tampered | (open)

[ Hei's never liked parties, with their particular synthesis of noise and boredom. While Pavel accepts his gift, he glances around the area -- a 180 degree visual sweep. Drunken singing and laughter, dancing shapes and merry conversation. Nothing suspicious. After a beat, he settles an arm's length away from Pavel, cross-legged and neutral-faced, with such a non-air about him that it's not about looking casual, more like absence. He doesn't feel like part of this crowd -- so festive and frivolous -- and as seamlessly as 'Li' blends into the surroundings, still he never goes out of his way to talk to many people. (How can he, when it's these moments when he feels so much more like BK201 than he does like 'Li' or Hei, and the last thing he wants is company. It's not always easy to slip normalcy on like a puddle of clothes left on the floor, but just because it's hard doesn't mean evading everything and everyone does him any favors. ]

[ If he wants Pai to start making connections -- however tenuous or temporary -- Hei needs to start making an effort himself. ]

[ At Pavel's question, he tips a shoulder, not indifferent so much as mildly, expressionlessly amused. ] For your sake, I hope not. [ There are some dreams so wretched it's safer to dismiss them as impossible. The alternative guarantees madness. ]

[Every so often, Pavel doesn't feel like a part of this crowd himself. Usually only when he drinks too much or dwells on certain topics, which is why he tries to drink and dwell as seldom as possible. The universe is a vast and indifferent place, and intelligent lifeforms live such limited and tenuous existences within it. It's difficult to bounce around and enjoy life when doing so involves ignoring the individual's rightful place in the universe. But those feeling pass, or are pushed so far away that they only visit under certain circumstances.]

I will hope not, too. I have heard of these things--dreamcatchers. The ones at home only work for children who believe that do.

[ Hei isn't much concerned with the universe or his rightful place in it, in the implacable spiraling of darkness and despair. The gap between human beings and their footholds in existence is a nice enough murk in which to drown yourself. So many have drowned themselves in it before. But what Hei's interested in more is the gap between people and people, and none of the above. Those engulfing silences between people. They're just specks, but they believe they're so close because they're in the same place, as if a string of concurrent words or a transmission of heat or bodily fluids are the beginning and the end. They don't even know themselves. They're question-marks suspended in cavernous bodies, if that. Living is a succession of endings, occupying space. ]

[ No. Scratch that. Most aren't even occupying fucking space. They're walking gaps. ]

[ He wouldn't say that to Pavel, though. Misanthropic contemplation has its place. This isn't one of those moments. ]

It's the same concept in my world. [ A beat, then two, before he amends, quieter, ] Contractors don't dream. [ Hei does. But then, he's not what you'd call the conventional Contractor. ] They were exchanged mostly for symbolism, with my old teammates.

[Hei's mind works in terrifying ways and goes places that no people who aren't sociopaths should attempt to follow him to.]

To catch the nightmares that Contractors do not have? [He's not teasing.} That's a good thought. Maybe we should exchange these in Starfleet, also, for the nightmares that we also never have.

[Not to imply that he doesn't believe Hei. From what Pavel knows about Contractors, he can't imagine how they would dream. Dreaming seems as if it would require more creativity and fancifulness and carefully buried fears and feelings than a Contractor possesses. They aren't like the people he worked with at home. They might say that they don't have nightmares--who wants to admit to being haunted by failures and deaths?--but they only act as if they believe each other out of politeness.]

Thank you. [He may have done so inadvertently, but Hei as good as called Pavel a teammate. This isn't necessarily a good thing. Regardless, Pavel is touched and inebriated enough to reach over to squeeze Hei's arm in the sort of casual, friendly gesture that marks his relationships with almost everyone who isn't Hei.]

[ In most ways, Hei's train of thought is inevitable. During Heaven's War, he'd seen the worst humanity had to offer in terms of selfishness, violence, and indifference. Logically, you'd expect exposure to that kind of behavior to result in more of the same. (The fact that it hasn't -- that Hei hasn't been entirely swallowed up by it -- says volumes. There's a core to him that the grime of his daily life hasn't yet seeped into.) ]

[ He doesn't respond to the faint note of skepticism in Pavel's words. Nor does he reveal that his teammates in South America never kept the dreamcatchers intact. Instead they'd carried fragments of them, like talismans. The implication, when you stopped to consider the cadre Hei belonged to, was fitting. The best of the best; the most ruthless. Walking nightmares. Something about the atmosphere here, maybe the sight of the dreamcatcher, or the smoky air, brings it back for Hei. What it was like to be a teenager, no older than Pavel, with deadly skills and a license to use them, miles from home and making it up as he went along, knowing no one had been so near the Gate before his team, like astronauts on the moon but better, juiced with hormones and adrenaline, excitement and fear, an adolescent's keen mind and a predator's deadly instincts. ]

[ They'd known they were special, anointed for their role, baptized by bloodshed and experience, their childhoods as useless to them as empty snakeskins. What they didn't know -- not he, or Amber, or Carmine, or even Pai -- was what they'd be forced to forfeit afterward. ]

[ Pavel's friendly gesture gets a raised eyebrow. But Hei doesn't shrug him off. Physicality is a calculated thing for him. Still, there's no harm in spontaneous contact -- provided it's in small doses. Tipping his shoulder with a faint smile, he says, ] I hope you live to get old, but not bitter. [ Not the same as Many happy returns or May you live to be a hundred. But it's sincere. ]

[There are still times when Pavel wishes that he could look inside of Hei's head--know what he has known, experience what he has experienced. The dark, murderous edge that lurks below the surface of Hei's public persona is intriguing, and Pavel occasionally wants to run a finger along that edge and know what it is to bleed on a self-made weapon.

But he enjoys his idealism and hope in faith in others, even if none of it is justified. He likes retaining his Starfleet identity and imagining that, as an officer, he will be able to put what talents he has to use. Pavel knows that the world is not perfect, but he holds on to a hope for better things to come. There will be things to forfeit, of course--life has already been full of sacrifices--but nothing comparable to what Contractors forfeit. The most that he can lose is his life.]

Thank you. [A smile ghosts across Pavel's features in response to Hei's wish.] I hope that you will live to a day without bitterness.

[ If Hei could read minds, he'd tell Pavel that his past, the shadow-world he belongs to, isn't a doorway worth entering. Intelligent, educated people usually get to choose the world they immerse themselves in. But Pavel, whatever morally defensible motivations he claims to have for treading into Hei's mind, is innocent of the realities. He's idealistic, and Hei can't blame him for that, because that's how he was brought up -- how he is. But fuck all if he's going to let the young man get sucked into a dimension that robs you of your freedom to say No forever. Hei's whole ethos revolves around allowing people to make their own choices, to point out the direction of their own lives. A confusing message, if your purview is deception. But that's not what it's about. Hei's seen the other side of the coin -- the coercion and blackmail of the Syndicate. If he can help it, he'll keep anyone else from sinking into it too. ]

[ His lips twitch at Pavel's words, wry rather than rueful. Hei knows better than to expect a day without bitterness. You can't put psychic fragments back together. Can't fix things because that's not how they work. Functionality is good enough. Refusing to be erased, trampled, defeated? Even better. ]

Or live. Back home, that's just as good.

[Hei is kinder than he might give himself credit for, even if "kindness" may not be the most apt descriptor. On some level, Chekov is conscious of this.

And yet he finds it said that Hei is so resigned to being as he is. Anything, no matter how many pieces it has been crushed into, can be reassembled into a rough similarity of the original; those who have suffered can be shown that not all of life is suffering, those who have learned never to trust can, in time, trust again. The human psyche is strong. There are no good emotions and qualities that cannot take root in a soul, no matter how damaged it is. (Or so Pavel thinks.)]

Then I will hope that you will live, and that I will live it be old without bitterness. [He traces he glowing edges of the dreamcatcher again, enthralled.] Or, failing that, young and still not bitter.

[He pauses briefly--not long enough to invite further conversation, but long enough to drag up a thought that he has been meaning to get out for some time. Excessive drinking is good at that--bring up thoughts that would otherwise stay hidden.] Do you think that it is possible for you do be a good person?

[ (Kindness has no use in Hei's life. Trust, tangibility, weapons -- those are more important.) ]

[ Yes, human beings have an infinite capacity for resilience. Hei has met his share of people who've surprised him. Worthwhile people. But it's not enough to reverse his whole view of human nature. His glance flicks to Pavel at the question, and he raises an eyebrow in that dry way Hei has, a mild sense of amusement. He's long since left behind the narrow moral guidelines of Good and Bad. Certainly it's not his way to spend time pondering the weltschmerz of morality and the human condition. You don't work for the Syndicate as a renowned killer and expect to survive with clean hands, and making up for the deaths you've caused by shedding more blood is impossible. Back home, factions of the organization are still chasing Hei. He has to eliminate them to survive. Even then, Hei's been carrying out wetwork for so long, and from such a young age, that sometimes he wonders if a weapon is all he can ever be. Because there's only one thing a weapon is good for, and because he's damn good at it. ]

[ So: No. He doesn't think he can be a 'good' person. He has a desire, in the midst of a horrible business full of deceit and killing and regret, not to be responsible for additional deaths. To expiate the crimes of righteous butchery by saving a handful of lives. But that's not about altruism. That's about choice; about the calculated decision not to reduce himself to one static thing -- a monster, a parasite, a predator. It has nothing to do with goodness or redemption. ]

[ Hei doesn't say that to Pavel. Instead he claps a hand on the young man's back -- both chiding and indulgent. Rises, and dusts the sand from his clothes. ]

You shouldn't drink so much, Pavel. Turns people into philosophical idiots. No one needs that at a party.

[ Harsh, but there's no rancor in Hei's half-smile. This is a conversation for another time. ]

[(Even things that don't have a practical use can develop. That includes kindness.)

But Pavel forgot that trying to talk about good and evil with Hei is fruitless rather than philosophically intriguing. There's no changing his mind or convincing him that, in the City, he has an opportunity to be a decent person--that everyone has the capacity to be decent. Hei's view of morality is far more complicated than Pavel's and, although the Russian doesn't believe in the stark contrast between good and evil that he did when he first arrived in the City, they can't see eye-to-eye. Pavel's worldview has no room for cynicism.

He almost goes sprawling--see, this is exactly why Pavel never has more than a drink or two--but rights himself and replies cheerfully.] It is a wonder I am ever invited to parties.

[ Kindness and decency may have their perks. But Hei will never, ever lie and say that they're more important than anything else. Kindness is for people who don't recognize the dozen different nuances of sound for each crack of bone; decency is for people who want a family and children and to live and do good until they get old. Hei may want satisfaction, if not happiness, but his satisfaction isn't that. At the end of the day, well -- nobody wants to be alone. Isn't that all anyone is looking for? It's enough that he can form ties with people, however rare or brief or tenuous. Enough that he can have roadmarks, if not anchors, to humanity, in the shape of those he meets. ]

[ For someone who subsists on illusions and emptiness, on a labyrinth of smoke and mirrors, it's enough. It's progress, even. ]

You can't get kicked out of your own party, [ he says, lightly brushing the grains of sand away from his clothes. ] Still, it's better not to push your luck. [ A joke, a warning, and advice, in his own way. ]

[All progress is good progress, and Pavel feels that progress is constantly being made with Hei. Now that the incident with the furniture on the ceiling is distant enough to make Hei's behavior that night a hazy recollection instead of a stark and immediate memory, Pavel is almost at ease with Hei. He likes him, in spite of his better judgment. He admires his intelligence and oddness and alien view of humanity and his brusque (but not cruel--not lately) attitude.

It's this admiration that spurs Pavel on to discard his cup and soldier on through this vodka-soaked melancholy without too much philosophical idiocy.]

I am not so stupid that I let myself become an idiot around anyone.

[ In Hei's history, he's liked a handful of people too. But he's felt absolutely no compunction in ruining or eliminating them, if that's what his survival required. That's how he operates, with a mutable dosage of harshness and sweetness -- whatever penetrates his victims softest corners, aims at the exact spot to get the arterial geyser of funds or emotions or info spurting. Whatever keeps him alive. He's a creature of expedience, his behavior tailored to the situation, and to the individuals in his periphery -- colors shifting and personas dappling like a chameleon's. He might be wearing a mask right now. He might not be. ]

[ The point is that Hei's spent a long time switching faces and identities. There's a deep wariness at the idea of being himself. Of letting that self -- so frayed and shriveled -- form real attachments with real people. He'd tell himself, There's a first time for everything. But BK201 doesn't function on the basis of cliches. (Still, once upon a time, he'd never imagined he'd function with teammates, either.) ]

[ He quirks an eyebrow when Pavel discards the cup. ] I'll take that as a compliment, then. [ One more thing Hei doesn't believe in -- Compliments. But his tone is dry rather than barbed. Why shouldn't it be, really? This is a party; not a stakeout. No reason for Hei's seeming amiability to invert into knives and venom. ]

[ (Nothing, at the end of the day, is without a purpose.) ]

[Pavel is in no condition to try to puzzle Hei out. It's an impossible task sober, attempting to determine how much of Hei is genuine at any given moment or if there's a shadow of truth to what he says or, indeed, if there's anything genuine and true about the assassin outside of Pavel's hopes. As such, he stops trying.]

It was intended to be complimentary, but I must always be an idiot to you, correct? Reaffirming what you know to be true takes no trust on my part. [Oops, he's still being a bit philosophical. He's Russian, he can't help it.]

[ Perhaps it's better to stop. Deadlier and smarter men have hit roadblocks trying to puzzle BK201 out -- or to find patterns in his rational and irrational decisions. The wisest conclusion they've come to is to leave him the hell alone. Some people aren't worth kinking up your brain trying to figure out. (Even so, sometimes the the sincerity Hei notices in Pavel, in Korra, is like a foreign language. Maybe if he listens long enough, he'll begin to mimic it. Maybe one day, he'll even mean it the way they do. Who knows?) ]

[ His mouth takes an imperceptibly wry turn at Pavel's comment. ] You're doing that thing again. [ That drunken philosophizing by the campfire thing. ]

Which thing? [Pavel studies Hei's face for a moment, as if that will help him remember what it was they were talking about.] Ah, yes--pushing my luck.

[He nods and returns his focus to the bonfire. When he speaks again, his tone is far too meditative and serious for his words.] Thank you for coming to this. Maybe there is a reason--tactical reason--for this... but you are here, and I'm appreciative.

[ Hei's built to react to the most volatile situations. To hear words like What's to stop me from killing you now? and to disarm his enemy with a smile or a word. To calculate how to avoid getting nicked by a whizzing bullet in a six-to-one firing squad, with a split-second's glance. To walk into a room, sharp gaze bouncing from head to head, and zero in on the person who'll be the easiest mark -- just by skimming over their body-language and expressions. ]

[ But he has no idea what to do here. Feels unprepared, by the seriousness swimming in Pavel's voice, by being handed the heavy anchor of his gratitude. Please, Thank You, You're Welcome -- none of those are things that Hei knows how to say. He isn't programmed for that sort of nicety, unless it's with the intent to manipulate. Instead, letting his cadence fall into something calm and quiet, he says, ]

The party's not over yet. I plan to stick around awhile longer.

[ For recon. For data-collection. For making sure Pai interacts with new people. (And, let's be fair, for the dessert table.) ]

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