oo1 ⊕ video ⊕ both courts

[falconkick]

Hey, uh. Network. My name's Sam, for those of you I haven't gotten the chance to meet yet.

[ a small smile and a lift of his chin that both say he might genuinely like that chance to meet everyone everywhere at some point. but he's here with something serious today, so he moves right along. ]

I wanted to tell y'all something I like to keep in mind from day to day, but especially on days like the last dozen or so. I'm retired military - Air National Guard pararescue, for any of you that are familiar - but I enlisted a long time ago. Don't ask for a number, a man's gotta keep some secrets.

[ feelin' your age, wilson? his cheeky smile is short lived. ]

When I went to basic, I wasn't exactly itching for a fight, so I wasn't with the other greenies that were disappointed when we started with folding our own bed sheets. My ma raised me right, and the first time I picked up a gun, it was with all due respect to the power they were putting in my hands. I didn't wanna let all that go to my head and forget the responsibility that comes with carrying arms.

[ he purses his lips for a quiet beat, inhales shortly before continuing. ]

Wish I could say the same for the first time I shot a man. My country went to war right after I was accepted into the PJs, and when it was down to me or him, I chose him. Just - [ he makes a small pew gunshot sound, glum; ] - and that was that. I wasn't scared and I didn't feel guilty about it - and that was what stuck with me. I asked my unit, my CO, anyone that would listen. No one could tell me whether or not I was supposed to feel good about killing the "bad guys".

[ another moment's silence - half to find his next words, half out of respect for the dead. he scrubs a hand over his head. ]

Still don't really have an answer, and like I said, it's been a long time. Some days I think I might be close, and other days I ask myself "man, who do you think you're kidding?" Thing of it is - whether or not you think it's for the right reasons, taking someone else's life isn't easy, and it shouldn't be. That kinda thing stains your hands, and then you gotta decide how to live with it. For me, at least, some days are easier than others. And on the days when it's not, I keep looking for an answer.

[ finally, he gives a small, weary smile. the point of this whole thing: trying to get people to talk about it so they don't bottle it in. sam knows where he stands, and it's at the door, trying to open it for others. ]

If you've got any ideas, please, I'd love to hear 'em. Maybe we can trade a few around, see if we can't come up with something new. Either way, today's a good day.

[ dead tired, quiet, but sam still says it with a smile before signing off. ]

Comments

private video;

[falconkick]

[ this is exactly why he wanted to talk to people about it. when sam speaks, it's with a certainty that comes from personal experience. one that didn't come without his own fears and failures. ]

No. It didn't.

[ certainty, but it's no simple thing to state, so sam thinks on it a beat before holding up his hands to the camera. ]

See, my hands you can touch, grab, put 'em where you need 'em. [ like around the hilt of a gun; sam drops one and thumps his chest with the other. ] But my soul? It's a little more protected. It can be stained of something cuts deep enough, but I didn't let it. I wouldn't.

private video;

[depicted]

[It is persuasive, reassuring. Every gesture Sam makes inspires confidence in the feeling behind it. The duality of body and soul may be particularly significant to Dorian, but Sam makes it feel real without the help of a magic portrait. So Dorian's shoulder relax, just slightly, as he smiles.]

I have faith that you would not.

[Dorian draws back, brushing hair from his eyes even as his brows crease in a frown.]

How did you know? What to do to stop the cutting from going so deep.

[He rushes to assure, to defend himself, frightened of accusation—] I've never killed anyone, not yet. But . . . if the Unseelie had attacked Caer Glaem instead of the Jabberwock, I might have done. And I can wash my hands, but I cannot conceive of what might wash the soul.

private video; cries about how long this tag turned out to be i am so sorry

[falconkick]

[ sam smiles right back, patient and 100% judgement free even as dorian rushes to explain. ]

It's not easy, I'll tell you that. I did what I did 'cause I thought it was the right thing, and it takes a lot to step back and look objectively at your own bias.

[ there's no gentle way to ease into it either, so sam inhales shortly and just - continues on, easy as you please. it doesn't bother him to talk about it, especially if it might help someone else. ]

I lost my best friend, out on the field. I lost a lot of my men out there, and that was hard, but this dude - he was gonna be the best man at my wedding, if I ever had one. We made half a dozen plans and suddenly they were just ... gone. Just like that.

So when I took my step back, I kinda fell flat on my ass for a hot minute. I had to look at what we were doing and what it was costing us, then decide whether or not it was worth it. And it just ... wasn't. I enlisted to help people, and we were -

[ ah. he stops for a second, because it's touchy, even if dorian might not know the mess of sam's war. vague, ambiguous, biased. he smiles again, brighter this time. ]

I reevaluated, went back to my roots. Remembered what mattered to me, really mattered, and found a different way to help people without hurting anybody else. Every time I manage to put someone back on their feet - it doesn't lessen the weight, but it makes it easier to carry. Kinda like Riley saved my life one last time after his dumb ass got killed.

no it's perf

[depicted]

[It takes until that last line that Dorian flinches, winces in sympathy with the loss. It's the bluntness of the phrase, when Dorian has lives eighteen years in a world of long, circuitous approaches to anything true. A name and a death makes it all so real.]

I'm so sorry for what you have lost, Mr Wilson. It is a terribly cruel thing to suffer.

I . . . I think I take your meaning. You turned outward, and it was an aid to the trouble with in?

[100% better for coping than 'cure the soul by means of the senses.']

♥!

[falconkick]

[ this time, his delight shines in his eyes. not for sympathy and condolences, those bring gratitude and an old grief, but for the way dorian puts it into his own words. it's something tangible and concrete, his own moral of the story. ]

Way more eloquent than I could put it, but yeah, that sums it up right there. If you don't want to lose sight of yourself, you gotta be able to dig in deeper than your wounds, make your core solid stone, and if you can, turn around with something better than where you started.

[depicted]

[Dorian smiles, just a little, but it is weak, faltering. He wonders if his core isn't already empty.

But he doesn't want to dwell on that, so he takes the lesson that he painted for himself out of Sam's picture. He turns the picture around to look at the world.]

What did you choose to do after you retired, Mr Wilson?

[falconkick]

[ sam will remember that momentary falter, but he won't push the point for now. he huffs out a breath instead. ]

Oh, I chose to throw my happy ass a pity party for awhile there. It wasn't pretty.

[ he smiles. ]

But after that, I decided to go back out on the field with my soldiers. I work as a counseling therapist with veterans, trying to get them off the battlefield, mind, body, and soul.

[depicted]

I don't think I've heard of anything like that. [Although it is obvious, now, where Sam is coming from when he does this. But, innocent of reality, he thinks back on parlour room discussions with officers returned from the colonies. He can't imagine that any of them would need a therapist, surely?] Our soldiers never had trouble adjusting to life when they came home . . .

[falconkick]

[ sam nods his head a little, but there's a furrow between his brows. ]

Maybe they didn't. Or maybe they just didn't talk about it. Even where I work, where we're accepting and encouraging of the idea, some people treat it like it's taboo, like it's a character flaw or admitting to weakness. Soldiers are some of the hardest cases to crack, 'cause we got it in our heads that we're not supposed to be able to.

[ crack, he means. which only makes it all the more likely to happen. ]

[depicted]

I . . . suppose so. It would hardly do to be 'not all there' [a distinct, displeased twist of the lips], not for an officer. [The shame on the family, the possibility of institutionalization—it doesn't bear thinking about, as Dorian well knows.] Your work is part of an institution?

[falconkick]

[ there's a small bitter twist in his smile at the wording, because yeah, that's what it sounds like. ]

That's one way to put it, yeah. It's more like a network of benefits for veterans and their families, but we're usually stationed at a hospital or a clinic where they can reach us easily.

[depicted]

Oh, so . . . it isn't like putting people in asylum? You aren't that kind of therapist.

[Victorian mental health care.]

[falconkick]

[ oh. ohh. ]

No, no, we don't. That kind of practice is pretty popularly condemned in my time. We still have asylums, but they're not like they used to be. We try to take care of our people.

[depicted]

Oh!! [Both genuinely surprised and happy, Dorian exhales. But then he thinks of how much better it would have been for his mother, how much happier she might've been. He can't help his envy.] I am glad to see that our . . . treatment of people has changed. You sound a wonderful person in how you help others. [It's awkwardly phrased, but Dorian does mean it in that way. Sam doesn't sound like those awful people at the asylums. He sounds like he actually could help people.]

[falconkick]

[ sam chuckles lightly, glad he at least seems to believe that they're not - that, anymore. ]

Thanks, man. I do try. Way I see it, it's all about what one individual person might need, no blanket cure-all - so if you ever have questions, I am always down to give it a shot.