victory_road | Open and Closed prompts

Entry tags:

Open and Closed prompts

Who: Hythlodaeus and YOU
When: July, on a Wednesday
Where: Around Goldenrod
Summary: Hythlodaeus is making friends and learning sign language :)
Rating: Mature. I don't trust Hythlodaeus' friends.

Painting Portraits

[His dear friend and house mate has tried to impart the value of a dollar on Hythlodaeus, and that they need way more of them. To his credit, he is trying now. Armed with several sheets of nice paper and a set of water colors, he's seated on the ground with a little sign advertising that he will paint a portrait of you and your pokemon.]

[There is no price listed, and while he's not painting a portrait, he will be doing little paintings of muscular, anthropomorphic horse men. They are very, very good]

Menacing the Radio Tower

[After his little lunch date, Hythlodaeus finds himself a little bit at a loss. He still has his art supplies, and he's still mad... So maybe he just needs to work off a little energy. If you're coming or going from the Radio tower, he will affix you with an intense stare for several seconds before looking down at his paper and drawing... a terrifyingly photo realistic portrait of you.]

Steven

[On the very worst Wednesday after a particularly terrible weekend, Hythlodaeus is at the right place at the right time, though not quite looking like himself. He seems to have left his mask and robe at home, instead wearing a simple short sleeve button down and a pair of khaki chinos.]

[He still stands out, a lot, since he's still eight feet tall with long white hair, but hey! At least everyone doesn't think he's a ghost now. He's just a werid guy standing there with a couple of cutieflies buzzing around him. He seems to be spacing the fuck out, staring at some far off point as he stands and waits.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I mean it does occur without negative emotion. I've had those intrusive thoughts without the negative emotion for years. On and off. Just-- you know. Idle thought of 'what would happen if I did such and such.' Mostly things like pushing people into traffic or off of buildings or whatever. I just-- push them aside?

[He sighs.]

The first time I ever thought of killing anyone was when my uncle was dying and I thought, maybe, he'd stop hurting if I pressed a pillow down on his face until he stopped breathing.

But, you know, I just-- keep those thoughts to myself. When they happen unexpectedly, for no good reason.

It's when I'm angry or afraid that it's-- harder. I guess. To not want to hurt someone, whether physically or emotionally.

[He bites his lip.]

Honestly, when it came to everything that made my first long-term relationship go sour... really, more of it came down to the fact that I was sure my boyfriend wouldn't like Real Steven, so I was just-- Nice Steven 24/7 for him. Until something happened that left us so disappointed and fucked up by it, I let my mask slip off completely and he quite rightly was angry and freaked out that the guy he'd been dating two years didn't-- exist. In the way he thought he did.

I do remember getting the urge to murder him about three distinct times during that whole terrible screaming fight, which ended up with me being kicked out of our--or rather his--apartment. But I didn't do anything.

I never did anything, nor had any outlets for this shit outside of sex, until--

[He's quiet for a moment before he says,]

There's something that you don't know--because Hades isn't telling you--that if I told you about it would make explaining all this shit so much easier. But if I did tell you, you couldn't let him know I told you.

Intrusive violent thoughts are a common experience, especially under duress, with or without low empathy or any other chemical issue. It can be important to make the distinction to not further alienate yourself from others.

Euthanasia, for instance... Well. It is all just there in the name. A good death. All things that live do eventually die, after all.

[Hythlodaeus tilts his head and blinks placidly at Steven.]

It sounds as if this is towards the heart of the issue. Very well, I won't tell him.

[Steven nods and lowers his voice anyway.]

Okay. So. Here's the thing.

Hades and I? We're both members of Team Rocket.

[He laughs, because it's all just so silly.]

Well! I had an inkling, but you two seemed so keen to deride the entire operation. So you're both criminals, by each of your accounts. This moves further from my understanding... I had a point to make about how you view death and killing and such, but I can hold onto it.

Where ever are you going with this?

I mean, I am going somewhere with this! It's just--

Okay. The thing is. As much as I've wanted to do all these things, I never. Well. Actually did anything. Except prey upon my charges for their energy every time El Pecador told me to and even then--

Even then, I didn't after we escaped. Even though I wanted to, so badly.

And then. Then I wake up here in Team Rocket's custody--because that's the thing, some of us don't wake up in the Fake Mom's house, some of us wake up in the Rocket dorms instead. And relatively soon after I joined up, D-- one of my colleagues is organizing a heist on the Pewter Museum and I end up rendering a security guard unconscious in the process and it's--

Fuck. It was good. When I got home and told Jack about what happen, he talked me through it and helped me with the whole-- liking it thing. He's really good to talk to about shit like this? He's-- understanding.

But since then I've just-- sort of been working through this. Through liking this shit. Through the medium of work. Because, you know, I've got a reason to do all this shit. That experiment with my friend and the incident with Hades and the stairs... I've only done this shit with a work excuse before. And--

[He sighs in frustration.]

Never mind. It turns out I don't know where I was going with this after all.

Then really, it simply sounds like you have not had enough practice. The shame is that you have, what was it, a maximum of a hundred and twenty years? And the goal is to enjoy yourself as long as you can while being beneficial to your community.

Admittedly, I do not understand much about crime itself, the rules and laws here are at times arbitrary. And to complicate matters, I’m not sure that all the people here are much more than complex simulations themselves. But we don’t need to get into whether or not a sufficiently complex algorithm is a person—

So, in order to... Steal valuable things, I suppose, you find force necessary. On one hand, this does run contrary to the general idea that you should only hurt people in an appropriate manner. On the other, someone is clearly controlling us and playing a game with us.

And this is quite fascinating as well... It seems that the forces at play have decided to pit us against each other, as much of our beginnings were involuntary.

[Hythlodaeus gives him a little grin. ]

It is just as well that you do not know where you meant to go with it all. We are all held in constraints that cannot be applied to our past experience and do not apply to the worlds with which we are familiar.

If we are to speak of this part of you, I feel that the rules of this universe will only obfuscate any truths. For instance, what would you have felt if your friend did not return after you killed her?

Terrible, [Steven replies instantly.] Angry at myself. Guilty as all fuck. She's like another sister to me. [He considers this.] But-- not in the same way it is with Charley, my actual sister. With L-- with her it's like I had a sister my own age? A peer, more or less.

[After a moment he adds,]

But that's because of who she is to me. I don't know if I'd have felt that way if she was like... well. Most people that I don't really actually care about.

Yet you enjoyed the process, the act itself. This, here, is the purpose of getting to the root of it. To find the balance between your appetites and the continued acceptance of your community. Here, the rules are shifted. There is a perversion of the laws of, well, everything honestly.

But it would be very detrimental to the socialization that you, your parents, and your community have striven to do. And that socialization was not for nothing. You do know this, of course...

[He moves his hand from his lap where it rests after their hug, placing it on Steven's back.]

You do not have your changeling community here, so comparing yourself to an older self is impossible. What do you envision for yourself here?

[Steven is quiet for a long moment.]

Making Beta. Alpha rank would be nice, but... beta's enough for them to let me on the air. Ah, that's the thing, [he says, looking up at Hythlodaeus.] Team Rocket more or less runs the Radio Tower. Not everyone who works there is a Rocket, but. There's enough of us in key positions? Anyway. If you want to get on the air as a radio announcer or a newscaster, you have to make Beta rank. So far, only two of us otherworld transfers have risen that high. One of us-- he just put in a shitton of time. The other one, he masterminded some big jobs for the team. That fossil heist that we all went on. Stealing an entire pod of Lapras--that we all went on again.

Maybe that's what I need to do for them to promote me. Lead us all on something big. There's a mine in Blackthorn where they dig up evolution stones...

[Then he shakes his head.]

I can plan my next move later.

But yeah. Making beta at the very least. Doing regular heists, because they're a good outlet for my need for violence and at least I'm doing something constructive with it? Even if it's working for the 'bad guys'--but honestly, Hythlo, the bad guys here do a fucklot more for their employees than most "lawful" companies back home do for theirs, at least when it comes to entry level positions.

And, well, I like being a part of a group, a community. The freehold after we escaped. The local gay and gaming communities before I was taken. Team Rocket... it does that for me. It's nice. I don't really care much about the people in it who aren't taken from other worlds like us... but I do care about having that community to fall back on.

And like I said, I want to be on the radio, not just in the newsroom. I was on television back home, you know? Before everything. I was good at it. At being a newscaster and a journalist. I want to do the same thing here. I'm putting together a podcast, but it's not the same exactly? There's a difference between indie productions you do practically on your own and broadcast media with an entire team of people behind you.

I want to be married to Jack. And that one-- that's the easiest to make happen. I'm pretty sure he'd leap on the chance to have a big fancy wedding as soon as I asked. Would like to announce to everyone that I belong to him. It's me that's holding back. I'm just-- not quite ready for the whole big thing? But I will be eventually.

And-- god, if we're aiming for the sky, I want to have some kind of relationship with Angel. I-- probably won't get that one. But I want it.

I just want... respect, I guess. My city to know who I am and to see me as trustworthy. Rank on the team--as high as Hades, preferably higher. I'd love to comfortably outrank him. Regular opportunities to use violence constructively. A chance to have a successful career more or less in my field, so I can feel more of an equal to Jack. God, but I want to feel like I'm closer to his level, even if I'll never be as great of a man as him.

[He gives Hythlodaeus a thoughtful look and the idea that he's sort of had in the back of his head for a while suddenly crystallizes into being.]

And. I guess I've got one short term goal just now. And you can help me with it.

Edited 2020-07-18 04:33 (UTC)

[ Hythlodaeus listens patiently as he hashes it all out for him. "And you can help me with it" are the sort of words that he himself uses. This isn't quite what he meant by healthy outlets for violence, but it was all a process, wasn't it? He could pick at it all later. ]

[ This was going well, at least. ]

Well, I do always try to help whenever I can.

[A lie. But.]

I would hear it, then.

[Steven gives him a knowing look.]

You mean whenever you'll get something out of it later, right?

Okay. So. Here's what I'm thinking: you should join Team Rocket.

I know, I know. Technically we're the bad guys. But it's like you said yourself, whoever's behind the space llama is just-- constructing sides, pitting two groups against each other. If you join the team, you'll be on the same side as Hades again.

And you can mostly avoid stealing Pokemon too. There's a quota, sure, but they don't actually check how you got them. Most of us just turn in ones that we catch in the field.

But seriously, Hythlo, they'll give you your own lab, so you won't piss off Hades by cooking in this one. And they'll handle the business side of your drug empire, so you don't have to bother with that tedious shit. They'll give you a stipend, so you won't have to rely on Hades for your money. You can get room and board from them, in case you need to a night or two to yourself.

And also? Hades will fucking hate it and I know you love him and all, but from what I can tell? He's your outlet. Isn't he? For the sadism and need for control and all that shit. This would be one way to annoy the fuck out of him and if he protests, you can just tell him that you're not doing anything he isn't doing.

Besides [and here he gives Hythlodaeus another knowing look], right now he really deserves you doing something to make him unhappy and uncomfortable. Not for anything he's done to me, but for what he's doing with you and Dirk.

Even if you're not fucking anymore, he's still-- well. He's still treating you like you're still in that relationship, even as he's doing his thing with Dirk. That's not fair to either one of you. Dirk deserves a boyfriend who doesn't have a secret sidepiece, even from just an emotional standpoint--and you deserve a man who isn't taking you for granted. Who isn't treating you as a sidepiece. Who isn't taking it as a given that you're all too happy to wait until Dirk dies to slip back into your old relationship.

At least, [he adds after a moment,] I assume Dirk doesn't know how Hades still acts around you. He, uh, seems like he'd be a lot more publicly passive-aggressive at Hades if he did.

You will find me to be a reasonable man.

[He gives Steven a pat to the back before he stands up. He erases the drawings from their earlier argument. He draws perfectly straight lines to form a two columned chart with two symbols at the top.]

Let us examine this properly. You have delivered several good reasons to join...

[He jots down "laboratory space" and "annoys Hades" under the positive side. "Catching pokemon" goes on the negative side. He turns back to Steven.]

To be clear, however, I love having a reason to speak to Hades. I do hate money, even if I recognize the necessity of it here. But... There are surely more negative aspects than you have yet outlined.

[He doesn't mention how Hades acts around him. He doesn't need to hand Steven ammo on this.]

Edited 2020-07-18 06:46 (UTC)

[Steven grins when he sees that 'annoy Hades' is in the pro column, before standing up to take the chalk from Hythlodaeus.]

You're right. There are a few more.

[He writes down 'Mandatory missions' in the negative column.]

Occasionally the admins send out an order we can't refuse. They haven't really done this to us since I joined [the instructions to 'make an example' out of Kurt during the revenge attack didn't count, because the rest of the mission had been Steven's thing] but I'm told it happens.

The quota's already under 'catching pokemon,' although I should mention that if you've got a full time position with them--and I think we could present your labwork as that to the admins--you don't have to submit pokemon for your quota.

And-- hm.

[After a moment he adds three more things to the negative side: 'easier to join than to leave' and 'incompetent native Rockets' and 'stupid uniforms.'

But then he goes over to the positive side and jots down a few more things: 'opportunity to make new friends (and annoy them)' and 'actually finding out what Hades does all day' and 'Hades can't hide by going to the Rocket Dorms/secret base' and 'Steven getting credit for bringing in a new recruit.']

You know, [he says turning back to Hythlodaeus with a wicked look in his eye,] it would definitely send Hades the message that no matter where he goes, you'll always be able to find him.

[He has to genuinely laugh at those additions to the positive side. He had him there, being able to follow Hades wherever he went was an extremely tempting thing.]

Uniforms do not particularly bother me. I have no real attachment to the physical in that way. [He erases it with a casualness]

You mentioned attaining rank in Team Rocket... What rank are you, and where did you start?

I'm a Private. You start as a Grunt, then it goes Private, Beta, Alpha, Admin, and the Boss, who's some asshole named Giovanni that I've never met. Alpha's as high as any of us people from other worlds can rise. Right now among our group we've got one Alpha and one Beta and [he pauses for a moment to mentally tally them] five Privates including me. Hades is still a Grunt. But the best jobs go to Betas and higher and I'm sure Hades is also trying to make Private as soon as he can, so I definitely want to rank up, even if getting on the air wasn't contingent on making Beta--which, as I mentioned, it still is.

Oh hey, I thought of more positives!

[He writes down 'find out who the other Team Rocket members are (satisfying curiosity)' and 'Steven will keep from retaliating for Rotom bullshit in return,' before favoring Hythlodaeus with an earnest expression.]

Don't get me wrong. I'm still pissed as hell about the sabotage. But the thing is-- if I can do this, if I can give you the opportunity to annoy the fuck out of Hades constantly and take away his one refuge from you... well. That's a much better revenge than anything else I can do to him.

Edited 2020-07-18 09:09 (UTC)

[ Hythlodaeus laughs aloud in mild surprise before taking the eraser to the last thing he writes. ]

Oh come now, Steven. You weren’t going to retaliate. We’re friends now! Besides... Hades is mine to annoy. But you have the right of it.

Even in Amaurot, even as the highest ranking member of the Bureau of the Architect, I could not stroll into the Capitol without reason. Well, I could, but not every room. And if there is no one who can hinder his work more effectively than myself when I desire it.

[ He taps the eraser next to one of the earlier items on the list. ]

I must ask, what does happen to someone who tries to leave?

They inform the Jennies that you're a member of Team Rocket and then you have to hide from the pokemon police. Or so I've been told.

[There's also the matter of the microchipped pokemon, but he doesn't know about that.]

Also, I'm friends with you, but that doesn't mean Hades isn't a complete and utter tool.

But hmm.

[He adds another thing to the pro side: 'friends on the team already!']

Edited 2020-07-18 09:18 (UTC)

Ah, that does seem like quite the yoke.

[ He laughs again, then looks down at Steven with a smile. ]

Yet if you threaten Hades again, I’ll make you invite me over for dinner with your husband. And I am a picky eater.

[ He looks at the board and grins. ]

Ah yes, that’s right. Dirk is among your number. We’re penpals after a fashion.

Well, if you're handling Hades for me, I won't need to, will I?

[But he's coloring a little at the reference to Jack as his husband. They're not married yet, of course, but in his secret heart of hearts they are. Why else would he call Angel his 'stepdaughter' earlier in the conversation?]

But yeah. Me, Hades, Dirk... see, all the people you like are on the Team. Don't you want to be a part of something with the people you like?

It sounds to me like you’re offering to figure out how to make pita bread and tofu.

[ He laughs, walking over to the oven to preheat it. He makes a thoughtful little sound before turning back around.]

I’d wager that anyone with a strong opinion about Hades is on the team. His coworkers usually do.

Jack would, actually. He's the cook in the family.

But... well, not everyone with a strong opinion. Enough of them, though.

Is that so? What would you be eating without him?

[ Hythlodaeus chuckles. ] So... Lydia and Tyler with any likelihood, hmm... Connie perhaps... she knew about the incident on the stairs.

[ He watches Steven’s face for any sort of reaction. ]

Estinien is a distinct possibility as well.

[He schools his reactions to polite blankness.]

You'll have to join and see.

And honestly, I'd be eating a lot of take out.

How sweet, to have a man who loves you to cook for you... Well! In any case, I’d love to meet him.

[ He leans in with a smile as Steven refuses to react. ]

I suppose so. [ He walks over to the persim berries as he finally begins his work. ]

Hades can get like that, too... he knows how to cook he just doesn’t. But... you seem like you would if you could. Plying others with baked goods is a time-honored tactic.

My mother and grandmother never taught me, just my little sister. I suppose because she was a girl and I wasn't.

I should learn how to, maybe. Why, are you offering to teach me?

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject