[video]

[velocette]

[He's been mulling this over since he met Hannibal, really.]

What was the first turning point in your life? Do you even remember who your real heroes were, when you were a kid? Or maybe some people do actually idolize their parents. For me, the only idols are the ones who can't become real, but it's been pointed out to me before that it's possible to worship someone in spite of their faults.

Comments

[bodilesswarrior]

After your time, maybe.

[Her brow furrows, slightly.] I think certain events are meant to happen. But we choose what to do with them.

[velocette]

A sort of selective destiny, then? [But that's not what he's really curious about.] How do you know if something is 'meant' to happen? An act of nature, something completely out of human hands?

[bodilesswarrior]

I don't think you can. [A beat, as her brow furrows and her head tilts.] Well - Iris can probably tell if something's out of joint, temporally speaking. But most of us - we don't know what's fixed or mutable. We don't know how much of us is meant to be. We don't know if gods are playing chess with our lives or destiny is being warped around us.

[A slight shrug.] The only thing we can do is make our own choices as best we can.

[velocette]

Do you ever think, though, that sometimes the best choices are the wrong ones? Looking around here, some of the strongest people are also the biggest fuck-ups who only later decided to turn their lives around.

[bodilesswarrior]

[A slight nod.] I think messing up - losing - can make us stronger, in the long haul.

[velocette]

What's the difference, d'you think, between the people who grow, and the ones who don't? It can't all go down to personality.

[bodilesswarrior]

Support is a big one. For most people - it's a lot harder to do it alone.

[velocette]

Don't they all have support here? People with like minds, at the very least their own Warden?

[bodilesswarrior]

Once they get one, sure. But some people don't know how to accept it. It can be hard, if you've never had it before.

[velocette]

Because of the fear of losing it?

[Philosophy he grasps easily, but basic relationship dynamics are a foreign concept. He looks like he would dissect it with a scalpel and tweezers if it was physical enough.]

[bodilesswarrior]

That, and... [A faint frown, as she considers.] Opening up, letting people in - if you've never done it, you need to learn how.

[velocette]

The problem is you let people in by being honest. But some types of honesty just scares people off.

[bodilesswarrior]

That's a big part of it, yeah. [A sudden, wry smile.] Real, emotional honesty can still - I'm not quite used to it.

[velocette]

Yeah. Yeah, me neither. Can take a punch, can take worse than that, but it's the emotional scars that form us. I guess craving control makes it worse...you'd be handing off the sculpting of your mind to another person.

[bodilesswarrior]

[Barbara just stares, for a moment, before pushing down a bizarre urge to laugh her guts out.]

Yeah. Yeah, that's it exactly.

[velocette]

[He can see something in her expression and doesn't quite know how to read it--he's used to derision or confusion or, occasionally, revulsion. This is...nice.]

Are you happy with who you've made yourself into?

[bodilesswarrior]

Usually. [Now more than ever, really.] The Barge helped me with that.

How about you?

[velocette]

Mm, I haven't really figured out who I'm making myself into. I just know the things I'm not.

[He chuckles] Which probably doesn't inspire much confidence in what I'm doing with my inmate...

[bodilesswarrior]

Honestly? I figure the Barge teaches the Wardens about as much as it teaches the Inmates. Maybe that's why we're asked.

[velocette]

What'd it teach you?

[bodilesswarrior]

[Her brow furrows, for a moment, as she considers.]

That it's all right to just be Barbara, and that she's still there under the mask.

[A sudden smile, slight and sharp.]

That vengeance isn't always wrong.