deercountry | Hey, teacher, leave them kids alone

[ It's too bad for Gideon that Daniel has way too much experience dealing with teenagers to see right through this. Not.. that it'd take much, but the experience certainly helps.

Which means he definitely knows I'll be fine never necessarily means exactly what those words would imply. Especially not coupled with that surprised expression on Gideon's face. It definitely worries Daniel, because.. well, has no one ever offered this girl some actual help? Or is it because he's a stranger, and she's unused to kindness from those? Who knows, but even that implication is kind of sad to Daniel, whose life was basically turned around by a man he met as a total stranger. ]

Well, we ought to do something about that 'not really' then. [ He offers, though there's something a little gentle around its edges rather than forceful. ] Do you want something to drink? I could make some tea.

[ If only he knew how Gideon's taste just aligns with Johnny's.... ]

Or some food. Are you hungry? [ And, you know, sitting together and eating might give him an opportunity to coax some more out of her, if this entire situation is still bothering her.

Which Daniel can entirely understand, since.. well, she was a corpse. So much must have happened there. He doesn't even want to think about it, and he's entirely uninvolved. He can't imagine how much worse it is for all of them. ]

[ This guy is really stubborn on the whole 'helping' thing, huh? Ordinarily, Gideon would jump at the chance for some free food. She'll never get used to how much better the food is here compared to the Ninth, and this guy has the personality of ~~Magnus Quinn, who she should have saved but didn't~~ someone who likes to cook. Now, the idea just makes her stomach turn.

Tea might be nice, though. The warmth might help. ]

Sure. [ Gideon says, carefully, like stepping around a trap. ] Tea sounds good. Thanks.

[ She's not really sure how he's going to make tea in the middle of a warehouse, but he's probably got his ways. Gideon figures she'll just follow behind him, a silent, well-muscled shadow. ]

[ Don't worry, because there is actually a kitchen.

.. granted, when they've wandered over there together.. It's not like it's a huge kitchen. In fact, it's not even like it's a clean kitchen, considering it's been maintained by Johnny Lawrence so far, and that guy's idea of an ideal dinner is ham slices straight out of the package with beer.

It looks like there's been some effort put into making the kitchen something a bit easier to work with and getting junk out of the way, but it obviously hasn't gotten very far yet. Taking care of all these kids is enough multi-tasking without adding cleaning up Johnny's dojo to his task list. ]

Let's see.. [ He says, grabbing the teapot. ] Do you like any particular flavour?

[ Maybe a bit of a mundane question to ask, given what Gideon went through, but since the other seems to keep the subject to some lighter stuff, Daniel will gladly go along with that for the moment. ]

[ Despite Daniel's best intentions, the question throws Gideon for a bit of a loop. She's only ever had tea a couple times in her life, and both times she never really got to taste it. She does know it's made of leaves, though. There are only so many kinds of leaves, right? Like, three kinds, maximum.

Gideon opens her mouth. She closes it. She opens it again. ]

Uh -- leaf flavor? Or red, if you've got it.

[ That's a flavor. It's like green tea, but different. Still, as soon as the words are out of her mouth, she realizes they're stupid, and quickly follows up with: ]

Or, like, whatever you like best. There's not really tea, where I'm from.

[ Daniel's lip twitches.

Because it's so very hard to hear someone say the words leaf flavour with such seriousness without laughing. And he doesn't want to laugh, since it'd feel like a pretty insensitive thing to do when Gideon only just returned from the dead and is clearly still not fully back to herself. But god, it's hard. It's really hard. He struggles, but Daniel does manage to keep the laugh to just that lip twitch.

Mister Miyagi would be proud, he tells himself. ]

Don't worry, I'll pick a good leaf.

[ .. okay, he couldn't fully resist that. But it doesn't sound like he's making fun of her as much as he's just having some private amusement - and he is already getting to work, putting some water into a kettle onto the fire and moving to grab some of the teabags he's been moving into the dojo. Because it's not like Johnny would have tea at ready. ]

You should sit down though, to spare your energy. [ He gestures at a few nearby chairs. Nothing fancy, given that it's a dojo and all, but it's a space to sit. ] You're not feeling any side effects?

[ He figures that it's probably safer to talk about the physical aspect of it than the mental or emotional one, so he doesn't feel as bad about bringing this up through that question. ]

Oh, good, I'm glad you're not gonna pick a shitty leaf.

[ Gideon doesn't quite smile back, but a corner of her mouth does twitch upward. Just a tiny bit, like a weed pushing through the sidewalk. It's easier to make a dumb joke than it is to admit that maybe she does need to sit down, that dying is upsetting and exhausting and is never as cool as it is in the comics. She still sits, more out of an effort to not upset Daniel than anything else.

While Daniel makes the tea, Gideon picks at a scab on her knee instead of answering his question. When she does finally respond, she's quieter, her voice weighed down by shame. ]

They're not so bad, anymore. Mostly I'm just. Cold. [ numb. feeling nothing, at last, and somehow that's worse. ] And I bleed a little easier. It's not a big deal.

[ To be looked after is to be studied, Gideon has always figured. She doesn't need Daniel looking too closely, lest he realize how rotten and pathetic she is, deep down. ]

[ He hums. ]

I suppose it doesn't sound like too big of a deal. [ He'll have her have that much, though he's pretty sure that Gideon is severely understating it all here. Isn't that what kids always do when talking to adults? He doesn't even think that the fact she doesn't know him well matters in that. His own kids often have trouble telling him stuff, after all.

He's kind of used to it, hence why he's trying to go along with it in this sort of way. Not pushing hard enough to break, but instead trying to gently bend along with the turns of conversation.

Yet not entirely giving way. It's why he says-- ]

But it would be completely fine if it were a big deal, you know. I sure wouldn't mind. [ He's giving her the mercy this time of not directly looking at Gideon, instead focused on grabbing some cups for the tea and mumbling under his breath that this place is a serious pig sty-- ] Or rather, I'd mind that it happened to you in the first place, but I've got kids back home. I'm used to constantly dealing with big deals.

[ Especially when you live in Extreme Anime Karate City. ]

[ The hum, the way he talks about his kids -- this guy is so much like Magnus it makes Gideon's chest hurt. He probably likes to throw dinner parties and thinks puns are funny. Fortunately, Gideon is able to stay somewhat out of his direct line of sight while he makes the tea. She tells herself he won't notice her crossing her arms tightly, like she's hugging herself. Gideon hasn't pulled that shit since she was eleven. Whatever she's doing, it's not to comfort herself.

Obviously. ]

It's not the corruption, or whatever, it's fine now. Better than the alternative.

[ She won't elaborate on what the alternative is, but based on the edge in her voice, it's bad. ]

I just fucked up, you know? But whatever, I'll get over it. You shouldn't get too mixed up in it. [ Gideon smiles, tired an wan. ] You don't wanna get hurt, not if you've got kids back home.

[ Gideon thinks about those shitty Fourth House teens and shivers, once. Then, she doesn't. Nothing good ever comes of that. ]

Oh, I'm not planning on getting hurt. [ He sounds almost.. amused as he's saying that. For some reason. Thanks, Daniel, very helpful. Don't get too cocky there now, my dude.

He taps his fingers on the makeshift counter as he waits for the water to boil so he can make some tea. Still not directly looking at her, but it's a very much conscious choice at this point. ]

Mostly since I'm assuming drinking some tea with you won't get me hurt.

[ Sure, the guy they were all involved with seems dangerous, judging by how everyone talks about him.. But if he hasn't chased the kids down to the dojo already, then Daniel figures it's probably not going to happen at all.

It's why he seems so relatively chill about all of this in this moment. ]

Or do you think differently?

[ Gideon actually takes some time to think about it. Which should say a lot, because she almost never thinks, and also, the fact that this is still on the table does not speak well of the Emperor. ]

Nah. Probably not. If you told him about this, he'd probably thank you, in some weird, passive-aggressive way.

[ He'd imply Gideon was still His. That's the part she hates most of all. ]

Has no one...told you about him? He's, uh, pretty shitty. And powerful.

[ It's only now that Daniel turns to actually look at her. He figures maybe it's a little easier for her to talk about the way she feels about someone than it is for her to talk about the way she feels in general.

At least - most teenagers seem to be that way, as far as he's observed.

Though the true reason for his turn is mostly so she can properly see the half-shrug, half-spreading-hands gesture he's making here, as he says: ]

I've been trying not to pry. [ And Johnny was.. pretty vague while trying to hijack his truck for this mission. ] I figure all of you had been through enough.

[ To not have to tell Johnny's strange karate ~~friendly~~ ~~homoerotic~~ rival about it. ]

All Johnny told me was that there was a guy who was treating all of you badly.

[ You can tell this is the PG version of what Johnny told him with all the swearing left out. ]

[ Yes, those were almost certainly the exact words Gideon's sensei used. He definitely chose to employ mild, unassuming language, and probably picked his words carefully. Totally.

There's so much Daniel doesn't know. So much that could genuinely hurt him, and that's why Gideon chooses to keep talking. It's not because of the weight of these secrets, or the fear they inspire, or the isolation. Duh.

She doesn't meet Daniel's eyes. ]

He's God, where I'm from. The Kindly Prince. So he's, you know, super fucking powerful, and an asshole, but he pretends not to be. He likes to seem like a regular dude, one who could really like you.

[ One you want to like you. ]

He's also my dad. And he left me to drown in that deep fucking sea, so, you know. Real swell of him.

[ Under regular circumstances the first part would be the most surprising thing here. After all, where Daniel comes from, you don't often get to hear that someone is a literal God - not unless they're just some scam artist trying to start a cult, after all.

But even though he hasn't been in this place for long, this guy has had the world's fastest course in learning how to accept things that would have sounded completely ridiculous to you, once upon a time. It makes the God thing just a side fact in this entire matter, other than the fact that it means this person they're talking about is very powerful. More so than Johnny himself described, anyway, since he left it at 'oh, he might summon a few skeletons.'

No, what Daniel's attention is instead drawn to is the second part. ]

Your father left you to drown?

[ Maybe more mundane in the face of the entire god deal, but of course it's where Daniel's entire attention goes to instead. He has way too many dad feelings of his own to not be absolutely horrified by the idea. If it had been Sam or Anthony in that water, drowning, dying-- even just thinking about it threatens to make him sick.

How could any parent ignore that?

Daniel may have seemed calm a moment ago, but the worry is very visible on his face now. His skin may even have grown a touch more pale. ]

That's.. why you died? Because you drowned, and he didn't even try to save you?

...Yeah?

[ Gideon didn't expect this reaction. A wince, maybe, or some light commiseration, but that's it. This guy barely knows her, what does it matter to him that her dad sucks? It shouldn't even matter to Gideon. She's away from him now, and that's all that matters. ]

It's okay. [ No, it isn't, but how the fuck does she save face, here? ] It was stupid of me to think I needed him in the first place. I don't, really. I've got my brothers. Fuck that guy.

[ Gideon forces some nonchalance into her tone, doable only because she's got years of practice. See, everything's cool, no need to worry! ]

Like, he doesn't even get half the babes Sensei Lawrence gets, so, you know. I'm doing so much better, really.

[ That's the mark of a good dad right there. ]

Listen..

[ Daniel starts. Slowly. He's never felt quite as much out of his depth as in this moment. There's something vaguely reminiscent of the way she stands in front of him and says this, so dismissive, as if it's truly ever that easy. As if saying it like that often enough will make her stop caring, somehow. It makes him think a little of Robby, though that comes with its own troubled and complicated feeling that crops up inside of Daniel's chest in an unpleasant way.

He figures she probably won't like the way he suddenly sounds so serious in the face of her own lightness, but he can't help it. He can't just go along with that. It goes against everything he believes in, and so Daniel's eyesbrows knot together in very genuine concern. ]

.. Gideon, right? I know it isn't my place to say this.

[ After all, he's pretty much a stranger to her. This is the first time she's meeting him, and he's already throwing this ball at her.

But what else can he do? Who else will say it, if he doesn't? And the idea of no one telling her this is more sickening to him than anything else could ever be. ]

But.. it's not okay. Even if you mean that, and you're okay with it [ WHICH HE.. SEVERELY DOUBTS... ] that still doesn't make what happened okay. Nothing ever would. [ Daniel still can't grasp it. He knows she isn't lying about what happened, there's no way, but it's still so baffling to him how any parent could ever do that and still live with themselves. It goes several degrees even beyond the most awful stuff Daniel himself has seen. ]

Even though he sounds like a.. [ This is definitely the sort of pause where Daniel almost says 'asshole' and reels himself in at the last minute-- ] .. like a jerk, he's still your father. It's never stupid to think you'd need him, that's just what every kid out there feels.

[ Trust him. Daniel "daddy issues" LaRusso over here is an experience expert. ]

There's no blame here with you. Something awful was done to you by someone who was supposed to protect you. To love you. [ Isn't that every parent's duty? ] And if you happen to not be totally okay because of it.. then that's fine. And it's not something you have to talk about with me.

[ God knows that she probably doesn't want to discuss it with someone she only met today. Daniel is realistic enough to realise that. ]

But if you want to talk about it.. Talk about it with someone you trust. Whether that's one of your friends, or.. [ He can't believe he's saying this, but he's trying to be mature here, and trying to think of the best this for this girl-- ] .. or Johnny, if you trust him.

Hey, teacher, leave them kids alone

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