Simon Monroe (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
irishrotter) wrote2015-04-19 08:15 pm
irishrotter) wrote2015-04-19 08:15 pm
Ninth Rising
[Friends filter, after the port]
[This broadcast is a little bit delayed compared to most of the others, like there's something Simon needed to do prior to checking in. Still, he looks as worried and relieved as everyone else when he does reach out to his friends.
No one will be surprised to know that neither Arthas nor Sylvanas remain on this list.]
Tell me you're all okay.
[Spam, open]
[Simon's communicator remains quiet after that. He answers his messages in a generally timely fashion, but there are no further broadcasts. The lack of sermons from the pulpit continues as it did after the sha took him over; he has no sermons to give. He's not suffering from the aches and pains of those who death tolled on the Barge, but he feels an echo of their weary faces in his own soul. He feels exhausted, too, even if it's a different kind of exhaustion.
On the surface, nothing has changed except that he has an emergency supply of neurotriptyline on him at all times now -- and thank Christ, only a few people know about that, anyway. Beyond that, though, he feels almost as lost and aimless as he was out in the desert. He shuffles along his daily routine. He takes his shot obediently when he wakes up, spends his mornings in the chapel and his afternoons in the library and doesn't really seem to bother with anything else, though he does still sometime turns up on the deck in the evenings to watch the stars go by.]
[This broadcast is a little bit delayed compared to most of the others, like there's something Simon needed to do prior to checking in. Still, he looks as worried and relieved as everyone else when he does reach out to his friends.
No one will be surprised to know that neither Arthas nor Sylvanas remain on this list.]
Tell me you're all okay.
[Spam, open]
[Simon's communicator remains quiet after that. He answers his messages in a generally timely fashion, but there are no further broadcasts. The lack of sermons from the pulpit continues as it did after the sha took him over; he has no sermons to give. He's not suffering from the aches and pains of those who death tolled on the Barge, but he feels an echo of their weary faces in his own soul. He feels exhausted, too, even if it's a different kind of exhaustion.
On the surface, nothing has changed except that he has an emergency supply of neurotriptyline on him at all times now -- and thank Christ, only a few people know about that, anyway. Beyond that, though, he feels almost as lost and aimless as he was out in the desert. He shuffles along his daily routine. He takes his shot obediently when he wakes up, spends his mornings in the chapel and his afternoons in the library and doesn't really seem to bother with anything else, though he does still sometime turns up on the deck in the evenings to watch the stars go by.]
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You were down there?
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I'm ready to catch a fucking break already.
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[But he offers up a wan smile.]
You okay? Need anything?
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Just the death tolls, Simon. Nothing to do but wait it out.
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How modern?
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[It takes him a while to get to Jimmy, because he has to hit the library first; he doesn't really have any books with him. He browses through the shelves for a while, and in the end chooses three for Jimmy: Catch-22 -- because he really would love to hear what Jimmy thinks of that one -- Stranger in a Strange Land, and Howl. Eventually, he turns up and knocks on Jimmy's door.]
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Hey. You find somethin'?
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A few things. I'm hoping you'll enjoy at least one of 'em.
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Why did you pick these ones?
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He sits, though, handing the books across to Jimmy one by one.]
Well, let's see... they're all American, around the 1950s and 60s... This is the one I mentioned to you before. [Catch-22.] About the Second World War. A satire. But in case you don't find it all that funny, this one-- [Heinlein.] --might be an easier read. It's science fiction.
And this one... [He considers Howl. Why had he chosen it?] ...I don't know. I always liked it -- I thought you might, too.
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He'll ask about that later, though. His fingers linger briefly on the cover of Howl, and then he looks up at Simon.]
Why did you like it?
[spam] cw: discussion of mental illness
It's... passionate. Angry, exuberant, rebellious. Ridiculous, sometimes, but... it made me feel something when I was younger.
[He rests his elbows on his knees, knits his hands loosely together.]
I guess anything that made me feel stayed with me back then.
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Literature could speak to you even when you were like that.
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Yeah. That, films, and drugs.
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It only takes one bad hobby, huh?
[He gestures, vaguely, towards Catch-22.] You said this one's about the other war. Gene's war.
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It is. World War Two.
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Was it worth the fight?
[Because he can't stand the thought of reading a satire of a war that had to be justified at every pass. Not when he could be going home after graduation just to see his son get drafted.]
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When the question comes, it's not one he's expecting. His brows lift curiously. It's pretty strongly out of left field, actually, in a way he doesn't question until he opens his mouth and starts to. He's always taken for granted that it was worth it: good guys and bad guys, practically movie villains, the innocent victims, the American cavalry rushing in at the last minute to save the day.
But he's never thought about it from the perspective of a soldier asking for the justification of his brothers' deaths. He stops what he was about to say and thinks hard for a moment, frowning thoughtfully at his hands.]
...It was.
[He flashes a slight smile, albeit mostly a rueful one.] But you might not want to read that first.
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Then I won't. [It's an unspoken acceptance of Simon's judgement of the war, and he nods.]
Thank you. For the books.
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