, have an idea to keep people from saying the exactly wrong thing.

As the mouthy one, I think you might want to consider the possibility of not punching people when they're not a physical threat. You don't have to respond to everything that angers you with a heavy fist.

[Jacob links his fingers together, letting his hands dangle between his knees.]

Great talk, warden. I'll be a good boy next time.

We done here?

No, we're not. For one thing, I know you absolutely will not be a good boy next time.

This sort of thing is why John's scared of you. The bursts of uncontrolled violence. I don't expect you to turn into a pacifist or anything like that, and I don't expect a solution overnight, but we are going to address it.

[There's the briefest tension in his fingers at the mention of John, but he's exhausted, so it doesn't extend beyond that.]

Didn't think it would - get out of control. Sometimes it doesn't. Most of the time it doesn't.

So, tell me what happened. The details. What was it about what he said that caused the response it did.

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